Why I Will Homeschool My Girls

I have two beautiful daughters, one is five and one is three. They are smart, hilarious, and kind. They are also crafty, creative, and if the moment calls for it, pretty sneaky. Annika is my third child but my first daughter, so while I am used to being a parent, I'm still figuring out how to parent a girl. It's still fun to buy dolls and walk through the girly aisles at the store, even five years later.

Annika goes to regular kindergarten right now. It's not ideal--there are 34 kids in her class for one thing, but for the time being it's better than having her home. I am planning to fold her into our homeschooling next year, for which I will probably need therapy, but I'm really excited to keep her with us. It's just been a recently that I've realized how important it is for me to homeschool my daughters. Let me tell you a story.

Annika's class had a Valentine's Day Party, pretty standard fair for a kindergarten. She dutifully made her 34 valentines and one for her teacher. I helped, but she did most of the work. She proudly put them in a bag and took them to school to hand out to her friends. This is where the story might get confusing. I think her party was on a Thursday. Annika has pull-out speech therapy on Tuesday, so on the day the kids made their Valentine's bags she was not in the classroom. Instead, on Thursday morning, Annika's teacher pulled her into the classroom to finish the bag. Annika did and put it on the drying rack so it would dry before the party. (I didn't know any of this before I picked her up.)

I picked Annika up from school and asked her about the party. I asked to see her valentines before we left the school grounds and she told me that she didn't have any. I couldn't figure out what had happened so I asked her if they didn't have a party or if they didn't hand out valentines after all. She said they did and she handed hers out, but that she didn't get any. I talked to her friends that were standing there and the girls had all gotten valentines. It was all very mysterious. Annika's teacher was still there, so I asked her and immediately the teacher figured out the problem.

Annika's bag was still sitting on the drying rack. The teacher forgot and Annika didn't want to make waves so she didn't say anything about it. So my little girl put her valentines in the other kid's bags knowing that she wouldn't get any herself and never saying anything at all. It broke my heart and I couldn't figure out why she didn't say anything to the teacher about her missing bag.

It all turned out in the end, there were valentines left over and most of them were just sitting on the teacher's desk. The teacher gave those to Annika in the bag that she had made and Annika was just thrilled. She was okay originally, but she was so excited over those valentines.

Annika is a nice girl, mostly a good girl. She doesn't make waves at school and can easily blend into the background. Her teacher didn't even know that she could read for a couple of months after she started. Annika just wants to be liked by everyone there.

At home, she's completely different. She lets her needs be known, she is sweet but it's not fun to cross her.  Annika knows what she wants and she will get it, by hook or crook. While it can get annoying at times, I'm glad she does. Annika needs a place where she can be "bad" and know that she will still be loved. I work hard so she knows that she is an important part of our family and she is allowed to express her opinions. (She has a lot of them.) She doesn't need to be indoctrinated into the thinking that in order for people to like her, she must be quiet and well-behaved. I don't want her ever to think she's bothering someone for sticking up for herself.

So, along with reading, math, and spelling, I plan to teach my girls to stand up for themselves. To make sure they are treated fairly, even if it means they stick out. I don't want them being "nice" in order to be liked. I want them to be liked for themselves and to have the strength to know who that is. I don't want them to miss out on something because they didn't raise their voice. There will not be another Valentine's Day without valentines. This is something I know I can teach better than the schools.

And that is one of the big reasons why my daughters will be homeschooled.

Weekly Roundup, The Not Gallstones Edition

It turns out that I don't have gallstones, but no one is quite sure what is causing the pain in my side right where my gall bladder is. So I still have a lot of pain, but no answers.

In any case, this turned out to be a great week. We had a couple of missing books and one child that just sat there staring at his book mystified but not wanting to ask for help, but really, that's just normal. I did have a couple of appointments and will have more next week, but it's turning out to be a good thing. I don't want the kids to miss out on schooling because of me and I can be in pain moaning about it or doing lessons. So I think it's kind of spurred me on in a weird way.

Harry:

• wrote his "pre" poem.
• raced his Pinewood Derby car.
• learned about fractions in math. He did really great with this, so far. We haven't gotten into least common denominators yet, so it could be premature to rejoice, but I'll take a happy kid doing his math happily any day without worrying what might come in the future.
• read more of Sentence Island. We're almost to the end and we'll all be sad about it. We love Mud the fish. 
• worked on more sentences in Practice Island. He was working on sentence 51 I think when all of the sudden he looked up and said, "Mom, almost all of these sentences are about the ocean and fish!" He's still having a hard time with prepositions so we're making a list of the ones he sees. That way he'll have a visual reminder and won't get frustrated when he can't figure it out.
• got to parsing in Latin. This might be his downfall. He is having a really hard time figuring out what to do and then how to do it. So we're taking it very, very slowly. We look back in the book for clues, he tells me what he knows and I use the answer key to guide him along. However long it takes is cool with me. Latin was his idea, not mine. Mine was Swedish.
• read about India and Pakistan and Israel and Palestine. Fighting over land just mystifies him. I love that.
• did some science too. He's finishing up the second of two chapters on electricity in his science book. I will be so happy when he is finished. I'm dying for something new!
• began Number the Stars, I think. He might have started it last week. If so, he continued with it.

