Our Day at the Giant Magnet

We headed up to Seattle for a day at the Giant Magnet. We didn't know what to expect, but we certainly didn't expect what we found. We got there a bit later than we had planned and had just enough time to eat lunch before heading over to McCaw Hall for the World of Laughter show, which was a set of shorter shows by a couple of the performers.

We arrived at the performance hall to find kids. Lots and lots of kids. It was chaotic and loud as the public school classes formed up outside the doors. Fortunately, being an individual family rather than a school group, we got let in and seated first...in the front row.



First up was this guy. He was our MC who also played a couple of really odd songs. The poor guy thought he was hip and funny, but he was really just a dork. Gosh, it's got to be painful to have your material fall that flat.


Now THESE guys are really weird! According to the MC and the Giant Magnet website, this is Godfrey Daniels but he has a couple of partners. His routine is completely silent and slow, but then you find yourself amused by the antics. It's really hard to explain.


Then after some more moments with our MC, we listened to this guy tell us a rather surprising story. According to the Giant Magnet website, this guy is part of Tahqua. He told us a story about how he was alive in his mother's belly and went into detail about swimming, and feeling, and thinking in the womb. Then he told about the birth and declared us all "awesome" because we were "birth warriors". His story was humorous and very descriptive. He was kind of like a combination of Native American and hippie stuck in the 70s.

Finally, the show concluded with a short skit by Jamie Adkins. It was a shorter version of the show we saw Tuesday night, so not quite as great as the first time. I would really love to see a full performance by Jamie. He is so darn good!


After the show, we headed outside where it was bright, beautiful, and sunny. The Space Needle looked awesome against the blue sky. (I've never seen it from this angle so had to get a picture.)

There were various free activities that were part of the Giant Magnet. Hula hooping, kite making, and working with clay were just a few options. With it being the warmest day of the year so far (74 degrees), we opted to play in the fountain. My kids have never played in a fountain like this, and boy did they love it.



Josh, who doesn't like getting splashed, threatened the fountain with a hula hoop. He mostly kept out of range of the spray, though the mist kept him cool. At one point, the fountain sprays stopped, leaving just a bit of water coming off the big dome. Josh, thinking it was safe, headed up to the dome and was standing right on top of one of the jets in the ground when it came back on. Boy did that shock him! He went running away in anger. I was quite a distance away at the top of the bowl (the fountain is located at the bottom of a huge depression) with Madelynn and had to yell for Mika to go running after him before he totally disappeared in the crowd. He was really unhappy about that jet!


At one point, I took Madelynn down to see the fountain. She didn't think much of it.


Mika and Sam jumped right in and had a ball. This especially warms my heart because not too long ago, this would have never happened. Mika was too afraid of getting water on her face to have this kind of fun.

The fountain won the battle; the sopping wet warriors returned to lay in the sun and warm up. Unfortunately for them, we weren't prepared for playing in the fountain so they went home sopping wet and cold.

It turned out to be a great day. The kids want to go back just to play in the fountain again.

Gardening

Due to our new interest in "real food" (organic, not genetically modified), we decided to try gardening again this year. The last time we tried, we used the usual row method with limited results. This time, we're trying the square foot gardening method...and we are getting the kids involved.

Last weekend, we finally had enough nice weather to actually get our boxes made, filled, and the planting begun.

Scott made the boxes and leveled the area we wanted to put them. My choice in placement was to get a much sun as possible while still leaving enough backyard for the kids to play (if we ever get the holes hidden under patches of grass filled enough to be safe).



Here, the boxes are down and the kids are using a large, plastic, sand toy shovel and hoe to help mix the dirt that's going to fill the box. This special mix is designed for maximum nutrients, drainage, and aeration. It's ingredients are outlined in the square foot gardening book.

Madelynn, if you look closely, is hanging out way in the back out of the way.


After deciding she was probably getting too much sun, we moved her to under the shade of a beach umbrella, which she thought was for helping her stand.


Sam striking his man-pose. While Mika, Madelynn, and I went off on errand (one of which was buying organic tomato starts that we didn't find), Sam stayed home and helped fill the boxes. Josh slept through it all.


Here's the finished backyard. We even dragged out our old sandbox for Josh. As you can see, Mika and Sam still like it even if they are almost as big as it is. Our garden boxes are in the background: four 4x4 boxes and a deep 3x2 box for potatoes and carrots. It was suggested we start small, and this is much bigger than the small suggested.

The next day, we began planting. Here are three of six squares of strawberries; the other three squares are in a different box. Each square has four plants. Using this method, you don't let the strawberries send our runners, instead you pinch them off so the plant puts all of its energy into making strawberries. This box will also hold two vine tomato plants, a zucchini plant, and a bush tomato plant. Normally, you want to stick with vine-type tomatoes to conserve space but we are trying both to see how they differ. We were also out of vertical squares (they need to be on the north side to avoid shading the other squares) but wanted more tomatoes.

We also planted some green beans, cucumbers, thyme, oregano, dill, basil, cilantro, romaine lettuce, spinach, carrots, and onions. More will be planted as the weeks go by because we are using a continuous harvest method to prevent it all from being ready at the same time. One thing I'll have to do is keep notes on how much is produced so we can better decide what to plant next year.

Of course, the kids will be involved in all of the steps. I'm even including math for Sam. We'll weigh what we harvest and find out how much that would have cost to purchase. When we have a total value for our produce, we'll subtract our costs and see if we had any savings, and discuss savings for next year since the boxes won't have to be remade.

Science, math, health...all rolled into one fun activity. The kids are excited about growing their own organic food.

