Mrs Darling's Homeschool Thoughts

Golden Keys

2011-09-07T16:57:00.001-07:00

One of my readers was looking for this poem. Yes, it was on the now closed Dishpan Dribble site. I did not write this but it is very old and that is probably why it cannot be found very well on search engines. It's a good poem to teach your children in this day and age when manners has taken a back seat! Here it is. Enjoy!

Golden Keys

A bunch of golden keys are mine
To make each day with gladness
shine.
"Good morning," is the golden key
That unlocks every door for
me.
When at the table "if you please"
I take from off my bunch of
keys.
It helps to make our mealtime calm
And keeps a smile on Dad and
Mom.
"Thank you" is one magic key
That helps the world to smile at
me.
And "please," I must remember all the time
You see, it helps me share
with friends what's mine.
"May I" is a key my Mom likes best
Because I
remember to ask before I test.
Oh, I see two special golden kindness
keys
One is "I'm sorry," and the other is "excuse me, please."
When grown
up is how I want to be
I use a certain golden key
That says "Yes please,"
"Yes I will," "Yes ma'am," "Yes sir,"
Then I get treated grown up, you can be
sure

I closed Dishpan Dribble

2011-09-04T16:56:00.000-07:00

For those of you who are asking about Dishpan Dribble, I closed it. It wasn't to keep you all out but rather because of a google matter. When prospective clients for my tutoring business would google my business it was taking them to the old blog. I locked it, hoping that without the traffic going to it that google would start redirecting traffic to my real business site. You are not missing out on anything there because I have quit blogging there. Most likely I will never start it back up again. I may export some of the posts to another blog and start something different. If I do I will be sure to link to it here.

In the meantime, I am preparing for homeschool again for another year. I will come back to share it all with you when I get it put together. So what are you all using for Science and History this year?

Crafts from Asia

2011-04-26T23:25:00.000-07:00

Peter is exploring Asia for his history lessons this month. While looking for some fun projects to go with the study I found these crafts. I just had to share them with you all. Enjoy!

See Chinese Paper Yo Yo and 1000's of others - or share your own on Cut Out + Keep

Resources for Teaching Geometry

2011-03-17T10:45:00.000-07:00

I've always been against teaching toward the state tests. This year I am making an exception. I took a peek at the sample tests from the state and decided I am going to take two weeks to groom the kids for that ugly test!

The Math test revolves around the metric system and geometry. My kids know precious little about either one! I am not a lover of Math and I cannot wrap my mind around geometry so we are in a pretty pickle! I don't understand why I can't find nay geometry classes for homeschoolers. Are we all geometrically challenged? Goodness, I hope not! I would like to think that some of you out there understand all the shapes and angles and areas and pi and radii and circumference and deci and decka and whoever else wants to join the crowd!

So anyway, in an attempt to better our understanding of such things I went to our local homeschool store and bought what is called in shorthand, "Key To's". I am just not as impressed with them as I thought I would be. Tink finds them almost impossible to understand, but then again, she does have the processing disorder so maybe I shouldn't evaluate a text on what is understandable and comprehendable to her. Here's the kicker though, it isn't any clearer to me either!

So back out for more resources. Here is what I found! Geometry books from Straight Forward Math! I love them! They are so easy to understand and use. Even Tink is understanding these books! I really can't recommend them enough. The pages have just a few problems on them. They are not crowded and overwhelming. The pages are white, not gray like the Key To's. The page color makes a difference to children with learning differences. Some kids cant look at black on white and need overlays to tone it down. Tink needs the white. The grayish paper makes her feel cluttered!

Everything in these Straight Forward Math books is explained clearly and simply. State testing for my kids is scheduled to begin on March 28. We have spent all of this past week doing Geometry and Math. It's really been a fun thing in the long run. The charter school is out for break this week and next week. As a result, we have been able to spend some valuable time pouring over the books without interruption. I have high hopes that Peter, at least, is going to score higher as a result of these two weeks of study.

I also found another book that I think is wonderful. It's entitled, "Everything You Need to Know About Math Homework. I use this as a tutor and a homeschool mom. Check it out. I purchased all the books mentioned here (except the Key To's) used for cheap prices at our local homeschool store.

How do you teach Geometry? Do you have any good resources to share? I'd love to hear about it.

Today my boy; Tomorrow a man

2011-03-10T22:09:00.000-08:00

Things are getting tough here at Blueberry House. School work has been laborious and painful. Peter is slogging down in the sticky academic mud of the ditch he himself has created.

Ten year old boys and school books have never been all that compatible, but Peter is making his fourth grade year a tough one for both himself and me! There are tears almost daily. I would take those tears into account a bit if a large part of them weren't due to a ten year old's natural bend towards laziness!

I take a little different approach to homeschooling than many people. I read of homeschoolers letting their kids learn through online games or board games or just from osmosis. I'm not that kind of homeschooler. I'm not saying my way is more right than theirs. I'm just saying I disagree with their method especially when it comes to schooling boys!

Boys are going to have to be the heads of their own homes some day. They are going to have to be bread winners. They will have to know how to get up on time every day and get themselves to work. They will have to learn to do unpleasant jobs whether they feel like it or not.

What am I teaching my son if I let him do his studies through games because he doesn't like to read or write? What am I teaching him when he cries because he doesn't want to do the work in his workbook and I let him quit because workbooks aren't his learning style?

I firmly believe in spicing up the schoolwork with supplementary games and such, but to make his entire school day out of such things is just not going to happen around here.

Peter must learn to write in full sentences whether or not he begs to to abbreviate everything. He must learn to put thoughts on paper and be able to write a cohesive story. He must learn to get at his school work without being told. He has to learn to finish everything in the lesson before marking it off of his goal chart. He must learn to try even the hard problems and not just put a huge x across every part he doesn't know how to do or every part he is too lazy to do.

My son has to learn that he cannot turn on the TV or play his PlayStation games until all school work and household chores are done. He must learn that he cannot play with the neighbor boy until all his music is practiced for the day.

Peter has to learn that before going to bed at night he must have everything ready for his charter school classes the next day; musical instruments at the door, music in his bag, gym shoes in his bag, water bottles packed, and all workbooks in their proper file in his big notebook.

He must learn to get up at 7:30 every morning and put on clean clothes, not the shirt or the socks he wore the day before. He must learn to eat his breakfast in a timely manner so he has time left over to pack the car with all the musical instruments: electric guitar, viola and two violins. He must also make sure that the cooler with our lunch gets to the car and that the big tub on wheels that totes all of our stuff into the building, is in the car every morning. It's his job to empty the lunch pail when we get home and to put the icepack back into the fridge for to freeze for tomorrows lunch.

It's Peter's job to empty the dishwasher daily and to feed the bird and to take out the recycle and garbage and to set the table. It's up to Peter to bring in the wood during the week day and to help Dad restock the wood bin on weekends.

Yes, Peter has a lot to do, but I am raising a boy, not a sissy. I am raising a future husband for some girl some day. I may be raising a future President or a future soldier who will be put on the front lines facing gunfire, extreme temperatures, hunger and pain. I may be raising some boys future daddy or some future evangelist or preacher.

I may be raising a future Fortune 500 corporate manager. My son may some day be a missionary on a foreign field and face danger at every turn. My son may have to stand up for truth and right at the risk of losing his own life.

In the light of all that, why would I ever give into his tears now and let him take the easy way out. Why would I let him do his school work and chores half heartedly? Why would I let him get by with skipping problems in his book because he is too lazy to look for the answers?

Ladies, you are homeschooling future men. Don't cripple your sons ability to be a responsible man tomorrow, by babying the boy of today.

The Top 100 Educational Websites of the Year

2011-01-22T20:53:00.000-08:00

If you haven't already taken a look at this website, you need to. Homeschool.com has listed the top 100 websites of their contributors. Go take a look! Its pretty exciting. A lot of them I already use, but I sure could look into those Science ones! I still hate teaching Science. I suppose it will always be thus. Sigh.

Breaking the day down by the hour

2010-12-27T14:56:00.000-08:00

Im sitting here during Christmas break re-evaluating where we are going in our school work. I'm content where Peter is but Tink is giving me a run for my money. It's time to rethink; why do I homeschool? The number one reason is so my kids can get a Christian education. I could put them in our church school for that but then we run into reason number two; Tink has a processing disorder and the school is not equipped to deal with it. Since I need to homeschool Tink it only makes sense to homeschool Peter.

There now I have the basics down. I'm back to the bottom line. The bottom line is to teach the kids in the ways of the Lord, to teach them to walk in truth and righteousness. Tink is 14 years old today. Lots of reflection is going on in her mothers heart and mind.

I have decided that Tink is only going to do the bare minimum in school this year. Between orchestra classes and volleyball she has 17 hours of her week used up. The average child attends school 7 hours a day at the very most. There are five days in the school week; seven times five is 35. Thirty-five minus 17 is 18. So Tink has 18 hours in her week for other book learning. Five and a half of those 18 hours are spent in classes at the charter school. Another hour is spent in a meeting with a state academic rep. Another hour is spent in mandatory volunteer work at the Academy. That now leaves Tink with 10.5 hours during the normal school week day to focus on her homeschool studies. That breaks down to roughly 2 hours and 25 minutes a day. Lets take out that 25 minutes for lunch time and she has 2 hours a day to do her work.

In that 2 hours she has to do Math, Science, Reading and Grammar. That would basically leave just a half hour for every subject. That doesn't count the homework she needs to do from the classes she is taking at the Charter school. I have been figuring her day from 8-3 with a 25 minute break for lunch. Do you see the problem? There aren't enough hours in the day.

Now assuming you followed all those numbers you know why I am at my wits end with her curriculum and education. After much thought and prayer we will be going into the new year with less focus on anything that doesn't positively have to be done in her curriculum. I have spoken to her Education Specialist and we have decided to test her orally every six weeks through this year with a test that is set up for this purpose. This will tell me whether she is actually making progress or not.

I will let you know what the results of the testing are. If after the first 6 weeks of this year we do not see even the littlest improvement I will have to refigure everything. If I see improvement I will let things be.

So what's happening in your homeschool world? Any milestones reached? Is there anything you have been doing that you are going to stop for winter break? Share with us.

Fall Semester in Retrospect

2010-12-03T11:35:00.000-08:00

I have a minute this morning so I decided to drop in here and let you all know how the first semester has gone here at Blueberry House. As in any other year there have been false starts and finding out that a book or program is just not going to work the way Id like it too. But that is just par for the course. If you are a new homeschooler and that is happening to you, take heart. Even us seasoned homeschoolers and teachers get it wrong sometimes.
Peter has evolved through the last three months to where he now is doing everything but Math in Christian Light Education. He has a huge three ring binder that has file tabs in the right cover. Each one is labeled with a subject from CLE. His Lightunits (same thing as the old Paces) fit perfectly in the pockets. I broke down and bought the actual goal charts from CLE when I could just have easily designed my own but why reinvent the wheel? Right? I hole punch his goal chart and put it into the binder and off he goes. He can work almost independently. I have him read to me every day; one day he reads his Reading story and the next he reads his Social Studies to me. He reads all vocabulary words aloud to me and then he is on his own!

Tink is struggling. I am not so happy with how things are going with her. I need to just figure out what is most important this year and let the rest go. Her three most time consuming things are her orchestra classes, her volley ball and a writing class that she is participating in at the Charter School. I really wanted to focus on reading vocabulary this year and so far I have but she is really struggling with it. I have to figure out a better way to introduce it - a better way to fit it into her schedule.

She is now complaining about Teaching Textbooks. She claims its too hard. Did I make a mistake when I let her skip TT Grade 6 and go straight from Grade 5 into Grade 7? She tested at Grade 7 with there online tests but maybe with her processing problems I shouldn't have let her skip. I plan on taking the Christmas break to figure out what to do with her Math.

The Grammar Keys arent working for her like I'd hoped either. I have a little cricket on my shoulder that continues to chirp even though I try to kill it. What is it saying? Well listen. Here is what it says, "Tink has reached her limit. She cant learn any further. Nothing is working because she cant process more. She is academically DONE!"

I refuse to listen but I have niggling doubts that maybe she is reaching her limit with English Grammar. She wrote a novel for NaNoWriMo this month. She ended with 7,612 words and ten chapters. It was required for her writing class. She got an A+ for this semester but mama definitely had to take over the editing to keep the story on track. Now that the deadline has been met my goal is to take paragraphs for her own unedited writing of that story and use if for Writing Mechanics. There's nothing like fixing your own mistakes to speed up that learning curve.

So life goes on. I have 13 students now. I plan 60 lessons a week. I have 2 students in first grade, 2 in second grade, none in third, 3 in fourth, 1 in fifth, 3 in seventh, 1 in eighth and 1 in ninth. There is never a dull moment!

Tink has an all day volleyball tournament Monday and Tuesday. I am looking forward to taking Tuesday off to go watch her play.

So how does your first semester look in retrospect. Have you found something that is working great? Is there anything that hasn't worked? Share it with us.

School Blitz

2010-11-11T18:27:00.000-08:00

We have a long weekend ahead because of Veterans Day. That means I have a four day weekend. I'm planning a 4 day marathon in my school room. I have so much to do but I'm looking forward to it. I have also attended a teachers conference this past week and hopefully I will be able to post my notes from that conference here on my blog before the weekend is over. Stay tuned.

Good Study Habits Need to be Taught Early

2010-10-27T10:06:00.000-07:00

I love teaching. I use to think I liked teaching older kids better than younger ones. The older I get the more I ponder that. I think I would still enjoy teaching literature or history at the high school level again but otherwise high school would not be something I would enjoy. That leaves the division between the older grade school kids and the younger grade school kids.

Most of my students fall into the upper grades of elementary school. I am just no longer finding it as enjoyable as teaching the first through third grades. My favorite grades to teach use to be grades 3-5. I ponder why that has changed. I really think the answer lies in the children's attitudes. The little ones just accept that what the teacher says must be obeyed. I hate it when teaching becomes a police job.

The older grade school set has also been able to develop a lot of bad study habits. If I get the children from first grade and teach them how to write their letters properly, how to narrate and write stories, how to study and when to play it just makes such a huge difference in what is accomplished in a days time.

I think the older I get the less energy I have to spend on fixing old problems that have taken root in the older children. Maybe it's not even so much a matter of having less energy. It may be more correct to say that I am less inclined to want to spend my energy in that direction.

My dear son, Peter, went to public school in the first and second grades. As a result nobody corrected his handwriting. I am just worn out with the continual struggle to get him to write neatly. I am amazed when I see how some of his letters are formed. He doesn't even know the correct way to write some of the letters and as a result he has been forming them however he sees fit!

I have no choice but to back up and to teach him to print neatly. Last year I noticed his sloppiness and tried to correct it. I naively thought it would right itself by the end of the year, but alas, it didn't! I've been trying to move him on to cursive and I'm still going to do that but now I realize he will need cursive and printing practice simultaneously. This is so frustrating, largely because it seems there are already too few hours in the day to accomplish all that needs done.

Homeschooling parents, you can give yourself a huge break for the later years if you teach your child good habits now. That does not just apply to shooling as we all know, but right now I'm speaking of the academics. As a teacher and a tutor for over 30 years I wish I could tell every parent of young children how important it is to teach good habits from the very first year of school. Here is the list of habits that your child must be able to do with ease by the end of third grade.

Your child must learn:

to study quietly
to stay at his work until it's done
to work through distractions
to read the directions
to figure out what the question is asking
to answer the question in a complete sentence
to form letters correctly
to write words neatly
to not disturb others

If you can teach this and if your child can learn this in the first three years of school you will save yourself a lot of frustration and headaches. More importantly, you will have given your child the tools to be a success not only in academics but in life in general!

A Birds Eye View

2010-10-18T19:41:00.000-07:00

Monday morning...I have an ADD first grader that wants to do everything except his Math, a 9 year old that just wants to play the piano and not do his work, a 13 year old that is more worried about the alignment of her ponytail then reading, another 13 year old who sits here studying through the chaos and an 8 year old that wants to jabber on and on about her day! Is there any better profession than teaching? I dont think so.

Should you or should you not use homeschool co-ops

2010-10-16T09:50:00.000-07:00

You will not have to read long here at Blueberry House to discover that I am not a lover of Science! I buy Science from Christian Light Publications because it has a box that you can get with every grade that has everything you need to do any experiments in their books. Each grade has its own box and the box has stuff in it right down to the soil and the paper cups, the beakers and the slides. Its wonderful...well it would be if I used it more often.

Even with that convenience I find myself dreading Science with the kids. Tink doesn't care about Science, but then she doesn't care about anything other than her friends, her violin and her volleyball. Peter on the other hand, loves Science and all that goes with it! Poor kid, his mommy is Science challenged! I've just never been big on Science.

Don't fall off your chair when I tell you that I really don't care why something works, as long as it works! Last week Tink had to write a science concept paper in her Writing class! Now I can't imagine why someone would pull Science into such a beautiful class as Writing, but the teacher thought it was a good idea. Tink was told her paper had to be on the Generation of Electricity. What a bunch of hair pulling and teeth grinding that was!

I had to help with her with the large majority of the assignment and I realized anew how much I hate Science!! Just let me turn the lights on, don't tell me about the electrons that bump into each other and generate electricity. I dont want to know about magnetic fields and turbines and such. I only care that electricity is there when I need it. I know, I know, that is so shallow of me, but I do not love Science!!!!

I have finally given up on teaching my kids any sort of formal Science. I understand that kids need to know a bit about how things work. Science is probably a very necessary class. Because of this supposed idea I have hit on the perfect plan.

For the last couple of years I have made sure that my kids get their dose of scientific information without any pain on my part. Yes, you guessed it. They now get all their science from homeschool co-ops or the charter school. I hate science! Did I say that already? Peter is taking an animal science class at the charter school. He loves it and so do I...for different reasons, of course. Tink is doing Life Science here at home through a lyrical music program. She learns the vocabulary through songs set to popular music. It's all pain free for me.

I'm really sorry to have broken that perfect homeschool image that blogworld so often portrays but I believe in telling it like it is. If you don't like a subject the kids aren't going to enjoy it. Find someone who loves the subject you hate and have them teach it. Peter is loving Science and I'm afraid he wouldn't if I was his teacher. I would end up killing all his joy. The experiments are the worst! Ach, how I hate experiments...and the mess that follows!

As for history. Ah, now we're talking! I love history! I am passionate about History. I teach it by book, by movies, by field trips, and by any method I can find. Tink is in two history classes this year because her mama loves history!

Okay, I better not get started on my love of the past. The whole point of this is to tell my readers that it's okay to not like a subject. It's okay. It doesn't make you a bad parent or teacher. It's okay to not understand a subject, such as, upper algebra. That's alright.

Don't sweat it.

Just find someone who is qualified to teach it and have them teach your child. The homeschool world is filled with woman who have teaching degrees in all subjects. Many of them offer classes in their specialized field. A good way to find these teachers is to join up with a yahoo homeschool group in your area or a homeschool forum that is localized.

Dont feel bad about needing outside assistance. Homeschooling can be fraught with unnecessary guilt! Free yourself and make use of those co-ops!

The First Month of School Review

2010-10-09T21:19:00.000-07:00

September is over and we are now well into October. I love this time of year! I get excited about all the possibilities. The kids curriculum and classes are working out really well. September always is the month of change and tweaking for me. After all the years of teaching I know what I want for the backbone of our curriculum but there's always a few things to fine tune by the time October rolls around.

One of those is Peters Spelling. I had pulled him out of Sequential Spelling for a number of reasons. Now I am putting him back in the program. The Christian Light curriculum is working very well for him. I'm moving him at a fast rate through the Language Arts program. I actually placed him at a 2nd grade level to catch the little nuances in the program and the vocabulary that the curriculum uses that may be different than other curriculum's. As a result of being placed so low and because we started in August he is now half way through the LA 2nd grade year. It was good for me to place him that low. It firmed up some missing areas, mainly the one of punctuation and capitalization. His third grade books are ordered and on the way. I will move him through those quickly too with the goal to be in the fourth grade books by February. Then we can slow down to a normal pace.

His history is working beautifully. He loves the map study. I ordered the loose leaf maps that match the fourth grade history lightunits. He is filling those out to have his own atlas at the end of the year. He is also making a salt clay map of the continent of North America. Unfortunately, I didn't stick to just salt clay. I added the oil in like I do for play dough so the map has been in the drying process for a week now. The middle of the US is still doughy! I'm going to have him paint it Monday regardless of the swamp conditions in the Midwest!

So other than adding in some extra PE classes, a digital story telling class and Sequential Spelling things have remained almost the same with Peter. I'm also working on getting him into a geometry class during the time that Tink is in her two hour history class. Peter would love a more advanced approach to geometry than what his dear mother is giving him! Psst, I'm not good at geometry but don't tell anybody!

Tinks classes and curriculum haven't changed at all! I am proud of that! I worked so hard on ironing out the creases and rough spots in her Middle School curriculum that there really was no need of change. I did add in a history class but that was so she could fellowship with 11 other middle and high school kids who are all Christian. Most of the kids she knew years ago and we had just lost touch. So this is wonderful for her. The history is World History and the exact same years we studied last year but I'm keeping her in the class anyway for the friendships and the potential friendships that may develop from that.

(This is Peter playing cards while on a break at the charter school)

I have put pics of Peter in here but none of Tink because I havent managed to get around to Tinks classes yet and get her pics. I will be sure to include her next time!

So this now finds us neatly tucked into the month of October! I couldn't be happier with September's results! So how are your plans panning out? Any glitches? Any changes? What are your thoughts as we move into this second month of fall schooling?

Peters 4th grade schedule

2010-09-20T14:19:00.000-07:00

This school year promises to be a challenging one again. The children's school schedules are full at home and at the charter school.

Peter is carrying a full load but he just cant sit and study for long. As a result I have interspersed his studies with lots of I have enrolled him in three different PE classes and community basketball in the evenings. He is a kid that needs to release large amounts of energy. I'm hoping this will be enough to keep him moving and focused during the rainy season.

Peter is taking math in Bob Jones again this year and is excelling. He is going into the fourth grade but is placing at the 6th grade level in math. He loves Math.

I wish he was so in love with Language Arts! I am taking him through two years in one this year in grammar. It's pretty intense but Peter has the wherewithal to do it. He just needs to focus his little self and set his mind to doing the work.

In Social Studies, Grammar, Reading, and Science he is using the self paced program of Christian Light Education,

He is also taking a Science class at the charter school. I am not a lover of Science. I pretty much cant stand it really. I just hate the experiments and all the "stuff". Okay, I know you Science lovers are cringing right now but knowing I hate it is the first step towards the realization that my kids wont get much Science if it were left to me. So Peter is taking Animal Antics Air and Water at the charter school. There he can do labs and experiment to his hearts content.

Because of this lack of feeling for science on my part I have also put Tink into a Life Science curriculum that is taught through musical lyrics. All of the word definitions are sung to popular camp songs so the kids can learn them easier. It's going to be a life saver for Tink who struggles with vocabulary and word definitions.

I have taken a completely different approach with Peter in Spelling this year. Spelling is built into the CLE program but I want him to have a bit more so I found a spelling book that I think will work for him. It's neither Bob Jones or Christian Light and right now I cant even think of the publisher.

I am so tired today. I couldn't sleep during the night. My mind was going in a million directions over a talk I am suppose to give to some teachers the end of this week. I was thinking of everything I wanted to be sure to include in this session on teaching the slow learner. Because of my restless night and because I ate sugar yesterday against my better knowledge, I am now dragging.

I am sitting in a guitar class with a tutoring student. I have another student in a hand bells class. Peter is in PE and Tink is in Writing for middle school. I'm starting to drag. In one hour I have my first public school student arriving at my house for tutoring. I have tons to do in that hour, not the least which is to get home and quickly brew myself a cup of coffee before the evening students arrive.

If only this headache would leave!

Fall Semester Lesson plans 7th grade

2010-09-14T07:03:00.000-07:00

All summer we have dabbled around in our books, doing bits here and there but not really buckling down and doing book work on a scheduled basis. Today ends all that because the charter school is opened today for classes.

I really struggled with the children's curriculum this year. I just couldn't quite find the right fit! Tink tested low in vocabulary and she has every year. It was time to see if this could be corrected. I searched all summer for curriculum that would incorporate vocabulary in a huge way! I'm finally happy with my final choice.

Tink has studied English inside and out. She can label and diagram sentences with ease. The problem though stems from her short term memory. I dont want her to lose what she already knows but neither do I want to put a huge emphasis on diagramming this year. The solution was found in Grammar Keys.

Grammar Keys is a software program that covers all the basics in language, and grammar and sentence mechanics. The student does the course online and also in a work book. The workbook comes on a DVD and needs to be printed on paper. It took me a bit to figure out how it all worked but when I did I was very pleased with the program. By using Grammar Keys Tink will not lose any of the knowledge she already has while we delve deeper into reading vocabulary.

I've stated before on my other blog how Tink placed at the 11th grade for Reading comprehension. Based on the test scores I also did away with the Reading book/workbook scenario. Her comprehension was at the 11th grade but her reading vocabulary was at 6th grade! This year she will be reading entire books and doing vocabulary and limited comprehension questions on each book. She will fill out a reading journal as she goes along and will write up a book report at the end.

I have chosen the book Jacob Have I Loved for the first book of the year. I printed out complete lesson plans for the book from Ed Helper. I'm not sure how much you can see on that link without a paid subscription but I'm guessing you can view the page. You would not be able to download the plans but it would still give you an idea of what it looks like.

For Science we are doing Teach with Movies. I chose this particular way of doing Science because the lesson plans were only $11.95 online and each movie has a list of vocabulary terms the children must know. Teach with Movies has movies and lesson plans for History, Science, Literature and character building.

Tink is doing United States History again this year. She didn't get it finished last year, mainly because we started it so late in the year. She is using North America Is the Lords from Christian Light Education.

