Wordless(ish) Wednesday: Reading, Writing, 'Rithmatic

I've never done one of these before, but hey, there's a first time for everything.

Harry turned 11 on Saturday

Which explains the conversation I just had with him (at least I think it does):

Harry: From now on I'm going to use Celsius.

Me (talking the bait, I know I shouldn't have): It will be difficult because everything here is in Farenheit and most people won't understand you.

Harry: I'm still going to switch to Celsius.

Me (pretty much losing it): You can't. People won't be able to understand what you are talking about. You'll have to move to Europe.

Harry: But I don't want to move to Europe.

Me: Just do your work!

A few minutes go by in which he is actually working.

Under his breath Harry mumbles, "Dad uses Celsius."

Me: No more about Celsius. Ever!

(Jason does use Celsius because he is a scientist and Harry is planning to be one. But in order for that to happen, he's going to have to survive 5th grade.)

Quick Pharaoh Update

I realized the other day that I hadn't changed the Pharaoh's salt in a while. By a while, about three weeks. Then I just put it off because I didn't want to deal with it in case it was gross. But I didn't smell anything from the box it's in, so I was hopeful. Then today at the party, one of the kids wanted to see it, so I took it outside and opened it up.

It was fine, but I was quite concerned for a while.

And that is how it became 9:00 on a Saturday night and instead of enjoying a cheesy tv show and some hot cocoa, I was standing on my porch in 50 degree weather, changing the salt on a chicken. (And, the 50 degree thing, give me a break, I live in Southern California. It's chilly out there.)

So I took a picture and wondered again what I'm going to do with the thing. I suppose I could wrap it in linen, but I really don't want to store a mummified chicken forever. But I've put so much work into it that it seems a shame to stop now. Maybe I'll give it to another homeschooler that doesn't want to start from scratch but wants to have experience. And they can have a turn with the whole salt thing. Then when they are finished, they can pass it on. It'll be like the exersaucer of homeschooling.

I'm brilliant I tell ya.

Here's the picture I took. Please remember that it was 9:00 on a RAINY cold night and we were in the dim light of my porch.

The Week That Was

I have decided not to complain on this blog anymore. In that vein, let me tell you of some of the exciting new challenges this week has brought. There is no end to to the dishwasher situation, which means that I have been without a working dishwasher for four months now. My crock pot cracked, but the crack was in a cool spiral pattern, so that was kind of interesting. My printer broke mysteriously, which makes my kids happy. And on Friday my car got a flat tire after the kids' sports class. The timing is only interesting because a friend's kid noticed the flat as I was turning to go to Costco to go buy a new crock pot. Instead I got a new tire, but at least we had lunch as planned.

Anyway, I swear I'm not complaining. Earlier in the week I did, but now it's just an interested chuckle. We'll survive without a dishwasher and possibly without a crock pot. The printer is important because of school, but we're off next week so that can wait. The tire was important and was fixed promptly and since the old tire was pretty new I got a discount on the new one. (Clear as mud?)

As far as school goes, we did some. All of the kids did their required number of days of math, reading, grammar, writing, Latin (for those who have it), and history. We were a little more hit and miss with spelling and science. But if we did everything perfectly I wouldn't have anything to blog about.

There were no real huge leaps this week. Most of what we're doing is plodding along until the next interesting thing comes up. So we're fine. Harry is flat out obsessed by Algebra and I've caught him multiple times this week trying to get the older neighborhood kids to teach him some. I had Sam read the Story of the World chapter to Annika this week, which was cute. And it was good for me to hear just how far he's come with speech therapy.

Being without a printer makes it much more difficult (really, almost impossible) to entertain my 3yo long enough to do anything of note with the other kids. She depends on the letters and other things I print out while we do school. So I've had to be a lot more creative. And that's good for all of us. She did things like cut out the toys she wants for Christmas and glue them to paper for her Santa list, empty an entire box of needles into the brown upstairs carpet, and cut even more papers out to give to me. Most of them say "Emma." So I'm keeping them all. Maybe I'll glue them to a piece of paper for a Christmas list. I need more Emmas in my life.

So, that's about it. Normal chaos around here. I hope this doesn't bore anyone. I'll try to put up a list of books we're reading on the sidebars in case anyone is interested.

Oh, we do have a birthday on Monday, so we had a birthday party today. Sam is soon to be 9. I don't have any pictures of Sam on my phone, so here's Perry the Platypus instead. You can call him Agent P.

Excuses, Excuses

I was just looking back on my recent weekly reports and if you just read those you would probably think we never did any lessons or schoolwork. We have had some things come up lately. Some things have been good (the Grand Canyon) and some not so good (multiple doctor appointments). In general I try to keep our mornings completely clear so we have good blocks of time to work. However, that doesn't always work as well as I'd like it to. And we made the Grand Canyon plans a year ago, so we knew it was coming up.