Flexibility

This last week and this coming week has me feeling particularly grateful we homeschool. We have some great friends that are moving across the country, leaving on Saturday, and we have been able to make visiting with them our highest priority after attending already paid for extracurricular activities.

Wednesday we had the girls over while mom went to get her hair done by her favorite stylist one last time. That turned into an impromptu sleepover. The kids had lots of fun. We also got our ants that next morning so they all got to enjoy that together. Something they did outside for fun also sparked a fun science experiment that the my kids and I hope to do soon.

Friday we went to a dinner theater one of the girls was in. We enjoyed the dinner and the play.

Then last night, Mika spent the night over there. They are dropping her off at her Monday afternoon computer class.

We're hoping to go to the Pacific Science Center together midweek.

Finally, they are having a going away get-together Friday that we'll attend.

In between all of that, the kids have been exchanging email and talking via voice chat any time they can manage it.

If the kids were in school, nearly all of this would have been impossible. Our friends would be leaving and we'd barely get to say goodbye. I'm so glad that I can set aside school and take the time we need to just be with our friends. In between everything we'll watch some documentaries (we've been enjoying Meerkat Manor and Mythbusters) and fit in curricula when we can. There's time to catch up later, even if later extends into the summer. Friends are more important.

Ant Progress

Our ants have made amazing progress! Here's some photos of their work:


This is the front view. Nearly all of the tunnels are interconnected. There are two new tunnels being built towards each other that will connect into a small circular path soon.


Here is a view of the back. If you look in the far bottom corner, you'll see that it looks brown. That's because that section is being used at what appears to be a sleeping chamber. Most of the ants congregate there and barely move while a smaller portion will continue working in the tunnels. After a few minutes, individual ants will reanimate and crawl away to begin working again.


This is the back view from the other direction, with the sleeping chamber closer to the camera.

One of our favorite things to watch is the ends of the tunnels where the ants are digging. You can see their mandibles pierce the clear part of the gel just past the end of the tunnel, clamp down, and dig out balls of gel. After a couple of digs, they gather the combined ball and carry it up to the top.

Antworks is Cool

We had some friends spend the night Wednesday night. If waking up with friends isn't exciting enough, we had our ants arrive Thursday morning for our Antworks Illuminated ant farm.



The ants arrived in a small vial. You get 30 but some of them are obviously expected to die in transport because the farm indicates it holds 20-25 ants. We had about 6 dead ants and plenty of dead ant parts. Holding them in the little vial was CREEPY!

Since Scott wasn't home, the job of moving the ants from their vial fell to me. *shiver* Once we got them into their new home, we watched them for a bit.


The information that comes with the habitat says that it may take 24-48 hours for the ants to start tunneling. However, we had a good tunnel going after just 7 hours. It goes from the middle of the gel to the against the glass on the back side of the tunnel. Using the high magnification tool, you can see the teeth on their mandibles pinching the gel into little balls that they then carry up to the top of the habitat before heading down the tunnel again. If you look from the top down, you can see down the tunnel just a bit and watch them come up it. There's about a dozen ants working this tunnel.


They've also started a tunnel in the corner on the front side of the habitat. Only half a dozen ants are working this tunnel.


The ants have been busy overnight. Here's what we woke up to. The two tunnels don't connect yet (one is towards the front of the habitat and the other is towards the back) but will within a couple of hours.

Recently Fun

We had one day last week that was particularly fun. After a good morning, where we got a lot of school work done with a good attitude, we took some time to play after lunch. We had just received the newest issue of Family Fun Magazine, and in it were some boredom busters.

We started out by trying a drawing game. Everyone sits at the table with a piece of paper and something to draw with (we used a colored pencil). Setting a timer for 30 seconds, each person draws something on the paper. Then you rotate seats and rotate the drawing in front of you 1/4 turn before taking 30 seconds to add onto the drawing. After 30 seconds, you switch seats again and add to the third drawing. When everyone has added to each drawing, enjoy the zany creations you came up with. It was fun, and we had some rather odd drawings.

After that, we moved onto another activity suggested in the magazine. There were at least half a dozen.

Finally, we just started stacking some plastic cups:



It was pretty cool. The kids loved it. I wish we had more cups...I might go buy a bunch more to see what we can do with them.

Then it was time to do what must always be done to anything stacked:


It was a fun little excursion from our normal schedule. After we picked up, we resumed school as usual. We'll have to do it again sometime.

What little spur of the moment things do you do to add a little fun to your days?

Short Days

Yesterday, I wrote about how we are currently over-scheduled, leaving little time school. Sure computer club, swimming, art, and taekwondo all count as school credit, but the work we call "school" consists of spelling, grammar, vocabulary, poetry, literature, writing, penmanship, math, logic, history, science, etc. This is what we have to fit into those 16 hours a week we have left.

How do I manage to home school a 3rd grader and a 5th grader in just 16 hours a week? It has little to do with me, little to do with our curricula, and a lot to do with my kids. They are fast!

Yesterday, I wrote on our white board a list of work I wanted them to work on while I was gone. Knowing that I would only be gone for two hours, I told my husband that they had more than enough work to do. When I returned home, two hours later, both kids were done and reading quietly on their beds. Here's what I assigned them to do, in order:

Read a 4 page section of our history book about Henry V and write a paragraph about what they read using what we've learned in our writing curriculum. The writing curriculum requires that they include 4 (for Sam) or 6 (for Mika) "dress ups". Adding these dress ups can be tricky.

Read two subtitled sections (2 1/2 pages) in our science textbook about echolocation.

