An Atmosphere of Learning
I’ve been thinking lately about the atmosphere of learning in our house and I feel like we could use some improvements.
When we first started homeschooling, I was much more relaxed about what we ‘needed’ to do. Since we were just starting out, I felt like there was all the time in the world, and we could take things easy. Homeschooling was really fun. We did a lot of hands-on stuff, and there was much less resistance from the kids (which may very well be chalked up to the novelty of homeschooling after leaving a desk).
Over the course of the last few years though, I feel like there’s been more and more pressure on me to ‘get it right’; to be more rigorous and push the kids harder. I try to combat that feeling, but I am not sure where it comes from, so it’s hard to fight. I’m sure there is outside pressure, but I’d wager that the majority of it is internal, and that can be really difficult to overcome. My post last week was partially about working through that feeling, so I don’t want to dwell on that aspect too much this week; instead, I want to talk about the overall environment that we create in our home as homeschooling parents.
When we first started, it was very important to me to have a ‘school space’. We’re fortunate to have the room to dedicate to school, even though at present, it’s become more of a storage space and we’ve moved school to the kitchen table. I think that this is something I need to work our way back into. I felt more ‘together’ when we were working in a dedicated space, and more like we were altogether more focused. The school room also has less distraction, and the kids both have their own spaces to work in (which means that they annoy each other less). The other aspect to this is our style of teaching/learning. One of the things I have always liked about Montessori style education was that it was uncluttered and accessible. Things were laid out in such a way as to encourage the child to experiment and choose their own path. I do still agree with that, but I also feel like there needs to be a good, solid foundation of the basics before a child can really move on into learning what he or she likes or needs. But, if I left it up to my kids right now, everything would be about video games. It’s hard to find balance between those two philosophies, but in my plan for next week (when we’re off) is to de-clutter as much as possible and get us back into our school room.
Another area I’d like to work on is my tendency to lapse into ‘teacher’ mode. I struggle with finding the balance between lecture and encouragement. I’m a talker, so what I tend to think of as inspiration or helping foster ideas tends to come across as nagging or droning on. I also tend to jump the gun when it comes to offering help or going
on a new direction or way of thinking about something, instead of giving them the time to really consider what’s already been said. That’s one of the reasons that I used the picture above with Holt’s quote, because I need to learn when to shut up!
Something else I want to continue working on is ‘learning by teaching’. Teaching others is the most effective way to ‘know’ something. I want the boys to work more on helping each other, either when one grasps a concept first, or by working independently on different parts of something and teaching what they know. I think this will also help me keep my mouth shut and let them find opportunities to shine.
We have an anchor chart similar to this one that we use when we start something new. I have found that learning where they are in this journey helps relieve frustration when they don’t grasp something right away.
Another area where ‘learning by teaching’ comes into play is in our extra curricular activities.
We have become involved in scouting recently, and one of the things I like about it is that it encourages leadership and mentoring. We have a split scouting troupe – one group of kids who are in the 8-13 age group, and another in the 3-5 year old age group. This is an excellent opportunity for the older kids to be actively mentoring the younger kids. This concept is also reinforced through their karate classes. Our sensei regularly pairs up more advanced students with newer ones to give them the opportunity to teach, which bolsters the students’ confidence in themselves. You can’t teach it unless you know it. I want to get to my kids on every level so that they really understand and know what it is to be adept at their skills.
Other than those areas that need work, overall I am pretty happy with the learning environment we’ve fostered in our home. The kids have access to board/card/video games, art supplies, research materials (both in print and online), books, magazines and other printed media, mechanical things to take apart and reassemble or create something new, science craft books and materials, quick & healthy snacks to fuel up when the need arises, and a variety of different modes of learning pretty much all the time. They have plenty of outdoor space (including 10 acres to roam, bikes and a mile radius to ride, skateboards, a pool, a garden and a pond to explore). We also regularly meet with our homeschool group in person, and the kids have an online chat list and can play video games online with each other. We also engage in regular community service activity and have scouting 1x per month (soon to be more often) and karate classes 3x per week with a ton of other homeschooled kids.
It really does help sometimes to write down the positive aspects instead of the negative ones.
Additional Sources:
This is an excellent ebook by Brenda Sain called Creating an Atmosphere of Learning.
Warmly,
~h
Top Ten Homeschoool ‘Must-Haves’
One of the groups I am in on Facebook joked about getting a new table and chair set for her homeschool room, at her request, for a combo birthday/Mother’s Day prezzie. Naturally, that made me start thinking about the things that I ‘must have’ as a homeschool parent and thought I would post about it.
In anything we do (sports specifically come to mind), it seems that there is a list of requisite supplies that you need in order to successfully compete or carry out the task at hand. Obviously, when you’re homeschooling, you have to have things like curriculum (or some sort of plan, even if you’re unschooling). A dedicated school room, while nice, is certainly not necessary; school can be just as well accomplished at the kitchen table or on the floor (or in the yard, in the car, at the library, at the park… you get the idea). So this list isn’t about the typical ‘basics’ – this is all about what I, personally, have found to be indispensable for homeschooling in our house. Your mileage may vary, and I would love to see your lists in comments or a link back to your blog if you write it there!
So without further adieu….
10. Coffee – without caffeine, nothing would ever get done. I an convinced that the pyramids were built *because* they had coffee running in their veins instead of blood. Though almost any kind will do, my very most favoritest combination is Texas Pecan coffee from HEB with Coffeemate Italian Sweet Creme non-dairy creamer. If you get coffee at my house, this is probably what I am serving you.
9. External hard drive – I have a Passport 500GB one (in fabulous red), and it’s almost full. When I got it, it was much more expensive – if you’re in the market and have the extra $20, I say go for the 1TB, minimum. Over the course of your child’s homeschool career, esp if you’re starting out homeschooling from the beginning, you’ll use it. I archive everything (in multiple places, really), and frequently. Computers come and go – I can’t tell you how many friends have lost *everything* because they didn’t back-up regularly. If you’re not already, PLEASE back your stuff up!
8. support system – We’re especially fortunate to have a supportive family. Not only Loverly Husband, but my parents and his as well. I was homeschooled, and so were several of my cousins, so I am lucky to have this kind of supportive platform to spring from. However, even with that built-in support, having a supportive community around me has been and remains essential to my homeschooling success. Not only for the ‘hey we’re having a crappy day’ support, but for the inspiration, the ideas, the encouragement, the thought-processing…. the list goes on. My homeschooling ‘community’ is in parts – real life, which includes family and friends (who do and who don’t homeschool), which includes my local homeschool group; and online support. I am a part of our local group’s chat list (and the kids have their own online chat list through the group as well). I also frequent homeschool forums, blogs, websites, and watchdog sites to keep abreast of the goings-on in the homeschool world at large.
7. Gallon-sized ziplock freezer bags – this is an organizational tool for me. I store lapbooks-in-progress in them. A gallon-sized bag holds the folded lapbook, all of the papers and templates and mini-books and the source material (literature selection, guide, and/or other assorted papers) all together in one place. It may not seem like a big deal, but if you’re into lapbooks, they’re indispensable.
6. storage clipboards - This many seem like a luxury item, and it is… this whole list kinda is, really. But this feels especially indulgent. We school ‘on the go’ quite a bit and my kids are notorious for losing their work. I usually keep things in folders (and what’s not 3-ring’d into place is stapled in), but these clipboards make storage and pencil-toting easy and all-contained. We have several of them and they get a good workout!
5. My blog – I have this on the list because I am a chronicler and I mean that it’s important for me to write, NOT that I think my blog is an essential for the world at large. By ‘chronicler’, I mean that when my kids were babies, I religiously kept up their baby books. When they started school, I kept papers, then at the end of the year, I culled, but still managed to keep a respectable overview of their school year. Now that we’re homeschooling, the days tend to blend together without some sort of narration. My blog allows me to do that in an unobtrusive manner. Sure, Facebook chronicles, and with ‘timeline’ even more so, but it’s not search-friendly. With blogging, I can chronicle what we did that day, or over the week or month or season. Tagging allows me to easily find posts on lesson planning or gardening or whatever, so I can usually fond things I am looking for. And one day, my kids will be able to go back and review their homeschool career (hopefully with fond memories).
4. Swingline 747 stapler - the big daddy, old-fashioned metal one. Not the plastic one. I staple everything, especially loose worksheets or bits of paper into the kids’ folders that would otherwise be in an easy-to-fall-out-of pocket. I have been known to threaten stapling my kids’ work to their foreheads if they don’t sit down and get finished. If that threat ever came to fruition, I have no doubt that my Swingline 747 would totally get the job done. You can get it in red (a la Office Space), but mine is a big, sexy black beast and I love it so much.
3. laser printer & cheap toner - I started homeschooling with an inkjet. It was serviceable, but ink was spendy and when I started using refill kits (which worked for a while), I ended up with cartridge recognition errors. Plus, I could drain an ink cartridge in a week. I don’t print an extraordinary amount (mostly lapbooks), but when I sit down to print, I do a lot at once. We replaced the inkjet with a wireless laser printer about a year and a half ago and OMG = <3. I get my toner through amazon, and though I have had some issues (most easily resolved/replaced), being able to print over 1,000 pages per cartridge is muy bueno. I use cheap toner because of the volume I print. If I were printing for business or something that needed to be pristine, cheap toner may not work best, but for my printing needs now, it’s worth it.
2. Homeschool Planner – this is the end-all-be-all of homeschooling must-haves for me. Without it, I would be utterly lost. It’s my schedule and daily ‘to-do’ list, and also serves as a reference when I go to put grades into the computer. I have a weekly plan and a daily plan, and when I need to find something we’ve done, it’s in the planner. I keep track of field trips, notes for our homeschool group’s blog, contacts that I have made in the homeschooling community… not to mention other personal information. All of my appointments are on the calendar, shopping lists, meal plans, birthdays… I literally LIVE by what’s in the planner. The one I use is here, blank and free to download.
and the number one thing I cannot live without… drumroll, please:
1. electric pencil sharpener – and I am not talking battery-powered. I mean one of those ugly, old-school, plug into the wall types that will sharpen a TREE. I cannot tell you how many pencils we go through. Let’s just say that I am pretty sure we’re contributing to global de-forestation. We’ve tried mechanicals, and I love them for myself (Papermate Sharpwriters are my personal fav), but for the kids, they go through them too quickly. We’ve had the Westcott iPoint Kleenearth Evolution Recycled Electric Pencil Sharpener for about a year now and it’s not let us down yet.
That may seem like a silly thing to have as the number one, but everything else has an alternative which, while not quite as good, is serviceable. The pencil sharpener though… I’d die and/or kill someone if I had to sharpen a thousand pencils a day with a handheld.
So, what’s your ‘top ten’?
Warmly,
~h
April Update
I suck at blogging this year. I know it’s not an excuse, but (like most of you) I’ve had too much on my plate lately. I used to make time for blogging, but I haven’t been motivated to do so lately. I tend to work in cycles, so this isn’t entirely unexpected from my end. Things have been kinda topsy-turvey for the last couple of months, but we are settling into a routine again, so hopefully updates will come a little more frequently now.
Let’s see…
February was pretty busy. For field trips, we saw a play (The Real Story of the 3 Little Pigs, which is based on this book - one of my kids’ favorites when they were small), visited the symphony, went to Moody Gardens, celebrated Imbolc and Valentine’s Day, met with our newly-forming Spiral Scouts group to finalize our charter paperwork, had a ‘s’mores and movie day’ with our local homeschool group and had our monthly community service day volunteering with our local Humane Society.
picture by Amanda Horn
picture by Jean Bennett
I also tested for my orange belt in karate, re-visited my doc for an update and medication switch to handle my depression and anxiety (because I am a good mother who does not want to end up on the evening news for freaking out and taking off my clothes and running down the street starkers), and got new contacts (because vision is of the good).
March was full of school-y goodness, with a visit to the ballet to see Snow White, the NOAA Sea Turtle Research Facility in Galveston, celebrated Ostara & observed Easter, went hiking in the Big Thicket (I’m Mayor of the Kirby Trail on FourSquare!!), the Exotic Cat Refuge in Kirbyville, TX, a hike in Village Creek, and another successful volunteer date with the Humane Society.
April has been equally exciting in some ways, but less ‘school-ish’. Due to inclement weather, we’ve ended up seeing movies (OZ and The Croods) instead of educational stuff, but those links are to lesson plan fun, so even strictly social/leisure outings can be built into school). I was also sick for a couple of weeks, so we missed out on some pretty awesome field trips (like NANO Days at the Houston Children’s Museum). I was bummed. I also missed our Humane Society date. Boo to that.
I’m on the mend though, and on a personal level, April rang in both the celebration of my 36th birthday and marked the occasion of my first ever 5K event. Loverly Husband and I went with my sister and some friends to the Mud Farm in Sour Lake, TX to do a ‘mud run’ obstacle course. It was so dirty and so much fun! #213 Heather Thomas 1:19:56 – 111 of 121 runners <— that’s me! He came in 38th with a time of 0:43:50.
picture OF me, BY someone who is NOT me…
Carrie, maybe?
In homeschool news, we’ve been working our literature unit pretty consistently. It’s been a long time since I’ve worked with the kids on a unit study; I’ve forgotten how ‘big’ this type of schooling can be. Even though this is ‘just’ Beyond Five In A Row, and ‘just’ The Boxcar Children #1, which is way below the boys’ reading/grade level, it’s still lent itself to some surprisingly in-depth lessons. We don’t necessarily have anything to show for it (other than the lapbook components), but it’s steady progress, which is a good thing. One of the more memorable lessons was on the construction of the Hoover Dam. The boys watched a half hour documentary about it and were pretty riveted. Another lesson was on planting blueberry bushes, which led to growing zones and was a nice tie-in to starting our garden this year. We’ll be planting more, but this was a nice start.
