B is for Bible School

For the next few weeks, I'm blogging through the alphabet. You can read read more AtoZ posts by clicking here.

B is for Bible School

I'm beginning to think that "school" is IntelliGent's favorite word. He loves school in all its shapes, from Sunday school to letter school. One of his favorite's is "Bible School" with Dr. Dad.

IntelliGent has been attending Sunday School with the older children in our church since he turned two. He has a fantastic memory and we spend a lot of time practicing memory verses. He loves reading story books about the Bible. 

We have talked with IntelliGent about the Bible and God since before his birth, but it wasn't until recently that we decided to add some formal Bible instruction in the home.

Dr. Dad and I bought the BJU Bible Truths curriculum (Walking God's Way) at the same time we purchased the K4 materials. We chose not to work through the Bible curriculum at an accelerated rate. The biggest reason for this decision is that Dr. Dad is teaching the material, and Dr. Dad doesn't have a lot of extra time on his hands to prepare lessons.

I love watching these two work through the lessons and talk about the Bible together.  

Could there be a sweeter sight?

Halfway

On Saturday, while preparing this week's school lessons, I realized we have made it to the halfway mark in our curriculum. Honestly, I was a little surprised. We've only been doing K4 for three weeks.

Sometimes, I struggle with this accelerated pace. I feel like we are attempting a marathon at sprint speeds. More than once, I've wondered about slowing thing down, just to be more "normal." Dr. Dad has reminded me, more than once, there is nothing normal about a 2.5 year old doing K4. My job isn't to slow him down, but to give him what he needs to learn and be challenged.

Currently, that means five lessons a day.

IntelliGent's love for school proves we're not going too fast.

Our school room

I strive to keep school fun. Our basement school room is a bright and cheerful place. Our schedule jumps from one subject to another with songs and games between. IntelliGent loves discovering the hidden letters, colors, and numbers in the "learning tree."

Perhaps these are the reasons IntelliGent insists on doing school every day. He'd do school on Saturdays too, if I'd let him.

If we stay at this pace and on this schedule, K4 will be done in three weeks. I've already ordered our K5 material. It should be here in time for a smooth transition once we finish our last K4 lesson.

Accelerated Learning

Today we finished the first quarter of Bob Jones University Press's Footsteps for Fours - a program we started a week and a half ago. Most of the content we covered in these first 45 lessons was a review of what IntelliGent already knew. However, he's demonstrated a good grasp of all the new concepts, except Left and Right.

When Dr. Dad and I ordered the program, we knew that we were going to be going through things at a quick rate. We were aware that IntelliGent already understood most of what the program had to offer but, afraid that I had missed some key concepts in our informal learning time earlier, we decided to purchase Footsteps for Fours anyway.

Keeping IntelliGent engaged and challenged has required we do a week's worth of lessons in a single day. IntelliGent is learning new skills as he cuts, glues, colors, and writes. His favorite part of the program has been the stories and nursery rhymes. Above all, he loves the little dog, Max.

Accelerated learning makes more work  for me than running through the teacher's manual as written would. Nap times are almost completely consumed with preparation for the next day's school time. It is tiring work but worth it when, in the morning, IntelliGent is barely out of his breakfast chair before he's pulling on my arm, begging to go to the schoolroom.

"Let's do school, Mommy. Would that be fun?"

Yes, buddy. It would be.

Just let me finish my mocha first.

Please.