How do you solve a problem like...

... Clara?

Sigh... time for my biannual homeschooling meltdown in regards to this child.

So, here's where we are right now...

1. Math - we're actually doing decent here.... not great but decent. I have her plugging away through Horizons for my own piece of mind. However, where she's really doing well is with the living math approach. We've added more living math books and we're playing more games again.

2. Handwriting - still a struggle but we're making some headway... finally. We have a handwriting tutor (an occupational therapist) who comes to the house once a week to work with her. She still really struggles, which makes me sad, but like I said, she is finally making progress. And thankfully, she's made enough progress that she can get more practice at it because she's able to do written work in all of her subjects.

3. Language Arts - we're finally doing more work with this now. I have tried working on LA with her at different times but it was just more frustrating than it was worth for either of us. Uppercase and lowercase letters were all the same to her... capitalizing the first letter of a sentence meant nothing to her since she tended to write in all caps anyway. Now that handwriting is beginning to click with her, simple grammar rules are making sense too.

4. Reading - she's moving along in reading. She's finally graduated to reading easy chapter books. She has a friend who is an avid reader and it's pushing her to push herself with the level of books that she is reading. I still have her do quite a bit of reading aloud to me so we can work on issues together.

5. Spelling - not great but we're slowly but surely making progress. She's doing an online spelling program at the moment, but I need to get back to something more hands on.

6. History, Science, etc. - to be honest, these have not been at the top of my priority list for her this year. We have had so many other, more pressing issues to work on after her learning assessment that I haven't been doing anything terribly formal for her.

So, here's where I'm at... where do we go from here? What is the best overall approach to take with her? I need a plan. I know that both of my children have different learning styles and completely different interests. I know that what works for Alex will not work for Clara. Alex is thriving with Sonlight this year... it's been really exciting to see. However, as much as I would love to have two Sonlight kids and be able to pass curriculum down, I'm just not sure that it's the right fit for Clara. Sonlight is so literature rich which is right up Alex's alley... he could lose himself in books all day long. Clara always has to be doing something. Things click better with her when she actually sees how they work, when she gets to touch and feel it.

Right now she's doing well with and has a keen interest in music. She's been playing violin for over a year now with moderate success, but now that her teacher has been showing her the same pieces on the piano as well as the violin, her playing has really taken off. Given her interest in piano, she will be starting lessons next week. She's also doing well with dance. She loves it dearly and it really seems to be the one activity where she can truly focus.

I've been re-reading the descriptions of all of the different homeschooling approaches. Would Charlotte Mason be a good fit for her? Would a more Montessori based approach be better? Would we just be better off focusing just on a few things and taking a more unschooling approach for the rest? I'm doing lots of research right now trying to figure out what would be a good fit. If anyone has any suggestions I would love to hear them! In the meantime, I'll be dragging out all of my books and catalogs again! :-)

one would think...

...we were studying ancient Greece based on the books I've found lying around the house...
... but we're not. We're actually studying early American history this year. So, why all of the Greek mythology?

Here's why...

The Percy Jackson and the Olympians Series

Okay... so since we're not studying this in school, why am I posting about this on my homeschooling blog? Well... because homeschooling has allowed Alex to become completely obsessed with Greek mythology.... it has allowed him to follow this "rabbit trail" as far as he wants it to take him. Homeschooling has allowed me to let go a bit and let him read late at night until he can't keep his eyes open any longer (this week he's been reading until around midnight). He loves this book series and loves to read.... how can you not let him run with this enthusiasm?

The stack of books shown above is last week's set of books, he checked out (and has already read) a stack equally as big this week. He knows the stories by heart now and talks about them constantly. I'm also reading the book series and I am just on the book ahead of him. When I finish a book and give it to him to read, he always asks me which myths are referenced so he can read up on them first. I know I couldn't "assign" this stuff to him and expect the same results. Jeff is also reading the series and is on Book 2. Alex LOVES to quiz his dad about what's going on in the book and the myths referenced. It's become a real family affair (oh... I should also mention that Alex and Clara are considering being Perseus and Medusa for Halloween).

