Charlottes Web

We finished reading Charlottes Web this past weekend. Elizabeth found a copy of the book on my shelf and asked if we could read it. Of course! We tried to read it with Josiah as well ... that didn't go over to well. He just wouldn't sit still long enough! So we read most of it after he would go down for his nap. It was great for her and I to have some mommy/daughter time.

After each chapter Elizabeth summarized what was read back to me as I wrote it down in her journal (as suggested by Carol Joy Seid). It was interesting to hear what she took from each chapter. More interesting to me was being able to see that she needed the pictures (few, though they were) to jog her memory of what had happened in the story. Only hearing the story was too abstract for her little mind! Below I will share a couple of the journal entries as dictated by her to myself ...

Chapter 1

About the pig. Her father tried to kill him. Her father gave her the pig that he was trying to kill. And then her brother, Avery, came down and then the little girl fed the pig.

Chapter 3

Wilbur ran away and escaped and he saw some people and he said to himself, "what should I do?". Then a man came with a bucket full of food for the pig and then he went back into the barn and then the duck followed the man into the barn. The duck said to the man, "he has to run out and do his tricks." Then the duck ran out of the barn.

Chapter 11

The little boy sometimes tries to kill spiders and his mom puts him to bed without any breakfast. (Did Charlotte do anything, I asked?). She made a web and the web had words on it.

Chapter 13

It was about making terrific words on the spider web. The pig woke up. the rat took a piece of paper and it had silly words on it with uppercase letters. The pig twisted and misted and turned and did a flip and blasted on the ground and went to sleep with a thump.* Then the spider told the pig a story about her cousin who caught a fish in her web and then ate it. then his favorite friend (Fern) tucked in herself and went to bed.

Chapter 19

The spider made an egg sac for her eggs. Then the rat had a big fat tummy. Everybody gave hugs because the pig was a famous pig!

Chapter 21

The spider - the big one - was going to die - but not the little ones. The rat was going to get the web that had eggs in it that was all covered, covered with strings from her web.

Chapter 22

The rat ate some of the pigs food and he grew fatter. The the spiders grew balloons and floated up into the air. One talked to the pig. Then 3 of them went on the door.

*That was my favorite sentence out of her whole narrative!

Carol Joy Seid Seminar

Since my last post I did one more full lesson with Elizabeth and then went to a seminar by Carol Joy Seid. From that seminar my outlook changed and we have taken a break for the past 2 months from doing anything structured. The following (in no particular order) are the few valuable things I took away:

1. Late is not bad (I plan on reading a book called, "Later is better than early" by Dr. Moore)
2. They will be judged by how articulate they are ... not at what age they learned to read.
3. Train your children's palatte for quality ... read, read, read - in front of them, to them, alongside them!
4. History is the logical core of our curriculum - teach it by using Classical History, of which she gives a list of books one can read for study.

- this can be (and has been) done with a library card, the Bible and a Good Math book

There was SO much more that she spoke about . . . much more than I can effectively articulate in the short time I have in front of this computer screen. I really must get back to cleaning my kitchen and getting ready to take care of the kids again once they are finished with their quiet times/naps!

All in all I would say that because of Seid's seminar I have decided not to be so focused with structured learning ... at least for right now. Ellie is only almost 4 and she just needs to be loved, played with and read to A LOT. I plan on continuing in that and giving her more "formal" teaching when she asks for it! Which just in the last week she has - I've decided that we will do that on my days "off" from watching Jonathan - in the morning ... a field trip here and there, library visits once a week and projects pertaining to something she is interested in as it comes up!

A, A, Apple

I've been really enjoying the kindergarten curriculum from My Father's World. It has 26 lessons (following each letter of the alphabet - but not in order) and we are on lesson 4.

We've accomplished the following letters so far:

1. Sun
2. Moon
3. Leaf
4. Apple

After this weeks lesson (each lesson takes about 6 days to complete) we will be entering into birds (studying Nest) and then the animals. I can't wait for the lesson on Dinosaurs ... I'm hoping we can take the kids to La Brea Tar Pits for a field trip!

Here are some pictures from our lesson in the letter "A" for Apple.

