Our Adventures in Learning

Wednesday, November 1, 2006

Wednesday

I love how things come together.

In all honesty, though I said that this year I was going to use our TruthQuest history guide along side AWOA I haven't been. I've thumbed through it but haven't used it like I planned. But, today we did. We had a reference to the book of Titus in the introduction of Ancient Crete, so we read it. I really needed it today, and though I never thought of reading it to C it fit perfectly with some things that we've been talking to her about lately. Once again the timing was perfect and it has nothing to do with me. Let go and let God, right? I feel so much better about all of this already.

We've cooked a bit, read together, discussed some things, daydreamed, and made some herbed yogurt cheese (or rather mixed it all up to sit in the cheesecloth overnight.) So far it's a successful day. We'll see if it continues this way.

Break time is over... off to eat and study the body. We haven't figured out just yet what body system we're talking about today, but I'm guessing we'll head for the skeletal system since C really wants to play the skeleton game in our game book. I've also got some fun projects in the Anatomy Lab that would tie in nicely, so I think it might be just the place to start with a new topic.

More later -

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Wednesday, November 1, 2006

Finally... a quiet day coming

We've been swamped lately so I'm really looking forward to a quiet day today! Granted, I have to teach tonight and my co-leader isn't there which leaves me dealing with ten very loud, very rowdy girls, but I think mom is going to help me. It does however mean that I really don't have to go anywhere today if I don't want which is a big improvement over the last week or so.

Last night was trick or treating, and the kids braved it even though it was wet and a bit chilly. We didn't have quite as many heading our way, but it was fun to get to say hi to neighbors and such. One of our older girls came by to have dinner and spend the evening so it was really nice.

I finally got C signed up for Upward Basketball! www.upward.org She's so excited. I've been driving around with the paperwork in my purse for the last week but we were never able to make it over at the church. It is at a church less than a mile away which will be wonderful! Practice starts in December with games running January through early March. C has never played an organized sport, so I'm hoping that it will be fun for her. I'm also hoping that it will help with some of the winter issues that we have when she can't go out and run! (The diet changes that we have made this year should also help with that... hopefully!) We were able to meet the coach, and he seems like he really has a way of connecting with the kids. He really seems like his heart is in this.

I've also started yet another business as an advisor with Lia Sophia jewelry. I'm determined that I'm going to make it where I can continue to be home with the kid. Things are still iffy with the company, and I'm sure that they will be for a while. It really took a hit with what happened earlier this season. (I don't know what I should or can say with the lawsuit... just think dirty underhanded fraud and general backstabbing of employees that crossed the line into illegal.) But, I have confidence that we'll pull out of it. I just want it to be easier in the meantime and I don't have many other options that would allow me to still keep C home. I think I'll really enjoy it. I'm still going to keep Usborne going, but the commission structure is so much better with LS, not to mention more people are apt to buy jewelry than books! Sad, but true. I've been working a lot on that the last two weeks trying to get it ready to really kick off. We'll see how it goes. Needless to say my online time has been cut drastically!

After a week of chewing on whether or not we should change around our curriculum we decided that tweaking was in order. C really enjoys Aesop's Fables, but not when we read them each and everyday. It's amazing what you learn when you simply ask your kid what they think. I was really annoyed that I couldn't let this drop so I started praying and listening as well as thinking. Funny how sometimes I forget that part.

I really don't like feeling like I can't change something. It goes against everything that I've gotten beaten into my head for the last six years, and not to mention everything that I tell new homeschoolers. "Don't be afraid to change." I was convinced it was a contentment issue on my part (not like I don't have those!) but the more I chewed on it the more I didn't like feeling like it was mastering me. So, I went out on a limb with C yesterday and handed her a piece of paper divided into two sections front and back. I asked her that I just wanted to do a little experiment... I had her write what each subject area would look like if it were exactly as she would want it so that I could make sure we were on track with how she saw things too. (She's like her older sister... give her some input and she'll be committed to following through. Tell her what she's doing and she'll fight you just for the sake of fighting.) C told me right off that math was perfect and not to mess with it. Gotta love that! She had language arts, history, science, and Bible to think about. I made sure that she knew that I wasn't saying AWOA wasn't right but rather I just wanted to make sure we were on the right track. Wow was it a surprise.