We’ve also been hitting math and Latin pretty hard, which has been surprisingly fun. I found a Cambridge Yahoo group that and has been helpful in finding add-on lessons to go with book I. They also have a files section with worksheets and practice lessons and games.
I’ve been working with the boys on timed multiplication drills using Math-Drills.com worksheets. 5 minutes to do as much as they can. We’re working on adding one number each week and it’s going really well. We started with 1′s and that was a real confidence builder for them both. I am also using a workbook that I found called Multiplication Puzzle Practice by Bob Hugel/Scholastic. It’s divided into riddles and puzzles and the lessons are cumulative, each one adding another number. With this and the drill sheets, they’re doing quite well. I’ve also found that they are motivating each other (in between snarky comments and death-threats whispered under their breath to each other). Sorry… it’s been one of those days, LOL.
I’m also going to start using Lesson Pathways again, I think – at least for Language Arts and Science. I need something more… guided, I think. I tend to flit about from subject to subject in science and I really want something a little more cohesive. Their 5th grade Language Arts is using Dear Mr. Henshaw – a book I remember doing in 5th grade and I loved it. I think the boys will like it when we’re done with Boxcar.
In personal news, we had another Journalistas ‘dinner & coffee’ event, I picked up two of the other Keri Smith journals (Mess and This Is Not A Book). I’m more or less done with WTJ, but am having a really hard time getting into the other two books. I think I am going to start Mess first; TINAB makes me cringe for some reason. I’m not ready to explore that feeling just yet. Somewhat recently, I also went to see Beautiful Creatures and to a Happy Birthday dinner with PBJMom, and spent a Saturday morning cooking quiche and toffee crackers for a friend’s Blessingway. Loverly Husband and I had 2 date nights with our ‘best couple friends’ (to see Evil Dead and IHOP, and out for dinner and coffee), had my picture taken by a real professional for the BBC’s new website (coming soon), and am almost done with Leader Training for our Spiral Scouts group.
photo by Sarah Lynne Photography
(click picture for link)
Sprinkled between all this has been regular school days, pool preparation for the summer, board meetings an peer counseling with the Beaumont Breastfeeding Coalition, complete and utter enjoyment of the new seasons of Game of Thrones & The Borgias, taking care of taxes, visiting family, and cooking dinner, amid other things. I’ve been in a funky place lately, but I am coming out of it now. My life is full, and I am grateful.
We’re getting ready for the summer, which means summer reading club, summer movie clubs, hiking every week, my niece, Appleberry, will be back with us, and lots of time spent lazing about on the beach (if things go well). Hopefully, you’ll hear from me again very soon!
Warmly,
~h
Lemurs, Adopt-A-Beach & Report Cards
The last couple of weeks have been pretty exciting – and thus explains my absence from blog-land (I hope). I keep meaning to come post, and I have drafts started, but when it comes down to actually posting them, I have fallen short of my goals. So, to make up for that, here’s an extra-long post!
Last week, our homeschool group toured the local emergency center (911 dispatch & emergency management offices), and talked with a local K-9 police officer about his job training, working with and handling his partner, beautiful Danish born German Shepherd, Hutch.
I’ve never really thought about the intricacies of emergency planning in a city – this was really an eye-opening experience. I know that our city took a lot of flack for how they handled the hurricanes (Rita & Ike) in the past, but I can imagine that any disaster is going to cause issues – it is good to know, and good to see and put a personal face on the emergency response team for the city.
The kids all got to field mock 911 calls, and listen to some real 911 emergency calls. They were nervous and embarrassed as kids are wont to be during things like this, but I think they were impressed with the level of stress that 911 dispatchers deal with. Some of those calls were scary!
After that, we headed back home with some of our friends, and while the moms were chit-chatting inside, the boys all went out to play with their 911 frisbees and to practice their archery skills. One of the kids came in and said, “Mom, there are lemurs in our yard.” quite matter-of-factly. I was skeptical, because honestly how often does one find exotic animals in their yard, right? But I went out and was shocked to find that yes, there were in fact lemurs in our yard!
h with a couple of ring-tailed lemurs
We have an exotic petting zoo down the street from our house – well, it’s not the zoo, itself, it’s where the owners of the zoo live, and house the animals that are not currently on display. That means that on any given day, we hear the brays of donekys and zebras, the caw of peacocks and turkeys and the low grunts of camels cracking the silence of a peaceful evening.
Right off the bat, I figured that the lemurs were from the zoo; they were collared and healthy-looking; and they were not shy of people. They weren’t overly enthusiastic about being picked up, but they knew enough to know that people=food, so we were able to lure them into a cat carrier with bananas.
I tried calling the zoo, but got no answer, so I hit the next best thing – Facebook. Several of my friends are all about animal rescue, so I tagged them – social media at its finest, I tell ya! Within moments, I had a thread with helpful suggestions and offers of assistance in finding the owners. After a little while I decided to walk down and see if the zoo was missing some little friends. Apparently, the lemurs have just returned from a 6 hour road trip and the lady that runs things came in, dropped everyone off into their enclosures and hit the hay – understandable after such a long drive. The lemurs we found were babies, who normally get out, but usually stay close to the adults. Who knows why they chose that day to explore – I’m glad we found them and were able to keep them safe! Hopefully, they will take this example under advisement and make sure that the babies are kept secure and safe on their premises from now on.
I have to say that I had a bit of a moral dilemma in this situation. I kinda dislike zoos altogether. Though I understand that people are more concerned with donating time and money to wildlife causes when they can see. hear and smell the animals and so zoos raise a lot of money for conservation and wildlife protection, I see it as a double-edged sword. The animals that are subjected to small enclosures, unnatural climates and habitats and subjected to the constant scrutiny of humans – it’s not a fair life for them. I have less issue with larger facilities, but for every large-scale zoo, there are a dozen ‘mom & pop’ zoos that have enclosures that are too small, or too unnatural. Then, you have the petting zoo industry, which is less concerned with conservation and more about capitalism via the exploitation of exotic animals.
I admit that there was a part of me that desperately wanted to keep those babies. Nevermind that I was not prepared to house or feed them – I was willing to do the research to find out what would be needed to properly care for them (while at the same time recognizing that in captivity, there really isn’t a ‘proper’ way to do that). But, that would mean knowingly keeping something that didn’t belong to me – so theft… and I am, naturally, at moral odds with that as well. Basically, it was a no-win situation. I was forced to do the legal thing, even though I felt that it was the wrong thing, ethically, especially when I saw that we were returning them to a too-small, less that secure, and overcrowded enclosure. Considering that Texas does not regulate exotic animals that are not classed as ‘dangerous’, and that this location is outside the city-limits (therefore effectively removing any city ordinance issues and authority), there’s really nothing that is going on there that ‘technically’ breaks the law, leaving my hands tied. That was a hard lesson to teach my kids – that sometimes, doing the ‘right’ thing can be the ‘wrong’ thing, too.
Le sigh.
In other news, the kids and I signed up a few weeks ago to participate in the Adopt-A-Beach cleanup program at one of our local beaches. I say local, but we’re about an hour from the coast in several directions. It’s one of the few perks about living where we do! This time, we went to Sea Rim State Park. I have to say that it was kind of sad to be out there. This is one of the state parks that they’d put a lot of effort into over the years – there was a massive multi-story observation deck with a museum, bathrooms and showers and the headquarters for the park. On one side was the beach, and on the other was camping and a wildlife trail through the marsh that was on raised piers through a mile or so of wetlands that was home to all kinds of fish, fowl and reptiles.
As a kid, I’d been down there many times with my mom. She ran our homeschool group when I was in school, and we had several trips to Sea Rim. This is the first time I’ve been out there since Hurricane Rita in 2005 – talk about shocking… all of that is GONE. The landscape is barely recognizable. Even the pavement that went down to the beach is disrupted and mostly grown over. There were several areas where we could see the piers from the walkway through the marsh – even the marsh that was protected by dunes and marsh grasses has been exposed by the shifting landscape.
On the upside, they’re working on it. There were a couple of blocked off areas with lots of heavy construction equipment out there and contractors. They’ve built back a walkway from the visitor’s section over the marsh down to the beach (but I don’t think it was open yet), and I hope that they’re planning on building an observation deck and facilities again. Hurricanes suck.
In any case, we did spend some quality time together, working as a team to pick up some trash off the beach. We collected bottle caps, plastic water bottles, plastic bags, motor oil containers, forgotten shoes and broken beach toys, fishing supplies…. all kinds of nasty stuff that’s been left behind. After that, the organizers sponsored lunch and a drawing – we all three left with fabulous prizes, donated by one of the companies that sponsored the clean up site. Afterwards, we played on the beach for a few hours. It was a fun day!
With the beach clean-up, that marks the end of the first grading period of our school year. For a while, I stopped using the computer and keeping ‘grades’. I liked that, but I feel like my own accountability was starting to slide, so we’re going back to grade-keeping this year. I am using the free version of Homeschool Tracker (Basic). With just the two kids, that’s all I need right now; when they get up into middle school (which is next year for LBB – yikes!!), I am probably going to upgrade to the paid version.
The boys both made the A/B honor roll – I think the lowest grade was 80. I waffle back and forth with grades sometimes. On the one hand, this is homeschool – we stick with something until we get it and then move on. Since we move at their pace, then there is no reason for bad grades, ever. But on the same token, I don’t want to ‘baby’ them through school. So far, I just do what is asked of me from the program – points possible, points accredited and time spent. I am going to have to figure out how to weight grades (so that tests carry more weight than daily work) for middle school – but thankfully, I still have a year to worry about that!
In any case, we’re done for the week! Hopefully, the next month will afford a few more blogging opportunities.
Warmly,
~h
Back to (Home) School
One of the things I miss about brick-and-mortar school is the ‘first day of school’. With homeschool, it’s just a matter of falling back into a good routine. We don’t go anywhere, there aren’t new clothes and new backpacks and lunchkits, there’s no excitement about seeing who’s in your class this year or moaning about getting this teacher or that one.
On the one hand, you might say those are bonuses to homeschooling, not drawbacks… but I really loved the first day of school. I am thinking that when we break and go back in January (which is technically the beginning of our school year), I am going to have to make the first day back a little something more than we did today… maybe a Schultüte (a giant hand-made cone full of school supplies and other goodies) or party decorations… something fun, I think.
On the plus side, we spent our first morning ‘back to (home) school’ in our pajamas, had lovely mochas and spent the first part of the morning in quiet serenity (with a little bubbling excitement just under the surface). Our first day back went well overall. Usually, after a break of any kind, going back to a regular school schedule is like pulling teeth, but they were excited to get back. We went school supplies shopping last week, and since I banned all school supplies from anywhere but their desks, I wonder if part of their excitement was being able to use their new colored (and totally erasable) pens to do their work.
They breezed through Reading and Spelling; LBB got hung up on math, but PeaGreen got through his morning work pretty quickly (and so he got to do his chores! Yay!!). After a bit of moaning and groaning, we took a break for lunch, then PeaGreen got over his hurdle. LBB was still in a funk and tried some of his old stalling tricks. We did some re-focusing, and then it was time to pack up and head over to a friend’s house to make soap.
The boys brought their work with them – Latin to finish, handwriting & Grammar (plus a bit of math for LBB). It wasn’t a total success (bringing work with us). PeaGreen – who is by far the less distractable of the pair, got finished with his work fairly quickly. LBB though…. he likes to dawdle. And stall. And find things to be distracted by. Being in a new place, watching mom do a cool craft – that’s not exactly a recipe for success. I cut him some slack though. To be fair, it wasn’t really a good time or place for ‘school on the go’. Our friend is extremely crafty and has lots of pretty cool things to look at. Plus, we were mixing oils and making soap! She even got out some homemade melt-and-pour soap and let the boys make up their own bars. LBB chose a lemon scent and PeaGreen chose grape.
Speaking of soaps… if you get a chance, check out her products at Goddess Divine Creations. I have a bathroom FULL of her soaps and they are *amazing* – my favorites at the moment at Nag Champa Hemp milk soap and Dragonsblood. I also use her Teen Clean Neem Facial Soap and quite a few others (Sin City Amber, Orange Patchouli, Lemongrass, Prosperity Blend, Strawberries & Champagne Salt Bar, Blueberry Salt Bar… oh, my list goes on and on!!).
The rest of the week has been surprisingly easy. Whatever mental block LBB had on Monday & Tuesday, he got over it by Wednesday and completed all his work in record time Wed & Thurs. PeaGreen is as steady as ever – he’s my little trooper!
We’re as busy as ever – Monday’s soap-making excursion, Tuesday’s field trip and planning sesh for the fall calendar with our homeschool group, Wednesday was mine and Loverly Husband’s 13th wedding anniversary, but we had a full day home at school, and Thursday (today), LH was home (we went to see The Dark Knight Rises… excuse me while I squee like a silly fangirl, but it was *fabulous*!!) but managed a pretty full day of schoolwork anyway – total gold star for Mom for managing to get school done with Dad home… that’s usually a no-go!
Speaking of Batman… Catwoman has always been one of my favorite characters, and I love the Batman/Catwoman ‘ship – I have since the good ‘ol days of Michael Keaton/Michelle Pfieffer movie way back when. I have to say, Anne Hathaway did a good job bringing her to life, and though I haven’t been as much of a fan of Christian Bale as the Dark Knight, it was good to see them on-screen together again (Batman and Catwoman, I mean). All things considered, this was a truly amazing movie.