Anyway... I just thought I would share our experience with this book series and how it has overtaken our lives :-)

On another note.... I'm sorry about the posting gap again. This time we had illnesses and doctor visits consuming my free time (Alex had another bout of MRSA and now needs to see a specialist next week). We've also had a couple of auditions that we're keeping our fingers crossed about. I did get emails from a couple of you and I'm working on emailing you back by the end of the weekend!

Happy Friday!

it's that time of year again....

It's back to school time!

Clara is officially a 2nd grader and Alex is officially in 4th grade. They were so excited to start school this morning that they got up early, showered, ate breakfast and then asked if they could start school a half an hour before I had planned to start!

I'm really hoping to have a great year. We have new curriculum, a new organizational system and soon will have new insight into the way Clara learns. I have a good feeling about this year.

Even though we started today, I still have one more school supply order on it's way... the last of the bunch. I held out on ordering our "fun stuff" until the last moment while I figured out where we were in our homeschool budget. In the end... we just HAD to get the fun stuff regardless! :-) Thankfully it shipped out today so we should have it soon. Woo hoo... just tracked the package and it should be here tomorrow!!! The kids will be so excited! (and I will admit to being pretty excited too)

We're trying out so many new things this year... I'm trying to decide whether to post about them now or wait until we've actually used them a while first.
Anyway... we're underway for the 2009-10 school year so I hope to be back to posting here as well since I pretty much abandoned this poor blog all summer!

testing, testing.... 1.2.3....

It was testing week in our house. In Illinois we're not required to do testing, but I do it just for our own records each year. We use the CAT/5 test... just because (I really don't have a good reason). :-)

I really wonder some times why I do this each year. I'm not exactly sure how much stock I put in a standardized test as a measure of what my children know. But I feel compelled to do this every spring.... something that will give me some form of "official documentation" that we're doing okay. It is incredibly exciting and extremely frustrating to administer these tests. You sit there and watch them get questions right that you expected them to miss and miss some you expected them to get. It's hard to keep quiet... but I do. I even managed to complete the crossword puzzle from the Trib the other day... something I hadn't done in months!

We finished today. I just have to mark my back-up answer sheet and send it off tomorrow.



It's funny to see how the general school population's scope and sequence for science and history/social studies varies from what we have covered. Even Alex's test was mainly about the community, with the only history really being the pilgrims, Christopher Columbus (which he's not so sure about after reading a book he just got at the library) and George Washington. The science seemed to have a lot about good nutrition and pollution/environmental issues. It's just interesting.

I've been saving this part until the last because I wasn't sure if I was even going to blog about it. But, in the interest of being open and honest, I will.

Taking this test brought to light some issues with this one...
... that have been plaguing me for a while. She's different... she's an "unconventional learner". She has flashes of brilliance that will utterly amaze you at times.... and then other times she'll be completely stumped by the simplest of concepts.

On her subtraction portion of her test today she aced it.... however I cannot make heads or tails out of HOW she got her answers. I watched her work on her scratch paper and what she did makes no sense to me.... but somehow it does for her.

She learned to write and read early.... but has completely stalled out. I'm not sure either is any better than it was this time last year. Although, last year she was ahead of her peers, this year she's on par.

I have to tell you, after we spent entirely too much time arguing about what it means to "fill in the circle" and what they meant by "dark" in regards to the marks she was supposed to make.... I found it rather therapeutic to spend the rest of the day researching schools to send her to next year. It was eyeopening.

I came to the conclusion that she will not be going to school next year. She doesn't want to go, she wants to be homeschooled and each spring we give them each the choice about the upcoming school year. I also can't send the message to her that "the good child" gets to stay home with me all day, while I'm sending her, "the problem child" away. I need to do this the right way.

