Homeschool 5.0

Wow. Nearly a year since my last post. Between the busy-ness of life and getting on Facebook, I've been swamped. I've been thinking lately that it is about time that I write up another homeschooling post. We are winding down with our fifth year at homeschooling and I think my views and experiences have evolved some. It's time to do some more thinking out loud to share where we are now.

We started homeschooling officially with the Pillowfight Fairy when she was four and a half and a kindergartner. We also had a two year old Adrenaline Junkie and a baby Happy Boy. When we began, I was about half exhilarated and half desperately researching how to go about teaching our daughter. My own experiences in public schools and both public and private colleges were my baseline and I had a vision in my head of how school at home would work. Tim was very supportive and did a lot of the theory and philosophy research to help us get a good foundation for what we were trying to accomplish. I was more focused on researching curricula and the practical aspects of doing school at home. We complemented each other well in that way.

So far, it has seemed like each and every year has been the most challenging. Each and every year presents new situations and challenges. As a result, I think we have adapted and grown. First, though, let me say what has stayed the same.

We are still committed to homeschooling our kids. The more we do it, the more it feels right. We see more and more benefits all the time. We like having our kids with us. We like having that time together whether work or play. We like being able to answer their questions when they come up. We like being able to address behavior issues right away. We like to be able to explain to them our perspectives on what they are learning and how our opinions have been shaped. We like to incorporate our faith into our school day instead of keeping it "separate and apart."

We still like our choice of educational philosophies: classical/eclectic. Besides the fact that it fits our personalities well, we find that it provides a strong foundation and yet is flexible enough to our family quirks and, yes, weirdness to be beneficial. We like sharing the old traditional stories handed down through the ages. We like teaching history and literature in a complementary way. I once said that I never really learned English grammar until I studied French. Now I can say that I never knew my English grammar so well as when I had to teach it and Latin, too. I am enjoying learning some of the things that I didn't get in school myself, whether from my inattention to lessons or simply because it wasn't taught anymore. I like seeing the change in my kids as they start to gain a good foundation in math, reading, and writing. They become more confident and ambitious. They begin to dream up ideas of what new things they want to do and challenges worthy of conquering.

Another constant is that although our kids are getting older, they have the same personality traits we noticed early on. The Pillowfight Fairy is still a high-strung serious kid in many ways. Right now she is nine going on "teen." She loves poetry and art, sports and space. She is predictably unpredictable. The Adrenaline Junkie has trouble focusing on one thing for very long. She is full of ideas and plans. She is constantly trying to improve whatever she is doing at the moment. She talks constantly, wants to meet everyone and make them her friends, and can not stop in one place for long. For those of you familiar with Bellwether, by Connie Willis, I can describe her by saying that she's got "itch." If anything, they aren't changing so much as deepening their personalities and becoming more defined. We are more familiar now with the Happy Boy's personality. He's our do-it-yourselfer. He is very independent and head-strong to the point of extreme stubbornness. He is still very much a happy kid. He just is less so, since he doesn't get his own way so much. The Chunk is a bit of a charmer. He is more of a people person than his brother. But I see some signs of an independent streak in him too.

We still still care enough about these kids to do what is in our power to give them the best education we can. As I say this, I know that someone will want to take that sentence and twist it into something I do not intend, namely a judgment against someone else. Let me elaborate for clarity. Our caring for our kids is our motivation. This motivation prompts us to act and make decisions in regards to their education. We can only act and decide in the framework of what we have power over. The education that is best in our eyes is the education that suits them and allows them to advance and be challenged in ways that bring out the best in them.

The final thing that stays the same is that I always seem to agonize every year about how much to teach, whether I'm over scheduling, and whether there is a better way to accomplish our goals. I usually make a very ambitious plan. I never complete absolutely everything that I plan, but I do get us through most of it and more of it than people generally expect us to do. I think it is healthy to keep asking myself if there is a better way. It keeps me from getting too complacent.

So, what has changed? We have four kids now and have said goodbye to another who was with us all too briefly. We have even busier lives than five years ago because we have chosen to not put some dreams on hold while we raise our kids. Some of those dreams have been remodeling projects, raising food, Tim's multitude of hobbies (Musical Theater being the currently active one), sewing projects, being hospitable, and keeping ourselves fit. The older our kids get, the more circles of connection intertwine through our lives and provide more and more commitments.

These past years I have also learned that good planning up front pays off each year as I try to get our lessons completed day after day. Life doesn't flow calmly and seamlessly from one thing to the next. There are bumps in the road of life. The best laid plans have to still deal with sicknesses, injuries, special occasions of many types. It is also true that no matter how well I plan, every lesson plan eventually has glitches and a need to switch to "plan B" to get us to our goals. Our most obvious glitch this past year was that our art lessons weren't lining up very well with when Tim was able to work with the girls (he being the best prepared to teach this year's art lessons). We are a few months behind on the planned art lessons. So, instead of giving up or over working ourselves, plan B is that art lessons will pick up again as Tim's schedule frees up and continue as part of our summer light load of work.

This next year, I expect to do some major shifting of methods as our Pillowfight Fairy leaves the grammar stage and enters in on the logic stage. In the logic stage, she will have more responsibility to work on her own. We will be working more on the whys of things rather than merely the whats of things. She will be learning formal logic and real life problem solving to a degree she has not had before. This will be a fundamental shift in our methods. It will be a shift that is both tricky and helpful as I have two younger kids still working at the grammar level (plus one that will be wanting Mommy to read to him all the time). Partially because of our busy lives and partially because of the many changes coming up, I am later than usual in doing my yearly planning. I have only a simple diagram of what I want to accomplish. Normally by this time of year I'm putting the final touches on my lesson plans and have all needed books and supplies purchased. I still have some major decisions to make about what school will be like for the Pillowfight Fairy. Then, once those decisions are made, I need to plan the reality of how three kids will learn their lessons everyday. When we do school together, we all have to adjust as each member of the family has changes to deal with. Even though I have been pleased with how the girls have been progressing in our chosen curricula during the grammar stage, that doesn't mean I can just repeat everything exactly as it was done before. They are each individuals of vastly differing personalities and we have to find a balance that works for us all.

Another thing that has changed over the years is that I have found that when I talk to people about homeschooling, I am less likely to deal with the usual talking points that come up between homeschoolers and institutional schoolers. I am more likely to talk about goals and results. I suppose that plays to my tendency to focus on practical issues. I care about theory. But, I see the goal as coming first, then the theory is what you pull from to choose your actions. The results are important, because they give you feedback on whether your theory is helping you meet your goals. Since every individual has a different set of goals they are starting out with, you really need to back up to that to figure out if you are speaking about the same things or simply talking past each other.

I am also less concerned that my kids don't like the work that I insist that they do. I don't subscribe to the theory that all learning must be happy and fun. It is nice when my kids enjoy their schoolwork, but I want them to learn some of the stuff they don't enjoy too. An example of this is where we have been making our kids learn piano. They hate to learn piano. They grumble every day they practice. Yet, we have noticed that they have learned and made progress. They were once despairing of ever succeeding, and now they know that they can in fact do it. They have gained confidence and enjoy showing people their skills. They goof off on their own time, playing the piano for fun sometimes. We are not completely heartless in our dictates, however. They have expressed a desire to play instruments other than the piano. We happily will comply with their desires (The Pillowfight Fairy wants to learn guitar and the Adrenaline Junkie wants to learn harp). But, we will do so on the condition that they achieve a particular level of skill at the piano first. As they grow older, I expect we will do more of this sort of thing. Once they have a good foundation in an area, we will allow them more say in what they learn. For the upcoming school year for instance, I gave the Pillowfight Fairy a choice about her language studies. She could continue learning Latin or she could switch over to learning a modern language. Since she had expressed interest in the past in learning Spanish, I had expected her to choose that. Instead she surprised me by choosing to continue in Latin.

Earlier I mentioned that I started out on this journey with my own schooling experiences as my baseline. I was trying to guide our homeschool journey based on that and a vision for something different. Now I find that while teaching our kids, that baseline is shifting. My experiences now include public school, private school, and homeschool. My vision is not merely something in my head anymore. It is a reality that we live with daily. That vision is less nebulous and more concrete with every passing year.

A Typical Homeschool Day For Us

I don't know that I've ever described in detail what a typical homeschool day looks like for us. So I took the time to take notes along the way today to help me describe the day in detail.

Disclaimer: This was a typical day in that we didn't have anything out of the ordinary planned for the day. Not every day looks like this. Some days have more work, some have less. Different subjects may be covered from day to day. Some days we start earlier, but we rarely start later (today was a late start day). I do not schedule each minute. I keep in mind what is important for me to accomplish for the day and just keep plugging away until we finish. As you will see, it can be rather chaotic and busy. If there is a badly timed appointment or someone comes down sick, It throws everything off. Also, I don't need to do a lot of lesson planning along the way. I do all of my lesson planning for the year before the school year starts (not standard practice, I'm told), so that I just have to pick up on the next day's lessons where we left off in the plan. This rendition does not include all conversations had along the way. I don't tell about all of the bathroom trips or diaper changes. I skipped at least one altercation between kids. This is simply to give a feel for what goes on during the day.