Bruce Wayne & Selina Kyle = <3
Batman & Catwoman = <3
So… things I learned this week:
- keep calm, and explore Mars – we need to incorporate the Mars landing into our lesson plans next week.
- keep calm, and pretend it’s on the lesson plan – be flexible with ‘on-the go’ lessons
- keep calm, and drink more coffee – coffee calms my kids down; that’s not a bad thing for desk work
- keep calm, and carry on – ignore distractions, like Dad being home
- keep calm, and play games – 8 minutes of math game is worth and other 15 minutes of hard-core desk work
- keep calm, and karate-do – our karate class was cancelled Tuesday due to the power being out from a storm. I just missed class and am looking forward to it this evening, that’s all {wink}
I am posting this on Thursday, and taking it on faith that Friday will go in a similar vein. Light a candle and hope that I don’t eat those words! Hope your first week back either went well, or will go well!
Warmly,
~h
NBTSBH Curriculum Week: Planning 4th and 5th grade
So as of today, we’re officially ‘back to school’ – yay!!
That means that it’s time to play ‘Not Back to School Blog Hop‘! Yay!! I love this time of year – it’s so… exciting. Everything is all hustle and bustle and getting ready for doing things! This past summer was the first time since we started homeschooling that we’ve taken a lengthy break (not that we’ve been idle), and even the kids are actually looking forward to school starting up again.
Rather than be frustrated with the school year not working out the way I’d envisioned, with a few changes to the fall programme I am quite happy with the way that she summer has worked out. We’ve had a full 8 weeks of summery-time fun, and spent tons of quality time with friends. The kids have gotten to attend some pretty awesome classes and even though it wasn’t structured, got plenty of learning in as well. Now that all that is past, it’s time to drag out the books, clean out the files and start fresh.
Some ideas that I’ve played with over the last few years that I want to put fully into practice again:
- workboxes – I am a fan of workboxes. We’ve struggled to find the exact right method of ‘box’, and are trying out one more . Eventually, I think I’d like to have this style:
This isn’t my picture, but this is the style I want to use. Everything is open and visible at a glance – I can see what’s inside the boxes at any time without having to mess with them. But for now, we’re using the file box system. I did print out some workbox tags from HeartofWisdom (and some from HomeschoolCreations as well) to help the kids see ‘at a glance’ what they have in their files for the day.
We have 12 boxes; we’ve been talking about this already for a while now. We started preparing for the ‘first day of school’ about 3 weeks out; I wanted them well-prepared with what to expect this year. I am putting the onus on them to get their work and chores done – with everything spelled out and in their boxes, as long as they follow the next box, they shouldn’t have any trouble – or get into trouble – for not fullfilling their responsibilities.
With middle school on the horizon in the fall of next year, I need to see more than a little independent work from them, especially LittleBoyBlue (who will be 11 in December). He has ADHD and SPD – but he also has a large repertoire of coping strategies to help him stay focused; there’s no reason I cannot expect him to handle this level of responsibility. After all, this is what we’ve been working towards! And I will still be there to offer reminders.
- meditation/quiet time/reflection time – some sort of similar idea Mind jar
W
e’ve been using our mind jars for quite some time now, though probably not as often as we could, and I have noticed that the boys are more easily able to contain themselves when we make meditation practice a more regular part of their days.
I have also been attending group meditation at the local Buddhist temple and Unity church, and find that in addition to my own formal private meditation practice, these group meditations are useful. I think that we’re going to start incorporating some sort of mindful meditation as part of our school schedule this year, even if it’s only 15 minutes or so a couple of times each week, with an eye towards having the kids attend in the near future. We’re not ‘religious’, but this sort of consideration for the needs of the spirit/soul/inner self/mind – whatever you want to call it, are helpful, I think.
Another area we’ve been slacking in is organized group charity work. AT one point, we had a HEARTS group, but that kind of fizzled out. Coyote Communications has a lot of great 
suggestions for community service work, and we’re planning our homeschool group’s calendar tomorrow at our weekly meet-up, so I am bringing a list and getting some plans on the books.
In addition to the regular subjects, math, grammar, handwriting (yes, still), spelling, geography, science, history and the like, I want to work on extra-curriculars. We’ve talked for a while about doing ‘adventure scouts’ with our local homeschool group – a scouting group that is completely secular and utterly non-discriminatory – for our kids to participate in, but we’ve never gotten it off the ground. I’d like to work on that this year. The kids’ hiking vests have gotten too small, so it looks like we’ll be getting new ones in the near future, too! (Oy… do I move all the patches, or just start getting new ones??)
As for some of the resources we’ll be using this year, I decided to go with a different big workbook than we have been using. I decided on American Education Publishing’s 4th and 5th grade Comprehensive Curriculum books to try out. There are actually 2 versions of these books; one is older and one is newer. I think I like the older version better, but both seem a little more challenging than the Harcourt books. The 5th grade books has a section called ‘citizenship’ that I am using as a guide for both boys, and there’s an ‘environmental science’ section as well with projects and activities that they can both do. These workbooks are pretty much our guide for covering basic skills in reading comprehension, math, grammar and phonics. I supplement that with activities like journaling, copywork, narration, dictation and reading aloud. We’re implementing a ‘student teacher’ section on Fridays where instead of the boys doing their reading lesson, they can teach it to me and their brother (the idea being that when you can teach it, then you know it).
I haven’t gotten the 5th grade Core Knowledge book yet, but I do have the standards for 4th and 5th grade printed out. (It’s the ‘download the sequence’ tab in the menu here. Although I like the ‘What Your X Grader Needs to Know’ books, we don’t use them for much past the checklist of skills. I may get it later, but I don’t need it right now. This is one reason why I like the big workbooks – it’s covering the basic skills for each grade level without much fuss.
For History, we’re still using Story of the World II and the lapbook from Run of the Mill Family (which is *awesome*). There isn’t a lapbook for Volume III, so I may be writing one! I am loosely using Mosaic’s activity guide for year II, but in January we will have to find a new activity resource. I may end up getting the actual SotW III book and guide. So far, between our timeline, the lapbook and additional reading and video watching, history has been pretty well-rounded, though I would like to add some more hands-on activities this year.
We’re doing a composer study each month; starting this month, our composer is Ludwig Von Beethoven. Miss Music has a great page with some basic info for different composers, and notebooking pages from Practical Pages (and their composer of the month wall chart as well). We’re only hitting composer study once or twice each week, so a month-long lesson on each composer (and possibly a lapbook) seems much more doable than one each week. I’d like to do an artist study as well… but one thing at a time, I think.
We’re using Seterra for geography, as well as some Practical Pages geography lapbooking. I am considering making just one big geography lapbook instead of breaking each thing up into smaller sections, but I am not decided just yet. Seterra has some nifty little flash games that help with identifying geographical features; the boys like games, so that worked out well.
Another idea I came across (on Pinterest) was to give the kids self-assesment tools, such as this poster, rather than rely on my interpretation of how they’re doing. We’re going to play with this a bit and see how we can incorporate it into their space. I am thinking that maybe we’ll talk about some of the assignments before they get started and see where they think they are, then afterwards, review again and see if they feel like they learned it. Not on everything, obviously – that would take a LONG time! – but when they seem to get ‘stuck’, maybe… idaknow… I’m still working on that.
So there you have it… a pretty good look at what we’re going to be doing and using over the next few months. To see more homeschool planning goodness, check out Heart of the Matter Online for their Not Back to School Blog Hop!
Warmly,
~h
It’s Not About Patience
Oh, if I had a penny for every time I heard some variation of ‘I wish I had the patience to homeschool my kids’, I could buy the bestest homeschooling stuff!
I would like you to think about that statement. What does it mean? First of all (and I recognize that I may take a tremendous load of crap for saying this), I think it’s a cop-out. We teach our children from the moment they are born. Everything they do is a testament to our ability to teach and support them as they learn, from breastfeeding, to sitting up, to walking to riding a bike – we’re there, preparing them, supporting, kissing boo-boos when they fall and gently encouraging them to try again. So saying that you lack the patience to teach your child is patently untrue (unless your kids were raised by wolves, in which case, I salute you {wink}).
If you’ve had a four-year old that is currently still alive and past that point, then you can most certainly homeschool your child, for NO ONE asks more questions than a four-year old who wants to know ‘why’. I know of no other scenario that is solely designed to test one’s patience than ‘Why?’ for an hour straight. No school-aged child asks that many questions, even when you’re trying to explain molecular science, prepositions and fractions (all in the same day).
When I hear, ‘If only I had the patience’, it kinda irks me. It implies that I possess something that you do not. Since I am a mom who takes medication for anxiety and clinical depression, I assure you that patience is not a virtue one must possess in order to successfully homeschool. There are days here where – just like in your home, I am sure – things go to crap the moment feet hit the floor. There are bad moods that must be dealt with, whiney kids that must be endured, savage beasts that must be tamed. I think the difference is having a strategy to handle those types of situations.
Most of us know when days like that are brewing. The smart homeschool mom nips it in the bud by feeding everyone, then shooing them out of the house. If nothing productive paperwork-wise is going to get done anyway, then take school on the road. We have a state park with a lovely pavilion area that is perfect for school outdoors. Between assignments, the kids can hike the baby bear trail or skip down to the creek’s edge for some stress relief and solitude before coming back and hitting the books again.
Then again, there are days where school just ain’t gonna happen – and you know what? They have those days in school-school, too. Those are the days your kids comes home and you ask, “What’s you do today?’ and the answer is ‘Watch movies!”. It’s perfectly acceptable to take a day off now and then – beneficial, even.
The other thing that I hate about that statement is that it automatically sets up a competition between you and me. Yeah, I homeschool – so what. Surely there’s something that you do with your kids that I don’t do (that I might even be envious of). That’s cool – rather than competing, why can;t we appreciate that we have different approaches to the many aspects of child-rearing, learn what we can from one another and support the rest?
So what is it, really, that prevents moms from homeschooling? For the vast majority, I think it’s a choice. And you know what? That’s perfectly fine – and it is a choice that should be supported.
Homeschooling does not automatically win you the ‘Better Mom’ award. You don’t get extra points; there is no gold star or special prize when your child graduates. We all educated our children according to the needs of our individual families – and those needs will vary wildly from one family to the next – from one year to the next, from one child to the next, and that’s as it should be.
But for some reason, there seems to be a taboo against saying, ‘I just don’t want to homeschool.’ I for one, think that if you know yourself, and homeschooling isn’t your ‘thing’, then it’s better to send your kids elsewhere to be educated. Homeschooling is a lot of work – it’s fun for most of us most of the time, but it’s work, too. If you’re not up to it, that doesn’t mean that you’re not just as dedicated to ensuring that your kids get a good education. You just have a different path to accomplish that.
Other families are not in a position to homeschool. Perhaps both parents need to work – or there is only one parent. There are those that manage to homeschool despite that limitation, but they more than likely don’t do it alone, and they word hard to make it happen. And those that do make it happen alone? Those are the ones that deserve accolades. But again, it’s not about being a better parent than you, it’s about what is best for their individual child(ren).
Still other families are happy with their local ISD or can afford a private school option (or charter school, or special theory school – whatever). Believe me, if our ISD was more interested in the child and not his ability to test well, I might have my kids in public school. If I could afford to put my kids in Montessori school, or if our area offered an affordable Waldorf style school, I would seriously consider it! But short of my husband working a second job, and me taking on a full-time job, that’s not going to happen! Some those kids who thrive in a classroom environment - and that’s fine, too. For every child who ‘needs’ to be homeschooled, I imagine there’s a child who just functions better in the hustle and bustle of the classroom.
I think that patience comment has become a convenient way to gloss over the real reason – explaining ones’ self fully would be too complicated (and invasive). Most of us can relate to feeling frustrated dealing with homework and equate that frustration with what homeschooling must be like, not realizing that it’s not even remotely the same.
I don’t know where all I was going with this, but it was on my mind and I wanted to write about it. Feel free to continue the discussion!
Warmly,
~h
Anchor Charts
Have you heard about anchor charts? An anchor chart is a chart that you make with your kids/students to help illustrate a concept. Once it’s created, the chart/poster is placed in an area so that it can be seen and referred to as needed.
I have seen many, many examples of anchor charts, and differing views on how they’re made. I’ve implemented a couple of techniques – from making them up before hand and presenting them to the kids, to working out a concept with the kids, taking notes and then making the final chart for display purposes. That seems to work better – making the chart together. I do admit to going online and finding an example of the chart I want to make and guiding the conversation in the right direction though!
A few months ago, I found a large wall chart pad at a school supplies store on clearance about bought it. Anchor chart pads are usually larger, but in a homeschool setting, this size creates smaller, more manageable sized charts that are idea for our space. The pad I use is a Bemiss Jason 24″ x 16″, 1.5″ ruled notepad, similar to this one at Amazon. We have a chalkboard on one wall and I just open the pad to the right chart and lean it against the board in the chalk tray.
Since we’ve been using anchor charts, I do think it’s helped. Most of them have some sort of catchy phrase to them that make the concept easy to remember. Some of our charts include:
- Reading Aloud (reading fluency chart)
- Reading Fluency (similar to our Reading Aloud chart, but less rhyme-ish. I actually like the Reading Aloud chart, used with the hand signs, better)
- Rounding Numbers
- Math Doubles (‘If you don’t know your doubles, you’re in ‘Double Trouble’)
- Math Strategies for Adding and Subtracting (8 ways to add and subtract: fingers, number line, abacus, tallies, memorize it, use a grid, count objects, put one number in your head and ‘add on’ or count the difference)
- Plot (like a roller coaster – beginning, middle (highest point), ending)
- Math Phrases (what phrases mean ‘to add’ – like ‘how many, altogether, plus… ‘subtract’ – remaining, left, take away, difference between… etc.)