She said that wants to go back to TOG. I was shocked. She seemed a little burned out after a few years of it, so we talked about what she missed from it. It wasn't really the program but rather the way we handled reading while using it. She doesn't like having the specific topic information guided for her each day. She likes having a book that is an overview for the week with lots of choice built in. I thought that I was trying to make our reading time that way with AWOA but I guess not! She said that we did more projects last year though I find that hard to believe, but never the less she wants more. I was even more shocked with how she wants to handle language arts. (This is all news to M because we didn't have time to talk about anything last night with company and a differently scheduled evening.) It seems that after one unit of the wonderfully gentle LA program in AWOA she... gasp.... loves writing! Everything has been worth it for that one little thing. On her own she's been looking at the Write Your Roots and Learn to Write the Novel Way programs that I have on the shelf. She really wants to use Novel Way but after some discussion I think we'll use Roots. It will tie in more naturally with her project for 4H, and it's also based on short stories which will be easier for her at this stage.

Some other things we're going to change...
History will lean a little more on our TruthQuest guide and some Heart of Wisdom things like last Spring though we'll likely go back to AWOA for the Medieval unit while following it loosely until then. We might just take some leave of it for Greece and Rome. I'm not sure yet. We're adding in more on some areas that she feels like we skipped. She's a walking oxymoron... she wants things fluid and filled with rabbit trails yet she needs to follow a time line. I think this comes from using A Story of the World loosely when she was younger and following it with TOG. (I've been secretly having my same issues since we started this school year. It didn't fit the mold with chronology but I've been telling myself it's ok to hit the major civilizations. Now it's not ok if my kid misses it too.) We're going to go back to our two year plan that I blogged on a LONG time ago. I think. lol More notebooking like last year and less lapbooking.

Science won't change much. We'll use the basic framework in AWOA but add in more experiments and hands-on bits and pieces. It's basically not changing at all.

Math - same; Art - same with more projects; Music - we're jumping to flute because we've still not had it in the budget to replace the guitar that we lost when the company blew up. Funny how when you have to fire someone they don't want you using their guitar anymore. I'm going to see if C's arms are long enough to handle the flute this year, and if so we'll add that in.

She actually wants to go back to the Bible being the focus as much as it was in HOW. We went from using it for everything to having it integrated, and she really wants it integrated in everything. I might look at picking up the HOW units (ebooks) that I didn't get for this year just to have going along side as yet another guide, but first I'll see if TruthQuest will be enough.

Oh, and to top it all off I've started helping in a different way in our children's ministry department at church, so now I'm also writing lessons for the 4th and 5th graders. Next year I won't teach on Wednesday nights so all I have to do is balance things until May. Pray. lol

Lots of change in many different areas at home. We'll see how it all pans out.

Off to exercise and get some breakfast. M just left for the office and C is waking up so the day begins! Hopefully I'll be able to start writing shorter blurbs more often, but I have a feeling that I'm getting ready to enter a season where I don't have nearly the time unscheduled and online as I did. We shall see!

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Tuesday, October 24, 2006

A new unit!

Today was lesson two in our new unit on Ancient Greece. So far I am torn about how I feel about it. I love the time period because my kid loves the time period, but I'm not so sure that really like having all of the lessons based on Aesop's Fables. I'll have to see how we feel about it next week. It will transition into using several Greek myths so hopefully by the time we're wanting more we'll get something different.

