Sunday Stuff...

1. We're doing a two week trial for The Boy on going gluten-free. The poor kid has had recurring stomach pain and digestive issues for about 4-5 years now. He was placed on an ulcer med and antibiotics for it at separate times, as well as digestive enzymes and probiotics, all with no real improvement, so I am really hoping this works. I've been reading What's Eating Your Child?, and it is a very helpful book for pinpointing possible issues. I'm also increasing his daily intake of essential fatty acids and DHA. Thankfully, we have a network of friends who are gluten-free, so I'm getting tons of helpful suggestions. I'm doing it with him as well, and M and The Girl will be mostly doing it (since I'm the head cook here!)

2. Lots of cooking going on today. I'm making a big pot of turkey-veggie-red-bean chili, garbanzos are cooking away in the crockpot for homemade hummus, and I'm making this delicious soup (I add cumin, and blend ALL of it to a smooth, velvety texture)...

 Roasted Eggplant-Tomato Soup

3. Grading papers and cleaning house today too. I need to catch up on laundry. Thankfully, The Girl has developed a [strange] passion for folding clean laundry, so I will definitely be enlisting her services! We don't do allowances, but I do pay the kids for small jobs that go above and beyond their general chores.

4. Homeschooling today too. On the agenda: Builders of the Old World; The Story of Science; some Book of Centuries work; math; art; geography; and music. Hoping to get to an actual art project today, while listening to George Gershwin's work. Still deciding which book to read next... The Dragon in the Cliff, The Swiss Family Robinson, or The Hobbit.

5. My kids have been on an old cartoons kick lately, everything from Cartoons That Time Forgot to classic Looney Tunes. I'm loving it! Takes me right back to my childhood.

Have a good Sunday!

Week 4... Field Trips Galore!

It was a week of field trips: living history, hands-on science, and so much fun!

Sunday

We headed out to a local, smallish Renaissance Faire. You can see the pictures here. The Girl loved all the costuming; The Boy the swords and armor; both loved the games and activities. It renewed The Boy's interest in fencing. We've been having some issues with cross-country, so I have a feeling he may be switching sports!

Anyhow, back to the Faire. We met up with some friends, ran into other friends, and enjoyed the whole atmosphere. That was our history for the week!

Monday

We hit the basics: math, phonics (The Girl), spelling/word roots (The Boy), and some reading from Andrew Lang's Blue Fairy Book, Ozma of Oz, and something else I can't remember right now! It was an uneventful day, though I did write a short paper for my college class. Oh, and I graded papers while The Girl enjoyed her roller derby practice!

Tuesday

Experiential science day! We headed out to the California Academy of Sciences for homeschooler's day, and had a blast! You can see/read more about it here. Basically, it was a day of fossils, skeletons, taxidermied animals from Africa, ostrich eggs, volcanoes, earthquakes, a rainforest, manta rays, starfish, and plenty more! A great way to do science for the week!

Wednesday

Another day of basics, though we spent a little time learning about Lucy as well. I also started both kids on the Couch Potato to 5K program, which we may do at a slightly slower pace than the program recommends. The Girl is reading more smoothly lately, and seems to at last have a vested interest in learning - frankly, I think she's embarrassed slightly at Park Days when the other kids play card and other games that involve reading, and she can't. We finished up the evening watching a few old episodes of Gilligan's Island, and of course some more Oz reading. We're really enjoying this series together! My dad recently gave me a number of lovely hardbound, illustrated volumes of the original Oz series - I have many fond memories of hours spent reading the books, and admiring the artwork, so I am thrilled to be sharing these with the kids!

Thursday

More basics! I do have The Boy considering dropping Teaching Textbooks, completing a couple of multiplication & division units in Math Mammoth, and then moving directly into Life of Fred Fractions. I think LOF would be more challenging for him, appeal to his odd sense of humor more, and make him think more than Teaching Textbooks does. He's going to take the weekend to think about it.

We also went for a long, family walk, since they put actual sidewalks on the street next to the new elementary school. We found another trail leading off along a creek, where there will eventually be a park!