This is not anyone else's typical day homeschooling. Just ours. Every homeschooling family handles things their own way, based on their own priorities, skills, talent, time, resources, etc. I did not have this kind of schedule last year and I probably won't have this kind of schedule next year. As the kids grow older the family dynamics and the school lessons change as they need to to accommodate our changing needs. I am not dictating this type of life for anyone else (make your own decisions please). That said, my disclaimer is over. Hang on it's a wild ride....

6:30 AM: The Chunk starts fussing in his crib in our room. We don't want to be up yet, so we let him fuss a little while longer.

7:00 AM: Tim starts getting ready for the day while I feed the baby and change a diaper. I put the baby on the middle of the bed and lay down again to nap until my turn for the shower.

7:30 AM: I get my clean-up time while Tim takes The Chunk with him to get breakfast. Tim checks news online while he eats breakfast, and The Chunk hangs out in a high chair next to the computer and plays. I join them at some point and then wake up the other kids. The Happy Boy wants a Mommy cuddle and then breakfast soon after.

8:00 AM: Tim is off to work. The Chunk is moved over next to the table and I start making breakfast for myself and the kids. The Happy Boy asks for green eggs this morning and I'm in a good mood and oblige. He and I have green eggs and toast.

8:30 AM: The Chunk starts to fuss since he is seeing us eat. I take a break from breakfast to feed the baby his "second breakfast," rice cereal and mushy bananas. In the meantime the girls wander in. After the baby is finished, I fix the girls breakfast. They are in the mood for toaster waffles this morning with their preferred toppings. Then I get to finish my breakfast. The Happy Boy finishes breakfast first and asks to play a computer game.

9:00 AM: The Happy Boy is on the computer while the girls get dressed. I put dishes in the dishwasher and run it (I forgot to the night before). I bring in two basketfuls of clean laundry that didn't get folded from the day before and dump them on my bed, deliver previously folded clean laundry to various bedrooms, and pay a bill. The girls have gotten dressed and come out to play on the computer, too. The Chunk has been playing on his playmat all this time and is starting to get fussy. After a diaper change and swaddling, he goes down for a nap.

9:30 AM: I help the Happy Boy get dressed. He then gets out some paper and a pencil and starts drawing and writing. He asks me how to spell various words. I check emails and facebook. I do a status comment on facebook. Then I send an email to my doctor with an appointment question. Since my allergies are causing me trouble this week, I do a sinus rinse. The Happy Boy comes over to watch (cheap thrills).

10:00 AM: I start lessons with the Pillowfight Fairy doing a Bible reading and a review of the latest latin lesson. The Adrenaline Junkie decides to make a home-made coloring book in her bedroom and the Happy Boy finishes off one more game on the computer. While the Fairy finishes her Latin lesson on her own, I do a Bible reading with the Adrenaline Junkie. Next, the Happy Boy asks for a snack, cheetos. I fix myself a mug of hot tea and put some chicken in the crock pot for tonight's dinner. I hear a cry over the baby monitor so check on the baby. It was only a phantom baby cry, he's still asleep.

10:30 AM: Back to lessons, I do a narration practice and writing practice with the Pillowfight Fairy. We read a chapter from the Last of the Mohicans (an elementary school level adaptation), while the Happy Boy is building a train track. The Adrenaline Junkie comes asking for help. She accidentally put some of her pages to her home-made coloring book in upside down and wants help to fix it.

11:00 AM: Back to lessons. This time I work with the Adrenaline Junkie while The Pillowfight Fairy plays in her room. We do some reading practice from a book of her choice. Today she chose "Madeline Says Merci." While we read, the Happy Boy climbs into Mommy's lap to listen to the story. Then I have her copy a sentence that I choose from the book. The Happy Boy goes back to his trains. The Adrenaline Junkie next has a spelling lesson and a math page. I hear the baby wake up during the math lesson. I get him up and change his diaper while the Junkie finishes the page on her own.

11:30 AM: The Junkie rushes off to her room to play with her sister. The Happy Boy joins them and all three older kids have play time while I feed The Chunk his next meal "elevensies" which is just a snack of oat cereal. After he's done, he plays in his highchair while I make lunches for everyone else.

12:00 PM: The Pillowfight Fairy gets PB & J, string cheese and a pineapple fruit cup. the Adrenaline Junkie and Happy Boy have other tastes. They each get a hot dog, slice of bread, slice of cheddar, and raisins. The boy likes milk, the girls take water. I reheat some leftovers for my lunch, add an orange and finish off my now cold tea. The Chunk starts to think it isn't fair that we are stuffing our faces in front of him and starts to complain. After I eat, I get desert for the Happy Boy (ice cream and caramel sauce) then feed the Chunk his next bottle. It turns out that the baby wasn't as hungry as he was making himself out to be. I chalk it up to teething. The Adrenaline Junkie skips dessert. The Pillowfight Fairy eats all but half of her sandwich. I save it for later, guessing that she will get hungry before dinner time. Then I clear the table, wipe it down, and hand wash some bottles and other non-dishwasher items. The Pillowfight Fairy reads from a comic book of Calvin and Hobbes while the Adrenaline Junkie and Happy Boy listen.

12:30 PM: After a while the younger two run off to play in the girls' room. The baby still is making not quite content noises so I pick him up and hold him while I check emails and facebook. My doctor responded to my message so I follow up on that. I surf the web while I bounce a baby on my knee.

1:00 PM: Our break is over. I put the baby down on his play mat while I get kids to clean up the bedroom. The Pillowfight Fairy has the job of sweeping under the dining room table. The Adrenaline Junkie and the Happy Boy take turns dusting various rooms of the house. I keep getting the kids focused on their chores until I hear a mad baby yelling from the other room. He has had enough of his mat and just wants to yell. I get him down for another nap.

1:30 PM: Chores are over and we go back to lessons. I start with a science reading with the Pillowfight Fairy. Afterwards I ask her to draw a diagram of something we read about. She asks to do a 3-D craft to illustrate and I agree. While she does that, I read to the other two. Three stories later the Pillowfight Fairy is done and wants a story. I read to her and the Happy Boy while the Adrenaline Junkie starts her piano practice.

2:00 PM: Then the Fairy reads to herself and the Happy Boy while I check the food in the crockpot and shift the loads of laundry. Then I call up Tim to check in with him. I tell him how the day is going and he reminds me to call someone about a babysitting job we need done. After the Adrenaline Junkie finishes piano practice, she celebrates because she's done with schoolwork for the day. The Pillowfight Fairy does her piano practice next while the others play with legos. I call our potential babysitter and leave a message. Then I make a new batch of formula, unload the dishwasher and reload it with the lunch dishes. I bring in the mail and sort it.

2:30 PM: I hear the baby crying over the baby monitor. I go get him up, change a diaper, and give him his "tea time" bottle. I note that the lego play has transformed into quite a production. They are re-enacting the scene where Moses breaks the tablets of the ten commandments because of the Israelites' worship of the golden calf. The Chunk gets some cuddle time with Mommy while we wait for piano practice to end.

3:00 PM: After piano, all three older kids want a snack. The Pillowfight Fairy gets the remainder of her sandwich from lunch and some potato chips. The Adrenaline Junkie wants a handful of cheerios (new in the house again since we are starting to feed solids to the baby). Happy Boy gets a graham cracker and potato chips. I then record what school work was completed thus far while the baby plays on a blanket nearby. I play and sing with the baby and the Fairy comes and joins me. The other two have to pick up the legos they left out.

3:30 PM: Next the Pillowfight Fairy cleans the table to get ready for more school work. The Adrenaline Junkie gets out a flannelgraph to play with. The Happy Boy watches the flannelgraph play for a while and then asks for another computer game. I am carrying around the baby with me at this point. I sort the clothing piles on the bed according to whose they are. I get the Fairy started with her math page. I stay close by to help her stay focused on her work.

4:00 PM: The Chunk is fussy and tired still. His last nap was too short. I put him down for a nap again and deliver the sorted clothes to the proper rooms. I come back to the Fairy and help her remember some parts that are still new for her and we work through them together. The computer game is too distracting, so that gets turned off and the Junkie and Happy Boy clean up the room and then stage a mock battle.

4:30 PM: With the math page done, the Pillowfight Fairy joyfully goes off to play in her room. Her school day is done. The Adrenaline Junkie is allowed to pick a video to watch (the kids have to take turns and this was her turn to pick a video and to say prayers for us before meals).

5:00 PM: While the kids are enjoying themselves, I check the math page and make sure a needed correction gets made. Then I break up the chicken in the crockpot and add BBQ sauce. I make sure the bread rolls for BBQ sandwiches are thawed and cut up some carrot sticks as a side dish. The Pillowfight Fairy wanders out from time to time to watch parts of the video. Then she goes back to her own entertainments in the bedroom. I have a spare moment again so decide to do another sinus rinse, without an audience this time. I finish just in time. I start to hear happy baby sounds over the baby monitor.

5:30 PM: I get The Chunk up from his nap. I give him an afternoon snack of barley cereal. He then gets play time in his chair while I sit nearby getting the next days lesson books in order and finish recording the days schoolwork. The school day is done, and dinner will be ready when Tim gets home.

The evening activities vary quite a bit from day to day. There is usually some clean up in the kitchen. Kids have to clean up toys before bed. Our main accomplishments tonight were having Tim check my calculations on our State Tax Return that I had done on a previous evening and my composing this blog post. The kids played some more. Tim spent some time in the backyard checking on some pepper plants and just enjoying the outdoors.