Here is what the website says about this book; "North America Is the Lord’s is a comprehensive history and geography of Anglo-America from a God-centered perspective. This study credits God, the Creator, as the sovereign Lord. It describes opposing forces in history: the kingdom of God and the kingdom of darkness. Social values belonging to God’s kingdom are upheld. This book counters the humanistic idea that we control our destinies, and that our land thrives because of our own ingenuity".
I love this book and decided it was well worth Tinks time to finish it!

Tink is doing Math from Teaching Textbooksagain. It's a good fit for her so I'm not going to reinvent the wheel.

Those are her main courses. At the charter school she is taking Orchestra classes including symphonic orchestra, a writing class for middle school and volleyball.

Once again her schedule is full but she seems to thrive on it.

Just a little brain dump

2010-07-26T07:07:00.000-07:00

We are half way through the summer and its time to think of curriculum! I took my kids to be tested so I would know exactly where they are. It's been awhile since I have done that and I really wanted a better feel for things this up coming year. I have been tutoring thirteen hours a week this summer so its not like I havent been in the teaching groove but there is something different about ordering curriculum for your own kids than buying it for others! Im so excited to get going with them!

I decided that this week I will tutor my own kids two hours a week. Tink hasnt done any school work so the two hour a week tutoring is going to really help her. I dont work one on one with Tink much anymore and Im hoping this month of August will give her a little boost. Im really excited about starting the tutoring with her.

I was amazed the other day when I had her do some comprehension exercises to brush up for the test. She had test taking skills down to a science. But then, why shouldn't she, poor thing! She's been tested more academically than any child should ever have to be!

I'm still not totally sure what I am ordering for the kids; not just which grade level, but also which publisher. Math is settled but I'm still sorta browsing for a Language Arts program. Tink is beginning to get into some tough stuff for her and frankly I'm not sure how much time I want her spending on dangling participle and the such. I just want her to literate and able to develop life skills that will stand her in good stead throughout life. Gerunds and gerund phrases don't seem to fall into that scheme!

Well anyway I need to run. Eventually my plan is to use this blog as a homeschool resource for others but for right now I'm just pecking away at the trivial and using it to sort my thoughts! All great things allude me! Sigh!

What are the Pros and Cons of the Courses Offered Through The Teaching Company

2010-07-18T15:00:00.000-07:00

I've been browsing the Internet looking for curriculum ideas. Thats what we homeschoolers do best, ya know! In my search I found this post over at Two Kid Schoolhouse; Change of Homeschool Plans. She mentions the history course offered by The Teaching Company. Its a course on DVD and I am highly interested in it. Tink learns well through DVD primarily because she is at that age where mom as teacher is not as cool as it used to be! I was wondering though if any of you have used any thing from this company and what are your ideas about it. Did you like it or didn't you? I'd really like to hear from anyone who has an opinion about the DVD's.

Homeschoolers Dirty Little Secret

2010-07-13T14:30:00.000-07:00

You all really must rush to Homeschool USA and read this hilarious account of homeschool and the competition that goes along with it! My favorite line is this one:

“I quit reading home school magazines years ago when a mother wrote in about how her 18 month old had a heart for the unsaved Asian children of the world. 18 MONTHS old! At the time, my 18 month old was sitting on the back porch picking the fuzz out from between her toes!"

Its all good and so funny because of the truth of the whole matter!

And speaking of homeschool, I'm still tutoring 4 hours a week and right now I'm busy testing Peter to see exactly where he stands so I can order his curriculum for fall. I wish I could say that the kids are busy reading and keeping intensive nature journals of their time spent outside but alas, nothing is further than the truth,. Peter spends all his time swimming in the pool and playing video games and Tink thinks summer is one big social hour complete with sleepovers and cozy talks on the deck in the warmth of the summer midnight!

I vacillate between making her do school work and telling myself she will only be 13 for one summer so let her live, laugh, and love and be young.

I'll be updating more regularly on this site real soon!

Hail to Summertime

2010-05-27T10:57:00.000-07:00

Blueberry House has closed for the summer. It was a wonderful year but boy, did I keep my nose to the proverbial grindstone! There were no unscheduled vacation days, no days when we could just sleep in, no days to relax..it was all strictly regimented by the clock out of necessity for the kids that attended my school.

Im ready for a vacation! I have several lapbooks I want to get posted on here. This year we did two of them; one on strawberries at the first grade level and one on Geography at the 4th grade level. I'll get the pics up here real soon.

I have gone through the school room and prepared it for next year. My kids are schooling through the summer but at a much easier work load. I am still tutoring through the summer too so not all school has come to a halt but the overwhelming majority of the day to day school schedule is over for another year.

Now its off to enjoy the summer ahead!

Somethings Worked, Somethings Didn't

2010-04-22T09:37:00.000-07:00

We're finishing up some books and others are left wanting. Part of the problem is that I switched the language Arts program on everyone along about Christmas. That means that no one is finishing their Language Arts. Other books I only meant to be term subjects so of course those books I'm not finishing.

I pulled Peter out of two different reading programs this year and finally settled on Reading A-Z. The Christian Light reading was too hard for him and the Bob Jones stories he thought were boring. I have never had a kid think BJ is boring and it amazed me. I refuse to ruin a child's love of reading by making him read stories that he isn't interested in.

So I switched the reading and now he is loving his stories. He is reading one now on how chocolate is made. It involves studying the map and coloring in the different countries that grow the cocoa bean and he loves map studies so this is working well for him.

We will not finish our Language Arts books this year but I am going to continue those in the summer. Both kids are the same as done with their Math. I plan on starting them in the next grade in Math beginning in June. That will give them a jump on the year ahead. Peter doesn't really need it but by doing this with Tink she will soon be to grade level with her Math.

Story of the World will not be completed but then again it wasn't written to be completed in one year. We will end the year at chapter 26. There are 36 weeks to a school year and we are doing one chapter a week so you can see that throughout the year we have missed 10 weeks of history. That was all in the fall term when I was undecided about what I really wanted to do and unsure of how I wanted to proceed with the SOTW. There is so much there that you really have to sort through it. It's about impossible to do it all.

Peter is also doing history in third grade Abeka and he will be finishing that in the summer too. Peter's Science will also continue through the summer because we are only about a third of the way through that. Again that's because I got a late start.

If there is one thing a homeschooling mom needs to know it is this: the curriculum you decide on at the beginning of the year is not a sure and firm decision. You may be oh so sure this is what will work but don't let yourself be tied to it when it isn't doing the job. Switch it out to something else. I do caution you though to be done with the flip flopping by Christmas. To go back and forth all year long is to confusing for the child. You will end the year not knowing where you are in the academic spectrum. As a result you may end up feeling defeated.

Today I only have three kids here. Two are absent and Tink is sick in bed. So out of the usual 6 I am down to half of that and it makes for such an easy day! Monday will be the beginning of the 32nd week of school. Five more weeks and we are on our summer program! Yeah!!

Next Years Curriculum Ready to go

2010-04-07T08:01:00.000-07:00

I've got next years curriculum almost figured out! Can you believe it? I know, me neither. I really didn't have a problem with figuring out Science or History. I am going with CLE and Story of The World again. We may just do SOTW as a story rather than using the tests and activity pages. I'm not sure about that yet.

Science was a no brainer because I hate Science. Yes, I know most homeschoolers love the Science part but I'm not one of them! With Christian Light you can order the Science kit that goes along with the book for every grade! You don't have to go looking for all the stuff to do the experiments. The books are all workbooks that are intended for the student to do on their own which is nice when mom hates to do the Science! I add library books and DVD's to the Science curriculum to spice things up and add variety.

Tink will be sticking with Teaching Textbooks for Math and Bob Jones for Reading and Language Arts.

Peter will be doing Math, Science, and History with CLE. His reading is still to be determined which means his Language Arts is still to be determined. I keep those two subjects in the same curriculum because publishers and writers usually match the grammar workbook to the workbook in the Readers.

For Spelling both kids will be doing Sequential Spelling by DVD. They are starting that this term and it is amazing! They are both doing book one so I only needed to buy the one DVD!

Music lessons and Orchestra classes will continue like this year. I am also adding a computer class for Peter and a photo editing class for Tink. The !classes will qualify as technology and therefore they will make the state happy! Yes, I try to keep the state happy and I am totally aware that it sets me apart from most homeschoolers but that's just how I operate.

So what about you? Are you thinking of next year yet? I have never had a year where it was just so easy to plan the fall term. I think it could be that my kids are happy with the work they are doing so I only had to make minor tweaks to the program.

Book Learning comes to a halt at 2 pm- Mama is unhappy!

2010-03-31T10:46:00.000-07:00

I'm up against a real problem. I know this problem stems from the fact that both my kids went to public school before they were homeschooled but my problem is that the kids have in their minds that all book learning ends at when the school bell tolls at 2 pm.

Now I know too that I am partly to blame for this. When you operate a school from your home you have to hold to definite times for each subject and for a beginning and an ending to the homeschool day. After the tutor students leave my own children just flop! Once in a while I can get Tink to do a little more without much prodding but if I want Peter to do anything it is like pulling hens teeth!

He is not interested in book learning. He learns wonderfully from videos and real life experiences. But a pencil is like a death stick in his hand. So here comes the other problem with operating a "school" within the home. I can't let Peter learn with videos and computer because the other children think they want to do that too and the parents are not paying to have their kids learn that way.

Interestingly enough, even though they hire me to teach their kids because they cannot, most of them have very definite ideas of how they want their children taught. Because most of the kids I work with have learning differences their parents send them to me to get them up to grade level. The parents that are more into unschooling would never send their kids here because of the structure of our day.

Parents are desperate for their children to pass the state exams and it is up to me to see that they do! Videos are not their idea of learning. Bill Nye the Science Guy would not qualify for a Science program. This is very frustrating when I know my own son Peter learns best that way.

On the other hand it really isn't a bad thing to have to take the death stick in hand and learn to wield that tool. So I have decided that Peter will do lessons just like he has been doing and then after everyone leaves he is going to do learning through video and computer program and reading.

I really think that Tink set a norm here with all of her learning problems. Peter has watched her all his little life and he thinks her behavior is the way all children behave. It is so frustrating.

I feel great excitement though for this next term. Nine weeks until the end of the school year. I have great things planned! I am starting a geography program for my two oldest students using lapbooks and games. I have decided against the Trail program I was considering in the last post. I got to thinking about what Kristin said and I can see the wisdom in that!

The end of spring break

2010-03-29T07:16:00.000-07:00

Spring break is over and it's back to school! I'm excited to be back in the saddle again. There was not enough structure over the week break and I hate not having structure. My husband took the week off and all schedules were flown to the four winds. Peter hasn't practiced his music, nor has Tink. In fact, not one child even picked up a book to read!

Well I guess that's not exactly true. Peter did bring me a book a couple of nights ago and asked me to read it to him. It was a deep thinking sort of book. Okay, no it wasn't, it was Cat in The Hat, but hey, at least we read something!

It is pouring rain here today, I mean, raining as in monsoon type rains! Tink and Peter both have classes at the charter school then it is back home for Peter and another little boy I tutor. Tink is at the charter school all day on Mondays.

Tonight Tinks youth group is taking a bus to a church meeting about 2 and a half hours away. I have mixed feelings about her going. I'm just not comfortable with buses traveling that far in this torrential rain! Maybe I will feel better when the sun comes up and I actually get into this day.

For now it's more coffee! Here's to the last nine weeks of school! Yes we are going to do a little bit over the summer but we aren't going to be hitting it with nearly the intensity of the winter days.

How Important is Geography

2010-03-26T19:33:00.000-07:00

When I was a student in grade school I never recall studying geography. I also don't know anything about geography! I cant tell you what country borders what country. I cant even tell you with any degree of certainty what state borders what state! Oh sure I know the states out here in the west where I live but I get totally confused when I head on into the midwest!

I want to rectify that with my own kids. Peter loves maps! He keeps old outdated ones in his bedroom which goes against everything I am about! I let him, though, all in the name of a good mother! Whenever we go on outings it's Peter who consults the map and lets us all know where we are going!

These last 9 weeks of homeschool I want to put a large emphasis on geography. There are basically three things every young student should know. These are:

1. The Worlds Oceans
2. The Continents
3. The Compass Rose

There are many ways to study geography. It's really easy to go too deep and find yourself in over your head. The information and the things you can study are just endless.

Some people choose to study Geography by going around the world studying the foods that are eaten in all the countries. Others study it by starting with a country and learning all the countries that surround it. Some just study the culture of one country; the dress, the terrain, the climate, etc.

I have wracked my brain this entire week of spring break trying to decide on just how to approach this study for my kids. I do think I have come up with the curriculum I want to use. I have pretty much decided that I'm going to use Trail Guide. It comes with a Textbook and a CD ROM. The CD ROM has all the activity sheets and maps and things you will need to go with the Textbook.

What I really like is that you can make it span several grades. They have already done the work for you and have included map work and things for all the grade levels. It's pretty much recommended for grades 2-5 and that's exactly what I'm teaching.

For first grade through sixth I I found this wonderful set of books Cantering the Country. It looks like a lot of fun. I am wondering if any of you have used either of these and what you like about them. Is there another Geography that you like. If so do share in the comments below. I haven't ordered anything yet so I'm still open to suggestions!

Oregon Home Education Network Conference

2010-03-23T22:16:00.000-07:00

I was excited to be able to take in a conference by OHEN this year. I have never been to a homeschool conference and wasn't sure what to expect. The topics were divided into several categories like parenting, homeschooling methods, etc. I cant recall the different divisions but they all looked interesting.

The conference opened with a talk by Pat Ferango, the big head guy of the organization. He had some good ideas and showed some good video with lots of quotes sprinkled throughout but it wasn't long before I began to get an uneasy feeling that he and I were not on the same homeschool page!

As long time readers know I do not buy into the unschool idea that is sweeping through the homeschool community. Now Pat didn't advocate unschooling but he was pretty loose about his ideas of schooling at home. His next class looked good though so I decided to stick with him to get a better idea of where he was going. My suspicion was confirmed. "Don't turn your home into a school," he said. Well, that's just what I have done and I make no apologies for it. He was of the mind that a child should not be made to learn anything if they didn't want to. Find out what the child is interested in and go with it. Well that might be fine but here in Oregon we have to test with the state so we have to teach more than how to build with Legos!

Not liking his lackadaisical approach to schooling I chose to listen to another speaker for the next hour.

I attended a class on classical education that was a good class but not exceptional. The teacher divided us into three parts and had us pretend that we were in a room school house with all grades in one. Then we read in unison from the chalkboard the different poems and Scripture she had written there. The point was to show how children longer ago learned just by listening to older children and how much of their schooling was learned by rote! Yawn! I attended a one room schoolhouse when I was a kid in the Mennonite Church. We had all 8 grades in one room. So while everyone else was wowed I was bored.

The next session I wanted to take in was on connecting with your teen in the early years. I've already raised a child through the teen years but I am open to learning more from older women who have taken more children through the teen years then I have. I was late to that class. I couldn't find the room if my life depended on it. Someone finally told me they thought it was upstairs. So I trotted up the stairs where I found another lady very mixed up and looking around for her class while sorting through her papers at the same time.

She had a dress on and so did I. The difference was that while I was totally comfortable in my dress she was not! It was on the short side and looked like it had shrunk. It was made of T- shirt material and stretched tight as she squatted to pick up her papers. She was smack at the top of the stairs and I was coming up. Well, you know what I'm about to say! Yes, there she squatted arranging her papers while showing her underwear to anybody coming up the stairs. Her hair was stringy and I just dismissed her as some poor woman who really didnt know what she was about.

I went to the bathroom then found my parenting class. I entered the classroom and who did I see teaching the class!! The same lady that already shown us her whitey tightey's! I was horrified! Now you can call me judgemental if you like but I can tell you that right then and there I knew that that woman had nothing to teach me on parenting! The number one thing you teach a little girl is how to sit, stoop and bend over in a dress. I wasn't about to endure an hour under her instruction. I backed out of that class so fast it wasn't funny!

Now Pat Ferangos classes were looking pretty good so I figured I'd go back and catch his next class. The one thing I did like was all the statistics he threw in about college graduates and how many of them had jobs and the percentage of them that actually made more than those without college degrees. Of the top people in the Fortune 400 group the salary of those with degrees was an average of 2.13 billion and the average salary of those without degrees was 2.27 billion.

Again though I was less than happy with his attitude about homeschool. The idea that "if a child doesn't want to learn to read then dont make them" just didn't sit well with me no matter how many examples he gave of 16 year olds that learned to read and do Math when they had to for jobs.

With his class over I had one more session for the day. I must choose it wisely. I chose one on Teaching Using Multiple Intelligences. That turned out to be the best class of the day for me! I am fascinated by teaching according to the child's aptitudes. I took copious notes in her class and will return to them once I get a minute of free time.

So this is a birds eye view of the conference. Would I go again? Surprisingly the answer is yes. I paid $50 for the conference and I do feel I got my moneys worth.

Sh! Class in session

2010-03-09T14:25:00.000-08:00

This morning arrived with snow on the ground. It was just a light skiff but still it was snow! Here in the Pacific Northwest cherry trees are blooming, daffodils are up and azaleas are in full bloom. The snow looked out of place in the midst of springtime! This afternoon the air is balmy and my school room window is open to let in all the merry little breezes.

I love the school room after the busyness of the day. A mere half hour ago here is what was happening in this room. Yes, its my Story of the World class. They are listening to the book read in audio and coloring masks of King Tut while they listen.

When they are done they will do map work pertaining to the lands around the Valley of The Kings and answer review questions on last weeks lesson.

You might notice the jars of colored pencils on the table by the girls in the pic above. Tink and Peter were always racing to see who could get the most pencils from the little drawer where they are kept. I got so tired of their bickering and squabbling about who was getting what that I finally got smart and separated the pencils into jars. I needed 5 jars. Well amazingly enough I had exactly 5 sets of each color of pencil! Now when the kids come in for SOTW they just take a jar to their desk and all the squabbles are over! Its such a simple solution yet it alluded me all this time. So much of how a day goes is due to how many little arguments can be avoided and how much time I have spent in preparation.

Another way I have changed the flow of things is to buy these little TV trays. They are portable enough that the kids can move them to wherever they want to study. Peter and my student P have permanent desks in the schoolroom but they move around a lot to separate rooms to get away from the noise when classes are going on. Tink and my other teenage student study downstairs most of the time. It helps to separate the boys from the girls. There's a lot less fuss that way!
So another day is over. Hopefully I have been able to touch these young lives and leave an imprint for good. Now I'm going to tidy the school room and go out for some fresh air!

Spring Term & Restless Kids

2010-03-08T11:24:00.000-08:00

Its amazing to see the many ways that kids can dawdle when they don't want to do their schoolwork. Peter is twisting in his chair, another student is dangling his pencil at the end of a string and watching it twirl and swirl in mid air.

I bought some wooden TV tables to use as extra desks. It's nice because they can fold up when not in use. We need them for those times when all the kids come into the same room to study. I now have 3 boys and 2 girls as day students and 2 boys as half time or hourly students.

I have three third grade boys! What a handful! It's good for Peter though because it gives him other children to play and learn with every day. Peter needs to play with other boys. Between those three and the neighbor boy he has a continual stream of little fellows to interact with. He also has friends at the charter school and at the church. Friends are important to Peter. It's also important to me that Peter relates on a daily basis with other kids. He tends to get too possessive of his things and too self absorbed if he doesn't have to give and and relate to other kids.

Spring term not only brings me a new student it also brings a new focus. I'm taking all three boys through a rigorous cursive writing program. It will be fast paced and painstakingly precise. I'm tired of the nonsense of ten year old kids not able to write or read cursive!

I'm also starting a writing composition class that again will be detailed and rigorous. Two of my students are ten year olds and really by then a child should have a fairly good grasp of the writing process. By the end of this year I'm hoping that Peter and the other two boys know all the main steps to writing a paper: brainstorming, planning with the use of graphic organizers, writing the rough draft, revising and on to the final copy.

I have a lot of work planned for the next 10 weeks of school and even though I am excited about the end I am not so burned out that I don't feel a tingle of excitement over the plans for the rest of the academic year!

Imported Posts

2010-02-07T08:22:00.001-08:00

If you have seen odd posts pop up here briefly in your google readers its because I have been importing older posts form my other blog to here. Once in a while I hit published without the date being changed so it showed up as a recent post insted of a very old one. The post you may have come here to read is here but its back in the archives somewhere. You will most likely find it under the Tink lable since those were the posts I was importing.

Around the Homeschool

2010-02-02T08:45:00.000-08:00

What a beautiful balmy morning! All the kids are quietly tucked into corners doing their Reading right now so I too have a quiet morning. The sun is spilling into the school room windows bathing everything in a soft glow. I love mornings.

Homeschool continues to flow at a hurried pace. Peter has about 4 books that need to be read in the next two weeks. He can't read that fast so I will be doing lots of reading to him. He is listening to Marley a Dog Like No Other on an audio book and I am orally reading Bud Not Buddy to him. In this manner we can start striking out the books on his list.

I've put Peter in Reading Detective along with his Bob Jones. Reading detective is a book of short stories and work sheets. The big plus for this book is the practice it gives the kids on pulling out inferences and information that is not written in the story. Bob Jones does that too but this makes so that every day Peter is being exposed to critical thinking at a concentrated level.

Juggling the schedule is continuing to be a challenge. Some things are ending while others are beginning. Book Club will be over in March. Volley ball will be over Monday but Basketball will just be beginning! Basketball practices are usually Tuesday and Thursday nights with games on Saturday. Fortunately the only thing I have scheduled Thursday nights is Peters viola lesson and I think we can fit both the lesson and the practice in.

This week I only have 3 full time students so I'm using the time to drill the parts of speech and multiplication to my third graders. The extra time was badly needed for the boys.

Tutoring on Fridays will end this Friday too since the state testing begins this coming week. It will be nice to have my Fridays free again. Between tutoring and volleyball games my Fridays have been eaten up without any housework or laundry or catch up stuff getting done.

Well after many interruptions I finally finish this. Reading period is over and its time to move on to phonics.

Winter Showcase

2010-01-31T15:12:00.001-08:00

The Winter Showcase of Homeschools is over. I thought I would give you a peek at the backboard I did and its spot in the fair.

Tinks violin class played music for about half an hour during the showcase. Here in the first photo she participating as a second violinist for Orchestra II. She is sitting there in the back corner on the far right. In the next photo she is playing first violin for Orchestra I.

It was a fun night. Tink had a girlfriend spending the night so she was all giddy and the last thing she wanted to do was to sit there and play violin! I picked her friend up at 2:30 pm and then she went with us to the showcase. The girls ate an entire little six piece cake I had bought them for the sleepover. I stopped at a little bakery here in town and let them choose what they wanted. Of course they wanted the cake with the name Chocolate Extravaganza!

They had nachos at the Showcase and came home and popped popcorn and watched a Nancy Drew video, then giggled until 1 am. The next day they both did their schoolwork together here. That's the joy of having friends who homeschool. You can have midweek sleepovers, roll out of bed and get right to school work!

I just bought Peter a new Social Studies/Geography book and I'm quite excited about it. I had to get him something that wasn't faith based so I had samples to give to the state. I put him Social Studies Skill Builders which is a combination of lessons from the Weekly Reader. I am loving it more than I originally thought I would. It's easy to use and so informative!

Well I've spent almost the entire weekend working in the schoolroom and now it's time to do damage control on the rest of the place.

It's the little things that take the time

2010-01-26T11:56:00.000-08:00

So much to do! I'm getting ready for a winter showcase at the charter school where my kids attend. I stayed up late making the backboard and now I have to get all the props around.

Besides all that there are papers to grade, copies to make, curriculum to buy, filing to do, research, writing...gobs of writing, tutoring, business cards to pick up, a business license to apply for, learning records to make out for the state, samples of kids school work to round up, test prep for kids and the list goes on and on!

Nothing to do but to get at it! So share with us what is on your homeschool to do list. Are you swamped with copying and grading like I am? I'm telling you I could use a full time secretary!

Gregor The Overlander

2010-01-20T09:47:00.001-08:00

I have written before of Peters involvement in a book club called, Oregon Battle of the Books or OBOB for short. One of the books he has to read is Gregor the Overlander written by Suzanne Collins. This book is fantasy and Peter isn't much into this sort of thing. I thought he would never get to a point where he would approach this book with anything close to enthusiasm. I was wrong. About 12 chapters into it he got so involved he would listen to the audio without being told.

This books reading level is 4.9 which is above Peters ability. I read to him the first 10 chapters then realized we were going too slow. I would never be finished by the deadline if we didn't figure something out. This is where the audio book came in. What a lovely way for him to read on his own without my help. Children who also follow along with the reading in their own books build fluency at an astonishing rate!

Students in OBOB must write questions and answers on the book they are reading and quiz their team mates in preparation for going before judges at the final competition. The judges have 80 questions written on every book no matter how long the book is! The questions include things that are very obscure such as the weather on any given day in the book or the clothes that the character was wearing. There is no way to predict what they will pull out.

The way the children are taught to read the books is very helpful in all subjects. As Peter reads he uses sticky notes to mark the side of the page that he thinks might hold important facts. When the book is read the kids take index cards and go back through their books forming questions out of the facts.

Gregor the Overlander is not a book I would have picked for my child to read but Im glad Peter is reading it. It is a whole new genre for him and it makes him think and reason in ways he hasn't had to before.

I, of course will keep you updated on how OBOB turns out! Hopefully Peters team will be selected to go to state!

The Mitten

2010-01-19T08:49:00.000-08:00

The Mitten was written by Jan Brett and has always been one of my children's favorite books. Now that winter is here it's a fun book to read and study. I have never met a child who isn't fascinated by the story of all the woodland animals that found a home in a little boys lost mitten.

I was therefore, very pleased to discover that Enchanted Learning had worksheets and a printable story for the kids on the book, The Mitten. I have a little class I teach on Thursday mornings and this was the perfect book and craft for them. This Thursday morning class has evolved and changed since fall due to the kids that come and go out of it. Right now the children that are in this class are the perfect age to discover the story of The Mitten and delight over all the little animals.