Sam:

• made a ger and a Genghis Khan to live in it.
• began his new Singapore Science Cycles book by searching every book in the house for info on kangaroos. Apparently we have no good books on kangaroos. I can't believe we're even allowed to be parents, let alone homeschool.
• continued adding and subtracting with regrouping. What can I say, it's MUS Beta. He only has two more lessons though, then we get to move onto multiplication!
• read about the Silk Road and China. Impressed our German guest with his knowledge after the guest told us that he lives in one of the towns on the end of the Silk Road. Classical education is really good for impressing people. 
• Worked on two lessons from Writing With Ease 2 and a bunch (we've doing a few each day) of lessons from First Language Lessons 2. We're past lesson 20 in WWE and it takes away some of the summary questions for the narrations. It's been tricky but Sam's done well with it. His problem is that he wants to tell me everything that happened in the book, down to the word. It's hilarious and very long.
• raced his Rhino-shaped Pinewood Derby car.
• read The Silver Chair, The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, and is now in Prince Caspian. To say he reads fast is a huge understatement.

The week went well. I just hope I don't have to be in pain every time I want to have a good week.

Genghis Khan Slept Here

Last week Sam read the chapter in SOTW 2 about Genghis Khan. We decided to do the "make a ger" activity from the Activity Book, but first had to buy the right felt. I have every kind of felt except for brown. Buying the felt alone took three days and then I had to locate all of the other supplies (paper, markers, glue). It was a little ridiculous and I felt bad every time I saw the felt sitting there. But finally yesterday the stars aligned and we undertook our building project.

Drawing the lattice work onto the cardstock.

Trying to make the ger wider than it was tall.

Covering the ger with brown felt. .

Creating the doorway.

Finished! Ready for Genghis Khan to move into.

After he finished the ger, Sam realized that he had to make a Genghis Khan. So we grabbed some sticks, some clay, a coke bottle lid and the rest of the felt. Sam came up with this:

The sign in front of the ger says, "Genghis Khan lives here."

I love doing projects with Sam. He really gets into them.



Oh, and of course, please excuse the messy kitchen. If we had waited for everything to be all perfect, we never would have had a chance to create. Not that I'm making excuses or anything...Of course not.

Eek, a Fraction!

Many, many moons ago I studied fractions in high school. My teacher was very nice, but somehow I got the whens, wheres, hows, and whys of fractions so mixed up in my mind that I just gave up. That started me thinking I was no good at math, which continues to today. Once I realized that math was hard I just gave up and decided that I'd have to be good at something else. It's not an uncommon thought and I know it plagues more people than just me.

Today I started looking at fractions with Harry. I decided long ago to make math neutral, to just work on it with each of my kids and not get concerned or panicky if it looked like they weren't getting it. That decision holds better some days than other.

The math book said to get something to show fractions with, so I looked around and quickly spied our tower of lego heads. Perfect! Hopefully even if I can't make math neutral, I can make it fun. At least 2/3 of the time.

Pre Poem

Not "before the poem," but a poem using the prefix "pre." And yes, it's about Persian Ninja Zombies.


Persian ninja zombies ate premium prepackaged brains,
predicted Bob would ride trains.
But they would prefer to go by plane
to watch the premiere of Preschoolers in the Rain.

Weekly Report, The Gallstones Edition

My gall bladder went bad this week. Apparently I have gallstones (I won't know officially until this afternoon, but it looks pretty sure from my symptoms.). Gallstones are really, really painful. So this week we've had to homeschool around doctor's appointments and my pain. But we're descendents of pioneers, so we pressed on:

Harry:

• continued with Singapore 4A; capacity and money. I know he knows money, so I'm trying to get him to finish the chapter today.
• learned about World War II and the Holocaust. I can't tell you how grateful I am to be the one introducing that topic with him.
• read many (sounds better than a bunch) of books about World War II. This includes a couple that I checked out of the library to preview, decided I didn't want him to read and hid. Apparently not very well as he found them and read them. They were books with pictures of children and bodies. I'm more than willing to teach the hard things, but I didn't want him to have those images in his mind yet.
• learned more about the workings of the body than he planned to. He now knows where the gall bladder is, what gallstones are and the risk factors for them. (Basically, very little pigment. If you know me, you'll know it was just a matter of time.)
• went to the aquarium with his Webelos troop. I am so grateful for a troop leader that is interested in the kids and is willing to go out of his way for them. 
• finished chapter 16 in Latin for Children A. I bought him the LfC Reader, but we aren't sure what to do with it. If you know, please help me.
• decided he wants to learn Greek too. Yet another language I can't help him with. What is wrong with these kids? If they wanted to learn an obscure language, what's wrong with Swedish? I can teach them that one easily. But nooo, they want to be all classical scholarly and stuff. 

