Wordless Wed. - Gladiators!

Wordless Wed. - Figures in Motion Ashurbanipal fights the Greeks

Wordless Wednesday - Our First Science Experiment, Crayon Cookies!

One down...

Life is finally starting to return to normal, and we are busy preparing for Spring re-enacting season to start, although we did have to cancel our first Regency event due to some family health issues. I'm hoping to return to that period at some point, but for now at least we are back to working on our mid-19th century clothing!


The past couple of weeks I have been working on Nate's wool tunic. Somehow, the whole ensemble reminds me of Fievel from An American Tale but I know its accurate, so it'll have to do. Speaking of which, the kids would probably love that movie...I must remember to put it on the Netflix list :).

It is one of the first lovely Spring days here in the Northwest, so we invited some friends over today and took our History project outside. We were working on making wigs like Thomas Jefferson and George Washington wore in the colonial era.

Not exactly living history quality, but tons of fun!

True love looks like...an igloo!

Why else would a full grown man stay up until 3:30am building a marshmallow igloo so a 5-year-old can learn the concept "I says ih" in a hands-on way? I love my hubby :).

Whirlwind week

Oh my goodness! This week has completely gotten away from me!

We went to our homeschool convention and wound up with loads of books. I ordered a science program from Sonlight so we will get to mess around with experiments and read about bugs, botany and physics next year. (I think we might order caterpillars and watch them hatch into butterflies!) I also ordered RightStart Math. This is a very light, hands-on math program that uses mostly manipulatives and games. I don't want to push the reading thing, so while we are doing tons of reading aloud, we won't be doing any "official" reading teaching. Noah shows no interest and is still really young, so I just want him to have fun learning without a lot of pressure.

Friday night our church rented out the movie theatre, so we saw Disney-Pixar's UP in digital 3-D. Noah was less than enthusiastic (what did I really expect from a kid who tells me normal life is "too real"?) and spent the whole time sitting by the exit. Nate, on the other hand, put on the 3-d glasses and said "I like it." Two minutes later, he shouted "I LOVE it!" in the silent movie theatre :). It was a cute movie and a fun family time.

Saturday brought our Big Huzzah at the Fort and we had a blast with the new camera. I'm still sorting through all the pictures but they will follow soon! Hubby actually said he was really glad we had gotten into reenacting because we have been spending more time together just being a family and helped him to feel closer to us after being gone so much at work. That comment made my day! I will bring him around yet! (We've started researching a new impression for next year and he is super excited about it!)

Saturday night we had tickets for the Broadway tour of the musical RENT in Seattle, and it was amazing! The two male leads of Roger and Mark were the original Broadway cast members and had some of the most incredible male vocals I've ever heard in a show. Everyone in the cast put on a fantastic show and I don't think you could have seen a better performance west of NYC.

We spent Father's day celebrating with my in-laws, although my poor father-in-law had to run between the lightening strikes to the BBQ! Everyone was safe and we had a good time, but it was some pretty crazy weather! The thunderstorms rolled in out of nowhere from a perfectly sunny & warm day, and you could see the sailboats down on the Sound scrambling for cover!

This week is Sports camp for Noah, and after one day, he has already declared that he would like to play soccer (which will probably change tomorrow when they play basketball :). For now, we are catching up after the events of the past week, and learning to work our new camera, so keep an eye out for photos soon. Hope you all are enjoying the early days of summer!

Early Adventures in Homeschooling

I'm slowly recovering from the horror that has been the past 5 days of stomach flu, and am beginning to get back to normal life. Mrs. G has inspired me to post about some of our early adventures in homeschooling/afterschooling (since the kids do go to preschool, but it is a co-op and is a completely play-based, whole child philosophy - no worksheets here!).

Other than using the books from the Core Knowledge Series, we have started using the Sonlight P4/5 program.

There are qualities I like about the Sonlight program, namely their science curriculum, and I appreciate that for preschool the sequence is primarily read-aloud books with suggested activities. There are elements I am not as fond of; I plan on modifying most of the Social Studies curriculum and substituting more "boyish" stories for some of the obviously female titles. Somehow I just don't think "The Hundred Dresses" would cut it around here! After all, the beauty of homeschooling is you can customize it to your child!

I plan on sticking with Sonlight's Science program next year, but I think we will be going in a different direction for other subjects. I've downloaded the Robinson Curriculum booklist and it seems like a good place to start, since Sonlight's literature program doesn't include enough classics for my liking.

I've previewed what feels like a million reading and phonics programs and right now I am leaning in the direction of The Phonics Road to Reading and Spelling, although the program is expensive. I don't think we'll start this part of our education for another year and a half (age 6), so I still have a bit of time to scour material and stress :).

That's where we are at right now, and it is still very much in the research stage, so it may change as I find different sources and get inspired by those of you who homeschool/afterschool! Education really is a lifetime of learning, especially when you begin to explore the daunting responsibility of passing it on to your child!

What Your Preschooler Needs to Know

I am slowly weeding through the myriad (and I do mean myriad) of options for homeschooling, (or "afterschooling" at our house since we haven't made a firm decision about school yet) and I came across this little gem.