For science we'll be studying the human body, so C is very excited. They have managed to take two of her favorite subjects and put them together. I mentioned that she could do some reading on the history of medicine along with some gory stories I thought she was going to twitch herself out of the chair! (I'm thinking something along the lines of the funny/icky Horrible Histories, but I'll have to dig for titles. Suggestions welcome!) We're armed with some really cool experiments thanks to a Wild Goose Anatomy Lab kit that I found CHEAP at Tuesday Morning. I can't wait to start with experiments! C really wants to disect something - anything! - but I think I'm going to get her to hold off until our oceanography unit this next summer so that the windows can be open.

Then again, if I can bring myself to do it I might grab a beef tongue and maybe a cow's eye for her to look at. I might toss that over to a "father/daughter" weekend project. Hmm.... that might be an idea. Can you tell that I was the kid that had a hard time in biology? I almost didn't make it through my AP class in high school. lol Now, C does want to work on some genetic lessons because she saw a really cool spread in a science encyclopedia (Usborne of course!) about genetics so she's asking all kinds of questions about hair color, eye color, etc. IF I could convince M to let me try a fruit fly experiment with her might give it a go, but somehow I think they would fall under the category of living, and he's put a ban on us bringing anything else home that is alive and not a member of the plant family. I might just test the water anyway.

This leads me to think AGAIN about why I can't just leave something alone. I have to tweak everything! I was telling my very dearest friend J this weekend that I just have the strong feeling to doink and tweak making my own unit for Ancient Greece and the human body using what I know the older girls liked along with what I know C would like and what we do like from AWOA. But, I am not unhappy with AWOA. Why can't I just leave things be! I'm making a concious decision to just leave it alone and think of something else when the urge hits. lol So far it's working, but I feel the mortar starting to crumble. What is it with me! I think it goes back to actually enjoying the hours and days... or more like weeks... that I would spend putting together a unit. I love the idea of following rabbit trails and camping out where C needs to be for a while. I love AWOA. I really do. But I also love sitting in the stacks pulling together resources and searching online for activities or ideas. Ugh. Is this where it points out that I need to work on being content? Tell me that I'm not the only one. I need to hear that I'm not the only one. Maybe I need an SHS post...

C has been a reading machine this week! She's finished Alice in Wonderland and started in on the new Illustrated Stories for Boys treasury from Usborne. She decided that the Stories for Boys sounded more interesting than the Stories for Girls volume. (Really, it came down to pirates vs princesses, and who can resist a pirate?) She's almost done with it. I hear rumblings that she is going to start either Jason and the Golden Fleece or The Trojan War. I really love the idea of "strewing" materials out. Glad you blogged on it De'Etta! It's working around here. I get books, happen to have them on a table or my desk, and inevitably she will ask about it. I just hope it keeps working! Then again, I think she'd grab anything remotely involved with Greece anyway since she does even when we're not studying it, but let me think my strewing is working!

Let's see what else I need to mention... Oh, we went to the halloween activities at the zoo this weekend. I love seeing C with her friend Q. They were Luke and Leia (spelling?) from Star Wars this year. Too cute! We had a ball. It was a very hectic morning a I had a Lia Sophia jewelry party that morning at a local Panera Bread before heading to the zoo. It was a blast. I'm thinking of picking it up as well so that I've got my foot in a few areas. I'm determined that no matter what the new year brings I'm going to still be at home with my kid. Never underestimate the power of a determined homeschooling mom, right?

Off to make dinner. My sweetie is coming home soon and it's Enchilada Night. Mmmm.... Oh - I finally started a bean jar (behavior) for C after reading about it last month on the Creative Homeschooling blog. It's going well. I'll write on it later. - S

What we've learned this week...

Bible: Ecc 6:9 and 9:10; I Peter 3:9; Matthew 15:14; Deut 23:21-23 (I'm also thinking of adding in some study from the Voice of the Martyr's kid's program, Kids of Courage. I just got it in the mail today - it's free - and I am just so impressed. I might have to blog on that later tonight...)

