Are You Smarter Than a Four Year Old?

It's Tuesday afternoon and all is quiet at our house. Annabelle is taking a much needed nap. Jacob is relaxing on the couch watching "Timmy Time" (a new Playhouse Disney show) after a busy morning at school. He should probably be napping along with his sister, but for now, rest time will have to suffice as he now believes "nap time is for babies."

Tuesdays are Classical Conversations school days. Jacob looks forward to Tuesdays, as do I. Annabelle seems to enjoy herself in the nursery, too. We are now four weeks into our homeschooling / Classical Conversations journey and I am happy to report, we are doing quite well. We've managed to get into somewhat of a routine. We don't have a definite schedule as far as time goes, but we do have a routine. That's a big accomplishment...for me. :)

These were his "first day of school" pictures (taken a couple weeks ago). We had actually begun homeschooling a week earlier, but this was the first day he attended his Classical Conversations class. He's such a big boy!

Jacob loves the Math-U-See program and begs to do math all the time. Hooked on Phonics is working out great. We're flying through the preschool material and will probably begin the kindergarten program next week. He's definitely ready. I guess I could have started with the kindergarten books, but the preschool materials have been a good review. Besides, Annabelle has learned a lot just from watching the videos. Jacob is already sounding out words and I'm confident he'll be reading in no time.

Classical Conversations has been an incredible experience so far. I've always heard that children have a much easier time learning and memorizing information than adults. This is no joke. It is absolutely astounding the amount of information Jacob has memorized in the past four weeks -- everything from great historical events, to science facts like the seven types of biomes, to fundamental concepts of english grammar. My four year old is now smarter than I am. He is an intellectual genius. ;) Just curious, do you know the eight parts of speech?

In case you didn't catch all the words, the eight parts of speech are: nouns, pronouns, verbs, adverbs, conjunctions, interjections, prepositions, and adjectives. Pretty impressive, right?

Know anything about William the Conqueror? No? Jacob will enlighten you on the subject.

Again, in case you didn't pick up all the words....After the church split into Roman Catholic and Eastern Orthodox, William the Conqueror defeated King Harold of England in 1066 and started feudalism.

Classical Conversations classes always begin with presentations (a.k.a. Show and Tell). Jacob doesn't seem to mind speaking in front of a crowd. I didn't figure he would. Anyone who knows Jacob knows that he talks incessantly...to anyone. Today's presentation topic was "My Favorite Bible Verse." He did a great job. He did the presentation much the same way as he did here in this video. Check out these skills:

Last week's topic was "My Family." I let him use the ipod to show pictures of his family. Of course, he loved that. My favorite part of this show and tell was when he said, "....and today, I am going to introduce you to my family."

Besides school, Jacob also had an eventful night at church last Wednesday. He is now an Awana Cubbie and a member of the preschool choir. He was sooooo excited about going to preschool choir and even more excited about becoming a Cubbie. His Cubbie vest instantly became a prized posession and he refused to remove it from his body. He is, indeed, proud to be a Cubbie and announces his new status to anyone he sees.