So armed with the cost of the private school we would most likely send her to (if we were to send her)... I started researching tutors. Right off the bat, I began communicating with an occupational therapist who is a handwriting specialist. Clara will have an evaluation with her in about two weeks, then we'll go from there. I'm also looking to have a learning assessment done. I have heard that we can have this done through the neighborhood school, even if we are not enrolled in the public school system. If not, I have found another place that will do it and they take our insurance. Pricing out tutors and such, we can still come in well under what the private school tuition would be, still allowing her to be home with us but getting the help she needs.

It's been an emotional week... but after hitting the bottom, I've bounced back and I'm excited that we have a plan.... a plan that's on the path to figuring out what makes her tick and will help her unlock her potential (that sounded a little cheesy didn't it... but you know what I mean).

oooooh.... new stuff!

Right after Christmas each year I get the itch to mix things up a bit with our homeschooling. So, this year I finally made my decisions and placed my orders the last of January. Everything is in now and as of yesterday, we've used it all at least once....

Simply Charlotte Mason Your Business Math Series - Pet Store
All About Spelling
English from the Roots Up Flashcards, Vol. 1
ThinkFun Math Dice
Kids Across, Parents Down: Crazy Critters

I'll write more about these later as we have more time to use them and see what we truly think of them. So far, so good though! We're really enjoying everything... but we'll have to see what the staying power ends up to be.

Sorry I've not posted for a while. It's funny. Prior to this year, the majority of the kids' friends were homeschooled. We were fairly oblivious to the schedules of the schools around us. We just did school.... not realizing that it might be a day off for the schools. Well... this year we've greatly upped our number of non-homeschooled friends and now we're very aware of the various holidays and breaks. Last week and this week have fallen victim to this somewhat. Last week the public schools here were off for Lincoln's Birthday.... so we went off with a friend of mine (a public school teacher) and her daughter to a local waterpark hotel for the night. Then Sunday night Alex was invited to spend the night at a friend's house since Monday was a holiday (they homeschool too... but the sister was having a sleepover that night since her friend would not have school on Monday... so the boys had one too), Monday night Clara stayed extra late (didn't get home until nearly 9pm) at her regular after dance playdate since her friend's private school is on break this whole week.... the list goes on.

It doesn't bother me in the least... I'm so glad my kids have so many friends and that they're not limited to just "classmates".... however, it cracks me up that there are so many holidays and breaks that I was not aware of! We've been back here over two years and this is the first time I've realized that a lot of the private schools here have February breaks!

Anyway... between the holidays and breaks this week and last... plus the fact that we've had workers in our house since last Thursday.... school has been a bit sporadic. Hopefully I'll be back to regular postings again soon!

Trust

(the photo above has nothing really to do with this post... I just feel all posts should have a photo)

That's my word for 2009 for our homeschooling journey.... TRUST. This all has to do with the epiphany I alluded to in an earlier post.

I've been doing a lot of thinking lately and here's where I'm at right now...

I need to TRUST my children more on this journey.

I need to TRUST that when they balk at certain things and struggle with others, it is not (always) because they're being difficult and don't want to work that day... but because whatever we were doing doesn't work for them. It doesn't fit their interests, their learning style or the pace they need to work at. I have been extremely guilty of trying to cram Clara into Alex's mold and getting frustrated when it doesn't work. I need to see that it is not always defiance at work, but her need for something different.

I need to TRUST that left to their own devices at times they actually come up better "educational experiences" than I could have ever have thought up for them. Plus there's the added bonus of their enthusiasm for those projects they devise themselves.

I need to rethink my TRUST in "curriculum". Okay... that sounds odd... I'm not saying that I don't trust curriculum.... but I'm talking more about my thinking that somewhere out there is the perfect curriculum that will solve ALL of my homeschooling problems.

I need to TRUST myself in my thought that the way I learned in school is not the only way to learn. There is no one right way to learn, different things work for different people.

I need to TRUST myself as the facilitator of my children's educations. Notice that I did not say "teacher".... I am the facilitator. We will learn together, I will provide educational opportunities, I will gather materials, I will say "oh, I didn't know that... tell me more".... my job is not really to teach them anything, but to help them learn.

