New outlook

As the season turns to fall, more than just the leaves are changing in our household.  On Friday I spoke with a wonderful woman who has been homeschooling her children for 20 years, she is now schooling her grandchildren.  She was an amazing wealth of knowledge and strength that we are making the right choice and that it will work out for the best in the end.

One of the first things she asked me was if I pray for each day to be a blessed day and things to go well.  Actually I had gotten so tied up in my own stress that I was forgetting this very precious step.  As she said with God’s guidance I can handle anything the world tosses at me.

She also was able to relate to my situation perhaps better than anyone else I had ever talked to before.  You see her son is adopted also, they adopted him as a toddler, he was diagnosed with Autism in 3^rd grade and this year started college to the University of Southern California on a full ride academic scholarship.  Basically this woman got it, she knew what I was struggling with and could tell me that there is a light on the other in of this tunnel we seem to forever be stuck in.  She did make sure I realized that it was a long road to go, but well worth it in the end.

First order of the week  - - - discard schedule.  Our son if anything like hers will never follow it on the principal of someone is telling him what to do and when to do it all day long.

Second step - - - put more responsibility on him, he might just surprise us with what he can do.

Third step - - realize that we need to take time to celebrate the small victories because the big ones might be a long time coming.

Fourth step - - remember to always make the plan in pencil because God loves to keep us on our toes.

Fifth step - - Make time for ourselves, we are not doing our son any good if we are stressed all the time and as much as we need a break from him he needs one from us also.

So he we are the start of week four with a new outlook and a plan in PENCIL.  First thing we did was tell our son that he knew what had to be accomplished and it is his responsibility to keep himself on track.  I made a sheet for each day of the week, with what each subject was working on, what assignments he needed to complete, and with all printed materials attached.  It is up to him to work at his own pace make sure the work is done correctly and stay on track.  It doesn’t matter one bit to his Dad and I if school is the only thing he has time for each day.  We would enjoy staying home a few evenings a week anyway.

Also the Math lessons through Connections Academy are very busy, they have talking characters and such so they are a little overwhelming.  Math has never been a problem in the past so now Hubby is going to teach the math lessons each evening one on one with Son to make sure he understands and just use Connections Academy for the quizzes and test.  (We had no idea this was an option being new to Connections Academy this year.)

Spelling and grammar are something that is lacking, so we have simply added that as a class each week.  I spent time going through the lessons for the week found vocabulary words and made worksheets to have him spend time each week learning these words, then will test him on spelling and usage of the words.  Yes Spell Check will always be there but it should be a back up not a necessity.

Although it obviously to early to tell if this is working or not, I am feeling very positive and look forward to the end of the day to see what got accomplished.