School Daze

 We went ahead and started school on Monday. 7th and 3rd grades. I'm not sure, exactly, how it is that eldest is in 7th, but I guess it has to do with the Earth circling the sun and so forth. Just seems to happen more rapidly than I remember it doing when I was younger.

Tempus Fugit and so forth.

That's probably spelled wrong, but I can't bring myself to care enough to look it up and fix it. So whatever.

Nothing amazing on the curriculum really this year -- all the standards. We're in the 2nd of a two year American history program and kicking things off with the 4 one-term presidents leading up to the Civil War. Have had some good discussions about states rights, slavery, and economics as a result. 

I feel like this history text is reasonably well rounded. I'm sure the progressives of teh world would beg to differ, but they just seem to want history washed with a different brush. I really do look for something objective. 

Eldest is doing Algebra this year. He's a smart one. I think I didn't do Algebra until 8th. Regardless, it's my favorite math and he is nonplussed at how excited I am for him to get into it. I guess we'll see how it goes. I've warned him that if he continues to tell himself he hates it, it will in fact become a self-fulfilling prophecy. 

I'm also going to give grades for him this year and sort of practice a bit with transcripts as I know that matters when we get to high school. Right now, he is leaning heavily into wanting to be in the Army - possibly attending USMA so I guess before much longer we ought to dig up what goes into that sort of application so he can be working toward looking good for an appointment. I don't want to think that far in advance, but it's only 6 years out and given how the last 12 have zoomed by, I suspect I'll blink and we'll be there.

Youngest is doing all the usual 3rd grade things. Is he 100% at grade level? Probably not, but he's catching up in the areas where he's weaker. And a benefit of homeschooling is that I can give him that time while still keeping him with his age-level peers in other things. If I had to say right now, I'm not sure college is in the cards for him - but there's time yet there. He still would like to be Batman when he grows up. So other than moving to Gotham City (although good night the way the world seems to be going, we might already live there) I'm not sure how to prep him for that future. 

I'm just loving the routine of it all.