I did a few things before school started because I knew we were going to have some breaks before the end of the calendar year. I started lessons earlier than I would have normally, even before the public school kids went back. This was a major source of contention with my kids. They couldn't figure out why they had school every day when their friends didn't. We took it pretty easy and stuck to the basics, but it still gave me a little bit of wiggle room when I needed it. Right now we are working through the day. This won't last forever and it's not true of all of my kids, but we are schooling all day right now. My first grader obviously isn't and even my third grader doesn't spend the same amount of time as my fifth grader. But we are still working longer than we would have without the breaks. Of course the kids have recess and snack time and lunch. It's not like they wake up, start working and then go to bed. And since we have already taken a lot of breaks, our holiday breaks won't be nearly as long as they would have otherwise been. We're taking three instead of five at Thanksgiving and probably not two full weeks at Christmas.

I don't want to burn us out or anything and eventually we'll get back to a more relaxed feel around here, but for now, this is how it is around here. We've had a good few months of playing and taking trips and now it's time to make sure we are on schedule to accomplish what we need to.

What a Difference a Week Makes

This is part of the family last Friday. My two daughters stayed home in the sunshine with their Grandma while the boys, my husband and I hiked down into the Grand Canyon and then back out. There were some moments when we weren't sure if the "back out" part would actually happen, but it did and we all made it back to the Rim. Where it snowed. It's only a couple of inches but that seems like a lot when you live where it doesn't usually now at all. (Hence, the shorts on Sam.)

Anyway, we took the week of Halloween off for the trip (not saying the boys didn't learn anything, it just wasn't official) and then tried to get back to things Tuesday of this week after Grandma left. To say that things went slowly would be an understatement. Because of the Big Trip and Grandma's visit, I think it was okay.

We'll get back to things for real next week and I'm sure I'll write something truly enjoyable about how wonderful our week was!

Hehehe, Um Yeah

So, last week...What happened to it? Where's my report?

Well, I'm sure that last week happened. In fact, I vaguely remember last Monday. But I had three doctor's appointments last week and Harry had one. All of them were at least 45 minutes away and I could take the kids to none of them. So I begged for people to take the kids when I couldn't be there and I prayed that one week of educational neglect wouldn't doom them for life.

The list of what we accomplished was short...math and reading happened most days (thank goodness books are portable). Mostly we rolled with the punches, tried to get to outside activities on time and I don't think anything major fell through the cracks.

We're back at it this week. Harry has a pulled leg muscle which is bad for a variety of reasons so he's not moving at all. That in itself should ensure that things go more smoothly. I don't have any appointments and as far as I know, none of the kids do either (I could check the calendar, but I kind of don't want to know if they do.). The dishwasher repair people are coming on Wednesday for the sixth time, but that's the extent of major house things. All in all, it should be a much quieter week. Thank goodness.

It's Important to Be Fancy

In her last-year's dance recital costume.

Math is always easier and way more fun with fancy clothes on.

Pharaoh Kluckfu Returns

Salt is amazing stuff. Seriously. I knew that salt has been an incredibly important method of preservation, but I've never seen it in action.

Until now...

For some reason I have avoided the good Pharaoh these last few days. I was supposed to change the salt on Thursday but just couldn't bring myself to do it. But finally, tonight I was resolved. Pharaoh Kluckfu was going to bathe in new salt no matter what. I also decided to have the boys help. They really haven't done much since the first day. Harry was kind of into it but also being goofy with a friend and Sam refused to be in the same room with so much raw chicken. So tonight they were going to get their hands dirty and make this project theirs.

Until Harry started wiping off the chicken in a motion best described as "the method guaranteeing that salmonella-laced salt would get all over the kitchen." And Sam stirred the salt mixture so hard that most of it went onto the floor.

So yet again, I was relegated the main chicken duty. Thankfully it still doesn't smell. I have newfound respect for salt. The skin feels pretty much like really dry skin, but the meat of the chicken is feeling really leathery. I think I decided that the chicken seemed lighter on an earlier change, but this time he actually felt heavier. I'm not sure why though. I took pictures, but I don't think it was close enough to see a real difference. Plus I'm not entirely sure there is a real difference in how the chicken looks, so I think I'll save those for another day.

Once I got the chicken filled up with salt, I did have the boys come over and fill the bag up with the rest of the mixture, which they were happy to do. And since it was clean salt, I didn't have to worry too much about unintentional food poisoning.