To do this craft I first printed out the mitten pattern. Then I traced it over on felt and cut those mittens out. You then put the two mittens together and either sew or staple around them leaving the top open.

Then you print out this animal template and have the children color and cut out the animals. They then put the animals in the mitten to take home.

I printed the story from the same website. It prints out in full page so the kids can color the pictures. They also have worksheets that go along with the story.

The mittens turned out just adorable and the kids loved this little lesson. The one drawback is that you do need to pay for the Enchanted Learning site. I get so many things off of it though that the cost is well worth it!

Jan Brett also has her own website with tons of crafts to go along with her books. You can find it here. There is just a ton of stuff to do on her website. I haven't even begun to explore all the resources that she has there! You just have to go take a peek.

There really is nothing like homeschool

2010-01-15T19:51:00.000-08:00

Today it was just the kids and I. We spent some intense time in the books. On Fridays I like to dig into the stuff that we cant hit during the rest of the week because of all the outside classes and the tutoring students coming and going.

A couple months ago I identified the crux of Tinks learning disabilities. Yes, she has a processing disorder but I wasn't content with just knowing that. After homeschooling her for four years I began to notice a pattern in both the state testing and the daily school work. I am now convinced that the problem lies in her vocabulary.

To help in this area I once again returned to Wordly Wise for help. To be able to define a word one must be able to pronounce it and then use it in context. Tink is having trouble with pronouncing words she reads. She can get the answers correct because the word is defined in the book and she can always check it's definition, but when I have her read me the list of the vocabulary words she cannot pronounce the words that she has been writing the definitions for.

Here are a few of the words in this weeks word list: conquer, crevice, assign, impatient, thwart, terse. Tink is 13 and she cant read these words. If she sees them in context in a story she does much better than just trying to read a word list, but when she is asked to define words on her state tests they are not in context. They are in list form and she fails it every time!

On Fridays we go over the words together...over and over and over...until she gets tired of going over them. We go over these same words throughout the week but on Friday we dig into the list and drill and drill. On Monday Tink does not know the words. But there is progress. She can read about half of them but that doesn't mean she will remember the definitions.

Wordly Wise goes over the words in many different ways including putting them in context in story form. Then the student does page after page of definitions. It's the best vocabulary program I know of.

I'm not worried about Tinks struggles with vocabulary. My heart goes out to her when I watch her trying to decipher the words but I know we will get through this just like we have gotten through everything else.

That's what I like about Fridays. We move from the school room upstairs into the downstairs living room. There by the fire we tackle the subjects that my kids struggle with the most. They are allowed to eat popcorn and drink hot chocolate while they work or to have their blankets and stuffed animals cuddled up next to them.

We don't worry about how far we get in the curriculum. We don't stress about getting all the subjects in for the day. If we stay on one page the entire time that is okay. We only work about two hours instead of the normal 6 hours on the other four days of the week but the work we do goes deep, deep into the content on the page!

For Peter it was all about preparing for Oregon Battle of the Books, which is the book club competition he is trying out for. He listened for over an hour to an audio of Gregor the Overlander while following along in the book. We then wrote out 40 questions about the material he had just read. Every little detail is fair game to the judges during the Battle of the Books.

I love days like this when we go deeper into the material then the time usually allows. I wish everyone knew the joy that comes from teaching your children at home! When you teach at home their entire education is in your hands. You can expose them to things they are interested in. You can work on their problem areas and help them soar in the areas they are gifted. It's an amazing, heady, yet humbling feeling.

Oh the Pain

2010-01-12T10:13:00.000-08:00

Today one of the kids looked at his worksheet and just wailed, "Contractions, contractions, contractions! Whyyyy so many contractions!?"

It made me think about how tedious it must be to learn the English language. Poor kid, some day he'll thank me!

Changing the Language Arts Program

2010-01-11T07:37:00.000-08:00

We are well into the swing of the New Year. I revamped the schedule a little to give us a bit more free time on Wednesdays. It's helping my weekly outlook considerably. Once again I have changed Peter and Tinks curriculum. I started the year with the kids in Christian Light Education because I wanted a self paced program for them.

It didn't work. The last thing I pulled them out of was the Language Arts. Last week I started them both back into Bob Jones again. Peter had some catch up work to do the first of the year, from his time spent in public school. With the start of his new Language Arts I am happy to say that he is now working at grade level in all subjects!

Tink doesn't like her new Bob Jones book but she was just spinning her wheels in CLE. So we'll see what happens here. I certainly hope I don't have to change anything else. This has been the hardest year for straightening out the curriculum and I'm not sure why.

The 27th of this month is a homeschool showcase at the charter school. I am making a backboard to showcase Blueberry House. I will take pics and show you all when it is done. I like the idea of a showcase for homeschool. It gives kids a chance to show off their hard work and their experiments and such. This year though I am going to use the Winter Showcase to advertise my business. I think it will be a great way to get a little more exposure.

Today the kids have orchestra classes. Then it's back home to do school here. At 2:30 it's back to the charter school. One kid goes to Science class, I pick up Tink who has been at the school all day and take Peter to piano lessons. After piano lessons we usually have book club but its been canceled this week. That makes my day a little lighter.

At 3:15 I pick up my granddaughter from the Christian Academy and then we are home for the night. I usually don't get back home here on Mondays until 5:30pm. Book club ends in March so my Mondays will always be a little lighter like this after we finish the club.

Well hope you all have a good week on the homeschool front. I have to go make lunches!

Blueberry House Christmas Party

2009-12-19T09:16:00.000-08:00

Thursday was party time at Blueberry House! We exchanged gifts but I didn't get a pic of that! Bummer! After opening gifts the kids dipped marshmallows and pretzels in chocolate. What a bunch of messy fun that was!

After dipping chocolates the kids went upstairs to play games!
After a much debated and animated game of Life they finally settled in to watch the Veggie Tales recount the story of "The True Meaning Of Christmas". The kids had lots of fun. It was a good send off for the Christmas break. Everyone went home with each others junk from the white elephant exchange. Junk, movies and chocolate; what could make a kid happier?

And thus ends the first 4 months of school. Over the break the kids are going to do Math, Language Arts and Reading. It should only take them about an hour every morning because I'm not assigning more than one page in Math and only 2 or 3 in Language Arts. Reading will be reading from books not doing the Reading from the Textbook. I have to keep them in the groove just a bit or its too hard to return after the Christmas break!

Have a great holiday everyone. Take time out to enjoy your family and friends. Don't forget to watch all those wonderful old Christmas classics that come out this time of year. Above all don't forget the One who came as a Baby so that we might have eternal life!

Merry Christmas to all and to all a Goodnight!

Pics of the Learning Day

2009-12-14T19:57:00.000-08:00

School continues in a rather seamless way. I would love to be on Christmas break right now but I am not and so I must live with it. After all, it is my schedule and no one elses so I could break it if I wanted to, right? Then what's the point of complaining? Well there is none really, save the fact that I really have to stick to a contract that the parents have signed concerning what days are school days and which ones aren't.

I've only got in 58 days of school this year since I don't homeschool on too many Fridays. According to the state we need 180 days in but I'm not worried. They will come in due time.

Mrs C has asked for more pics of school so today I just grabbed the camera and took off through the learning spaces and snapped what I saw. This is the result.Tink has always got to be doing something a little different. Im telling you that girl marches to a different drummer! That pic is not in any way posed. Thats exactly how she was studying when I caught her.

The pics below were taken a couple of weeks ago. The kids were doing their History. Note the CD player on the table. They listen to the Cd's of Story of the World and do the map work and art work while they listen. Its a lovely break for me from the usual teaching. You might also note the messy school room and Tinks wet hair and robe. This is not the result of a late morning. Instead these pics were taken at exactly 1:00 pm. The learning space is all a'cluttered from the days activities. Tink had been dressed but she took a shower and washed her hair over the lunch break because she has volley ball practice at 2:30.
Some how I don't have any good pics of the other three kids I tutor. I will have to remedy that and get their pics on here too. Really nothing shows better the truth of homeschooling than a peek into the learning spaces! Sometimes it's just not a pretty sight!

Stay tuned for Christmas pics the end of this week.

Sports, Music and Science

2009-12-03T21:37:00.000-08:00

School consumes every day yet it doesn't hit this blog. How weird is that? I've been busy teaching little ones to read and write and that is a full time job!

Tinks volley ball team has been having 5:30 am practices at the nearby college and I have just gotten so tired of it. I finally set about to find a gym that they could use in the afternoons. Well God cares about the little things. The gym at the Charter school had openings and now Tinks team, the Eagles, from the Christian Academy is able to play in a gym in the afternoons. The Christian Academy doesn't have a gym of their own so they are at the mercy of the gyms in the area. Today Tink had her first practice with the Eagles, in the charter gym. It's such a blessing!

Peter is busy with his music lessons and wont hit sports until January. He seems to have a real love for the piano...more so than the viola. The jury is still out though so I'm going to wait and see how it goes before I pull him from viola.

I'm looking around for a good secular Science curriculum. I need one that isn't faith based so the charter school can accept work samples from me. Does anyone know of any publisher that puts out a good third grade Science curriculum? Id love to hear from you.

Times Tales

2009-11-23T16:45:00.001-08:00

One more day of school this week and then we are done until next Monday! Its a short week and I'm glad of it.

For the last three weeks I have halted all Math for the third graders. Instead of proceeding in the Math book we have been working on getting those pesky multiplication tables down. From here on out all else hinges on knowing those. Skip counting just wasn't working. It just seemed that the kids could not remember all those numbers when we got past 5. The sixes stumped them and it was time to do something.

I've been printing worksheets from the Internet for these three weeks. One of the boys is sorta getting it, the other is still struggling a lot. Tink has worked with them enough now that she really does seem to have them committed to memory. I thought we would never see that point with her. I finally let her use a multiplication chart because I was worn out trying to teach her for two years and still not getting it into her brain. Well, as it turns out we are in our fourth year now and somehow they are sticking with her.

Not so for Peter and P. So I did what every good homeschooler does and begin my research on the Internet. I also begin asking other homeschoolers if they knew of any easy way to teach multiplication. As a result here is what I bought. Its called Times Tales. In one day Peter knows his 3's and 4's. I haven't taught him the rest yet. I cannot say enough good about Times Tales as a method for teaching the multiplication. You must go check it out!

How To Make Firewood; By Peter Darling

2009-11-18T07:30:00.000-08:00

First you need to cut a tree down. You need a chainsaw and some gloves and some safety glasses and ear muffs.

And then you cut the limbs. You need a chainsaw or some clippers.

Next you use your tape measure to measure the wood and then take a chainsaw and cut your wood.

Then split it with axe. If it isn’t splitting you need a wedge to help.

The wood is ready to be stacked now. You need some pallets to keep the wood dry from the wet ground.

Be Peter

We are learning to write stories here at Blueberry House. Peter first had to use a graphic organizer to do his How To paper. I told him I wanted him to choose something he knew how to do and then list the steps to get it done. On the left column of the paper he wrote the steps. In the right column he wrote the items needed for each step.

Then we moved on to the rough draft. This version here is his rough draft. I left it just like he wrote it; typos and all. He is just so proud of this paper. I make him type his papers in Microsoft Word. As you know, if you are even close to the right spelling of that program will correct the word for you.

I have a whole article written by a teacher about this new twenty first century way of teaching our kids to write. Handwriting is out since our kids will most likely be using the computer for even the most mundane writing in the future. And the computer will be far more advanced than these clunky things we have now. We already see that in the IPods and hand held computers. But anyway that's a subject for another post.

Now I'm out the door for the academy and the Thanksgiving feast. My little Indian is so excited. I've made a pumpkin pie and he cant wait to take his pie to the class. Hopefully I will remember to take some pics!

North America is the Lords

2009-11-12T20:39:00.001-08:00

Okay I'm well aware that I am beating this History thing to death but that's where I am right now and that's where I'm going to stay for a bit. I came to a sort of resolution. I put Tink back into North America is the Lords by Christian Light Education. I decided to sit with her and just do it with her. I think the lugging down in the history department was more a stubborn resistance than anything.

She really does seem to get it. Of course, the huge, mammoth history book is intimidating but she needs to get over that. I was struck again at what small chunks they take in that book. There is no reason she shouldn't be able to understand it.

I really want her to get this stuff because we have beat Colonial America and the founding fathers and presidents to death around here. This is different in that she is studying about the Continent of North America and all its different climates. She is studying about the tundra of the Arctic right now and what flowers grow there and what animal life it supports. She studied about the Rockies and the Continental Divide, the great lakes and the plains. Like I said this is a new branch of social studies and I think she needs to know this stuff.

I still haven't taught the kids about the wars. They did a real brief overview of WW1 about three years ago and that was it. I will need to hit that next year. I'm planning on studying the Civil War and the World Wars in different terms. For now though Tink stays in CLE!

I've made a little change in schedule to accommodate Peters piano practice. Eight years old is very different from 12 years old when it comes to the ability to work when tired. Peter just has one melt down after another when he tries to do his music practice in the evenings. So now I have decided to let both kids practice their music in the morning, right after devotions and Bible Memory and before they start their reading. It seems to be going much better for Peter this way. I think it will be better for Tink too once she gets in the groove!

I am so incredibly tired tonight I am going to bed now. I'm just exhausted. Tomorrow Peter has an early dentist appointment then an early afternoon viola practice. Other than that I am going to work in the school room all day.

Oh the Frustration

2009-11-10T16:39:00.000-08:00

Okay, Ive had it! I'm going to write my own curriculum! I've thought about it for ages and now I know I'm going to have to bite the bullet and write it myself. . . . someday!

I cant find any good history or Social Studies out there! Yes, we are doing Story of The World but I want Tink doing more. One reason is that if she is reading from a SS book she is getting in extra reading and by doing a workbook I can better see how much she is comprehending what she is reading.

A child like Tink will not read two stories in her Reading book in one day. Her goal is not to learn and to work hard to progress academically. Her goal is to complete the lesson and call it good. So that being the case I have to sneak other reading in by way of other subjects so she doesn't catch on that it is really more of the same!

I pulled her out of the Reading in Christian Light Education and today I bought her the 5th grade Reading through Bob Jones. I pulled her out of the Social Studies through CLE but I don't like Bob Jones History at any level! Its odd cause I love Bob Jones otherwise. I just don't like their History. So it looks like I will have to find something on the Internet. I tell you, I really will write my own someday. You just watch me!

I ordered Social Studies, Reading and Language Arts from CLE for Tink this year. The only things she is still in is LA. I ordered Reading, Language Arts, Science and Bible for Peter and he is still doing all of them save the Reading. I ordered too high of a book for him. I really think he will be able to do CLE. It's a very advanced program and it is definitely not for the slow learner or the student with learning difficulty. It just does not work for Tink or my 4th grade tutor student.

So here I go to research curriculum for a good history program. By the way if you want an excellent history for grades 1 -3 I highly recommend Abeka. It's amazing.

I might resort to living history books for Tink. I'll have to see.

Story of the World, Story of My Day

2009-10-27T21:45:00.001-07:00

Today we finally got into Story of The World. We've been doing it but it wasn't working like I wanted it to, so I tweaked the schedule and made it fit. I first had to decide what students I really wanted to take the course. Students come and go from here all day and there's a different mixture at different times of the day. No matter how I thought about it I just couldn't decide where to really fit it in.

I finally figured out that my problem was that I didn't want any of the kids to miss it! Well, I tucked it into the Tuesday afternoon slot and that will catch 5 of the six kids that come through my door. The other one is only 5 years old and wouldn't be interested anyway.

I love the Cd's. Its so nice to have someone else read the story to the kids besides myself. While the story is being read the kids do the color page. After the story they narrate back to me and orally answer the questions in the book. We do this in a class setting.

Then we do the map work and chart out the different areas. The kids love it. I thought of dividing everything up into tiny segments and cover several days but it just works better for us if we take out a chunk of the afternoon and just do it all then.

Today was a very rough school day. Nobody wanted to listen. Tink was in a sensory frame of mind. Peter fought with the other student his age all the live long day! I thought I was going to lose it with that boy! Peter and Tink just couldn't pull i together today. Tink had to have her 2 cents in on everything and if I turned my back for one minute chaos reigned! I ended the day so exhausted I actually crawled into bed at 6:00pm, turned out the light and slept soundly for an hour.

Its the Small things in Life

2009-10-26T12:30:00.001-07:00

You should see the rain! It's coming down like it did in the days of Noah, I declare! My schoolroom is quite cozy on a rainy day. Over the weekend we went to Ikea and my husband bought me a wonderful desk chair; padded, reclining, swivel, handle that raises the seat up and down, big tall back on it - just cant be beat! Now I just have to keep the kids out of it.

Wanting So Much More

2009-10-24T21:27:00.000-07:00

I'm so frustrated! I want so much more for the kids on the educational front. I know, I know, my kids do a lot but I want more. I want them to delve into Shakespeare. I want them to study artists. I want them to study and appreciate the different music genres. There is just so much I want to do and there is no time to do it!

I found a wonderful weather game online. Check this out! Its called Treehouse Weather Kids and wow it is an awesome program for teaching kids about clouds, weather, and storms etc. I would love it if Peter had the time in his day to do this. The problem is that I am a firm believer in playtime. I could have Peter doing this sort of thing in the late afternoon after his 3R's are done but I also want him to play. I love looking out the window and seeing him sneaking around behind the trees with his toy guns waiting to ambush the neighbor boy who is also sneaking around the bushes with his own gun.

And oh the joy of hearing his voice in the wind as he talks to his friend while biking down the street as fast as they can go. Something has to be said for the carefree days of childhood. I want to preserve this but I also want to press for more work on the academic side of life.

There are days I wonder if Tink will ever get it. I went to the hair salon today and left the kids with assignments to do in their books. Tink didn't finish even half of her stuff in each subject. She said it was too hard. When I checked her work I saw she wasn't even half trying. Listen, when a 12 year old writes that the US exports Kangaroos then you know for sure her heart isn't in it!

We haven't been able to get to Story of The World at all this week. That saddens me. I'm seriously thinking of cutting out the charter school next term except for the orchestra classes. It takes an entire day of our school week. I'm always thinking about what else I could be getting done on those days with the kids.

Just when I decide I will indeed quit the charter school Peter will ask excitedly when Wednesday will be here so he can go be with his friends. I'm all at sixes and sevens about this.

I have decided that I am going to have to divide things up by terms. Our days are taken up mostly be Reading, Phonics and Math. Peter does Science and Tink does Social Studies here at home. The kids I tutor don't even do that. I realize I am working with children who have disabilities at some level and that reading, math and phonics have to take precedence. But I'm just so frustrated. I want to do more. I want to do tons more.

I have this nature detective book that I printed off the Internet that I would love to have Peter work on. But there is no time. I have to find the time! I just have to. Here is another contrary thing; I don't want the charter school but the charter school is providing the fun hands on type learning that the kids love. I'm giving them the nitty gritty. So maybe it all balances out.

But oh for a 30 hour day so I could fit just a wee bit more into our schedule! I have to admit that right now I just don't have an extra half hour to do anything more in my day than I am doing. Its just not there. I had a little bit more time this week with the Christian Academy closed. That was nice. I didn't have to rush right out of here after school. But I couldn't really start anything permanently in that time because Monday it all picks up again...that is if I let Tink return this coming week. I may just hold her out another week. They shut down because of swine flu and its still making its ugly rounds out there.

Well I have to figure out something here. There is just so much out there for the kids to learn and I want them to learn it! I will have to figure out a way! The frustration builds!

Time for Math (Part 3 in the series on independent study)

2009-10-21T04:41:00.000-07:00

We do Math from 10:15 to 11:30 every day. How much independence should you give your child in Math? How do you teach Math at multiple levels? I begin my Math period with a 5 minute Math drill for all grades. Some are working on addition and some are working on multiplication. We see how many problems out of 100 they can complete in that 5 minute timed drill. Tink does these drills with us.

Even the first grader is in on this. She doesn't have 100 problems nor is she really being timed but to include her as if she was part of it is good practice for later. Everybody puts their name on top of the paper including the first grader with her page of apples filled with little addition sums. At the mark they all begin the drill. This gives me a blessed 5 minutes to regroup and make sure I have everything ready to go at the end of the 5 minutes.

After the timed drill Tink and the two boys do oral multiplication drills with me. We use flash cards or just do recite them by rote, whichever the kids want to do that day.

After the multiplication practice Tink takes her books and heads for the computer to do Teaching Textbooks. She is working independently on her Math. Other days she moves on in her Math book in Bob Jones. I have already checked everything over and have written down exactly what she is suppose to do that day. If she hits a snag she checks to see what Lesson in Teaching Textbooks I have written down to correspond with that part of Bob Jones. To see more on how I use the Teaching Textbooks in conjunction with Bob Jones you can read this post; Teaching Textbooks and How They Measure Up.

You can see here that it is important that I have done my homework and lesson plans. If I wouldn't have plotted all this out for Tink the evening before or the weekend before I would now have to stop and try to figure things out while I have three others waiting. By writing this all out I have made it so that Tink is in charge of her own destination in Math. So now she is working independently and I turn my attention to the two boys who are both in 3rd grade Math.

The first grader is still working on her sheet of apples while I'm getting the boys started. I explain each section of Math that is due that day. I work out a few of the problems on the board and we solve them together. Then the boys on their own. I spend the rest of the time until 11:30 working with the first grader. We do her Math lesson in just a short period of time. She doesn't need that entire time for the Math she has. I use the rest of that period to do Reading with her. If you look at yesterdays post you will see that she doesn't do her Reading during the reading time slot with the other kids. I fit her Reading in here in the Math space.

After lunch I read a story to the kids. We are reading Snow Treasures. This is one of two times that we all come together every day. The first one is at eight in the morning when we all meet in the living room and sing our morning prayer, Father We Thank Thee, and then do our Bible Memory. These two activities keep us all together as a group and keep even the most independent student involved with everyone else.

Story time is finished at 12:30 pm. The next period is from 12:30 to 1:45. This is the time that we do phonics and grammar, language arts and spelling. Again all the children are involved for the first five minutes. We do drills on the parts of speech or the different kinds of sentences; interjection, question, statement, command. Then everyone is off to their own books. I have laid the worksheets to be completed on their desks during the lunch break so they know exactly what to do. I then go to each child and explain each section of their lesson. They then begin work.

At this point the first grader who has done her phonics in the early morning reading time will go to the living room and listen to her Hooked On Phonics Tape. This gives me time to drill with Peter who still needs phonics help even though he is in the third grade. We go over charts of beginning and ending digraphs and consonant blends. He does timed word drills that focus on whatever digraph we are working on.

Peter is a fast worker. While the other third grader does his Language Arts Peter not only completes the drills with me but he does his Language Arts in CLE and his phonics pages in Horizons and A Reason for Spelling. Twice a week he works in Science and Bible. These subjects are just fitted into the time slots when he finishes early.

For example if he finishes his reading before reading period is over he begins reading in his Science. In Math if he finishes early he will again pull out the Science and start from where he left off before. In this manner these two subjects get done. Any experiments are done after the other students leave in the evening.

I give all spelling tests on Thursday. I call out the words to each grade so everyone is taking the test at the same time. I call out their names and the word that is for them. It goes like this: K- run, P & P - struggle, Tink - appreciation and so on down the list. Spelling is over in ten minutes and every one has had their test.

In the afternoons Tink is working independently on her History and Language Arts and Vocabulary. She does the spelling with us. Once again that keeps Tink, the independent learner, involved with the rest of us.

Once a week we take 15 minutes at the end of the day to do Story of The World. All four of the students are included in that class.

Hopefully this gives you all some idea how to include independence with one on one learning in your homeschool. Independent learning should begin at the first grade. Even when your child has mastered independent learning he should never be left on his own at the grade school level. Include that child in all drills, and memorization and any class that covers multiple grade levels, such as; Story of The World.

Remember there is nothing set in stone about all this. Do what works but keep the end goal in mind. The end goal is an independent child that can pursue his future with confidence because his mother gave him the skills at a young age to do so.
Does this all make sense to you guys?

More on Independent Study and Homeschool Structure

2009-10-19T06:55:00.000-07:00

To school younger children who are less independent than the high school you will need to know your child and what they are capable of. Again remember that independence is the goal.

I discussed in the last post how I leave Tink on her own much of the time. But I still have three others to teach who are not independent learners yet. So how much independence should you give a child? A child at the first grade level will not be able to do a lot on their own. I start my first grader on handwriting first thing in the morning. The others start on their reading.

The first grader is doing handwriting because she can do that without help. The others are all doing reading. I start with the one reading at the second grade level. He reads to me the words from his word wall. Then we read in Pathway Phonics which is a wonderful book that teaches blends of sounds and then flows them into words. This takes about 15 minutes. I then release him to go read his story while I get the third grader. The third grade boy has been reading in his reader while I'm working with the second grader.

As the switch between the boys is being made I use this minute to switch the first grader into her phonics book. She will now be circling all the pictures that start with the letter w. Then she will circle all pictures that start with wa then we then wi and so on through the vowels. It doesn't matter at this point whether she gets them right or wrong. This just gives her something to wrap her brain around and try on her own until I have time to work with her.

Now the with the second grader reading his story and the first grader doing her phonics I turn my attention to the third grader. He reads the words on his word wall then he reads a page of his story with me. He doesn't need a separate phonics course, being very proficient at it. He gets a lot of phonics stuff in his reading workbook and language arts anyway. So he reads a page to me.

There is no need for him to read the entire story to me. One page can tell you if the child is comprehending or if there are words that he doesn't know in the story. So he reads the page to me. Then I have him read the next page after me. I read a about two sentences and then he reads those same two sentences. This is fluency practice. I do this with every reading class including Tinks.

If reading two sentences is two hard and the child is still hesitating I read just one sentence at a time. Sometimes I have them read right with me. We both read a passage aloud. This gives the child the idea of how reading flows without stopping. This sort of reading is a huge part of teaching fluency.