It was a busy day. I didn't get much time to rest in between one task and another. I do get lots of variety of activities. On some days I make a point of going for a walk with the kids or spend time in the backyard. I actually avoided that today because the allergens are overloading my system lately. When I go to sleep tonight, my rest will be well earned.

Observations from a week of sunshine

The following are some thoughts that were triggered in the last week. They run the gamut of topics so I won't try to group them. It has just been one of those weeks when all sorts of thoughts are stirred up.

We had our first full week of sunshine in a long long time. It was wonderful. I had started to forget what it was like. Once again we were able to go for walks (the neighbors tell me they think of them more as parades). We managed to get three walks in this week. I would have done two more except for appointments that disarranged the other two days. We did get some time for play in the backyard too... once the ground dried out for a few days. The kids and I always feel more energized and happy when we get some outside time.

through the years I have been thinking more and more that we need time outside among growing things. We need to become familiar with the land and sky. We need to acquaint ourselves with plants and wild life. We need to learn the ways of weather. It is when we learn more about these things that we become more acquainted to the God who made them. When we learn more about God and his creation, we start to understand the ways of God and how the world really works. When we isolate ourselves from nature in man made buildings, grouped into man made cities, doing man made jobs, for man made reasons, we start to lose our grasp on the character of God. We lose our grasp on reality and lose perspective on what is really important. Now I will agree that these man made things are useful and in many ways necessary for our survival. But they are not all there is and they can lead us to destruction if we don't open our eyes to that which was not made by man.

One day this week I took the kids for a playdate with friends while I had a dentist appointment. It was scheduled for our most productive time of day so I just let the kids have the day off from school. They loved that too. In some ways I got some time off too, but I noticed that most of the day was chaotic and the place turned into a big mess. I keep rediscovering that whenever we have a schedule or even a general plan for the day, everything goes much more smoothly and needed things get accomplished. But, every time that I let schedules or plans go out the window, nothing much gets accomplished at all. I even think the kids don't get to have as much fun in some ways. They get caught up in minor issues instead of the things that are more important to them. They end up never getting around to the stuff they said that they wanted to do. This theme keeps recurring enough that I'm tempted to go to a more year-round schedule than what we currently have. The main reason I haven't is because I have a tendency to over-schedule myself. I need the extra time to deal with days lost along the way for appointments, sickness, or other unplanned events. I need the time to consider what worked and what needs to come next. I need a break to get ready for doing it all again, even if the kids tend to get a bit chaotic. I guess I'll just have to give the kids a basic non-school day schedule to give them their needed structure.

Today, we had the Pillowfight Fairy's main evaluation to determine if she has Asperger's Syndrome. The preliminary answer to that is "no." But the evaluation was useful, because it did determine where she is having communication and social issues that can be improved upon. We will probably be investigating how to best integrate some extra training into her school schedule next year. And for those who are always questioning homeschooling's ability to properly socialize individuals, our daughter's issues are not the result of homeschooling. We know this because her siblings do not have these issues even though they are growing up in a homeschooling environment just like their sister. Rather these issues are individual to her and would be there whether she were homeschooled or attended a traditional school. In fact, it is her differences early on that convinced us that public school or even an institutional private school would be inappropriate for her. And it is her differences now, that made us wonder if there was something more specific that needed to be addressed. I like that we have the flexibility to find our way and follow the path that our daughter needs to go along. I like that we as her parents can weigh our options and determine what seems best for her, rather than trying to fit her into someone else's idea of how she should be educated.

I find it interesting that although we started homeschooling to fit the needs of our eldest daughter, we discovered that it fit the needs of the whole family, too. The only drawback I see to our homeschooling is the great effort that is needed to get it done. I don't say this to mean that I regret it. Homeschooling is one of the most challenging and yet rewarding things that I have ever done. I just keep coming back to the feeling that other people would also benefit from homeschooling, but they are afraid of the challenge and the work. Yes it is a lot of work. It requires discipline. It requires sacrifices in time, money, and numberless daily choices. But like the farmer working his land or the musician practicing his instrument or the businessman trying to succeed in his career, good results only come if you put in the work that is needed. I think if you asked any teacher they would probably tell you they wished their students, students' parents and everyone in the education process put in a 100% effort into the lives of their students. It would make a marvelous difference. We are nearing the end of another year of school and I am feeling drained and overworked. But I also can see the progress made and the good work done. It came little by little and day by day, but all of the work was worth it.

I broke down and joined facebook this week. Now that I'm in the inside, I can see how useful it is to help people manage their contacts. After only three days, I'm already starting to see how different people use it in different ways. I can also see how people can abuse it and how some people can have it become an addiction in their lives. I'm finding some of my library training is coming into use. After all, facebook manages information. People have to be wise about how they present their own information and wise about how they use other people's information. There are a lot of people out there who are not wise. By the way, if you want to be my friend on facebook, you will need to be my friend off the computer first.

School Progress

I suppose I'm overdue for a progress report about how the schoolwork is going. The girls got a little out of sync with their school work during the month or so we were doing half days. The Adrenaline Junkie, being on a half day schedule anyway, continued at the regular pace. The Pillowfight Fairy, being on full days, is now three weeks behind her sister. We would have been finishing up at the end of April if this were a typical year. Since it is not, we will probably be finishing up near the end of May. Although the Junkie will finish first, I plan to continue her studies with a variety of items to keep her busy and learning as well. The plus side to all of this is that they will have less time to forget what they learned before the next school year begins in July.

So, What is the Pillowfight Fairy doing? In her Bible reading, she is starting II Kings. In her spelling, she is being challenged with 4th grade level work, although I consider her 3rd grade by age. She has daily piano practice, and although she complains, she is doing well and making progress. I'm pleased with her progress in grammar, and she is quite good at sentence diagramming. She likes her Latin lessons enough that she has been spontaneously making sentences with what she knows and trying to teach it to the Junkie and the Happy Boy. She is getting the hang of narration and questions for reading comprehension which I have been concerned about in the past. She still has trouble when we read something she has no interest in. She has also developed a dislike for most of the literature I have chosen for her to read. Right now we are reading the Hunchback of Notre Dame (an adaptation for elementary school level) and she doesn't like it much, but she is starting to identify with Esmerelda. I think she is going to be furious when she finds out the ending. It will confirm her suspicion of all things French. We are also studying about the French revolution in history. She was really worked up about how French society, pre-revolution, was soooo unfair. Tomorrow I get to teach her about the reign of terror and how French society, post-revolution, was soooo unfair too. We are doing chemistry in science. Today we did an experiment that created visible layers of liquids of different densities. It was pretty cool. In math she is starting to learn about remainders when dividing and is getting the beginning steps toward long division. She is doing well. She is learning. Every little bit seems to build on what there was before. I feel like I'm starting to see progress in understanding, that previously, I was only trusting would eventually come.

What is the Adrenaline Junkie doing? She is practicing her reading everyday and getting better steadily. Currently we are using the "Phonics Bible" for this since she likes the stories and it gives good reinforcement of phonics rules. She is also practicing reading with the McGuffey Primer. But with the primer, I am having her do copywork exercises to practice writing. She has daily spelling lessons that help her learn simple words and reinforces the reading. Once a week I have her write out ten dictionary words from her spelling book as writing practice, vocabulary building, and composition practice by making up a sentence using one of the words from her lesson. She has daily math lessons and can add and subtract, understands a little about clocks and coins. She has made good progress with getting her two digit numbers correct and rarely miswrites them anymore. She also has piano practice. She has made good progress, too. She struggles more than her sister, but her sister struggled early on as well.

The Happy Boy mostly just want to play. He will play by himself or with whichever sister is taking a break at the time. He loves to be read to. I try to make sure that he gets some book time with Mommy during the day. He is making progress with his potty training which is a little more important to us at the moment. So far my three oldest kids have all potty trained after age four and it gets old after a while.

Little Chunk is usually a content baby. He has fussy times when he gets overtired or goes through a teething bout, but still is amazingly easy-going most of the time. This is very helpful for our school days. I have to work feeding and diaper changes around everything else we do, so it's nice that he isn't too demanding. He is a hungry child most of the time though. It is not unusual for this child to drink a quart of milk a day. He is supposed to have his four-month check-up tomorrow. I hope all of us are well enough for a well-baby visit to the clinic. However, it was not looking promising this evening. I'll have to figure that out in the morning. I would kind of like to know just how much this huge child has grown. At four months old, his 6-9 month clothes are tight. Either he needs to slow down his growing, the weather needs to warm up or I need to go shopping, because I don't have many long-sleeve/long pant clothes for the 9-12 month size. (Boys can wear pink can't they?) I'm also concerned that he will grow too big, weight-wise, for his car seat carrier. We have another car seat for when he does grow out of it, but I don't have another stroller that can handle a baby that can't sit up yet. This is an example of when my plans don't always match up with what reality throws at me.

Our cat, Misha, has improved some since I last posted. She will come out and visit with us in the evening, but she still doesn't move much beyond that.

Neuro-atypical?