Sam:

• is really, really excited to start MUS Gamma. He still  has a few more lessons of Beta to go, but his heart isn't into it really. He just wants to start something new already!
• read about Ghengis Khan and the Mongols in Mongolia. We had big plans to make the ger from the Activity Book, but haven't yet. Blame the stupid gall bladder.
• did the same science as Harry. He's lucky, he has Jason's skin tone. But I wonder if that means his appendix will attack him rather than his gall bladder? Hmmm. I'll have to worry about that more later.
• created a sculpture in the same style of Alberto Giacometti. The project again was from The Usborne Art Treasury.
• read a couple of other books that I can't think of and can't go get right now.

Overall, it was a goodish week. I had more plans to hang out at the park and do more schooly stuff. But considering that I spent half the week wondering why my body hurt so much and the other half just wishing my gall bladder gone, we did pretty well. Next week I'll have pictures. Of the kids, I promise, not my gall bladder. 

Also, a quick ps. I am so, so grateful for my usual good health. I've never had pain like this before and I can't imagine how it is to have it always. Those of you who do have my thoughts and prayers. And admiration. You are amazing. Hats off to you.

One Good Thing

Story of the World Volume Four covers the modern world. So we "get" to discuss things like the Civil War, World Wars I and II, and the Holocaust. (I know there's more to come, I just haven't gotten to it yet.) Harry has been interested in war history for a while--the planes and troop movements and even the weaponry interest him. But I haven't taught him any of the wars in depth because, hey, he's 10.

Today we read the chapter in SOTW about Hitler and the Holocaust. I let him read the first section by himself. It covered the attacks on different countries and things like that, but nothing emotional. I read the section on the Holocaust out loud to him after sending the other kids outside. I have to admit I cried. I've known about the Holocaust since middle or high school and I still cried while reading about what people will do to other people. I had to stop a few times to catch my breath or answer questions, so it took a while.

Harry wanted to know why people didn't do anything, why the US didn't swoop in and save everyone. He asked why the German people were okay with this happening and what happened afterward. I talked to him a bit about the people actually being worked to death. He is having a hard time with the fact that no one did anything. Except the Danes. Way to go Denmark. (I'm not being facetious.) We also talked about the fact that if we see something happening that isn't right, we have to take a stand. Whether it's something happening here at home or far away, we have to make our opinions known. I need to be better about that.

We listen to NPR in the car all of the time so he's no stranger to some of the awful things happening in the world. (I don't turn it off as much as I should, but I'm getting better about it.) It's just really hard to end a history lesson with the fact that some people are evil.

Oh, the One Good Thing I referenced in the title isn't that we talked about the Holocaust. It's that I got to be the one to talk to him about the Holocaust. I got to sit with him and read and he got to see how I reacted while reading to him. I think it does a great disservice to kids to study things like this academically while not allowing emotion to show. I'm thankful that I got to let my emotions show and that we could talk through them and talk about horrible things and what they mean for the world. Just knowing that horrible things happen isn't enough. If history is going to be important we have to allow our kids to see the that things affect the world and it's people years and years later. Even if it makes us cry.

Looking on the Bright Side

This week started out with Annika dumping gallons and gallons of fish water all over the play room floor and just never got back to normal. I sucked up as much water as I could and put fans around and checked it every so often but other than that, I just had to hope for the best. We also had a few random, one-time things come up. Annika had a Literature Parade at school on Wednesday morning, kicking off a day of driving and we were just thrown off. And, to continue the all-Annika week, she started Spring Break on Thursday. She is now out of school until the 18th. I'm going to do my best just to fold her into our regular studies next week. In a perfect world I would have the boys' Spring Break then too, but did you see our week last week?

So, rather than focus on the not-so-great stuff, here is what we did this week: (It's going to be a short list.)

• Sam finished lessons 25 and 26 in MUS Beta. I am frantically trying to get Gamma to start on. 
• Harry worked on capacity and measurements in Singapore Math. I think he's on chapter 3 now. 
• Sam read some books, but I don't know what they were.
• I do know that he read a couple of chapters from Little House on the Highlands.
• Harry didn't read anything official for school, but he spent at least an hour reading every day, so I'm happy. 
• We managed to do an art project this afternoon. Paul Klee from the Usborne art project book I mentioned last week.