By the time we are done the second grader is done reading his story. I take him and do the exact same thing with him for fluency that I just did with the third grader. Then both boys finish reading whatever they haven't finished and then move on to the comprehension exercises in their workbooks.

At this point I turn my attention to the first grader and for the next 20 minutes before break we do our reading. The phonics she was working on will be corrected and done together by the two of us after lunch. But for now it is just 10am and time for a 15 minute break. After break we do Math. Of course, that is a post for another time. Hopefully though, this has given you some idea how to teach reading to multiple grades and how to foster independent learning at each level.

Note that by the time reading period is over each child, other than Tink, has worked independently for about an hour and with me for half an hour. The reading period lasts an hour and a half.

What Age Should a Child Start Studying Independently Part 1

2009-10-17T11:16:00.000-07:00

At what age should a child be studying independently? I hear this question asked everywhere I go in the homeschool community. Let me just start by saying there is no magical age. Having said that I want to add that if you have a child without any learning disabilities he should definitely be studying independently by the time he's in high school.

Much of a child's success at school is found in his study habits. If as a homeschool mom you spend all your time going over every problem with your child and coaxing him through every page you are doing that child a huge disservice. One of the main goals of parenting is to teach a child to be independent. If you haven't taught your child that by the time they leave home, your child will flounder in the real world.

So how much should the homeschool mother be involved? How independently should a child be working for their grade level? This question has about as many answers are there are homeschool moms. But since this is my blog I will just give you my opinion on this. Bear in mind that I am speaking of the child without special needs.

First grade is almost entirely hands on. Second grade is too. Third grade the child should be more independent. By fourth grade and on up a child should be able to work on their own about 3/4Th's the time.

I am schooling four children this year. They are working in curriculum at 6 different levels; grades K, 1, 2, 3, 4, and 5. Tink is the fifth grader and she is almost 100% independent. Tink would be a 7th grader if she were in public school. But we all know the story of Tink. If you don't you can go over to Dishpan Dribble and click on the Tink label and read about her struggles.

But even though Tink is working independently I go through every one of her workbooks on the weekend. She has a terrible habit of just skipping over a section that she doesn't understand or just doesn't want to do. I go through every subject and circle in red the sections that were skipped or the sections that she got wrong. She self corrects her books but she doesn't always go back and correct the wrong ones after checking them wrong.

As I go along I write on a piece of notebook paper what page each section is on. I tuck the paper into the book and this becomes her first assignment in each subject on Monday morning. Every book has a notebook page of sections she must repeat.

Before doing any quizzes or end of unit tests Tink has to check with me. I give a cursory look through the book and give her the go ahead or stop her and send her back to do more work. No quiz can be taken until all those little sections skipped have been made up. But sometimes Tink will go ahead with the quiz. Whenever she does this she fails the test.

If after completing, grading and redoing the entire section she still fails the quiz at the end of the unit then I take the section that she got most wrong and give her Extra Practice worksheets until she understands that section. You will find that usually if your child fails quizzes or tests it wont be the entire thing. It will be one or two sections that she just didn't understand thoroughly while going through the workbooks. Pay close attention to the things your child is missing most and concentrate on that area.

I give Tink a lot of independence but she will be 13 in a few weeks and she needs this. I even have her on her own at the charter school on Mondays. It is up to her to get herself from class to class and to write down the assignments and know what her homework is for the week. Again this is practice for life outside my four walls. All this does not come easy for a child with a processing disorder but Tink is doing very well and Im proud of her.

I say she is independent but even then I have her read aloud to me at least three days a week. She either reads from her history book or her reading book. I help her with fluency and comprehension while we read. She also reads the words to me from her word wall every day. Mondays post will have more about how to do a reading class with your child and how to teach them to be fluent readers.

If Tink is going to test out low on something you can count on it that it will be in the vocabulary part of it. She is doing book 5 of Wordly Wise and again I have her read every vocabulary word to me before doing the lesson. You can see that although Tink is basically an independent learner at this point I still need to be involved in a very real way in her learning.

Now you may be wondering why I don't keep a closer eye on Tinks work during the week and why I just go through her books on the weekends. The answer is two fold. I want to teach her to study independently and I don't have the time to check it all while she's doing it. I can tell you though that the parts she skips are becoming fewer and fewer because she's catching on that if she doesn't do them now she has to do them later. This is all part of teaching a child independence.

Now the other three children I follow closely. The first grader never leaves my side- well almost never. I will explain tomorrow how to work with children in grades 1 - 4 so you will more clearly see the progression of total dependence to independence.

Teaching Textbooks: How do They Measure Up?

2009-10-15T19:54:00.000-07:00

I have heard so much about Teaching Textbooks for Math that I finally decided to put my daughter in this curriculum in the hopes that it would save me some time. Teaching Textbooks is a math program that comes with Cd's for each grade. As of now they only have the Cd's and books for 4th grade and above.

The student listens to a lecture, does the practice problems and then proceeds to the rest of the problems. A huge workbook comes with the Cd's. The problems to be worked are in the workbook and on the Cd. The student has the choice of doing it all online or using the workbook. This is handy because the child isn't always by a computer. If you are going to be gone the student can listen to the lecture and then do the lesson later.

The program also has a button that the child can "rewind" and listen to the lecture as often as the like. They then watch the problems being worked out as a voice walks them through each step. After viewing the method they then do the problems that follow.

There is a gradebook online that the parent can check to see all the problems the child has done. It shows how many times he tried the problem and which ones were wrong. It also shows if he viewed the solution to the problem. Ideally if the student misses a problem he will watch a demonstration of the problem being worked out step by step. The parent can check quizzes and quiz grades too. Every problem in the workbook is repeated on the Cd so the child could possibly view the solution to them all if he were so inclined. Now keep in mind TT doesn't just tell them the answer. It works it out step by step explaining the entire process.

I love the concept behind this program. However, there is one thing I don't like. Teaching Textbooks is behind most faith based Math such as Horizons, Bob Jones, Abeka, etc. Because of this I am using the Cd's as practice in trouble areas. For example, Tink, who has a processing disorder, is having a difficult time with long division. She has been at it now for 2 months. Some days she seems to grasp the concept and other days she just has no idea how to get the answer. So now I have her listening to the Cd's and working through a lesson a day in the long division chapters of Teaching Textbooks. I started her at Lesson 64. When used in this way I love the books.

I would not advise anyone who has been using faith based Math to go to Teaching Textbooks as their sole Math program. When I discovered how slow the Teaching Textbooks were I decided to continue in Bob Jones. I use Bob Jones for my main curriculum. I use it as my compass to show me where my daughter should be. If she hits a snag we stop and do those chapters in Teaching Textbooks. To show you just where Teaching Textbooks line up with Bob Jones I will do a chapter by chapter comparison. I will use BJ for Bob Jones and TT for Teaching Textbooks in this review of the curriculum.

This is a review of Bob Jones Grade 4 with Teaching Textbooks Grade 5. Note the grade differences then note that in BJ 4 they are covering the subject matter of TT 5. I will go through the Table of Contents in the Teaching Textbooks beginning at Lesson 1 of fifth grade.

Number Patterns - BJ doesnt cover this because they did it in Grade 3
The Way Numbers Work- again too elementary for BJ 4
Numbers and Words- BJ (same as above)
Millions - BJ (same as above)
Greater than Less Than- BJ reviews this but it was taught in Grade 3
Addition Basics up to 4 digit numbers- BJ
Subtraction Basics - BJ
Surveys and Tally Marks- BJ
Rounding and Estimating with 2 and 3 digit Numbers- BJ
Addition with Carrying and adding more than 2 - BJ
Adding and Subtracting with 3 digit numbers - BJ
Roman Numerals- Bob Jones
2 step word problems- BJ
Multiplying 3 digit numbers with carrying- BJ
Rounding and Estimating- BJ
Geometry- lines, segments angles, polygons, perimeter, area, - BJ
Fractions - equivalent, reducing, comparing, adding and subtracting with different denominators -BJ
Decimals in fractions, words, dollars, adding and subtracting, regrouping twice, regrouping with zeros and comparing decimals - Bj
Percentages - BJ
Metric Measurements- BJ
Dividing a Decimal by a Whole Number - BJ

You can see here that everything covered in 5th grade TT is covered in 4th grade BJ.

On the other hand Bob Jones has added Statistics, Graphing, and pre algebra to their 4th grade program.

This is not a matter of Grade 5 TT teaching the same things as BJ 4th grade but using more complex problems. No, not at all. Most, if not all, of TT 5's problems are simpler than BJ 4!

To sum it up, again I say Teaching Textbooks is a wonderful program if used as a Math Lab for the student. However, if you have had your child in faith based curriculum you must get Teaching Textbooks a grade higher than where your child is in the faith based books.

My hope is that this will clear up some of the confusion about TT that I am seeing on homeschooling sites. I hope you have found this review helpful. I will gladly answer any questions you have on this..that is.. if I know the answer!

Illustrated Bible Memory

2009-10-13T20:57:00.000-07:00

So how do you teach Bible passages to young children? Let me show you how. The computer has made this easy as pie. Since September I have been teaching my children Psalm 147. I'm just picking and choosing a few verses in there. We aren't memorizing the entire chapter but almost all of it. The children were forever getting the verses mixed up so I made this copy of the verses in Microsoft Word and printed them out on paper; one picture to a page. As they recite the verses I flip to the picture that goes with it. Are you interested in seeing how this works?

Okay here is Psalm 147 in pictures.

Praise ye the Lord for it is good to sing praises unto our God.

He telleth the number of the stars; He calleth them all by their names.

Sing unto the Lord with Thanksgiving;

Sing praise upon the harp unto our God.

Who covereth the heavens with clouds,

Who prepareth rain for the earth,

Who maketh the grass to grow upon the mountains.

He giveth to the beast his food,

And to the young ravens which cry.

He sendeth forth his commandment upon earth;

His Word

runneth very swiftly.

He giveth snow like wool;

He scattereth the hoarfrost like ashes, he casteth forth his ice like morsels;

Who can stand before His cold?

He sendeth out His word and melteth them,
He causes the wind to blow,

and the waters flow.

Great is our Lord,

and of great power.

His understanding is infinite. Psalm 147

The children are having no trouble learning it now. Of course, Peters favorite picture is "He sendeth out His word". Of course that is just down his line! And that little cloud blowing wind should be bigger. I loved him so and when I went to enlarge him in google clip art, lo, he had been removed and you couldn't enlarge it. I just went with the little image in google and then I enlarged it in Word. So on the kids papers it is a big cloud blowing wind.

Peter calls the part where God sends clouds, rain and grass, the rain cycle. He had no problem memorizing that part even before the pictures were done. But my dear little Tink with the processing disorder wasn't helped by trying to recall Peters rain cycle. Of the three children memorizing this she does, however, have it down the best and can recite the most of it even without the pics.

Well I hope you enjoyed this little tutorial. No go make your own and see what you can come up with. If you do I would love to see what you have done. Be sure to link it in the comments here.

Fall Printables

2009-10-06T17:39:00.000-07:00

Fall is a good time to be a teacher. There are so so many things you can do that are theme related in every subject. The colors are bright and vibrant making all the children's pages look fun! In my homeschool I use a lot of printables off the computer. If a child needs a practice sheet on a certain subject I can print one off with a theme or season picture on it. Today I thought I'd share a few of those resources with you.

I'm not big on the Halloween themed printables but I do use the fall and Thanksgiving ones. In so doing the Halloween ones pop up on the same pages. If a link leads you to one of those pages just know that I am not advocating the use of goblins and witches. The link is there to take you to the autumn pages. This first one leads to a teachers website with all sorts of themed worksheets. I think you will find it fun and well worth a peek. Free themed worksheets for the seasons

Here is a book on the life cycle of a pumpkin. We are including this in our Pumpkin Lapbook, put together by the 5 to 8 year olds. How a pumpkin Grows This is another cute one on the seasons that will be included in the lapbook. Months of Fall When I actually post the lapbook pics these will be repeated.

Here at Kidzone are all sorts of autumn themed pages on subjects for all grades. Another great site is found here. I think some of the worksheets on this site you might need a subscription to print properly. And do not miss these wonderful, colored autumn worksheets at Kidsnetwork. They are far the younger set and they have everything from handwriting worksheets, to Math, to finding the difference. Its an adorable set of worksheets all with acorns and pumpkins and leaves.

Sometimes the workbooks get long and tedious and computer games just never are as fun to do as a real worksheet. I'm getting more and more disillusioned with the computer as a source for online learning games. By the time you find the game and set the child up and explain how it is done they could have completed half the work on paper in most cases.

Lately it seems like everywhere I turn I hear someone say that they just need to find a great online game for their child who is struggling in some area. No you don't. Use tangible sensory things that they can touch and feel and use time after time. Use things from nature like counting real acorns and pebbles, and drawing leaves by tracing ones you have gathered. And when all else fails don't forget the wonderful sense of accomplishment that can be achieved through a nicely colored, themed worksheet... a worksheet that a child can take pride in.

Marching Into our 5th week

2009-10-05T07:31:00.000-07:00

Im looking forward to another week of school. I have so many fun things planned. The kids are learning in leaps and bounds and everyone is moving forward at an incredible speed. We're already wiping out Lightunits (paces) in CLE.

Fall is here and with it comes all the fall school activities. I'm making a link list of these activities to post here. I just need to add a few more and then I'll post it for you all.

We got our new TT CD for Tinks Math so she can start today. I'll have to tell you about that too. Its not going quite as planned. I do think I've taken a not so good situation and turned it into a workable one though. I'll tell you about that too but right now I have to get ready. I have to be out of the house in an hour to the Charter Academy.

Who knew Ancient Times Could be so Fun

2009-09-30T21:24:00.000-07:00

Oh my I have such great ideas for this blog but I don't have time to do anything with them! We have some exciting things happening here at Blueberry House! Last year I wanted to get started on Story of The World and just never did. This year I decided that I would introduce my kids to ancient civilization regardless of what else may come up!

You see, part of the problem is that I don't like studying about ancient civilizations. I think in colors and in my minds eye those two words are a dusty desert color. But Peter loves the whole idea of pyramids and mummies and ancient dynasty's. Tink and I are not so inclined. Id much rather study Colonial America. Now that is something to get excited about. But alas, my kids know tons of stuff about the settling of America and the colonies and such. So it's time to move on or move back as the case may be.

So we have started our study of the Egyptians. I had a shock awaiting me! I absolutely love this study! It actually helps to understand the Old Testament settings and stories better too. Now you can find us making cave paintings and a prehistoric hunters game bag or a model of the Nile. We even get to make a mummy from a chicken! I kid you not! And something more down my line is the making of scented oils. Oh, and we cant forget about the chance to make Sumerian seals out of clay, white glue and water! Yep, it looks like fun!

And back to my love of Colonial America...well... guess what? Peters history class at the Charter Academy is holding an actual Thanksgiving feast with authentic foods in November. Everyone is suppose to come dressed as Pilgrims or Indians. I've already got the basics of Peters costume figured out. He will be an Indian. I will be a Pilgrim. My sister in law has the Pilgrim hat she is going to loan me with the white apron and I will find a straight black dress at the thrift store.

I could tell you about much more but my husband just told me he's going to bed and I would really like to go to bed at the same time. See what I mean? There is never enough time to tell you this stuff. I'll try to catch you all up in what we're doing on the homeschool front this weekend if I get a moment.

Pumpkins Everywhere

2009-09-24T20:19:00.001-07:00

Today my K-2nd graders started their pumpkin lapbooks. They are simple ones but, oh so reminiscent of fall and everything it meant to us "back when". We also made Calendars for the month of October and each child wrote the dates in their own calender made from card stock. We worked with the letter P for pumpkin and illustrated mini pumpkin books for the lapbook. We studied chipmunks with the use of a picture I had taken from the kids, Backyard magazine and mounted on card stock.

We learned that a chipmunk can carry 4 acorns in each cheek pouch and one in his teeth. That little nugget gave us not only a Science lesson but a Math lesson as well. The kids figured the acorns in the chipmunks mouth much quicker than they would have if the problem were written on a paper.

I love this time of year. It makes it so easy to plan lessons. I will post pics and links to our pumpkin lapbook when it's done. I love lapbooking especially at the younger ages! So stay tuned here for an update.

Organizing and Lesson Plans

2009-09-19T09:25:00.000-07:00

I literally spent 10 hours in the school room yesterday. I don't have school on Fridays so I used that time to get lessons planned for the week. I taught Home Ec at the Christian Academy in the morning and at 1:00 pm I began work in the school room. I had to stop for an hour but then worked straight on through till almost midnight.

I made out new word walls, went through every child's books and carefully graded and made note of where they are and what each one has to work on, prepared extra practice sheets for those areas, nailed down a workable class schedule, sorted through the files, etc. Through it all I kept the copy machine cranking out duplicates of master copy's that I wanted to file and keep.

I had to make another trip to the homeschool store yesterday morning. My dear little Peter has to back up a few months in his reading. That third grade book was just too hard and he was starting to declare that he didn't like reading. After sitting for an hour and only making it to page 2 I knew we had to make a change. The poor little boy cried quietly into the couch cushions when I told him that I was changing his reading book. He was quick to note the 2 on the new book. It upsets me so that publishers do that! I wish there was a discreet way to tell the instructor what grade level it was without the big number on the book!

Thankfully the fist story in the new book was about a hurricane coming to the coast. There was a picture of a little boy throwing a huge roll of masking tape toward his father as the wind whipped the trees. It shows huge cracks in the window and Peter was instantly taken in by the plot. He came to me later and told me that he liked his reading book and that it's so much easier to read! Bless his heart!

Today I have to finish the lessons plans for one of the kids and make out a new word wall for him. I actually think at that point I am ready for the new week. Monday we start classes at the charter academy and the kids are all excited. We will be there all day on Wednesday and just for one hour Monday morning. It will help break up there day and I think after these past two weeks of study that we are ready for the charter classes to begin.

Peter is taking a writing class there and I'm interested in seeing how they teach it. Tink and Peter will both begin their orchestra lessons Monday morning. It will be Tinks third year of string orchestra and Peters first!

Well I must spend the morning cleaning the house. It got quite out of kilter yesterday with me holed away up in the school room all day!

Peter the Scientist

2009-09-17T20:50:00.000-07:00

Peters Science Kit came today! Yippee! Christian Light Education offers a science kit to go with their science book. The kit is made up of every thing that will be needed throughout the year for the particular grade level. We opened it and it was filled with lovely things, like, balloons, tuning fork, dirt, seeds, beakers, thermometers, dirt, different kinds of rock, paper cups, magnifying glass, etc.

Now sure I have most of that stuff around here but it was worth it to me to pay 30 dollars for the kit just to know that everything would be at my fingertips when Peter gets to that particular experiment.

After that arrived today in the mail my husband told me that he has ordered a Science Box online for Peter. It's designed to teach the principles of electronics to children. Here's the way it is advertised:

The easy-to-handle components snap together to create up to 500 different electronic experiments.
Create circuits that involve magnets, water, sound, light and touch.
Create circuits that make a light bulb flash, motorized fan, sound effects, recording voice, AM Radio, Burglar Alarm, Traffic Lights, display letters and numbers.

He is going to be thrilled when it arrives!
Peter earned $10 stacking wood for the neighbor the other night. He spent it at the homeschool store on a box of plaster stuff and forms for making volcanoes, or planets, or dogs and cats even! That boy loves Science! But then what boy doesn't.

The other day a friend of mine asked Peter what his hobby was and he said, "Extension cords!" I about split. How true! I'm forever taking them out of his bedroom. He has them strung from one end to the other connecting radios, Cd player, lights, and clocks.

Man, I love that kid! Cant wait until he sees his new Science stuff!

Finding Curriculum to Meet the Needs of the Child

2009-09-16T19:57:00.000-07:00

School days, school days, good ole' golden rules days! How I love teaching! I drink in curriculum like others drink sweet nectar! And then there are those times I actually get drunk on curriculum. Those are the times when I have hit just the right combination for each child I teach. It has taken me a week and a half to find that magical combo for a little ten year old boy I homeschool.

P is ten but he is actually working at the third grade level. There really isn't any reason that he is two years behind, other than that someone somewhere dropped the ball with him. He catches on to things quickly but, oh, how he hates to study! By afternoon he needs prompted to move to every single problem!

I just haven't been quite comfortable with his placement in the curriculum I thought he would need. I decided to try the same Reading from Christian Light that Peter is doing but that quickly had its disadvantages.

The first was that I wanted him to go faster than Peter. Peter is actually in 3rd grade but working about 4 months behind in reading because of his bout in the public school system! So, you see, Peter can do third grade reading but it challenges him. I like that. P can do third grade reading too but it soon became obvious that he knew far more words than Peter did. So now came the decision. Do I keep him in third grade reading or do I switch him to 4th and challenge him a bit more? There were words in the third grade reader he didn't know but there weren't enough of those words to really make it worth his time to stay there.

On the other hand, he positively cannot do the critical thinking needed in the CLE worktext for third grade reading. In CLE the student doesn't just fill in the blanks to the questions nor is there multiple choice questions. Instead you will find questions that need some abstract thinking to answer them properly. For example" "Matt said he would have seen the money if Lee hadn't seen it first. Would he have seen it? Probably or Probably Not. The child then circles the answer he thinks is right. Then it asks. "What did you read in the story that makes you think that?"

This kind of critical thinking is really tough for Peter but almost impossible for P. So now do I keep him in third grade and make up my own questions? Should I focus on reading the words and on comprehension and not bother right now with the critical thinking part of it since he is so behind? Should I put him all the way back in CLE Grade 2 just so he has a better chance of doing the workbook?

Well, here is where my years of teaching asserted itself. Diagnosing the problem was the hard part. The answer was easier. It was Bob Jones! They have critical thinking in their curriculum but they give the younger child four options to choose from to help him with the abstract thought!

So today I moved P. over to Bob Jones Reading 3B. That is the latter half of third grade. I'm hoping by the end of this year that he will be ready to read at the fifth grade level come next fall. That would put him only a year behind grade level.

A couple of other things have become apparent to me these first two weeks of school. Peter needs to back way up in Phonics because he was never taught the consonant blends or vowel digraphs or anything past the basic letter sounds. I schooled him last year at home from February through mid July and by the time I really became aware of this I didn't want to switch things up for him.

He was in the middle of second grade when I pulled him out to homeschool. I put him back in the BJU Reading for first grade last year, but I didn't do anything for phonics other than what cropped up in the first grade worktext that went along with the reading book. Now this year I have a firmer grip on where he's at and now its time to buy him a phonics book.

Unfortunately, my beloved Bob Jones curriculum didn't meet the need here as clearly as Horizons Phonics program. So now Peter is working in Horizons Phonics and Reading Book 1. He will be able to zoom through it but there will be lessons that will stop him in his tracks. Those will be the lessons on all the blends. Im feeling so good about this choice of curriculum in Phonics. It's exactly what he needs!

On the other hand, P has Phonics down better than any of my students but the child knows nothing about capitalization and sentence structure! Enter English 2: Writing and Grammar from Bob Jones! Perfect!

So now to see a complete list of how this all goes together for each student look on the sidebar and you will find links to all of the curriculum the kids are in. When you teach children that are coming in from the public school or who have learning disabilities you can almost never put them all in one tidy curriculum tied up in a pretty bow!

Tink, however, has been home schooled the longest and she is now in that
"pretty package" time of her life. After being all over the board the last three years she is now in the 5th grade on EVERYTHING! It just thrills me. Yes, I know she should be in 7th grade this year. I am well aware of that, but when you consider that three years ago she was working at the beginning first grade level then you will understand the thrill of having her in the 5th grade! She is doing CLE in most of her books. She hasn't started Teaching Textbooks for Math yet because the Academy that purchased the books still has not given us the code for them so she is finishing the remnants of Bob Jones 4th grade from last year. Hopefully I should get the code this week!

I have another student, Kay, who is doing wonder- fully in Hooked on Phonics combined with The

American Language Series. I'll tell you more about the details of her studies in a later post. For now let it be said that I am one happy woman! The curriculum is all dove tailing beautifully!

A Peek inside Peters Mind

2009-09-10T05:22:00.000-07:00

I'm up early to get ready for the school day. The days are running smoothly and filled with intense learning! We don't have any outside classes this week because the charter school we use doesn't start until the 21st of the month. So every day is here without a break. You can almost hear the wheels grinding as the kids learn new concepts.

I'm excited about The Story Of The World. I got it for the kids this year complete with the activity book and the Cd's. We didn't get to History or Science this first week but I plan on starting it next week. This week is all about learning the schedule and meshing 4 little personalities together.

I put Peter in a self directed curriculum called, CLE, this year. It's put out by the Mennonites and the children work through ten workbooks in each subject for the year. It is working wonderfully with the boy! They get to grade their own work with answer keys and Peter is loving it.

I do have to tell you something funny though. Yesterday Peter came to a part where it said he was suppose to study the words, wonderful, remember, and yesterday. After studying them the book said to write them without looking. When I checked Peters page I noticed that letters were everywhere. The words weren't written in straight rows. He was so frustrated.

It took me forever to work through the communication gap between us and figure out that he thought when it said to write the words without looking that he was suppose to close his eyes and write them! The poor boy! There he was struggling to recall the spelling while closing his eyes and writing the words! I felt so sorry for him. His frustration was so real. You should have seen the relief on his face when I explained to him what that really meant. Oh the dear boy! It took me forever to figure out the problem. My mind just couldn't grasp that he was closing his eyes so he wouldn't look just like the book said! Isn't it just amazing how we get so used to the way a thing is worded that we think nothing of it. Then here comes a child who has never encountered it and he just takes it so literally! Man, I love that kid!

