Well, school started this morning! Alex tried to get out of it, but I persevered. I put both him and Amanda at the table and started her working first. She is pretty independent, so I just let her work quietly while I devoted the lion’s share of my attention to Alex. We started with a placement test from Teaching Textbooks (homeschoolers know this is the best math curriculum ever). I printed out the Algebra 1 test and had him work on that. The word problems, he obviously couldn’t do, but some of the purely mathematical expressions, he knew exactly what to do with. He got several right, and several more wrong, and then we got into an argument! He kept saying, “In Ukraine...” and then I kept saying, “Math is math...” so I ended the math lesson! But at least I did get and idea of what he knew and where his level is. I think I am going to start him in Algebra 1 and then move along faster once he gets English better. I don’t want to hold him back, but I know there have been some gaps in his schooling.
We then moved on to English lessons. He is doing really well, however, I think I am going to break down and buy Rosetta Stone English. It isn’t my favorite program, I used the Spanish fro Amanda and gave up, but for purposes of getting him conversationally fluent, I think it will be the fastest way, and the easiest for me. He can just work on it at his own speed, leaving me free to do other things. But for now, we are just using the workbooks that I bought in Ukraine. They have all the instructions in Russian. I am not thrilled with the way they present information, but it has been pretty good so far, and they do have some grammar in them.
We worked for only about a half an hour, as we were interrupted by the sprinkler man and the window man... ARGH!!! Every person coming to the door set the dogs barking and distracted Alex too. It will take some time to get him accustomed to working without getting distracted. But it was a good start this morning, and one we can build on.
Then it was time for grocery shopping. Yikes, that is an adventure. He wants all kinds of stuff that I don’t want him to have, but at this point, I am going to pick my battles one at a time. I gave in to most things, but let others go. I just trust that in time, when I can explain things to him, we will gradually get him over to our way of doing things. I did buy him a 1/2 pound of sandwich meat to make some sandwiches - and guess what - it is gone already! He has had 3 sandwiches already, plus a lunch! Oh, teenage boys with hollow legs.
Amanda had to go to the studio for 2 hours this afternoon, so Alex came with us and while she was there, he and I ran errands. We went to the post office to mail a letter and small gift to his girlfriend and buy some International Return Coupons, so that she can write him back. We then went to the Social Security Office to apply for a SS card. Even though we checked the box at the embassy when we did the paperwork, they told us to still apply at our local office. I had to show them the judgement, his passport, my passport, and fill out an application. Relatively easy, all things considering.
We have just had a quiet afternoon, some Wii, some bike riding, and me cooking dinner. We will be off to kickboxing class later and then more schoolwork tonight. I figure if I make it non-threatening then he will be more willing to do more to catch up!
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