August 3, 2020 (Monday, GCQ)

Dear Diary,

Today is the fourth day of homeschooling for my seven-year-old son. He slept for 12 hours overnight. He slept at 9:30 pm last night and woke up at 9:30 am this morning. 

As I was waiting for him to wake up, I ate breakfast at 8:30 am then I felt unwell by the time he woke up so I let him do whatever he wants such as watching TV, playing mobile games, and playing with his toys. But before he did all these things, he made the bed right after he woke up, like it was already a habit. Even though I felt unwell, I made sure to let him eat breakfast.

At 1:30 pm, I finally felt well enough to review my entries from July 31, and I discovered some interesting trends that I could be proud of:
- I taught him how to operate his computer on day one and he was already independent about it on day two! :D
- I introduced the habit of making the bed to him on day one; I facilitated it on day two, and he was already voluntarily doing it by day three! Today it was automatic. :D
- I helped him practice self-introduction on day one and he spent 40 minutes just to get it done; he used half the time on day two while glancing on his notes from time to time, and he was able to do it in just five minutes without looking at his notes on day three! :D
- His first spelling quizzes in English involved simple words. His next quiz involved compound words and he did well. :D

I just reintroduced Lupang Hinirang to him on day three. I wonder how long it will take him to master it. 

We officially started our lessons at 2:48 pm by praying for three minutes and checking the date today for 2 minutes. We proceeded to discuss the weather in Science for 26 minutes and he asked to play the weather song five times! He really liked it! He asked to do it again tomorrow.

Since we were trying for him to master Lupang Hinirang as our national anthem, we practiced again today. It took us 6 minutes for three repetitions or 2 minutes per song practice. We agreed to do it again tomorrow.

Our next topic is arts and he tried drawing a ninja while watching Art for Kids Hub on YouTube. This took 18 minutes. And I just realized today that these art sessions could give me time to multitask as it keeps my son busy and his attention focused on the art lesson. I collected the laundry from the clothesline. It’s another win. He also asked me to draw my own ninja, to which I gave in. It took me 4 minutes. He was so enthusiastic about it. :D

We moved on to MAPEH by singing the Bahay Kubo song. It introduces good music to sing along to, information on healthy veggies and we also got to clap hands to the tune. He was feeling happy. He also questioned some abbreviated words which I patiently discussed. We played the song thrice. It took us 9 minutes to do this.

My son went ahead and browsed the next topic. When he found out that it was Pagbabaybay at Pagbabasa in Filipino, he expressed disappointment. As usual, he was hesitant with reading and spelling tasks. He was loud and rambunctious. I tried to be patient and watched as he unwillingly does the task. I then thought about how I could get through this exercise with him without losing my patience. Then I thought about folding the laundry, which I collected earlier, as I wait for him to complete the exercise. It took him 20 minutes to finish the drill. The quiz lasted for 7 minutes and he got  8 out of 10.

Our last subject for today is Other Languages: Nihonggo. He breezed through Level 1 and decided to try Level 2. He found Level 2 difficult so he decided to practice and study before taking on Level 2 again. I was glad to hear that he wanted to study so he could beat Level 2. That was really a bonus to elicit from him a voluntary decision to study more. 

Since he was really into the Nihonggo lessons, I was able to continue folding our laundry. But as I was about to finish folding the laundry, he asked that I join him in answering the next quiz. We got into a bit of horse-playing as I was teaching him some Japanese words and he got hurt by accidentally folding his pinky finger backward. He cried but he quickly forgot his painful pinky as he continued the quiz. 

Now, there are benefits to him hurting his finger during horseplay: 
- he would learn first-hand that horse-playing  could cause him harm
- he will be able to remember what he was studying then in relation to the memory of pain. 

True enough, when the item came up in the quiz and he couldn’t answer, I just needed to remind him that it was what we were trying to study when he hurt his pinky for him to know the answer to the question in the quiz. He spent one hour and 5 minutes for all of these. I have to say that he’s totally hooked up with this one!

After all that we did today, I learned that I could multi-task every time we have Arts, Pagbabaybay, and Other Language as subjects. Anyway, today’s subjects included:
- Computer
- Science and Health
- Civics, Culture, Geography, and History
- Music, Arts, Physical Education and Health
- Filipino (Pagbabaybay, Pagbabasa at Pagsusulat)
- Other Languages: Nihonggo

I finalized “his notes” for today and prepared the lesson for tomorrow in 55 minutes. That’s it for our fourth day!

P.S.

My son would keep on using his painful pinky to get affection from me or his father until the end of the day. It was funny yet heartwarming. I am not sure if it is still painful or not, but I know that he wants to be loved. So we just gave it to him.