As I mentioned briefly in a previous post, we are going to have the Pillowfight Fairy evaluated to see if she may have Asperger Syndrome. The more we read about it, the more it sounds like our daughter. My mother-in-law loaned us a book titled "The OASIS Guide to Asperger Syndrome." I would highly recommend it for anyone wanting to understand this fairly common disorder.

In leading up to our daughter's evaluation, I got to go to a parent-only screening class. This involved letting one psychologist go over all of the basic information once with a group of parents instead of having every psychologist say the same thing over and over to every parent they see. Then I got to talk to a psychologist about our particular concerns one-on-one. The gist of the conversation resulted in the psychologist agreeing that we may have an Asperger's kid, so an evaluation would be appropriate. We have an appointment scheduled for next month.

Between reading the above-mentioned book and listening to the two psychologists at the clinic, I have had several ideas floating through my mind that I thought might be worth sharing.

1. The book keeps using the term "neurotypical" in place of the term "normal" to refer to the majority of the population. I love that term. I have had a love-hate relationship with the word "normal." That is probably because I have never quite felt "normal" as it was always depicted to me. But I can understand something being typical without putting a value judgment on it. In reading the book, it helped me see some of the areas where I may not be typical myself. As it describes Asperger's as opposed to typical thought and behavior, I kept seeing how I don't always have typical thought or behavior myself (though not along the Asperger's direction). It makes me wonder how much of what is considered a "disorder" is simply natural variation among people. It also makes me wonder how our society does not adjust well to having people who are different among them, despite all the pride in tolerance.
2. While the introduction was being given by one psychologist, she spent time explaining what kinds of psychological help is given at their clinic and what stresses kids deal with. She also described how their schedule of appointments flows with the school year. What she did not mention directly was that school is a major stress point in kids lives. She did mention that the appointments drop off when school is not in session. I take that as either the schools or parents are not feeling the need for psychological assistance when school is out.
3. One thing that I thought was helpful to me is that just because something is normal or typical, doesn't make it good. Her example was that typical behavior for 2 and 3-year-olds is to have tantrums. That behavior is typical, but it is not OK and the child needs help to change that behavior to something better. This resonated with me after reading the above-mentioned book, since some examples of Asperger kids having trouble with others involve things like socially accepted white lies. These would be things like one person asking another if they liked their new hair color (which looked bad) and the friend, lying to reassure her, tells her that she looks great. The person asking the question neither wants nor expects the truth and the person responding understands this and provides the desired lie. In the case of Asperger kids they are trained to recognize such things and respond in a more socially acceptable way than the tactless truth. Personally, I find this sad. I consider the normal behavior depicted here as undesirable mind games that encourage an acceptance of deception both against others and toward one's self. However, to function in our society, we train those who have a natural disinclination for such behavior to imitate it to blend in. Yeah, I have a lot of gripes against the normal or typical way of doing things.
4. One thing mentioned that I found quite disturbing was that among the stresses that are currently typical for your average 4 and 5 year olds, besides the fact that they are starting school, is that they are frequently going through a divorce in their family. I have my own opinions about how we put kids through school in our society, but this statement about the commonplace situation of kids enduring the divorce of their parents as they start kindergarten just wrenched my gut.
5. When I was speaking one-on-one to another psychologist, he mentioned that we may have to change our decision about homeschooling or at least accept services through the public school district if that is deemed necessary for our daughter. He stated "that's how we do it (at that clinic) because it's free". Now, I agree that one should always be open to making adjustments as needed to meet the circumstances in which one finds oneself. However, I have found homeschooling to be so beneficial to our kids and to our family that it would take a lot to just switch to public school without weighing other options first. It could be that the services could be provided without full enrollment. It could be that there are other options that would suit our family better. I'd like to find out the full range of options before making a decision about that. Besides, we haven't even had the evaluation yet. Isn't that jumping the gun a bit? Maybe I've read about too many conflicts between public schools and homeschoolers or maybe it's my individualist streak coming out, but the saying that keeps popping up in my mind is "there's no such thing as a free lunch." Too often things that are labeled free have strings attached, hoops to jump through, or a hidden cost.

So, after the evaluation, we will have a better idea of what is going on with our daughter and what kinds of help she might need to get along with people better. In the meantime, I've been enjoying her company and being reminded how much she is like a normal kid too. We have told her a little bit of what this is about. She is looking forward to the evaluation. I think she likes the idea of having a new person to talk to.

One third done!

I always enjoy getting to one of my goal points in the school year. It reminds me that we are actually getting somewhere. This past week we finished week 12 out of 36 scheduled for our school year. That means we are a third of the way done. I am pleased with the progress, but the schedule has been hard to maintain lately. I'm expecting a baby by the end of the month and am slowing down considerably.

Since we will be taking time off from school after the baby comes, I don't want to take our usual break just yet. But, I can't keep up the schedule as is, so we are starting to do half days until the baby comes.

So what progress has been made?

The Pillowfight Fairy is covering the following subjects: Bible reading, spelling, Latin, piano, grammar, writing, literature, history (1600-1850), chemistry, mathematics, sewing, drawing, and crafts. Her favorite subjects seem to be Latin, grammar, and chemistry. Latin is liked because it is a different language and she enjoys other cultures. Grammar is a favorite because she enjoys diagramming sentences. With chemistry, she loves science and doing experiments. She least likes reading in any subject, spelling, piano, and mathematics. This is mainly because although she reads very well, she doesn't like assigned reading, and doesn't like repetitive practices. However, she still must do these things to improve and make progress. I have seen improvement in her writing abilities. Mainly that she is writing smoother and quicker. She is progressing steadily in all of her subjects, though from my perspective , her best subject is mathematics. It is a pity she hates it so. She picks up the concepts very quickly, she just hates practicing it over and over. For literature we have completed elementary school level adaptations of The Stories of King Arthur, Robin Hood, and The Three Musketeers. We are currently reading Gulliver's Travels. I've come to the conclusion that although she has liked parts of all of these books, she gets bored with chapter books that take this long to read. Her least favorite was the Three Musketeers. I think that this was because it has had the most complicated story-line so far. There were so many plot twists and little details that show up at one point then are important later on. She didn't like trying to make sense of it all and simply decided that she doesn't like the French. She also has a weakness in her reading, in that she tends to read what she expects the words to say rather than what they actually say. It can be quite difficult at times to make her slow down and read every word exactly as written. She wants to read quickly, but then simply fills in what she thinks it ought to say. This gets in the way of reading comprehension for obvious reasons. So, I make sure that I am there with her with readings still, instead of letting her read on her own. I probably need to find a way that works for her to improve her comprehension abilities. We have already tried a few methods to prompt her retention of the material, but so far they haven't worked well. I think this is because of her incorrect reading to begin with, rather than in recall or memory which she has demonstrated to be rather good in general. She has made good progress with her sewing project (a patchwork pillow) of which I will include a picture when she has completed it.

The Adrenaline Junkie has been doing much better with her schoolwork this year. She is doing phonics reading practice, spelling, mathematics, Bible story book reading, and piano. Her favorite subjects are reading and spelling. She hates piano practice. The rest of the subjects she considers an interruption to an otherwise fun day. She is reading and sounding out words better this year. She seems to understand the spelling better this year too, although she has always had an interest in it (she has an urge to express herself). Sometimes she picks up on the math quickly such as addition or telling time, and at other times she seems to have a mental block with it. She can pattern match most symbols and shapes very well, but when she comes to numbers and how they are written, she sometimes acts as if she has never seen one before. She confuses which number comes first in a multiple digit number such as confusing 15, 50, and 51. When counting she mispronounces the 30s and 40s so that they sound almost identical and gets lost on the way through her count to the higher numbers. But I'm impressed with how quickly she is picking up addition of numbers like 14 + 3. She seems to be catching on to these faster than her older sister did. I suspect some of her math confusion is related to her lefty-righty issues. Her hatred of piano practice is rooted in her preference to simply play at other things all day. But she gets frustrated by mistakes and being asked to work her brain so hard. Even so, she is making progress. Her greatest weakness right now is her preference for joking around. She has class clown tendencies. She wants to make people laugh and to get them to join her in play. Schoolwork interrupts her preferred activities, therefore it is bad. Her biggest self-motivation right now is her desire to express herself. She wants to talk and write all of the time. In that her lessons help her do this, she likes them. If they require her to be quiet or to absorb information, she doesn't like them.

The Happy Boy mainly plays. He will sometimes join in his sister's phonics lesson. He likes to draw and play with playdough. He can spend several hours clipping tiny pieces of paper with scissors to make "treasure" for his miniature treasure box. He loves being read to. He likes to play simple games. He keeps asking for someone to give him piano practice too (The Adrenaline Junkie sometimes helps him out here). He has an obsession with letters and numbers. He loves to run and jump. For now, all of this is appropriate for a three-year-old boy. I try to be flexible when he wants to join in with the girls' schoolwork.

Some things that please me are when I see all three kids being able to play with each other. They all like to role play (love of acting from their Daddy's side of the family). They take turns saying lines of their favorite stories for entertainment. They like telling jokes (even if they are only knock knock jokes that don't make any sense because they just made them up). They all like to sing (they all prefer to be soloists, too). None of them are plagued by shyness like I was as a kid. I like to see them starting to help each other as they should when one of the others gets hurt. I like it when I see the willingness of the older kids help the youngest when he wants a crafted toy like theirs, or wants to play some of their games.