Memory work: Psalm 139 - This one will be a good bit of work! I'm so glad that we're really pushing memory work this year. We've not done more than verses in the past, so it's nice to see passages come out of her.

History: Free reading on Ancient Greece, which has been mostly on myths. She's also reading the Ancient Greece portion from the Vistor's Guide to the Ancient World.

Science: Body basics (cells, organelles, tissues, systems basics) as well as the Integumentary System. We did a really neat fingerprint exercise today where she made two copies of each finger print with only one marked as to what finger it was. Shuffle them like cards and try to match the marked with the un-marked cards. She loved it!) We also watched some Brain Pop movies online and played with some websites.

Math: More work on adding/subtracting fractions. We are still in Chapter three of Math Smart Jr. I've also picked up a few more fraction books at the library. We've been really lax on our math lately with too many math movies and and too little moving forward. So, today we moved forward.

Language Arts: A new spelling list, a new spelling rule (silent e), and practicing note taking so that she can re-write passages in her own words using her notes. She actually enjoyed it! Writing has always been an argument if it wasn't for fun or a comic book story, so I'm thrilled that she likes this approach.

Literature: The Town Mouse and The Country Mouse; The Hare and the Tortoise; The Lion and the Mouse; The Fox and the Stork. Free reading.

Fine Arts: Free craft time with some Ancient Greek project books. I LOVE the books that Chick Fil A gave out last summer. I hear they have a new series that I have to go get... Also, today we discussed the themes in Minoan art and some trends that started appearing in Greek art.

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Tuesday, October 17, 2006

Catching up on comments

Sorry I'm so far behind! Here's hoping I can catch up on everything on line and in real life this week... I usually try to post a reply in the comments section, but since I'm so far behind I didn't know if you'd look there! So, you're making it to front page.

To Jodi:

Sounds like a full but great week! I must get the polar bear fractions book because we're studying antarctica and fractions, LOL. Having said that our library is so bad it probably won't come in until we've all learned fractions and are studying Africa or something! Maybe I'll check PBS.

He he... that's what I have trouble with sometimes with the good books only it's because all of the local homeschoolers have them checked out. It's a massive raid on things when someone mentions a title on a local list, but I bet it's like that everywhere. We're lucky that we have a large homeschooling community here locally, but it puts a crimp on my library reserve list! I say all this in jest (partially) though because we're really lucky to homeschool where the library system was voted the nation's #1 system several years in a row. Got to love that!

Thought I'd let you know, in case you're mass deleteing on the lapbook groups, a new lapbook from HOAC has just been released and it is about multiplication.

Oooh.... Going to look....

It's great hearing about your weeks, you add so much detail to your posts, I sometimes forget to be detailed, or forget what I had wanted to post by the end of the day. I'm working on it!

I'm glad you think so! I feel like I drone on and on sometimes. But, I keep thinking that the point was to let friends and family know what we're doing, and this is what we're doing! Personally, I think your blog is wonderful. Visit it all the time. I go to your blog and De'Etta's first before anything else so I'll have time to read them. lol

For De'Etta....

I've been looking everywhere for a pumpkin patch, corn field etc. I was finally told "De'Etta this is cotton country - or maize!" I guess I should have known that. :::snort::: I finally have accepted that I am not going to find an apple orchard, pumpkin patch or corn field in W TX. I dreamed of those things for three years in AK - because we were always snowed under when the rest of the country was doing "fall things". Oh well.....God knows I need extremes I suppose. LOL