Analyze one sentence using the four-part analysis we've been learning. This means they had to identify the part of speech for each word in the sentence, all parts of the sentence, all phrases, and the type of sentence. It's challenging, at times, because some of Sam's sentences include direct and indirect objects, subject complements, and prepositional phrases. Mika's sometimes include those and gerunds, appositive phrases, and participial phrases. So, I only assign one sentence at a time.

Complete one page of math. Each page usually has 18 or 20 problems. Mika's working on fractions, sometimes doing ok, sometimes struggling. Sam is working on prealgebra...negative numbers with exponents right now.

One side of a penmanship worksheet.

One Venn Perplexor logic puzzle.

Complete another math page.

Do the other side of the penmanship page.

Complete a second logic puzzle.

Read a 4 page chapter about Joan of Arc in our history book and write a paragraph from the reading using our writing techniques.

Read a two page section in our science text book about microbats and bat ears. Complete a math exercise in the science book demonstrating the importance of bats. If a brown bat eats 600 insects on hour and eats 10 hours a night, how many mosquitoes will it eat in a night (assuming all it eats is mosquitoes and not other insects)? How many will it eat in a week? How many would 100 bats eat in a night? Week? If your city had a colony of 50,000 bats, how many would they eat in a night? Week? Year? It was a staggering amount, by the way.

Read through your current vocabulary chapter. Choose 5 vocabulary words and write appropriate sentences for each.

So, they finished all of that, in two hours, completely on their own. I never expected them to get all that done. I was shocked. When I got home, I looked over their work and we discussed and reworked anything that they missed. That took a grand total of 10 minutes for Sam and about 20 minutes for Mika (she missed more math problems).

The subjects that they didn't cover are ones that I wanted to work together with them. We'll focus on those today.

The Cons of Homeschooling

I received an email from a public schooled 9th grader doing a research paper for school. She explained that she chose the topic of homeschool, and admitted that she specifically writing about the cons of homeschooling. On that note, she asked me the following questions:

What are the major distractions for you and your family? How do you guys deal with these distractions, and do they ever take away from learning time?

Also, do the tv and/or computer serve as distractions for you guys?

Here is how I answered the questions:

Thank you for the opportunity to answer your questions.

Generally, the home environment provides much fewer distractions than the school environment. We don't have to take attendance, say the pledge, hand in homework, pass out papers, collect papers, wait while disruptive classmates are reprimanded, or wait until the teacher can get to each student to answer questions. Because of this, we are able to complete the same or more schooling in half the time or less. Distractions are certainly not a con of homeschool!

Anyway, since you asked, here are a couple of distractions we've experienced and how we combat them.

One of the major distractions to homeschooling is the sheer quantity of good curricula available to us. It can be difficult to choose curricula and sometimes the parent will get distracted by a new curriculum she has heard about. This leads some homeschoolers to jump around between curricula, looking for the perfect one. This may lead to a lack of continuity, and sometimes, gaps in learning. For example, I had difficulty discovering a history curricula in the first couple of years. In our case, this did not lead to a problem, as standard K through 3rd grade curricula for history/social studies revolve around learning about following rules, holidays, and our communities and social servants (per our local school district's Grade Level Expectations). These lessons are things that homeschoolers learn easily as a part of living life; we are out in the community experiencing our community resources rather than sitting in a classroom reading about them. Math is a subject where finding a curriculum early on and sticking with it is important. The different sequences used by different math curricula means that switching could lead to gaps. For example, I did not like our math curriculum and switched to a new one when my daughter was in third grade and my son was in first grade. The different sequences meant that I should have required my children to repeat a year. I did not have my daughter repeat; however, she has been able to come up to speed in the gap area (subtraction mastery) over time. My son completed the first grade curriculum by the first publisher by December, so I just had him do the first grade curriculum by the second publisher during the second half of the year, bringing him up to speed for second grade. In our case, this did not lead to a problem which is confirmed by their standardized test scores.

Another distraction experienced by some homeschoolers, us included, is the management of younger siblings during learning time. I have two students to teach, but I also have a two-year old and an infant to take care of. We solve this problem using a variety of solutions. Carefully chosen curriculum, organization, discipline, and flexibility have solved this problem in our home. My students can complete much of their school work independently, and they are expected to focus on school without policing. Each student has a binder that holds the current week's work, divided by subject. They know what needs to be done each day in each subject. So, if it is time for spelling, they know to log into our spelling practice program and practice their current list(s). They don't need my help to do this. They know that if it is time for math, they are to pull out today's math page and work on it. I supervise, provide instruction when needed (ie. we have one math lesson a week, the rest of the week is spent on practicing that lesson and review), and answer questions as they come up. This gives me time to manage the younger children while still being available to my students. Some subjects can be done on the couch while I am nursing the baby. We can read and discuss history, science, and literature selections during these times. Other subjects can be scheduled around nap times or times when the younger ones are preoccupied with other pursuits. When all else fails, we can pick up missed subjects in the evenings or on weekends when Daddy is home to help occupy the younger children. Flexibility is both important to successful homeschooling and a benefit to homeschooling.

You asked about distractions taking away from learning time. This question highlights a flaw in your thinking about homeschooling. When you homeschool, learning time takes place whenever you want it to; we are not limited to the 9am to 3pm school day. Rather, we can fit our learning time in where we wish. For example, last year my son had taekwondo class (which counts as PE) from 10am to 12pm Monday through Friday. We came home, ate lunch, and did the bulk of our school from 1pm to 4pm each day. This year, my daughter has a computer class on Monday afternoon, both kids have an art class every other Tuesday morning, and my son has taekwondo every afternoon/evening. On Mondays, school is completed from 9am to 12pm. On Tuesdays, we do school from 1pm to 3:30pm. On Wednesdays, Thursdays, and Fridays, we keep a regular 9am to 3pm schedule, but we take two 30-minute "recesses" and a 30 minute lunch. Of course, the computer class, taekwondo, and art class all cover school subjects, but for us, they are more of a fun, social time. We do our literature discussions as a bedtime read aloud as a family. We also have about a dozen field trips we take each year; they occur during the school day, in the evenings, and on weekends. As you can see, we "do school" all day long.

