school's {not} out for the summer

We've been spending the mornings prepping for the upcoming school year--or at least as far as math and communications are concerned.

C has math workbooks that review what he learned last year and preview what he'll learn this year.  We had some tears of frustration yesterday (not that I blame him; I remember those well), but he figured out the answer and understands the concept, and I've been learning to adapt my tutoring techniques from the campus to the living room.

I've found that he does better work when we first do several examples together, before I supervise while he completes a problem on his own.  He completes three worksheets each day while T watches math videos and completes assessments through Khan Academy.

For communications, the boys are writing their own stories, which they've enjoyed reading to their dad when he comes home from work.  First, they wrote them with paper and pen, and now they're using OmmWriter.  The program has sounds, music and backgrounds, which they enjoy.  After they've typed them up with OmmWriter, we'll copy and paste them over to Microsoft Word for editing and revising.  We plan to act them out with Lego characters, take photos and then publish their stories through Blurb.

Also, we started Free Rice for grammar and vocabulary practice.

They were thrilled, of course.