Lia's Challenge is almost over. We hear that Dd#2 is a finalist. She's having a hard time concentrating on anything else. Cross your fingers...
Saturday, July 25, 2009
Blogs that like my kids
This blog picked up Ds#4's video to Lia's Challenge.
http://www.standforlife.net/2009/07/who-makes-more-sense-7-year-old-or.html
http://www.standforlife.net/2009/07/who-makes-more-sense-7-year-old-or.html
Wednesday, July 1, 2009
Family Catechism
I'm looking into my options for doing religion together as a family next year. This is what I've come up with.
Sacraments / Doctrine - Mass unit study - Sunday Preparation looks AWESOME! and it's free!, St. Patrick's Summer by Marigold Hunt, discuss Q in St. Joseph's Baltimore Catechism, Catholic Catechism Board Game, Faith Folders for Catholics
Living the Liturgical Year - we've all discussed this at length with my favorite suggestions being at 4Real Learning forums
Scripture - Coloring pages & narrations from Golden Children's Bible, Life of Christ, Bible History from TAN books : Knecht's Bible History (the slim blue volume) for ~K-3, Schuster's Bible History for 3-6, and the Bible History by Johnson, Hannan, and Sr. Dominica for 7-9 (the first two books have the same illustrations). Middle & High school students just read the Bible.
Saints - Vision books are our favorites for upper elem / middle school and Catholic Mosaic suggestions for youngers.
Apologetics - for the older crowd.
- The Apostolate's Family Catechesis download free & discussion guide play it as a game free online
- Mercy Academy has a multi-level plan for Christian Doctrine
- Family Faith Formation seems like a nice program - for $120 they send you a once a month packet for your family which includes games, activities, booklets, and audio CDs and lessons that take about an hour per week to cover.
- Father McBride's Family Catechism (EWTN catalog has it new) take a look at the inside, it wouldn't be for youngers.
Sacraments / Doctrine - Mass unit study - Sunday Preparation looks AWESOME! and it's free!, St. Patrick's Summer by Marigold Hunt, discuss Q in St. Joseph's Baltimore Catechism, Catholic Catechism Board Game, Faith Folders for Catholics
Living the Liturgical Year - we've all discussed this at length with my favorite suggestions being at 4Real Learning forums
Scripture - Coloring pages & narrations from Golden Children's Bible, Life of Christ, Bible History from TAN books : Knecht's Bible History (the slim blue volume) for ~K-3, Schuster's Bible History for 3-6, and the Bible History by Johnson, Hannan, and Sr. Dominica for 7-9 (the first two books have the same illustrations). Middle & High school students just read the Bible.
Saints - Vision books are our favorites for upper elem / middle school and Catholic Mosaic suggestions for youngers.
Apologetics - for the older crowd.
Trying something new - 2009/2010 plans
As I'm planning for next year, I'm considering my options. Although I've always been a Classical homeschooler, I'm sort of taking a break from the classical model and hoping to have a really fun year, while keeping up the academic rigor. (The plan is for Classical highschool for Dd#1, so I'd like to do something different before we dive into that in the coming years.) It's an exploration to see if the model that fits us better is more/less fun than another OR if my expectations that school will always be a joy is not in sync with reality.
We WON'T be studying chronological history. Let me repeat. I'm throwing history out the window for the year. Shocking, isn't it? Instead, we'll be reading literature for fun (and studying audience, author, events from that time period, literary terms & usage, etc. a la TWTM method) My younger kids haven't read Charlotte's Web since we've been so immersed in history and I plan to cover this and other important literary works next year.
We WON'T be studying a year of one branch of science. Instead I'll let the kids choose 9-10 topics that we'll play with by reading library books and finding experiments on and trying to figure out which branch of science that topic would belong in.
Math (MUS), English (LOG for youngers & Seton for olders), Latin (LCII and Henle) will all be pretty standard stuff.
I may take a short break from Dd#1's Traditional Logic (Memoria Press) to do logic puzzles and games with the entire family.