TV and the computer do not serve as distractions for us. We, like most homeschoolers we know in real life and online, have strict "screen time" limits. Our children are allowed 90 minutes a day to play on the computer and Wii. They each have timers that they use to keep track of their daily allotment. My experience is that our family limits are on the more generous side. Our TV is rarely on during the day. If my two year old is watching a video, it isn't a distraction because our TV cannot be seen from our school table. There are times when we use the TV and computer to enhance our learning. We watch both documentaries and movies to help give us a better understanding of what we are learning. For example, we will be learning about Robin Hood as part of our Medieval History studies soon. Besides reading our history text, we will also read the classic novel, The Adventures of Robin Hood, see the 1938 film, and watch Men in Tights just for fun. We do not experience TV and computers as distractions.

I hope that answered your questions. If you have follow up questions, or additional ones, feel free to email.

Personally, we do not experience distractions as a negative to homeschooling. On the contrary, I find the things that I jokingly refer to as "Homeschool Distractions" to be benefits to our educational experiences. Things like running off to the science center or history museum, taking a day off to visit the beaver ponds with some friends, spending the day molding coco puff castles, or curling up on the couch to read a good book are all homeschool distractions AND valuable learning experiences. I had a hard time coming up with anything else to mention. I think homeschoolers are very creative about finding ways around distractions in order to have a successful home school.

A Day in the Life of Us

Sometimes people wonder what a homeschool day looks like, and I can tell you that I seriously doubt any two homeschool families have similar days. I definitely think ours isn't typical but I thought I'd keep track of our basic day so I could share.

6:59am -- My alarm was due to go off in 1 minute so I turned it off and promptly fell back to sleep.

7:57am -- I finally dragged myself out of bed, checked my email, gave Madelynn her morning medicine, got dressed (no shower), got Joshua dressed and nursed Madelynn. The big kids did their chores which consist of getting themselves dressed, brushing their hair and teeth, making their beds, feeding the animals, and putting away the dishes from the night before. They also get their own breakfast and help Josh get his. As I got the diaper bag ready to leave, Sam changed Madelynn's diaper and got her dressed.

9:05am -- We all got into the car and left for MOPS. On the way, we listened to our current Harry Potter book on CD.

12:30pm -- We arrived home from MOPS. After walking into the house, I promptly clean up three spots of cat puke we found, made lunch (tuna sandwiches and Doritos), ate lunch, and checked my email and Facebook. Madelynn napped in her swing.

1:05pm -- Finishing lunch, I had the kids start their Bible lesson for the day. While they did that, I recorded Mika's spelling words into SpellQuizzer and helped Sam with a question on his study. Josh was on the computer. Madelynn was still napping in the swing.

1:25pm -- The kids and I gathered in the school room and completed a literary analysis lesson, using A Bargain for Frances. Josh was now playing on the Wii.

2:02pm -- We finished out literary analysis lesson (though I realize now that I made a mistake on part of it). Mika laid down with Josh to help him fall asleep for his nap while I did math with Sam. Madelynn slept on.

2:30pm -- Mika came down from getting Josh asleep. I let her do some independent reading. I helped Sam complete a key word outline for this week's writing assignment. (Mika did hers independently yesterday.) Madelynn slept on.

3:00pm -- Mika, Sam, and I read our next chapter in Story of the World about Australia and New Zealand.

3:20pm -- We finished formal school for the day. Mika and Sam each got on their computers for their free time. Madelynn woke up, and I began to nurse her while on my laptop.

3:30pm -- Sam got dressed for and left to taekwondo. Mika continued her computer free time. I continued nursing Madelynn while on my laptop. Josh woke up and played on the Wii for a while.

4:00pm -- Mika has been having trouble with this week's math lesson so I oversaw math practice. Mika then completed her spelling for the day, and we discussed gerunds for her grammar lesson.

5:00pm -- With school work done, Mika returned to her free time on the computer. I played with Madelynn. She giggled and then Mika got her camcorder to record it.

5:20pm -- Sam and Scott arrived home. I talked with Scott about an article I was reading about math, showed him the video of Madelynn giggling, and showed Sam some math on the white board that I had read about.

5:45pm -- Scott and I talked while he cleaned and cut cauliflower and I washed dishes. Mika and Josh played on the computer. Sam played with Madelynn.

6:15pm -- I prepared dinner with Josh's help. (He handed me potatoes to peel. He put cut pieces of potato into the pot. He stirred seasonings into flour and helped me dredge meat in the flour. Scott held and played with Madelynn until I needed to nurse and then took over preparation of dinner.

7:00pm -- Dinner was done. While we eat, I continue to nurse Madelynn.

7:15pm -- We decided to listen Harry Potter on CD until 8pm.

8:00pm -- Scott and I watch Hell's Kitchen while the kids play or watch it with us. Madelynn cries, gets a diaper change, and finally falls asleep.

9:00pm -- We wanted to listen to more Harry Potter.

9:40pm -- The CD ended so we decide to wait until tomorrow to continue with the next, and last, CD for the book. The kids retreated to their bedrooms to read their books (Mika is reading the Redwall and Warriors series. Sam is reading the Warriors series.) Josh and Madelynn are passed out on Scott and me. I'm writing this post.