Anyway, Pharaoh Kluckfu is well on his was to an eternal rest. And I'm just going to rest. Hopefully not for eternity though. The kids aren't as well versed in mummification as they should be yet.

This Week

Another really bad picture of one of the kids' projects. The finished ziggurat.

Things are just a blur. By the time I get to Friday, Monday is just a vague memory and by next week I'll have forgotten this week ever happened. So I think it's a good thing I have this blog and these reports. So let's see what I can reconstruct.

Harry:

He is still working in WWS. He's on week 4 and has just started the topos section. He read that he had to write a paragraph or so that is between 150 and 300 words and just about cried. So I showed him the word count on just one of my blog posts and he was somewhat mollified. Meaning he didn't actually cry, but he also didn't jump up and do the work. It got pushed back to Monday by the need to get to football. Lucky kid.

I have somehow become a person that does several different math and Language Arts programs in the hopes that, I don't know, the kids will know everything and no one will ever think their homeschooling was a failure. Something like that. So, we read about direct and indirect objects and subject complements in Grammar Town. We really do have a lot of fun with that curriculum. It's so worth it. And eventually we'll finish Grammar Town and move onto the rest of the books.

Harry has been plugging away at Latin for Children for oh, the past two years. As of right now I don't have any real specific goals for him in Latin, other than lean it, so this is fine. But I was reading on the WTM boards last night how other people do the program and it gave me some great ideas. So we're going to try a few of those and see how it goes.

Science was human reproduction. He did all of the work asked of him in My Pals are Here and now knows how babies grow inside the mother. He's known the mechanics of how babies are made since a second-grader at his old school told him. The lesson was pretty much review and he's moving on now.

Papyrus (grass) started growing along our Nile River this week, so of course I took a picture or twelve. (Look, it's a centimeter higher than ten minutes ago, quick guys, get the camera!) We also read about Hammurabi and his code of laws, did the maps for that and for Abraham and the Israelites, and Harry outlined the relevant pages in the red KHE.

And since Harry's reading assignments go with history, he finished the Illustrated Children's Bible and started something else, that I can't remember all of the sudden. Oh, The Broken Tusk. We'll be starting India soon and since the library's copies of any Gilgamesh stories at all are on hold, we decided to skip around a bit.

Ziggurat in progress.

Sam:

Sam does what I ask him usually with no trouble at all. He goes down his little checklist, does the work and checks it off. He might ask for help if he has a problem, but more likely he will just skip the problem and go to the next thing. So I have to watch him pretty carefully.

Math is fine. He's working through MUS Beta in his own systematic way. This week the focus was on multiplying 9s.. So he did that, took the test and moved on. Sam is incredibly smart, but I have to be careful about how I challenge him because if it's too much for him, he shuts down completely.

Reading...He moved on to the Illustrated Bible. He's a couple of days back from Harry so that they aren't trying to read the exact same thing at the exact same time. It's better that way. The only trouble he had was on answering some questions about "what to you think?" Sam is firmly in the grammar stage in his concrete thinking even though he is an incredible reader, so those questions are tough. But it gave me a good excuse to talk with him about what he'd read.

History is the same as Harry's, minus the outlining. WWE, FLL, and spelling are all going fine. He's just chugging along in them. Although we were feeling silly with the new outlining rule in FLL and we kept drawing lines on his paper until we had a little guy.

Who knew that outlining could be so fun?

I know we did some science together--it was about mass and matter. He finished the chapter and we'll move on next week.

Sam spray painting the ziggurat.

Annika:

I had the hardest time with her at the beginning of the year because she kept asking me over and over for things to do and couldn't just wait.  I'm happy to say that she doesn't bounce right next to me asking for work. She now bounces across the room, so I think that's progress. I actually had the genius idea to create a little board with all of her subjects on it. So she does her math, for instance, then she pulls the little tag off and brings it to me. The she knows what comes next and is usually willing to wait for a minute or two until I can get to her. I usually have the tags organized so she has something that's dependent on me, then something she can do independently next. It really has seemed to help.

Annika's board.

Annika started subtraction this week in Singapore Math. We have little counting bears, so we would set them up and half of them would go to the movies and we'd count the other half. First grade math isn't nearly as stressful as fifth grade math.

WWE, FLL, spelling and reading are fine. Annika learned the definition of a noun and then promptly taught it to her little sister so now they say it in unison, all. day. long. But I guess it's a good thing she knows it, right? We are reading from Tomie DePaola's Book of Bible Stories for reading, so she's going over stories that she mostly already knows. I usually read these to her so she can concentrate on the story, not the reading. She reads to me later from something that she's picked out.

She did the same history as the boys, but we talked about her sense of sight for science. I have a book or two that I want to read with her next week and then we'll move onto hearing.