Tink is taking choir at the Christian Academy and she is all on pins and needles because she has to sing the scales and the first few lines of Amazing Grace in front of the class. The teacher is calling them up to the piano and playing notes while they sing them. I explained to Tink that they are just trying to see who can carry a tune and who needs to put in each different part. This is letting them hear the child individually. Well, she is about breaking out in a rash over it! Why is growing up so fraught with worry? Poor kids!

Well I better get. I have to plan a kindergarten curriculum this morning. Yes, I have my first kindergarten/first grade class meeting this morning and I have new clue what we're going to do!

School Starts Tomorrow

2009-09-07T21:13:00.000-07:00

Well here we go! We're launching into another year of school! It's 9:15 pm and I have the lessons as planned as they are going to get for tomorrow. I'm exhausted and it appears like I could be working on a huge migraine so I'm going to try to stave that off at the get go. Sleep will cure it quicker than anything.

My day starts at 5:30 am tomorrow. The kids come at 7:45 am. Here's to the school days of fall 2009. I cant help but wonder what lies ahead this year...

School shopping

2009-08-31T20:25:00.000-07:00

Went school shopping today. I spent 228 bucks on school supplies and shoes. Yes, I homeschool but there are certain things the kids need. I got each of them a tub for storing their books and things in. Peter needed a coat and shoes and Tink needed shoes. Of course there was also all the little things adding up. The kids had gobs of fun. They love school shopping. Peter picked out everything in black. Tink bought everything in pink. Ya gotta love it!

I Hate the Detailed Planning

2009-08-21T06:25:00.000-07:00

I'm working on a unit study of the Civil War for fall term. Can anyone tell me why I just don't a use unit study all made up? I have this thing about getting the bones of a study from other resources but then working my head off to change it all. I tell myself to just go with it after all I paid for the unit study but it doesn't work that way. Many times I just think I need to write and sell my own curriculum. It would save me so many problems!

I have six students this year including my own two. Trying to work everyones schedules together is fine, detailed work and I don't do detailed work very well. I look huge bulky problems that you can get your hands and mind around.

Look at this schedule I am working with.

I will call the students by numbers.

On Mondays I take my kids, numbers one and two, and student number 3 to the charter Academy at 9 am. At 10 am we are joined there by number 4. At that time I take numbers two, three, and four back to my house and school them all day. At 2:15 I take those kids back to the charter school. I pick up number one who has been there all day and drop off number four for his mother to pick up. I bring home numbers one, two and three. Three is later picked up here.

Tuesdays I have students one, two, three and four all day. We are joined for three hours in the morning by student five. He leaves and I'm back to four students for the day.

Wednesdays I take one, two and three to the Academy and we are there all day. Everyone has different classes.

Thursdays numbers one through four come for the day and now we are joined for three hours by number 6. Number 6 leaves at noon. The other four school on through until 2.

Friday I just have my own kids numbers one and two!

To combine tutoring with off site classes and making everyones offsite classes dove tail is giving me a migraine but I do think it is finally coming together. I spend entire days working with parents on schedule, I kid you not.

Now I just need to get curriculum all fine tuned!

It Aint No Favor

2009-08-15T09:09:00.000-07:00

There is a wonderful homeschool program offered in the big metro area near by. It offers kids a chance to learn wood working, apple pressing for cider, sewing leather, hiking, making a fire without matches. making their own bows and arrows and learning archery etc. It operates on Tuesdays, a perfect day for Peter. So I look up the cost and lo, it is $425 for homeschoolers. It's 8 classes. Now ladies and gentlemen, this woman aint payin' no thirty bucks a class for nothin'. Ya git that?

The irony is how the website goes on and on about how much they want to get children back to nature and back to working with their hands and what a favor they are doing all of us to let our children take part in this during the school day rather than weekends. Well by the looks of that price I'd say we were doing them the favor, not the other way around!

I charge $25 a day for my Blueberry House homeschool. This year it is comprised of one full time student, one 3 day a week student, and two 1 day a week students. Just think what I could get for my work if I was really concerned about the homeschool community? Instead of roughly $400 a month I could make $400 dollars in just 8 days! Hmm maybe I need to refigure my amount of empathy here!

The Excitement is too much!

2009-08-13T18:30:00.000-07:00

Well I'm thrilled. I have my little Blueberry House school filled with students this year. It really doesn't take much to fill it! I have two full time students besides my own two and that has me jumping for joy!

There are still three maybes out there. The one is a kindergarten boy that I would just tutor a few hours a week and the other is a full time student in 5th grade that is doing an online charter and I would just have to supervise her. The last one is a little 4th grade boy that would be full time. I love the full time kids. I get to know them so much better and the day flows better with the full timers.

Needless to say I'm incredibly excited about getting started. Now I have to find curriculum for the child that confirmed today. Wait a minute. Did I say I have to? Aw, lets change that. I get to find curriculum. Is there anything more exciting than blackening ones nose by turning page after page of curriculum in search of the perfect book! My heart skips a beat just walking into the home school store!

I'm already rethinking Tinks reading. I think CLE is going to be too hard for her. I think I'm going to keep her in Bob Jones. She's doing okay there so I don't think I better mess with it. I'm keeping her CLE books though because Peter will need them in a year or so and besides that the reader is so full of wonderful stories that it belongs on everyones bookshelf whether or not they are using that curriculum.

So anyway, I'm just letting you know that if you want to find me the next couple of days go to the homeschool store. Look for the lady with no head. That would be me. Well, actually there will be a head attached but it will be buried deep in the bookshelves and not immediately visible!

Not Back To School Blog Hop

2009-08-11T09:30:00.001-07:00

Today I'm joining Darcys Not Back to School Blog Hop! This week we are suppose to show our school room. I guess technically I was suppose to do this yesterday, but who's keeping track? Our school room is not being used this month. August is the only month of the year that no real school takes place in this room.

Oh yeah, I am in here juggling things around and getting ready for the year ahead but the kids conveniently stay in other parts of the house. My children are not like others. They do not look forward with anticipation to the new school year. Their summers are so full of fun things that when August rolls around they are more than willing to spend their days riding bike, swimming, going to the park, going rafting on the river and camping with friends. School is just not on their agenda. This table is Tinks spot. She spends most of her study time here. You will never see Peter here unless he's doing crafts.

Here is where Peter studies, across the room from Tinks desk. I also have another school desk in the media room for students who are watching videos and taking notes. Other times it's used for studying when a student wants to get away from any tutoring noises going on in the school room.
This pic was taken from standing in the curriculum closet. That chest of drawers with the colored fronts is filled with craft supplies. Oh, did you want to see the curriculum closet?

Here it is in all it's glory. I have tons of work to do here. The file cabinet is on the wall behind me in this room.

Here is a close up of the top shelf of that book shelf on the right. Yes, the kids love to craft things and this is the supply shelf.

And here is a close up of the other bookshelf that holds curriculum.
Because I tutor and homeschool other peoples children I have added computer stations around the house. This is the one that my kids use the most. It is downstairs on the main floor.
Here is our second computer station. This is actually my sewing cabinet made over. This station is at the top of the hall on the same floor as the school room. My computer in the school room makes up the third station.

There is actually another computer station but it is in my husbands office and used only by me if all the others are full.

So now you have seen where we study and learn. How about showing us your space. Go on over to Darcy's and join in the fun!

Working in the school room

2009-08-10T16:44:00.001-07:00

I have spent this balmy summer afternoon going through the school room files. I've relived memories of Tinks struggles and victories on her road to learning. My what a journey we have had!

Now I have the children's workbooks all filed in their own files under the correct grade and name. We are doing several subjects that use paces or lightunits as CLE calls them. These need filed with their answer keys so the kids can pull them themselves. In the process I discovered that I overlooked ordering Peters reading workbooks. I ordered the answer keys and the textbook but no workbooks. Arrggh! I plan on getting that order in this afternoon.

I had debated whether or not to buy the home science kit that went with Peters Science curriculum but after browsing through things I have decided that it would be very nice to have the kit. That way when he needs to do something we don't have to run all over looking for a beaker or a measuring device, never mention the fact that we don't even own a microscope. So I'm thinking I'll stick that kit into the order. It's made up of the exact things needed for each experiment and matches the lesson plans. I think Peter will be thrilled. He loves Science. Tink is taking two science classes at the charter school so I wont be teaching her the Science.

I just figured out that Labor Day isn't until the 7th this year. That seems like such a late start to school. It gives an entire week in September before we have to hit the books. I suppose I should look at it as a good thing because it will give me more time to get the tomatoes done in the garden but I am just raring to go!

I have a bunch of stuff I have to print out before school starts so I do have some school stuff to stay busy with. Tink and Peter are doing the same handwriting course so I need to make copies of the handwriting sheets so I can use the same book. Tink will go faster than Peter since she has had cursive before. She hates using cursive but I'm hoping that by putting her back through the course and that she will will get more efficient with it. It will be Peters first year of cursive but I have no doubts he will sail through.

Well now I better get that order in before time to make dinner. I'm grilling chicken and garden squash and making some rice pilaf to go with it.

More curriculum buys

2009-08-05T20:06:00.000-07:00

Spent a delightful hour at the homeschool store. Came away $150.00 poorer but I finished getting Peters curriculum and I got the rest of the curriculum I needed for one of my tutoring students plus a Spelling book for my sister in law. So all in all it wasn't too bad.

Going into the store just whetted my appetite for more books and more learning going on here. I wanted to come home and get the kids into their books immediately but alas, there were 25 pounds of cucumbers waiting for me to make into pickles.

September cant get here fast enough!

Revamping the Learning Center

2009-08-01T08:58:00.000-07:00

Today I will be running around town all the live long day. I have so much I need to accomplish. With babysitting all week it leaves only the weekends for getting things done. I have to make a trip into the big metro land to the Christian Supply Center to get sheet music for Tink. I hate going to the big city for stuff. While I'm there I'm going to buy the book The Power of a Praying Kid. I want Tink to read it. I looked on Amazon for the book The Power of a Praying Teen and say immediately that Tink would not be able to relate to those topics. My dear little Tink is such a young 12 year old, bless her heart.

I'm also taking these next four weeks before school to refigure the use of my schoolroom. I need to make sure that I am using it to it's fullest. In reevaluating the furniture in the room I see that I could move some things out that don't pertain to school. I have a chest of drawers that holds craft stuff but I really could put that somewhere else. I'm thinking of moving it into the walk in closet so I have room for another school desk.

I also got to thinking about ways my children study and where they study. I cant believe it didn't dawn on me before but in looking back I can recall all the times that Peter went to his room to get away from the actual learning noises of the other students. So why then have I not put a desk in his bedroom? Well that is going to change. He has a huge desk are under his bunk bed. It even has a shelf under it all for a computer tower but Peter is only 8 and his shelf is loaded with toys. We need that area. So I'm going to move in an actual school desk. I have two upstairs in the school room but I don't want to use those because they have colored seats and I want something nicer than those in his room.

Tink doesn't do well in a school desk because of her sensory issues. She needs some place where she can move around more. She loves the couch and she also likes the table here in the school room. They all afford more twisting and moving area than a desk seat.

I love rethinking everything and coming up with new and better ideas. It's all about what works and sometimes I'm amazed at how the obvious is just in front of my eyes!

Just Chatting

2009-07-27T19:55:00.000-07:00

Summer rolls on relentlessly! Fall seems far away! In the middle of the garden harvest and the hot days in the pool, friends and kool-aid, pop cycles and watermelon comes another student to check out Blueberry House.

That excites me! I am ready to get moving on it all. I have a lot of school work to do this month. I have to finalize curriculum for two of my students and Im also considering buying another computer desk so I can up my computer stations to three. Ikea has some very cheap computer desks so maybe I will be able to purchase on this weekend. If I do get the job with the new student she will be doing K12 and another station would be nice.

If I don't get this student it will be more a matter of price than anything. I feel sorry for these people that want me to teach their kids but I really need to make some money on it or I might as well just invest all my time and energy in my own kids. This tutoring is my way of helping out with the family income while still homeschooling and remaining at home with my kids, so no matter how I want to help people I cant just do it for free. That bothers me in every way because I love to teach and I love the kids, but it just has to be this way.

So while the summer drags on with unbearable heat I get these tiny moments to dip into the school year to come. Im loving it!

Bring on the School Days

2009-07-25T12:22:00.000-07:00

All I want to do is work on school things. I do not want to work outside or in the garden anymore! School cannot come fast enough!

Why is it so hard

2009-07-17T10:12:00.000-07:00

to get the kids to do school work in the summer? Always about mid July we come to a halt. I planned it that way this year but we didn't quite finish up. I thought it would be no big deal to continue on another two weeks and wipe out the books. I was wrong. Nobody wants to hit the books. The kids want to swim all day and lounge around in the heat. Its this way every year. I need to go with it.

The key to success is to find the flow of your days and work with it instead of fighting it. So I have decided that we will take from today through August off just like I originally planned last fall. What is 10 or 12 pages in a workbook? Its not going to mean they can't move on to the next level. I need to quit sweating it!

Here's to summer!

Homeschool and Harvest

2009-07-15T05:20:00.000-07:00

I haven't been updating here because I haven't done any homeschooling this week. We are up to our necks in summer harvest and on top of that I am trying to get things organized and packed for a vacation to the beach and to the lake. The temps here are in the 80's and 90's this week so my early morning hours that I usually use to update my blogs are now spent outside getting the garden and yard work done before the heat.

It's now 5:23 am and the sky is just beginning to be streaked with the dawn. I'm going to skip my shower this morning and just go straight outside and get started. I need to water everything thoroughly, clean the deck, and around 7:30 am I'm going to fire up the mower. Hopefully the neighbors will be pretty much up by then and not be too upset at the noise.

I also have to go over the garden very carefully for produce that will be too big when we get home. Tomorrow morning I'm going to pick everything that is even close to maturing because of the week ahead when I wont be picking. I'm praying for temps in the 70's next week so the garden don't get out of hand.

The only home school thing I have done is to order Tinks Teaching Textbooks for Math. Yesterday I went to the charter school and they ordered them for me. By getting the books through them I can get them with state funding that is set aside for each students textbooks.

Our homeschool Academy here is really a state charter public school. They are pioneering a new idea wherein they offer elective classes to homeschoolers. High school can take core classes there too. The state pays for everything up to a predetermined amount set by them. A child in 6th grade like Tink gets $600 for her schooling.

We dont actually get the money in cold cash. It is set aside for curriculum and classes by accepted vendors. You can school at home using your faith based curriculum's but they will not pay for anything that is faith based. So I can get them to pay for Tinks Teaching Textbooks but not for the rest of her books.

I know here in Oregon there is a huge uproar about homeschoolers taking advantage of public school money for classes. I agree that it blurs the lines between homeschool and state and if I could I would school without the use of them but my husband is not on board with that so far. He just has this thing that a state teacher needs to oversee everything! It's frustrating.

So anyway that means Tinks entire curriculum is here and I still have to go to the homeschool store and purchase Peters Math. He is doing Bob Jones. So one more book to buy and all my curriculum will be here. Of course, I still have to purchase stuff for my tutoring students. That is a harder job than for my own because I know my own kids so well and know exactly what is a good fit.

Well its a hair past 5:30 so I better get to the garden. At 9:30 I have physical therapy for my back. Its kinda ironic that I bend and weed and pick veggies for three hours, then go to therapy and come back and do more of the same. I'm not sure how much the therapy will help under those circumstances but a woman has to do what a woman has to do!

The Box

2009-07-10T08:15:00.000-07:00

You may or may not believe this but I still have not even opened THE BOX of curriculum that came the other day! We are in the middle of vacation Bible school and during the day I babysit three kids and I kid you not, I just have not had time to even look at the stuff. The longer the box sits there the more I view it as my reward!

When the house is all clean and the kids are all asleep and its still a decent evening hour when I am not too exhausted but just tired enough to be relaxed, THEN...I will open THE BOX!

Am I asking for too much? Will the stars ever be aligned in such a way?

I've tutored, interviewed, tested and counseled prospective students and parents this week but I have not touched THE BOX!

Making home school fun for the bored child

2009-07-09T21:27:00.000-07:00

This time of year homeschoolers are already turning their thoughts toward the fall and the new school year. All sorts of questions arise from those of you who are new homeschoolers. A day does not go by that I am not asked a question about homeschooling from some mother who is trying to do her very best but is new to the scene or feels she lacks the skills to handle the job.

Today I was asked how to make schooling at home fun for a seven year old. I'm pretty much a curriculum person having first been a private school teacher before homeschooling. I just like the structure that a curriculum gives. I also like that you end up with a quantitative measure of the work done. This is especially helpful if you have a husband who is not totally on board with the homeschool thing or inlaws who think their grandkids are getting the short end of the stick!

There's nothing like presenting the doubting relative with actual worksheets and books completed to prove that you have been doing "school". But you know what? Lets be real here. Textbooks can get boring! Online schools get boring! My advice to any of you who have children who are bored and unmotivated is to get them involved in outside classes.

Find a co-op that you can join where your child has a chance to learn with other children. I know home schoolers hate that word socialization so I wont use it, but let me just say that our kids do need to get out and play and learn with other children their ages. God made us that way. He made us to want to socialize,it's a healthy thing. Children raised in large families have a huge advantage in that there is usually someone that will want to play what they are playing. You can even have teams when you play games in the back yard. But if you have only one or two or three kids its a little trickier to keep them from getting bored with the whole routine.

When children reach about 12 years old they start desiring to be with friends. Most children are already feeling the God given urge for a little independence. That shouldn't threaten us. Its a healthy thing. If the preteen or teenager did not feel this then there would be something to worry about. God made our kids to want to play with others and attend events with others. This is part of His overall plan; it's the beginning of the separation from the parent and is a forerunner to the independent adult.

Now I know there are home schooling mamas that disagree with me on that. That's okay. I'm no stranger to opposition. I can say that by my age opposing views just do not matter to me. But then again it is every parents right to school in the way they deem best. I just want to caution new homeschoolers though to not try to do it all in your home five days a week. As a rule children will do better if they get out at least for an afternoon. It also helps for them to know that there are other kids out there learning at home.

Children can get inspired from projects other kids are doing. They can get excited about reading a book if a friend is reading the book. Children feed off of each other. A parent who is aware of this can use this to her advantage by finding other homeschool friends for her kids that will be positive influences in their lives.

So now as you plan your new year let me encourage you to plan to join a local co-op or community sports or a book group; something that will make schooling more than meeting with mom at the table for several hours of study.

I have not yet found the child that doesn't look forward to his weekly activity with other friends. Incorporate this into your school week and you will find that it will also help you! You will be able to bounce ideas off of other homeschool moms and they will be women who will understand the day to day schedule and demands of home schooling. You will come home feeling refreshed and ready to tackle the job ahead.

The Curriculum Is Here!

2009-07-06T17:29:00.000-07:00

Is there anything quite as exciting to a homeschool mom as when the curriculum arrives in the mail? Today the door bell rang and there was the UPS man with our box of books for fall. The kids are usually thrilled to see the brown mail truck stop at our house but today they didn't appear too excited about it! I wonder why.

I havent forgotten this blog

2009-07-04T18:25:00.000-07:00

I no sooner opened this blog then I was laid flat with a back ache that wouldn't go away. But don't worry. There will soon be regular updates here, just as soon as I can start sitting for longer periods of time.

Homeschool Blog

2009-07-01T11:33:00.000-07:00

I've worked laboriously on this weblog. I've spent many long hours into the night on this thing and finally I think it is ready for show and tell! I have decided that I have just too much stuff I want to say about homeschool and the only way to do this is to start a new blog for just that purpose.

The kids are still working through their Math and Reading. Mr Darling and I have decided they wont be taking time off this year. Tink would be going into 7th grade in the fall if she would have stayed in public school. Instead she will be going into 5th grade. The cool thing is that for the first time since preschool she will be doing all of her work at one level. Its taken 3 years to undo what the public school did. Its taken 3 years to give her confidence that she can open a book and do the work in it. Yes, she still had a sensory disorder and she still falls very low on the bell curve for short term memory but we have made huge strides and we are proud of that.

Peter is going into third grade but needs to spend the summer brushing up on phonics and spelling and finishing his Math. He wasn't taught any phonics in the public school and since I just pulled him out in January we couldn't get through the entire second grade in just those few months left. He will be ready to go into third grade in everything but phonics though so I suspect that by Christmas he will even be caught up in that.

Today I am suppose to tutor my granddaughter but I don't think I will be able to. My back is totally killing me.

I'm still sorting through the books and papers and getting the files in order. What a huge job! Tomorrow I plan on going to the Exodus homeschool store and returning some books. Im then going to buy Peters next Math book. Im thinking that the Academy where the kids take some of their classes will pay the 200 dollars needed for Tinks Teaching Textbooks. I'll have to check up on that.

In the meantime you all just have a look around and enjoy yourselves. I am no where near done with this. If you would like your home school blog to appear on the sidebar then just let me know in the comments and I will add you!

Organizing The Homeschool Files

2009-06-25T21:16:00.000-07:00

What a beautiful summer afternoon. The temp has now reached 80 degrees and a brisk wind is blowing through the school room window. I have been deliciously busy sorting papers and organizing folders for the coming school year.

I'm tutoring my granddaughter once a week this summer and getting her ready for Kindergarten, Day care is not the best place to learn your letters and numbers! As I prepare the lessons every week I find myself prowling through half a dozen kindergarten and preschool worksheets to find the ones I want for each letter and number! Its so frustrating.

It dawned on me that it might be a good thing to organize this all so that's what I've been doing! I'm taking each letter of the alphabet and putting all the worksheets that go with that letter into that folder for the file. I have them stuck everywhere right now. I'm finding them in other file folders, some are filed under Vocabulary, still others are filed under a very broad file heading called Kindergarten, (what was I thinking?) and still more papers can be found under Scholastic Worksheets! By all the stripes on the flag, I have no idea what sort of filing system that is! My system was slipshod to say the least! So now by the time school starts in the fall I am going to have a file folder for every letter of the alphabet, every number to 20 and one for all the worksheets teaching the colors!

I've also organized my flash cards into word families. I had done a large portion of this last year but I finished the job today. I need to buy more paper clips before I refile the cards into their box. After all the Kindergarten stuff is done I'm going to start working on first grade. First grade also needs a system with all the vowels. I am also setting up file folders with all the different consonant blends and vowel digraphs and such. How nice it will be when I can say, "Oh, I need a worksheet on consonant digraphs" and there it is all filed neatly away.

I see I started this several years ago because in looking through my file I can see such folders as aw and ou but I need to complete this all and get it organized. I'm tutoring a first grader in the fall and this will help tremendously with her. You wouldn't believe the first grade papers I have stuck around from all the different books and from printing off the computer. I could compile an entire years worth of work just from loose leaf worksheets!

And speaking of Phonics, cause we were ya know, Peter can read well enough to go into third grade in the fall but he knows nothing about Phonics. I was going to put him into a self paced program written and published by the Mennonites called Christian Light Education but then I looked at the Level 100 Language Arts and realized he cant do it! He doesn't even know what a prefix and a suffix are! He doesn't know what a contraction is. He doesn't know what a compound word is! How frustrating.

The public school he attended taught the whole language approach and they didn't even use reading books! If a kid wondered how a word was spelled and what it was the teacher put it on a word wall and they all studied it! Thus Peter can read words like environment, nuclear, submarine, dynamite, and continent but he has no idea about long and short vowels! I could just scream!

So I've written to the company about this little issue and I'm waiting for a reply. I need to know if he has to do the first grade reader just because he's in first grade Language Arts! Do the two go hand in hand? How much you want to bet they do!

Then my sister in law from Central Oregon calls today and tells me she has all her curriculum ordered for her 3 school age kids for the fall already! Help! I've miles to go! Didn't I just tell you about all the organization that needs done in my school room?

On top of that we haven't even hit the canning season! Oi, this isn't looking good for me! I must get on the stick!

Okay, after writing this I spent the entire rest of the afternoon figuring the kids curriculum for next year. I'm going almost entirely with CLE as mentioned above. The only thing the kids aren't doing through CLE is Math. I'm keeping Peter in Bob Jones Math and I'm switching Tink to Teaching Textbooks which is a whole 'nother post!

So this fall Peter will have Language Arts, Reading, Handwriting, Science and Bible through CLE. He will have Math through Bob Jones. He will have History, Music Strings, and Story Writing through the Charter Academy. PE will be determined.

Tink will take Reading, Language Arts, and Social Studies through CLE. Math will be through Teaching Textbooks. Orchestra, Science, Volley Ball and Composition will be through the Charter Academy.

The Christian Academy where the kids take PE and choir hasn't weighed in yet on whether or not the homeschoolers are going to be involved so I'm waiting to hear from that arena, otherwise all these classes are signed up for and all curriculum has been bought save the Math. My CLE order for half a year came to $250.00 for both kids combined. I will order the other half when we get to winter term.

I can now breathe.

So where are you all in your planning for next fall? Are any of you stuck in yesteryear like I've been? Who's got all their curriculum ordered? Who hasn't even given it a thought? Come on, time to fess up here.

My Homeschool Philosophy

2009-06-23T21:18:00.000-07:00

I found a quote over at Toad Haven that exactly fits the philosophy I have for my homeschool. I guess I didn't realize I had a real honest to goodness philosophy but it appears that I do! Here is the quote I found.

Homeschooling is not about sitting at the kitchen table with a pile of textbooks all day, recreating school in the isolation of the home. (Unless, for some reason, you want it to be.) For many--maybe most--families, homeschooling is about getting out and about. It is about opening to possibilities, about finding learning opportunities around every corner, and about having the 'luxury' of making the kinds of community connections that are sustaining and enjoyable. It is about exploring the world with open eyes and minds, trying new things, going new places, meeting new people. It is a veritable kaleidoscope of experiences that provide a unique educational path for every child--and parent. You can find or create anything you want, and have a blast doing it." -Shay Seaborne

That's exactly us! We do work through textbooks, after all I was a school teacher before I became a home school mom, but we do not sit and do this in the home all day every day. If you have read my blog for very long you know that we are an on the go home school family.