- Math Fact Families
Warmly,
~h
Educate the Children
All over Facebook recently, I’ve seen pictures with a topic, like ‘Stay at Home Mom‘ and ‘Home Birthing Parents‘, and ‘Doulas‘ with 6 pictures that reflect the different attitudes and perceptions of what the parents/people who subscribe to the beliefs of the topic are like. I looked around for one on homeschooling, but couldn’t find one, so I made one:
And I thought I’d write about how homeschooling (or homeschoolers) seem to be viewed by the outside world.
I think one of the main perceptions I get from local society is that I don’t fit in with their ideal of what a homeschooling mother ‘should’ look like. I don’t own a denim jumper, I only have 2 kids, and though I drive a mini-van, it’s just your average-sized grocery-getter (or chariot, as one of my friends lovingly describes the transportation of choice for busy families). That’s not true for all areas, of course, but here there are definitely more than a few denim-jumper/quiver-full families. If it’s not the denim dress uniform, then it’s khaki and twin-sets (the less-than-stylish around here call this brand of woman a ‘West End Wanda’); another group that belong not to. My standard uniform is a black tee-shirt, jeans and whichever shoes I feel like putting on (which can range from Doc Martens, to wedge heels, to flip flops, depending on the day’s activities), which puts me firmly in the ‘impostor’ – or worse, ‘secular’ – category, according to the homeschooling majority in my area.
Then you have homeschooling as portrayed in the media. Over and over, I’ve seen stories about how abusive homeschooling is, and/or that the only reason people homeschool is to indoctrinate their kids into religion. While I do know plenty of homeschoolers who do so for religious reasons, most don’t fall anywhere near that crazy tree. For most Christian homeschoolers, their goal is to raise their kids with their family’s values at the forefront, including the need and desire to be faithful ministers of their god. Though I disagree with that approach, I do understand it and think that it’s dishonest to link homeschooling – even if the primary goal is religious in nature – with abuse, neglect or other acts of parents who would find some other way to harm their kids if religion was taken out of the picture. Those people are mentally ill and that does not describe the vast majority of homeschooling parents.
Up next is the perception that teachers have of homeschoolers. This one also gets an unfair rap in my opinion. I think that this perception is perpetuated by children who, for whatever reason, go back into the classroom after homeschooling for a while. Many times, the child is classified as ‘behind’ when that’s only part of the picture. One of the main benefits of homeschooling is that you can tailor your child’s education to your individual child. In Texas, we’re not required to follow the school’s curriculum, so we have a lot of room to truly match what we’re teaching to where our child is at. We can also go about education in an entirely different manner (mastery-focused instead of covering X amount of material this week; or take history chronologically while the school starts with your family and branches out from there). We can use unconventional methods – from educational philosophy or theory to using non-standard materials or classroom environments. Since we don’t follow the same method and curriculum as classroom teachers, that means that there are areas where our child may be behind and there are usually also areas where our kids have a more well-rounded education than his classroom counterparts. But too often, it’s not the whole of education that shows, only the areas where your child is not ‘up to standards’ and thus, the myth continues.
After that, we come to how non-homeschooling people see homeschooling (not all of them, obviously – but some, certainly). I think that the perception (not necessarily of ‘me’, but of homeschooling parents in general) is that homeschooling parents see their kids as genius-level potential, and that with enough early learning and constant fact-drilling, it will be enough to bring that potential into reality. I know that I speak for plenty of homeschooling parents when I say that our kids don’t hold any more potential than yours, nor are they smarter than your kids. The difference is how we go about accessing that potential. Homeschooling, again, allows us to tailor every aspect of our child’s education to that child. Even if we have several children, we can adapt how or what they’re learning to address that specific child’s needs. If we have a child with ADHD, we can do spelling words or math while the child is on a trampoline or yoga ball. If we have a child who is a night owl, we can start our school hours later in the day (or even have school at night). If we have one child who prefers reading and another who is adept in math, we can cater to those strengths while taking the other subjects a little slower to ensure that the foundation is solid before moving on. Give any student that level of personal attention and you’re going to get better results.
Next, there’s my perception. Since the comic is not my own creation and yet I identify with it wholeheartedly, I dare say that other homeschooling mothers feel similarly at least part of the time. If the text is too small, it reads, ’5 minutes after Mindy died trying, Brice finally understood fractions‘. It seems like there are days, especially when we start something new, that I explain and explain and explain and yet still it seems like nothing gets through. We’ve been doing this for over 2 years now, and I can see the pattern… all the sudden, one day it clicks. There’s no rhyme or reason to it, but it’s happened over and over again. Then we start something new; rinse, repeat. As frustrating as it is to get the idea through my kids’ head that they’re learning something – they’re not experts yet and mistakes are okay; expected, even – the poor dears are blessed with enough aspects of my personality to ensure that failure is a big deal. They’d rather not do it at all than fail. But the other side of the coin is the gratification and exhilaration on their faces when they do finally get it and can do it like a pro.
Then there’s the reality of what it is that I, and homeschooling parents all over the world like me, actually do, and that is educate our children. We’re not experts, we’re not perfect. We have good days and bad, ups and downs and yes, there are days when we want to throw in the towel. It’s not about being superior or thinking we’re better or can do a better job than you; we don’t homeschool to judge you or your educational choices. In fact, we don’t care one bit what you do with your kids; we’re too busy doing stuff with our own kids.
The long and the short of it is that homeschooling parents come in a variety of packages, and no two are exactly similar. Now that I think about it, I’m may have a tee-shirt made that says ‘Homeschooler: Contents May Vary‘ to wear when we’re out and about. Like non-homeschooling parents, we do the things we think are best for our kids. Any contentious parent homeschools with genuine intent, and with their children’s best interests at the forefront of their lives. They’re not abusive, they’re not fanatics; they’re just regular people who feel like homeschooling is the best educational path for their kids. We’re not raising geniuses; we don’t think our kids are prodigies, but neither do we let them bum around all the time without seeing to their education. Our methods may look lackadaisical to you, but until you live in our home and see what we do, how we do it and what the results are, then we respectfully suggest that you keep your nose occupied elsewhere. We’re human; we get frustrated just like anyone would, but we’re also in a unique position of seeing our child’s mind expand on a daily basis – and taking pride on the role that we play in helping them learn.
Even with all our differences, homeschooling parents have one goal: educate the children.
Warmly,
~h
Photo credits:
homeschooling family: http://www.recycledpolyfurniture.com/about.php
religious indoctrination as child abuse: http://jesusmustbestopped.blogspot.com/2011/08/childhood-religious-indoctrination.html
kids playing video games: http://www.sheknows.com/parenting/articles/822769/are-your-kids-addicted-to-video-games
reading baby: http://ladyhazard.tumblr.com/post/372126132/aashawn-cristina-awesome-reading-baby-im
Mindy comic ( (c)Todd Wilson): http://extrememakeover-homeschooledition.blogspot.com/2011/07/year-two.html
Homeschool outside: http://thepioneerwoman.com/homeschooling/2011/03/how-long-will-you-homeschool-your-children/
Fidgets for ADHD Homeschool
One of the benefits of homeschooling a child with ADHD is that you have an almost unlimited amount of freedom to experiment with and utilize the many therapeutic tools that are out there to help such children maintain their concentration on the task at hand.
Fidgets are one of the tools that have been shown to be successful in helping ADHD children maintain focus when they’re doing mentally intense work. If you’re not familiar with them, fidgets are little toys or gadgets that provide children with attention disorders stimulation (tactile, oral, or gross motor, or a combination thereof) and/or an outlet for their excess energy during seat-work. Some fidgets are small, either handheld or for the desktop to keep hands busy while the child is thinking, writing or calculating. Others are larger and provide different types of stimulation and feedback over the whole body, like weighted or vibrating materials; or furniture that allows the child to move more freely than your average desk set-up, like swings, balance boards, mini-trampolines or exercise balls to sit on.
There are some stores/websites that sell fidgets and sensory materials, like the Therapy Shoppe (which separates their fidgets into categories like alert fidgets, calming fidgets, silent fidgets, and tactile fidgets), Fat Brain Toys, Sensory University, and Sensory Edge, and these are great if you can afford them.
But when homeschooling, you’re often on a budget and even inexpensive fidgets can seem out of reach when you’re not sure what things your child might like. Since I can relate to that, I thought I’d put together a list of fidgets that are easily ‘found’ or made at home.
Starting with small fidgets:
- spring/spiral (plastic, taken from an old spiral bound book or notebook and cut into pieces. Those spiral shoelaces also work well as a fidget.)
- Lego tree (round, though I’m sure the conical ones would work just as well – lovely for palming and twiddling)
- velcro dots (sticky-backed ones can be applied to the underside of the desk)
- clothespins (alone or can be used with clip-ins like a bundle of rubber bands, a few bent chenille sticks, yarn or other something to make a ‘brush’)
- soft bristled paintbrushes or jumbo makeup brushes (feel nice on cheeks, over eyes and lips)
- skinny balloons (stretchy and can go onto fingers – but don’t let them chew on them!)
- foam stress ball (often given out free at conferences, fairs, doctor’s offices, the mall…)
- filled stress ball (the dollar store often has squeeze balls; there’s one called a ‘blob ball’ with a net outside that lets the inner part bulge out of that is both disgusting and fascinating; or you can make them from big latex party balloons filled with sand, moon sand, powder, modeling clay, rice, beans, poly pellets, or a combination of things for long-term use (can double balloon and tie for a little extra protection). If you’re looking for other textures, you can fill them with peanut butter, pudding, tapioca, jell-o, etc (but these are, for obvious reasons, disposable after a day or two).
- worry stones made from polymer clay (or air-dry glue/cornstarch clay, also called ‘cold porcelain clay’) or rocks
- aluminum discs (made from the bottoms of coke cans – Use tin snips to cut the rounded bottoms of a coke can out, then put them together, convex sides out and seal the edges by gluing and then burnishing, or with tape on the outside. Use sandpaper to smooth and finish the edges. It makes a lovely palm-sized convex disc that feels good in your hand.)
- butterfly/triangle paper clips (can put several together on a binder ring)
- a long bolt with a rubber band on the open end and loose nut to twist up and down (metal or you can find plastic ones in the plumbing section of the hardware store)
- put a rubber band on a pencil, slide on some metal hex-nuts towards the top end and add another rubber band. The pencil is weighted and the nuts are twistable. Also works on crayons and markers)
- mini rain stick (toilet paper tube or even smaller diameter cardboard tube, nails and rice/beans and masking tape)
- egg shaker (re-use those old plastic Easter eggs – fill with rice, beans, poly beads, BB’s or anything similar and seal with tape. You can papier-mache for extra security)
- bean bag (scrap material and dry beans/lentils/rice/poly pellets)
- poly pellet (single to roll between index finger and thumb)
- teethers (especially gel-filled ones and ones with ‘nubbies’ on them; Sophie the giraffe is fun to chew on as well)
- rubber bands (tie a bunch together, then snip all but one of the loops to make a ‘koosh’ type ball
- tape measure with a button re-winder
- Rubik’s cube
For larger stimulation, we have used:
- weighted lap blanket (I made them from a fat quarter of fabric and filled with poly pellets from the craft store)
- noise cancelling earphones
- foam ear plugs
- vibrating neck pillow
- yoga ball
- rolling pin on the floor (under desk, for feet)
- yoga
- balance board (can be made from a 24″ long piece of 1″x 6″ scrap board with a 1″x 1″ half round piece of molding nailed to the underside. Sand the edges and let your child paint and decorate it. The child stands with feet on the outer edges and balances the board up on the round.)
- weighted hula hoop (can be made by cutting open a regular hula hoop and adding steel ball bearings and taping back together)
- sensory steps (in our version, I made a couple of sheets of 8.5 x 14 paper with eight 4″x3″ squares of sensory material – just enough to ‘toe’ and small enough to fit under the best. Ours include sandpaper, lentils, elbow macaroni, faux-fur fabric, shredded plastic, rubber bands, toothpicks, crinkled aluminum foil, yarn, Easter grass, egg shells, lego bricks, shredded newspaper, terry cloth, and pantyhose.
- rice sock (tube sock filled with rice; can be knotted every few inches to provide more even distribution and/or a different ‘feel’; also can be filled with lavender or other herbs and rice, and heated to make a warm aromatherapy weight)
- meditation/mind jar
- 2lb hand weights (also works to roll with feet on the floor)
- yoga block (for feet to manipulate)
- weighted tube (a paper towel tube with a spent D cell battery in it. Close both ends of the tube with cotton balls (for cushion) and tape. Tilt back and forth gently to let the battery slide from one end to the other. It has a nice ‘thunk’ to it.)
- sensory tubs (usually used for younger kids, but are very useful for older kids with SPD)
- sensory bottle /science bottles
- sound therapy: white noise; thunderstorm; fireplace/thunderstorm are all amazing and vary in length.
- alpha wave sound therapy on low volume over headphones. You can record this video/sound, then put it on an ipod and loop it for however long you need it for. Once is almost 10 minutes. Any sound therapy we use with headphones for maximum effect.
We use or have used most of these (not all at once, obviously). Different things seem to work at different times, and I’ve noticed that even my younger son (who is not ADHD) seems to focus better when allowed an outlet, so even though these types of tools and activities are ‘for’ kids with attention or sensory issues, they can definitely be of use to children without them as well.
