Weekly Wrap Up: The One with the Bickering

Joining the Weird, Unsocialized Homeschoolers, Homegrown Learners and The Homeschool Chick...

I'm not quite sure why exactly, but we have had a bit of a rough week here at the lab.  The sun has been shining.  We have enjoyed seasonably warm weather and many hours of time outside for most of the week.  By all appearances, I should be raving about what a fantastic time we have had this week.  Instead I'm here to tell you about how I was this close to sending the test subjects back to school on more than one occasion this week.  It wasn't anything homeschool related technically that caused me to feel this way.  That part of our day has been going swimmingly.  As you may have guessed from the title of this post, it had everything to do with the incessant bickering the boys took up this week.   

Now, I know that all children bicker and I don't expect that to disappear completely in our family life.  However, when I see my children purposely antagonizing one another, driving one another to whining or tears, I have seen enough.  When it happens on a daily basis, I start to get a little whiny and irrational myself.  

I don't really want to send the test subjects back to school yet.  Please don't misunderstand me when I say that.  As I have mentioned here on numerous occasions, I love our school and I would not be surprised if our children returned to school at some point in their academic careers.  It's just that I do not believe that that time has come yet.  I am enjoying the way the boys are blossoming at home.  Our experiment, so far, has been a wonderful success.  On Wednesday, TS 1 asked if he could do a report on Jupiter combining what he is learning in Science with what he is learning in Writing.  DId you catch that?  He asked me if he could do a research report!  

Thursday afternoon we had a serious talk about treating others as we would like to be treated.  While I don't expect all sibling conflict to end, I was clear in communicating that the constant bickering, purposeful antagonizing, whining and tattling was not acceptable.  We talked about how those behaviors are not pleasing to God and discussed how He would want us to handle conflict and moodiness.  I also let them know that if I see that they are consistently unwilling to work on these weaknesses, they should expect unpleasant consequences.  

In a much needed change of routine and environment, we went on a fascinating field trip on Thursday afternoon at a local college's art gallery.  The workshop was entitled Drawing and Neuroscience.  The children were given a guided tour of a small exhibit on this topic and then engaged in various activities to experience some of the ideas hands on.  It was after school hours this time so RA was able to join us :)

Today is a big day for our family.  It's this little man's eighth birthday today! 

Sandwiched right in the middle of a big brother and little sister, this guy is the quintessential middle child: easy going, witty and carefree.  We love him to pieces and look forward to celebrating him this weekend!