Annika used her sense of sight to compare these three objects.

These reports always end up longer than they should. I think I just talk to much. So if you've actually read this, thank you. I'll try to make it shorter next week.

We Have Papyrus!

The inundation this year was just enough for the papyrus on the banks of the Nile to start growing:

Again, please ignore the stripes. Argh.

See the little shoots of grass? Cool, huh. But it looks like the Nile is a little low, I'll have to fill it up again in the morning.

Math Anxiety

I don't know if it's true for all homeschoolers, or even most homeschoolers, but for me the subject that can literally keep me up at night is math. How to teach it, what order to teach, what program and style, how many pictures on a page. All of these are huge questions. And I was going blissfully through life not unlike the grasshopper, saying that I'd get to those decisions later. After all my oldest is only ten and in fifth grade. We've had one major math issue and I switched him from MathUSee to Singapore to solve it. And it seemed to. Things have been pretty smooth sailing since then.

But then Harry decided that his life's dream is to take Pre-Algebra in sixth, not seventh grade. This wouldn't be a big deal except that I was counting on that year to figure out which math program to use going forward. And there are so many different choices out there. So many that I'm not even sure I know them all.

Let me list the math programs I know of, and if I have any thoughts about them, I'll list those too:

Saxon: Most likely won't use Saxon. Didn't like Saxon K and while it may be silly to base my decision on something Harry used for one month six years ago, I'm okay with that.
Singapore NEM and/or DM: I'm not entirely sure if these are the same program or what. I like Singapore Primary, so I lean toward these. But I have no real reason to lean that way, just as I have no real reason to lean away from Saxon.
AoPS: I'm not entirely sure what this is or if it will appeal to me, but I've seen it listed in various places and people seem to like it, so maybe it will work for us.

There are most likely lots of other programs out there that I haven't even heard of. There are certain companies I won't use, especially BJU, even if it's a great program. If there is something you think is fabulous though, let me know.

But, if you were picking from the three above, which would you pick and why? Sell me on one of these please. I need to sleep.

Recreating the Nile and Building a Pyramid

Last Friday my friend and I had the kids mix up a bunch of sand with a whole lot of glue to start the process of making sand cubes for a pyramid. We followed the ingredient list in the SOTW Activity Guide, which reads: "sand," "glue" but gives no measurements for either. So we just guessed. I'm not sure how much sand we used, it was a fifty-pound bag, I'm thinking it was about a quarter of it. But we did use at least three bottles of glue and some mod-podge just for extra sturdiness.

It worked! You've seen the pictures in other posts. But today we got to pull the cubes off of my baking sheet and build.

Building.

The end result. I am a terrible photographer. Sorry about that.

 Like I said, the pyramid would have looked a lot better if the blocks really were the same shape and size. But we had a good time building anyway. Maybe next time we won't do this during ant season and we'll be able to use the sugar cubes.

And now for the Nile...

This was a pretty straight-forward project, which was nice. It also didn't really take too long. The hardest part was getting the Nile Delta right.

Please ignore the colors and lines. I have no idea what's happening.

 Shaping the foil and laying down the river bed.

 Look, Sam is participating! Putting down the dirt for the banks of the Nile.

After the inundation. Hopefully the papyrus (grass) will germinate with in the next week or so. We'll have to get our Playmo Egyptians to mow their lawn.

And that's it for Egypt. This is more projects than I think I've ever done before and it's really because another mom and I realized that we were in the same spot in SOTW and that we also had free time on the same afternoon. That never happens so it must be fate that brought us together.

Next Up...A Ziggurat.

The Week in Pictures & Words

Emma playing Barbies. They were fighting over who got to wear the pink dress.

Panera School Math Class.

Emma's ouchy toe. She dropped a stainless steel water bottle on it last Friday.

Everything is easier if you can work on the floor (spelling).

Cheesy Harry sharpening his pencil for the umpteenth time.

Annika's Math Work

Sam pretending to be a scale and measuring the mass of the sand.

Marshmallow Constellations. I'm pretty sure this doesn't exist in real life. But then the marshmallows don't anymore either.

(Sorry for the lines in the pictures. I have no idea why they are there and I can't for the life of me get rid of them. If you have any ideas, let me know.)

So, for the words:

We are back in a better groove than we have been since our trip. Work is getting done more and more consistenly. Thank goodness.

I don't think there is anything major to talk about this week. Everything is just moving onto the next lesson or book or whatever. Oh, Harry did start piano again on Tuesday. It's not easy to find a teacher around here for less thatn $90/month. But I did. Sam will start in January when his schedule clears a bit (I wish I was kidding.) and Annika in a couple of years.