What are some of your cheap/handmade sensory tools?
Warmly,
~h
Girl’s Weekend Out
This past weekend, I got to take off with the girls for a couple of days Ren Festing it in Plantersville, TX. As much as I love my darling children and Loverly Husband, being a homeschool mom means that opportunities to pamper myself with time away from them are few and far between. I’ve been in a funk lately and this kind of break was very much needed.
If you haven’t been to a renaissance faire before, I highly recommend that you check one out, and if you are so fortunate to live near enough that you can attend Texas’ version, then you should most definitely put that on your list of Things To Do. Like our reputation suggests, in Texas, we do it bigger, and Ren Faire is no exception.
The Texas Ren Fest is one of the largest in the US, with 65 acres of Renaissance Goodness to be had. There are games, food and assorted craft vendors, plus tons of live entertainment – and the best part of all is the people-watching. From the elegantly made up professionally fancy-dressed staff to your average Joe and Jane with every culture and genre under the sun represented, the people-watching portion of the day is one of my favorites. We saw drag queen Geishas, a family of satyrs, gypsies and belly dancers, plenty of nearly-nude-but-for-chain-mail-clad barbarians and fur-covered Celts, elaborately costumed English Lords and Ladies, a Star Trek away team, a couple of Nazgul, Hobbits and Wizards and more than a few winged fey. Each weekend is a theme; this was the Highland Fling weekend, celebrating Scottish Culture, so there were many, many kilted men to oogle (and plenty to quickly look away from lest you see something you might wish you hadn’t). We joined the fancy dress fun as a band of gypsies complete with bells and coined skirts. Apparently, Saturday (Nov, 12) was a record-setting day, attendance-wise, with the most visitors on a single day, ever. How fun to be a part of that!
We truly had an awesome time. We walked and shopped, saw some shows (Tartanic (shirtless, sweaty men with bagpipes and drums *swoon*) and Sound and Fury (Testacles and ye Sack of Rome) stand out as the most memorable) and munched on tasty snacks – oh, so very much fun was had by all! Pictures! (Disclaimer: none of them were taken by me!)
Originally, our plan was to camp, but with the wildfires scouring the land (and they are bad – we saw acres of burned woods and dead trees on our drive out there), there are burn bans in effect pretty much everywhere, which makes camping not as much fun so we opted to hotel it instead. I don’t often get to do things like this without the kids, but when I do it’s always nice to come back home relaxed and in a better frame of mind. That said, I freely admit that I’m already looking forward to the next one!
Warmly,
~h
Enjoying the Autumn Weather
We had our first cool front come through last week – a much needed, much appreciated cool front. It’s been unbelievably hot this summer, and even though I say that every year, this summer really has set records. I’m not an outdoors-y type most of the time, but between the swarm of love-bugs that have finally left town (or died out – whatever) and the unrelenting heat, this first taste of cooler weather made me positively antsy to be outside.
We packed up the kids’ remaining school work one day last week and went out to one of our local state parks to enjoy the cooler weather. It was actually quite a bit cooler than we’d thought when we left the house; several times, I had the kids run around the pavilion we were sitting at to warm up. We did nearly get carried away by mosquitoes; normally those nasty little bloodsuckers fade away once the weather turns, but maybe the woods offered some shelter because even with the cooler air, they were out in droves. Yay for bug spray!
When we got home, in keeping with the autumn atmosphere, we made caramels. This is my new favorite thing ever: MICROWAVE caramels. Yes. Microwave. You just mix everything in a big Pyrex bowl and throw them in there, stir occasionally and in six minutes, you have lovely and brown and bubbly and smooth and creamy caramel… and with a tiny sprinkling of flaked salt on top, they’re oh, so very tasty!
The recipe is from Food Network, but I found it on Pinterest.
- 1/4 cup butter
- 1/2 cup white sugar
- 1/2 cup brown sugar
- 1/2 cup light Karo syrup
- 1/2 cup sweetened condensed milk
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Combine all ingredients.
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Cook 6 minutes, stirring every two minutes.
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Stir and pour into lightly greased dish.
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Let cool.
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Cut, wrap in wax paper & store in air tight container.
I didn’t have brown sugar, so I used a 1/2 cup of white sugar with a tablespoon of blackstrap molasses. I didn’t have Karo, so I used a 1/2 cup of white sugar with 2 teaspoons of water (stirred to dissolve the sugar). The caramels didn’t quite set up the way they should have, but they taste fantastic. One day, I’ll buy the other ingredients and make the actual recipe… maybe. My version is more like a thick caramel sauce and is amazing in coffee and over ice cream, in case you were wondering.
Hope you’re celebrating fall with hot cocoa every morning!
Warmly,
~h
Just DO it.
If you’re unfamiliar with our schedule this year, we have school for four weeks, then take a week-long break, all year long (with a couple extra weeks in December, between the end of one school year and the beginning of the next, which is on Jan 1).
This week, thank all that is sacred in that which was, is and ever shall be, is our off week. We had kind of a wonky schedule over the summer, with a lighter workload and more days off than I’d originally planned. As is wont to happen, I started feeling like things were sliding, so in a fabulous (but misguided) flurry of organization and determination, I announced that we would henceforth be putting our noses to the grindstone and get back on track. Somehow, in my blaze of glory, I decided that the best way to accomplish this was to skip the last break, which put us at 6 weeks straight of school.
Oh, silly young Padawan… there is still much to learn.
The funny thing is, I already knew that this was a mistake. Our schedule last year was 6 weeks on, one off. We only had school 4 days a week, but I realized towards the end of the year that 6 weeks was too long. We all get burned out, and consistently, by the end of week 6, I was seriously struggling to get schoolwork organized and the kids were lollygagging about, doing any and everything but schoolwork. After 5 weeks, max, we all needed a break! This just goes to remind me that, even as a somewhat more experienced homeschooling mom (now that I’m almost through our 2nd year), that lingering ‘school’ mentality still exists.
So, in an effort to maybe have these things sink in (AGAIN), I give you my list of reminders why homeschooling is awesome:
- City ISD school year calendar and State Education Association list of skills by grade: these are not the schedules you’re looking for.
- There WILL BE gaps in their education. No matter where they go to school, or in what style they’re educated, or how many days and weeks they spend learning, there is always MORE to know. No two ideals of what is ‘core knowledge’ will match up, so stop trying to please everyone else! Teach them how to learn, and to love learning that they will be
FINEAMAZING. - For the love of Pete, stop trying to ‘catch up’. Education is a marathon, not a race. They’re going to be ahead in some things and behind in others. That’s okay… they’ll get there when they need to.
- Remember the fun stuff! Education is not just about book learnin’. There are arts and crafts and gluing macaroni and cotton balls to construction paper. It’s creating seed mosaics and painting with food dyes, exploring the world, doing it themselves, and learning at the knee of a seasoned professional with knowledge to share. Revel in the fact that you have freedom from the established norm – the amazing opportunity – to collect these types of learning experiences for your children. Be willing to go out and MAKE them happen for them!
- Breaks are essential to balance. Being parent and teacher is an extremely stressful job. It’s easy – too easy sometimes – to get caught up in the constant pressure and demand for educational excellence that homeschooling parents deal with. It comes from within and from outside – but it cannot rule your relationship with your kids. Take breaks often and enjoy them fully. Laze about and relax!
~h
Calling School on Account of Blahs
One of the many, many things that I love about homeschooling is the flexibility. We’ve reached the middle of the week and after a couple of days of ‘phoning it in’, I am calling school on account of blahs.
I am not ‘sick’, but I feel kinda… meh, and I know I am not giving them my best. It’s not that it’s been a ‘bad’ week; things have been fine. But the kids are just doing the work to get it done, rather than doing any real ‘learning’, so instead of continuing to push, I think it makes more sense to spend a couple of days getting over whatever this is we seem to have and begin again next week.
Intellectually, I know that breaks are beneficial. Not pushing when your heart’s not in it; actually stopping to re-group and rediscover your joy in homeschooling is necessary. It’s something that I’ve said and read over and over again, and yet still I occasionally find myself battling the ‘get it done’ mindset.
We’re not bound by anyone else’s rules or policies. We have no one but ourselves to report to or satisfy, and we’re not disrupting a carefully crafted time-table to put off today’s plan in favor of something that fits better. I purposefully designed our school schedule so that there would be enough school days built-in so that we could take breaks where needed. But still, there is the lingering feeling that ‘today is a school day’ and so we ‘must’ get XYZ finished. Silly, I know. Perhaps Mommy needs some de-schooling today. {wink}
In any case, it’s 9:45 and the kids are still in their rooms. They’re not asleep; I can hear them chattering and laughing. I am thinking brunch, chores and then grocery store for hot chocolate and coconut milk to make coconut whipped cream. Then, I think we might scour the KidCraft Pinterest board for something awesome to do this afternoon. Yeah. That’s a good plan.
Warmly,
~h
Meditation with Kids – Mind Jar
A while back, I decided to start working in some meditation time to our day. Immediately after making that decision, I forgot about it. Well, that’s not entirely true; we’ve done a couple of meditation times as a group, but not as much as I’d planned on incorporating.
Over the last month or so that I’ve been Pinteresting things, I’ve been seeing the ‘mind jar‘ pop up over and over again. The uses are myriad; everything from an alternative to time out for littles to an actual meditation tool for kids who don’t know how to zone out. I thought that was a great idea, and wanted to make some with the kids as actual meditation tools, and for taking personal time outs when things get stressful.
Since we’ve been workboxing school, I have more awareness of the fun things that have been getting left out because we’re so focused on trying to get the ‘real’ work done. I know I said it in yesterday’s workbox update post, but that is one of the advantages of workboxing – being able to see patterns and gaps in our week. I’m using a worksheet that I originally made when I first read about workboxing. I’ve updated it now ,here’s a blank version of mine if you’re in the market for one. Planning out the week’s plans and having a weeks’ worth of actual assignments as opposed to a general idea of what we’ll be doing is an improvement, I think.
I’ve been able to add in things that we haven’t had time for, which is awesome and ever so much more fun for them; more craft projects, more games, more time to do something one-on-one with Mom. When we first started homeschooling, I bought this book of file folder games. I made up several of them, and we used one or two, but since then, they’ve been sitting on the shelf next to our completed lapbooks. Now that I have to fill a time slot, it’s been easier to throw those in there for a supplemental math or language arts lesson and to make sure it gets done instead of skipping it because we’ve already been working on school for however long.
That’s one area for the kids that I see a benefit in. They’re expecting to have to do ALL of the boxes (however many are assigned for the day). They haven’t questioned any part of how many boxes there are as of yet. If they have 12 boxes, then they’re expecting to do them all. This was one aspect of workboxing that I liked – that they didn’t need to ask me what else they still had to do; they can see it. That aspect will be worth something to keep however we tweak the system in the coming weeks.
Back to the mind jars though…
The recipe I found originally called for glue, water and glitter. Others mentioned glycerine and a similar project that I did with my kids called for baby oil. I didn’t have any of that on hand, but what I did have was a huge bottle of styling gel that I bought eons ago and will never, ever, ever use. It’s water soluble (science lesson sneak-in there – more on that in a minute), so it worked out just fine.
We did end up adding a few drops of food coloring to the jars to make the colors pop a bit more, and it did take a little mixing-magic to get the consistency just right. The idea is to have the jar clear in about 5 minutes. The kids jars take about 5-8 minutes to get calm again (depending on how ‘clear’ you want them).
After messing with theirs so much, I decided that I needed one, too. Unfortunately we were almost out of gel by that point, so I started experimenting with other substances. I had about half a jar of hair serum (to tame frizziness) left from a long time ago so I tried that. The only problem with that was the new product was oil-based. Let’s just say that a lesson on water solubility was enjoyed by all. With glitter. In any case, I found another bottle of water-based gel in the bottom of a drawer and made a pink one with white pixie dust in it for myself. The solution is a bit thicker in my jar and the glitter is a bit lighter; it takes about 10 minutes to clear.
I do have to say that it is totally mesmerizing to watch the glitter sparkle and fall! On a scale of 1-10, I rate this an 8 for make-ability, a 5 for mess-making (with a 3 for mess-making potential – spill one of those containers of glitter and you’ll see what I mean) and a 10 for fun/usability. Add some gorilla glue under the cap to make the jars resistant/less prone to unsupervised additions and this is nearly the perfect craft.
Hope your weekend is fantastic!
Warmly,
~h
Workboxes, Week 1
Well, we’re almost through our first week with workboxes. We’ve actually completed all of the boxes every day so far (though I did change ‘health’ to ‘chores’ yesterday – kinda cheating, I know, but I was ready for school to be done).
I haven’t decided exactly how I feel about them yet. I’m thinking that we’ll give it another week and see how it goes. I am almost sure that the actual ‘box’ part is just adding an extra/unnecessary step; I’ve seen several versions of workboxing mods that use a single box or bin with manilla mailing envelopes to hold the work, and others that use hanging files, covered cereal boxes, and lots of other methods. Since we’re so limited on space, I am wondering if something like that might be better.
I am also going to have to figure out something else to do with the ‘done’ cards or tags… the process we have now feels like a bunch of extra steps that might be eliminated. I saw several people using velcro dots on the fronts of boxes (or on a sheet of paper inside the front of the box) to hold all the tags; I’m thinking that I might want to try that instead. I do like the chore cards though, so I may play around with that and see if I can come up with a better way to manage them. We have a chore chart in the hallway that I made months ago; we may go back to that style for a while.