The project idea

Sam's version.

 

Annika and Emma hard at work.

• We played at the park and enjoyed the warm weather all week.
• I read to Annika and had her read to me. I love when they discover how fun reading really is!
• Emma listened to Annika read book after book to her. I just watched an enjoyed.

I've decided to find the good in everything we do. I think that this blog can easily get caught up in the "oh-my goodness, homeschooling-is-hard" mentality since I sit here thinking about our actual days. It's so much easier to focus on the negative and nitpick the day apart when I'm trying to remember everything that we've done. to combat that, I'm going to find at least five good things every day. I might not post them all of the time, but I will find them.

That and I'm planning for next year. Bright, shiny next year when I'll be a perfect teacher and my kids will all be perfect students. I can't wait!

Planning is Fun!

I will have three official students next year and one preschooler. To say that I'm concerned would be a huge understatement. I honestly don't know how it's all going to work, but I'm sure I'll figure it out, probably in June of 2011.

These are my plans for next year, as of right now. They do have a tendency to change, so I'll keep you posted (since I'm sure you are dying to know!).

Harry's 5th grade: (Can I just say how surreal it is that I'll have a 5th grader next year? Weird since I'm still 20.)

Language Arts:

• MCTLA Town Level
• Classical House of Learning Logic Stage Ancients
• Working Words in Spelling but I don't know what level yet

Math:

• Singapore Math 4A, 4B, 5A We switched from MUS this year and he tested into 2B, so that's where he started this year. I actually expect him to start on 4A before the year is over, but I'm not sure when.

History:

• SOTW Enhanced. I'm planning to have all three of the kids doing Ancients, but adding where I need to. Harry will work on a timeline, outlining, mapping, and all of the other stuff he is supposed to do. He'll use the Kingfisher History Encyclopedia along with SOTW. 
• His readings will also follow along with the Ancients

Science:

• This is my biggest concern. I'm planning to continue him with Singapore My Pals are Here 5-6 grades, but I'm not thrilled with the idea. I might just go back to my roots and follow what TWTM says to do. We'll see as the summer goes along.

Latin:

• Latin for Children B. An easy choice. He's doing well in it and we're keeping it.

Logic:

• I don't know. We're religious, but I school secularly and I don't really want to use something that I have to edit every day all day. So if you have any brilliant suggestions, I'm all ears. Even if they aren't brilliant, let me know.

Sam's 3rd Grade:

Language Arts:

• Writing With Ease 3
• First Language Lessons 3
• Spelling Workout whatever level he is on at the beginning of the year.
• Reading follows the history suggestions. I might have him read the same books as Harry, but do the lower level of assignments from CHOLL and have Harry do the upper. Hmm, I just thought of that. Brilliant idea! Less work for me and keeps the kids together and we can all discuss together. Awesome!

Math:

• MUS Gamma. He's actually going to start that this month sometime so we're jumping the gun a bit. He's just breezing through math right now. I do have a concern though. Harry got completely stuck on division at the end of Gamma last year and lost all confidence in his math abilities. I don't want that to happen to Sam but I don't want to switch him just because I'm worried. So we're sticking with it until it doesn't work.

History:

• Ancients: I'll add to SOTW but not nearly as much as I will for Harry. I'm so excited to only have one history stage to work on next year.

Science:

• Singapore MPH Science, 3-4. Same concerns as with Harry, but going to get it anyway.

Latin:

• Latin for Children A

Annika's 1st Grade:

Language Arts:

• Spelling Workout A
• First Language Lessons 1
• Writing with Ease 1
• Copywork
• Reading: follow SOTW and WTM. Also Ambleside

Math:

• Singapore Math 1A. I'm not going to even introduce MUS with her. Also, she is quite the little Harry clone so I think she'll really like it.

History:

• SOTW Ancients

Science:

• Playing around outside

Possibly Song School Latin if I feel like it and think she wants to.

I have massive reading lists for all of the kids that we'll work through as well.

Whew, I have my work cut out for me.

Blah

I wonder if there is such a thing as the spring blahs. Maybe that's why they invented Spring Break. Hmm...I'll have to think about it a bit more.

I'm a bit frustrated this week, so I haven't posted. I had a great week planned out--full of work and fun and maybe the beach. But none of it has worked. On Monday Annika  opened the filter to our 100 gallon fish tank and dumped between 15 and 20 gallons of water onto the new carpet in the playroom. Yep. She did. Then she lied to me about doing it. On the other hand, she told me only a couple of minutes after the water started gushing out so I was able to stop the water pretty quickly and it looks like the permanent damage will be minimal. I hope.