Friday

Friday was in some ways a very bad day, and in others, an opportunity to grow. M finally got a call back from his boss regarding his job status now that he's not "disabled" any longer from his arm injury. It was not a good call. Basically, his job was filled while he was out, and so he no longer has a job. Unfortunately, in California, when you're on state disability, your employer does not have to keep the position open, especially if it would cause hardship for the company. If M had been on Worker's Comp, it would have been a different matter entirely.

He did get a severance package that will help for a bit, and he will get unemployment. Truthfully, he didn't love his job anyhow, and often came home angry or upset. I personally think it will be good for him to find something new, something more along the lines of his interests, away from all the negativity that job had to offer.

He's looking at getting back into landscape maintenance, perhaps at a local college. We are trying our best to look at this as an opportunity, rather than something terrible, but I admit that with the economy the way it is, I am worried.

We did really enjoy watching the first half of the director's cut of Fellowship of the Rings last night though! We are all very much looking forward to The Hobbit this December, right in time for my fortieth birthday! We plan to watch the second half of Fellowship tonight, and then next weekend, we can work on the second movie. We're also thinking about reading The Hobbit before the film comes out, which of course might lead the reading The Lord of the Rings. I wouldn't have any problem with that!

Next Week

We're going to try a two-fold approach to history this week: Sunday will be world history with readings from Builders of the Old World, The Story of Science: Aristotle Leads the Way, and some Book of Centuries work. On Wednesday, we'll read from The Rainbow Book of American History, and do more work in the Book of Centuries.

Science will be focusing on energy and matter, with a combo of a couple of lessons from BFSU, then a chapter from The World in a Drop of Water. We need to get out and collect some pond water samples for this, so I think we'll be visiting the local wetlands area - a nature walk and specimen collection all in one!

I'm also taking a break on regular math lessons to give each kid an "end-of-year" test from Math Mammoth, so that I can pinpoint their weak areas, and target those. The tests are multiple pages long, so I will be spreading them out over the course of the week.

And finally, we're trying to decide between reading The Dragon in the Cliff, The Swiss Family Robinson, and The Hobbit! Which would you choose?

Friday Follow-up... Science This Week...

Pictures from our recent trip to the California Academy of Sciences! 

 We always think of Night at the Museum when we see this guy!

Waiting for the 3D dinosaur film

I think manta rays are one of absolute most fascinating creatures ever!

And yes, I have a thing for giraffes.

A traditional tule reed boat, made in the Coast Miwok style

Intrigued by a pitcher plant display

The Girl fondly remembers the stink flower from last time!

Cool little creatures hiding under a rock

And of course we always love penguins!

The biggest egg here is from the now extinct elephant bird (see skeleton below)

A happy girl!

Cool fossils and skulls abounded

And a happy boy!

Wish this one had opened up - the other side of the wings were a vibrant blue

We also...
felt the tremors in a hands-on earthquake exhibit
watched a movie on earthquakes in the Planetarium
watched the penguins have lunch
checked out a lot of fish, sea creatures, fossils, and more!

Wordless Wednesday... Looking Back...

At the California Academy of Sciences in 2008

We went again yesterday, and I'll post pictures tomorrow. They've definitely grown a bit since this picture was taken!

History This Week... Renaissance Faire!

We headed out to the local, small Renaissance Faire this last weekend, and had a blast!

 There was some awesome pillow fighting!

M contemplating the giant Jenga

 All hail the Queen!

Leather crafting - they each made a bag to carry all the "stones" they collected through various games (Rat-a-Pult, pillow fighting, darts-and-apples, etc.)

There was live music with the Danse Macabre

Archery!

Fencing!

More of the Danse Macabre

And a beautifully costumed woman with a very large owl

Of course there was more... Irish songs; tons of people in incredible period costume; good food (loved the Chicken Tikka!); watching mock battles where the armor looked incredibly heavy; honey tasting; falconry... it was a day well spent! (Not to mention an incredibly fun way to learn some history!)