10:30pm -- Lights out for the kids. Scott will probably go to sleep then too. I often stay up a bit later, reading, but probably won't stay up very late tonight because I'm really tired.

So, that's what happened today. Each day if pretty different. The thing that is similar from day to day is the fact that we don't really have a routine. I choose what subjects we'll work on based on a variety of factors, but that is another post.

A Japanese Meal

**Brag Alert**

We just learned about the Yamato dynasty of Japan. One of the suggested activities in our activity guide was to make a Japanese meal. We decided to try an authentic Japanese restaurant instead. It went VERY well.

We opted to order a couple of combination meals and an appetizer for us all to share. We wanted to try as many things as possible rather than each person only tasting what was in their meals. We also weren't sure how the kids (or picky me) would respond to Japanese food. We ended up ordering:

tori karaage - deep fried boneless chicken that has been marinated in our special sauce
gyoza - fried pork and vegetable dumplings served with a special sauce
maguro niggiri - tuna sushi
gohan - sticky rice
miso soup (Scott only but I tasted)
chicken teriyaki
beef teriyaki
deep fried shrimp
vegetable tempura
calamari steak
sake (Scott only)

All three kids loved the tori karaage and gyoza. In fact, they begged us for more gyoza. Mika liked pretty much everything except the sushi, which she said wasn't good but wasn't bad. Sam liked everything except the sushi and teriyaki. Josh liked everything, especially the rice. He ate all of his rice and some of Scott's too.

The kids also had fun trying to eat with chop sticks. Mika was doing pretty good. Sam eventually got the hang of it well enough. They both refused to use the forks they brought us. Josh even tried to use the chopsticks. He wasn't as successful but he tried really hard and loved it.

The really special thing about the meal, though, had nothing to do with the food. While Scott was out in the entry with Madelynn (she was having a hard time and crying), an older Japanese woman came up to our table and told me that I had "the most well-behaved children she has ever seen in the whole world". She then stopped to tell my husband the same thing on her way out. Our waitress (who we think is probably in the family that runs the restaurant) also brought out kids some sherbert free of charge, though she didn't say why. They were being well-behaved in this quiet restaurant...even Josh.

Structure and Scheduling

Sometimes you see people write about a typical day in their home, or you are asked what a typical homeschooling day looks like. Well, in our home, there really is no such thing. I'm just not that structured of a person and life gets in the way.

Every time I try to add more structure to our days, I find that I'm more stressed and more happy about how things are going. I find that life gets in the way of completing that which is on my schedule. My piece of paper says I'm suppose to be doing history right now, but math took an extra 10 minutes, asked for help or drinks 10 times, and Madelynn decided she needed an extra few nursings. According to my paper, I'm exactly 78.3 minutes behind schedule...which makes me stressed out and likely to snap at the kids.

I think I try to add more structure into our days every school year. This year was no exception. I found a nifty, pre-made, schedule for our science text. It told us which pages to read each day and which activities to do on which days. It followed a 5 day a week schedule, which I prefer. It looked ideal...on paper.

This week was the week we'd be starting that schedule. Up until now, we've been finishing last year's textbook which we had gotten behind on. When I went to put the kids' work in their weekly binders, I saw the new science schedule and took a closer look. Start a new chapter mid-week, it says? Huh? Why would I ever do that? Do this activity on Tuesday and that activity on Wednesday, and this other activity on Friday? But what if we have an appointment or a field trip and we don't have time for science that day? I'll feel behind. It'll get stressful. I'll push the kids to catch up, maybe even get snappy.

So, we've gone back to our old way...the way that worked for us last year. There's still some structure to it, but the emphasis is on flexibility. I have a preset goal for each subject each week: 1 spelling list per week for Sam, 2 spelling lists per week for Mika, 1 chapter of history each week, 1 chapter of science every two weeks, and so on. My goal is to get the reading done and complete any complementary reading, movies, and activities during the time allotted. Which days we get it done, doesn't matter. If, on Thursday, I see that we've made great progress on science (and have another full week to finish the chapter) but got very little history done, I'll focus on history that day. Maybe we'll start the day with history and do more than we would normally to make sure we get it done and get caught up. If we don't get to an activity, I simply move it to the next week if I REALLY want to do that activity or drop it altogether. I got the basic work done (ie. the reading) and that is enough for that week. The goal is to keep moving forward and find that we've completed our curriculum by the end of the school year. The extras are just...well...extras.

Sometimes I don't get even the minimum done in a subject by the goal date. Sometimes, like right now, I hae 4 chapters of history sitting in my kids' weekly binder. Again, I don't stress it. Seeing it sitting there in their pocket divider each week reminds me that I need to step it up in history a bit for a while. (I'm especially not worried because I had doubled-up the history in my filing for the last few weeks to fit 42 weeks into 36) I know that we'll catch up by taking a day here and there to focus on history a bit more. It's the big picture I'm looking at.

Playing a game based on the last two history chapters.
It would have been dropped if I was worried about keeping on schedule.

So, what I'm saying, in short is:

I look at a bigger picture when scheduling structure into our homeschool. By doing so, we have time for errands, outings, field trips, appointments, and getting behind without the stress that would bring if I had a more strictly scheduled day.

It works for us.

What works for you?

Slow and Steady

I know I won't win the race but I'll get much closer to the finish line than I had hoped.

What I'm talking about is getting ready for the start of school which, for us, is next Monday. I previously talked about my filing system. I love this system because, once it is done, requires no more major planning for the entire school year. Between the end of my pregnancy and having a newborn, I'm not going to finish my filing before next Monday but I have gotten a fair amount done...and that makes me feel much happier than I was feeling.