I have to say that I love reading everyone's weekly reports, I really do. But when it comes to writing my own, I don't want to say FLL, lessons 6-10 every single time. Instead, how about you assume that I'm keeping up with the kids main lessons in their core subjects and I'll post about more major things. Things like interesting books read or projects done. If the kids make a big leap into something new, I'll post that or if they totally fail at something...well, I might not post it in so many words. But if I start asking for help with something, it's probably because something didn't go so well. Okay? Thanks.

Keepin' It Real

On the off chance that you've discovered my blog and think that our days are all covered in rainbows and kisses, I will post an actual conversation that I had this morning with my 10yo.

Latin began at 11:30, it's now about 12:45

Harry, "This Latin is really hard." (Goes back to staring at the ceiling.)

Mom, feeling and sounding relatively sympathetic, "I know, but if you just look at the index in the back of the book, you'll probably find the word you need defined."

Five minute pass. I think he's working, but he's just looking at his book, flipping through it, hoping that something will stick as it passes.

Harry, staring at the floor, "Mom, are you going to dress up for Halloween?"

Mom, not quite as sympathetic as before, "Not the time. What do you need help with?"

Harry, flipping through his book and freaking out now, "I don't know...I don't know what this word is."

Mom, not sympathetic at all, "If you can't say it, spell it."

Harry spells sepulchre.

Mom, "It's sepulchre. What do you need to do with it?"

Harry, "Nothing, I just needed the answer."

It still took about another thirty minutes after this conversation to finish his Latin work. It was read a page and do a one-page worksheet.

And this ladies and gentlemen is why I'm grateful for the Word of Wisdom.

Chicken Mummy, Day Four

It's a good thing my friend also started the chicken mummification process with me. Otherwise I would have definitely given up by now. Not because it is smelly, because honestly, it isn't. Just because eww. I am not a fan of chicken and to have one, even one that is completely encased in salt, in my kitchen is just icky.

That said, I checked it again yesterday. It sits in an unused cupboard in it's oh so attractive Costco milkbox sarcophagus drying out. Really the only smell is the rubbing alcohol and a little bit of pumpkin pie spice.

This is the Pharaoh Kluckfu shortly after being taken out of his bags:

 He still has the old salt mixture on him.

This is a very brightly lit picture of what he looked like out of the bag and without the salt on him.

This is the mummification mixture. Two boxes of salt and half a box each of baking soda and baking powder.

I'll check him again on Thursday. See you then.

Color Coding

I put little colored dots on the kids books so that I can tell whose is whose just by looking at the spines. But it doesn't always work quite like I want it to when the books are pretty much the same in every other way:

It's almost enough to make me switch programs for at least one of the kids.

Book Work

If you ask the kids they'll tell you how much they love Fun Project Mom and that she really doesn't come around nearly enough. They usually have Sit Down and Do Your Work Mom instead.

This is what she presided over this week:

Harry:
Tales of Ancient Egypt for CHOLL. He finished the book and we're off to the Bible next week.
Singapore Math: I can't remember the lesson numbers but the big deal was learning negative numbers. I even looked up negative numbers on Khan Academy for him to watch. (It's a big deal because I usually forget to have them watch extra things.)
Life of Fred: Chapter 5. Another big deal, he did the "Your Turn to Play" and got the problems all correct the first time he did them.
Science: Human Reproduction. It's interesting. I won't be googling videos for him on this one.
History: You kind of already saw it. We also read the chapter in SOTW on Sargon I. Oh and I had him outline from Kingfisher Encyclopedia for the first time. It's been on his list of things to do since the beginning of the year and we finally did it. For some reason I thought it would take hours because again I was projecting myself on him. Eventually I'll learn not to do that, I hope.
Grammar Town: We finally got the Teacher Edition and I'm really excited about it. Harry isn't quite as excited.
Writing With Skill: I had to go buy a thesaurus but after that things moved swimmingly along. I am having to make sure he actually reads the directions and finishes the assignments. But when he actually works and finishes what he's supposed to his work is really good.
Spelling: He did some at some point.

Sam:
Sam runs through his work really, really fast. I'm trying to figure out what to do for him. He is so smart but he freezes when he gets to something hard. Sam is by far my most challenging kid--challenging because he's so smart but sometimes can't let out what's in his head.
Anyway, for right now, this is what Sam is doing:
Writing With Ease: We finally go the books we needed, so this started on Tuesday. Things are going fine.
First Language Lessons: Fine. We have a fun, goofy time with this. I would love to do Grammar Island with Sam--he's smart enough that he'd get it easily, but the scripted work of WWE and FLL is more his style. He has a really hard time with open-ended questions. Anyway, back to the goofiness. We make up stories and fun things to go with the scriptedness of FLL.
Spelling: fine. Spelling Workout is nothing to get excited over, but hey, he can spell.
Science: Umm...I thought we did some, but I can't find any evidence of it. We'll do better next week.
History: Check Harry's list, but he didn't outline anything.
MathUSee: He finished two lessons for real and a bit of Singapore Math 1B for fun. 
Tales from Ancient Egypt: I started Sam with the Grammar Stage lessons of CHOLL because he's in third grade and that's Grammar stage. Duh. He's been reading since he was three. So I bumped him up to the Logic Stage lessons so he and Harry are reading the same books. But I'm also having Sam read Annika's books to her because I want him to read the picture books too.