McIntosh, Braeburn, Sansa, Fuji, Jonagold, Red Delicious, Golden Delicious & Granny Smith

Elizabeth's favorite apple was the Granny Smith

Josiah's was Red Delicious

With the leftovers we made an apple pie!

perfectionism

How do you handle a perfectionist? Especially when it is your child? I've always known that Elizabeth is a bit of a perfectionist ... she's a first born - and as a first born myself this was pretty easy to recognize!

The other day while we were working on schoolwork we finally reached the #20 in our counting to 100 exercise and it was time to write the #20. I helped her w/ the 2 and then sat back and allowed her to write the 0 on her own. "Aaaah, it doesn't look like a 0, it looks like an "O"!", she cried. After a deep breath I responded with, "Here is the eraser, let's erase it and you can do it over." Simple as that! Took her about 3 try's until she was "satisfied" with the way it looked. Wow. I had no idea she could get so bent out of shape about such a little thing!

I run into the same dilema when Ellie is drawing something. I can see that she has a "picture" of what the thing she is drawing is supposed to look like and she gets frustrated when she doesn't see on the paper what she can "see" in her mind. I don't want to give into the urge that I have of just doing it for her, (not that I would do very well since I'm not much of an artist) so instead I'm learning to give her direction on how she could make something ... or help her in one area of the drawing. For example ... showing her once how to make a tree (we were making a book about why she likes trees) and then talking her through it as she makes it on the next page. Or helping her draw the lion's mane but having her do the head, body, etc. It seems like this type of instruction works quite well for my little girl!

blossoming!

Elizabeth is just blossoming w/ her schooling. Yesterday she was in the office with Chris and I listening to us chat. We said something about Jamba Juice and immediately her little ears perked up and she grabbed a piece of paper on my desk and began to sound out the words Jamba Juice. She did "j" and "a" all by herself and then got stuck not knowing where to go next ;)

My Father's World has 26 lessons, each of them being 6 days long. I am using it very loosely. It goes through each letter of the alphabet focusing on some aspect of God's creation. It is not in alphabetical order ... which is simply fine with me. We are on lesson 2 - learning about the moon (and space). The first lesson was about the sun!

My very next step is to purchase the workbook, Teach Your Child To Read in 100 Easy Lessons. I have had more than one mom recommend that book to me. Just this past Thursday I was at "Park Day" with the homeschool I am apart of and yet another mom recommended it to me. I think it was because she saw my daughter snuggle up to another mom who had some books out and got this mom to read them to her - oh how Ellie LOVES books! We will be adding that into our daily learning soon.

I am also planning on going to a seminar on A Literature Based Approach to Education (Point 3 on this page describes this approach pretty well) with Carole Joy Seid. Mainly looking forward to "developing my own philosophy of education" as we continue deeper into this whole homeschooling thing!

my experience

It's obvious that I'm super excited about this whole homeschooling adventure that we are embarking upon. However I want to be sensitive to those who have not chosen this way of life. Do not allow my excitement and fervor in this adventure cause you to feel you need to defend how you have chosen to school your children. I am not sharing my excitement to disuade anyone off the path they have chosen!

I liken it to my cloth-diapering experience. I LOVED cloth diapering. I talked about it a lot and shared a lot of knowledge w/ many friends and wished more people felt the same as I did. However I never wanted to "put it upon" anyone else or make them feel that they were doing their children or the environment a disservice by not "being like me". I feel the same way about homeschooling. I'm excited about it and so I'm going to talk about it a lot - honestly hoping to encourage others to look into it for themselves. BUT in the end a persons decision to homeschool or not is their own and I do not look down upon anyone because they have made a different decision than I have.

So if that is you my friend keep coming back to my blog and read about my experience remembering that it is what it is: my experience!

For additional reading on education (whether in a home atmosphere or classroom) check out For The Children's Sake (Foundations of Education For Home And School) by Susan Schaeffer Macaulay. I'm only on Chapter 2 but I am finding it a wonderful read so far - I believe it would benefit both the parent who wishes to homeschool, the parent who hasn't decided and the parent who has chosen a public or private education.