So far, I've managed to get the following organized and filed for the year:

History
Our history comes with map and coloring pages for each lesson. There are other activities pages for some lessons as well. I plan on doing one lesson a week. However, there are 42 lessons to fit into 36 weeks so I had to double up on a few lessons. Once I figured that out, it was simple a matter of getting them into the correct files. I don't do any other planning. Looking into the file and seeing what lesson we are on next is enough for me. From there, I can hit the library and pull any supplemental books I want and look in the activity guide to see if there are supplies I need for extra activities or projects I want to add.

Science
I have a schedule figured out for our science and extra activities and experiments that go with each lesson. I cheated on this one and pulled a schedule that someone else created. It covers our text in only 18 weeks, giving me plenty of time to finish what we didn't get to in last year's text. So, following the preprinted schedule's example, I created a schedule for the remaining three chapters of that. Then, because the schedule has more than one week on each page, I filed them in the week that is listed first on the page. I'll just carry the schedule over from week to week.

Math
Samuel's math is filed by year. Because he tends to work ahead, I don't file his math by week. Instead, I file it by curriculum (ie. Epsilon, Zeta, Prealgebra) and pull a week's worth at a time. His math was easy to file. Mika's math was filed one lesson per week.

Logic
My kids really enjoy logic puzzles such as Mindbenders and Perplexors. This year, I went with Perplexors because you get more puzzles in a book for the same price. I also chose to get three different kinds of puzzles: Perplexors, Math Perplexors, and Venn Perplexors. I added up how many puzzles we had altogether, divided by the number of weeks we'll be doing school, and came up with the magic number of 4 puzzles per week. So, two pages (front and back) went into each week. I decided to keep is simple but still varied. One week has 4 perplexors, the next has 4 math perplexors, and the one after that has 4 venn perplexors, and so on.

Home Ec
I'm using this great, free cooking curriculum I found online. I printed out each lesson and filed those those. The curriculum is specifically written to girls but I want my son to be able to cook, too. I have them alternating weeks. I'll complete the lessons and recipes with one child one week and then complete the same lesson/recipes with the other child the next week. This way, they each get to complete all parts of the recipes rather than sharing the work. I'm have some house cleaning in there. Again, it's alternating but in a different way. One child will learn about cleaning one area of the house, while the other will learn about cleaning a different area of the house. These tasks will stay with them for an entire month before they move on to a different area.

That's all I have filed so far...but I'll keep working to get as much done as I can. I think I'll work on Samuel's language arts next, and both kids' writing assignments. Mika won't have a formal language arts, other than writing, but I want to think about how to plan what we are doing to make sure I'm remembering to make her work on her projects. Once I figure that out, I'll come up with some kind of schedule to add to the files.

Then I'll have to come up with assignment sheets for problem solving. That will be easy because I already know that I want to do two problems a day. DONE!

I'll have to come up with a schedule foreign language and drawing when I receive those materials. We probably won't be starting those two subjects for a few/several weeks.

Finally, if you'll look at the top of the right sidebar, you'll see a square for a spelling program. That's SpellQuizzer, which I'll use for spelling and vocabulary for Samuel and science vocabulary for both kids. I have to program in the lists for the year. The spelling words need to be done when Josh is either outside playing or taking a nap since I don't want his noise recorded in the background. The vocabulary will be added in when I can get to it. I'll get the first few weeks done sometime before we start school, and add in the rest when I can.

So, while I won't finish it all before Monday, I do have a good chunk of it done. I feel much better about starting school, especially since I still have time to get more done as I'm nursing Madelynn.

Learning Chess

This is a rather embarrassing thing to admit.

I just taught Sam to play chess. It's been years and years since I've played. So long, in fact, that I had to look up the rules to remember them all. First, I taught him how to set up the board. Then we went through each piece and how they moved. We discussed a few of the lesser used moves like castling and en passant, a move I was not familiar with. Finally, we discussed the goal of the game and terms like check, checkmate, and stalemate.

Once he got all that down, he wanted to play. I think he learned a lot in that first game. One less was that you have to pay attention to the game. I moved while he was watching the tv. He had no idea which piece I had moved and to where. It's a good lesson that he needs to learn, in general, so I didn't tell him which move I made. He also learned about getting too excited about capturing a piece only to realize on my next move that he had just sacrificed an important piece. Ooops! A pawn isn't worth losing a knight or rook.

So, play went along until I had captured all of his pieces except his King. This is where my lack of practice, skill, and strategic abilities shows up. Despite my having captured every piece, we still tied. Yep, the game ended in a stalemate. His king wasn't in check but neither could he move it to any piece without putting into checkmate. At first thought, this seems like I won but the rules state that a stalemate is considered a tie.

So, my son tied his very first game of chess.

Organized Homeschool Helps Independence Happen

Yesterday, I described in detail how I organize our school year. One of the things I love about this system is that it really helps my kids work independently, releasing me to spend my time on other tasks. I'm always available to stop what I'm doing to help...answering questions or giving an occasional, quick math lesson.

When I say my kids can work independently, I'm talking about the fact that I can tell them to get started on school and off they go, without help from me. They know that their work is in their binders. All they need to do is grab their notebook and a pencil and get started.

Part of being independent is the ability to do their work in whatever order they wish. Often, they'll just start at the first divider and work their way through the dividers. Other times, they'll jump around, working in whichever order they wish. I just have to keep an eye on Sam who will do math to the exclusion of everything else.