So, things haven't gone as planned. But then I started asking myself when they ever go as planned. Do I ever have a week where someone isn't sick or a class isn't canceled or something like that? Nothing major, but something that is enough to throw a wrench in the works. I really don't. Last week Emma was busy throwing up (on me) every other day. No fever, no other symptoms, but throw-up every other day. It was weird. The week before Jason didn't feel great so he took some days off of work and while that's fine, having Daddy home definitely throws things off.

The question is what do I do with the changes? Do I throw up my hands and declare a mistrial? Do I get anxious and frantic that we won't complete what we've started? Do I do both? Or do I just go one doing the best I can and trying to catch up whatever I can the next day or week?

I think I probably do a lot of the first two questions and not enough of the last. My goal this week is to rework the schedule to absorb the missing work from this week and at the same time make sure that I'm not trying to pack too many things into a small amount of time or sanity.

Because that small amount of sanity is all I've got left.

Plotting and Planning

It's Sunday night here and I'm about to go to bed. About this time every Sunday I sit and think about my plans for the week. It helps me plan out meals, figure out who is probably going to be tired on what day and generally organize my week. I don't write much down, but the ten or so minutes I spend thinking about things really helps me get ready for the craziness.

Big Stuff:
Annika's Spring Break starts on Thursday. I think. I thought it was later in April, you know, around Easter, but someone told me that it starts this week.
Sam's speech therapy was moved this week. Just have to remember.
Annika's school has a Literature Parade sometime this week, I'm assuming before Thursday. She mentioned something last week about needing gray clothes. We have no gray clothes for her (she's a 5yo little girl for goodness sake) so I might be making a quick run to WalMart for sweats.

Regular Stuff (in no particular order and with no dates or times attached):
Harry's classes: 3 hours of freeish time for me
Sam's classes: 3 hours of freeish time again
Annika's dance
Emma's dance
Chess Club
Annika Daisy Scouts
Sam Scouts (I'm the leader, so it's mine too)
Harry Scouts (not the leader, thank goodness)
Piano lessons
Sports class

I think that's about it. It looks like a lot more than it really is. A lot of the kids' stuff is packed into just a couple of days so I'm not driving crazily hither and thither too much. Also, we host as many classes here as I can just because I'm lazy on the days I can be.

I've also realized in the last few months that trying to cook a full meal every night is impossible. I end up being cranky and irritable and just wanting the kids to go somewhere else while I cook in peace. So, I'm not cooking the full fancy meal every night. I'm still making dinner, but I want to enjoy the hours between 5 and 7 rather than dread them. I'm doing as much prep as I can in the morning, using my crock pot and I've vowed not to open  a cook book most nights. I need to make dinners that are easy to make and easy to clean up instead of the perfect osso bucco Martha Stewart recommends in the latest issue of Whole Living.

Now I'm making things like spaghetti and stir fry and saving the cool, fancy dinners for the weekends. It really makes a lot of sense. Something had to give before my sanity did and dinner is the only thing that worked. And it's not that I'm not feeding my family good food in the evenings, I'm just trying to do it quicker and easier.

Wow, justify much?!

Week Number: I have no idea, but we're not finished yet

So I'm never quite sure how to format these reports. Do I do it by child or by subject? Should I just post quick bullet points or talk about what we did? Pictures or no? Ack...so much stress. It's amazing I ever post at all.

The kids found the Lite Brite set this week. I thought this one is funny, it's Peppermint Patty Taking a Test.

There are tadpoles in there. The kids found them in the vacant lot below our house.

Last week I started with Emma and she's only 3 and not a "student" of our school yet, so this week I'll begin with Harry. He's 10 and is most definitely a student.

Annika is READING to Emma!

 Harry this week:

Language Arts: He wrote a poem about Stalin, finished The Impossible Journey, narrated it, did some spelling, a Sentence Island assignment where he wrote sentences with subject/verb disagreement and then fixed them, read about the prefix "super" and wrote a "super" poem.
Math: You know how people ask you how you are going to possibly teach math to your first grader and you laugh because you are pretty sure you can handle first grade math? Well, I can no longer laugh. Thank goodness it's fourth grade, not first grade, but it came a lot earlier than I thought it would. Harry's working on pounds and ounces right now and figuring out how to subtract them was trickier than I thought. I did get it and taught Harry, but it was a little touch and go for a while there. That's kind of embarrassing to admit, but I don't usually subtract pounds and ounces; if I'm using them I'm cooking and adding more to it (ie: butter for cookies).
Moving on...
History: The Russian Revolution still (see above Stalin poem) and the Communist Revolution in China. Harry read a book on the Long March and today we'll be using paperclips to show it visually, ala SOTW Activity Book.
Science: Electricity still. He read the next chapter in Singapore Science, and spent time playing with Snap Circuits--one of the best kits ever invented. I also really love the chapters on electricity more than some of the others. But I'm not sure why.