My one brilliant idea this week: Sam was having a really hard time narrating one day--I knew he'd read the book and understood it, but the words weren't coming out. So instead I grabbed a piece of paper and drew a web on it with the story title in the middle and then things I wanted him to tell me about around it. He actually had fun doing it and it opened him up enough to be able to tell me about the story.

Annika:
WWE and FLL: We did the next lessons, Annika thought it was fun to call Jason and I by our first, proper, special names instead of Mom and Dad for a day (I thought it would be fun for her).
Science: We made pumpkin playdough together. Does that count? We also talked about the different things we were putting into the chicken and why.
History: See chicken mummy. (I think if people ask me about history from now on, I'll just point to the chicken mummy and not say a word.)
Singapore Math: Addition. We're plugging along. She's remembering more and more and we're still using manipulatives and number lines. It's all good. She really likes math I think partly because it really reminds her of the structure of school. Math is math whether you are in a school building or at home.
Spelling: Kind of the same thing as math. Plugging along, going fine.
OPGTR: She's reading pretty well already, but I thought it would be a good idea to go through OPGTR anyway. I don't want her to get stuck later on and it's good practice for her speech issues. She's doing fine, I did find a place that she needs more help with, so we're going back through it again. But that's pretty much why we're doing the book.
CHOLL: Temple Cat and The Egyptian Cinderella. Complete with narrations and copywork.

And that's it. Sometime soon I'll post about Emma's preschool and some questions/problems I'm having. Maybe the five of you that read this will have some answers for me. Hopefully.

Craft Like an Egyptian

Let's face it, Ancient Egypt is cool and not only because it has it's own theme song. There are lots of projects and cool things to do.

You can write in hieroglyphics. I was going to post a picture of some hieroglyphic writing the kids did, but I forgot to take one. And I didn't save the actual hieroglyphics they did. Um, I know this is prior to the Egyptians, but here's some cuneiform the kids did:

I don't know what either of these say.

We also began the construction of a pyramid:

Mixing the sand and glue. It took a lot of glue.

This is about 24 hours after mixing. They have been cut twice and still have a lot of drying to do.

A lot of people don't actually make their own bricks and honestly I would be one of those people if we didn't have ants. It just seems silly to create a project out of sugar cubes and then break it up five minutes later because the ants found it. Plus I don't really need more bugs and semi-alive things in our kitchen with the whole chicken mummy thing going on. There is a limit.

I have to say that I don't normally do quite so many projects in such a short time. I have a friend that loves and thrives on projects and invited our family to hang out with hers. We also have the great Story of the World Activity Book that gives instructions on how to do everything.

Pharoah Kluckfu: The Next Day

I had to change the salt and spices in our chicken mummy this afternoon, so I thought I'd take a picture. Nothing much has changed with it. There isn't a smell (yet) except for the rubbing alcohol it was washed with. The hardest part was trying to get it out of the bags without stuff going everywhere.

And just because I don't want this to be the last image in your minds, this is Isis, our cat. Unfortunately she has become a Zombie Cat:

Pharaoh Kluckfu

A friend of mine talked me into mummifying a chicken with her. Well, actually it was supposed to be a kid project, but how often does that work out? Especially since Sam is one of the kids and doesn't touch icky things even in the best of times. Fortunately Annika really got into it--she was kind of scarily excited about it:

 Anyway, we got the requisite mummification supplies: dead pharaoh (chicken), and lots of salt, baking powder and baking soda. A friend supplied us with purple gloves which added an air of whimsy to the proceedings.

Combining the mummification spices.

Harry and Not-Sam. Sam was in the other room trying to stay as far away as possible. They were drying out the chicken.

The end result. I promise that there is a chicken in there somewhere.

Oh, and in case you hadn't hear, mummification Rocks! At least for some of us.

Blech: Weekly Report

So for one of the very few times since we began homeschooling, I really started to think that maybe I am not cut out for it and that we'd all be better off with the kids in school. It was that bad. Honestly I can chalk a lot of it up to being gone for two weeks on a road trip, having car trouble and getting the flu, but that doesn't explain all of what I was thinking and feeling.