Saturday Ramblings... And Happy Fall!!!

image courtesy of coolchaser

It is officially my favorite season of the year! I am, technically by a few days (at the last end of the spectrum), a fall baby, and as far back as I can remember, fall has been the best season of the year.... the crisp air, cooler nights, leaves changing color, the upcoming holidays, and so forth.

We have a lot going on in the next few days, so I should have some good pictures coming up soon!

Thank you all for bearing with me through my wishy-washiness. I realized that it isn't the books we are using that are the problem, nor is it the approach to child/interest-led learning. Instead, it is that I am not developing the ideas enough - I am not folding in additional resources, tangents, ideas, etc., though this would make it a much richer learning experience. The Boy has a desire to create a lapbook, probably inspired by his much beloved Ology books with all their little foldouts, envelopes, and more, so I bookmarked some great Pinterest sites (here and here) for Wright Brothers lapbooks. What I do like about the Pinterest pages and googling ideas is that there is NOT a pre-put-together kit for a Wright Brothers lapbook... we will have to create it ourselves! More room for creativity and development than in putting together something that someone else has pre-made for you.

So today we are celebrating fall. I plan on roasting a chicken, and making this delicious cauliflower dish, except that I will cut the cauliflower into pieces, and add some broccoli. Since The Boy and I did not make it to his distance running this morning, we'll be running this afternoon. Also on the agenda: some more paper grading; a library trip; a bit of house and yard work; and writing a fake conference paper proposal for one of my classes. Exciting stuff, huh?

Hope you all have a wonderful first day of fall! Enjoy the new season!

Week 3... A So-So Sort of Week...

You can tell just from the title that this was just a getting along sort of week!

We started out strong!
Read about New York City in Richard Halliburton's Complete Book of Marvels
Read some Greek myths, Celtic fairy tales, and a bit about ancient Greek history
Read about the invention of the printing press with this lovely book (this tied in with our Wright Brothers book)...

The Boy aced his quiz #2 in Teaching Textbooks. The Girl happily returned to Math Mammoth for a review of place value. The Boy worked on spelling, alliteration, and journaling, while The Girl flew through a number of pages in Explode the Code. We read through chapter one of Grammar-Land, and did an exercise in listing nouns.

But, I have been feeling vaguely dissatisfied with science and history. I feel like we're just not doing enough with either. So I've decided that we really need to step it up a notch, and I have come up with two options for each that I need to consider over the weekend, so that we can start up fresh next week!  

AND HERE IS WHAT WE DECIDED

HISTORY

Option 1...
Use The History of US as a basic, daily reading (i.e. "spine")
Then, follow the rabbit trails AS DESIRED with:

Some good  historical fiction

Topical books from the library

Movies, documentaries, etc.

Hands-on activities from a variety of books, & from Time Travelers

Option 2...
Continue with books from Landmark and similar series, following the kids' interests

Add in short (picture) topical books on interrelated subjects (examples for Wright Brothers include kites, the printing press, bicycles, and more)


Add in notebooking/lapboooking, related projects, and more!

Read once a week from a history spine, so that the kids will have more topics to explore!

Then, Science

Option 1...

Use Building Foundations of Scientific Understanding as a base/spine


Add in topical books, readings from the Kingfisher Science Encyclopedia, and videos from Bill Nye, etc.


Plenty of hands-on, and some notebooking with printable pages from Noeo

Option 2...

Keep going with topical books, like The World in a Drop of Water, following the kids' interests

Add in scientist biographies, topical books on interrelated subjects, and plenty of hands-on

Documentaries and science shows (Bill Nye again!)

Lab reports/notebooking (see Noeo link above)




This gives me a lot to think about, and discuss with M, over the weekend. Hopefully, by next week, I'll have some resolution one way or the other!

If you made it this far, I hope your week went well! Have a good weekend!

Monday Musings... Mathematical Thoughts...

I subscribe to a yahoo group on living math. And today's email had some interesting links, so I thought I would share a couple...

When Less Is More (an article from Psychology Today)

and this great TEDtalks on youtube, from a math teacher (it is only about 11 minutes long, and worth listening to!)

