Oct. 23, 2009 - Science with Water

I am beginning a list of library books to go along with our study of the book Science with Water.

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Oct. 23, 2009 - Decluttered Item of the Day

I am still in decluttering mode, so I thought it would be fun to keep an on-going list of items I have thrown away or given away.  Yesterday it was my 4-inch-high stack of homeschool catalogs.  Today I found two more catalogs, a K-4 teacher's manual that I know I will never use, and three books that I have duplicates of.  What will it be tomorrow?

1. Homeschool catalogs
2. K-4 teacher's manual and three duplicate books
3.

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Oct. 21, 2009 - Favorite Homeschooling Catalogs

I'm decluttering the easy stuff first: homeschooling catalogs.  I love to look through them, but I have found that I tend to feel discontent when I do -- like what I am doing is not enough or not good enough somehow.  Most of the information contained in the catalogs is available on-line, so I doubt that I will miss them much.  I am making a list of my favorites, in no particular order, so that I don't forget any of them:

Rainbow Resource
Vision Forum
Saxon Homeschool
Veritas Press
Dover Publications
Timberdoodle
Lamplighter
Rod & Staff
Christian Liberty Press
The Critical Thinking Co.
Heart of Dakota Publishing
The Great Books Foundation
Christianbook.com
Beautiful Feet Books
Keepers of the Faith
Sonlight

I keep finding catalogs, adding them to my list, and pitching them. I like my new "virtual" pile of catalogs much better, and it takes up a lot less space. 

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Oct. 21, 2009 - Simplifying

Several months ago my husband sent me a link to a Time magazine article entitled How to Live With Just 100 Things. The idea has intrigued me ever since then. I tend to be a pack rat, so this would be a huge challenge for me, but a challenge that I am contemplating.

I plan to begin by finding one item to throw away or give away each day for a while.  I will also keep a numbered list of the personal items I plan to keep.

1. Bible
2. Engagement ring
3. Wedding ring
4. Kindle
5. Library (yes, I know this is cheating but I will work on reducing its size)
6. Sewing machine
7. Camera
8. iPod
9. Computer
10. Printer
11.

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Oct. 21, 2009 - Report Cards

Beth is in kindergarten this year, and I do not grade any of her work or give her a report card.  She is, however, taking ice skating lessons from the local park district, and they get a "report card" every four weeks.  She has enjoyed the first seven weeks of lessons.  Last week she told me she wanted to sign up for more lessons when this session was finished.  Today she told me she changed her mind.  I asked her if something happened during today's lesson to make her sad, and she said that she always slowed down when she tried to glide, and she was afraid her report card would say "needs improvement."

I had really hoped to avoid the whole concept of report cards for a lot longer.  I really don't want Beth or Matthew or Nathan to have the same hang-up with grades on a report card that I did growing up.  I worked hard to get a good grade, but missed out on real learning.  I quit when things got hard or when I was afraid I would not get a good grade.  I want the kids to not have that fear.  I want Beth to be able to continue to ice skate because it is fun, no matter what a piece of paper says. 

I tried to explain to Beth that everyone has areas in which they need improvement.  That's part of life.  I told her that if I was giving Nathan a report card and one of the categories was walking, I would have to check the box saying "needs improvement."  I asked her what grade she thought I would get on a report card in the area of house cleaning.  Definitely "needs improvement."  But that doesn't mean that Nathan won't learn to walk in his own time.  It doesn't mean that I am going to totally give up on cleaning the house.  And it doesn't mean that Beth will never learn to glide.  It just means that at this moment in time, we are not there yet.

I hope she gets it.  I hope she doesn't quit.  I hope that on her report card of life, in the category of sticking with worthwhile things even when they are hard, Beth gets a check in the box saying "complete."

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Sep. 29, 2009 - Educational Experiment

My husband is taking an economics class, and last night he showed me something interesting.  Experiments have shown that people are happier with their choice if they have fewer options to choose between.  (People are least happy if they have no choice at all.)  If there are more choices, people are less certain about whether or not they made the best choice.  The experiment was done with chocolates, but I think it applies to homeschool curriculum, as well.  There are so many options available that I could spend all my time researching curriculum instead of teaching, and I would still second-guess my choices.

Having said that, I would still love to try out more than one curriculum.  I wish I did not have to pick.  Since I have three children, I am so tempted to do a little experiment and pick a different curriculum for each of them.  Of course, they are totally different people, so what worked for one might not necessarily be the best fit for another, anyway.  Right now, this is what I think I would try.

