Thursday: Our School Day

On Thursdays we drive up to St. Pete to attend the St. Petersburg Homeschool Co-op. This is our first semester attending and so far we love it. We were unsure if it would be worth the drive and money, but so far every minute has been worth it. Its our day to get away and have school. Some of Oakley's friends attend school regularly and at times Oakley will ask where they are and I will respond that they are school. He often responds saying he wants to attend school so we thought this would be a fun way to have school, but also be involved. We are unsure on what we are going to do when the time arrives when school truely begins. A lot of praying going on for that subject! I do know that the times are so precious and we have our entire lives to be in school so I don't want to rush it!


We leave the house at 8:00 am at the latest. Sometimes that means eating breakfast in the car and Baron taking an early nap on the ride up. We enjoy early conversation discussing what the day may bring us. It takes us about a hour to get there so lots of time for praise and worship in the car and talking about anything that Oakley would like to talk about. I really enjoy car rides with him. We tell stories and talk about our friends and those we love. He sometimes is able to talk to family on the phone as well.


Once we arrive around 9am we get ready for the first class at 9:15am.

Teacher Doug (we call him) is our Science and Nature teacher. He is very friendly and always bringing one or more of his friends to share with us. Today we learned he has 60 animals total that he cares for! I believe most of them are reptiles and more on the exotic side. You can tell he loves animals and takes very good care of them. 


Today he started the lesson with the song, "The Old Lady That Swallowed a Fly". He had a doll that looks like the old lady in the book of this story and had all of the animals the lady consumes in the story as well. What really through us for a loop is when he started taking the animals out of the old ladies mouth to help save her so she wouldn't die (his personal version) when he got to the spider a live terantula came out!


We were all a little startled at first, but after Teach Doug asked if anyone wanted to be tickled by the spider the line formed of all the brave and adventurous girls in the class. It is funny how the girls are fearless and the boys in the class always hesitate to touch the snakes and spiders. We learned that Matilda the terantula excretes silk from her abdomen. She actually released some while Teacher Doug was holding her. He said she hasn't ever bitten him the 20 years he has had her. We were all amazed.


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Teach Doug is holding the brown terantula Matilda in his hand here.

The next animals Teacher Doug shared with us was a few lizards after a brief lesson on our lungs and how trees release oxygen and "eat" the carbon dioxide released by us. Of course the lessons are very basic since the ages range from 3 to 5, but I believe it is a fun way to lay the foundation of these lessons. Science was always my favorite subject through my years of school.




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Brief Lesson on Lungs. Learned that some snakes only have one lung!


The lizards he brought today were timid and scared. He was very careful with them because they do bite and also will scratch you. He mentioned that many Floridians have Iguanas as pets, but they have problems sometimes when a female human in the home goes through her monthly cycle the Iguana can sense it and gets really aggressive. I personally don't understand why anyone would want a lizard for a pet. It is not something I picture cuddling up too! lol.

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Teacher Doug putting the Iguana to "sleep"

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A Chameleon that can hang from trees like monkeys.


After Science and Nature class we have two hours of free play on the nice big and somewhat shaded playground. Oakley has met a friend that he really loves. His name is "Zeke". Zeke is short for Ezekiel. Zeke and his mom Amanda are very nice. They live in the St. Pete area and are believers as well. I have really enjoyed them on our school days.

Baron is taking off now that he is walking. Playing with a ball that is just a big as he is here.

Oakley's favorite part of the playground is the tire swing. I get sick watching them go round and round.

After some play we have lunch. We usually bring our own lunch, but today we took advantage of the pizza and homemade soup they sale. It was yummy. After lunch and more play fourth period is our second and last class of Waldorf Inspired Art and Handwork Class. Mrs. Yarrow is very sweet and patient with the young artist. We have painted with wet on wet watercolor, made leaf prints with vibrant beeswax crayons, and have made and decorated our own paper. Here are some pictures of Oakley making paper from recycled white paper.

Thursdays are long, but very fun days for us.  I am so thankful that I get to share this time with the boys.  They fill my heart with joy seeing them learn new things everyday.