Well, after 2 weeks of "gradual schooling", we are back at it full-force. We are working on our newest unit study on the Renaissance and Reformation, and for the first time in a long time, I am actually bored. I usually love history. We are only on unit day 3 and yet it feels like we have been doing this one for weeks.
I still blame it on my lack of a real (translated LAZY) summer vacation (we had to year-round school last year due to sicknesses, deaths, and getting behind due to other issues), so I guess I am just not in the mood for hands-on projects and 300-page library books and worksheets just yet. I wonder if perhaps I am losing my touch with unit studies? We have used them almost exclusively since the fateful day we began homeschooling the oldest in pre-k...could it be that I am actually growing weary of them? I am finding myself thinking more often, with delicious anticipation, of the children working on Lifepacs this year, with mom grading finished papers and not much of anything else. Less work planning...less work making projects..less work trying to assign a fair grade to those projects...yes, workbooks would be the easier way for me to go this year. But I look back on past units...how we studied the ancient Egyptians and made mummies and a model of the Nile river; how we studied Creation and the universe and its wonders; how we came to the Middle Ages and learned so much we never knew about Europe, the plagues, castles, and the daily life of the people who lived then via our projects and so many wonderful read-alouds. I know if we had only used workbooks and texts, out learning experiences wouldn't have been as rich. So, onward we go. Tomorrow we meet Queen Elizabeth!
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