We have 2 sacraments (Dd#1 Confirmation, Ds#4 First Communion) this year and we'll be studying those intensively, but I'm hoping to do religion class together as a family with additional reading on the part of the bigger kids.
We WON'T be studying chronological history. Let me repeat. I'm throwing history out the window for the year. Shocking, isn't it? Instead, we'll be reading literature for fun (and studying audience, author, events from that time period, literary terms & usage, etc. a la TWTM method) My younger kids haven't read Charlotte's Web since we've been so immersed in history and I plan to cover this and other important literary works next year.
We WON'T be studying a year of one branch of science. Instead I'll let the kids choose 9-10 topics that we'll play with by reading library books and finding experiments on and trying to figure out which branch of science that topic would belong in.
Math (MUS), English (LOG for youngers & Seton for olders), Latin (LCII and Henle) will all be pretty standard stuff.
I may take a short break from Dd#1's Traditional Logic (Memoria Press) to do logic puzzles and games with the entire family.
We have 2 sacraments (Dd#1 Confirmation, Ds#4 First Communion) this year and we'll be studying those intensively, but I'm hoping to do religion class together as a family with additional reading on the part of the bigger kids.
Wednesday, June 24, 2009
Quote of the Day
The workbook explained that stories have a beginning, middle and end and write your own story using a beginning, middle and end. Ds#4, who is 7 years old, came up with this.
The Advechers (Adventures) of P. Skywalker
I just becam (became) a Jedi night (knight).
And ileons (aliens) attak (attacked) my house.
And I chopt (chopped) them and made them into ileon (alien) fish.
The End.
The Advechers (Adventures) of P. Skywalker
I just becam (became) a Jedi night (knight).
And ileons (aliens) attak (attacked) my house.
And I chopt (chopped) them and made them into ileon (alien) fish.
The End.
Monday, June 8, 2009
In My Dreams - A perfect teacher's planner
It's become a quest. Organizing 4 kids in school/activities/chores plus keeping all my work straight in a mind that's getting more muddled with the years -- I keep thinking, "If only I could find the perfect planner."
I've researched others. There's some VERY good ones. But nothing perfect (it couldn't be because life isn't perfect, could it?)
In my dreams, my perfect planner would incorporate :
room to fit each kid in each subject in my planner
the kids chore list
room for lots of outside activities
more room in the language arts portion (because there's so many seperate subjects we do within that category - spelling, poetry, memorization, writing, handwriting, typing, reading AND grammar)
SATURDAYS AND SUNDAYS (because kids sometimes have left-over work to do then!)
*saint and holy days as well as national holidays
a section for each of the kids' spelling words / vocabulary words / items they're supposed to be working on that I forget from day to day and kid to kid what they're working on
*the Sunday readings
*child-centered reflections on the Sunday readings
*gradebook
*gradescale
*periodic table
*These are all included in the nearly perfect planner from Creative Communications.
I've considered making my own, but I don't really like 3 ring binder and everytime I try to concieve of it - my mind gets more muddled...hmmm.....
I've researched others. There's some VERY good ones. But nothing perfect (it couldn't be because life isn't perfect, could it?)
In my dreams, my perfect planner would incorporate :
room to fit each kid in each subject in my planner
the kids chore list
room for lots of outside activities
more room in the language arts portion (because there's so many seperate subjects we do within that category - spelling, poetry, memorization, writing, handwriting, typing, reading AND grammar)
SATURDAYS AND SUNDAYS (because kids sometimes have left-over work to do then!)
*saint and holy days as well as national holidays
a section for each of the kids' spelling words / vocabulary words / items they're supposed to be working on that I forget from day to day and kid to kid what they're working on
*the Sunday readings
*child-centered reflections on the Sunday readings
*gradebook
*gradescale
*periodic table
*These are all included in the nearly perfect planner from Creative Communications.
I've considered making my own, but I don't really like 3 ring binder and everytime I try to concieve of it - my mind gets more muddled...hmmm.....
Monday, June 1, 2009
How do you handle the logistics of a classical education with a large family?