Other Stuff: Harry had Improv, Art and Music (they are practicing to put on an opera), and Greek and Latin Roots. We had to cancel Chess Club because Emma was sick. He made it to Webelos but Volleyball is canceled today for rain. Oh, and he's frantically working on his piano theory because his lesson is in about three minutes.

Sam:

Language Arts: Let's see, he's reading and narrating Little House on the Highlands still, he read The Mysterious Howling after I refused to finish reading it to them (I really didn't like it), he's working on his chapter in Writing With Ease 2 and his lessons in First Language Lessons 2. I know he also read a bunch of books on the Medieval period, which I am too lazy to go find. He did some spelling, I think two lessons this week.
Math: Subtraction with Regrouping three numbers. Can you hear the Jaws theme? That proved fairly tricky, but we printed out a couple of worksheets from the MUS site for more practice and I think he's okay. It's just another reminder to stay on top of what he's doing.
History: The Jewish Diaspora. He did the mapwork and coloring page from the SOTW 2 Activity Guide.
Science: The Singapore Science chapter on materials. He's been wandering around the house telling me what everything is made of. It's kind of funny.
Other Stuff: Cooking class, Arts and Crafts and Word Factory. We had to cancel his Wolf Scouts because it's at our house and Emma was sick. Sports is canceled and he's doing piano right now.

She's fine, just enjoying the warmth after a week of rain and cold.

Exciting Thing for the Week: We did art! Both boys take an art class, at least for another week, but I'm not at all happy with the instruction. This week I decided to pull out our art stuff and see what we can do. It turned out pretty well, I think: Van Gogh Afternoon.

We were invaded by armies of small ABAB patterned bears thanks to Emma.

"Super" Persian Ninja Zombies

Another four-line poem assignment, this time using "super."

Persian ninja zombies: superior to
Superman going to a supermarket through
a supersonic supernova while
eating a supersaturated sandwich.

again, by Harry

My Mythical Kids

Yesterday I cleaned the kitchen while listening to a couple of Susan Wise Bauer's convention talks. I love that I can do this. I have Well-Trained Mind and read it at least once a year, but there is just something about having the author talk about how she does things or exactly what she meant that really makes homeschooling this way seem possible. (Wow, now that's a run-on sentence.)

So yesterday I listened to her talks on using the Great Books to teach history and how to teach writing to middle graders. I listened and nodded and cleaned and thought, "wow, this makes so much sense. I'm going to make sure I start this with the kids tomorrow." It's not that we haven't been doing what she says, well, except for the whole middle-grader thing, since Harry is only in fourth grade, but it's always good to have a reminder or a kick in the pants. So that was yesterday.

This morning Harry read the last of The Impossible Journey and Sam read a couple chapters of Little House in the Highlands. Harry came back to the desk and told me a couple of things about the book, we talked a little and I was about to tell him to grab his science stuff and all of the sudden it occurred to me that this is when I ask him about who he identified with or some of the other questions from the talk. And then I panicked because I couldn't remember them. And I let the moment go by. I tried with Sam, but he just clammed up and wouldn't say anything, so that didn't work.

It was then that I realized. I want to do these things and I know they are important for the kids' educations, but rarely do I ever put them into practice in real life. But while I am listening to the talks or reading the books and blogs I ask the questions and do the memory work. I do all of these things though with my imaginary kids--the ones that pay attention all of the time, do their work without jumping up and down 500 times and don't eat all of the treats out of the pantry. Last night I could just picture the kids sitting down to discuss things and we had a fabulous night of serious intellectual pursuits. But then Emma threw up again and I was back into my real life with my fabulous but very real kids. And since I'm not going to trade them for the mythical ones, I need to come up with a plan to implement all of these wonderful ideas in the here and now.

Harry's Poem About Stalin

By way of explanation...we have been studying the Russian Revolution and reading books about the time right after when Stalin came into power. So, it's fresh on his mind. Also, this wasn't the first thing he thought of. Originally Harry's poem was going to be on Roman Gladiators, but we couldn't think of a good metaphor. Then he thought of birds and planes, but lost the paper he was writing his ideas down on. When I talked to him again he said he wanted to write a poem about Stalin and compare him to an iron fist.

The assignment was to write a poem using a metaphor. There could be other poetic devices, but metaphor was the primary goal.

Without further ado...

Stalin is an Iron Fist
by Harry

Flowers and trees bloom and pop,
Sun rises and doesn't stop.
Birds are noisy, eating seeds,
But in the garden there are weeds.

