So excited about school!

Why am I so excited about school?  Let me tell you.

I'm looking forward to getting into a routine with the children.  I've been working hard to get things in order and organized to hopefully help my organizational, procrastination inclined self be able to keep up through the year without stress!  I've been working on getting our chore charts ready and look forward to implementing them when we start school in two weeks.  I'm planning for them to be a part of our "school" day.

I'm looking forward to the fun themes and all the fun books and activities each new theme will open up for us.  We're going to have a GREAT year!

I'm looking forward to starting back up with our muffin tin Mondays.  I'll be starting our muffin tin Mondays back up with the start of school!  So excited to see what ideas I can find to put in our tins this year.

School with the kids is just exciting to me.  I love watching them learn.  I love watching them figure things out.  I love trying to answer their questions and I'm super appreciative that this day and age when we have internet I can answer just about any question with a few keystrokes on the computer. 

Some of my favorite homeschool resources (and ones that look awesome but I haven't tried yet):

Phonics:
Confessions of a homeschooler's Letter of the week
Moffattgirls Ready2Read - free printable phonics program for early readers
Starfall
reading eggs - this one costs a fee but we tried it out on a one month free trial and we really enjoyed it.  This is something I would consider doing for Howler depending on how well he picks up reading.

Math:
IXL math - this was one we tried a one month paid subscription on to give it a try.  It was ok.  I did not invest in a longer term subscription for a few reasons.  1 - it wasn't something I remembered to let the boys do on a daily basis.  2 - I wanted a set math curriculum that I knew was teaching things in some sort of methodical order and not hodge podge based on whatever the kids clicked on.  But the website allows you to do 20 practice questions each day for free so something to consider for fun or extra pracitice.

I'm low on math stuff as it's not something that I've come across often online. 

My kids also enjoy playing the games on pbskids.org and Disney junior.  Beware though I've often found one of them watching videos when they're supposed to be playing the educational games.  Just so you know. lol

Are you excited about school starting?