Some of the things that need improvement are attitudes about work, using good manners, learning self-control, and following instructions. I realize that all kids probably struggle with these same issues, but sometimes I wonder if our kids just have a little tougher time with some of these (whether by personal inclination or because of the way we've raised them thus far). I am trying to rectifying some of this by making manners more a part of how they are to behave every day here at home, making them have more work assignments that are their responsibility (instead of Mommy being their servant), and insisting on consequences for them not controlling their behavior or following instructions. It has been particularly hard for me to be consistent about this lately when I'm so tired. But I try.

Since I'm right there with the kids as they do their schoolwork, I am in a good position to see if they are understanding their lessons. Still I find it a better measure to see what is getting through to them, when I see them practicing, or reciting, or describing, or creating something that uses their new knowledge. Mostly, that is done in their off-time, when they are just playing.
Because of this "playing of their schooling", I sometimes wonder if I'm giving them enough off-time to help them use what they learn. Well, with us shifting to half days for a while, that may help out that area a little.

That is the end of my little homeschool report on our progress. I've taken more pictures that I will probably share soon that illustrate our adventures with pumpkins lately. For now, I'm tired and need my rest.

Pregnancy news

I promised another post after my doctor's appointment, so here it is.

As of this Thursday, I am eight months pregnant. I am slightly on the big side of that. The doctor said that my abdomen measures at about 37 weeks instead of 35. The doctor doesn't think we will be having a small baby, but he's not huge yet. We have a month yet, if the baby comes on time. A baby can gain another couple of pounds still.

The baby has turned head downward, which is of course a good thing. Especially because the baby was transverse when they last checked. The baby has not yet "dropped," as they say. I have been feeling stronger contractions from time to time, but they are still widely spaced and not a concern. Although the doctor told me I was 1 centimeter dilated and 25% effaced, I take that with a grain of salt. In earlier pregnancies, I have had widely varying measurements from different practitioners this early on, so until I feel the contractions at 5 minutes apart I don't get very concerned.

I'm still in good health, but am much more uncomfortable. My out-of-whack posture is causing sciatic nerve problems. The advice for treating this is ice packs on the lower back and walking around (avoid sitting much if possible). I also had a rambunctious little three-year-old Happy Boy bounce onto my foot Friday night (while I was propping up my feet), which had the effect of breaking my right pinky toe. The advice for treating this is ice packs on the injury, staying off my feet and propping up the foot as much as I can (avoid walking as much as possible). Now, I'm sure you can see just as well as I can, that there is a bit of conflict in what I need to do to treat these problems. I do the best I can. I have to walk around to take care of the kids anyway, so that is exercise for the nerve problem. I use an ice pack on my lower back when I can barely walk anymore from pain. When I don't need to walk I sit to get off my foot, or lay down for a nap. I can't reach my foot to do ice packs there so, there you have it. Tim tells me I'm a trooper.

I am looking forward to my parents' arrival to help out in the near future. However that is still about two weeks away. In the meantime, I'm still managing to do the basic housework, getting the kids to do their schoolwork, and trying to remember that if something is on the floor, the kids can pick it up. Naps are getting to be a necessity again.

Coming up soon, we will be off to our local flu shot clinic this weekend. The kids (and Tim) hate that I insist upon this every year. Although we homeschool, we are not isolated. We get everything that's going around. Having some protection from the worst of it is helpful. Also, if I get the flu shot before the baby is born, he'll have some protection. Babies aren't allowed to have the shot until they are 6 months old. So, anyone who spends time around tiny babies, should have the shot if they can to help protect the little ones (thinking of our brand new baby niece here).

As mentioned in my last post, we need to find time to shop for a sofa, too.

Then we need to plan a birthday party for the Pillowfight Fairy who is approaching age 8 at rapid speed. She is a little worried that the baby might be born on her birthday, and she doesn't want to share her day. I am just trying to figure out how to schedule a party with contigency plans if I need to make a trip to the hospital.

One good thing that has fallen into place in the schedule is that our neighborhood clean-up is going to be early next week. We will be able to set out all of the carpet and other flooring debris from our remodeling projects and the clean-up crews will take it away for us. Just in time for us to clear off the RV pad for my parents arrival. I hope all of the other appointments and needed things will fall into place just as nicely.

We are only three days off our homeschool schedule (courtesy of sick kids a couple of weeks ago), but we should be able to make that up by delaying our next break a little while. We'll be taking a few weeks off when the baby comes anyway. So, that will kind of reset for us what "on schedule" means for us this year. We will probably be finishing the school year at the end of May rather than the end of April. I can live with that.

I think that gets me up to date on most of our news. We are nearly one third of the way through the school year. So my next post will probably be reflecting on how that is going.

Right brain, Left brain

All is well. I have approximately 7 more weeks before the next baby arrives. We are on schedule with the schooling. And if I want a working dishwasher in the near future we will be doing some much needed work in the kitchen in the immediate future. So the battle between order and chaos continues.

In the meantime, Tim and I are still trying to think ahead to the next step in homeschooling, so that it doesn't sneak up on us and take us unprepared. Two things we have been considering are first, what kind of physical activity do we need to get our kids into so that they don't turn into blobs, and second, what kind of art do we need to teach. As a result we are keeping our eyes open and asking for advice from those we know. Tim's brother suggested some art books to help with teaching drawing. They are "Rapid Viz" by Hanks & Belliston, and "Drawing on the Right Side of the Brain" by Betty Edwards. We've taken a look at them and think that these books will be helpful, but to do it right, we will need to learn the techniques ourselves to be effective teachers of them. So we are starting now (particularly Tim) in working through the lessons and exercises so that next year we will be better able to teach them.

Each book has a different slant. Rapid Viz teaches methods to take ideas and to quickly get them on paper using perspective and other technical skills. Drawing on the Right Side of the Brain is about teaching a person to better control which part of the brain is doing the artwork. It talks a great deal about what the left brain does and is good at, and what the right brain does and is good at. Reading through this information has helped to explain some things going on with us and our kids that we thought puzzling. It turns out understanding left and right brain function can be helpful in education.

OK, that's not really a huge surprise. But, until you actually learn what the left and right brain functions are you miss a really big piece of the puzzle. For instance, I knew that my two daughters seem to operate and think completely differently. I chalked this up to personality and individualism. But, now I see a left brain, right brain element at work that I had not realized before. And although I see it as useless alter a person's personality to educated them, I can evaluate whether they are operating more left brain or more right brain and tailor instruction to meet them where they are. Personalities are tricky and complicated. brain function is quantifiable and much easier to adapt to.

So what have we learned about left brain and right brain you might ask? Well, many of these things we knew in some fashion. Left brain is where language use takes place. Left brain is where logical methods of thinking take place. Left brain thinking is orderly. Right brain is more comfortable with symbolic understanding, intuition, and chaotic thinking processes. What I didn't realize so much is that the left brain likes to be the boss of the two and tries to take over even when the right brain is better able to handle the task at hand. Also, some people have a more shared way they use their left and right brains. The more we read the more we realized that although I am very left brained (no surprise there), Tim actually is one of those people that has a left-right sharing going on in the brain.

Then that got us thinking about our kids. Are they lefties, righties, or shared as far as brain function goes? The Pillowfight Fairy shows strong signs of being a left brained kid, a bit like her Mom (puzzling since she's so much like her Dad). The Adrenaline Junkie shows strong signs of being either right brained or shared like her Dad (even though she's much like her Mom in other ways). We are not sure about the Happy Boy yet. It is easier to tell when they are older. It helps if they read and write some, as well as some other older kid things, to be able to diagnose how their brains are functioning.

So now we understand better why our oldest kid does so well with language, prefers routine, and gets upset when she is asked to try something different or learn something new. Now we understand better why our second kid has more trouble recognizing patterns, can't stand to write a letter of the alphabet the same way twice, gets more confused about her left and right, and likes to move about and experience her learning, rather than hearing, or reading it. So now that we know where their strengths lie, it is tempting to just keep to those strengths. However, we need to help them overcome weaknesses too. If we just right them off as left brained or right brained, without helping them to compensate for their weak areas, we are not doing them favors. So a left brained kid can learn easily in left brained ways. But we will also have to do things to teach her how to access her right brain for some useful skills in life. A right brained kid can be very creative and intuitive, but will encounter lots of bumps and road blocks in life if she can't learn to maneuver in a world set up for left brained people.

We are already helping the left brain side of learning with our emphasis on rigorous academics in language arts, mathematics, science, history, and religion. I like to think that we are also already helping some development for the right side of the brain with teaching music and art. But even so, you can teach mathematics in left brained ways (pattern matching, counting, logic) or right brained ways (spatial perception, symbolic representation, role playing). You can teach music and art in left brained ways as well (scales, notation, perspective). So is it better to teach these subjects only to the student's strengths, avoid the strengths and work on the weaker area, or a little of both? I am currently of the opinion that you start with strengths when you can, but don't completely leave out areas where they function in a weaker mode. We may start to teach drawing from a more left brained method for a left brained kid (like perspective) and then later teach some right brained methods after progress and success has been gained the other way. We may teach dance and music appreciation to a right brained kid first, and then move on to mechanics of dance and musicals instruments to round out their learning.

