Spring has sprung...

I can truly tell that Spring has sprung when my kids go bug hunting! First it was earthworms...





Then it was some little bug that rolled up tight, and only opened up again once he was back on the ground. Not being from this country, most of these things are foreign to me. I'll have to see if I can find out what it is.

Schooling Year Round

I recently came across a post on another blog that reminded me that schooling year round is not the norm here in the US. In South Africa, the school year runs mid-January to early December, with the longest break being the Dec/Jan break. Of course, that also happens to be the warm season.

I prefer to school year round for a number of reasons:
1) Any length of time off tends to turn our brains into fudge.
2) I like to have the wiggle room that schooling year round allows. This allows us to have time off when we're sick, for vacations, or when we just plain need it.
3) It allows schooling to be more of a lifestyle than an "on/off" thing. Even when we're not officially doing school, we're still in the mode, and everything is a learning experience. It's a mindset that's easier to maintain when we don't have to switch it on and off.
4) We LOVE schooling in the summer because we love the outdoors and nature studies. There is so much to explore and it's so much richer if we do something with it - turn it into a nature notebook entry, look in depth at something in the encyclopedia.

Our calendar for next year goes as follows:
1st Term
7/14/08-8/1 /08
8/4/08-8/8/08 = VBS week
8/11/08-8/15/08 = Ease into school with a 3-day week (Mon/Wed/Fri)
8/18/08-09/21 /08

2nd Term
09/24/08-11/23/08

3rd Term
12/01/08-12/19/08

4th Term
01/05/09-2/13/09

5th Term
02/23/09-04/17/09

6th Term
04/27/09-06/12/09

This kid is H U G E

My 6 month old is 23 lbs and 30". We had to give up the infant car seat far too early for my liking. And having a baby this large brings its own set of homeschooling challenges. For example, I have to consider that I cannot hold 23 lbs for all 3 hours of a field trip. But not all places are condusive to bringing a stroller. He is half the weight of my 5 yr old son. And 100th percentile!

Embarking on the Green Hour Challenge

I came across the Green Hour Challenge on other blogs that I read, but never had time to look at it closely. Now that the weather is gorgeous, I'm looking for outdoorsy, nature walk type things. And the Green Hour Challenge is just the ticket!

I will prepare for this today by printing out the notebook pages and looking at the assignment, and hopefully we'll have our first Green Hour Challenge report back by the end of the week!

Devotions

I came across the most wonderful publisher at the MassHOPE conference this year. They are Generations of Virtue. They had so many inspiring books and devotionals.

I would love to have a special mom/daughter time with C. I think we need it. So I plan on doing "Just Mom and Me Having Tea" with her. At the conference they had a cute tea set with the book so I have my eye on this...



If we have time I'd also like to do "His Little Princess"


I would love D to have some one on one time with M, too, so I plan on getting "A Little Hero in the Making" for them.

Fairy Tales

I was just reading one of my favorite bloggers, Jennefer, over at Smooth Stones Academy and her most recent post contained some quotes about Fairy Tales. I have always been "afraid" of fairy tales and fantasy, in spite of the fact that I grew up with it.

As I mentioned on her post, I think part of that is that somehow modern fairy tales and fantasy has been mixed with and distorted by horror and evil. Even in discussing this with my husband, he has come up with all the same questions and comments I have had:
- Will they know it's not real?
- Shouldn't the strong, firm foundation (i.e. biblical truth) be securely in place first?

We're still discussing this, and I hope to post our conclusion sooner rather than later, since this decision will most certainly influence the readers and read aloud books that we use.

Please feel free to comment about your thoughts on this one!

A long term plan

I've had a wonderful discussion with the ladies over at the WTM forums, and I wanted to leave a copy of my conclusion here:

I absolutely agree with both of you. [*Note* This is referring to letting the kids have fun, and rediscover just how exciting history is.] I think that's at the heart of my dilemma. There are definitely so many curricula I could just pick one and go with it. But I lean towards science/geography for fear of burning them out on history (already!) and that won't really address the problem. I think looking at history exactly as you described it with a little reading and a lot of fun is definitely on the cards.

I guess one way to do that would be to take Jessica's idea of looking at our state history from a very hands on/adventure/exploration perspective. Along with that we could look in depth at some animals that we have here - starting with insects, looking at birds, and some of the bigger animals - skunks, foxes, coyotes, bears etc. That would mean a trip to every reachable zoo in the state, and definitely a reciplrocal zoo membership!

Thank you to all of you for helping me to think this out. I definitely want to take advantage of the fact that they're 'only' in 1st and pre-k and use that to have fun and allow them to function at the level they're at. I also want to take advantage of their sponge brains and fill them with facts. Ultimately, it doesn't really matter what we're doing because we will still be focussing on the 3 R's, but I do want to do other things that will make them excited and look forward to school because I believe that along with the 3 R's, the foundation of expection and attitude needs to be created at this point, and will have lasting effects, hopefully in a fantastic attitude towards learning for the rest of their lives. I want to take advantage of being able to just take off and have fun somewhere, or do a fun project or activity, and within that, I want to build our relationships and learn more about them so that I know how to adjust our long-term plan for their benefit according to their gifts and needs in the future.

My tentative long-term plan for C, M and J is this:

(I do not think we will be using MFW for anything. I had planned on Adventures, but I may just put it all together myself, because I am so attracted to so many different resources out there. I would feel like we'd missed out if we were stuck to resources someone else had chosen.)

So that means this next year is a "filler" year. But I hate to call it that because filler sounds so much like...well, cardboard. I want it to be an exciting year filled with adventure and following our interests. I already have some ideas for how I'm going to approach it. But more on that later.

I am so thankful for the ladies over at the Well Trained Mind forums. They really helped me think through this one.

There is hope for my blog!

I am SO excited that in the future there is hope of a beautiful template for my blog. I really need to be organized and inspired with everything I do, otherwise it falls apart. Hence the stop-start-stop-start nature of my blog.

Well, I am excited that there may be a solution for that on the horizon. So bear with me while I try to make this work in the meantime ;)