Innovations

S has this expression on her face that just drives me mad. She's intelligent but she doesn't like to do more than she could. She reads like a teenager, but she doesn't like to discuss the reading. I don't sense any exuberance on her part.

She can write well, but she doesn't like to.

"I don't like to think a lot," she says, much to my exasperation.

Okay, maybe I shouldn't press her if she doesn't like it.

Animals. She likes animals. We call her our 'animal expert'. When you have a question about an animal, go and ask S.

History. We have a problem with history.

"I don't like it," she said once, a long time ago.

Then we went on a field trip with OHVA to a museum, and when we got back home she said,

"I like it a little bit now."

Ok, so maybe not enough hands on activities.

She loves arts and crafts. I love creating too. So why not dabble in it a little bit more? Time constraints is my biggest problem. As it is, I'm drained everyday teaching one kid at a time, one after the other.

I'm seriously thinking of ditching OHVA and doing it on my own. Sure, I have all those paperwork and research to do, but I guess I can start doing those now. Seems like we're going to be in Columbus for a little bit longer, now that we don't know when hubby's going to be done.

I stumbled across 'lapbooks' on Orlando Mama's blog. Delighted, I speed surfed through more websites that depict photos of actual lapbooks. Immediately, I applied it to our lessons.

Comically, I had went into the bathroom mulling over the problem of S's lack of exuberance. When I came out, I was all ready to employ the lapbook. Talk about 'conducive'.

I actually enjoyed myself watching them do the activities. Today, I woke up groggy and sleepy from lack of sleep. I told them that I was tired and might need a nap.

Then we started to work on Machu Picchu for S's history and we did the entries for the lapbook. I got so caught up in it that S said,

"I thought you were tired."

Me too. Nothing beats enjoying what you do I guess.

No wonder I went through my undergraduate years with a long face like S's. I guess now we know where she got it from, huh?