Russia turns cold.
Birds flee, gardens die.
Iron first comes and closes,
Stalin takes power, no more roses.

The iron fist grabs and crushes
changing life, people to mush.
Stalin has power, no one against him,
The iron fist will always win.

I think...

that a "good day" should really include a little of this:

The painters' workshop

 We bought The Children's Book of Art and The Usborne Art Treasury. I'm embarrassed to say how long it's been since we've opened either one. The Art Treasury book has actual projects in it--so you read about an artist and then do a project in the same style. I know I've looked at it a few times, but I've never actually done one. I know, I know.

But that all changed today. The kids actually stayed in different rooms for quiet time (only coming out six or seven times), Emma took a good nap, and the stars all aligned so that I could paint with the older ones. We read the quick biographies about Vincent Van Gogh, looked at the project, and...actually did it!

Here are the results:

Harry's before he painted the blue sky in.

Sam's. The red thing in the middle is a bird.

Mine. I know, I'm shameless.

Annika's. The large pink thing in the middle? A tree.

Emma's. She woke up as we were finishing and decided to paint too.

So, I don't know that we can do this weekly. But I will definitely try harder, it was a lot of fun. It's kind of nice now that most of the kids are past the "let's dump paint everywhere just to see what will happen" stage.

And I liked hearing that I'm the "greatest artist in the world." All the incentive I need!

Just plugging along...

 

This week Emma decided that she wanted to learn to read. I've been making a real effort to read to her this last little while, so I think she just got inspired. So we sat down with OPGTR and turned to lesson one--the short-A sound. We went through it and repeated the poem and had a grand old time looking for the A's. And when we finished she looked at me and said, "thanks Mom, for teaching me to read." Then she climbed off my lap, went running through the house yelling, "Annika, Annika, I know how to read too!" Thankfully Annika didn't burst her bubble. (Aside: she's not really ready for formal reading instruction like OPGTR she just likes having lessons like everyone else.)



Annika though is reading amazingly well. She's really taken off with it! I turned to the last lesson we did in OPGTR and started again with the next one. She read it and the next five lessons. I knew she was reading--she hasn't kept that a mystery, but it was fun to have her on my lap zooming through the book. Annika also grabbed on of the math workbooks we have and went through seven or eight pages in that. I kind of lost track and she just kept going. We got her report card this week which said something like "she's about to start reading and is doing well in class." It really annoys me that her teacher doesn't know that she's reading, but that's why she's not going to first grade there next year.



Sam is doing well, plugging along with his work. He actually finished two lessons in MUS Beta this week. They were easy and he's ready to be finished with the book. He's started to read Little House in the Highlands also, so I'm getting a bunch of questions about "bairns" and "lairds." History was about King Richard, King John and Robin Hood, so I think we'll have to have a viewing of Robin Hood tonight. (Viewing sounds way more educational than watching, doesn't it?) FLL and WWE are going well, just plugging along in them. I don't think anything exciting happened with them this week. Oh...I had a great idea this week. I usually listen to the kids' narrations and try to write them down while they are talking which leads to me saying, "wait a sec" and them forgetting what they wanted to say. So I decided to have them speak into the microphone on my iphone. That way they can talk for as long as they want and I can transcribe it later. The only problem is that the iphone is a fascinating toy so they talk for a long time just to get to use it.




Harry, let's see. He finished The Time Machine and is still (right now) reading The Impossible Journey. We are so far behind on his reading it's not funny. If a SOTW lesson is to take a week and they should do all of the other reading, how do people keep on track? I have never been able to figure that out. So, he'll keep doing readings that are a few weeks behind where we are and I'll keep feeling guilty that I can't keep it together and we'll both go on like we have been. Practice Island was better this week. I had him review direct and indirect objects and I'm keeping a closer eye on him while he does his assignments. Last week Harry decided to write his metaphor poem about Roman gladiators but he couldn't think of any metaphors for it so he switched to birds and planes. I'm hoping to get some of it written today. Math--kilograms and grams. He's doing well in Singapore Math. The best part is that I can see how he thinks about math changing. He's better able to solve problems in his head and way more confident in his math abilities. Yay! Latin was a review week, SOTW was the lead up to WWII. It's one of my favorite time periods and I get to use some of my old teaching stuff. I love it.

Lots of text, I know. I'll try to take more pictures next week. This week the only ones I took are from our Scout Den Meeting and they have lots of other kids in them, so I can't post them here.

Good Day

A few years ago on some of the blogs I used to read people asked "what makes a good day of school/learning?" At the time Harry was in kindergarten or first grade and I only had three kids instead of the four I have now. (Let me tell you, adding the fourth was both fabulous and crazy.) A good day of learning was when I read to Harry and Sam from one of our 5,043 read-alouds, we did a little addition and colored a lot. A really good day of learning was when I kept Annika from eating our math manipulatives. But there was also this intangible something that you could feel--connections made and understanding achieved. It was something that you couldn't put on a list but you kind of knew it when it happened.

