I really wanted to title this something like ‘Katie and the very good, super productive, still filled with learning, unschool-y day.’ A fun title, but way too long for a blog post title.
We Are Not Unschoolers
I am not an unschooler. Let’s just get that out there. I DO think unschoolers who execute it well give their children a huge gift. There are elements of our homeschool that are unschool-esque such as many I mention in this post about how we became outside the box learners, and also the planning backwards method I use. But at the end of the day, I do have somewhat of a plan. I consider us more child-led homeschoolers. If learning more about child-led homeschooling is something that interests you, I recommend the book, Educating the WholeHearted Child by Sally Clarkson.
House Organizing
Our house has fallen into a bit of disarray. Ok, not really… but for this clutter-phobic mom, it has. And eventually, the clutter really starts to get to me! Winter is coming and all the winter gear is about to come out of the attic and there is no place to put it. Well, there wasn’t… until our very unschool-y day.
My youngest is doing a year of pre-k this year and the days he has school are when we get the most done, naturally. I’m sure any of you who have busy, mischievous 4-year olds who wake up at 5:30 a.m. ready to conquer the world destroy the house, understand. I digress…
Since my youngest had off school yesterday I decided earlier in the week it would be an organizing day for me/unschool-y day for the kids. Of course, I relied a bit on my lovely daughter to entertain her 4-year old little brother for parts of the day. Which she is really good at! I managed to get a TON done. And I really think my less cluttered house will allow me to be a more productive mom, as outward clutter definitely exasperates my already cluttered, trying it’s best to multi-task, mind.
Where the Unschool-y Day Took Us
The great thing about organizing is discovering things you haven’t used in a while. Such as this Discovery Kids Activity World Map that we’ve had for 5 years (but haven’t used for 2 years). It’s meant to hang on the wall, but we found it to be just as fun on the ground. Joe spent a good chunk of time, putting all the labels in their place!
As usual, much of the day was spent with a nose in a book.
And another discovery, a wooden tangram tetris puzzle, found in our mudroom while I was organizing!
And it wouldn’t be an unschool-y (or a typical day for that matter), without a creation made by our in-house baker.
The creation of the day: Homemade Oatmeal Packets
Joe and I had a chance to venture out in the marsh in our backyard. We both needed some fresh air and activity! Because it’s so thick back there, we have to wait until the plants all die to hike there, which is now through the end of winter. If you go far enough you run into the creek!
And here Joe is classifying volcanic rocks with his Rocks Activity Kit.
Also, we were able to finish The Tale of Despereaux, our book club book for November. This was accomplished because I was able to get the audiobook from my library app. We did not expect to finish it in one week, but the kids loved it and kept requesting more. Also, it was a pretty quick read, or ‘listen’! As a side note, I just discovered there is full motion picture for this story. It will be fun to watch it and compare to the book.
All in all a pretty good day!
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