Overall, I’m not sold on the system for us, but there are some things I like about it, so I’m not ready to scrap it just yet. I thought I’d do a pros and cons list this week and then re-evaluate next week. In the interests of disclosure, I will say that I have not read Sue Patrick’s book (creator of the workbox system), or attended any kind of lecture or class on them. I’ve just been reading about them since last year and checking out all the different mods and tweaks that I’ve seen in blogs and put my system together from what I’ve read. That may very well do Ms. Patrick a huge disservice, so please take my two cents on the matter with a spoonful of salt. {wink} I like the idea of the workboxes system. Ideally, it seems like allowing the kids to be completely responsible for their work makes me happy. I just don’t know how that will work out practically speaking with my kids.
Pros:
- I like that having a weeks worth of plans laid out in advance helps me see where things are missing; I’m planning better and even though it’s still taking a while, the day is well-rounded.
- I like that I can also see where I am harping on ‘work’ and not adding in enough ‘fun’ stuff; workboxing it helps me make sure to include fun stuff at even intervals during the day.
- I like that everything is done the night before; I can just say “okay, time for school” and they’re set.
- We’re getting a CRAPLOAD of stuff done! I am impressed with the number of completed assignments that they’re turning in every day.
- it takes up a lot of space – the whole time; from storing packed boxes, to while they’re working on an open box, to boxes they’re saving for homework and boxes that they’ve completed. I’ve got boxes everywhere.
- the packing process takes a long time – not so long that it’s prohibitive, but long enough that I can see myself getting bored with it in the near future. I’ll want to pack them, but slack, then feel stressed about it in the morning.
- it’s not saving us ANY time. My kids still dawdle. The only benefit here is that I can say, “Okay, time’s up. Pack your things back into the box and set it on the side of your desk. That’s homework.” But then I still have to oversee homework. Le sigh.
- Even though we have the shoe-box sized bins, they’re still not big enough to hold workbooks or larger materials. Even their journals and notebooks get curved into the bottoms of the boxes.
- I’m also concerned about long-term wear and tear on the boxes, themselves. They’re dollar-store boxes, but that was still $24 on box. If I upgraded to heavier boxes or wider ones, that will be an even bigger expense.
The Many Uses of Index Cards in Homeschooling
It has recently come to my attention that index cards may be the most awesome invention ever.
One of the main things I like about them is that they are portable and easy to organize – color coding, alphabetizing, numbering – all methods work equally well. They fit well into kids’ hands and they’re easy to work with.
Rather than re-invent the wheel, I’ve been finding tons of creative uses for them via the internets…
Heart of Wisdom suggested 10 Super Index Card Ideas, I found #6 to be the most appealing:
6. Book Record/Bookmark
Index cards make great bookmarks — students can write out the title, author and publication date at the top of an index card. write notes about the book on the card. When finish the book, drop the index card into a file box and have an ongoing record of your reading.
I LOVE this idea!! LBB tends to read something and it goes in one eye and out the other; this would be a great way to help him keep track of the details in the book to refer to when it comes time to work on a book report.
I also found the Hipster PDA. There are downloadable templates here, or you can just make your own since the concept is basically a bunch of index cards clipped together with a binder clip. Still fun, esp for the kidlets. If the index cards are too big, you can also use blank, printable business cards; they’re smaller and would be perfect for making your own card games, flash cards, new cards for re-purposing old board games (Candyland adapted for math, chutes and ladders adapted like Mad Libs – that sort of thing), create-your-own geography games, Hipster PDA-mini… etc.
They can be used for copywork, too – write or print and paste a phrase, a poem or paragraph on an index card and have the child copy it below (or affix it to the back for longer paragraphs). This helps the child see how the words are spaced when written (if you wrote it out). Plus, by archiving them in an index file, you and your child both can see the progression of penmanship as the year goes by.
Index Card timeline for shorter time lines, or specific time frames, using a string and clothespins to hang index cards would be a great idea. We’re using a scroll timeline right now – it’s LONG when all out, but easy to use for the most part – but I like the idea of using index cards, too. That would make it easy to add new figures or pictures during a unit, and then they can be added into the scroll.
Another great idea is using index cards and book card holders to make a ‘tired word rescue center’. Use one book card holder for each letter of the alphabet, and write commonly used words on the blank side and synonyms on the back (happy on the front, joyous, delighted, pleased and others on the back). That could even be expanded into a vocabulary-building game.
Another nifty index card idea is for spelling. I used an index card file box and a binder ring. Each week, on Monday, I give the kids 7 words. I write the word on the front (blank) side of the card once in print and once in cursive. Then the kids write their words three times, in print, cursive, print on Monday. On Tuesday – Thursday, they play games, write them, quiz each other - they have a list of spelling activities that they choose three from each week and practice every day. Then on Friday, we test. Any words that they get correct come off of the ring and get filed alphabetically. The words that they miss stay on the ring for another week (or until they get the right on the test).
To keep the rings separate, I write their initials on each card, and the date that each word was given so I can keep track of how long they’ve had a word. Once they know the word, it goes into the box, and that will eventually be their word bank. Also filed away are sight words (all of the ‘a’ words on a single card, etc.). This helps prevent a constant barrage of, “Mom, how do you spell…” during writing assignments.
I know there are tons of other ways to use index cards – what are some of your favorite ideas?
Warmly,
~h
NBTS Blog Hop – Student Photo Week
Once again, we’re participating in the Not Back to School Blog Hop over at Heart of the Matter. This week, it’s student photos!
Even though our school year ‘officially’ starts in January, it’s really hard not to get caught up in the excitement of ‘back to school’ around this time of the year. We stock up on school supplies (OMG, SALES!!!) and clothes and take their ‘official’ school year picture.
Since my kids started Kindergarten in school-school, their picture each year was always taken in the fall. I have one of those big Kindergarten though Graduation progressive picture frames for each of the boys and so to stay consistent, I take their ‘grade’ pictures around back-to-school season so that the pictures are about a year apart. I always wanted one of those frames and now, having one for the boys, I love seeing how much they change from year to year.
I’m not obsessive about haircuts and uniforms the way I was when they were in school, so even though we have head-shots, they’re not as tailored and ‘posed’; artificial, like they were in school. I think my kids are super cute always, but so far, I think I like their homeschool ‘school’ pictures better.
Technical info: I try to take their pictures outside; natural light and all that, then I edit in Picasa and add the text. I am a font-freak and downloaded that one from DaFont.com.
I also update their school ID cards each year. I think it’s helpful to have something ‘official’ for the kids. We haven’t ever been bothered with questions that are invasive, but I like to be prepared.
On the fronts of the cards, I have spaces for their names, grade, and birthdate as well as my name and phone numbers and our homeschool group affiliation. I used a template at Homeschool Oasis. If you scroll all the way to the bottom of the page, there is a downloadable MSWord.doc that has samples of all the card templates she offers. I used the ‘Card E’ layout and added more stuff into the card – our homeschool crest, our city’s flag and the state flag, and you can’t see it, but I added our homeschool group’s logo and name. I did not sign the front of the card because I have the back signed.
On the backs of the cards, I have a signed medical information, emergency medical release and emergency contact information, as well as a notice that they’re exempt from the daytime curfew in our city.
There’s also discussion on a list I am on about daytime curfews so I thought I’d share my ‘solution’. We do have one in our city, and though I oppose the ordinance, it passed with flying colors a few years ago. According to the state law though, we’re exempt. It’s not actually spelled out in so many words, but if we were accosted, I think my interpretation would hold up. One exemption is in the event that a minor child is with a parent or other appointed guardian. My kids are nearly always with me, and when they’re not, they’re with someone I trust, so them being out and about alone is a moot point. The reason I claim ‘exempt’ is because in TX, homeschoolers are considered private schools, and as such are exempt from compulsory school attendance laws. In any case, I updated their ID cards this year with the city ordinance and state statute that grants their exemption from daytime curfews.
I also made an educator ID card for myself, and I have both of the boys’ names on my card and their grade and the homeschool group affiliation. I put my homeschool group membership card on the back of my educator ID card. Our homeschool group operates on more of a traditional schedule (Aug/Sept through May/June) and we (parents) have group ID cards for discounts at places like Joann’s, Michael’s , Barnes & Noble and more. Once the cards have been updated for the new school year, I print them and then have them laminated at the print shop.
Do you use a homeschool ID card? Post your favorite resources, or links to your blog if you feel like sharing yours!
Warmly,
~h
Underwater Basketweaving
I read that in a post by Pioneer Woman a while back as the name for a subject that the overly ambitious homeschooling mom might engage her kids in. Imagine my shock and surprise when I learned that UB actually exists, along with a host of other seemingly odd courses: Philosophy via The Simpsons, Science via Harry Potter (we may actually use that one), and cultural studies by way of a Zombie Apocalypse… pretty snifty if you ask me – the other stuff that is, not necessarily the UB part (though I kinda wonder now if the pressure of the water helps keep the strips from being so fly-away when you’re weaving and am oddly tempted to try this in the pool now…) Anyway, PW’s post inspired me to examine my own motives and methods and I thought I would share.
Motive
My motives are multi-faceted. I think that most homeschooling parents can say that, but it seems that many? most? have a primary reason for homeschooling. I always get confused when talking about the ‘primary’ reason… we have the catalyst – what happened, what immediate need that was not being met that was the push I needed to make the decision to venture into homeschooling; but the reasons that we homeschool are much more broad than ‘a’ reason.
For one thing, I see homeschooling as an extension of our parenting style. Though we don’t follow every tenet of attachment parenting, that’s definitely the way we lean and I feel that this approach is responsible for the relationship that we have with our kids. As for educational goals, we want to have children who know how to find the information they need when they need it. To start with, we want them to have a solid foundation in math, science, history, language arts and a developed artistic voice. That means that at this age, we’re less delight-led and more eclectic with classical/CM leanings. As they get older, and master the basics, we’ll branch out more into their individual paths of study. We’re cultivating and fostering those interests now, but are more concerned with building a solid foundation right now. We also want to cultivate in them the desire to continue learning, even when there’s no paper due or grade attached to a project.
Obviously, homeschooling is not the only way to accomplish those things, but for our kids, we believe that homeschooling is the best way. Homeschooling allows me, as the primary teacher, to tailor my kids’ lessons to their individual needs; learning style, interests, abilities. It allows them to stay on one concept long enough to master it rather than ‘having’ to move on because we have to cover X number of pages/concepts this year.
Homeschooling also allows me the benefit of setting a schedule that works within the context of our family. We’re night owls and prefer to sleep later in the mornings. We can also incorporate community activities and area events that we’d normally be too tired for if we had to deal with school-school, and field trips on a whim. I’m sure there are additional benefits, but those are the ones that stand out as most important as write this.
Method
Though we look at education as a mutual responsibility, it works best for our family to have me in the role of primary educator. I’ve always been the primary caretaker, so this is again a natural extension of that role. It’s more traditional, and one of the few aspects of our lives that does fall into a more traditional/stereotypical ideal.
As a teacher, my methods are myriad. I am continuously looking for and learning about new ways to teach and new things that I think might inspire my kids. When I read about something I like, chances are that in the following weeks we’ll experiment with some form of that idea. If it works out, it might become a staple. If not, then I scrap it and try something new. This approach might not work for everyone, but it suits us quite well. It means that we’re not bogged down in any one thing or way for too long, but it also means that we’re not terribly consistent with any one style. We probably don’t garner the full benefit of Charlotte Mason style homeschooling, for example, but we incorporate plenty of her techniques into our homeschool and that works well for us. Besides, I honestly don’t think that any one method would suit us well enough to stick with long-term anyway.
One of the more inspiring things I’ve come across in recent months was a video by Escapist Magazine called Gamefying Education. We’re gamers, so naturally this caught my attention. It also made some darn good points about simple ideas that can change the way kids react and interact with education – things that even teachers in the classroom can implement. Since we’re not trapped by the a school administration’s policies and procedures, you’d think that such ideas come naturally, and to an extent they do, but having it all spelled out in this way (and in relation to gaming) was very illuminating.
The three areas of change that the video talks about are scoring, autonomy and motivation to continue learning once the lesson is over. One of the thoughts that struck me most in scoring was the notion that people go into a graded task with the thought that they have 100 points and that every mistake chips away at that. However, in gaming, you always start at zero and accumulate experience points as you go. You still can end up with the same number of points (though who wouldn’t choose a max of 100XP over a max of 10XP??), you just count up instead of down. Simple, but revolutionary.
The other two points, autonomy (freedom to choose their own direction) and motivation to continue learning, are less of a novel concept out of the classroom. I think that most homeschooling families tend to do so with and eye towards nurturing their kids’ interests and facilitating opportunities for their kids to expand them. But I really like the idea of learning as a game. The large-scale project that was mentioned in the video is beyond me at this point, but I am going to continue thinking about it and bugging my fellow homeschoolers out there (You. Yeah, YOU. *nudge, nudge*) and see what we come up with.
I did find Integer Jim’s math game, ‘Quest for the Golden Calculator‘ and am trying to convince my homeschool group that we should do this as a group activity, but so far they seem pretty unenthusiastic about the idea. I also found this website with game resources – in particular is a Jeopardy style game-creator that’s pretty awesome. That’s not exactly the large-scale game that the video was talking about, but it’s a pretty good start, I think. In any case, I look forward to brainstorming more on the game idea and hearing what you guys come up with, too.
Warmly,
~h
Copywork, Narration and Notebooking
We’ve been doing copywork and oral narration since we started homeschooling in 2010 and we’re planning on starting notebooking in the fall. In case you’re not familiar with the terms, let me explain:
What is copywork?
