Apr. 24, 2008 Our HS Graduate
It has been almost a year since our oldest son (who was always homeschooled) graduated from our hs high school. This has been the year of new beginnings for him and for us! He moved to Nebraska at the end of January to begin getting set up for residency there. He will eventually transfer to UNO and will be studying photojournalism and maybe political science. He visited us for about five days of spring break in March. That was rather nice. We cooked up a storm for him.
I'm trying to upload a photo of J outside his apartment, but it's not working! I'll try again later.
We have all been adjusting and preparing for our next hs graduate, our only daughter. The transitions are now coming upon us fast and furiously, but we will ride the wave with it!
Javamom
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Mar. 6, 2007 Amazing Grace, the movie, a Must See
Dh and I loved this film. My recommendation for taking your children? DO take your older children to see this, as younger students will likely become bored (b/c of lack of a frame of reference and understanding). There are many scenes with Parliament in heated debate over the issues surrounding the slave trade at the end of the 1700's / beginning 1800's. There is also talk of Revolution and use of Laudanum (an opiate which in that day was prescribed medicinally by doctors, but its effects are terribly obvious). There are many scenes which would be good for speech and debate students. They will simply need to pay close attention for best appreciation, as many facts and words are tossed back and forth. Some subtle moves are made and I'm thinking even my 13 yo son would miss a lot of the importance of these things, if he did not have some reference points to be able to connect to these scenes.
This movie is *fantastic*. Wilberforce comes to believe that “God Almighty has set before me two great objects: the suppression of the slave trade and the reformation of society.” The film presents Wilberforce's struggle and growth in faith. We meet John Newton, who wrote the hymn Amazing Grace, and we learn his story and struggles as well. These scenes are very powerful. He urges Wilberforce to pursue with diligence the ending of the slave trade, even though it is a daunting task, since many of the Parliament members have money and interests in the trade and in the refining of sugar cane.
There are almost no graphic scenes that would upset young ones, save one that is not real clear as to what is going on. There is narration by one character or another of what is being shown, which is a scene of children and maybe an adult female in a dark room where sugar-cane is being boiled down in huge cauldrons to make refined sugar. The narrator is talking about how some children are engulfed in the flames on accident or roll into the fires from falling asleep of exhaustion. I think it is important information to know, but does one want to see that and hear it on a movie screen? If so, then go rent and watch Amistad instead. In this film, you never see a person burning or being beaten, you never hear the sounds of people screaming or see people being hurt or harmed. We know these things happened, and it is told to us in different scenes by one of the twelve abolitionists as they work to gather evidence and signatures to bring before Parliament.
The most graphic scene is right in the beginning when we see (first from a distance, and in the rain) that a man is whipping a horse multiple times. It all turns out alright, as Wilberforce stops it in time.
We get a strong sense of "The Abolition Committee" which really existed. It was formed to help gather evidence to try to persuade Parliament in campaign after campaign to pass a law making the slave trade illegal. One of the twelve was a former slave, Oloudaqh Equiano, who wrote and published his own accounts of slave narratives (which my husband has students read in his High School American Lit. class).
Finally, the music is stunning. The final scene partway through credits rolling is that of bag pipers playing Amazing Grace as they slowly march forward to join a band dressed in costume playing on period instruments also playing Amazing Grace. VERY stirring.
This film portrays the Christianity of an impressive politician in such a positive light. Tell your family and friends about it.
It is a *must-see* in my humble opinion!! |
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Dec. 8, 2006 Spanish Study Party a success
Well, my family and I are in our second year ever in an official homeschool co-op, and we've been homeschooling for 13.5 years, now. We've been on break from co-op classes for three weeks, basically. Last Friday was the sign-up day for next semester, which begins mid-January.
I have been teaching Jr. High Spanish and the High School Spanish 1 credit classes, both last year and this year. It has been a good challenge for me, as far as the regimentation, keeping up with the money usage, grades, and paperwork. This year, I implemented (along with the Spansih 2/3 teacher) a predominantly paperless system for homework! The students type up their homework, using keypad codes for all the accents and ñ's, and send their work to me via Word in e-mail. It has turned out great! I can get their graded work right back to them, and a couple of the students make corrections to bring up their grade and to better understand the material.
Since there are only ten weeks per session, the high school "for credit" classes have to keep going between semesters. This is tough for some, but not impossible. If the students are self-motivated and used to gleaning information on their own, they can succeed at this. Most of us (as high school credit-class teachers) try our best to be accessible for our students through e-mail and telephone. Many of us also plan one between semester study session to trouble shoot any problems and to present new concepts they will encounter before the new semester.
There is just too much infomation to wait until January to turn in five or six lessons to be graded, so we've got them on a pretty tight and productive schedule during these holidays. My kids will get two weeks off, both before and the week of Christmas.
I hostessed a study fiesta for my class today, and it went well! They are learning direct and indirect objects in Spanish sentence construction, as well as more uses of "tener"--to express hunger, thirst, etc. Soon, the students will learn "weather" expressions, seasons, the verb "gustar" among other things.
We are using Bob Jones Spanish. I am a CM homeschool mom who leads a CM bookclub that studies Charlotte Mason's writings. My family and I have homeschooled from the very beginning, and our oldest is a senior this year. I never thought I would use a Bob Jones anything! LOL 
It just happens to be a very, very thorough program, and works especially well in this group setting. Spanish was my minor in college and I've taught several different ways, with most age groups using so many different programs. One of my favorites for younger and middlers is now out of print :-( but I am very pleased with BJU for the high school classes.
It's been a busy week, but a blessed one. I'll write more later.
I definitely keep up with my posts on blogger better than I do here, but I will try to be more consistent at hsblogger!
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Aug. 12, 2006 Currently Listening...
to the Thistle and Shamrock program on public radio.
This is my first post here. My original and main blog is here. I am checking out HSB since some of my homeschooling friends have blogs here. It will be difficult to keep up two blogs, since I share internet time with two of our teens!! They are limited to about an hour a day, but still...you know how busy we moms are.
All the family is out this evening and I find myself home alone!! What a concept!
I am more of an extrovert, but I still need down time away from ministry and crowds to regroup. So this time is a gift.
I am on worship team this weekend, and we have had quite a bit of company, here and there...friends of our kiddos and friends of MINE! What a treat. Our guestbook is almost full, and I will need to make a new one.
One solitary job I had this week was the commission of binding a Blessing Book for a localish Dentist for his son's graduation dinner. It contains 36 pages, plus a couple of endpapers or flyleaves.
You can see the full gammit of the process of hand-binding a book on my other blog, but I will include a couple of photos here, as well, to whet your appetite!
Oh, man. I can't upload them from my hard drive, so I'll have to post them from photobucket...I'll be back...
Javamom
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