It has definitely got us thinking about how we do our teaching. It also explains a lot of things that just seemed strange. Like how our Adrenaline Junkie who has trouble remembering which hand to use in playing the piano will suddenly break down and weep at the piano, not because of the mechanics of playing the piano, but because the song is so sad (in a minor key). She has a feel for the music that her older sister, who masters the mechanics more easily, misses.

One thing I like about starting school early...

We typically start our school year in July. This works for us for several reasons:

• We are inside doing schoolwork during the hottest time of the year.
• Our kids change to new grades at church in July, so if we change at the same time, there is less confusion about what grade level they are in.
• We take more breaks throughout the year and stretch our school year out a little, so starting early allows us to end in the spring instead of summer.
• When everyone else is experiencing back to school season, we are already one sixth done with our school year and are taking our first break.

Currently we are in our first week-long break from school after successfully completing six weeks of school. I like to review how things are going every time we take a break.

So far, it looks like I planned the Fairy's 3rd grade year well. It is slightly more relaxed and better organized than last year. She is covering more subjects, but never more than eight per day. I am also trying not to over plan the art projects. We are concentrating on sewing skills this year, allowing her to work on drawing, crafts, and educational coloring books on the side as her interests take her. I have also decided that this is a good year to increase some household chores for my two oldest. After every school break they will get an additional household chore to do until they are doing one job every day by the end of the school year. I think they are old enough to learn to sweep, dust, clear the table, wash dishes, and clean in the bathroom. So by the end of the year, I will have some semi-competent help with keeping the house cleaner than it usually is. Frankly, I've been so busy with other things, I haven't been keeping it as clean as I like. It is time for that to change. My kids need to learn that their mother and father are not the maid and janitor and that keeping the house clean is a job they need to do too. I do not intend to raise my kids to be well educated, but be unable to function on their own.

The Adrenaline Junkie could probably handle a bigger school load, but she is doing well with what she has. She has a very short attention span still. But she is a year older than her sister was in Kindergarten and is doing more as well. I have been keeping her work to short blocks, and that has been working well. She is also more social and needs playtime with her little brother (that helps him as well).

The Happy Boy has his good days and bad days. It helps that he can play with playdough or draw on his own. Then he has playtime with whichever sister is available. He sometimes listens in to the Kindergarten phonics lesson, since sounding out words is interesting to him now. He understands more than I realize. I get clues about this every now and then. The other day he was drawing on a tablet on my lap and spelled the word "monday" all on his own. That surprised me.

That is where we are right now.

A Simple Comment and Where It Leads...

I didn't expect to have anything interesting to blog so soon. But these things often come up when you least expect them. Last Sunday night, I was visiting with a new acquaintance at the church playground while watching kids play. It turns out that their family also homeschools. So the topic turned to what methods do you use and are you with a group, etc. In the course of the conversation she made a little commonplace comment that I've heard often enough before. It was a comment that seems completely ordinary, but the more I thought about it, the more it bothered me. The comment was that she didn't feel comfortable teaching her own kids after they reach 7th grade level work, so she sends her older kids to a charter school/homeschool arrangement where they are at school two days a week and then do independent study at home the rest of the week.

Now, please don't mistake my concern with this. I am not a purist that thinks my way is the only way. I have no problem with charter schools or independent study programs. I think that parents should be in charge of their own kids education whatever path they need to follow. The part of the comment that bothered me was not regarding method of schooling. The part that bothered me was about a person's comfort level in teaching their kids past a certain level.

Now, I understand that not all people feel like they can teach. By all means, if you don't think you can teach, don't teach. Though, I sometimes wonder if that is sometimes used as a cop-out so people can do as they please instead of sometimes making the occasional sacrifice to do what is best for their family. Personally, I don't feel that I am tempermentally suited to teach in a classroom situation where I would be teaching other people's kids. I am perfectly fine with teaching my own kids one-on-one. I have friends who are public school teachers who are just the reverse... they'll teach a passel of other people's kids without batting an eye, but can't imagine teaching their own kids. There are plenty of valid reasons to not teach. I'm O.K. with that.

What I keep coming back to in this comment that bugs me is, if you can teach up to a certain point, what prevents a person from teaching past that point. I didn't get into a deeper discussion with this acquaintance on the topic, because I thought that might be a little bit too much for a new acquaintance. What I started thinking about was what makes a person qualified to teach.

Knowledge about particular teaching methods may equip a person to teach better than if they were ignorant of those methods, but methods don't make a teacher. To my mind, understanding of the subject matter is a key element to being able to teach it. Though there are times when prior knowledge isn't necessary if the teacher is learning along with the student. Perhaps the student is outstripping the teacher's abilities. That would be cause for a different teacher indeed. But let us say we are not talking about extraordinary abilities. When a teacher gives up teaching at 7th, 8th, or 9th grade, there are probably lots of reasons for it.

But to my mind, in my usual way of thinking, anyone who has mastered a subject themselves should be capable of teaching it. So I keep thinking back to the comment and wonder about the teacher's mastery of the subject matter. With what little was said, I got the feeling in the conversation that the mother felt that her writing and composition skills would not be able to keep up with what her kids needed. Instead she is finding a way to keep the best of both worlds so to speak by using additional teachers to fill in the gaps while still keeping a workable homeschooling situation for her family. That is commendable. I don't want to imply with what I say that I am tearing anyone down. But, the comment about not feeling competent to teach what you yourself should have learned in school, should really prompt some self-reflection. If I cannot teach someone what I learned in school, did I really learn it or did I just punch my time card and manage a passing grade on a report card that didn't really mean anything? If I cannot teach someone what I learned in school, am I functionally below that level in education myself? If I cannot teach someone what I learned in school because I forgot it from lack of use, is it necessary for my child to learn and necessary for me to relearn? If I cannot teach someone because I never learned it myself, is it a good thing for them to learn or am I trying to give them something I never had (whether good or bad)?

Now comes the follow-up questions to all of that self-reflection. If I had what is considered a basic education (whether public or private), and am not qualified to teach those same subjects to someone else, does that mean that my education failed to reach the mastery stage and therefore failed. How many people who are educated in these "normal" methods of education (most of us were not homeschooled after all) are not well enough educated to be able to teach what they were taught? If a large percentage of people have this problem, what does that say for the education they received? What does this say about the educational systems used in our society?

I would love to tell you right now that I have all of the answers to the above questions. I don't. I do think these are some of the questions we parents should wrestle with as we figure out what is best for our families. I think I know some of the answers for me. I will share with you some of the answers as they apply to my teaching.

I had an excellent public school education. Two of the four colleges I attended were public and two were private. They were all good schools and I had many good teachers. I have studied four widely diverse subject areas at the college level. I should be well equipped for teaching others what I have learned myself. For the most part I am. Yet, I too have strong areas and weak areas. I remember upon receiving my bachelor's degree, thinking to myself, "why didn't I learn all of this in high school?" I felt a little let down that my good education wasn't better. Those of you who follow my blog may have seen my tendency to think deeply from time to time, but I do not claim to be a great writer. I have a masters degree in information science. I am a proficient researcher by training. I relate well to college level studies. I like the give and take of a deep and challenging conversation. I find the basic steps of early education kind of boring, but I understand the necessity of them. So I work hard at helping my kids understand them. I am actually looking forward to the time when I can teach logic and deeper topics about our world. I look forward to guiding a teen through their own studies and deep life questions. Will I come across things I simply cannot teach? Yep. My seven year old is already beyond my musical abilities with the piano. I never learned to play the piano. I played violin for just over two years. I picked up most of my basic music reading ability during that time, which isn't much. When she passes up my husband, we will need to find her another teacher for piano or whatever other instrument she chooses to learn. I am an active person and I like to walk, but I am not a good swimmer. Our kids will get swim lessons from someone else since we see that as a matter of personal safety as well as a good skill to know. I learned French in school and never completely felt like I could speak it. I struggle learning languages. This year we are beginning to teach our oldest daughter Latin. I am learning it with her and my knowledge of French helps me a little. At some point, I expect she will surpass my abilities, since she seems more gifted with languages than I am. We will still teach her, but probably through independent study style lessons where she is learning from someone else, instead of being directly taught by her parents. It is completely possible that with her love of language she will surpass my English abilities. My husband has better skills there than I do, but she may end up needing another teacher for that. We seem to have very independent minded kids and they may all go in directions we never imagined or had any training in whatsoever. That's O.K. We are equipped to handle the basics. And we know how to find appropriate training for the other stuff.

As for the broader implications of people not being able to teach someone else, it worries me. I remember back when I was working at a Christian College library, I got a phone call one day from a man who was very concerned. He worked at a church where they had just received their new quarter curriculum for their children's classes. They were scheduled to start using it the following Sunday, but nobody he talked to at his church knew much about the publisher of this curriculum and he wanted to talk to someone who was familiar with it so they could tell him whether it was O.K to use, in other words, was it doctrinally sound? I truly wished I could have helped him out, but I couldn't. I wasn't a specialist in Sunday school curriculum and the person who might have helped him was unavailable at the time. After talking with him I realized that if he didn't understand his own faith well enough to read a child's Bible lesson and analyze it for accuracy, then he had a much bigger problem than "should we use this curriculum?". He didn't know what he believed. People who don't have a good understanding of what they should know, don't know how to operate at the level that society says they are qualified to operate at. It is easier to be scammed when you don't understand things like finances, advertising, religion, and politics. When people are not able to think logically and critically in many areas of life, they run into trouble. When this is a widespread problem, society runs into trouble.