Specifically, this question was addressed with The Well Trained Mind in mind (sorry about the bad alliteration.) Classical Homeschooling may look different in your family during different years and from family to family. Here's some of our version.
I've got 5 children who are presently 13, 11, 9, 7 and 1 1/2.
Things they work on their own :
Things I pair them up on :
Things they all work together on :
History*
Science*
Religion discussions
History discussions
History projects
When asking around and trying to implement academic excellence (remember: I said "trying") having a toddler running around dumping the dog's water into the dog's food and all over the floor or/and a baby crying to nurse...it seems incredibly difficult if not impossible. Here's my tip : It seems incredibly difficult because IT IS!! You may look back on this year of toddlerhood or infancy as one of the most challenging (please read - this is *hard*) particularly with several other kids to teach, a house to keep clean, errands, gym class...etc. That doesn't mean you can't get through it. Really, your kids may even learn more than you expected! Hard is not the same as impossible. Hard means life is really sucky right now and you have a lot of suffering to offer Jesus. Hard means He carries you through. Hard means you need carried through.
Back to logistics -
I've got 5 children who are presently 13, 11, 9, 7 and 1 1/2.
Things they work on their own :
- Math (Math-U-See and they mostly work on their own)
- Grammar (CHC or Seton Catholic workbooks)
- Spelling (Natural Speller)
- Memory work
- Religion text
Things I pair them up on :
- Prayer memorization
- Latin (2 kids work together on a level)
Things they all work together on :
History*
Science*
Religion discussions
History discussions
History projects
When asking around and trying to implement academic excellence (remember: I said "trying") having a toddler running around dumping the dog's water into the dog's food and all over the floor or/and a baby crying to nurse...it seems incredibly difficult if not impossible. Here's my tip : It seems incredibly difficult because IT IS!! You may look back on this year of toddlerhood or infancy as one of the most challenging (please read - this is *hard*) particularly with several other kids to teach, a house to keep clean, errands, gym class...etc. That doesn't mean you can't get through it. Really, your kids may even learn more than you expected! Hard is not the same as impossible. Hard means life is really sucky right now and you have a lot of suffering to offer Jesus. Hard means He carries you through. Hard means you need carried through.
Back to logistics -
- Every kid takes a turn at "Baby Duty." Some of the younger kids can only handle 15 minutes at a time, but everyone has a turn at my attention (which they may have to stand in line and wait patiently for) and everyone has a chance at doing their seat work and everyone takes a turn on "baby duty." It's like a law at our house.
- I made the preschoolers montessori materials to work with (so they're in the same room as we are) and the toddlers have toys that are just for school time. Here are more toddler tips.
- As soon as a kid can read, he's reading out loud from a book that's on his level, but that we're all on the same topic about - religion, history, science.
- *The big kids read books and have papers due on their own level, but in the same topic we're all covering together. Some of the big kids' books are read aloud (by the big kid to a little kid) -- that's one of the GREAT benefits of living books : The reading level a kid can comprehend being read to is higher than his actual reading level -- so he can enjoy some of the big kids' books.
- *I have one book I'm reading aloud to the majority (if not all) the kids at all times in one topic or another. This is in addition to the books the kids may read to each other. 20 minutes a day gets us further along than we were before. Read aloud time is not always pretty. Some kids need to wiggle quietly, some can draw and others need consistently drawn back into the story with questions directed at them and OFTEN we just quit because I'm too frustrated at kids who can't be quiet or keep their bodies to themselves (boys!) but then we try again the next day.
- This is important : the biggest thing in a classical education is to try again the next day. And wake up and try again the next day. Day to day it can look like you're making very little real progress. A mom gets caught up in wiping noses and cleaning up messes and finding erasers and scrubbing peanut butter out of hair and...then at the end of the day you look at your lesson plans and realize "We didn't get to Latin AGAIN." or, "We forgot to chant our memory items." or even "We haven't hit chemistry in a MONTH." If you wake up the next morning and try again -- it will all come together. A classical education is about the years of learning building on one another rather than looking for accomplishment in the day to day. Don't give in to discouragement (or if you do, find encouragement FAST!)
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