There is so much to learn outside our four walls. There are so many opportunities for the kids in classes I cant offer them. We also travel and camp a lot which affords other new opportunities. If you are interested in some of our vacations you can click on my vacation label on the side bar. We are in the process of planning a road trip to Washington DC, taking in some things along the way such as, Mt Rushmore, and Yellowstone. Once we get to DC their will be too many things to do all in one trip.

We did this trip with Wendy when she was Tinks age and we loved it. We toured the White House and the Capitol. We went to the Smithsonian Institute. We saw the Gettysburg battlefield in Pennsylvania and hoards of other things. Now its time to take the younger two.

This year the kids are signed up for classes to stretch their minds again. Peter is taking a class called History Fun and is going to pick up the viola and see if its something he wants to pursue. Tink is also taking her violin class again but this time she is playing first violin and she's so excited. She's also taking a volley ball class.

Both kids are taking a Science class called Inquiring Minds. In this class the kids enter the world of a scientist. They ask the questions, and set up the experiments. Its class that is much in demand and I was quite pleased that the kids got it!

We love our outside classes. We are an active family and this kind of schooling is perfect for us. I love then finding something like the statement above that just sums up our home school experience in one tidy nutshell.

Over on Homeschool 101 is a list of 10 things you need to know about homeschooling. Number 9 is this:

You do not have to starve or live in a tent to homeschool your children. Thousands of homeschooling families are able to make the money they need and homeschool their children at the same time. While you create a family business or dream job, or restructure your current job, your children will learn the most important skill of all- how to create the life of their dreams.

Now doesn't that just go along with my post on cottage industries? That's what I love about tutoring. It's perfect for a homeschooling mother like myself.

I'm excited for the new home school year. A lot of stuff has to happen between now and then but it doesn't stop me from feeling that rush of adrenalin at the thought of school in the fall!

Procrastination In Children

2009-05-30T20:34:00.000-07:00

My children have procrastination down to a fine science. It has gotten so bad that I finally decided I had to take drastic action! Yesterday morning I called a meeting with the kids after breakfast. I informed them that we were not going to start school work immediately, instead we were going to talk. I explained to the children that they have gotten very negligent in their chores and that schedules are not being kept and that we are all running ourselves ragged meeting deadlines unprepared.

I pulled out a paper and told the kids that they were going to help me figure out a way to make our schedule work for all of us. The first thing I wanted to address was our Thursday and Friday schedules. On those two days we do not have morning classes and the kids seem to treat those mornings as a Saturday morning. They want to sit around in their pajamas and take their good old time eating breakfast and getting ready for the day.

Somehow morning cartoons have once again crept into that morning time. So the new rule is now really an old rule revisited. No one is allowed to turn the TV on until after 4 pm. The children complained that they couldn't wake up and get started immediately on their work. So we brainstormed and this is what we came up with. They must be up by 8 am and be ready to start their school work by 9 am. Eight in the morning is still a late hour to them and they feel like they've gotten to sleep in. The other three days a week they have to be up by 7am so we can get to classes.

Between 8 and 9 the kids have to clean their rooms, get dressed and eat breakfast. We then made a list of things they could do if they finished early. With the kids help we put together this list: Reading, painting, clay, computer, typing, sewing, Lego's, tanagrams, trampoline, basketball.

To facilitate the other three mornings of the week the children now have to lay out all their stuff the night before. This involves more than you would initially think. On Sunday night they have to lay out the required uniform for their martial arts class, their clothes for school and Peter has to get his basketball uniform laid out. Tink has to make sure she has her violin and her book ready to go.

On Monday night they have to lay out the required clothes for the Christian Academy. That involves polo shirts and solid color pants and skirt for Tink. Because Tink has PE there she has to lay out her culottes.

On Tuesday night they lay out their martial arts clothes, their clothes they are going to wear for the day, and Peters basketball uniform again. Once again Tink has to make sure her violin and book are ready. Wednesday night they need to again prepare clothes for the Christian Academy. Vests and shirts for Awana along with their Awana books have to be gotten around and laid out on the table in their rooms. Besides the clothes they have to get the books around every night that they will need for Academy classes. Its a lot for kids to remember but it's totally imperative that this be done in order for our mornings to go more smoothly.

Mornings were becoming a rat race and I was tired of getting ready to leave only to discover that one or both of the kids couldn't find something. In trying to get more organized it became quickly apparent that I would need to purchase a few things to help this go more smoothly. I bought Tink a back pack so she could carry her books separately from Peters. I rounded up another white erase board and wrote the days classes on them and to which school we were going to be going to each day. Both kids already have their list of weekly assignments for their classes at home.

Chore lists were tackled in our breakfast meeting. The chore chart is working well but Tink thinks Peter needs more chores and Peter thinks he has way more than any other boy his age. In discussing this I discovered that Peter was feeling overwhelmed with his chores and school work. It's no wonder, poor boy. He's getting introduced to school at home and its a far cry from his days of boarding a bus and spending the entire day at a public school.

I realized Peter needed some help. So we discussed how to break his chores into smaller chunks. To prevent him from putting off his chores we are now setting a timer for each portion of the job. We also identified the hated parts of the chores. I discovered that he didn't mind bringing in the wood but he hated how dirty and cold his hands got. That's why he kept putting off the job. That was easily remedied by a pair of gloves. He didn't like putting his trucks on the shelves because they continually rolled off. Now Mr. Darling is going to put little tabs on the shelves so the trucks stay in place. Actually I know that frustration. I've had the same thing happen to me when I've tried to organize the trucks.

Peter said that when I sent him in to clean his room he didn't know where to start. My children's rooms are never messy as kids rooms go. Its usually just a few toys left out and his clothes from the day before thrown around. So we worked out a plan where he would gather all dirty clothes first, then move to trucks, then to any Legos, then on to straightening the toy shelves and lastly dusting his table and windowsills. His cleaning zone includes the upstairs family room so we broke that into small chunks too.

After we identified the hated parts I told the kids I would help them the first several times through. Tink doesn't seem to have any problems in this area. She loves cleaning and rarely complains when it comes time to clean her zone. Both kids told me they were frustrated with their Tae Kwon Do uniforms because they didn't know where to put them! They were right. I hadn't designated a spot for them.

Charting and planning are an essential part of every day. Organization is not an option. Its highly necessary to get through a day around here. The list of activities for morning time are on the white board by the computer. The days list of classes are on the white board in Tinks room. Beside the computer are papers for both kids; forms from Alliance Academy that need filled out for Technology. Every time the kids use technology for study they have to write it down; V for video, C for computer, I for Internet, A for Audio. The website of video or what ever they have used needs to be listed on the same line with the date and how much time was spent in the activity.

Tink fills out another sheet for every time she practices violin and for how long. They each record choir classes and any performances they have had that week.

Paper work is done for each child on their activities. Again there are abbreviations for the different sports and activities. P just simply means out door play time, T is trampoline, BB is basketball, V is volley ball, etc. There are about 10 different letters for all the activities. All these papers need filled out daily and handed to the ES once a month.

When I finally set down and figured all this out it dawned on me why I have been feeling like we are racing through our days unable to catch up! With a tight schedule we cant allow anything to slip through the cracks.

To come to this sort of organized day I had to ask myself a few questions. Why are the kids putting off what they are suppose to be doing? Why are they not prepared? What can we do to prepare in advance for each day? Do I need to implement a reward system? What will be the outcome if chores are not completed in a timely fashion? What happens if we get to a class and they don't have the right books or clothes for the class? What can I do to make things easier for the kids? Do they fully understand what their jobs are? Do they know how to do them?

I was amazed at how helpful the kids were in identifying the problem areas. They really got involved in the brain storming and in telling me how they felt about things. This morning I heard Tinks alarm go off. I was amazed when immediately afterward I heard her feet hit the floor. Within seconds she was in the shower and her day had begun. Peter was a little slower but much better than he had been the day before.

So now we'll see how this next week goes. Hopefully we all find a bit more sanity to our day! To help pinpoint the problem and to identify ways to change it I read the book, "The Procrastinating Child" by Rita Emmett. I found it at the library and Im about half way through it. I highly recommend it. It has been a life saver around here.

Our Day In Pics

2009-05-15T21:19:00.000-07:00

We only have three more days of Academy classes so in memory of this past year I took these pics. I wanted a representation of each class for a keepsake for the kids. I thought that since I write about these classes so much that I would give you a peek into what these classes look like.

On Mondays Peter has clay class while Tink takes Orchestra. In the afternoon both children have Tao Kwon Do. So here my dear readers is what Mondays have looked like for us this past term.Tink is the second girl from the right in the brown and pink shirt.

Tuesday mornings we are at the Academy at 8:30 for Tinks clay class which I do not have a pic of. While she is in class Peter and I go upstairs to the school library and he does his schoolwork. This is the library where I often sit and type my posts. I'm sure you've read about it here cause I'm so in love with it.At 10 am Tink is done with Clay and it is time for Peter to go to PE. While he is in PE Tink does her school work. Parents have to stay with their kids in class if they are 3rd grade or under. So I pack up my stuff and move to the gym. Tink studies sprawled out on the stage.I sit on the gym floor just under Tink so I can help her with her work. If you notice Tinks coat and book on the stage you can get the real feel of the above pic and this one together. And yes, I can talk on my cell and work on the laptop at the same time! Note the ugly commuter mug of coffee Now do you see why I want another one? This thing goes with me everywhere.And yes, I know this is a bad pic of me but its all Ive got. Tink took it and I guess I'll blame it on her.After Peter is done we gather everything up from the gym and off we go down the hall to Computer Tech. Both kids are enrolled in this class. This is my favorite of their classes because I can just plug in the laptop at a table there and do research while I sit in with them.Tech lets out at 12 noon. We quickly gather our things and run for the car. We have to be five miles across town to the Christian Academy by 12:10. The kids brown bag their lunch on Tuesdays and eat it in the car. I drop them off at the Christian Academy at 12:10 and I am free at last. Did I really say that? Well, yeah, I have to admit it. I am free until 2:00 pm. The kids have choir and PE at the Academy; yes Peter has two PE classes on Tuesdays. Thus ends Tuesday.

On Wednesday we are out of the house by 9 for Peters cooking class. Peter has cooking from 9:30 to 10:00. I got into the cooking class after the smoothies and pizzas were made so this is the only pic I got.
At 10:00 Tink has orchestra class again.Then its home to study and have lunch. At 2pm we leave for Mad Science which I don't have a pic of. After Mad Science is another Tae Kwon Do class. Thus ends Wednesday.

Thursdays there is nothing until 1 pm and the kids act like its the weekend! Its so hard to get them motivated to do their school work. At 1:00 there is PE at the Christian Academy. At 3:30 its time to leave for Tinks violin lesson. At 6:00 its off to Awana.

Friday is homeschool at home all the live long day! Yeaahhhh!

And that is our school week in pics! Tonight was the awards ceremony for Awana. Its over for the year. Next week we do our Monday through Wednesday classes and its over for the year! I'm giving the kids a short break through Memorial Day and then on Tuesday the 26th we will pick up our home schooling again and finish our books by the 16th of July. Hows that for a neat wrap up of the year?

And yes, in case you are wondering this schedule has almost driven me insane! There I said it for you!

The Value of Homeschool Organization

2009-04-16T22:02:00.000-07:00

I have a tutoring job for next year if I want it. It would involve schooling the child for a couple of days a week like I did several students last year. I'm not sure if I want to do that. This lady has asked me because she feels overwhelmed with her day and even though she has home schooled this child for the last 6 years she is feeling very inadequate. This, along with my emails and comments I hear from friends, makes me wonder why people feel so unable to home educate their kids.

I want to take a closer look at this. There is one thing that must be admitted right off the top and that is that school will take a huge chunk of your day. On the other hand that doesn't mean you have to let it bury you.

I have a sister who homeschools 12 children and has been homeschooling for 20 years! I have another sister who home schools 9 children and has been doing it for almost that long.

What is the secret to successful homeschooling? That is the question I get most often.

Large families are finding success because they are not reinventing the wheel. They found what worked and went with it. Do not be lured by all the boxed curriculum and all the wonderful glitter and glam that is being sold for homeschoolers. Teach reading, 'riting, and 'rithmetic and your child will be fine.

Two statements people make to me all the time are at polar opposite ends of the spectrum; "I positively could not do everything you do in a day" and the other one is this, "I could do it too if I only had 2 kids." I find myself bemused every time I hear those things. I am here to tell you all that you can homeschool and run an efficient household whether you have 2 children or twelve. I am also going to tell you that if you are unsuccessful in scheduling your day and homeschool with 12 kids you will be unsuccessful with 2 kids. Does that surprise you?

I'm trying to tell you that the amount of children you have does not determine success in your day.

A disciplined person is disciplined.

An undisciplined person is undisciplined.

Is that so hard to figure out? Do you know something else? Young mothers with 2 or 3 preschoolers is doing more hands on minutely care of her children than the mother with 12 children, that is if the mother of the 12 did her job correctly. You see when you have a bunch of kids the labor is less. The work is more but the labor at mothers hands is less because the older children have been trained to help. So lets not get caught up in numbers. Do not compare yourself with others on the home front or the homeschool front.

Even disciplined people have times when the day doesn't run smoothly.

Monday through Wednesday the children have to be up by 7 am to get out the door by 8:15 because of classes they are taking at the Academy. On Thursday and Friday mornings, days with only afternoon classes away, I have a rule that the kids have to be ready for school by 9:00 am. They get up when they want but the latest they can get up is 8:00 am. That gives them an hour to get ready for school; shower, make beds, eat breakfast, and do whatever else they want to do.

Some days we have been so busy that by Thursday morning, our first day of the week without morning classes, we are just exhausted. If I can tell the kids are still soundly asleep at 8 I will let them wake up on their own. This morning was one of those mornings. Now the problem with getting up an hour later is that it can throw off your entire school day and many will throw their hands in the air and declare they cant stay on a schedule so why bother. Let me tell you a secret.

Younger kids are incredibly unaware of the time. So your child got up at nine? Act as if its eight. Instead of rushing around and not giving them time to wake up and do their morning chores in the normal way just pretend its an hour earlier and do everything the same as you ordinarily would.

Don't give the children 5 minutes to eat breakfast while you shriek at them that once again you are behind schedule and if everyone hurries you will only be 15 minutes late in starting the day. You are setting the atmosphere in your home all wrong and the day will go backward from there.

If you have a child that falls anywhere on the autism spectrum you will know the wisdom in what I have just laid out. Those children like Tink cannot be rushed, They need rigid schedule to thrive. It leaves one to wonder how it effects the "normal" child? Just because the "normal" one doesn't act out does not mean he isn't stressed by your rushing and harsh words. He just has the skills to deal with it. So please, ladies keep the kids on a schedule and realize there will be times you will have to go with the flow.

My children stumbled out of their beds at 8:45 this morning. The 3 day Easter weekend was fast paced and chucked full of stuff for us. Monday morning we hit the road on the run and havent stopped. So I let them wake up in their own time. They got up at 8:45 so that means school begins at 9:45. It barely makes a ripple in our day! They still have their hour to get ready and do their normal morning things.

Now let me hasten to add that getting up late should be a rare thing.

Children need to learn the discipline of arising at the same time every morning and going to bed at the same time at night. When your kids get older they will most likely have to punch a time clock. Teach them to be on time now!

Make sure your children know what is expected of them on the household front. What chores do they have to get done and by what time? Have you planned their lessons or are you handing them a book and expecting your 8 year old to go on his own? Even a 6th grader will benefit from knowing exactly what lessons need done for the day or for the week.

This is the time of year that the homeschool mom starts to count pages and see how much needs assigned to end up where she wants her children to be by June or whenever you stop your school year. If you have fallen behind don't assign 10 pages a day in each subject to catch up. Instead figure out a good stopping place and stop; usually at the end of a unit or before a new concept is introduced.

Since teaching school is such a huge part of the life of the homeschool mother you will need to make sure that you are disciplined or the rest of your house will fall apart.

Last week I was talking to a homeschool mom of 5 children, all adopted, and all with learning disabilites. She told me she had gotten up at 2:30 am to get everything done that needed done and that it wasnt uncommon for her to start her day at that time.

Mothers we have grown lazy. We have made excuses. We have bought into the thought that we need our me time. We have been looking at the other side of the fence and thinking we have it harder. We count on each finger all the things we have to do that she doesn't and why that excuses us from discipline.

The following is a little story of a mother with 10 children.

Years ago I visited my sister when she just had 10 kids, nine boys and one girl. You think you have excuses because you have three and someone else only has one? I stayed at my sisters for a week and listen to what she did.

She got up at 5:00 am to prepare for her day. Her boys got up early and went to the barn to milk. She ground her own wheat to make her own flour. This particular morning was no different than any other. Eighty muffins and 3 gallons of milk were consumed at breakfast along with other stuff! She had ground all that wheat to make those muffins. She ground her own corn to make the cornmeal. She sprouted the sprouts.

She made her own yogurt by the gallons! She made all her own cheeses on the back porch, She hung all the laundry on the line to dry; laundry for 12 people. Her home was immaculate all 900 sq ft of it. Yes, she didn't have a huge beautiful kitchen. She had a house of 900 sq ft!!! Do you get that?

She was regimented about school. One room in that tiny house was set aside for the school room. In it were about 7 old fashioned school desks. They entered the school room at 9 am with all the morning chores done; cows milked and fed, kids dressed and fed and all the breakfast put away.

The baby slept in a basket at my sisters feet. The preschooler played with his toys quietly in the corner. They schooled all morning. By lunch time they were done for the day. As the boys grew into highschool ages they were disciplined enough to finish their work on their own in gaps in the afternoon farm work but mothers work in the academic department was done by midday. Then it was on to fixing lunch and the myriad of chores that await a mother of 10 children.

So now would you want to tell me your excuses again? Go ahead. Im listening.

The Parts of Speech

2009-04-14T20:38:00.000-07:00

This is just terrible! I cant seem to get a tiny minute to update this blog! You know me, there's just gobs of stuff I have to say and not enough to time to say it in. Life is so busy and so full - which in reality is a good thing but it sure makes for a busy day. It also means I don't have time to do the things I want to do for fun which includes blogging here in my corner of the blogosphere and reading all you peoples good blogs.

So here I am trying to school Tink in the differences between the three forms of the word to and then on to labeling the parts of a sentence. She knows this like the back of her hand but is being obstinate because she wants to go volunteer in Peters PE class. The teacher told her she could a couple of weeks ago and I wish the teacher would have never said that because this 10-11:00 hour was when I worked with Tink on her studies between classes. Now she wont concentrate and it's become an hour of battling with the wills.

I told Tink today that if she completes this Language Arts page she can go help but now she is trying to ask me every question instead of figuring it out on her own. Now its time to implement stage 2. Now the rule is if I have to help her on this entire page we have to do another one so she can prove to me she understands it. Amazingly enough she is now sailing through the page. Hmmm, how did she suddenly remember it all?

Tink is working with the different forms a word and identifying the parts of speech for the italicized word. The sentences are like this:

1. The apple is on the ground.
2. The miller ground the wheat.
3. The grocer sellsgroundcoffee.

The answers are as follows:
1. noun
2. verb
3. adjective

Could you do this?

Lets try one:

1. She enjoys many hobbies like knitting and sewing.
2. She put like colors together.
3. Do you like peanut butter?

Can you identify the parts of speech for the word like? If you know them leave your answers in the comments. Lets see what we moms still remember. Sometimes teaching the different parts of speech seems so trivial and unnecessary when dealing with a learning disabled child and yet, who knows what she could become? As a writer or a teacher she would have to know this stuff. Admittedly, most people never have use for this knowledge after leaving school; and to think that we spend long hours and months studying this!

Well I am running out of time. Both kids are going to tech class in about ten minutes so I have to pack up and get out of here so I can join them in tech. My coffee that was steaming hot from McDonald's is now cold from sitting on the window sill here in the library. Its a shame. Coffee should never be allowed to grow cold!

Oh, one more thing. I'm reading a book entitled, Why Christian Kids Rebel. Its an incredible book and I plan on sharing with you the thoughts of the author later this week. I have very little time for reading so when I do I make sure my books are loaded with practical advice and lots of food for thought. I have about 10 library books loaded with "thought food" on my shelf at home and no time to read them. Its a sad commentary of my life, I'm afraid.

Okay, so now I'm outta here and on to tech. Oh and I must stop at the office here and sign both kids up for Mad Science. Man that class is expensive; $75 for just one kid and I'm enrolling two. Madness for sure! And yet Tink told me that she knew most of the answers on her state test from what she had learned in Mad Science. So it behooves me to enroll the kids - we do all we can to appease the State gods.

From there it's off to the music store to buy Tink a new violin book. Then out to the Christian Academy for another PE class. You cant have too many PE classes when you have a son like Peter who loves to eat and who is gaining weight at the rate of 1.5 pounds a month! He's been adding in a lot of bike riding lately and he's still gaining weight. He's involved in two hours of PE and two hours of Martial Arts a week besides all his outdoor play at home. I have no idea how he can gain weight like he does!

Anyway while the kids are in PE I'm going to be cleaning house like a maniac, unless...well...unless I get caught up in some good conversation at the Academy. Oh woe is me. I like to visit with friends far more than is good for me.

Easter Lapbook

2009-04-03T15:25:00.000-07:00

Tink has finished her Easter lapbook just in time for Resurrection Day! This was a fun lapbook and an excellent way to put the details of Jesus last week on earth deep into the minds of the kids. I downloaded the Easter story that came with some of the mini books and wouldn't you know it I cant recall which site it came from. But the story was told by an aunt to her niece and it was told clearly and simply enough that both my kids could understand it. As we covered each chapter Tink would do the mini book, or books, that went with that part of the story.

Peter was especially struck with the story of the Passover. Could it be because he is the oldest son and his life would have been taken that night if his parents decided not to put the blood on the doorposts? Who knows? But the other day I heard him tell a little friend that he just loves the Passover. Folks this is what homeschool is all about for us as Christians. Our children can get a secular education anywhere but they cannot have the Bible as their main textbook in any grade school save the home school(and some private christian schools). If you are the mother of a Christian home and are homeschooling I beg of you to make the Bible your greatest study.

The story of Jesus' last week on earth is so important in the spiritual lives of our children. I felt it was of such great importance that I decided to drop other workbooks this week and focus on this chapter in Jesus life! We continued our classes at the Academy but here at home Tink did nothing else but this lapbook and reading stories pertaining to the Easter story. This lapbook and all the stories and discussions around the kitchen table culminated in one huge ending Friday night when we attended the Easter play at our church, entitled, More Than Just A Man. It was a perfect ending for our study.

This past week was a soul searching, thoughtful time in our home. A couple of weeks ago when we had barely begun this study we had communion at church. It was one of Peters first communions since he had asked Jesus into his heart. His understanding of what was happening was far greater than it had been because of this lapbook study.

I wish I could tell you all the intensity of this past week, the spiritual growth in my children and the deepening of faith that has taken place in our household as we made our way through this epic time in the life of our Lord. But now without further comment I will show the lapbook Tink has made.

Easter Lapbook
This lapbook has been made from a file folder. We will be taking a closer look at the mini books in the pics below.
This little lamb book is Tinks favorite. Each lamb lifts up to reveal another lamb underneath. The lambs tell how they resemble Jesus. Tink has written on them things like: Jesus was pure and good, Jesus was a sacrifice for sins, etc. The story that came with the download had the three ways Jesus was a like a lamb so it was easy for Tink to do this one.
The first photo above shows the communion book in the right hand bottom corner of the first flap. This is an inside look at that communion book. It explains what the communion symbols are for. This book too has a unique fold inside. Each of the three symbols are defined in the inner fold: The donkey, the palm branches, the word Hosanna. This book is a pile of coins. The top one says: The Wicked Plot of Judas. The pages tell the plot how he was betrayed for thirty pieces of silver.Under the coins in the pic above is The Betrayal and Arrest of Jesus. The photo below shows the inside of that book. Each one of these sides opens up yet again. And now the story is told in the child's own words. Now lets focus in this last flap. The book the Easter Song is sung to the tune of Do You know The Muffin Man.
Now we will lift up the inner flap of this file folder to reveal more books underneath. The flap is made from card stock and stapled to the file folder. Under the flap we now have eggs telling the story of Jesus using Bible verses in each egg. Under the flap and against the file folder we have three more books. The blue one tells the symbolism of the Easter egg. The orange one shows different kinds of lilies. Here we see the inside of the lily book. Also take note of the green book in the photo above that says, He is Risen. Now to the green book. It is actually card stock stapled together with a slit in the top in which we have placed a Jesus that can be pulled from the tomb by a string. This one too is one of my kids favorite parts of the lapbook. They love to make Jesus rise from the grave!
Hope you enjoyed this lapbook. I belong to several yahoo lapbook groups and if you are here from the email group feel free to leave a comment too. If you have done an Easter lapbook my readers and I would love if you would leave the address to it in the comments below.

The mini books for this lapbook came from:
Homeschoolshare: The Legend Of The Easter Egg
Homeschool Share: The Parable of The Lily
Allbright-News
Christian Preschool Printables: I believe the only book from this one was the one of the Risen Jesus coming from the tomb.

If you see one of your templates in here and I have not mentioned your website be sure to let me know. I will give you credit here in this entry. If you would like to see more lapbooks that I have done just click on the Lapbooks and notebooking label below this entry.

The arrangement of this Easter lapbook is my original arrangement.

Something Is Rotten In Denmark

2009-03-19T21:27:00.000-07:00

I'm sitting here in the library waiting on Tink. She is taking her state benchmark test. What for? You see the state is only grading the first five questions on each test! This public school system is so messed up!

You know what gets me? For three years I have worked my butt off to get that child at grade level. I haven't let her do a lot of the fun stuff she wanted to do academically because I was working toward the BIG TEST. We kept our noses to the grindstone. She cried. I cried. We worked through snow days and vacations. We worked most of every summer. She sat inside grappling with adjectives while her friends were swimming in the pool. We struggled through multiplication, alone in our upstairs schoolroom while her friends went to movies at the mall. We worked and worked and worked...and worked, for what? So she could do five problems on a reading test?