For myself, If I find an area that is important for me to improve (whether for training my children, or for my own needs), I would wish to make changes and improve. I would not relinquish my ability or right to teach my own children lightly. So, to finish up... I would like you to consider your own answers to those self-reflecting questions and consider what is going on in our society when people consider themselves or others as unfit teachers.

Rather busy lately

Hi everyone. Just a quick note to let you know what I've been up to and why I haven't posted more.

1. I finally finished getting everything ready for our new school year which starts this Monday. And no the kids don't want to hear about it.
2. I've been madly working on a baby quilt with the hopes I'll have it ready in time for my sister-in-law's baby shower. (I plan to post pictures afterward, since the actual subject of the quilt is to be a surprise.)
3. My seven year old had a week at church day camp which completely messes with our normal schedule.
4. Currently my five year old is having swim lessons which completely messes with our normal schedule.
5. Our backyard orchard fruit season is just starting with plums that need to be picked every couple of days (I've been drying them this time).

My latest library homeschool/teaching book review is short. It is titled "Homeschooling Step-by-Step" by LauraMarey Gold & Joan M. Zielinski. It was published in 2002 so its not too far out of date. It is a great place to start if someone has questions about homeschooling, whether they are wanting to homeschool or if they are curious because someone they know is doing it and would like to understand the movement better. It covers how one starts homeschooling, dealing with legal issues, how to teach, educational philosophies, curriculum, parent/teacher confidence as a first timer, learning environment, balance, challenges, support, and graduation. I can't say that I learned a lot, although I appreciated some parts of the educational philosophy section that explained Waldorf method and Montessori method which I have heard about but never had explanations for. I see the book as a one stop shop for information. By reading it, you get a better idea what you want to look at further. It is potentially very useful if you are needing lots of general information. It is also helpful at pointing the way to more information on each subject. I found it an easy and interesting read (particularly since I'm already homeschooling).

Latest Pregnancy News

Since I had a doctor appointment on Tuesday and an ultrasound on Thursday, I should probably give an update on how the pregnancy is going.

I'm at the half-way point, twenty weeks, and all seems to be going well. My doctor says that the baby's growth seems to be on track, and he agrees that I've been more reasonable with my weight gain this time. My second trimester blood test has come back testing negative for problems.

The ultrasound results won't be ready until Monday, but we are fairly experienced with ultrasounds by now. We know that the technician isn't allowed to tell us how the baby looks to them, but we can ask questions like, "are we looking at the stomach?," "Is that the division in the brain?," and "Are we looking at the left side or right side?" According to our own view of the ultrasound, the baby's body parts seem to be in the correct number and positions. The brain is divided and formed properly, the heart is on the left side, and there are two kidneys. We did not see any sign of the problems that baby E had. If I don't hear any results on Monday, I'll email my doctor to get an official report from him (since I'm not scheduled to have another appointment until July).

My doctor was a little peeved that I didn't have an appointment with him until 20 weeks. I had been scheduled with nurse practitioners (and not my usual one at that) since they were having trouble scheduling me. I've had this doctor long enough through enough pregnancies and memorable events that he knows me by name and face. He told me not to let that happen again, if I'm having trouble with appointments, I'm to email him and they will work it out. He's been a good doctor. That's all of the pregnancy news.

Now for my homeschool update:

The book I picked up this past week wasn't as useful, but I was distracted at the library with a misbehaving three-year-old. I picked up "Making the Grade: Everything Your 3rd Grader Needs to Know." I thought it was one of those guides that covers what subjects are usually covered in third grade. It is not. It is a set of supplemental lessons to be used to reinforce the traditional curriculum (though it doesn't spend much time covering what that curriculum includes). I thought that the most useful part of it was the introductory material. It has a section describing how the book should be used, a note for homeschoolers, a section talking about ideal communication between home and school, and finally a section describing what a third grader is like. Perhaps if a parent was not happy with their child's current schooling, a book like this might be helpful to supplement the regular school day. If a homeschooler is trying to scrounge up more lessons to teach their kids, this might be helpful. However, we are pleased with the lessons we already have planned and don't see this type of supplementary lessons as a helpful thing. I did find the section describing a typical third grader to be helpful. I haven't come across descriptions like this for my kids since they were preschoolers. I had noticed various ways my oldest was growing and changing, but I had no idea how typical some of this was. Now I know that she's actually acting normal (for her). Who knew! I'll try to find a better book next time.

Combining pregnancy and homeschooling, my husband tells me that I'm already nesting. That's because we discovered that our baby is a boy and now I can sort through all our baby things to give away the girl stuff. I'm also getting the "Boys" room reorganized to house two kids and revamping the "Girls" room to have room for desks. Four and a half months early is only early if you don't realize that we will be starting our new school year in only three more weeks. Once school is in session for us, I will not have nearly this much time to organize and move furniture. I will be doing third grade for the Pillowfight Fairy, kindergarten for the Adrenaline Junkie, and keeping track of a preschool Happy Boy who will soon not be taking afternoon naps. Desks for the girls are so they can have a quiet place to write, color and do lessons when they need the quiet. We are going to have four kids ages eight and younger, quiet places are getting harder to find.

What does a teacher do during summer vacation?

Teachers take a much needed break. I am doing that. But I'm also doing something else that teachers do on their break. I'm doing a little professional development (so to speak) by checking out books on education from my local library and reading. The idea hit me as I was at the library with the kids. I was letting each of them check out two books, why couldn't I? There happened to be a shelf in the kids section dedicated to parents and educators, so I looked through it. I checked out a two inch thick tome titled, The Educated Child: A Parent's Guide from Preschool through Eighth Grade, by William J. Bennett, Chester E. Finn, Jr., and John T.E. Cribb, Jr. Despite the daunting size, it was actually an easy read and I finished it in just a few days. So here is my book report:

Their audience is intended to be very broad. Any parent of school age children or educators of children in any setting are encouraged to read it and use it as a resource as necessary. It tries to address what makes a good education for kids in those age levels. How to recognize the signs that your school choice is either achieving or not achieving this and what you can do to improve any problems found. It discusses what is an appropriate core curriculum for children in these age levels in the subjects of English, History and Geography, Art and Music, Mathematics, and Science. It discusses how parental involvement helps a child succeed in school and how specifically to do this. It discusses how to provide a good education to both special needs and specially gifted children. It addresses common school problems and what to do if your school or child is dealing with these. It makes a case for the need for character education, health education, and extracurricular activities in addition to academics. It also includes a very useful chapter describing a variety of issues currently debated in education such as : Education standards, skills vs. knowledge, multiculturalism, discovery learning, multiple intelligences, self-esteem, cooperative learning, public vs. private schools, charter schools, home schooling, religion and schools, social promotion, tracking, uniforms, year-round schooling, bilingual education, teachers unions, and more. The final chapter addresses the issue of becoming involved in education reform. This is not talking about theoretical reform but the nuts and bolts of bringing about change from the local level to the national level.

So after reading this I should ask the question of "what did I get out of it?" The book talks a great deal about the public school situation so does it have anything to say to a homeschool mom? The answer is yes. I related well to their repeated emphasis that the parent must be involved in their child's schooling and the person responsible for seeing to it that their child gets a good education no matter what choice of school they decide on. I found the discussion of core curriculum helpful to me so that I can gauge whether we are making good curriculum choices for our kids. I found the section about parents helping their child succeed to be very good practical advice for any parent and several areas gave me food for thought. One was teaching good study habits. A weakness we have doing school at home is that it is difficult to provide a quiet area for study when some kids are in school and some are not. I will need to find some better solutions for this problem. The Pillowfight Fairy already complains about the distractions bothering her and I know the Adrenaline Junkie is even more susceptible to the problem. So I have some brainstorming to do on this one. They talked a bit about testing, reasons for and against it, how to develop test taking skills, and how to do authentic assessment. I'm not big on doing a lot of testing. I am wary of teaching to the test instead of making sure real lasting learning is taking place. However testing is useful in some ways. We already do spelling tests and math tests on a regular basis. I verbally quiz her on her readings to see what she is getting from them. But, I have been reluctant to do any official, comprehensive tests, partly because they are not required in our state, and partly because I don't want to pigeon-hole my kids into a category and instead think in terms of individual skills and knowledge rather than grades. However, at some point we will probably do more testing, so I need to consider how to train in test studying and test taking. They also presented the idea of the IEP (individualized education program) that is used in special education programs and bemoaned that it isn't available for all kids. This is the idea that every child's progress is reviewed at least once a year and a new plan put in place for how to give that child the best chance at a good education. I love this. This is what many homeschoolers already do when they are tailoring the education to each child. Perhaps we don't all do it in a formal fashion, but it encourages me to continue to make my plan every year and review how we are progressing frequently (I need to review more frequently than I do). I was reassured in the school problems section that we are so far avoiding the problems that they mentioned. In the area on non-academics, I was challenged that I don't have a plan in place for teaching character, physical education and other extra-curricular subjects. It's not that we don't do this. We are simply doing it haphazardly. Having a more specific plan with clear goals would be a good thing. I liked the section explaining the various educational issues out there. I already have my personal gut reaction to each debate, but it was helpful to get more background on it and a better understanding of why the opposite side holds the view it does. It didn't change my mind about anything, but it helped me clarify my position on each debate.