Sure we did work, but if I measure out our weeks in how much time I convinced the kids to "just sit down and learn something" I'm not really fulfilling what I've set out to do. And that is? That is have a happy family; one that loves, trusts and relies on each other.

Next week will be better, I'm convinced. And I'm not just thinking hopefully either. We've been back for long enough to be used to being home (I don't look for maid service every morning anymore) for one thing. Also, the kids went to all of their outside classes last week, so we have an idea of what our week is going to feel like. And closer to home, I think I've got a better handle on our lesson schedule and I've rearranged and reorganized a few things so the days should more better in general.

It's going to be a good week, next week.

It has to be.

The Fun Stuff

Every year I swear that we will do more projects and fun stuff and less sitting with books. And every year that lasts about two weeks. Fortunately for the kids we are still within the two weeks. So last week they made bean people and dig an archeological dig in our sandbox.

 Today we made tortillas and painted "caves."

Let's just see how long this lasts.

A Post from the Past

Annika's birthday is tomorrow so I decided to go through my family blog to see what I've written in the past about her. I don't like to repeat my birthday posts. Anyway, I found this post that I wrote in January 2007. At the time Annika was about 18 months, Sam 4 and Harry 6. I had just pulled Harry out of a really bad kindergarten situation. I thought it was kind of interesting to read 4 1/2 years later.

 a new old normal

I've been thinking lately about this whole homeschooling idea. It seems to me that we are in something of a good rhythm. Things aren't perfect--the kids still fight, lessons don't go as I'd like them to, and the house is something of a mess, but I like what is happening.

Before Harry went to preschool we did little lessons or crafts every day. They weren't necessarily fancy or elaborate, but we did something every single day. We also had time to go to the park and play with friends, even though we did go to the occasional baby class or had a doctor appointment that messed with the schedule. All in all we had a slow pace of life that allowed me to do what I dreamed of and wanted to do with our kids.

Then Harry started going to preschool and there was stress. And driving. First the stress--is this the right preschool, what should he be doing in preschool; all of those questions that I continually asked myself. Once I found a preschool that I loved, I had to volunteer twice a month and drive all of the way over to it. It was fine--I felt like I was doing the best thing for Harry and I really did love the preschool. I also don't regret taking him there, he made a good friend he still plays with and I think it was a lot of fun for him. I also loved his teacher.

I also don't regret that he didn't finish out the year. It was stressful to have Annika with me and try to find a place for Sam to go when I volunteered. So when he decided not to go anymore last January, that was fine.

We tried to get into a good rhythm last year when we were "homeschooling," but it never worked. We had a hard time getting back to the crafts and little lessons he and I used to like. I also felt like I was continually shoving Sam to the side. (I couldn't do the same with Annika since she was nursing still and demanded to be fed!) I kept trying to get Harry to sit down so he could learn something and keep up with this or that curriculum . Yes, I know he was barely 5 and if I could go back, that is something I would change.

So it was off to kindergarten for Harry. He loved parts of it, but was continually stressed. I kept trying to do little lessons with him when he got home or before he went in, but more often than not we concentrated on being on time! It just didn't work for all of the reasons I've already mentioned.

Now, we're back. We do little lessons on things he needs to know. We read a lot, we draw and paint and play outside. We play math games and occasionally do work in his math book. We pull Sam in and teach him the words we are reading. I still nurse Annika so she's right in the thick of things.

Mostly we live. We do all of the things that got lost and made me feel good about being with my children. I'm a much better Mom now. So when you visit, expect a mess, children everywhere (it's amazing how three can suddenly feel like 300), and a happy family. Back to what worked so well, just bigger.

Unexpected Curriculum Problem

Is it weird that I continually mix up Annika and Harry's math books?

The reason:

Sorry the picture is upside down but I only have a minute and can't figure out how to flip it.

Anyway, I get them mixed up because Harry's is purple and Annika's is yellow. My kids are color coded--Harry is green, Sam is yellow, Annika is purple and Emma is red. That's how it goes when I buy toothbrushes or print their daily sheets or anything that it will be helpful to tell who's it is at a glance. So to have the books the "wrong" colors is really throwing me off.

Of course, if this is my worst problem, I'm doing pretty well.

Whew...

One of my biggest ongoing worries has been Harry's writing. He reads a ton but has never been one to make up stories about his animals or anything that I would say is a precursor to writing. He's done narrations and we did most of Writing with Ease and all of Sentence Island, but it still was a nagging worry in the back of my head. The schools around here also do a lot of writing, starting in kindergarten. Seriously. One of Annika's prompts was "The cloud in the sky looks like.." and they had to write three sentences about it. It's a little ridiculous.