I may have more to add to this but at least I've got the start of it written down.

Funny thing is... this whole thing came from a freak out I had about spelling. I kept looking for that one "perfect" curriculum that would magically teach my children to spell. Then I thought about school spelling programs a moment.... they don't exactly teach a child to spell (stay with me here)... they give them word lists, spelling rules, some worksheets and tests... just like almost every curriculum I had looked at and/or purchased (I have quite a collection). Where the child truly learns to spell is outside of this curriculum either through activities created by the teacher or at home with their parents... through a myriad of ways... drills, flashcards, writing out the words, spelling games, computer games, etc. The list goes on and on... but it all comes down to what works best for that particular child. I needed to stop looking for a curriculum to solve my problem for me, I need to trust my children when things didn't work and I needed to trust that I could come up with ways that would help facilitate the learning to spell process.

So, here we are at the beginning of 2009 with a fresh outlook on our homeschooling journey... let's see where it leads.

Thank you!

I just wanted to write a quick note of thanks to those of you who have commented on my blog posts recently! I rarely EVER get comments so this past week has been quite a treat!

I know to some, three comments is no big deal but for me it's HUGE.... so thank you Audrey, Alycia and Jules!

You all made my day! :-)

rabbit trails

I know I always talk about my "favorite" thing about homeschooling... and with every post it's something different. Well... today one of my favorite things about homeschooling is the freedom to follow "rabbit trails".

I decided to document one of Alex's recent trips down a rabbit trail.

It started with this book...

The Mysterious Benedict Society

It was given to us by a friend.... totally random book to read. After reading the book, Alex came to me to tell me that it was cool... in the book the kids communicated by Morse Code. He thought this was a made-up code for the book, so when I told him it was real, he got very excited. I found a key for the code online and printed it out for him.

The next thing I knew, he was a note writing machine...

He was busy writing notes for me, Jeff, Clara and his friends. He loved writing them and decoding the notes we wrote back.

On my next trip to the library, I picked up a couple of books for him...Top Secret: A Handbook of Codes, Ciphers and Secret Writing

and another book I can't find right now (but I hope I do before it's due!).

In these books they give examples of many different secret codes and brief histories of these codes. In the book I can't find, it mentioned a special code that was part of an old radio show called The Shadow. He wanted to know what I knew about it.... which happened to be very little.

So, we went snooping around the internet and found that the episodes where available as free downloads from iTunes...

So now, we've had exposure to an old time radio drama!

The trail continues though. He was looking for a new book to read and chose this one...

Wright 3

Codes played a role in the first book of this series (Chasing Vermeer) so that piqued his interest to start this one. I have a feeling that this book will take us down a path that includes looking at books of Frank Lloyd Wright's work and perhaps a trip to the Robie House for the Wright 3 tour.

It's been a fabulous learning adventure... an adventure started by one random book but lead us down a path that benefited us in so many ways.... history, spelling, grammar, logic, math, etc. And it was all done with passion and excitement... not just skimming the surface... but diving down deep. I can't even imagine what the difference would have been had I assigned him a report on the topic of Morse Code instead.

Now this rabbit trail is leading me to add more books to my Amazon wish list.... sigh.

Here's my most recent addition...

The Cryptoclub: Using Mathematics to Make and Break Secret Codes

We aren't at the end of this trail yet... I can't wait to see where else we have to go! :-)

rethinking our activities

Today was our gymnastics day... but we did not go.

As a homeschooler I fell into the trap of scheduling my kids for every activity they wanted to do... just because I could. We had our days free from a school schedule and our evenings free from homework. Why not fill our afternoons and evenings with activities that provided social opportunities? Well... because this type of schedule left no time for play. At least no time for play without having to cut a playdate short because we had a class to get to.

The kids asked to skip gymnastics again today.... so I figured it was time for a sit down talk. I asked them why they didn't want to go... they loved gymnastics and enjoyed their instructors. Why did they not want to go? They wanted to play, that's why.

