Unimpressed!

We stopped by Le-Amen on our way to gym on Tuesday on the way to gym to fetch Misha’s portfolio that was handed in for monitoring last term.

Honestly, I must admit I wasn’t very impressed. For starters when I arrived at around 2pm I was told “I’m on lunch, but I will help you.”, as if she was doing me a favour fetching Misha’s portfolio. When I asked for the feedback on their evaluations, I was told we weren’t getting any this term. So much for support & feedback.

Then I noticed that they didn't give any feedback on the worksheets etc. in his portfolio except for his painting. Except for “Beautiful” on his painting, they didn’t comment on any of his other work although he had many 100% worksheets in there.

The poor kid was quite upset about that. "All that Work for nothing. That's just mean!" he said. I can just imagine how disappointing the lack of positive comments must be for him. Of course, now I still have to try motivate him to do more worksheets for the rest of this term. I can already hear him replying why should he do them if they’re not even going to comment on his work.

Unfortunately his laptop also caved on Tuesday morning. It seems the hard drive has gone. Fortunately Clive was able to swop the hard drive with the one from my old laptop with the broken screen, so at least now it’s up & running again.

Of course Jesse reckons the laptop broke because I made them do “school” on it. I suppose for them anything would be a good excuse not to do school. He’s quite happy that his Switched on Schoolhouse is not yet running again, as it gives him a valid excuse not to do it.

I may need to reconsider how we’re going to address doing school the way he learns next year. I have noticed that Switched on Schoolhouse seems to have too much textbook approach with lots of reading & not enough interaction. I’ve signed him up for a 2 week trial at Time4Learning to see if that will help. So far he says he likes it more than SOS. I may just let him continue with Time4Learning instead for now, until he’s conquered the reading / worksheet resistance. We can always transition him to Switched on Schoolhouse in grade 7/8 in order to get him used to the system by grade 9 when he would ideally need to start Alpha Omega Academy.

I have also found some very cool educational iPad apps that could make a huge difference to their learning on the long run. Only problem is that Clive takes his iPad to work so they can only use it when he’s home . I must admit the Kindle App for iPad has revolutionised our reading. Both the boys & I prefer the eBook reading to real books. I like to hijack Clive’s iPad to read in bed whilst he’s asleep as it’s more comfortable & doesn’t disturb him.

WoW, I can’t believe another week’s gone again. I’m amazed at how fast the time’s flying. We have just 5 & half more weeks to final hand-in for this year.

Watch this space next week. I’m hosting the next SA Carnival of Homeschooling Blogs. If you wish to contribute, please visit the Carnival home page & complete the submission form. Next week’s topic is Math Focus & from the submissions I’ve seen thus far you’re in for some awesome tips & resources.