Photo courtesy of the US Dept. of Education's blog

They make me wonder about the importance of math. I know a lot of unschoolers that seem to have done pretty well in life without being made to sit down every day and do math.

BUT, a) I am paranoid, and b) The Boy talks about engineering as a possible career, so I think for him, math is important. I do have plans for him with math over the next few years... I want him to finish out his Teaching Textbooks this year -- he's off to a great start -- and then I think we'll transition to Life of Fred. Probably before the end of this year. To work in LOF Fractions, the first of the original Fred books, he needs to have math skills that include multiple digit multiplication and long division under his belt, both of which will be well covered by Teaching Textbooks this year.

Why Life of Fred? I like that it emphasizes a different approach, with fewer problems to complete, but is still rigorous. I noticed in the TEDtalk linked above that one of the problems he cites is the sheer repetitiveness of math homework, so I think fewer but more in-depth problems would be good.

Of course, The Boy might choose to stay with Teaching Textbooks. That's his choice. While I do insist, evilly, on math, I think my kids should have the freedom to choose what program they go with. I do hope he'll go with LOF, because I think he would love it and it would challenge him, but we'll have to wait and see.

As for The Girl, she loves both her Modern Curriculum Press workbook and Math Mammoth at the moment. I am not sure what approach I'll take with her later on, since neither MCP or Math Mammoth don't go all the way through to high school levels. I am tempted to look into Hands On Equations (which is definitely on the pricey side, but looks really good!) for her. Or perhaps she would do well with something like Math-U-See at some point. Hmmmmm. Or conversely, she might do well with a more traditional, spiral approach, such as Saxon.

I do know that for both kids, I'll keep adding in living books, math in daily life, and some fun math games.

So, is less more in math? How do you approach math in your home?

Scattered Sunday Thoughts...

Dropping the Narnia study for a little while. Since we have listened to all of the Narnia books on cd before, I don't feel bad about this. Why are we dropping it? Well, we watched Journey to the Center of the Earth (the 2008 version) last night, and tonight we'll be watching the classic version. We're going to be reading the book as well at the demands of my children!

The kids and I decided that since 90% of their historical interests are centered on American history, we should make that the focus of our Sunday history studies, so look out Rainbow Book of American History... here we come!
Scratch that on the American history. I read from Roger Lancelyn Green's Tales of the Greek Heroes, and then we got into Greek history instead! However, I think we will try the American history next Sunday, unless the kids really want ancient Greek history!

I am so glad fall is on its way! This is my favorite time of year... the changing leaves, crisp fresh air, soups and stews, all the holidays approaching. I hung up the fall wreath on our front door yesterday after adding some beautiful (artificial) orange and red maple leaves.

Our vegetable garden is winding down. There are some tomatoes still ripening on the vine, and a few squash lurking on the plants, but I need to start planning out a winter garden!

I am totally confused about the optimal approach to diet and nutrition. I have lost fifty, yes fifty, pounds with a low carb approach, but am not sure that's how I want to live the rest of my life. I watched Forks Over Knives, which promotes plant-based foods, and really downplays use of animal products. I read Primal Blueprint, which says that fats and loads of protein are good, veggies are good, and grains, beans and dairy are evil. I've read Nourishing Traditions, which places an emphasis on animal products and pre-soaked grains, and The McDougall Plan, which is strictly a very lowfat vegan approach. And probably half a dozen other books with varying approaches. Now I'm reading a book on the Mediterranean diet, which says more or less everything above in moderation, but not too many fats. I want something that is versatile enough for my whole family, and not as expensive as paleo can be. So I am confused, wandering in the dark, so to speak. How do YOU approach healthy eating?

On today's agenda: an art project for the kids and I; some homeschooling; catching up on laundry and dishes (I hope); a little grocery shopping; muffin baking for tomorrow morning; and some more reading for my classes. I'm working my way through The Time of the Butcherbird and a few bits of Chaucer's Canterbury Tales. I just finished grading two batches of papers!

