Home*School*Home

Friday, March 31, 2006

My Date.

Yesterday, I went on a lovely lunch date with a wonderful gentleman, a sweet guy, a little less than 4 feet tall, my 7 year old. It was such a beautiful day yesterday that we couldn't do school, so we decided to take a day off. We've been having a kind of hit and miss spring break, doing school a couple of days and taking a couple off. My daughter was invited to go shopping with her cousin and my older son was invited to a friend's house, so my younger son and I went out for Chinese food followed by a bit of toy shopping. Boy, for a little guy, he can sure put the Chinese food away. I think he must have a hollow leg! It's good to have some 1 on 1 time with each child from time to time. It started out as a way to make him feel better since he didn't have a playdate and ended up with his brother and sister jealous and wanting their date with mom. They are already planning what they'll order, LoL.

Thursday, March 30, 2006

The Checklist.

One of the things that worries homeschool parents is that they won't teach their children everything that they need to know, that there will be educational gaps. Of course, if you think about it, probably everyone's education has some gaps. You might have learned a great deal about whatever your teacher was most interested in. You might not have learned a subject you needed to learn, but that your teacher found boring or tedious to teach. Of course the school system may have changed the order that they taught subjects in, causing you to miss some things. You might have moved to another school district and completely missed studying the parts of speech. You did okay, right? We've all read the quote about how education is not the filling of a bucket, but the lighting of a fire and we've read the homeschool authors who reassure us that no one's education is without gaps and as long as they know how to learn they'll be fine. If, despite all these reasurrances, you still worry, there is The Checklist. Oh the joy of it for people who love to check things off on a list! Of course, we don't need anything like this ... I don't know about you all, but I really, really want it.

Wednesday, March 29, 2006

The Crystal Cave.

I'm talking about The Crystal Cave, a novel about Merlin by Mary Stewart. This was one of my favorite books as a teenager and my 13-year-old recently decided that he's ready to read it too. So we looked for the copy we have. We couldn't find it. We decided to just check it out of the library. When we got there, we couldn't find it on the shelves, so we asked the librarian. She couldn't find it either. It was supposed to be there, but wasn't. So, off to the bookstore we went (there's only one bookstore in our small town). They had all 3 of the other books in the series but not The Crystal Cave. We're starting to feel like maybe this isn't a good time to read this book?

Tuesday, March 28, 2006

13th Carnival of Homeschooling.

This is some good reading. Get a cup of coffee and visit this blog carnival. All kinds of homeschooling blogs are featured. I got into these carnivals a little late, but I really have enjoyed reading posts from my fellow homeschool bloggers.

Monday, March 27, 2006

Spring Break?

My kids found out that the kids at the local public school are on spring break this week and now they are lobbying to have a spring break here. I think that means spring cleaning, don't you? Actually, I seem to recall that we had an extra winter break this year and I don't think we need a spring break right now. I need to count the days we've been in school and see if we have some leeway. We do want a summer break!

I do love the flexibility of homeschooling.

Saturday, March 25, 2006

Max's New Fur-Do.

A couple of weeks ago, Max got his hair done, courtesy of my daughter. He looks pleased with the results, doesn't he?

Thursday, March 23, 2006

Carnival Of Homeschooling.

I've been enjoying reading the blog carnival about homeschooling. See one of them here.

Man-Dough

Yesterday when we were making bread, my youngest son made a man out of the dough and called it Man-dough. He makes people out of everything. For a while he had an entire army of men made out of garbage bag twist-ties. He also has a group of people made out of modeling clay. Boys are interesting creatures. ;-)

Homeschooling Advice.

1. Try it. You might enjoy it. It might change your life. It might not be your thing, but you won't know if you don't ever try.

2. Find out what your state (or country) requires, the bare minimum. Do this and then with the rest of it, have fun with it. It doesn't have to be all serious and it doesn't have to look like the inside of a classroom. You're at home. Relax. Play. Read. Learn together. Enjoy your kids. They grow up way too fast.

3. Don't let a written curriculum boss you around. If it works, great. If it's not working for you, throw it out. If only parts of it work, use those and throw the rest out. It's not the boss of you. When shopping for curriculum, read reviews. Try to go somewhere where you can actually hold the book in your hands and look through it. Print out a sample day or week and try and implement it or borrow it before buying. It's kind of hit and miss buying books without being able to see them.

4. Find a homeschool support group. Or two. If you can't find one in real life, find one online. Get support where ever you can.

5. Make a mess now and then. Go outside and put some mentos in coke. Make alka-seltzer rockets. Make some great art. Make a timeline and a map. Grow some borax crystals. Use levers to lift things. Make a trebuchet out of whatever you can find around the house.

6. Go on as many field trips as you can.

The point of this blog.

"there is a theme, if you read, you'll get a growing conviction that homeschooling is a lifestyle that is worthwhile, that it is extremely good for kids and families, that it promotes bonding, is a personalized education that is superior to what you can get anywhere else for your kids, is fun and can be done even if you have a 400 track mind, no math skills (thankfully my husband does though), through working, job changes, bad hair days, home remodeling, deaths, illness, surgery, broken bones and various other things and it actually makes dealing with these things easier, not harder, than it was when we were in the public schools, because homeschooling is so incredibly flexible. That's the point I've been trying to make for the last 5 years or so."