Copywork is what it sounds like. The child copies a passage as-is in their own handwriting. When they’re beginning writers, you start with simple things (name, address, phone number, etc.) and can progress to whole paragraphs. We started with regular notebooks and then went to Mead’s RediSpace notebooks to help my boys learn proper spacing in print. Now that they’re progressing to script, they’re still helpful.
Copywork is beneficial on many levels. It can cement an idea through repetition, it exposes a child to proper grammar and syntax and tons of other benefits as well. Copywork was one of the first things that we started with when we began homeschooling, and it still features today in many different guises. We often start our school time with copywork of some sort and then go on from there.
What is narration?
Narration is ‘telling back’. Basically, the parent/teacher reads something, or discusses something, then the child tells the story or passage back. You can facilitate the narration by asking questions like, “What do you remember about what we just read?’, or “Name 3 things from this paragraph”. You can help your child organize his thoughts by asking what happened first, second and last. Oral narration precedes written narration; Charlotte Mason recommends that written narrations begin around 10, however you know your child best. My oldest is 10 and we’ll be starting written narration (in small doses) this fall.
Here’s a nice how-to on narration from Charlotte Mason Education. I also found a nifty article from Mozart & Mud Pies on difficulties with narration. This applied for my oldest and the verbal cues to imagine the scene helped tremendously.
What is notebooking?
While I’m sure there are a hundred different definitions to notebooking, the way I see it is basically a collection of copywork, narrations, dictation, artwork, research and more, all on a particular topic. You can go into a topic with the intent of notebooking it, or a notebook can serve as a landing ad for your child’s work on that topic. One of the most awesome and inspiring examples of notebooking style homeschooling is Jimmie’s Collage. Every time I go there, I find something else that I want to try with my kids.
If you’re into lapbooking, you can easily combine notebooking; either with pockets or brads to keep papers bound into your lapbook. My kids do a fair amount of copywork and writing in their lapbooks already, so we’ll just continue adding more as we go along.
I found some great links on notebooking here.
Since my last post was on the sometimes value of worksheets, it got me thinking about the alternatives to them. I thought I’d post my thoughts.
Basically, I think I might have gotten a bit lazy. Worksheets are easy and pretty basic. I am considering working with the boys over the next few weeks to assimilate their math work over the last few months into their math journals. In looking through the worksheets though, while they certainly did the work (in one form or fashion), those types of worksheets are entirely unsuited to notebooking. The worksheets we’ve been using have been more broad-subject types, which is good in some ways, but bad for delving deep into a subject or topic for notebooking.
One of the advantages that notebooking has over worksheets is that the kids actually write more, especially when narration is part of it. The kids can write their own thoughts instead of merely answering questions. I think that it will be a challenge to get LBB to write, so we will probably work on dictation and copywork (he’ll dictate, I’ll transcribe and he’ll copy) until he gets the hang of it. I’m not planning on starting PeaGreen with written narrations until he’s 10 or so – another couple of years, yet – but we are going to start notebooking with him, too.
Putting together a good notebook – helping the kids – will be an experience for me. We’ve gotten pretty good at lapbooking, so I see notebooking as an extension of that; the next natural step. I’m looking forward to the challenge!
I’m curious, do you notebook? What are some of your favorite resources?
Warmly,
~h
Homeschooling and Worksheets
Worksheets get a bum rap.
There, I said it. Even though it is universally known that ‘proper’ homeschoolers all loathe and despise them and that they are not featured in ‘real’ homeschooling…. I kinda like them. So that’s what this post is about. It may alternately be titled, “In Defense of Worksheets in Homeschooling: A Perspective”.
To make things easier, I am going to use the term ‘worksheet’ to mean either worksheets or workbooks (which are essentially bound volumes of worksheets). Before you get your nose out of joint, I need to explain to you what I mean when I say ‘use worksheets’. You may have noticed that when I talk about worksheets, I say that we don’t ‘do’ them. In fact, I say that fairly often – not necessarily here, but certainly in forums and such. I should clarify – we don’t ‘do’ them, but we do use them. Often. That may seem to be a contradiction, but it’s quite a difference in definition in my book. The word ‘do’ is almost always in quotations when I say that; that’s because my version of ‘do’ is not the same as what ‘do’ means in the classroom.
For starters, I’ll agree with those who say that worksheets are just repetition, or that they’re disengaging, or that they’re boring and so on and so forth… yeah, yeah, yeah, I get all that. But the information contained on or in the worksheet is (sometimes) useful. I say sometimes because I’m not talking about just any ol’ worksheet; I’m talking about well-planned, leveled worksheets; worksheets that go along with lessons as a review or to solidify concepts through practice – not busy work. When I say ‘use’, I don’t mean handing your kids a worksheet, sending them to their desk and expecting them to do 30 of the same thing over and over again. I mean using the worksheet the same way that you might use any other tool – to help with a task; in this case, cementing information or concepts in the mind.
Many of the worksheets that my kids ‘do’ come from a workbook (though I do print them from different places online; SuperTeacherWorksheets is a favorite but we use it primarily when I am looking for something specific). Even though we utilize the pages, our use of them comes mainly in the form of discussing what is on the page and then using the actual page to record anything they want to remember about the information. They may actually work some of the problems or answer the questions as repetition, but rarely do they just go ‘do a worksheet’. Much of the material is covered on the chalkboard (yes, we have an old-school style chalkboard in our school room. Two, actually. {wink}) or orally. Many times, the worksheet is in front of ME and the kids are bouncing around answering questions that I toss at them. We also use videos to kick off new concepts (like homophones). Simple, but effective for my kids (YMMV).
So, you may ask, ‘why use worksheets? Aren’t there other ways of doing that?’ Well yes, of course there are other ways of accomplishing this same thing, and I am not dismissing those methods at all. In fact, one method that we will be using quite a bit in coming years is notebooking – essentially writing everything instead of going over the material on the workbook pages. We don’t use it right now because my boys are not yet strong writers or strong spellers. I suppose I could answer, “Mom, how do you spell” 6,000 times a day, or I could allow each lesson to take 2 hours because they need to look each work up in the dictionary… but I’d rather not do that. So we’re taking baby steps to get to the point where tons of writing is feasible (having said that, whether that style will work for my kids remains to be seen and is another matter entirely) – mainly, starting with copywork* and a word bank. We’re working on an index card style version, which is basically a dictionary that they write on index cards and file at their desks that is made up of words they have learned or are learning to spell.
This year we used an all-in-one curriculum workbook as a guide for the kids work. Since we don’t use a boxed curriculum, I found that this is a really good way to keep us moving through the lessons. I have a tendency to get bogged down in the lessons – where one thing can be learned, there are 7 more that can enhance it! Using the workbooks as a guide keeps me on-track and moving so we’re not lost in one thing for weeks on end (like our US Constitution lapbook – we spent 4 weeks on that almost a year ago and didn’t finish it, but I am STILL burned out on it). Some things, like grammar concepts, they’ll cover over and over every year, so even though they may not have mastered homophones just yet, we can safely move on because we’ll cover it again in a few months.
And then there are some worksheets that I do give them with the expectation that they will take to their desks and work independently. You may have noted our struggles with working independently in the past and this summer, much of the math work they’ll be doing will be a review of already-known concepts. Since this is a review, I do expect them to know it and to work independently. But that doesn’t mean that they are required to do exactly as the worksheet directs. I often give alternate directions, or allow them to come up with their own version of what to do. I sometimes wonder if that’s not doing them a disservice – teaching them, or allowing them to think that things are negotiable, but I tend to feel that most things are negotiable, so maybe it’s not such a bad thing after all.
This is really all I have to say about it; I just wanted to offer a different perspective to that of the vocal majority of worksheet-hating homeschoolers. Carry on!
Warmly,
~h
*copywork: this article is on the value of copying a painting and is directed at student artists, but I think it’s an excellent article and can be extended, for many of the same reasons, to the printed word. Copying sentences, phrases, paragraphs, quotes, poems – all of this and more can be used to reinforce ideals, expose new ideas, improve penmanship, reinforce grammar and spelling, teach prose… the benefits are myriad. For more on copywork, check out:
Counter Cultural School, Homeschool Jungle and this thread from the Well Trained Mind forums.
The Meanest Homeschool Mom
And thus has the devil-may-care, relaxed lifestyle to which my children have become accustomed come to an abrupt end.
Recently, some of the parents that I share a homeschooling discussion chat list with were talking about being overwhelmed as a homeschooling parent. I was going to chime in, but decided to put my contribution in blog form and post it here, because it would be a long post and I enjoy monopolizing the conversation.
It seems like since my FIL died, we’ve been thrown off kilter. For whatever reason (nothing directly related to his death – just the time frame), we have not been able to get back into a good, consistent daily routine. I came to the realization that we have simply got to make some changes around here a week or two ago when I lost my schmidt ( with a nod and a wink to Rants from Mommyland) after dealing with whiney, uncooperative and lazy children for several days in a row. I need to clarify that this wasn’t a mere moment of frustration; this was the final straw on a huge pile of hay. I completely and utterly lost it and in one of those spectacular displays of Mommy Mayhem, announced to the children that a New World Order had arrived.
From now on, I declared, there would be no more luxuries they have come to expect – no recreational television viewing, no video games, no dsi playing. It wasn’t that they are ‘grounded’. Being ‘grounded’ implies a punishment of some sort that, after whatever time limits have passed, shall be lifted. No, I explained in the Mommy Has Had It voice, this is more that they are simply no longer have any of those privileges. At all. And so shall it remain until I see a dramatic and sustained improvement in attitude and application of self to schoolwork and basic picking up after self-ness.
This may seem a bit extreme to some, but Loverly Husband and I see this as an overall positive step for our family. It got to the point that I was outright angry irritated all the time about having to try to get the kids to do their work and pick up the mess they made. They’re not incapable, they’re unwilling – and that doesn’t work for me. It seemed like every day, I was cajoling and pleading and threatening and bargaining with them to accomplish even the most basic of assignments, or reminding them several times to do a task (like: put your shoes on the shelf. – 15 minutes later – Put your shoes on the shelf. -15 minutes later – PUT YOUR SHOES ON THE FRAKKIN’ SHELF!) and then whining when I say that they can’t play/watch/do until XYZ is done (but Mooooom… that’s not fair!!). That sense of entitlement and no work ethic was buggin’ the crap outta me.
We tried things before this: chore charts, a stapled packet of school work, timers, attaching chores to money/video game time – nothing has worked consistently. And no matter what I asked or required, there was always – always – something that had to be done before they could do whatever task (no matter how small). LBB is the Champion of Stall and his tactics are legion. When the physical stall tactics run out, he has mental check-outs that he engages in, better and deeper than anyone I’ve ever seen. Makes me insane.
So we took a drastic step to see if we can curb some of that. We’re two weeks in, and though The Stall is still around, I’m in a better mood and we’re accomplishing more school work (though it still takes LBB all day sometimes). We are using the timer still – a reasonable amount of time is given for an assignment and when the timer dings, we move on. If you haven’t finished it, then that’s your ‘homework’ – for you to do on YOUR time while the rest of us are enjoying whatever leisure activity we have planned for that day. Doing it this way sucks for whoever is indulging in The Stall on their school time, but doesn’t punish the one who did do his work that day (and amazingly, they both have their days – it’s like Goofus and Gallant tag-teaming Mom most days… le sigh). It also keeps me from feeling resentful at having to skip whatever field trip we’d planned on doing – we don’t skip it; approximately 137% of our field trips are in some way school-related and I don’t want to skip them because someone prefers to make sound effects rather then write his paper. What this means is that someone may have to do his remaining schoolwork that evening while the rest of us play, but that’s the way the cookie crumbles, Chief. I’ve been stressing Time Management in a big way lately and though the situation looks bleak, I remain hopeful that this lesson will one day sink in.
The other, known but forgotten, benefit to the ‘no TV’ thing is that I just plain enjoy my children more when there is not a constant stream of television in the background. It’s not like they’re allowee to watch all that much to begin with, but I know how convenient TV can be, and I am not above letting the TV engage the kids for an hour while I get a break from the never-ending chorus of mom, mom, mom, mom, mom, mom,mom,mom,mom,mom,mom. I’ve realized it in the past when we’ve banned TV for whatever reason, but it’s always surprising to see how much more creative and more willing to try new creative things when they aren’t mentally calculating how much longer it will be before they can watch TV or play that next level.
Like I said, we’re two weeks in, and though life is not perfect, I think we’re on the right path. They’re slow to adjusting, but they don’t ask ‘now can we watch TV?’ 6,000 times a day, so I’m calling that progress.
Warmly,
~h (aka: The Meanest Homeschool Mom)
Things that are Not Banned: bike riding, board games, swimming/slip-n-slide/sprinkler play, play dough/modeling clay and other sculpting mediums, wood carving and burning, helping Grandmother and Grammie and Gramps (all of whom live next door), visiting with friends, going to the park, fishing, hiking, art journaling, reading, trampoline – anything that requires physical or mental effort, engages the mind, body and spirit… so I’m not a total ogre.
Ten Stupid Things Homeschoolers Shouldn’t Do
I found this article last night and before I post the link, let me issue a warning: stupid should hurt. It is not a quality article by any stretch of the imagination. We’re not even going to talk about the grammar…
However, this is the kind of information that is out there and I admit that I feel a certain responsibility for clearing up blatant misinformation, so this is my attempt to do just that.
Right off the bat, we’re informed that homeschooling is a ‘tedious task’, but that the we can be sure that the kids will learn what they are supposed to (presumably if we make education tedious enough… I guess if you use a non-traditional and dynamic method, your kids are doomed to idiocy). We’re also cautioned about parents who simply ‘claim’ to homeschool with very little progress. Thankfully, we’re given a list of blunders to avoid so that we don’t all into that category.