The kids know how much to do in each subject. For us, it's usually as simple as "do one side of a page each day" or "do one page, both sides, each day". They remember how much to do in each subject, and if they don't, they can look at how much is in the divider and figure it out. Another option is to add a sticker to the front of the pocket with a reminder of how much should be done in that subject. They also have the option of doing as much in a subject as they want, as long as everything is finished before the end of the week. They are not so good with that option.

The goal is to get everything done by the end of Friday. I don't really care how they get there, whether it is a little bit each day or all of a subject or two each day. On Saturday, any unfinished work is completed. It adds a little motivation to get it done, because the kids don't really enjoy spending their Saturday sitting at the table doing what they should have done during the week. Oh...and they get no breaks on Saturday...you work until it is done.

In the subjects that I've chosen to save for doing together, they skip those until I'm ready to sit down with them. Usually, this is history and science. Sometimes they'll remind me. Sometimes, I'll ask them if they are done and they'll tell me that everything except history is done, and that reminds me to sit down with them to do it. I won't penalize them for not getting this work done by Friday since it is often my fault that it isn't done. Instead, I eliminate some of the extras in these subjects, sticking with the basics to catch up.

Homeschool Organizing

Last year, I wrote about how I found this great organizing method for homeschool organizing and was implementing it for our own home school. Well, last year was our best year, by far! We never got very far behind; a few times, we got a week behind in a subject but it was so easy to catch back up. We finished most of our curriculum early, and the rest was done by the time we were ready for our summer break. Best of all, it required a few days planning at the beginning of the year and that was it. The rest of the year required very little work for me. As the year went along, though, I figured out a couple of small changes I wanted to make for this year.

I've been working on getting this done enough so I could have some pictures to go with this post...for someone who's waiting for it. (Hello, friend!) I'm trying to get as much done before the baby comes. I'll finish up as I receive the curriculum that I haven't been able to order yet. Then we'll be good to go for the rest of the year.

My method starts with a simply filing box. Because I only have two kids in school, one box is plenty. It's about 18" deep, I think, and wide enough for standard hanging files. If you have more than three kids, you'll need another box or two.


Here's a photo. In the file box are 12 hanging files, each labeled with the months of the year. I start with August as that is when the school year starts. If you look closely, you'll see that I have a 13th hanging file labeled "Sam's math"; I'll explain that in a minute as it is an extra piece that is probably not necessary for most people.

Each hanging file is filled with file folders. Each week of the school year, including holiday weeks, are accounted for with its own separate file. Each child has their own set, which is color coded.


Here's a close up of the file folders. Each one is labeled with the dates (numbers only) for the week. For example, you'll see 17-23 behind the August tab. This means that folder is for Monday, August 17th through Sunday, August 23rd. I always start with Monday because that is the first day of the new school week. I always include the weekend at the end because we use the weekend for finishing anything that wasn't done and grading.

If the week begins in one month and ends in the next month, I file it in the month it began. For example, if Monday is the 31th of August and Sunday is the 6th of September, that file will be labeled 30-6 and filed in the August hanging file.

You'll also see that there are two files, identically labeled, right next to each other. The pink one is Sam's work for that week. The blue one is Mika's work for that week.

What do I put in these folders? Everything. All consumables get pulled apart and filed. I figure out how much I need to file by taking the number of pages divided by the number of weeks we are doing school. If the pages are single sided, I'll put that number of pages in each folder. If the pages are double sided and the number I need in each week is even, I'll put the appropriate number of pages (ie. 6 pages to complete equals 3 double sided pages filed). If the number is odd, I'll round up (ie. 5 pages to complete equals 3 double sided pages). In this latter case, we'll work 6 pages each week and finish that curriculum early. If I want to do one chapter/lesson a week, I simply file all the pages that go with that chapter/lesson in each folder. If it is a subject that I don't have a consumable, I'll be creating assignment sheets or logs for those subjects. The assignment sheets can be as simple as read chapter three, or as complete as listing how much to read each day and adding in activities. I plan on using logs for some subjects. These are subjects where I tend to go with the flow and don't have to finish by a certain time...reading logs for reading/literature fit this category well. I'll also have a PE log so we can keep track of how much and what kind of activity they are doing.

The file labeled "Sam's math" has folders labeled "Epsilon", "Zeta", and "Prealgebra". I found out last year that I couldn't file his math by week because he likes to work ahead at varying speeds. He would do anywhere from 1 week to 3 weeks of math each week and it was too hard to keep track of which week I had last pulled from. So, I decided to file his math separately by year. This year, I suspect he'll complete at least those three levels of math so I created files for them and will pull a week at a time from which ever level he's working it. This gives me the flexibility of pulling out what he needs, when he needs it, easily.

That's PART 1: The Filing Box

Part 2 of my system is the three ring binder. Each child has one, color coded to match his/her files. Here's Sam's binder. As you can see, we are reusing last year's binders.

Here's the inside of the binder. Inside you'll find pocket dividers for each subject we are covering during the year. These dividers are plastic and have a pocket on each side. Each Monday, I pull each child's file folder for the week and transfer the papers to their binder. Spelling pages go into the spelling divider, math in the math divider, and so on. We have 16 dividers so that each subject has a separate divider. Our subjects this year are spelling, grammar, vocabulary, poetry, writing, math, problem solving, history, science, logic, Korean (for Sam), Drawing, reading, social skills, PE, and home ec. The work to be done is put in the front side pocket of the divider. When the work is done (whether it is a worksheet, assignment sheet, or log), the page is placed in the back side pocket of the divider. This way, they can't lose an unfinished page among the finished pages.