Week Two... We're Getting There...

This week, I worked on making some adjustments. Even though we had a great week one, I felt overwhelmed by some of my own choices for the year, and so I decided to readjust a bit.

What Worked This Week

Math

Math is still going well. The Boy is moving right along in Teaching Textbooks, and The Girl loves her MCP Math, as do I. I think I found the perfect math workbook for a girl who really wanted a math workbook this year! The Boy worked on estimating, rounding, adding, and subtracting with three digit numbers this week, while The Girl finished a review of addition and subtraction, finishing up with two pages of word problems, which she seemed to enjoy!

Language Arts

A definite highlight was reading Ruth Heller's beautiful book Merry-Go-Round: A Book About Nouns. We did not get to Latin this week (not that I am hugely worried about that), but The Boy did work on spelling, and started a unit in Word Roots regarding suffixes. The Girl made great progress this week! I've noticed that she is writing a lot more too... she's constantly asking me how to spell this or that, and she's proud that her handwriting is improving. I think for now we will continue with our mix of Explode the Code and Reading Pathways.

Science and History

In science this week, we studied a bit about energy (BFSU) - how it transfers from one thing to another, how it is created/where it comes from. We smashed one Hot Wheels car into another to show the transfer of energy. We discussed solar power, wind turbines, and so forth. We played around with both microscopes some more. We read a bit in Moon of the Deer, and spent time examining bug, rocks, and more in our backyard.

In history, we continued reading through The Wright Brothers. We learned about the construction of a printing press by Wilbur and Orville, which got the kids interested in the history of printing. I have a book for us to read today called Breaking Into Print: Before and After the Printing Press. This is what I am trying to encourage... following the rabbit trails that pop up from somewhere else! We also read a section in Builders of the Old World after watching Night at the Museum. We may or may not continue with Builders next week, since The Girl still wants to follow the Wright Brothers with Sacajawea!

I still find myself trying to cram us into a box a bit with history. I know, I know... I said I would let the kids follow their interests this year, and am really trying to do that! I will learn to let go a bit!

And finally, Literature

We dropped a lot of the books from A Picture Perfect Childhood this week. While I love the idea, the practicality of it for me just isn't there. Instead, we moved forward with our Narnia literature study! We read The Aunt and Amabel, a short story by E. Nesbit in which a girl,  sent to "Coventry" in the Spare Room finds a magical world inside a big Wardrobe. Sound familiar? It was from this story that C.S. Lewis drew his inspiration for the wardrobe in The Lion, the Witch & the Wardrobe. We also started reading The Snow Queen.

We read about Claude Monet, and discussed his art, using the Artchive to look up a few pieces.

Other books for the week included continued reading from In the Beginning: Creation Stories from Around the World, a few short stories from Grandmothers' Tales, and more of The Lightning Thief in the car. The Girl and I enjoyed beautiful versions of The Tale of the Firebird and King Midas after her reading lessons. I think I ill continue to read a short story/fairy tale to her after each lesson. I found this book that looks like it will work well for this, and am waiting for it to arrive at the library. Until then, we have a stack of other, gorgeously illustrated fairy tale books on hand.

We also finished up The Marvelous Land of Oz as a bedtime book. Next up: we decided to go with Pippi Longstocking since I think both kids will enjoy it!

What I'd Like To Work On Next Week

With The Boy: I'd like to start reading through Breakthroughs in Science with him. I'd like him to do a little more writing next week as well - we didn't really get around to it this week.

With The Girl: I can't think of anything we need to change right now, except making sure that I read her a story after her reading work!

With both: Art project(s) definitely. Finish The Wright Brothers. Start some poetry work with Pizza, Pigs & Poetry. Continue the Narnia study. Listen to some beautiful music. Bring in Greek myths (to replace creation myths), and some Celtic fairy tales to replace Grandmothers' Stories.

Hope everyone else had a good week! Next week I'll get some pictures in my recap as well!

Progress...

