So this morning I am reading the Lewiston Tribune and guess what is advertised for sale in there............ Bullet proof backpacks here in little ole Lewiston Idaho. I thought to myself are they really necessary here? I really do wonder how many kids are packing them to and from school, feeling relieaved that if a bullet comes flying at out of nowhere they might be a little more protected then fred walking next to them wearing the spiderman backpack. So this really makes me wonder what in hell is this world coming to? I mean come on this is lewiston people, I might consider Braden having one in LA or some other big city but the LC valley, come on. I need to research it a little more about the crime rate around here. And see if there ever has been any drive bys or anything of that nature. But anyways I got to thinking if it is this bad now how bad are things going to be in two and a half years when Braden starts school. So I got to thinking well maybe I can just homeschool him, no this isnt the first time I have thought about this, I have thought of it many times before. And no I am not one of those freako parents who feels that they need to protect there children from the outside world. I am totally not like that. Its just that I am really a small town girl who never really had to go to school with 77947923984 people. I went to the smaller schools where you knew everybody and hell there families too. I do feel that kids need to be out running with other kids and getting a solid education but really how much one on one time do teachers have with children when there is a million kids in each class? How much are they really learning? But anyways back to this homeschool thing. I know that I am not smart enough to home school him for long but I thought well maybe at least kindergarten, so I looked up the Curriculum of Kindergarten, just to see what you have to learn in those short few months and just wait until you see what I found. I am really freaked out by it.
Kindergarten Curriculum Guide
Social Studies
* Meanings of holidays, traditions, and customs* Understanding and appreciating other cultures* Individual's role in family, home, school, and community* Relationship of the individual to the group* Work and jobs* Safety rules and symbols* Basic human needs* Self-respect and self-awareness* Awareness of others* Location of home and school* Diagram of home and school
Science
* Observation of everyday, familiar things* Common animals and plants* Interrelationships of animals and plants* Classification of living things* Farm animals* Care of pets* Like and unlike plants* Indoor plants* The sun: our principal source of energy* Weather and seasons* Temperature* Light* Colors* Senses* Earth, moon, stars, planets* Simple measurement* Beginning experimentation
Language Arts
* Phonics* Choral reading* Listening to literature, music, poetry* Nursery rhymes, fairy tales, fables* Social listening* Constructing visual images while listening* Oral communication skills* Role play* Following and giving directions* Paraphrasing and summarizing* Organizing ideas* Experience stories* Relating events and experiences using complete sentences* Listening for correct speech habits and word usage* Beginning writing process* Manuscript handwriting
Health and Safety
* Personal hygiene* Good eating habits* Good grooming* Care of teeth* Major body parts* Physical fitness* Safety to and from school
Mathematics
* Simple counting to 20* One-to-one relationship* Concepts of more, less than, same* Sequence of events* Correspondence of quantities* Ordinal-cardinal relationship* Number-numeral relationship* Recognition of basic sets* Meaning of addition and subtraction* Introduction to number line* Estimation* Elementary geometry (shapes)* Calendar and clock* Denominations of money* Basic problem-solving strategies* Basic chart and graph concepts
So yes they expect a little 5 year old to know all of this by the time they get out of Kindergarten. Five years old people, does anyone else feel this is a little extreme? Sheesh what about being a kid and playing with blocks and maybe learning a color or two? I honestly thought that kindergarten was to mostly make a friend or two, play all day and get a book read to ya and then have a nap. Wow was I wrong. Kindergarten is some serious business these days. Theres no time for messing around.
So there goes all my ideas of homeschooling Braden, lord knows there is no way in hell I can teach him all of that. Hell without looking it up I dont even know what some of it is. So heres my idea now. I am going to start working with him on the stuff that I do know so that when he gets into this huge ass school where you need to wear a bulletproof backpack and you have to share the one teacher with a million other kids maybe he will at least have a chance. Hell a little jumpstart never hurt anybody did it? And I honestly hope that I do not have to send Braden off to Kindergarten his first day wearing a bulletproof backpack.
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With the recent school shootings (2 seperate schools in the last week) I think those guys at MJ SafetySolutions are on the right track with the My Child's Pack bulletproof backpack. I didn't realy think about it too much, but now I am changing my thinking. I hate to think about my kids having to have a bullet resistant shield, but it in this world, I think giving them some piece of mind, might be worth it.
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