Elementary School Lessons

This is Julian’s second quarter book report and first paperback read: Junie B. Jones Has a Monster Under Her Bed

Catholic Filipino Academy, kung saan nakalista ang aking anak na si Julian para sa kanyang homeschooling ay nagdaos ng pagtitipon para ipagdiwang ang Buwan ng Wika noong ika-24 ng Agosto, taong 2007. Ito ay ginanap sa Quezon City Memorial Circle sa Lungsod ng Quezon. Si Manuel L. Quezon ang pangulo ng Pilipinas ang itinuturing Ama ng Wikang Pambansa. Kaya nararapat lamang na sa lugar kung saan nakalagak ang kanyang mga labi ipagdiwang ang kanyang naiwang “advocacy” na pagpapalaganap ng wikang pambansa na isa sa mga magbubuklod sa mga Pilipino. Bagama’t ito ay napakalapit lamang sa amin, kami ay nahuli ng pagdating ng mga halos tatlong oras dahil ang inang-guro ay nagturo muna sa kanyang mga estudyante.

Pagdating naming doon, nagsisimula na ang paglalaro. Ang aking mga “mahiyaing” anak na akala mo ay mga anghel kapag wala kami sa bahay, ay nagmasid muna. Kanilang pinagmasdan kung paano maglakad na nakaapak lamang sa bao ng niyog at hahawak sa tali na hihilain para makatayo ng tuwid. Pagkatapos ng ilang mahahabang sandali, sila ay sumubok ding gamitin ang mga bao sa kanilang paglalakad.

Ito si Julian. Siya ay desidido ng pag-ibayuhin ang kanyang paglalakad gamit ang bao ng niyog. Mahirap mang balansehin ang sarili pero ito ay kanyang nagawa.

Ito naman ay si Tania na ne-engganyo sa paglalakad sa bao sa kadahilanang nagawa ito ng kanyang nakatatandang kapatid. Subalit sa kanyang paglalakad, siya ay mahigpit na nakakapit sa kamay ng kanyang ama na nakaalalay sa kanya.

Ito si Julian na nakapila para hintayin ang pagtawag sa kanyang numero para agawin ang panyo mula sa isang guro. Ang larong ito ay tinatawag na “Agawan ng Panyo.” Pasensiya na po sa mga magulang ng mga batang nilabuan ko ang mga mukha, ako ay walang permiso mula sa inyo na ilathala ko ang inyong mga anak sa intarnets kaya ganito ang aking naging pasya.

Marami pang mga laro ang ginawa kagaya ng pabitin kung saan mag-aagawan ng mga laruang nakasabit ang mga bata. Meron ding sungka at larong gamit ang mga lastiko. Hindi nawala ang “basagin ang Palayok” na may mga lamang kendi.

Ang pananghalian ay salo-salong pagkain na dinala ng mga gurong-magulang. Bagamat kami ay hindi na kumuha sa hapag-kainan dahil kami ay may dala ding baon, kitang-kita namin sa aming kinauupuan ang saya ng mga bisita para sa pagdiriwang na ito.

Pagkatapos ng lahat ng ito, ang mga bata ay nagtungo sa Butterfly House of Bahay ng mga Paru-paro. Si Jjulian ay hindi na pumasok, siya ay pagod na at nagyayayang umuwi na. Si tania ay pumasok at kaming dalawa ang namangha sa ganda ng mga paru-paro. Marami akong larawan ng mga paru-paro ng magaganda ngunit sa hindi ko alam na dahilan, marahil dahil puno na ang aking dalang kamera, ang mga ito ay nag-“error”. Dalawa lamang ang natira at ito ang isa:

Julian is almost finished with most of his first quarter lessons. This has been a difficult feat for us because we started late in the program, first week of July. There should be 8 weeks for each quarter and tests should be given during the eighth week. We did good, I guess since we are only in the sixth week of our homeschooling program.

Will be posting more about these tests. Meanwhile, he still has to “review” for the test. Much as I want to give the tests now, I want him to experience reading the notes that he wrote in his notebooks as well as reading the Review Notes I encoded and pasted in his notebooks. Homeschooling is not a walk in the woods. It is hard at times but definitely worth it. 🙂

Julian loves Roman numeral numbers. I would be putting the Hindu-Arabic numbers here and I would let him put the Roman equivalents. No editing will be done, promise. Here goes:

28 – xxviii
541 -dxli

867 – dccclxvii

Julian encoded the Roman numerals himself. He didn’t even made these all caps, 🙂

To those wondering if my son leads a “sheltered” life, far from the more socialized peers, he does get socialization with children his age, children younger than him, children older than him plus some significant adults.

In __________ Center where I teach every MTW, he attends a small group that I teach called Social Language and Conversation.

Here we do social skills lessons, listening skills, following instructions, all incorporated in different language components like inference, comprehension, comparison and contrast, answering questions appropriately.The other two children in this group are also six years old.

He gets to play with children younger than him. He gets to talk with children older than him. He gets to interact (though this still has to be worked on further) with significant adults like the speech-language therapists as well as occupational therapists as well as the office staff that I work with, three times a week. Now, wouldn’t this be too little? I think it could be but then he learns more valuable lessons here.

Like patience in “dealing” or playing with some of these children.

These children have special needs, with language and communication problems, with inattention problems, with listening and following instructions problems and with inappropriate social skills behavior problems (Well, of course, not all of them have these all at the same time.) So what kind of socialization is that?

Here, he tends to adapt himself to these children and their being different, having special needs that have to be worked on. When he tries to adapt, he learns patience, which is not exactly his virtue in dealing with others.

Yes, there were numerous times that I saw him with his temper flaring because he did not like what the other child(ren) did, he had his fist up ready to hit but then I had to explain to him how he is not supposed to do that and why.

One of the downside I see here is he tends to pick up the terms we use so he applies labels to the children. Like when a child is unable to sit still, he asks if the child has ADHD. If a child acts different, he asks if the child is autistic. Here comes another lesson in life that not all children or people are the same. And that we do not need to put labels on people just because they are different.

What about competition? Well, he challenges himself, pushing himself to the limit with his skills.

Challenging himself alongside others? Oh, there are a lot of challenges. He is challenged because some students have better fine-motor skills than him: writing, cutting, coloring and drawing. He is is being challenged by us because these children who are supposedly going to the center for speech/language therapy are not shy about expressing their feelings and thoughts by speaking, which is the skill he lacks when dealing with other people.

Well, if truth be told, I have to ask him to do errands for me just so he could talk to the staff and other therapists in the center. Our joke is I might have to get him a session for him to overcome his being shy.

He also gets to socialize with my own students on Fridays and Saturdays. Well, not those in the morning because most of the time, he is still asleep. He is able to talk cars with my teenage students, preferably KJ and JE. They also talk about movies, TV shows, games and gaming as well as share jokes.

All in all, I am not complaining. Making a schedule for him is not easy but we still manage. Even if we started late in the program, we still manage to get by. In fact, we are done with Christian Living education except for the test and Hail Holy Queen prayer which he, I’m sure, will be memorizing by himself.

The oral book report? He was able to memorize several books, verbatim. And explain what these stories are all about. We are starting to gain ground on Filipino and Sibika which he didn’t like at first so we are a little behind these lessons, specifically in Sibika. Math is not a problem since he can do the four basic operations even before we started homeschooling.

So when would he go to a “real school”? Maybe when he doesn’t have frequent asthma attacks at 3 or 4 am which keeps him awake, which in turn keeps him asleep till 9am or 10am. It is all up to him to decide.