All in all, it was a helpful book and I'm glad I read it. If anything it encouraged me that our choice to homeschool is going to give our kids a good education. Not because homeschooling is inherently better, but because of the seriousness and effort with which we approach our task. So I'm ready for another book to read, but have no idea what it will be. The shelf I had look at wasn't very big. I may have to check their online catalog and ask them to hold one for me that I find more interesting (leisurely browsing doesn't happen with three kids seven and younger at the library).

End of school! Yea!

The Pillowfight Fairy is quite pleased to know that we finished her second grade year today. She has some very unrealistic ideas about doing whatever she pleases for the foreseeable future. What she doesn't realize is that her Mommy is at least as excited as she is. No more prep. work. No more being the bad guy by making her get back to her studies. It is a well deserved break.

Unfortunately, I tend to look ahead and know that the break isn't really all that long. A mere month and a half. But, I have nearly completed next year's lesson plans for both girls, so I can spend that free time doing other things. I think my general priorities are getting financial information in order again (it's amazing how fast I get behind on that when my attention is elsewhere), cleaning, organizing, discarding, and one craft project promised to be done in August. All that cleaning, organizing, and discarding is my normal personality but it tends to go into overdrive when I'm pregnant. You could say that I have a perpetual nesting instinct.

So, now that school is over again, I can look back on the year with satisfaction. The day to day schoolwork didn't always go smoothly, but it went anyway and with fewer bumps than in the previous year. I think that I am getting better at the teaching side of things. I also think that the Fairy is appreciating her schoolwork more (even though she still complains). I will probably be spending a fair amount of my free thinking time to mull over the best ways to work with the Adrenaline Junkie. I need to cover the same material as I did with her sister, but now I need to present it differently to a very different girl. I have noticed signs that the Junkie is making a mental transition that comes between preschool and grade school. That gives me hope that she'll be a little bit more able to learn academic subjects. The trick will be how to incorporate ideas that she relates to in order to retain her attention.

I also don't know how far along the Happy Boy will be in the next year. He will still be a preschooler of course. But, he is beginning to be able to draw semi-recognizable things and likes to have people write words for him. I suspect that I will be encouraging him to do lots of drawing this year. He will probably want to participate when I'm reviewing phonics with the Junkie. I would not be surprised if he ends up being another early reader. He will probably stop having afternoon naps this year too. So, I'll probably need to break out the playdough and paints again (much to everyone's joy).

I don't know if you have noticed, but I talk a lot about what I see or plan for the future. I like to think about it. I think it just helps me prepare myself for the real thing if I can visualize it in my head first. Then I end up writing it in this blog. That gives me a chance to put it outside of myself and look at it from a different angle. Sometimes I'm simply planning what I need to do tomorrow. Sometimes, I'm wondering how the next year's schooling will progress. Other times, I'm trying to glimpse a distant time yet ahead (like when I no longer have to change diapers or potty train). I have learned that my looking ahead can be both good and bad. I have been known to plan something too far in advance and had to redo all of my work to get it right. But, when I plan ahead, I do accomplish so much more than if I didn't.

Besides school, there have been a few other things going on. I've finally been making jelly from last year's pomegranate harvest that has been taking up way too much room in my freezer. I bought myself a new food dehydrator to prepare for this year's fruit harvest. I've been making plans for summer camps, swim lessons and road trips. I've been potty training the Happy Boy for about a month now (with mixed results).

I'm now into my second trimester. My visit to my health provider last week was uneventful. It was mainly checking the heart beat of the baby (in the 140-150 range for those who follow such things) and scheduling my next blood test to look for abnormalities. The blood test I took care of today. I won't have the results back right away. I'll probably have them by my next appointment in June. I will also have my ultrasound in June. We are looking forward to it because we are curious about whether we are having a boy or girl. But, we are also dreading it, because we have already had bad news from ultrasounds twice in previous pregnancies. I am forcing myself to assume the best until told otherwise.

We also took a cat in for surgery today. One of our three cats has had a nasty growth or abscess on her tail for a while. After several vet visits, we finally had to have them remove most of her tail. I'm not sure what the recovery time is on tail amputations, but we'll have to be keeping an extra close eye on her for a while. So far she seems to be doing well, but she is a bit wobbly from the medication she is on.

That's all of my news for now.

Observations from a week off from school

We have just finished our final holiday week of the school year. The end of the school year is approaching fast. Typically in these final few weeks of school the actual work tapers off as we end some subjects before others. We have two more weeks of math, three more of grammar, and so on. As some topics drop out, I can lengthen the lessons for the remaining subjects and speed up their completion. So sometime in the next six weeks, formal lessons will be replaced with a more relaxed schedule that is more typical in our holiday weeks.

During the school year we take a week long holiday about every six weeks with a two week break at Christmas. This helps us keep our sanity knowing that a break is not too far distant. For mommy these breaks give me a chance to catch up on long term chores (like clutter management, or toy retirement) or schedule otherwise difficult to fit in shopping trips. For the kids it is a chance to play an extra video game, work on that craft project, read a book for fun, do some coloring book time, and play outside more (weather permitting). Mommy gets to just enjoy some down time, too. After a week break, a return to the usual schedule is refreshing. Much more than a week and the kids start to show signs that they need more schedule "boundaries" to feel comfortable again. I think the week off helps clear my brain too. It helps me have time to reflect on our progress, plans for the future, what works, what needs to improve and just who are these kids of mine.

So here are a few random observations from a week off from school.

• The Pillowfight Fairy likes piano enough to play it for fun when she doesn't have to.
• The Fairy and the Adrenaline Junkie like to play games together.
• The Adrenaline Junkie and the Happy Boy have the same energy levels and a similar interest in running all over the place.
• The Fairy has made substantial progress in her needlework craft to the point that it is now entirely her own. She can usually thread the needle, she can start her thread and end it properly and she can follow the pattern of stitches to completion. Mommy is only needed if some unforseen disaster occurs.
• The Junkie reads and spells better than she realizes. She assumes that she can't read things or spell them, but when prompted is pleasantly surprised that she can after all. She just doesn't like going to all that work when there is an easier way (such as ask someone else to do it).
• The Junkie has no perspective. Specifically she doesn't understand why Mommy can't teach her how to make a video game during her brother's naptime or drop her off at her grandparents' house (2 hour drive) whenever she feels like it. She has grand plans of inviting everyone we've ever met to our house for a party. She suggested we make a child sized wooden train and railroad in our backyard. Then this has to compete for space with the life-size castle she is planning to make out of cardboard. She is very eager to wash dishes and clean house except that she can't reach the sink properly and she doesn't have the patience to do the job as instructed. (I remember my own attempts at dishwashing at her age and do not wish to recreate the mess and the work needed to straighten it out again.)
• The Fairy and the Happy Boy can actually play together sometimes and enjoy themselves. I've noticed how the two younger kids play well together. But, the oldest kid tended to want to do her own things when not doing school work, or to play with her sister. But this week I actually saw her initiating a game of catch with the Happy Boy that gave them both some fun. It was good to see them get along so well.
• All three kids are actors. They will all re-enact any favorite scene at a moments notice. They will "quote" videos with each other during lunch (each taking turns saying a particular character's lines). Even the three year old does this.
• When the Junkie gets an idea into her head it is hard to get her to let go of it. She is tremendously stubborn. She doesn't take no for an answer and she gets in trouble for being overly persistent.
• The Junkie is normally very unfocused in her manner of living. She flits from one thing to the next on average every five minutes. She forgets what she is doing and makes mistakes because she is distracted or overly playful.
• The two previous observations seem to be contradictory, but I suspect that they are simply two facets of her personality. As she gets older, I suspect the stubborn persistence will give her drive and focus to do the things that are important to her. The unfocused, distactableness in her personality is a combination of her love of fun and an untrained mind. Fun and humor are often a result of the spontaneous action or word. This can be nutured and encouraged to result is a well-developed sense of humor. However, some of the lack of focus is purely, lack of training or discipline (not discipline defined as punishment, but discipline defined as planned growth toward a goal). I see a great deal of potential in this little bundle of energy and contradictions that are my daughter. She will be a challenge to train. May God give me the wisdom I need for this little girl.
• The Happy Boy is firmly in his routine is good phase. If the day goes along his normal routine (even if everybody else's routines are off), he is content and cooperative. If his routine is off, he is argumentative, grumpy and quick on the tantrums.
• The Happy Boy likes to snack. I don't generally allow my kids to have snacks, because it usually ruins their appetites for the regular meals. But if a kid has eaten his/her last meal well and is hungry early, I might allow a snack (growth spurts usually do it). But the Happy Boy seems to be like this all the time. He likes a big breakfast, snacks, and smaller meals the rest of the day. It makes me wonder what the teen years will be like.

Those are pretty random thoughts. But I like to mull them over in stray moments. Eventually, I may come up with educational goals, house rules, or wise precepts based on these disjointed ideas. Like a cook does with a recipe, I like to let my thoughts simmer on the back burner, so to speak, for a long time. From time to time I stir or add a little seasoning. Then I taste to see if it is ready serve yet. Eventually these little morsels add up to something useful and perhaps helpful to someone else.