I knew it was going to be one of those days.
It had started early with the flash of lightening and immediate crack of thunder following. This act of God was a guarantee that our youngest son would soon be joining us in bed. To be fair, we did have a small tornado come through the yard a year earlier and take down our favorite 300-year-old oak tree. But at 4 a.m. in the morning, this is little consolation.
After two hours of a little boy, flopping elbows in my ear and knees in my gut, I got up early. Of course the eight-year-old had his radar on and fine-tuned, so he, too, was up early and raring to go. Before I could even get into the shower, these two whippersnappers were wrestling in the hallway, fighting over who stepped past the imaginary line in the carpet, shooting marbles, and shouting monster noises at each other in a game of “yucky guys.”
So, it was no surprise that come 9 a.m. when I was ready to start schooling, I had two little boys still bouncing off the walls and a big sister complaining she shouldn’t have to work if they weren’t going to.
What’s a mother to do?
Spend the rest of the day fighting with kids to sit down and do their assignments?
Not this mama!
Deep in my arsenal of homeschooling tools is a little envelope of creativity, just for days like this. It’s a list of fun-filled learning games for “bouncing-off-the-walls” kids. Human Bone Bingo came out from hiding first. Three kids wiggled around the floor trying to reach their own spines, identify their fibula and tibia, and race to find their bingo bone parts for the win.
Since this was a must-move-fast kind of day, we went straight to the back yard after the youngest won bingo and began a Bug Hunt. Who could find the insect most difficult to identify? Equipped with three different insect books, two magnifying glasses, and three insect cages, my three kids flashed across the yard so quickly they looked like streaks. Squeals, laughter, and lots of startled insects later, we had captured three insects. The youngest found a tree weevil. The oldest found a bug that looks like a stink bug with a spiny arc sticking up on its back (name still to be determined & the winner). My middle son found a green lace wing.
The excitement of the discoveries had them running to the house for paper and colored pencils to draw their finds. This mama trotted behind them, a little smirk on my face because I’d made it to lunchtime without raising my voice even once.
After lunch, while my youngest napped, we played Multiplication War. For this game, we removed the face cards from a normal deck and flipped over one card per player. The person to multiply the two numbers showing fastest wins. A tie instigates war.
At the end of the day, the kids all hugged me and thanked me for letting them have the day off from school.
And as long as they don’t realize they had a fun-packed, bouncing-off-the-walls, learning kind of day, who cares if they think we took the day off!
Lisa Blauvelt (with her family and three dogs, two cats, a horse, pony, donkey, two red eared turtles, a fluctuating number of tadpoles and baby fish, and various other creatures collected by her adventurous boys) puts her education degrees to work at her home in the Deep South. There she teaches not only her own children, but others who come to her home to learn. Her decade long experience in teaching children to read will soon be published as a 476 page guide for parents.