Now that life is more complicated with running kids hither and thither and keeping track of what they are all learning and what they've had to eat during the day and oh my goodness, everything else a mom of four does I decided to revisit the idea of what makes a good day of learning.

For me, right now, a good day of learning involves staying home more than going out. We live in a place where the kids can go outside and play pretty much any day of the year, so outside play is important. Reading to the kids is important, whether it's a "school" book or just a story book. I need to make time for Emma every day. She gets her own read-aloud time and special books, but so often it's easy to just tell her to wait and then it never happens. Of course we have our formal lessons, those are important in any day. But I'd like for the kids to take what they are learning in one subject and make the connection with another. That may be the intangible part of what makes a good learning day. The importance of connections is also why I love doing classical education the way it's set up in The Well-Trained Mind. If we study a time period and talk about a author from that period and also study an artist from that period it really cements what that time period is about.

I'm sure there's more and I'll probably think of it as soon as I hit post, but for now, this is what makes a good day of learning.

Oh Joy...

Reading at dance class.

Apparently this week was a bust too. I just graded a bunch of Harry's work (and by grade I mean looked at it) and he had a bunch wrong in Latin, math, and grammar. And when I went to find Sam's I couldn't. It's either gone or I just imagined that we worked this week. I'm actually leaning toward imagining it.


Where do I go from here? I think a couple of lessons on following directions are in order--Harry's actual Latin was pretty much okay, he just didn't fill in sections of the charts. It wasn't that he didn't know the words, he just didn't finish the chart itself--so we don't know if the are singular or plural or male or female. I'll have him fix it on Monday and stay closer to him next week.

I will do a little review of grammar and math on Monday morning before we start anything else. Math shouldn't be a problem, he started Singapore 3B this week. The first lessons are on measurements--kilometers, meters, feet, and inches. It looks like he thought that a kilometer is one hundred meters rather than a thousand. So we'll go over that on Monday morning, he'll redo what he missed and we'll go on our merry way. Grammar is going to be tougher. He has been getting the same things wrong for a week or so now. Indirect and direct objects are his nemesis. So we'll reread the part in Grammar Island that talks about objects, I'll try not to pull my hair out and we'll go on our merry way. (I hope.)

Other things were better. Harry is reading an adaptation of The Time Machine (Classical House of Learning Literature) and The Impossible Journey to go along with history. We had a long discussion of Joseph Stalin which worked well with everything we've been hearing about Libya lately (I have got to stop listening to NPR in the car.). He finished his poem for "spec" in Building Language. I'll post it later. And best of all...we did science this week!!! I decided that doing everything every day wasn't working and now we have history on Tuesday and science on Wednesday. It actually worked. As did the science topic--electrical circuits. So Harry got out his snap circuits and we played after he did his work.

Jason brought home some dry ice this week. We had a blast (literally--they put it in bottles with hot water, closed the bottles and tossed them into the backyard.) It's nice to have a scientist for a Dad.

Sam read and read and read. He also kept going in MUS Beta--lesson 23. He actually used the MUS blocks to work out how to regroup in subtraction. But by the end of the week he had it and could work without the blocks. Emma was happy to see the blocks out and decided to do some regrouping herself, usually with the blocks Sam needed. Of course. We kept going in WWE--The Pied Piper. He has really good writing but spent more time decorating the paper than doing his work. First Language Lessons is going going going. He's on linking verbs and if I could find those packages of index cards I lost we would be moving merrily along. Where, oh, where can you be index cards.

Scary Annika

History is so fun when you are in second grade --Knights and the Crusades. I got a little worried when he kept playing Muslims vs. Christians though. The MUS blocks, the pattern blocks, the games outside were all the Crusades. But at least I knew he understood what he read. We did the maps and the coloring page too. Someday we'll get to all of the other fun activities. Science was playing with Snap Circuits with Harry and inspecting all of our batteries. He also recharged all of our rechargeable batteries.

That's about it for the week. Oh, and just for kicks, someone asked me if I'm having a boy or a girl.

I'm not.

I forgot to mention...

At least one of us was sick every day this week and aside from reading and a couple of days of math (not consecutive even), we didn't do much school work this week. I probably shouldn't post this, but in an effort to "keep it real" I'll put that out there. I eventually called off school for the week, called it Spring Break ('cause I can do that) and went around cleaning every surface in our house with lysol, bleach, and vinegar. But not at the same time, I promise. We're fine.

It'll be back to real life next week though. mwahahahaha. (aimed at the kids who think this week was just so fun.)