We have been very fortunate to have made several friends here who homeschool and have time to play during the day. We have also been very fortunate to have made friends with several families who don't and would like to play in the afternoon/evening. In order to cultivate those friendships, we have got to have time to play. If a friend calls and wants to set up a playdate but we can't find a day that works because we have classes everyday... they'll stop calling. I'm finding that being available for our friends is definitely more important than many of the classes the kids are in.

So, after a discussion tonight with Jeff... going forward, each child will have one "special" activity and a music lesson. Right now Alex's special activity is swim and Clara's is dance. They will be allowed to choose one other activity that is convenient to the other's special activity to do once a week. For example, Alex does martial arts one day while Clara is in dance because it is just on the next block from her dance class and it runs at approximately the same time. Clara will also do swim class on one of Alex's swim days because her level was available at the same time.

So far this week we've had three playdates. Those hours spent playing had greater benefit than any of our miscellaneous activities we run around to. I can't even compare the hour and a half they would have spent in gymnastics to the 3 hours they spent outside with their friends riding their bikes and scooters.

We signed up for a lot of activities after moving here in order to make friends. But now that we have them... I think our focus should be keeping them.

Okay... sorry about that rambling... I just had an epiphany this afternoon and decided to share it! :-)

my posting "to do" list

I'm behind on some posts I want to do on this blog so I'm listing them out so I can be held accountable for actually getting them done :-)

1. One last educational activity post from our Hawaii trip (an amazing event we got to be part of).
2. One last post about our Hawaii unit study (odds and ends I haven't posted about yet).
3. What we've done so far with our new unit study that we started a week ago (butterflies).
4. The post I promised with all of the fabulous reading list suggestions that you all gave me a few weeks ago.

I think that's it... for the moment. The problem is, that we keep doing cool things so I just get further and further behind. However, we're testing this week so cool things will probably be at a minimum.... lol!

it doesn't hurt to ask

That's my new homeschooling mantra! LOL!

Well... seriously, what's the worst that could happen? They could say "no", right? But that's not too bad... especially when you consider that part of the time they say "yes".

Here's what we learned by asking this week (well... one thing I asked about a few weeks ago but it is happening this week).

1. Monday at the Notebaert Nature Museum we learned by asking that homeschoolers are welcome in the Teacher Resource Room. We also learned that we are welcome to materials on their freebie shelf and we are able to check out their theme bags and boxes. The boxes look super cool... but I didn't feel like dragging one home on the bus that day. So instead I checked out a literature theme bag...
filled with this....
They have a bunch of different themes on several different reading levels.

2. Yesterday at the Art Institute, by asking in the Teacher Resource Center, I got an Educator's Pass that gives me free general admission to the museum.

3. And finally, a few weeks ago I got an email newsletter from a business here in Chicago. They were running an educational workshop on a Saturday. I asked if they would consider running an additional workshop during the week for our homeschool group. They said "yes" and we go on Friday to see their presentation and participate in the activities they've lined up.

Have you asked for any cool homeschool stuff?

Q&A time...

Kelly (designisgood) asked the following...

how do you keep up with two blogs?

The truth... I'm a big giant procrastinator and right now I have a ton of assignments due for Memory Makers and instead of working on them, I've been busy procrastinating and keeping my blogs up to date! LOL!

And given that I still have a bunch to do (two layouts done though! woo hooo!) I'll be back later to give you my opinions and observations on Atelier Art, Angel! :-)

Apparently I work best under stress! LOL!

Ack!!! Why is it...

... at this time every year I get the itch to totally rework our homeschool plan? Is it the new year thing? Is it mid-year burn out?

I think maybe I'll start by rambling here in the next couple of days about what we're currently using for each subject and what I like and dislike about each to see if anyone out there has any suggestions. I keep trying to find this perfect mix of The Well Trained Mindand Charlotte Mason... sigh. I've been rereading The Well Trained Mind so perhaps its time for me to balance it out with another read through of The Charlotte Mason Companion.

I do this every year... am I the only one?