Beth, my oldest, seems to enjoy projects and crafts, so I think My Father's World seems to be a good fit for her.  I love the focus on the Bible.  I see a lot of my personality in Matthew, my middle child.  I think he would thrive on something that is "just the basics."  I would like to try a 3 R's approach with him, using the Robinson Curriculum.  Nathan, my youngest, is quite curious but seems to be more sensitive than Matthew.  I would like to try a Charlotte Mason / literature approach with him using Ambleside Online.

For now, I'll see how this year with Beth using MFW 1st grade goes.  Matthew is only three years old, and Nathan is not quite one, so by the time they reach school age I might change my mind ... again.

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Jun. 24, 2009 - Curriculum Hopping

I am a book junkie.  And a curriculum junkie, as it turns out.

I never thought I would have a problem with curriculum hopping.  Before Beth reached school age, I joined Yahoo groups on many homeschooling topics, and I never understood why parents would switch books every year ... or even more often.  I always assumed I would find something I liked and stick with it for the long haul.  Now I am seeing that my problem is that there are so many different choices that I like, and I want to try them all out!  I am fascinated with the Charlotte Mason approach (Ambleside Online), Classical Education, Thomas Jefferson Education, Robinson Curriculum, and My Father's World.  At least they all have a few things in common, such as learning from real books rather than textbooks.  In my "spare time" I plan to read as much as I can about each of these approaches.

For this year, I am committed to finishing My Father's World First Grade with Beth.  I am interested in seeing her progress, especially in writing and math.  When Matthew and later Nathan get to school age, I hope to have learned more, and I may take a different approach or use a different curriculum with them.  I hate feeling like I am using my children as guinea pigs, but feel confident that they will get an adequate education in spite of my curriculum experimentation.

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Jun. 23, 2009 - Summer Vacation

I had originally intended to have school year-round.  However, at the beginning of June, I found myself feeling stressed out and burnt out, so we have taken the entire month of June off for our summer vacation.  As the month comes to a close, I need to sit down and evaluate where we have been and where we are going.

Beth should be in Kindergarten this fall, but we chose My Father's World 1st grade curriculum for her.  She has finished the first 20 days, and although the level of the work seems about right, I feel that the length of time that is required each day is a little bit of a stretch for her.  When we start back up again, I am going to see how I can slow it down -- perhaps by stretching each week over two weeks -- so that the amount of work is appropriate for a kindergartener, but the level of the work is appropriate for Beth.  I am a little concerned that having a formal curriculum is taking some of the fun away from school.  I know that it seems more stressful to me to have a list of things that "need" to be done each day.

The break has been nice.  It has been nice to be able to get up and go without feeling like we need to do school first.  To be honest, I'm kind-of dreading hitting the books again.  Am I the only one?

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May. 13, 2009 - Nature Study -- Close to the Ground and Seasons

I am not an outdoors girl, despite the best efforts of my mom.  (Mom grew up on a farm, while Dad grew up in the city, and I seem to have taken after Dad!)  However, I do want Beth, Matthew, and Nathan to feel comfortable in and learn about the beautiful world that God has made.

That is why I am so glad for the focus on nature study and the weekly "Exploration Day" that are a part of My Father's World First Grade.  A week ago Monday was our first Exploration Day, and we spent a couple of hours outdoors looking at ants, worms, and snails.  We put a piece of bread soaked in honey near an ant hill.  It was amazing to see the ants scurrying around carrying little pieces of bread.  Then we lifted up two large rocks in our flower bed and found three snails underneath.  One had been moving recently, so we saw the silvery, slimy trail that it left behind.  We didn't find any worms under the rocks, so we dug in the flower bed to hunt for worms.  Fortunately for us, last week was rainy, so we found several worms fairly close to the surface.  I accidentally cut one worm in half with the shovel, so Beth and I talked about how it might be able to grow a new tail.  We talked about and observed how worms moved, and looked for the setae on the worms' segments that help it move.  (I have to admit that neither Beth nor I actually touched the worms -- I just scooped them up with a small garden trowel to put them into our worm habitat.)

I loved all of the book suggestions for the week.  I learned so much about ants, worms, snails, moles, and mushrooms.  (My husband laughed at me when I told him how much I am learning from Beth's first grade books.) 

I also love how the first week's books seem to have helped Beth to be more interested and aware of ants and worms and other things that live close to the ground.  Last week at the park we noticed a lot more ant hills, and Beth asked if we could repeat our experiment with the honey bread at the park sometime.  I love how Beth stopped to notice something we hadn't taken the time to notice before and is showing curiosity and interest in it.