1. Preaching about homeschooling - Not every parent favors homeschooling. Some are just too busy and others do not have the ability to teach their kids at home. Pushing the idea of homeschooling only alienates you and your child in the community which is dangerous because your kids need a strong community presence.
I don’t think I’ve ever met anyone who ‘preaches’ about the virtues of homeschooling. Most of the homeschooling parents I know are advocates of homeschooling, yes, but I think we all realize that it is not the right choice for every parent. Homeschooling takes a tremendous amount of effort and it definitely is not feasible or desirable for every family. We know that. We even know people whom, if we found out about their desire to homeschool, we would actively discourage from trying to homeschool. But if you’re on the fence about it, talking to a homeschooling advocate can definitely give you a confidence boost enough to go ahead and try it. It’s not like ‘deciding’ your child’s educational path is the end-all, be-all decision. If you try it and it isn’t for you, then you can do something different – no harm done.
2. Setting a homeschool without additional help - There are too many ideas outside your home that can be used to properly implement homeschooling. Learn as much as you can from various groups online or in your local area. This will constantly give you fresh and smart ideas in teaching your kids.
However badly presented, this idea is a good one. I wouldn’t say that it’s ‘necessary’ to utilize outside resources (after all, few schools make use of the educational resources that their community offers to their full advantage), but it certainly can and does enhance your homeschooling experience. You’ll also offer a more dynamic lesson when your lesson incorporates ‘out of the box’ locations and resources.
3. Accepting all teaching responsibilities - Do not think that you can teach everything to your kids. This can only damage their learning process especially on the young ones. Identify the subjects you can’t handle and seek help so that you will maintain the quality of education.
This is one of those tricksy worded ‘helpful guidelines’. I daresay that as a reasonably educated adult, I am more than capable of teaching my elementary school aged child the basics of a 5-8th grade-ish education all by myself. With the inclusion of the local library and internet access, I might even extend that through high school. Personally, I would say that it is more in the later years – high school and beyond – that homeschooled students might benefit from having specialized teachers. Certainly if one knows oneself to be woefully lacking in any given subject, the responsible homeschooling parent will seek a mentor for their child.
4. Difficult schedule - One of the reasons why parents want to homeschool their kids is that they want their kids to have more time at home. Do not remove this advantage by establishing a hectic daily schedule for your kids. It is stressful for you and your kids.
This one makes no sense to me. Even the most rigorous homeschool schedule I’ve seen is less hectic than a schedule where the kids are being shuffled back and forth to classes every hour. Add in after-school stuff and that makes for a very full schedule. I don’t know of any homeschoolers who over-schedule themselves or their kids.
5. Overspending - You have to expect to spend a little bit more on books and other supplies for homeschooling. But you still have to be smart about the budget as overspending will not translate into a well-educated kid. It might even be the reason why the kid is not concentrating enough.
This one is reasonable, and makes a good point: Overspending does not result in a well-educated child. I don’t understand how more money = not concentrating, so we’re just going to ignore that part.
6. Moving forward without feedback - Assumption is the number one enemy of parents. Do not just think that your kid already knew the subject because it will only confuse your kids. Consistently ask for a feedback so that you can adjust the pace or even your teaching techniques.
The number one enemy of parents? I hardly think so. I don’t think this one makes much sense either; most homeschooling parents can see within a lesson or two whether or not their child ‘gets it’ and/or if this book/curriculum/style is working and will make those adjustments accordingly and automatically. Feedback in the form of discussion is kind of like flogging a dead horse. I will say that discussion with your child and getting ideas and input from him/her about how and what is being learned is a good idea – but that’s kind of a different point than the one being made.
7. Asking too much from your kid - Avoid stressful situations by setting realistic expectations from your kid. This will even be beneficial for your kid since he will have a good learning experience. Easy to understand subjects will be easier to learn which can be slowly adjusted depending on the kid’s response.
Again, however badly worded, this one contains a little nugget of useful insight. As a homeschooling parent, I think it is very easy to have high expectations – maybe even unrealistic expectations. Good communication with your child can help keep you both on the same page, as will resisting the urge to push them ahead or compare them with other kids.
8. Ignoring school-based ideas - Homeschooling is not a very unique system compared to regular school environment. Learn from regular teachers regarding their teaching methods and techniques and implement some of those ideas at home. Teachers are professionals who know what to do with kids so their ideas can really help in homeschooling.
I’m gong to flat-out disagree with this one. Homeschooling IS a very unique system when compared to institutionalized school environments. Classroom teachers and homeschool teachers have little on common and therefore their teaching methods can and should vary greatly. Homeschooling parent/teachers have any and all teaching methods at their disposal – the traditional teaching environment and style guarantee a good education in the exact same way that expensive materials do.
9. Pushing for more activities - More free time does not mean additional activities for the kids. Let them decide what to do with their free time and simply supervise or simply be a parent that prevents them from danger.
Again, disagree. More free time means exactly that there is more time for additional activities for the kids. Without spending 8 hours a day in a classroom, they will have more free time for activities of their choosing – academic or otherwise.
10. Not knowing when to stop- Your kid will reach an age that homeschooling is no longer an option. Parents have to recognize this stage so that they can help their kids have a normal adolescent development. Homeschooling is still a good option but should not be the only option parents should push to their kids.
Aaaaaannnndddd…. disagree. Completely. Utterly. In every way. There is no age when homeschooling suddenly becomes less beneficial. The benefits of homeschooling continue as long as there is an active parent involved. While the individual circumstance might prompt your family to choose other schooling options, homeschooling is a viable option from Kindergarten through High School Graduation – and even college or trade school (via correspondence) should one desire it. The idea that a child ‘needs’ to be in an institutionalized school environment in order to develop normally is absurd.
Since this is supposed to be a quick list of things not to do, here’s mine:
- Don’t spend a bunch of money on curriculum in the first year. Your style will change as will your expectations over the first year. Get a better idea of how you’ll homeschool before committing to a curriculum.
- Don’t stress about whether or not this is the ‘right’ thing. If you’re worried about it, that means that you’re mindfully considering your options and whatever you decide, it’s the right decision for your family right now.
- Don’t compare your kid, yourself or your homeschool to others. It’s not a contest.
- Don’t over-explain. Homeschooling is legal in most states. Learn your state’s rules and requirements and fulfill them. You don’t owe a single thing else to anyone.
- Don’t push – yourself or your kid. Take your time; you’ve got plenty of it!
- Don’t go it alone. Find like-minded families either in real life or online. Connecting with other homeschooling families is key in homeschooling success.
- Don’t be afraid to mix it up. Utilize every resource available to you – not all in one day, but do use them. There are a ton of resources and opportunities in your community and region. Find them.
- Don’t ‘cover the material’. Homeschoolers have the luxury of being able to be ‘mastery oriented’. We’re not on anyone else’s time table. Master each concept in turn, then move on – regardless of what ‘grade’ it is.
- Don’t burn out. Take regular breaks for yourself. You need and deserve to be well rested and centered so that you can continue giving your best to your kids.
- Don’t put too much stock in anyone else’s lists.
Warmly,
~h
Note to Self: You’re Doing Just Fine
This is a reminder that I need every few weeks, it seems. We’ve now successfully completed almost half of our fourth year of homeschooling, and STILL, I go through phases where I have these doubts.
Most recently, it’s come to my attention that my father is under the impression that LBB (now 11.5 years old and in 5th grade) does not know his multiplication facts. Nevermind that he’s been working on division for the past few months, and doing beautifully at it (including fractions and decimals). My dad asked LBB what 5×5 was, and LBB said ‘I don’t know’. When my dad told him to figure it out, LBB made like he didn’t understand what he meant or how to go about doing that. So this, of course, prompted a call to me with concern about his math skills.
Le sigh.
This prompts several responses on my part. On the one hand, towards LBB: “WTF, man? Really? 5×5? You’re having trouble with FIVE TIMES FIVE? That’s arguably the easiest of times tables and you’re going to choke on that one?? Dude. C’mon – you know this. Just take a minute, think about it and answer the question. No big deal.”
Then again, I totally get the ‘on the spot’ freak out. If someone asked me, my initial response would be to freeze; like if I was still enough, they won’t remember what it was that they asked and I can get out of the situation without answering the math question.
Towards my dad, I get this mama-bear, ‘Hey man! Not cool! Don’t test my kids!’ sort of feeling. I understand that it was a reasonable question. I know that some of my homeschooling compatriots have unsupportive families, and a question like that would come from a negative place, but my family is very supportive and I don’t think there was anything untoward or sneaky meant by it, but still, I get a little twitchy when I feel judged. I feel like my kid’s lack of willingness to answer a question is a reflection on my teaching ability (because that is what got called into question – not his attitude or interest, but *my* part in it).
Honestly, could he be stronger in math? Yes. Am I drilling him on basic multiplication tables? Daily; and this in addition to our regular math lesson. Do we do ‘math bingo’, Timez Attack, flash cards, and other ‘fun’ math things to help cement those concepts? Yes. Are those things going to make him pop out with the answer to a random math question? Meh … maybe. Maybe not. The thing is, I can’t separate his interest or cooperation with others from their perception of my ability to teach. I understand that it’s not my job to correct this perception, but it still affects me when I see/hear/feel it in action and directed towards me.
My kids are not babies anymore. They’re young men, and though they do still have to do the work assigned to them, I can’t learn it for them. I have said this before and I still think it’s true: One of the hardest parts about homeschooling is that no matter what you do, the blame rests firmly on your shoulders. When your kids are in school, to a certain extent, if they don’t get good grades or learn what they need to, then you can cast off some of the blame onto the school system. The school, in turn, can shove off some of their responsibility onto the parents – they weren’t involved enough, or didn’t give the child support/encouragement/motivation – whatever. But as a homeschooling parent, ALL of the ‘blame’ rests squarely on your shoulders… which is wrong, I think, to a point. Some of the blame rests with the child, himself, and I think that it is this point that many people forget or don’t realize, especially in homeschooling.
We see this in reverse and don’t question it. When a homeschooled child excels, we say how smart s/he must be, and congratulate them for persevering and working so hard. We don’t pat the parent on the back and say, ‘Way to go, Mom! What a great teacher you must be!’ So why do we blame the parent when the child’s ability doesn’t match up to what our perception of where s/he ‘should be’?
Children are not ‘babies’ forever. At some point, they do grow up. In fact, we have years between baby and adult that we should use to teach them to be responsible for themselves. This is a gradual teaching and learning – not something that they master all in one day or by whatever grade. If we want them to grow up into productive members of society, then we as parents must allow them a certain amount of responsibility, gradually, and offer them the opportunity to succeed or fail on their own merit.
Over the past few years, my kids have taken on more responsibility for contributing to the overall running of our household. Their chores are divided into either ‘dishes’ or ‘laundry’, and they switch every month.
Dishes includes (but is not limited to):
Laundry includes (but is not limited to):
It’s a little un-balanced, but they both agree that dishes is the most onerous of the two, and so gladly will take on more work in order to not do dishes. Loverly Husband and I also have chores; in addition to helping the kids, we both do our own laundry, clean the fridge, clean all the stainless, blah, blah, blah… everyone has chores.
My point in laying all that out is to say that where we used to step in and pick up the slack if the kids forgot their chores, now, we don’t as much. If they slack, then dinner has to wait until they’re done, or they don’t have the right clothes, or, or, or. It’s not just mom or dad ‘nagging’ – it’s the whole family who is irritated at you for not pulling your weight. It’s been a slow process, but one that’s starting to pay off. They’re more likely to step up and say, “Oh, I forgot to do that. Give me just a minute and I will get it done.” It doesn’t always happen, but it is happening now whereas before it wasn’t. They see more now how each person plays a role, and if they don’t do their part then the whole family suffers.
I think learning and education are the same way. Though I play a role in their education (especially right now), as they get older, I will play more of a guide role and less of a participant role. It will be up to them to choose a career path and go after the skills and education necessary to meet those goals. It will be my job to encourage and support and help guide them to appropriate courses, but ultimately, especially though high school, their education becomes more and more a product of their own efforts.
LBB is starting middle school in the fall. Middle school! I don’t want him to reply on me so thoroughly to ensure that he’s applying himself that he can’t work independently. Of course, I will be watching and making sure he is doing the work, but my goal isn’t for him to ‘just do the work’. That’s not real education. Based on what I know of my kids, and of children in general, this type of responsibility is years in the making for some kids, and that’s okay.
Contrary to what we tend to believe, there is no rule that says kids have to do or know XYZ by Xth grade or by age N. Children aren’t programmable robots. They learn at different rates. They have different interests and what motivates one child may do the opposite for another. Knowing this, and repeating this is what keeps me from throwing the towel in some days.
And then there are days like yesterday, where we got into a discussion about the origin of life, and the boys both had fun schooling Mom on which came first, the chicken or the egg. Apparently, they are much more well-versed in this conundrum than I am, and though we both used the same bit of research (located independently, I might add), it was applied in different ways. They were so excited to showcase their knowledge, and that’s something that can’t be taught.
So yeah. We’re doing just fine.
Warmly,
~h
May 3, 2013 | Categories: Advocacy, Day in the Life, Homeschooling Tips and Tricks, Lessons Learned, Math, Parenting, Rambling Thoughts, Science, Testing & Assesment | Tags: commentary, homeschooling, homeschooling challenges, methods, Parenting, raising responsible adults, secular homeschooling | Leave A Comment »