If you have read my blog for a while, you will know that The Girl has struggled with reading. A great part of it seems to have been simply a lack of interest, other parts... well, we suspect some sort of disorder with her, but have never had her evaluated for various reasons.

Anyhow, I digress. She's been working in MCP Plaid Phonics a bit this year (alongside daily work in Reading Pathways), but yesterday pulled out an Explode the Code book instead. Each lesson has a page where the student has to read two sentences and choose the best sentence for the little picture. I think there are about 7 or 8 of these on the page. She got to that page, and asked me, for the first time ever, if she could read them to herself, and then have me check her answers. Of course I said yes, and off she went to curl up on the couch. 15 minutes later, she was back, book in hand. She waited while I skimmed the page... and, you know what?

SHE DID IT!!!! She accurately read the entire page and chose the correct answers, which she then proceeded to read aloud to me!!!

She has never wanted to read to herself before. And she was so thrilled she did it right that she finished off the entire lesson, "just for fun and because I'm getting better at reading, Mommy."

Wordy Wednesday... Adjustments...

I have, thanks in part to the many supportive comments, gotten over my issues from the other day. I know in my heart that our approach is right for us. Enough said.

Image courtesy of AllenCentre

Now, I was reflecting yesterday on how our school year is going so far. For the most part, I am delighted with it. But (yes, you know there would be a "but"), I feel like we're skimming along the surface. I feel like I am constantly juggling library books: looking them up; putting some on hold; stopping at two libraries to get the rest... you get the picture. My library card is constantly maxed out, and I've thought about using the kids' cards to add to the pile(s).

Then I stopped. Yesterday, I was working on another list combined from A Picture Perfect Childhood and the Core Knowledge lists. And I just stopped for a moment.

We're having fun, check. The kids are learning some interesting facts, check. We are reading lots of books, check. But... we're not really getting any depth. We're missing out on some of the things I wanted to do this year. We're jamming in history where we can fit it, instead of enjoying it. I don't have time to read one-on-one with the kids.

Image courtesy of Aero-Lite

There are books I would love to share with them. The Girl wants me to read Pippi Longstocking with her, and I think The Boy would enjoy Breakthroughs in Science by Isaaac Asimov.

I've decided for the time being, to back off on the multitude of short [i.e. picture] books, at least to some extent. To choose more carefully, so that we have time to go deeper, instead of just skimming along the surface.

I'd also like to have time for my Narnia study!

This week we'll slow down. I don't need to read them every book on the aforementioned lists. I'd like to revert a little more to this schedule, which I found so inspiring at the start of my planning!

In other news, The Boy is really enjoying cross-country. He does find it to be very challenging, and I think today, hill training, will be a bit difficult. But his coach is awesome! He encourages every kid to do the best they can, not judging themselves by what others are doing (hmmm... I think someone said something about that to me in one of the recent comments on my blog!). And The Girl still loves her roller derby. We haven't managed to get back to piano lessons yet - I'm still trying to tighten down my college schedule. And no 4H this year. Too time consuming, and the kids just weren't interested in the projects being offered enough to make it worth our time and effort.

Hey, while I'm rambling, any tips on household cleaning/maintenance when you have a busy schedule? I find myself consistently falling behind on dishes, laundry (especially folding and putting away), dusting, etc. I did fare much better with planning ahead for menus, groceries, and the like this week, so that is a step in the right direction!

Image courtesy of evanlaar

And one final thing worthy of note... I have, at long last, hit the FIFTY pound mark in my weight loss journey. I hit 45 quite some time back, then plateaued for a long while, although I was happy to see that I could maintain the loss! Only 12-17 pounds to go!

Monday Musings... Am I Doing It Wrong?

Many days, too many days actually, I check in on the message boards for The Well Trained Mind. I read the curriculum boards, and the general board. I read posts on what everyone is using, their schedules, and more.

And then I worry... just a little, really not that much at all, but that nagging voice is definitely at the back of my mind. You see, I have an eleven year old sixth grader on my hands this year. A middle schooler.  And we school for maybe 2.5-4 hours a day depending on how into things we get. [Note: I don't include his free reading time in this number, or the time he spends playing around with computer animation] And then I read posts where people say they are spending 6-8 hours a day on school at that age. And they are using many resources for everything... multiple math programs, multiple writing and grammar programs. If not multiple, then intensive.