There were no experiments scheduled for Exploration Day this week, but we did read several books about the seasons.  (We had read books about the seasons in the past, so much of this information was a repeat for Beth.)  We did take another piece of honey bread outside to watch the ants again.  Our first Exploration Day was a little bit overcast, but this week it was sunny.  I wonder if ants are more active on sunny days, because this time we put the bread near an ant hill (a different ant hill with a different kind of ants than last week) and the ants immediately swarmed to the bread.  It was amazing how fast the bread was covered with ants!

We enjoyed our first two Exploration Days, and have even begun a nature journal.  The curriculum even helps nature journals seem doable, since they suggest drawing or tracing illustrations from the books we read to add to a science notebook or nature journal.  I'm not much of an artist (yet), but I did trace pictures of ants, worms, and snails for our notebooks.  I still need to find a picture to add for our study of the seasons.  We are looking forward to starting on a new science topic tomorrow.

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May. 8, 2009 - Embracing Imperfection

I am a perfectionist, and have been since I was very young.  Unfortunately, my perfectionism often discourages me from beginning something new because I'm afraid I won't have the time or ability to finish "perfectly."  I have been thinking about it lately as it affects our homeschool.

My husband and I purchased My Father's World first grade books for Beth's next school year at our local homeschool convention in March.  Beth was very excited about her new books, and wanted to start them immediately.  I kept putting her off because I wanted to read through the entire teacher's manual, collect the supplies for the entire year, make checklists, and be sure that I knew what I was doing and was "ready."  I wanted to make sure I would be able to borrow all the suggested library books and figure out a system so I would have them for the correct week.

One seemingly small thing about the curriculum in particular was causing me stress: the authors suggest starting the school year on a Thursday in order to have a shorter first week to ease into the school routine.  In this way, a new memory verse is introduced each Monday, and each Wednesday is Exploration Day, a lighter day allowing time to do hands-on math and science activities and to go outdoors and enjoy nature.  What would happen if we were to miss a day?  We would be off schedule.  Would we then have to double up one day, or take off an entire week, to get back on schedule?

With Beth asking every day when she could start her new books, I finally gave in and started ... on a TUESDAY!  It was so freeing to start out off schedule!  I can see that the curriculum is set up well for starting on a Thursday, but it works out no matter what day I start.  I'm sure we will have vacation days and get back on schedule at some point this year.  We may even get on schedule and back off several times over the course of the year, and that is okay!

I am learning that sometimes just jumping in, even if I don't feel ready, is the best way.  We finished Day 9 today.  We are still reading some of the library books suggested for last week.  We've even read a couple of the books intended for next week already.  We're learning a lot, and I am learning to relax and allow myself to be imperfect.

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May. 1, 2009 - Proverbs

For the My Father's World First Grade program, Beth will be memorizing several verses from Proverbs this year.  Earlier this week, Beth and I discussed the purpose of Proverbs:

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Apr. 30, 2009 - Our Homeschooling Adventure

Our homeschooling adventure has officially begun.  Okay, maybe it began last August when Beth, my daughter who was four at the time, announced that she wanted to start school when the big kids did.  I had been dreaming of homeschooling and planning for the day to come since before Beth's birth, but I thought I would wait another year before doing any "formal" school work with her, so I was unprepared.

I thought four was very young to begin school.  I also had Matthew, my 2-year-old son, to care for, and was pregnant with Nathan, my youngest son.  I had my hands full.  However, I did want to take advantage of her interest in learning, so I pulled together some things I had accumulated in the years since Beth's birth.

We started with Teach Your Child to Read in 100 Easy Lessons, and finished it in December.  I am happy to say that Beth reads fairly well now.

I had always planned on taking an eclectic approach to homeschooling.  I thought I would put together a little bit of this and a little bit of that, kind-of doing my own thing.  Then this spring we heard David Hazell speak at a homeschool convention, and I felt that My Father's World curriculum offered, already put together, what I hoped to accomplish.  We purchased the first grade package for Beth and the preschool package for Matthew.

Beth was so excited when she saw her new school books that she began asking, almost on a daily basis, when she would start first grade.  (We have been trying to tell her that this year is kindergarten, since that's the grade her age-mates in public school would be in, but she won't go for that!)  I finally gave in this week, and we started My Father's World First Grade on Tuesday.  So far, three days into the program, Beth and I both love it.  She is ready to start school each morning before I am.  I'm looking forward to a fun year.

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