Teacher Mommy

Teacher Mommy what are we going to do next? Asked Ellie tonight. It's been so fun! Tomorrow is the end of our first week of "school". She has had such a fun time learning. Mon and Tues I taught her during the boys naps. On Wednesday we had friends over until 2:30 so I had her take her rest first and then we did our lesson. Today we got home from errands and a swim date at 3pm ... Mommy was exhausted so I put both kids in their rooms and we all crashed until 5. After dinner Ellie and I did her lesson together. It was so fun and she was so excited to do each activity! The best part for me is not being stuck to a set time. I like how flexible schooling can be!

On another note, I am really treasuring this time with Elizabeth. As we took a shower tonight, I held her in my arms while the water poured down on us and I really felt like I have the potential right now to really draw near to my little girl and develop a relationship that will get us through any rocky times we may have ahead. She looks up to me right now and as much as I can I want to learn to love, cherish, admonish, train and teach while learning to not exasperate and frustrate her. I know that I can be harsh instead of firm & loving at times and I'm asking the Lord to keep that part of me in check.

This new season we are in is amazing!!

My Father's World

Last week I transformed a corner of my diningroom (which had been my sewing area) into a schooling/sewing area. Elizabeth's desk is one that my dad refurbished for her 3rd birthday. I have most everything set so that we have room for her schooling AND I still have a place for my sewing ... should I ever choose to finish a project!

After a Homeschool convention this past July I had decided I really wanted to check out My Father's World curriculum for Ellie. I had initially thought that I would begin next year when she was 4 years old. But then my friend Janet gave me the unused curriculum that she had! I was super excited as I opened it up a couple of weeks ago to take a look. It seemed to fit my style just perfectly. I am one who needs a plan - anyone who has lived w/ me for any amount of time knows that about me! I really feel like this curriculum is the right fit for me!

That being said as I read through the material for kindergarten l I realized that Elizabeth could do the work that was given and if I waited a year she would just "outgrow" it! It is geared toward 5 and 6 year olds as well as "mature" 4 year olds. Elizabeth is not quite 4 years old but I really felt like she was "ready". Plus she won't stop talking about wanting to go to school ... thinking that I needed to send her somewhere for that to be accomplished. When we set up the "school" area and told Ellie what it was for she immediately stopped talking about needing to "go" anywhere for school and has been super excited (and asking me almost everyday about when we could start)!

The plan was to start on September 1st but last night after some consideration I decided that there was nothing holding me back to start sooner ... so today during Josiah and Jonathan's (the boy I watch) naps I did her first lesson with her. She LOVED it! She is further ahead than I thought so I think that the first 10 days are going to be a breeze. We are starting out by going over the creation ... day 1 was today. For the first 7 days we will read a passage in Genesis corresponding w/ that day of creation, cut out and color the # that goes with that day, focus on the ABCs, create a "creation book" and learn some new songs. Days 8 - 10 are review days, however I'm not sure we'll need to do them or not. She went through the lesson so quickly today and was very upset when it was done ... in fact, she cried. She may need something a bit more challenging by day 8 - so we'll see!

Taking the "plunge"

It was a decision that was made in my heart before my children were even born. I have always wanted to be a mom, always wanted to stay at home with them but never felt like I was up for the challenge of "schooling" them. However by the time they were born I knew that I didn't want to send them to traditional school ... that I wanted something different for them than what I was given - specifically in regards to public education.

I've watched my dear friends Debbie Sanders and Carrie Smyth take "the plunge" into homeschooling. I've also been greatly influenced by the Noce family, whom I met while working at a camp in Colorado 11 years ago. Through the Noce's I saw children that were well-adjusted, well-socialized and ahead of their game in terms of schooling. By watching them I saw that it was something that really could be done ... if done rightly!

Two years ago my friend, Janet, told me about a school in the area that I could be apart of (if accepted) and have access to a whole network of families doing the same thing. We looked into in this past Fall and in the first part of 2010 we interviewed with them and were accepted! It'll be 2 years before Elizabeth officially starts kindergarten but over these next two years I'll be able to connect with other pre-schooling moms AND be apart of any activities available for their age - concerts, field-trips, etc.

One of the moms I've already connected with has 3 children - the oldest two being 5 and 2. She is also new to our school and our kids have really hit it off! I'm looking forward to seeing how the Lord might lead us to do some of our schooling together (we have the same curriculum for kindergarten - which I'll address in another entry) and will both be starting it this Fall w/ our oldest children.