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The Byrd's Nest
Sep. 15, 2006
Winter Promise Activity: Make a Native American pouch
Sep. 15, 2006
Winter Promise Activity: Weaving a mat
Sep. 15, 2006
Winter Promise Activity: Weaving a mat and a basket
Sep. 15, 2006
Winter Promise Activity: Weaving a mat and a basket
Sep. 11, 2006
The Lord works in mysterious ways....
| I homeschool my children for the benefits I believe they will derive from this educational model, both spiritually and academically. Homeschooling, however, has been a blessing to me, particularly this year. My husband has thrown himself into a new job this year, an endeavor which has been rewarding in many ways but carries with it great risk. Being by nature a worrier ( look up worry in the dictionary and surely my picture will accompany the entry ), it has been difficult for me to endure the specter of financial ruin I envision just over the horizon. An additional and unexpected benefit to homeschooling is that my focus can rest on something other than my worries. The school hours are a respite from the cares of the day. As we weave an native-American basket or drill multiplication facts, my thoughts are on the here and now and not the unsettling future. This is not why I homeschool, of course, but it is something for which I am grateful, nonetheless. |
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Sep. 7, 2006
Winter Promise Activity: 3D Columbus Map
Sep. 7, 2006
Winter Promise Activity: Make a Wigwam
Sep. 7, 2006
Winter Promise Activity: Make a Teepee
Sep. 5, 2006
My nest.......
Sep. 5, 2006
Mama and Papa Byrd
Sep. 2, 2006
Three weeks down....
| We are three weeks into our school year and it has been so much fun! I set up a schedule, fully expecting to have to tinker with it as the year progressed. So far, however, everything has gone off without a hitch. Last year my children attended a university model school where students attend classes two days per week and homeschool on the remaining days. There were many wonderful things about this model and I remain a fan of the school. The teachers were wonderful and a blessing to my children. However, it was liberating to be able to determine my own schedule and choose my own curriculum. Flexibility --- one of the wonderful benefits of homeschooling! A great find for this year has been Winter Promise. Two of my girls are using American Story 1 and loving every minute of it. I love it, too. There are so many wonderful options for history studies now but Winter Promise comes closest to meeting all of my expectations. My third grader detested history and one of my primary goals for this school year was to alter this opinion. Perhaps history would never be her favorite but there was no need to hate it. After three weeks of Winter Promise, my daughter now declares history to be her favorite subject this year! I love that Winter Promise is low maintenance for me. Most days I can just open up the manual and I'm set. The curriculum is a delightful balance of reading, projects, notebooking, and timeline work. Web site links and DVD suggestions just add more flavor to this fun yet substantial curriculum. Winter Promise is so easy to use for multiple grades. We aren't using the language arts component because I'd already purchased my language arts materials prior to discovering Winter Promise. I am impressed that Winter Promise offers graded reader to go with each program. We are using American Story 1 and I could buy readers to coordinate with that program for my first and third graders. As we are using it, my girls are loving all the books we've encountered thus far. It feels so good to feel satisfied with a curriculum choice. This isn't always the case. If I ever figure out how to shrink pictures, I'll post some of the projects the girls have completed with Winter Promise. |
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Aug. 4, 2006
The Adventure begins.....
| First a bit of history...... I first heard of homeschooling when I took my first education class. The professor assigned various groups of students to research a topic or trend in education and to present an oral report to the class. One group presented their report on homeschooling. I had never even heard of such a thing! How strange! Yet, I was intrigued enough by the idea to search out books on the subject. I read the few books I was able to find at the time and then put the idea out of my head....... or so I thought. A few years later and the Lord has blessed us with a precious daughter. At the time, we lived in a bad school district. Sending our daughter to public school was not an option. Private school seemed like the way to go except that it would necessitate me teaching full time to be able to afford the tuition. The that long forgotten idea of homeschooling popped back in my head. Homeschooling could be the back up plan, I reasoned, if we couldn't swing private school tuition. Soon after we moved to a suburb whose schools enjoyed a good reputation. Problem solved, right? Only now I couldn't rid my mind of that pesky idea of homeschooling. I pondered it even as I sent my oldest off to public kindergarten. It was only half day and she had a wonderful teacher. Still..... I felt like the Lord was putting it on my heart to homeschool. It had academic advantages, certainly, but also afforded the chance to shape my children's characters for Christ. So, prior to first grade, I composed a list of homeschooling's advantages and presented them to my husband. He agreed. I ordered curriculum and we were ready to go. I lasted six weeks. My mom thought I was TOTALLY NUTS. My friends gazed at me with quizzically raised eye brows. I felt like nobody supported this. What if they were right? What if I ruined my children, turning them into social misfits who years later would relate to their therapists that it all began with Mom's refusal to allow them to go to "real" school? What if? What if? ARRRRRRRRRGGGGGGGG!!!!! This combined with sleep deprivation (I had just given birth to baby number 3 at this time) and pain ( I ruptured a disc in my spine giving birth to said baby) left me too insecure to continue. I wish I had leaned on the Lord more during this time but I clung to my worries instead. In the meantime, my oldest continued on in a traditional school setting - first private school, then public school after a move to a new city. The time came for our second child to start kindergarten - full time kindergarten - and she just wasn't ready and did not want to go. We prayed about it. My husband and I went to our local homeschool group's end of the year bash. My husband couldn't believe the number of people there. And they looked so..... gasp..... normal! And their children were...... another gasp....... friendly, polite, socially adept. So, we decided to homeschool just for kindergarten. It was fun. My mom still thought I was a loon but it was only for one year. They say the Lord works in mysterious ways and in our case it came in the form of a bully who tormented my daughter mercilessly ("You're ugly... you'll even be an ugly grown-up. You should just die" ). My child, formerly an A student, began to dread school and her grades fell. We pulled her mid-year. The torment she endured was enough to make me not care if the neighbors or the immediate family thought I was crazy. My daughter heaved an enormous sigh of relief and the adventure began........ |
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Aug. 4, 2006
Confessions of a reluctant homeschooler....
My first blog entry....... be patient with me, please. 
Our homeschool year begins on August 14th. I am shivering with anticipation; I've been ready to start for weeks now. This is amusing considering I couldn't wait for school to end just a few short months ago; that I actually contemplated enrolling all my school-aged kids in our local public school. My youngest will be in Mother's Day Out two days per week meaning that having the older kids in public school would provide me with two child-free days per week. Child - free days?!??  I've heard of those but haven't actually experienced them since I was a newlywed, well over a decade ago.
Despite my fantasies of a pristine house, time to volunteer, exercising my way back to a pre-partum figure, reading a book for pleasure, I eventually felt that tiny tug on my heart, the one reminding me that I feel the Lord has called my family to this adventure otherwise known as homeschooling.
And here I am...... crossing off dates on the calendar. I love seeing my children grow and learn; I wouldn't have it any other way.
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