And I'm not. The Boy uses ONE math program in general. We do some reading of some mathy books, but I would hardly equate that to using two or three programs simultaneously. And he's not doing an intensive writing program, just spelling, some fun grammar, and free writing at the moment.

We're also not doing chronological history, or any given history curriculum, for that matter. Or an organized science program.

And so I worry a little. Am I shortchanging him with short lessons? And a lack of organized curriculum?

But then I look at what we are doing. We learn history and science everyday. We read a lot, and he is exposed to high level vocabulary and beautiful writing everyday. He does well with math, and is improving his spelling. He no longer resists writing. He has time for reading on his own, creating art, playing in the backyard with his sister, watching movies, playing around on the piano, and more. Since we're not in public school, I am not sure that we need to take as long, or longer, than the local public schools to educate him on a daily basis.

Of course, at the other end of the spectrum there is unschooling. By those standards, I am probably making my kids do too much. We tried that though, and for us, it didn't work at this time.

Perhaps I am doing this wrong. There is that possibility. However, I am a firm believer that there is no one-size-fits-all in education. Perhaps some kids do thrive on 6-8 hours a day of school. I don't think mine would, but that doesn't make the other people wrong, any more than it makes my approach the correct one! I guess I'll find out in the long run if this approach works, but at least for now I've got two happy children who are fairly eager everyday to do their learning!

Do your views on home education look different than "the norm"? How do you school outside the box?

A Cowboy Story by The Boy...

I handed The Boy the book Unjournaling earlier this week, and asked him to choose a writing prompt, and to write for at least 10 minutes. He ended up writing for almost 20 minutes, so that he could finish his story. I have corrected the spelling errors to make it more readable, but the words are all his!

First, the prompt:
A bad dude in a cowboy hat is walking into a saloon in a bad Western movie. He's looking mad and dangerous. Tell what happens, creating a happy ending. (note: I'm not sure The Boy's ending is exactly happy, but hey, he wrote a story!)

The Story
A thief called The Hat Smuggler walked into a saloon one day, hoping to get some new hats, and he pulled out his gun and said "Stick 'em up and gimme your hats!" Everyone stuck up their hands, not wanting to get shot. "Gimme your hat!" he said, pointing to an old man with a handlebar moustache. The old man, named Bert, said "How can I get me hat off my head if me hands are above me head?" The Hat Smuggler, named Daveed, ripped Bert's hat off, crumpled it, and threw it at the old man. Daveed pulled out his gun and shot. But it backfired, and killed the Hat Smuggler, and so everybody got to keep their hats. The end.

Week One... Such a Good Week!

A glorious sunset

 In all my years of homeschooling (this is the seventh already!), I don't think I have ever had such an easy transition from summer to school-time. It has been such a good week, and I feel that we got a lot done... we're off to a very smooth start for the year.

A mere sampling of our books this week

Books

Books themselves are now the backbone of our homeschooling efforts. And our books vary widely in topic! I'm using the 12 Month book guidelines from A Picture Perfect Childhood, along with various selections from the Core Knowledge trade books list. And so every day we sit down on the couch together, and I read. We have read books this week about everything from gravity (our BFSU topic of the week), to Queen Elizabeth I, to slavery, Native Americans, civil rights, microscopes, creation stories, apples, and more! When I sit down with a stack of books each day after lunch, the kids are eager to sit down too, and see the books (ah, the benefits of illustrated books!), to hear about what we'll be learning today, and I love it!

We're also about two thirds of the way through The Marvelous Land of Oz as bedtime reading. I decided that though we are loving the Oz series, we will switch gears a little when we finish this book, and read The Trumpet of the Swan, after which we may read the next Oz book, or perhaps something else entirely!