What Your Preschooler Needs to Know is put out by the Core Knowledge series with the idea that there is a base set of common knowledge and culture kids are expected to know. And do these people understand preschoolers!

There are six sections: poems, songs, stories, history, science and art. The poems & songs are mostly well-known Mother Goose and Nursery rhymes, but the history, science and story sections are new information to us, broken down into 3-4 page segments with fantastic colorful pictures. Perfect for a preschooler!

Noah's favorite section is the science pages and he is loving learning about an ant colony! We have fallen into a nice routine of a morning walk or bike ride and then reading time/science info. I'm thinking about adding some of the Usborne Book of science experiments too since he seems to be so interested!

So, these are our early adventures in homeschooling/afterschooling! I'm considering the TATRAS phonics program as well, but I don't want to push reading, I'd rather start too late than too early, so we might not do that until next year. After all, I'm trying to balance a child who lacks self-control, with a mind that is ready for some info about his world! The last thing I want to do is make this seem so rigid that he doesn't want to do it! The quest continues...

Homeschooling Revisited

That time of the year that I hate is rapidly approaching. I'm not referring to Christmas, but the season that occurs right afterward: Preschool& Kindergarten Enrollment. Once we return from the holiday breaks, the open houses, curriculum fairs and application bombardment begins.

I hate this time of year because I actually care deeply about the education my child receives and am secretly afraid I will make the wrong choice that puts him off learning forever. No matter what choice I make, it never seems to fit perfectly our family or our child.

Public school makes me nervous because of overcrowding and classes sizes in our district. Not to mention those ever creeping up "standards" that require Kindergartners to read and take long standardized tests. I'm all for high academic achievement, but artificial evaluations designed to impress the parents are not my ideal educational goal for my children.

Private schools in our area are financially prohibitive, and my choice based from investigative research would be an all-boys school, the closest of which is located in Downtown Seattle, and thus, completely impractical from a commuting standpoint.

Enter: The Pioneer Woman

Many of you are probably familiar with this blog as it is one of the most famous Mommy blogs. The Pioneer woman writes with wit, seems well-educated, and has chosen homeschooling for her children. She also includes the viewpoints in her posts of other families that have made the same choice for different reasons and take different educational approaches. Her posts encouraged me to investigate some of the homeschooling or non-traditional educational approaches available.

And are they ever available! I assumed that either you were at home, working on schoolwork for 6 hours per day, or you went to public school during the same time frame. I had no idea how many variations and options there are for home education! There are tutors that meet weekly, keep records and teach specialized subjects. There are co-ops to join with language and science classes, field trips, and more. There are also combination programs of half-time public school/ half time home instruction. In addition, there are literally dozens of curriculum options. In sum, a whole new world of education to explore!

I need far more time to think about the best option for our family as we proceed. I suppose I really should get this thought out since Noah keeps growing and will be approaching 5 this summer. Yikes! I do have a few concerns about homeschooling/home educating.

1. Intellectual & Physical space
I need space to get my work done and create. The kids need this space as well. Right now, we have quiet time in the afternoon that gives all of us this time and space. As the kids get older, however, I wonder if this will become a significant drawback to home educating. I have noticed it seems to be less of a problem for families with land and/or a farm with lots of chores or outdoor places to roam. Unfortunately, space is at a premium around here and we don't have the option of a larger place so it is a concern for me.

2. Financial concerns
The long term plan to pay for college includes me returning to work. If we choose to home school, those plans will be delayed or rethought altogether. I'm not sure how we could afford to have me out of the work force for all those years. This is less of a concern during the elementary years when we had planned for me to be at home anyway with younger children.

These are just some of my thoughts as we move forward on the educational trajectory. I will post more musings another day about some of the curriculum options I am currently exploring. For today I am simply overwhelmed and humbled by the many challenges involved in raising responsible, God-fearing, and educated citizens!

Homeschooling & Abeka

The days have been getting shorter, the nights seem colder, and my thoughts are turning to the start of the school year. Granted, my kids are not old enough to really, truly start school, but we will be beginning preschool in a few weeks.

Last year's preschool did not work out. They were pushing Noah a little too hard academically to memorize facts and sit still for long circle times (at age 3!) and he was just too active for that format. I have considered homeschooling, but I am still unsure of that idea too. For now, we have compromised on a cooperative preschool that I attend with him 2-3 times per month. The school is completely play-based, they play outside for at least 25 minutes per day, and no circle time is longer than 10 minutes. I am hopeful that it will be a better fit.

I'm still pondering what I can do at home with him. My mom once said that she wanted the joy of teaching me to read herself and seeing how that opened up my world. I agree. I would love to share in teaching the boys to read, so I am looking for some kind of curriculum. I'm thinking about the Abeka books because it looks like they have a very strong phonics program and I think I can break it down as slowly as I want. Although, I'd like to go to a display or convention to be sure before I invest that kind of money. Making the best choices for educating your children can be so difficult sometimes!