The Official First Day of School

Ever since we decided to homeschool, our plans for our first day of school have been to visit the Bob Bullock History of Texas Museum for an overview of Texas History. So today was our first day!!! YAY!!!! Except. . . I woke up with a migraine. NOT on our first day!!!! I realized, though, that since this is homeschool, if my migraine didn't go away, I could move the field trip to tomorrow. With 4 Advil and an Advocare Spark and a little time, my migraine subsided. So, back to our original plans. . . the museum!!!

We said the Pledge of Allegiance and had our devotional and loaded up into the Frontier West "school bus" (my new Ford Expedition that my husband gave me for Mother's Day) at 9:15 (our regular "start time"). We encountered very little (almost no) traffic--another sign that this homeschooling is meant to be (very little traffic on Mopac in Austin in the morning is very rare). We arrived, paid our admission, and began our trip through the museum with the display of the Spanish coming to the Gulf Coast and encountering the Karankawa Indians. We ended with modern times and NASA. Their favorite display was the movie about the Revolution. They also liked the extensive display on Texas ranching, as they felt almost like experts, since they frequent the dude ranch in the Hill Country.

We also saw the Wild Weather of Texas movie. Many facts about weather were accompanied by amazing footage of the extreme weather, and we actually felt thunder, wind, humidity, and saw lots of lightning (it was one of those experiential theaters).

The children have chosen their topics for their first research projects: YaYa will be researching the Indians who occupied Texas before colonization. Elliot will be researching the Texas Revolution and Davy Crockett (and he actually spent several hours this afternoon--after school was over--researching and watching video clips).

Tomorrow we will complete our post-field trip activities, begin our research, start our Reading and Writing Workshop and continue our work with time.

Momma's thoughts: I LOVE homeschooling!!!
Elliot's thoughts: "Fun! Awesome! Cool!! I liked it!! I learned a lot!"
YaYa's thoughts: "Very very fun! Awesomeness and coolness! I enjoyed learning!"