I'm furious! Now of course if that is all that is required I definitely wont have her do more of the test. For her sake I'm happy about that. What I'm furious about is the fact the state is so powerful it can demand our children go back into public school but its so lame that it cant even provide an education for our kids after it has them in their greedy hands!

My daughter was at the district public school for 4 years and was being shoved into 4th grade when she was working at a beginning 1st grade level. That's when I pulled her out and began homeschooling. In three years she can now pass a fifth grade test, or so I think! How will I know? She's only required to do the first five problems!

To say I'm angry is putting it mildly! Its time somebody stands up and realizes the state doesn't have the answers! They are wandering around blind folded, shuffling money from one pet cause to another. I wish they would leave us homeschoolers alone!

I totally regret putting my children in the Academy, not because the Academy itself is so bad, but because it gives the state the upper hand and the state has no idea what it's doing. The state doesn't care about all these kids that are falling through the cracks. All they care about is that they are shoved into institutions so they don't lose money or control.

Our state legislatures are right now trying to ban virtual schools in this state. Now I'm not necessarily fighting for virtual schools; I'm more interested in parental rights. It should be our right as parents to teach our kids in the way we see fit. It costs this state roughly five hundred dollars a child to school them through online schools at home. It costs them about 1900 per student to school them in the classroom. So you can see its not about money.

Our school district is trying to close down one of our grade schools and close the other schools on Fridays to save money and yet now they are demanding that all home schooled kids using online schools be put back into the brick and mortar schools at three times the cost! Its clear to see this is about control!

Monday 300 virtual school students and parents rallied at our state capital to protest the initiative under way here. The state doesn't seem to understand that if they do away with virtual schooling they will lose at least half of those kids back into the home school community. At least now they are getting some money from them as they are part of the public school system. It just doesn't make any sense.

My children are now part of the state school too. I am fighting that tooth and claw! I am praying with all my might that my husband allows me to home school in the fall without the use of the charter school. I want no part of this public school system whether it be charter schools or virtual schools, its all public school and I'm fed up to the neck with them all!

Dreaming of Springtime and Lapbooking

2009-03-09T22:09:00.000-07:00

I stayed up until 1 am this morning. Its now 6 am and I can barely open my eyes. Its going to be a long day I tell you! So what kept me up all night? Glad you asked. You see, I was prowling the Internet for free lapbooks on Easter. Yes, that's just how excited I get about lapbooks! Peter is working on about Spring but I wanted to find one on the Resurrection for Tink to do. I can tell you that they are almost nonexistent. Curr Click has one you can buy and Homeschool Share has one on the Legend of The Easter Egg but I want one for Tinks age level and I want one for free. I spent $11.00 on Peters Spring lapbook so I'm looking for downloads without spending a penny for Tinks.

If I had my way we would lapbook our way through the school year. I couldn't believe the cool things that I found! A year ago when we made our last lapbook you could scarcely find anything. Now I start searching and the coolest things are all over the web! I want to do all the Literature and Bible ones but time wont permit. I love them so much I may just do them myself! Yeah really. I would do that.

There just aren't enough hours in a day I tell you! I have so many things I want to do with the kids that it's annoying when the day ends and everyone is tired! I want to haul every one up at the crack of dawn and get going again! There is just so much exciting stuff to see and do and study this time of year!

Yesterday Peter finished his pinch pot in clay class and its already filled with dirt and sunflower seed. I need to start getting containers around for indoor seedlings for the garden. I would love to do a unit on gardening and such and I will eventually but here I go, racing ahead of the season. Yesterday it snowed almost all day. Thats annoying. I want spring time!

Have you ever noticed how many holidays are in the spring? You have St Patricks Day, April Fools Day,Easter, Passover, Mothers Day, and Memorial Day. My heart about skips beating when I think of the possibilities for learning tucked in there! Easter of course will take the largest portion of our spring time study. I am finding little books and templates around the web to design my lapbook for Tinks study of Jesus Resurrection. I even found a little fold book on communion!

After prowling around the web for four hours last night I went to bed only to dream that I had found the perfect lapbook. All night I was working on mini books and searching for more ideas. The only problem was that I was in bed so when I awoke my lapbook was not all ready for Tink like it had been in my dream! Okay, so I just realized how weird that probably sounded. Dreaming of lapbooking? Yeah, well, what can I say? I told you all this exciting stuff! I even joined a new lapbook group sometime in the wee hours of the morning. I didn't realize I had done that but this morning there was my acceptance in my yahoo mail account. Its amazing the things I can accomplish on autopilot!

This is such a busy week. I need to stay focused. I would love to go on the church bus tonight to a church out of town where Bible Conferences are being held but can I do it? Wednesday through Friday we are having our own missions conference. Thursday my dear mother in law comes! Friday is also Homeschool Recess Day with friends. Saturday is Peters last basketball game. Praise God from whom all blessings flow! Peter spends a total of 10 hours a week in sports. That doesn't count any organized practice at the hoop or outdoor play. All ten hours of that are done under the watchful eye of teachers and coaches. Poor kid is simply exhausted come nighttime.

Well its 7:00 am. I really need to get in the shower. We have to be at Tinks clay class in an hour and a half and both kids are asleep still. Today I have to bake bread cause we are totally out! Bread is a huge staple around here and being out of it is not an option! All I really want to do is work on printing stuff off for the lapbooks but there now, I spose you get that after this post!

I'm busy planning our Easter activities. We are planting real grass in our Easter baskets instead of using the fake stuff. I saw that idea somewhere last week and wondered why on earth I hadn't thought of that before. Sometimes I think my head is buried in the sand! Speaking of Easter, last Sunday night we had communion at church and Peter was just full of questions about it. Its the first time he had taken communion. That was a huge part of my desire to do this Resurrection lapbook. After kids do a lapbook they understand a subject so much more!

Of course, there are all the traditional Polish Easter dishes to start thinking about. Easter in our house is a culinary delight as well as a feast for the schoolroom! And then there's the May day baskets I have determined that my kids will do this year! Oh, dear reader, I really better just get off of here. There is so much to do and to think about and to put together.

In countless fluted creases
The little elm-leaves show,
While white as carded fleeces
The dogwood blossoms blow.

A rosy robe is wrapping
The early red-bud trees;
But still the haws are napping,
Nor heed the honey-bees.

And still in lazy sleeping
The apple-buds are bound,
But tulip-tips are peeping
From out the garden ground.

And yonder, gayly swinging
Upon the turning vane,
A robin redbreast singing
Makes merry at the rain!

Literature and Spring Plans

2009-03-03T20:42:00.000-08:00

It has dawned on me that I can now pull out my old Five In A Row and reuse it with Peter! Oh happy day! I try not to force my love of literature on the kids but when a person is passionate about something its hard not to push it on others. Peter loves to read but I don't see him developing a great love of literature. I suppose that is to be expected with a boy. But regardless of where his love lies I am going to introduce him to it anyway. So out comes my FIAR books!This is exciting stuff. I cant tell you how I love it. Im also going to use the
Literature book from Veritas Press that has all the books with workbook pages. And by the way, if you're looking for good literature for your child check out this site at Veritas Press. I have linked to the second grade literature but you can find all grades there on the sidebar at Veritas Press. I need to keep Peter occupied. I had forgotten how quickly a second grader can go through his work compared to a 6th grader!

I'm also going to go back to lapbooking since Peter has never done one before. With Spring around the corner I'm going to do one on Springtime with them. I haven't ran this by Tink yet. She may not be interested and if she isn't I'm not going to push it. I am going to insist that Peter do it though. Tink stays incredibly busy with her books. It's Peter that needs more. I'm thinking of taking the more scientific approach to spring than just the nature stuff because Peter loves science. I'll have to see whats out there for this sort of lapbook because I am not into making my own this time around. Speaking of lapbooks, the Multiplication Lapbook I made and designed is making its way around the world, I kid you not. It has been linked to over and over and is part of lapbook clubs and yahoo groups. Maybe I should have copyrighted the thing. I had no idea it would catch on like it did.

Tink is writing the final draft of her report on Mice. She is typing it into Microsoft Word and loving it. Peter is in a typing class this year so I'm using the same website to teach Tink how to type. Both kids have to spend at least 15 minutes a day on their typing lessons. Peter is thrilled to discover that if he keeps his fingers on home row he can type without looking. Tink doesn't see whats so great about it! sigh

Both kids are busy making their cars for the Awana Grand Prix this weekend. Oh the decisions that must be made! I have left the entire thing to their Dad. He has cut their designs and helped them with sanding and painting and the whole bit. I have had nothing to do with it. I love projects that I don't have to be a part of! Sometimes its nice to sit back and let someone else do the teaching!

While Ive been typing this I have been in the Academy's family room. A Russian lady came in a while ago and she and I have spent the last half hour talking with her. She teaches Russian here at the Academy. I had a fun half hour of picking her brain about the culture there. She explained to me the difference between Orthodox Russians and Old Believers, and the difference in weather from St Petersburg to Kazakhstan where my girlfriend lives. She told me about the types of wheat grown there and how the peasants have made a living from genetically programming wheat when they didn't even know they were genetically programming it. She laughed a rippling bell like laugh at the thought of it. She is such a refreshing lady, beautiful in her long dress and brown wavy hair to her waist. Ah, its a good day when I meet new people and learn new things!

I have several homeschool events and fun things scheduled with the kids. This morning I made our plane reservations to Idaho to visit grandma over spring break. Mr Darling is going to meet us up there on the weekend and drive home with us so that means we will do a bunch of sight seeing on the way home. I'm actually looking forward to it. My sister and her family are there too so there is always plenty to do.She has nine children so each of my kids have a cousin or two around their ages up there to play with. She also owns and operates a bent and dent store. The kids love helping out in the stock room or at the register. They're all excited about it!

Next week one of my friends is doing a huge homeschool play date at her house. Its called Home School Recess. The kids are all Peter and Tinks age so they will playing basketball and soccer and ping pong and such. I haven't told the kids about it. I have learned not to mention that stuff until closer to the date just in case something happens we cant make it. Then in April we are scheduled to do the School On Wheels with Amtrak. For only $13 a child Amtrak is offering two way fare to Seattle for homeschoolers. The idea is that you homeschool on the three hour ride to Seattle. Then you get off the train and take advantage of the Aquarium and museums close by and then be back to the train in four hours for the ride home. Its such a popular event here that I had to sign up for it last fall. I hate paying for stuff so far in advance but I had no choice. Its a wonderful opportunity for the kids. They rode the train several times before but they never tire of it.

Well Peter is now in his PE class. Tink is watching and supposedly doing her Spelling on the stage of the gym. I have a feeling I better go check and see what she is actually doing! Somehow studying in the gym doesn't sound conducive to learning.

There is no end to the studying of books

2009-01-19T22:33:00.000-08:00

Today is a holiday here in the states so there is no school. It's a cold winter day with temps at 25 degrees F. Now to some of you in the East and midwest right now that would seem almost like summer! But 25 is as low as I care to see it. I truly could live in 75 degree weather forever, with a dip in temps for Christmas. Is there anywhere like that? I doubt.

I'm going to take today to figure out exactly where we are in our books. It takes continual pacing to get finished by summer. I school until the middle of July every year than take 6 weeks off and start up again in September so that gives me a little longer to get through things.

I'm still not totally happy with Tinks reading curriculum or lack thereof. I wish I could find a good strong reading program. I love BJU but Tink freaks when she sees the book because of earlier struggles with it last year. I have her in Houghton Mifflins Golden Threads now but when that is done I'm not sure where we'll go. I ordered the Houghton Mifflin reading book for third grade and I'm thinking of going into that next. The one shes doing now for reading is actually a Literature book.

We're still doing Word Walls only now Im not printing and cutting the words out by hand. I payed for Ed Helper and now I use it to make my word wall. Tink is also working through Letters and Sounds by Abeka for more phonics exercises. She's half way through that book and should finish it by April. I'm going to move her up in that same curriculum to the next book when she's finished with it. She's also doing Explode the Code for Phonics and is almost done with Book 7 that she started in the fall.

Phonics and Reading are an important part of our day. Tink reads aloud to me every day so I can monitor and catch any problems. If you are interested in looking at any of these books you can find the link to them in my sidebar under Tinks Winter Curriculum. Having a 10 week old baby on my left arm and pecking with the right doesn't lend itself to putting in all the links, if you know what I mean.

We're only about a third of the way through our Science book. I want to be finished with the unit on Plants by the end of January. We're sticking closely to the Science Schedule I layed out here. We're still lapbooking this unit too.

In History we just finished studying about Benjamin Franklin. Tink is taking a surprising interest in this man. She now studies intently any picture she sees in books of men of that time to see if she can pick him out. I guess I never realized before what a sort of ugly man he was. Oh well, I'll take brains over beauty any day and he certainly had the brains! We're still notebooking our Abeka History book besides answering all the questions in the book.

I want to stop here a moment and tell you about the great characters in Abekas 3rd grade History book. Of course, I was also impressed with their 2nd grade History book. That's way more than I can say for their unimpressive Reading program. But for those who are interested here are the people that the kids will study this year in the order they are given in the book. It also gives the span of time we are studying beginning in the 1400's and ending in 1957! That's incredible span with many interesting characters.Here they are:

Fall Term as divided by the book,
Christopher Columbus 1451-1506
John Smith 1580-1631
Pocahontas 1595-1617
Miles Standish 1584-1656
Squanto 1585-1622
William Penn 1644-1718
Benjamin Franklin 1706-1790 (we are to this point. Winter term in our district starts Feb 4 so we are perfectly in place in History. That feels good!)

Winter Term
George Washington 1732-1799
Daniel Boone 1734-1820
Noah Webster 1758-1843
John Greenleaf Whittier 1807-1892
Robert E. Lee 1807-1870
Abraham Lincoln 1809-1865

Spring Term
Clara Barton 1821-1912
Ulysses S Grant 1822-1885
Louisa May Alcott 1832-1888
Booker T Washington 1856-1915
George Washington Carver 1859-1943
Laura Ingalls Wilder 1867-1957
Billy Sunday 1862-1935

Isn't that an exciting lineup? I cant wait for Spring Term. Maybe I can finally interest Tink in the Little House books or in Little Women. I can dream, cant I? You mothers of kids who love to read have no idea how blessed you are!

In Math we are moving slowly. I have to supplement with so much extra work so Tink can grasp it that the actual book progress is tedious. We are doing Horizons and are still in Book 3A. I keep thinking we're almost done with it and then another page appears from nowhere! Okay, I'm sure it was there all along but goodness, its taking forever! I am happy to say that Tink is finally getting a firm grip on the multiplication tables. She uses little books from her Multiplication Lapbook but I've been seeing her work more and more on her own. She is fast with the flash cards up through the 6's. She's knows beyond that but she has to think harder.

In Language Arts we are only a fourth of the way through the book. There will be no finishing in this book this year. Tink and one of my other students are learning about the writing process in unit 4 of Abekas Language Arts. They are learning how to glean information and document their sources. Then they move on to rough drafts and finals. While they are doing their research and such I am having them work in Unit 5 which is on the proper use of quotations. So we're moving slowly but Tink is learning and that's what counts.

In Literature we are studying WWII. I know that sounds like History and it is but we are using it for Literature. I'm reading the kids the book, Scout, And The Secret of The Swamp, while they color the pictures that go with WWII. For a complete over view of exactly how we are doing this study you can go to World War II under labels on my sidebar or you can click here.

Our Read Alouds right now are Snow Treasure, Scout, and a Magic Treehouse book about Dragons. I cant rightly remember the title now. This one Mr. Darling and I are both reading to Peter. Tink has no interest in it having "outgrown Magic Treehouse", as she puts it.

So this brings us to the end of this somewhat boring update. I love reading homeschool updates but I realize a lot of my readers are not homeschoolers, therefore a lot of this stuff is not particularly interesting.

Well Tiger Lily is needing care so I have to go.

Plans for The Winter Schedule

2009-01-12T21:31:00.000-08:00

I've been the weekend brainstorming and combing over listings and classes in an attempt to formulate some sort of schedule now that Peter is home. I still haven't gotten things all put together but here is some of what we will be doing for winter term.

Our winter term starts the 26th of January because that's when the Academy begins their term. That will give me a little time to implement this schedule and fine tune it. Tink really wants to keep the coffee shop in the schedule so we are going to do that. This morning is usually coffee morning but we will not be doing that today. There is just too many other things that need taken care of .

Tink has orchestra at the Academy so while Im there I will find out about Peters Education Specialist (teacher). He has to be assigned an ES before we can actually start his curriculum. I also have no idea of what classes he can take there so it leaves me a little in limbo. But here is what I have planned for the kids outside the Academy.

We are going to go back to our Children's Hour. I have a label on the sidebar explaining exactly what that entails but its basically a time around the breakfast table where we work on our Bible memorization passage, learn new songs, work on memorizing the Awana verses for the week, memorize a poem, and pray. Our church is praying around the clock in 15 minute increments asking God to bless the work there and praying for the people and the ministries. I signed up for my 15 minute slot at 8:45 am. I did this so we could finish our breakfast in prayer at that time. Breakfast is at 8:15 am so it will be perfect to do our 15 minute prayer time at 8:45. I thought it would be nice to get the kids involved with that.

School work will begin at 9:15 am. Tink has been starting at 9 usually but Im moving it forward to give a little more time for clearing the table and getting the dishwasher started. I don't time my daily household chores or put time on cleaning schedules but I do stick to times when it comes to school. One big reason is because of the classes we take outside of the home. If we don't stay on schedule here then we wont be able to make classes on time. Tink is now on her own weekly schedule which I also explained before but I will have to go back to an
old fashioned daily scheduling for Peter. At 2nd grade he cant work independently yet.

I haven't found a read aloud book yet. There are just so many good ones. I'm thinking of trying Little House in the Big Woods again. Last time I did Tink threw a fit but she is much further along now and I think Peter would like it. It just seems odd to me that we have all day every day to work together. I haven't quite grasped that yet. Tink works until about 2:30 on her school work everyday. At second grade Peter doesn't have to put in as long of hours so I'm planning projects for him to do. I haven't gotten them all figured out but when I do I will let you in on them. In fact, you will probably have to bore through pictures of them.

His extra curricular classes are going to be in archery, fishing, and golfing. He's taking basketball starting the 19th of this month. The others are all in February and March. Dad has instructed Peter to fill the wood box this afternoon so that should keep him busy at least an hour. I'm also taking the kids roller skating this afternoon at the skating rink, if my knee starts feeling better by then! The rink here offers special rates and days to homeschoolers. My goal with Peter home is to keep him moving as much as possible. It's back to nature walks, skating, neighborhood basketball and soccer, yard work, bike riding, jumping on the trampoline and any other form of exercise I can find for that boy. Ive got all sorts of exciting things planned for spring term that involves the outside work, not the least of which involves teaching the kids about composting.

We are now starting our winter bird study using the bird cards from the Abeka curriculum. I went through them and pulled out the ones that show birds from our neck of the woods. We have so many coming in to the feeder right now that I have decided to post the cards right there by the window for easy reference.

I haven't figured out the poem we are going to learn, nor the scripture memory, nor the song we are going to learn, nor the book for sure so I really have to get that nailed down this morning before the kids wake up. I have ideas but nothing firmed up yet.

I'm throwing around the idea of doing Five In a Row with Peter, not the entire curriculum thing with it, but just the part of reading the books and the busy work. They have the best books for literature reading for kids Peters age. When the mind is blank its a great resource. And speaking of books I am putting a library day back in the schedule too. While at the library I'm going to show the kids how to use the computers to find the books. They are always asking about the referencing system and such so now is the time to teach them how to use their local library.

Well I have to go take care of my knee. Yesterday I wore heels to church for both services and now my knee is shooting pain. I'm going to keep the heating pad on it every minute that I am sitting today. The pain is excruciating again. I also have doctors appointments to make this morning. There is no time to loiter here much as I love the planning of things. As I said before in a post below, planning is easy, at some point though it all has to be incorporated and that doesn't happen at the computer.

I'm off to get more coffee and get started! Have a great day.

Homeschool Projects for second grade

2009-01-08T22:33:00.000-08:00

Are you a homeschooler? If so grab a cup of tea and talk with me. Are we all here? Lets just spread our stuff out here on the table and get down to business. You all know that I have been homeschooling Tink for 3 years now. Homeschooling a learning disabled child is an entirely different ball game than teaching a child who naturally learns.

In the course of schooling Tink and pushing her up to and way past her limits I have had no time for the fun things of home school. Tink will be in junior high next year. There are things she needs to learn. There is no time or inclination on her part for glitter and paste and fun things. Bugs are gross. The study of the human body is gross. Geology is boring. History is not cool. Math is too hard. Reading is to be shunned at all cost! Literature is for the poor geek who doesn't understand that dancing to musical Cd's is way more fun. Yes, this is how Tinks brain works.

Now enter Peter; a boy who loves the outdoors, who loves to invent things, who loves storybooks, who loves board games, who loves science, who loves everything about his world and just cant learn enough! Now do you see why I have to switch gears?

So here I am brainstorming ways to tap into Peters natural curiosity of the world around him. Here is what I'm tossing around:

starting him on a nature journal
setting up a nature shelf
make animal tracks from molds and plaster of Paris
Put together an essay on any animal. Turn in paper report and clay or Lego model of animal
Do a study on the Beaver. We live in the Beaver State. We would make our own dam and read books like Bartholomew the Beaver.
Get a microscope and let him go to town on the thing
Teach both kids how to hand sew on fleece (peter did this at his old school and loved it)
Introduce Peter to martial arts
Do a salt clay map of whatever Peter would want to study. He loves his maps.
Get stuff to add to his back yard scientist kit
Add to my craft shelf so the kids always have stuff on hand to craft with.

On that last point I have tons of craft stuff on bookshelves in the schoolroom and in a craft chest. I was just noticing the other day that paints are drying up and beads are spilled and raffia is almost non existent. I still have gobs of nice brushes, felt pieces, puff paints, iron transfer patterns, t shirts, melting beads, fabric glues, and I have more foam cut outs than I will ever use!
There is just so much to do and so little time. With our new schedule we are gone to classes all day on Tuesday so that day is just out for anything close to constructive hands on learning.

Here is what the schedule is looking like:

Monday
10-11 Pottery class- Peter, Orchestra- Tink
3-4 Tai Kwon Do - both kids
7- Basketball-Peter

Tuesday
8:30 - 10 Pottery- Tink
10- 11 PE Peter
11-12 Tech Launchers- Peter
12:10 Choir - both kids
1:10-2:00 PE-both kids
3:00 Volley ball-Tink

Wednesday
10-11 Orchestra-Tink, Cooking- Peter
3-4 Tai Kwon Do
7 basketball-Peter

Thursday
1-2 PE both kids
3:45-4:15 Violin-Tink
6:15-8:15 Awana- both kids

Friday
5:30 - 8:30am volleyball-Tink
Volley ball games are on some of these Friday nights

Saturday
Peters basketball games

So yeah, this schedule leaves me a little dizzy but I did my best to get the children's classes to overlap so we didn't have to spend too much time on the road or at the schools where the classes are held.

Chores and other learning have to fit in the cracks of this schedule. This is why it's necessary to stay on schedule around here and to keep on our toes. I'm trying to work in our Children's Hour into that 8:30 am slot. Its not going to be possible on Tuesdays but we should be able to get to it other days.

If you're thinking that's a lot of sports for the kids, it is. My goal is to keep Peter as busy as possible. He just bursts with energy and the house cannot contain it all!

Each child will be studying and working with me in the times that their sibling is in class and they aren't. There are wonderful study nooks all over the academy along with a moms coffee shanty and a snack bar. I have a lot of friends that are waiting for their kids too so it gives us all time to chat a little. At the Academy parents are not allowed to leave if the student is in grade school. In a way I suppose its good for me to have this down time during classes. I can use that time to do computer work when the kids aren't needing my help.

So there you have it. That's what a homeschool mom thinks about and plans for while she is sick on the couch with a cold.

Do you all need a refill on your tea?

Do you have any neat project ideas for boys of eight years old? I welcome all suggestions.

Winter Schedule for 5th Grade

2009-01-07T21:56:00.000-08:00

Today was a good day in spite of my aching ribs and heavy coughing. I met with Peters ES again today and got everything squared away. There was a chance that he wouldn't get into the cooking class because it wasn't listed in the handout of open classes. So I asked the ES if she could just check into it for me and see if by any chance he could join. She says, "Well you're in luck. I don't have to check in because I am the new cooking instructor for winter term so of course he can join." This class was crucial because it means that Peter is in class the same time as Tink.

So why is that important? Well dear reader, obviously you haven't been around Peter. You see that child cant sit still for nothin'. When he waits on Tink in class he runs around and around the gym, then up to the family waiting room, then out to the playground, then wheee down the elevator to the cafeteria where he asks to join a class of all things! The class was a gym class for younger kids and they had teeter totters out and he thought it would be fun to join. Of course they told him no! But you see what I'm up against? Its just best for all concerned if he is in his own class in those time slots that Tink is busy. Today he actually settled down for a while and joined a game of pokeman cards that was being played at a table nearby.

So now with Peter enrolled in all the classes that I want him to be in I can breathe easier. I actually had an hour this afternoon of free time while both kids were in Tai Kwon Do. I went to Joannes Fabrics and just browsed through the craft stuff enjoying every minute of it. I was awakened to the fact that the rest of the world is closing in on Valentines Day and here I am stuck in December! That was eye opening! So I decided the best way to catch up was to purchase some adorable little cookie cutters and cupcake forms. It made me feel like I was moving to the beat of the same drummer as everyone else anyway!

And speaking of moving to the same drummer I'm totally feeling in touch with the heartbeat of life. There is nothing like getting smack into the heart of learning to give me that feeling that life is alright. Today I spoke for two hours with Peters teacher, planning his term. All around us were others studying and other teachers talking. My girlfriend sat at the table with her kids and everyone was deep in their studies. A room that just seeps of education and learning and intellect is a room I love being in.