I'll trade you some pumpkin patches and apple orchards for some sun. I'm having serious reaction to no sun! I went from GA peaches to the land of corn, and though I wouldn't have thought that there were extremes oh did I notice them when I got here. (I guess you could say that I had adjustment issues. lol) I decided about two - or three? - years ago that I was going to like it here if it killed me, so I dove headlong into the local things like apple picking and such. I love fall because it's my last ditch effort to hold on to decent weather and a little sunshine till Spring. Choosing joy, right? In my "catching up" project this week I finally got about 20 pounds of apples made into sauce. I've got 20 more to do, and I'm wondering if it was enough. I think next year I'm going to have to go up another 10 pound bag. (Yep... this is for THREE of us. You should have seen what I made when we had our oldest here!) Here's hoping that you found some fall things to do... and that your computer's fixed! I talked to my dh last night about your computer troubles (again... note the late factor of being behind lol), and his response was just what he said to me when I had troubles.... switch to Linux. lol At least he's consistent, and God knows I like consistent so He gave me M.

It sounds like you are having a fabulous year.

I can honestly say that I think we are having a great year. Though, it had to be better than last year. We were months away from trying either an online charter school or just tossing in the towel and having her in ps this year because I was so frustrated. Thankfully my husband has a calmer head than me. I think that's why I'm SO excited about this year and have that "shout it from the rooftops" attitude. I'm thankful that God gave me the strength and the path to follow. It's going well. I know that some of my family might think it's silly when they read this, but it was all bathed in prayer this year and boy was there a difference! But, I know YOU already know that it makes a difference.

PS we had a cold front come through today and it got down to 76* - which was WELCOME!

Choosing Joy again..... how long does it take to get happy about overcast and cold? lol

Hugs and laughter to both of you... Too bad we're spread across the country because I sure do think it would be fun to have a cup of tea with the two of you!

Steph

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Tuesday, October 17, 2006

Another sick weekend!

I feel so bad for C! She had yet another weekend where she was sick. I think she's thrown up more in the last two weeks than she has in the last two years! (In fact, I know this is true because typically she never throws up.) I'm not sure what she got hold of, but it came back. She was up at 3 am this time and it continued on for the entire weekend. This time it took her a few more days to really get over it but she seems back to normal today. Her appetite isn't what it normally is, but her spirits are so we're past the hard part. Knowing her it won't be long before she's hungry.

Other than being on trashcan duty this weekend it was fairly quiet. I had a booth on Saturday that wasn't wildly successful but wasn't a waste of time either. Hopefully I'll pick up some shows or workshops from it. We watched some good bits and pieces on the History Channel and slept... a lot. We finally caught the Engineering an Empire episode dealing with Egypt. I have to say it.... I love that we like history. Maybe one day I'll head back to college and major in history. Ahh.... I'd be in heaven. Now, just don't ask me to tell you dates on what happened when with who. It's the story I love.

Today brought us closer to finishing our study of Egypt and closer to starting our study on Ancient Greece. We worked on language arts and learning how to use the presentation tools in Open Office (think Powerpoint I guess) so that C could make a slide show about the plagues. Jodi - She now says that she wants to use this instead of lapbooking! I think we might mix up what we're going to do and try different projects for different subjects. We read through the plague of flies and all I can say is EWWW. This study is interesting though because I never knew that the plagues cooresponded with Egyptian gods. Each showed how that god wasn't powerful and how the one true God was the only one with power. Amazing. We're having a good time hanging out in Exodus. I guess I'm not so ready to leave our Ancient Egypt unit after all!

I also worked on my October newsletter for my Usborne customers. I'll post it here too so that you can read what's going on. (If it worked right you can scroll to the next post. If it didn't, look up. lol) There are some great new titles out so it's given me a boost and energized me a little bit. I love new title season.

Hopefully I'll catch up here this week. I'm wading through hundreds of emails and stacks of "to do" lists so we'll see. How on Earth do we get so far behind sometimes!

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Homeschooling is more than an educational choice in our family. It's a lifestyle and an adventure that we've never regretted. We educate using a Hebraic model of education (as opposed to a Greek model) with more emphasis on unit studies that also include an offering of interest-led/child-directed choices and, as always, lots of Charlotte Mason's approach built in.