At the end of the week (Friday), I grab their three ring binders and go through them. Any pages undone are either finished on the weekend. We also go over any missed problems over the weekend. At times, I'll let unfinished work be added to the next week's work. This is especially true if it is a subject that we cover together as a group. It is easy not to get too far behind because you see the pages add up each Monday, which reminds you to spend extra time catching up.

On Monday, I empty all of the finished work from the binders and place them back into the file folder they came from. This gives me ready access to this year's completed work should I need it. This is handy for CVA's monthly reviews as I can grab the folders I need to reference as I write the review. I grab the new week's work and put it in the appropriate dividers.

I love this system. It required very little in the way of planning for the rest of the year. At most, I would look to see what chapter/lesson we were on next so I could grab those library books or experiment supplies ahead of time. If I had the time/energy/inclination (which I don't with the baby due), I might make it even easier by creating a third set of file folders for this stuff. Then I'd just have to grab the list from the folder and go.

Summer Reading

Have you signed your kids up for your library's summer reading program? It is a great way to motivate your kids to keep reading and learning through the summer.

The Tacoma Library just had their big kick off for their summer reading program, but it isn't too late to sign your kids up. All kids meeting their reading goal by August 15th, will receive a drawstring bag and 2 tickets (child and parent) to Pt. Definance Zoo, good on August 22nd. The library has arrange for Nanda to perform at 11am...get to the outdoor theater early for the best seats.

In addition to the free zoo tickets, every week there will be a drawing for a weekly prize. Kids will be entered into each week's drawing when they read another book and report it at the library or online. If your child finishes their ten books before the end of the program, they can continue to read to enter the weekly drawings. There is one winer each week.

Meeting the reading goal is easy. All kids have to do is read 10 books at their grade level. Qualifying reading includes any library book, magazine, graphic novel, or audio book. (They request that only library books are read towards the goal.) Younger kids can participate by listening to audio tapes or mom/dad reading books to them.

My kids are well on their way to finishing their goals. Mika is finished with five books already, and she'll be finishing her sixth later today. Sam has finished two books. I'm especially proud of him because his books have been on a sixth grade reading level! Josh has finally shown some interesting in being read to, rather than just looking at pictures and turning pages, and has finished four books. I know we'll be at the zoo on August 22nd. Will you?

Binary Anyone?

I was talking to a mathy adult that I know a week or so ago. Just to give you an idea of what kind of guy I'm talking about...he ran across a fact about the earth's rotation (I think) in his kids' science book that he thought was wrong, so he's been trying to work on a mathematical equation (at a calculus or higher level) to disprove the fact. Just for fun.

Anyway, I was talking to this guy, getting an opinion about a math curriculum I'm thinking/planning on using with Sam for high school math, when he suggested I teach Sam binary and other bases. So I did.

It took about 15 minutes to teach Sam binary and how to covert numbers between decimal (the numbers we normally use) and binary. He spent part of the rest of the day, and several days since, practicing. The next day, he figured out base 3 and base 7 on his own. Then he tried out base 14 but got it wrong. It took about 3 sentences to explain that he was wrong, why, and how it should be done. He can now do hexadecimal (base 16). The kid GETS math.

An interesting thing about this was that I never understood binary myself until about two weeks ago. After thinking about it, I figured out why it was such a mystery, so hard for me, before but so easy now. It's our math curriculum: Math-U-See.

Math-U-See is very strong on teaching place value, something that most math programs don't teach well. I never realized how important place value was when it came to understanding and doing math until we started using Math-U-See. It made so much sense, and made mult-digit multiplication and division make sense. Rather than just following the steps, as taught, you understand (I'm mean really understand) why it works. It is this understanding of place value that allowed me, and my son, to understand binary so easily. After all, binary is no different from the numbers we are used to working with, except the value of each place is different.

And THAT is another reason I like Math-U-See so much. I highly recommend it!

Stop Motion Part 2

Mika loved how her first stop motion video came out.

Not wanting to be outdone, Sam wanted to make a stop motion video, too.

So, they collaborated and made another video today...

How Does He Do That

Sam tested for his red belt Monday night and received it Tuesday night. He was very excited and happy about it. I know he doesn't look like it in the picture, but he really was.

It is at taekwondo that Sam shows off his amazing memory. During his testing, he is required to show mastery of the high blue belt hand technique, kicking technique, form, and one-step sparring. They also look at no contact sparring and knowledge of Korean terms used in the dojang. They also often require that you remember your hand and kicking techniques and forms from all former belts (white, yellow, orange, green, purple, blue, high blue). During the testing, the master verified Sam's age (age 7) and told him that he was only required to demonstrate knowledge of the five one-step sparring forms for his current belt only. He then asked if Sam remembered the others. Sam replied that he did and went on to demonstrate all 30 one-step sparring forms, in order, without hesitation. Now, that's an amazing memory!

Not only did he remember everything during testing, but since Tuesday evening he has learned his red belt hand technique, kicking technique, and five one-step sparring forms. He's learned all of that in just two evenings. And I'm not talking about learning it but still needing to practice it until he can remember it all; he learned and knows it all. The only thing left to learn is the form. Then he'll have to "sharpen it up" for the next 6 or 8 weeks before he will be eligible to test for high red. This is typical for Sam: to learn everything necessary for the belt within the first week.

I wish I had his memory!

Mika and Her Webkinz

While Sam spends his time learning math, Mika spends hers with her Webkinz pals. She plays with them. She takes billions of pictures of them. She makes stop motion movies with them. With only a tiny bit of help from me showing her how to add music and save it to the proper format for uploading, here's her first attempt...

Webkinz vs. Chores - Making the Bed