In the car, we're making good progress through The Lightning Thief. The Girl and The Boy are constantly comparing the book to the movie, and The Boy, having read the entire series, just keeps telling The Girl "Just wait!", or "You'll love this part!", or "They left this part out of the movie, so you really want to listen!"

The Basics

Math is going extremely well for both kids right now - neither has had a single complaint about their choice of math texts. The Boy skipped the first 7 lessons in Teaching Textbooks, but did take the first quiz, scoring 91%. He then decided to start with the next lesson after reviewing the second quiz, and hasn't scored anything under 95% the remainder of the week. He's working on carrying, estimating, and so forth. The Girl loves MCP Math. She does every problem on the front side of each page/lesson, and about half or more of the problems on the back--this was my choice since there are quite a few problems on the back of each page! She's worked on a review of addition and subtraction this week.

We also started reading through The History of Counting, and had a lot of fun playing around with body counting! We pretended to bargain for various items using this method.

The Boy worked on spelling this week, and will be taking a spelling test today. He also worked on several pages of word roots, and started Latin. He wrote a short story as well, and is thinking about topics for an essay we'll work on over the next month or so. The Girl has enjoyed MCP Plaid Phonics this week, mostly review work, and read several pages from Reading Pathways, and a couple of Nora Gaydos books. Next week I am hoping to get into poetry with them both!

Reading his favorite science encyclopedia

History & Science

We read another few chapters in The Wright Brothers this week, and several entries from The Dangerous Book for Boys Yearbook, which we now refer to simply as The Yearbook, as The Girl thought it was not fair that it says "For Boys", not "For Boys and Girls". Several of our picture books (see Books above) also gave us some historical insight.

In science, we read about gravity, microscopes, and Anton van Leeuwenhoek. We explored slides with our new microscope, and I taught the kids how to prepare slides, comparing water from the dog bowl (after our large dog drank some), the well, our faucet, and from a bucket that had been sitting a while. Today we're going for a late afternoon hike/nature walk, and I hope to collect some pond water for further comparison. We also watched documentaries-- The Incredible Human Machine, and Disney's Oceans. The kids noticed that some of the life forms we observed in our microscope work, and this book, were quite similar to deep sea life in the documentary... a great connection! There were a few episodes of Mythbusters as well, and we checked out NASA footage of a recent solar flare too.

Sorting some fabric squares for a doll's quilt she is planning

All the Odds and Ends

The Girl and I read The Talking Pot together, and then cooked the Danish Apple Pudding (more like cake) recipe from the back of the book. I am trying to make sure that each week at least one of our library books has a recipe for her and I to try out. We have a lot of fun with this - The Girl loves stories, and cooking, and we enjoy spending the time together! We generally do this on a Saturday or Sunday, when we have more time. The Danish Apple Pudding, with a healthy dollop of vanilla yogurt, made a fantastic breakfast, by the way!

The Boy worked on movie making and computer animation this week too. He loves to take videos and edit them, using iMovie or Windows MovieMaker, depending on which computer he is using. He's always talking editing terms these days, or soft body physics. He read a lot too, going back and forth between Spyology (he's big into codes and ciphers too) and Aliens on Vacation.

In art, we worked on a project based off this work, but we haven't quite finished... oops! Maybe today? I'm hoping these projects will turn out well enough to scan and include in our calendars, which will be gifts from the kids to all the relatives at Christmas.

Oh, and I almost forgot! The Boy started cross-country track this week. We met the coach, who we both immediately liked, and walked with everyone --parents and kids-- over the trails we'll be using for training. Mondays he'll be working on speed sprints (with M tagging along), Wednesdays are hill training, and Saturday mornings are distance training. I get to tag along on Wednesdays and Saturdays, since the coach highly encourages parents to participate alongside their kids. The Boy and I ran about half the distance this week, and he loved it!

All in all, an excellent week. There were a couple of things I would have liked to have gotten done, but after all, it was only the first week back, and I am very pleased with what we accomplished! Next week's goals: start the Narnia literature study (I've got two versions of the Snow Queen to choose from), and start our Book of Centuries. Other than that, I'm not making any changes, or adding anything else!