I was struck anew today at how busy us mothers really are. No matter what stage of life your children are in if you are a mother you are busy. There is, however, an entirely different level to that busyness when you homeschool. There I sat at the table with my girlfriend and Peters teacher and our kids studying and 4 busy hours later I see the same girlfriend dressed all in white with her black belt for Tai Kwon Do and teaching a class. One of her sons, about 15 years old, who had been on the phone at the Academy working out a business venture of some sort, was here now too, dressed in his white uniform with his black belt tied firmly in place, teaching the beginning class.

I thought of all that had happened in the four hours since last we had met; doctors appointments, more schooling, laundry, dinner prep, and on and on it goes, yet here we were for yet another class, going, going, going. This is the kind of energy I feed on and this is what thrills me. When a person puts in a full day of hard work, the evening hours are so much sweeter because you know you have redeemed the time throughout the day and now you can rest in peace and rejuvenate for the day ahead.

There's a lot of busy work that goes into having an ES in charge of the kids. I have to meet with her once a week but the funny thing is that she isn't requiring anything of me that I haven't already been doing. Here is where I toot my own horn. So pardon me if I sound a bit smug but she wants a weekly report of pages done in each subject and then monthly she will write a report on what was actually being learned on those pages. That then is turned into the state and it has to match what the state requires for that grade.

Well goodness, Ive been doing all that anyway so now all I have to do is attach my Word document to an email and send it to the ES. It has all the info on it. I was keeping my own records on this just in case the state ever stepped in and questioned what I was doing. Now its proven to be useful. Here is the form that I will send in this week. Note that it looks much like Tinks weekly schedule I have shown you before but on this one I keep record of what exactly she is learning in those subjects.

Week of January 19
Language Arts -
217, 218 – Introduction to Adverbs
219 - Adverbs that modify adjectives or adverbs
220 - Distinguishing adjectives from adverbs
221, 222 – Practicing with adverbs
Math
101- Division Facts with 6 or 7 as a divisor;
102 – 103 Identifying the correct operations using a calculator
104 - Identifying equations in word problems
105 - 107 Chapter review
108 – Fractions : halves to twelfths
109 – Fractions: Part of a set
Reading
Esther the Queen pg 177-181 workbook pg. 71 and 72 –comprehension: inferring character traits and emotion from dialogue
Esther the Queen pgs182-187 workbook pgs. 73, 74 Using comparative and superlative forms correctly
Esther the Queen pgs 188 -192 workbook 75, 76 (read words on 76 to me); matching antonyms and using definitions from a glossary
Esther the queen pgs 193 -200 workbook pgs.77 and 78 Structural analyses; demonstrating understanding of contractions
Spelling
Lesson 20 – Working with the long oo sound
Lesson 21 – Work with double consonants
Health
Chapter 2: Exercise for Good Health
Pgs 21 - 25 Facts about Muscles
Vocabulary - Lesson 6. When you are done read the story to me.
Music – Choir Tuesday, Violin Lesson Thursday, Orchestra Mon and Wed
Violin - Practice 5 times Put a check mark here after this sentence for every time you practice!
1______ 2_____ 3_______ 4______ 5 _____
PE- volley ball practice Tuesday and Thurs, Game on Friday; Tao Kwon Do Monday and Wednesday

Who knew that I had it all covered? The ES was very pleased because this means that she doesn't have to write up a monthly report. I've done the work for her! Little did I know...

Okay, I'm over myself now and facing plain old me. You see in reality I am a coughing hacking mess sitting here in my red robe and pink slippers sipping 7-up. Why the 7-up you ask? Well because my mother use to give us 7-up when we were sick as kids and now I still need it when I'm sick. That's just the way it goes. My kids need it too. I don't know where they got that idea! (wink)

I have so much to tell you and show you. I still havent shown you my organization stuff and now hubby bought me a cool gadget for the cans in the kitchen and a .... this is all another post in itself. So hang in there. I'll be back.

Field Trip To Historical House

2008-12-08T22:41:00.000-08:00

Yesterday the kids and I took a tour of this historical house. It's the Steven Crawford house and one of 6 houses that are set up as museums here in the city. For the month of December they are celebrating, "Let it Snow", and what a celebration it is!!

Right now it is decorated with a snowman theme for Christmas. It's like entering a time warp to a bygone era. Built in 1907-08, the Stevens-Crawford Heritage House never passed out of the hands of the family that built it and still has most of its original furniture.

The kids got to hear Christmas carols on an old victrolia and Peter watched in fascination as a rope pulley brought wood up to the kitchen stove through a trapdoor. Tink was delighted with the dolls in the child's room. There were tin dolls, china dolls, and glass dolls. Gorgeous doll houses were set up with intricate doll furniture in them. The one had actually belonged to Merdie, Steven Crawfords daughter.

"The Stevens Crawford Museum is located in a 1908 classical Foursquare style house. It was owned by the original family until 1968 and much of the period furniture is still kept in the house. There are 15 furnished rooms, including a working kitchen, living room, bedrooms, dining room and a doll collection. There is also a museum area which features displays of souvenir plates, children's toys and Indian baskets."

If you would like to see a slideshow of the inside of the house go here.

I now know what we are going to study in history winter term. I was appalled at Tinks lack of knowledge on Oregons history. When we study it this winter term I am going to take the kids through all the historical houses and museums. We live in the oldest city west of the Mississippi and it's steeped in history.

Now I cant wait to start our study!

Defining Curriculum

2008-11-12T15:17:00.000-08:00

In the comments below Carol has asked what I use for Copywork, Composition and Reading Comprehension. I decided to answer this is an entry as there are others who might be wondering the same thing.

Copywork is usually copying the same Bible verse every day for a week complete with all punctuation and capital letters in their place. Tink is part of a Bible Club called Awana. Awana is structured similar to the girl scouts where you earn badges and awards for things you do. Her copywork verse is the one that she needs to memorize for Awana lesson that week. I have also used poetry for copywork.

Composition is just another term for composing stories. I have Tink write at least one story a week. I do not correct the story. She would get too discouraged if I did. On the following story I complimented her on the sequencing she did. There will be lots of stories to write and as she learns more and more in grammar and spelling and story structure the stories themselves will begin to take shape better. We've been doing a lot of work on topic sentences and putting your story in order as it happened. I was proud to see evidence of that here. We work on that type of thing in other English classes. By the time she actually writes a story she's so proud of it and it really is her best work. If I would use that to work out storywriting on she would be devastated as would anyone who writes or draws something only to be met with negative reviews. This is her story from this past week.

A Pumpkin Story

Once upon a time I went to a pumpkin. I saw the biggest pumpkin. But it was to heavy. I Fond other one it was to small. I look for other pumpkins. I fond one that was perfect. I ast if I could get it. My mom said yes. I was happy. We went home. We cut it opened the pumkin. We tuc out the seeds. We made eyes and a nose and a mothe. Then we put the pumpkin out for Halloween.

She asked me how to spell; other, Halloween, biggest, and perfect. I guess she thought she knew how to spell the rest. When she finishes her stories we put them in a 3 ring binder. I'm hoping to see great improvement by the end of the year and by using a binder we will have all her stories to compare the early ones with the later ones.

For Reading Comprehension I use a Scholastic book that consists of paragraph size stories. They're usually about facts such as facts on frogs, insects, airplanes, pilgrims, the planets etc. In other words they're not just nonfiction little stories. They are paragraphs packed full of info at her reading level. At the end of every paragraph story scholastic has designed questions to see how much of the story the child has comprehended.

Here's a sample story from the 2nd grade book which she is now doing.

Tigers are the worlds biggest cats. Most tigers are bigger than lions. A tigers body can be as long as a car. A tiger can even weigh as much as two adult people! Tigers are good hunters. Why? They are good at jumping. They are fast. They can see well in the dark. When tigers hunt at night they surprise other animals. A tigers favorite foods are deer and wild pigs. They also eat other animals, like monkeys, buffalo and goats. Tigers live in Asia. They live in different types of homes. Some tigers live in rain forests. Others live in the woods swamps or grasslands.

Now the comprehension questions are these.
1. What is a good title for this story? A. animals B. Cats C. Tigers

2.What animals do tigers often eat. A. deer and wild pigs B. pigs and dogs C. birds and lions

3.Where do tigers live? A. Africa B. Mexico C. Asia

Write a sentence telling why tigers are good hunters.

And that's all there is to it. Just a paragraph with a few questions but it helps Tink tremendously since she is hampered by a reading comprehension at a kindergarten level. In true Charlotte Mason fashion I also use narration to help her with comprehension.

Notebooking Our American Heritage ABeka

2008-11-08T22:39:00.000-08:00

The entire family was home today which is unusual for a Friday. Mr. Darling was off work and Peter didn't have any school. That means that Tink didn't have school either.

She has been really struggling in Reading so I told her she has to read the same story from her reader the entire week. She has always resisted this. She thinks she should be able to read the story once aloud to me and then go on. Well this year I see that this can no longer continue. Now I put her words for the next weeks book on the word wall so she always stays ahead of the book. We read her book from Reading A-Z once aloud on Mondays. Then every day after that she has to read the book to herself until the following Friday. On Friday she then reads the book aloud to me again so both she and I can see the progression. This method will also help me see if she really can grasp the story or if I need to give her easier books.

When Tink began Reading A-Z last January, she began at Level G. She is now at Level O. The stories have doubled if not tripled in length and the words have gotten much much harder. Today was the first day she had to read the story to me the second time since we are finished with the week. She was amazed that she could now read easily the sentences that were too hard for her on Monday. She went right over words like trickery, treacherous, oddity, pondered, and absurd.

Those were all words that had been on her word wall last week but when it came time to read the story on Monday she stumbled so badly I really began to wonder if I would need to back her up a few levels. When kids miss not only the words but the periods and such it effects their fluency. When the fluency goes than for sure they are reading at too tough a level. Tinks fluency was about nonexistent. But then I had to ask myself; Is this just a bad day for her or is this really too hard?

The only way to answer that was to have her read the same story for the next three days than read aloud to me on the fourth. How she resisted it! Well she read the story again today and sailed over the hard words like she knew them all her life! Then she turns to me and says, "Mama I didn't really understand this story when I read it to you on Monday. It didnt make sense and now it does!"

I am literally jumping for joy! It seems that with Tink I always have to reinvent the wheel; always twist and tighten and rethink and redo. It certainly keeps me on my toes!

I've spent a good part of today putting together our history journals. We're using Our American Heritage by Abeka books but there really isn't a lot of hands on work or questions to answer in the book. The book begins with Christopher Columbus in 1451 and goes through all the Plymouth colony guys like; John Smith, Pocahontas, Miles Standish, Squanto, William Penn, and Benjamin Franklin. Then it it starts on the presidents from George Washington to Abraham Lincoln. Then it backs up from Lincoln in year 1865 to Clara Barton in 1821 and goes through Grant, Louisa May Alcott, Booker Washington, Laura Ingalls Wilder, and Billy Sunday. It ends with Billy Sunday in 1935.

Do you see what I see? I see a wonderful notebooking opportunity. So I got online and found these notebooking sheets to print. Then I googled the men's names and printed out pictures of them and maps and anything that had to do with them. The kids are going to paste these pictures on the worksheets and then right beside the pic on the given lines any point of interest about that person. I have four different pics of the lives of each man. I got the first three done and that will last us for the next couple of weeks.

I'm also excited about introducing Tink to Louisa May Alcott. Now I don't expect to read Little Women to her just yet. I was an avid reader as a child but even I couldn't get interested in Little Women until I was about sixteen. I can't tell you how often I tried to read it before I finally made it through! So to expect Tink to get interested at her age is pushing it but I am going to have the girls watch the movie Little Women.

And when we get to Laura Ingalls I am going to read Little House in the Big Woods to Tink. No, she's never heard that story. She is almost 11 years old and has never read or heard any of the Little House books! So far she has fought any effort on my part to get her interested. I'm hoping this is the year!

I have a lot more goodies to tell you about but I really must get to bed. I have successfully avoided a migraine for three weeks now! The keys to my success are sleep, B Complex, SAM-e, chromium, and spirulina. I've used all my keys today except sleep. So now I must sleep.

Thank you all for your prayers and support after the post below. It means a lot to me!

This weeks homeschool in Review

2008-09-20T22:29:00.000-07:00

Tink is loving the Bob Jones curriculum. Maybe Ive finally found something that will stick.

Tink aged 11

In Reading Tink Read: Music In Your Heart, Trumpets and Pitchers, An Instrument For God. In the workbook she did pages; 7-15 which involved labeling the parts of a violin, completing poems by finding words that rhyme, writing adjectives to describe Gideon, working with long vowels, answering true and false for story comprehension, looking at the main character and deciphering the characters feelings and actions, working with the letter r as a controlled vowel sound, and more story comprehension questions.

Vocabulary: Working on Word List I made for words that are coming up in her book that she doesn't know.

In Language Arts she is finishing the Abeka 4th grade book from last year. We have done a unit and half so far into this term. This past week we did pages 143 - 156. We worked with compound verbs, capitalization and punctuation, recognizing nouns, compound nouns, common and proper nouns, and working with complete subjects and complete predicates.

Math - we finished chapter 1 and are in the middle of chapter 2. We learned the five steps for solving word problems, worked with comparing, missing addends and unknown parts, worked with charts and averages, and place value. Thursday morning we went to Starbucks and Tink did Math while I worked on paperwork. She had a hot chocolate and donut while I had coffee and pumpkin loaf. It was a cool morning and just perfect for studying at the coffee shop!

Spelling: Tink took two spelling tests this week and completed the workbook pages.

Literature: Reading Jenny Wren. Tink is reading a chapter a day and she thinks it's killing her.

Electives were: Monday: Clay Creations, Tuesday: PE, Wednesday: Tink wasn't feeling good so she missed her Beginning Orchestra class, Thursday: choir and PE, violin lesson and violin evening class, Friday: Life Skills in which Tink baked two different kinds of cookies. Peter also helped with this.

In co-op Tink worked on writing a good topic sentence, she had PE and played board games.

Peter 7
Peter goes to a charter school and then does some stuff here at home that I give him on the side.

In Reading he did story comprehension worksheets, identified sentences that tell about the picture, did a high frequency word match, did a phonic analysis of vowel sounds, and consonants, practiced sight words.

In Language Arts he identified telling sentences

Math he worked with identifying congruent shapes and finding cubes.

Stories read this week by me to Peter: 0 (ahem) that is changing this week!

The Path To Fluent Reading

2008-09-09T11:01:00.000-07:00

...is strewn with many obstacles for the learning disabled child.

When I was a child reading was my favorite past time. I was on the hurting end of a spanking many times because I was reading instead of working. In my own home I am the only one that loves to read. Mr. Darling has never read a novel in his life. Even in high school he used jacket covers and cliff notes for his reports. Now our daughter Tink hates to read too although for very different reasons than her daddy.

Peter is still an unknown, only just now beginning second grade but I think...I hope... that in him I have found my reader! That boy loves having stories read to him. When he brings books home from school they are far more interesting than the books Tink would bring home on library day. Yesterday Peter brought home a book about sharks. He read as much as he could and I filled in the words he couldn't read.

Tink use to bring home books on Hannah Montanna or Scooby Doo or The Cheetah Girls. This was mostly due to the fact that during those first few years of school she had no love for learning and the only things she could relate to were the pictures on the covers of those books. She recognized them from TV. We have since banned the kids from watching Nickelodeon of Disney.

The banning has stopped Tink TV watching almost entirely. Peter though has discovered shows like, How'd They Do That, How Things Are Made and Animal Detective and would watch them by the hour. I am amazed at the stuff he has learned from those shows! There's hardly a conversation around here that he doesn't have some new fact or something to share that he has learned on those shows!

Tink rarely ever quotes a fact or shows interest in knowing how things work in the world around her. The only thing that truly interests Tink is her music. She loves her music Cd's and spends hours dancing to them. When shes not dancing with the music she is outside playing with her friends.

My goal this year is to get Tink to read! I am ordering her the Reading Pen in hopes of jump starting her reading. New readers will have no idea of the hours upon hours that I have spent in teaching Tink to read. If you would like to know the methods used you could click on the label Tink on my sidebar. Some would say that the things I did have worked; after all she did place in her grade level this spring on the state tests. But I know that her reading is halting and frustrating to her no matter what the tests show. Two years ago Tink was reading at a beginning first grade level so she has made huge strides but I want to see her reading smooth out and her comprehension improve. To that end I have ordered the pen.

Also with the coming of this school year we are adding in a library day. We did this last fall and it was very successful. I also started a Book Club in our co-op that I hope will inspire her to read more.

The co-op went off splendidly yesterday. The little girls who's home it was are both avid readers. Tink adores the oldest girl that is her age. The sisters are both reading Nancy Drew books and so the mother had made a desert from the Nancy Drew cookbook. Tink of course hated the desert. Her sensory issues will never allow her to like meringue but she did adore the idea! Tink has never read a Nancy Drew book so I'm hoping her new found friends excitement will wear off on her.

The co-op went off without a hitch. The day was gorgeous and warm. The first hour was spent in English Composition, the second hour was PE and the third hour was learning games. For PE. the kids played bad mitten and darts and then ran through obstacle courses. They loved it. There was a huge tree fort at the farm and Tink and her friend disappeared up in its leafy loftiness to share secrets. Tink told me later that it was so restful and peaceful up there and she didn't want to come down. I think she was overloaded sensory wise and the tree house was a nice reprieve.

When Tink got home she was a wild girl; running around the table with her plate at dinner, scooping ground meat out of the dish with her hands, hitting and punching Peter and just totally out of control. The day with all its new activities and new friends was just too much for her. She's doing so much better that I am not as vigilant as I used to be. Last year that would have never happened because I would have been prepared for it. This year I wasn't and it was disastrous. So next week I will be better prepared for this behavior. The classes are at our house so the reactions will not be as strong; hopefully.

So learning continues to happen with setbacks and triumphs to be sure but at least its happening. My goal is to have Tink a fluent reader by the end of this year. I will have to work hard to make this happen!

Im Drowning in Books and Clutter

2008-09-01T21:59:00.000-07:00

You guys would not believe the mess Im in! My house looks like a hurricane blew through. This is Labor Day weekend here in the states so that means a four day weekend for Mr. Darling. Since its been mostly a rainy weekend I decided to nab hubby for some furniture moving! Of course, there were the regular family things first like biking along the Columbia River, shopping at Ikea and the strip malls, dining out and all such things but then it was down to business. I had a plan and I wouldn't be deterred.

The plan was to gut the small school room, the one Tink and my students referred to as The Principles Office! It housed the learning table, the chest of drawers loaded with crafts and the bookshelf of curriculum. It was where I took the kids to study with them individually. I wanted to move that room down to my office which is much bigger and where the kids desks set and where the computer was. I hated being spread through two rooms. The problem was that my office was also a guest bedroom back in the day. It also held a bed and my sewing machine cabinet.

The job was to move the bed and cabinet up the hall to the schoolroom and to move the table and bookshelves and chest down to my office. Oh the mess; the unimaginable mess! I never knew I had so much curriculum! I could open a store with the stuff. All the drawers from the sewing machine cabinet and chest needed taken out. All the books and pens and stuff needed taken off the table and the bookshelf. The kids trotted up and down the hall with the stuff for over an hour! We piled it all in the guest room across the hall. Take a look!

This my friends is my guest room and this is my work for the day! As you can see I am no where near ready to start school tomorrow! I wont even show you the garden swelling with produce ready to be canned! Help! I am in one disorganized mess and it's killing me!

Fall 2008 Schedule

2008-08-27T22:26:00.000-07:00

Go to Haven at Hometo enter the contest for this tea themed giveaway.

This weeks assignment at Homeschool Blog Awards is to write about our plans for this coming school year. If this would have been last weeks assignment I wouldn't have been able to tell you much because I hadn't yet fine tuned our schedule or curriculum. But this week I put my nose to the grindstone and really concentrated on this.

I have posted our curriculum on my left sidebar with links to all the subjects if you are interested. Last year I used mostly Abeka. This year I'm switching to BJU. I've always been partial to Bob Jones but I've never used it as fully as I am this year. One of the reasons I am going with it is because of their intense Reading program. Even though my daughter is going into 5Th grade she cannot read at that level efficiently. The public school would have her in the 6th grade. The state has her registered as 5th grade and I have her in basically 4th grade stuff. Im hoping that if I take one more year to reinforce this Reading that she will be on her way and we can get rid of the Phonics part of our curriculum once and for all. For those of you who are new readers, Tink has a Sensory Processing Disorder so school is very hard for her. I still have not figured out what Im doing for Math.

My son will be in second grade and he will be attending a charter school once again. Bearing that in mind, this is how our day will look this fall semester.

6:00 am Everyone up, Breakfast and Bible Memory
8:00 am Leave for bus

Monday
8:30- 10:00 Clay Creations
1:30 Afternoon co-op consisting of:
English Composition( how to write short stories, book reports, essays, etc. This class is taught by me)
Art
Educational Game Time
Book Club

Tuesday -Thursday
8:30 Back home where Tink and I will begin our day with our morning walk.
9:00 School subjects in this order with no particular times
Reading
Math (still to be determined)
Language Arts
Spelling
Geography (book still to be determined)
Band
Violin
Choir
PE

Friday
Life Skills (this will focus on everything needed to run a home efficiently)
Band

We will do History winter term and Science Spring term.

Our extra curricular classes are all in the afternoon save one. Clay Creations (Pottery) is Monday morning from 8:30 to 10:00 at an Art Studio two blocks from my sons bus stop. He catches the bus at 8:15 so that will work perfectly into our schedule.

The other electives this term are Band, Choir, PE and Violin. The first three are offered in the afternoons at our church school two miles south of me. For violin Tink takes private lessons at a little studio set among wild flowers and woodlands, in back of an adorable little cottage. Tink loves it. That is about five miles from our house. You can see we don't drive far for any of the classes.

On Monday afternoons I have started up a co-op with four other families. We rotate houses so as not to overload any moms. This has taken a huge amount of my time to get off the ground but Im excited about the possibilities and friendships that can come from it. The children in this co-op range from ages 5 to 12 so we have the classes divided into K-1 and 2-5.

It is very important to me that Tink takes a wide range of classes and that these classes be taught by people other then myself. This helps her in processing information from teachers who are not directly working with her from the sensory standpoint. In the real world Tink will have to be able to process instructions and information without compensation for her disability. This is part of what I do to prepare her for adulthood.

It also helps with her social inadequacies due to her disorder. It helps her learn what is acceptable behavior and what isnt. An interesting discovery was made about how children learn when a scientist, whose name alludes me right now, brought up his baby with a baby monkey to see what would happen. The gist of it was that the child's speech did not develop because he learned to bark and squeak like his sibling, the monkey. The scientist immediately stopped the experiment when he saw what was happening but this is the precise reason Peter attends a charter school for now. He needs to learn normal behaviors and not copy his sister who not only has sensory issues but has also been diagnosed with Oppositional Defiance Disorder. This is also why Tink takes classes with other children and why it is high on my list of life skills for Tink. I will write more about this nature and nurture study another day. It is fascinating to say the least!

So that my friends is our schedule in a nutshell. If you all want to read more about home school schedules and how people are organizing their school day just click on the link in the first paragraph. There's some interesting stuff going on in homes all over this country.

Peter moves to second grade

2008-06-12T15:14:00.000-07:00

Yesterday was Peters last day of first grade. I loaded up the kids and we went to his promotion and his picnic. he loved it. On the way home we rolled back the moon roof on the Honda and rolled down all the windows except Tiger Lilys. Then I cranked up the Disney station on the radio and we drove down the country roads playing the music as loud as we could in honor of my sons promotion to second grade; through the construction zones where hard hats turned to gawk at us...we just kept right on a goin'. We were celebratin' big time! The little boy I'm babysitting for the summer was here for his first day. Lets hope he doesn't go home and report what an odd bunch we were. But goodness, how the kids loved riding along in the wind like that!

I planted the garden today except the beans. I will plant them tomorrow. It's so good to finally have the garden in. It's just been forever this year. Thank you all for your comments on my gardens below. Gardens and friends just go together, don't they?

Well today my housekeepers come so I have to keep the four kids out of their hair. Tink has the Math part of her state test to do today so I'm going to take the boys and Tiger Lily to the park for the hour she's testing.

Im still sorting out this years school stuff. It's a forever project. I haven't even began to plan the fall yet. I'm too busy planning for the summer. I am getting the co-op off the ground so that feels good. We are all meeting in the park for our next meeting and having a potluck.

Today we started our summer read aloud program. Peter needs practice reading. He isn't reading where he should be by the end of first grade but he doesn't have a learning disability so I know that I can easily catch him up to grade level by fall. I'm already getting tutoring calls for fall and I'm not sure yet how I'm going to handle that. I guess I'll wait and see.

Tomorrow night we leave for a weekend in Seattle. The kids are excited because we decided to stay at a new motel up there that requires taking the ferry. They just love those ferry rides across the sound. I like going up their but oh my, fine cuisine is the name of the game at my in laws and yikes...can my diet afford it? I'll have to just do my best and not stress over it I guess.

The weather remains cool and today we had drizzle again. The rain is suppose to set in by tomorrow. At least there's an end to it in sight. We seldom get any rain July through September and we're almost there. We need to hang in just a wee bit longer.

Many of you are asking about my Dad. He is home from the hospital and doing well. My sister is staying there for this month. Pop sleeps the day away and still has the catheter and the tube into his back going to his k&dneys. He's still experiencing quite a bit of pain so continue to pray for him.

As usual the day threatens to get ahead of me. I have lots of watering to do this morning. While I'm outside working I've been popping sweet warm strawberries into my mouth off of my small little strawberry raised garden. Oh they are so yummy. Okay I'm going out to greet the day.