Anyway, we started Writing with Skill last week and we're planning to start Paragraph Town in a few weeks, so we aren't lacking in curriculum. But I was still worried. Harry hated the first couple of days of Writing with Skill and the work I saw didn't help. So yesterday I sat down next to him and went over exactly what I expect from him for his WWS assignments. I stayed next to him while he worked and didn't let his frequent sighs and moans distract him or make me feel like the ogre he sometimes thinks I am .

Lo and behold, his assignment yesterday was better. I was really impressed. He didn't like actually doing the work, but hey, he's ten, he doesn't have to. But the writing he gave me was good. I know that WWS and the fact that it takes you through exactly how to do the assignment helped, but I liked how Harry used words.

Today I wasn't able to sit next to him, so again I was concerned. And again, he impressed me. This was a longer assignment and he did really, really well. There were seven well-formed sentences waiting for me.

So, in short (haha), I think Harry's problem is with the actual writing, not writing. I'll have him try typing the next assignment out, instead of hand writing it. And maybe we can turn something that makes both of us scream into something tolerable.

I Will Survive!

Well, it took us two weeks to finish a week's worth of work, but that's kind of how it goes sometimes, especially in the beginning. I'm not going to go through everything we did because I think that would be the world's most boring post. Here are some snapshots and thoughts about the first bit of school:

• My biggest challenge this year? Figuring out how to organize my days. I have the work figured out, the papers are all in folders, and the books are checked out and ordered. Those are variables I can control. What I can't control are the people. The best laid plans are still at the mercy of Emma wanting to sit on my lap, Annika not understanding 3+5, Sam forgetting he just read, or Harry freaking out about writing a sentence. Or me losing it because all of these things happen at once. I need to make sure I can keep my calm and project it to those around me. Much easier said than done.

Annika's first science page.

• Harry hates writing. I do mean hate. With the passion of a thousand fiery suns. Which kind of makes me hate writing. He started Writing with Skill this week. That seems to be going fine, probably because the book is telling him what he has to do. The real problem is the written narrations he has to do. He looks at me like he's never heard of something so cruel and promptly forgets what he's just read. I'm mean enough to tell him to sit still and think. I think he's old enough to write on his own five sentences about a book he's read. Otherwise he's doing pretty well. His work is basically a continuation of what he's been doing for the past few years.

This is how we are keeping track of books or chapters read. Annika gets a bead for each chapter she reads, the boys for each book. Emma pretty much if she asks. (What can I say, she's really cute.)

• It's fun to teach Annika. She really likes to figure things out. She can whip through the work I give her in just about an hour which means she spends the rest of the time that I'm working with her brothers asking me for more. Thankfully we have a bunch of cheap workbooks. Her reading is taking off and I'm having a blast starting First Language Lessons and Writing with Ease with her. It's a lot of fun to do the same things with her than I did with the boys. And to find new things just for her. She's starting Singapore Math from the beginning instead of Math U See. She's also reading different little stories than the boys did. I'm trying to make sure I spend time actually with her on my lap, reading. It's something that gets lost easily in the chaos.

From a Classical House of Learning project. They made people out of beans. Emma just used the glue. 

•  Sam does everything quickly and perfectly. My challenge with him is to keep him challenged. For now I've added Latin to his studies and he's reading a lot. He has a tendency to "shut down" if challenged to much, so I often feel like I'm walking a tightrope between what I know he can do if he tries and what he's willing to try to do. I've added Latin for Children to his work this year and he's doing a bit of Singapore Math with his Math U See. MUS is going well, I just want to make sure his whole brain is working. I'm also trying hard to keep him in books. Some kids outgrow their clothes all of the time, Sam outgrows his books. I'd say it's annoying but it's really pretty cool.

Our archeological dig.

I'm always more interested in projects at the beginning of the year. By the end I just want to get through things.

I wonder what a car, baby, dress, money, gun, Cub Scout belt loop, Pokemon, and stick can tell us about the civilization that went before?

 As you can see we have some challenges ahead, but that's always true. It wouldn't be homeschooling if I were completely confident about everything I'm doing. Oh, one thing that's going well is our memory work. I put it in their Fancy Folders (Annika named them) and we pull it out first thing every morning. It's been a great thing in a lot of ways. The obvious one--they are memorizing and using their brains. But I didn't expect the kids to become closer because of it. Some of what they are memorizing is the same for each child, so they kind of compete on that (not cool, they are different ages) but most of it's different. But because Harry can see Annika and Sam working hard to memorize something and actually get it, he cheers them on. And it's the same for the other kids. Totally unexpected benefit, but absolutely worth it.