An Avalanche of ToDos

I made a list of all the things I need to do to close out the school year. It's only February, but if we are going to drive to California, we might want to have the formal, school-y, legal stuff all done by early May. I have to organize our medical records. Our pediatrician was closed at various times during the year, so we missed some well-child visits. 

School "year" has become sort of irrelevant to us, on a practical level. We have decided sometimes to take time off of certain subjects or programs, but I can't find a time when we are like, ok, we're done learning for a while now. Sometimes the least structured or planned days provide the most opportunities for growth and learning. Sometimes you can only learn things at a certain time of year. You can't cross country ski in July! We are all very curious and like to learn new things, but sometimes the challenge is in the pruning...staying focused on a small number of things at a time so you can actually master or finish things.

Max continued with his science class on zoom today. He insisted on wearing headphones this time so I didn't hear as much of it, but he was pretty engaged the whole time. They are studying states of matter, and sorted little cards we had cut out before the class. I am amazed at how engaging zoom classes can be for little kids, and how much Max seems to learn and retain from this class. Online education is totally possible, maybe even really great for little kids! What it is not good for is occupying them for large amounts of time while their parents work. This class only lasts about 30 minutes and I have to help him prepare materials beforehand. 

Marko read about the Perseverance landing on Mars. He signed up for a daily science email newsletter and that is how he found out it was happening today. He was absolutely amazed by it. We didn't watch all the videos, but I am now extremely curious about the potential discoveries. 

Laurel's homework for her anxiety class was to teach us the class content for the week. She made us each draw little cartoon representations of the "worry" voices in our heads, and then she explained how our bodies physically react to perceived danger. Then she taught us a 4-7-8 breathing exercise. 

In the evening, I went to a zoom meeting for our Girl Scout service unit. There is a lot to do to try and get our Bronze award project going, plus the service unit wants to organize activities in the spring and summer where we could somehow get together but also not all be in the same place at once. I would love to make some archery happen. 

The key is going to be picking the right things to work on, and mentally setting the rest aside.