Well, as per usual, it's been a few months since my last update. We've had a lot on our plates since June, mainly because we moved out, spruced up, and SOLD our house. Yay!!! I have never seen such a large number in my bank account. It would be more awesome if I didn't know it's going to be dropping as soon as possible to it's former miniscule self when we buy a new house.
So what, are we homeless?!?! No, we're lucky enough to have both my and DaddyO's parents here in town and, because I am allergic to the sweet doggies my in-laws own, we are currently living in my parents' house. Along with my parents. And my uncle. So if you're playing along at home, that means there are EIGHT people living in this house right now. Cue disaster music.
Don't get me wrong, I'm grateful that we don't have to shell out rent while we're house-hunting, and I'm grateful that my children get this time with their grandparents and great-uncle. Truly. But whereas before our lifestyle choices and radical unschooling were just something weird that we crazy kids were doing, it's now *right there*, in the grandparents' faces, just begging to be critiqued, apparently.
So what do you do when someone you love tells you you're raising your children wrong? What do you do when someone with NO knowledge of educational theory or even brain development tells you that you're damaging your children by focusing on your relationships and character rather than academics? And not just damaging them, but actually setting them up for a life of illiteracy, ignorance, and flat-out failure! And never mind that our little family is happier together, more respectful, and has less yelling and anger than mine ever had growing up. Apparently THAT counts for nothing. So what do you do to shore yourself up and keep going?
Well, if you're me, you read a book. Or two. Or six.
Because, dangit, I KNOW this is right. I know that we are making the right choice for OUR children based on their needs and personalities and our definition of success (which, by the way, has little to do with money and more to do with healthy relationships, confidence, and determination to succeed at THEIR goals). But sometimes, when someone I love tells me I'm doing things wrong, it takes the wind out of my sails. It gives me pause and sends me back to the ol' drawing board to reevaluate and make sure I'm doing things right. And you know what?
I am.
Among the books I've read in the past two months are: Playful Parenting by Lawrence Cohen, The Big Book of Unschooling by Sandra Dodd (again), Radical Unschooling: A Revolution has Begun by Dayna Martin, How Children Succeed by Paul Tough, and a really good book on how to set your boundaries so you can say "none ya bizness!" when people get nosy in a critical way. :-) Because while I LOVE to talk about Unschooling and consensual living and how to grow strong family relationships, I realize that I do NOT have to put up with people who want nothing more than to tell me that I'm living my life incorrectly according to their expectations.
I beat the crap out of that box. :-)
Thursday, October 4, 2012
Wednesday, June 6, 2012
When academics don't matter
I always get the itch at this time of the year to look back and see how my children have grown. It's normal, I guess, given my own experience of the "school year" and how surrounded we are by schooling families. But this time I find the growth hard to put into little boxes and define in words, because so many huge changes have happened this year. This is the year that we let go of bedtimes and encouraged our children to start listening to their bodies. This is the year that we stopped punishing our kids and started problem-solving with them. This is the year that I stopped mentally fussing about whether we were getting in enough math, science, reading, history, what have you, and just started letting my children be. This is the year when we got joy. Or maybe the joy got us.
Y'all know Tex, he is my tough nut, my Contrarian, my challenge. He gets anxious, he gets overwhelmed, he panics, and he has a hard time sometimes coming back to center and letting anyone help him find a solution to his problem because he is convinced it's a problem so big that there is no solution. So the other day when I was puttering around the kitchen and overhearing Tex's end of a Skype conversation as he was gaming with a friend, I was bowled over by joy while listening to him. Something was obviously going wrong for this friend on the game they were playing, I could hear her hollering even through Tex's headphones, but Tex remained chill. In fact he said, "okay, calm down, take a deep breath... now, tell me what you were doing when that happened, and we'll figure out what went wrong." ???? !!!!! Oh my goodness, is this my child? This helper, this reasonable voice, this soother and problem-solver? And they did it, too, the two of them together figured out what the problem was and they behaved differently the next time so that it wouldn't happen again. I couldn't have been happier. Does it mean that he gets measurably less frantic when he is having a problem? Nah, we're not there quite yet. But now I know we'll get there, because the process is sinking in.
I can see it even more clearly in Noodle and Monkeygirl, whether because their personalities are easier or because they've been parented with more consistent kindness. Noodle is never scared to stand up for himself or what he thinks is right, even to another adult. He comforts his little sister and helps her joyfully when she needs it (as long he's not at a crucial point in his computer game, natch). He will take responsibility for his own care as much as he can rather than expect someone else to do it. He creates solutions with his friends to help things be fair rather than let one person feel unhappy or left behind. And even little Monkeygirl, princess-y though she may be, will grab a foam sword and rush to her brothers' aid if she perceives that they are being treated unfairly. She comforts her friends when they are sad and shares with them when they are feeling a scarcity (unless you want her favorite crown, then you are S.O.L., dude). She tells the truth even when it makes her look bad and apologizes without prompting when she knows she is wrong.
This is what I mean about how sometimes academics don't matter. If I could choose to have my children be of good character but short on book learning, I would pick that in a hot second over the opposite. Luckily, no such extremes are necessary, and my children can grow to have a good dose of both. But this is what I see lacking so much in schools, where the focus is on learning the material, and the character traits that we see as being most desirable in adults (and which I see countless news articles and friends lamenting the lack of in our children's generation) are barely nurtured at all. Far too often, in institutions of many kinds, obedience is more important than standing up for one's convictions; memorization is more important than critical thinking; working for the reward (good grades, praise) is more important than self-motivation. And for some children it's not enough for them to get a few hours of good examples at home (if they're even lucky enough to get that) if they're spending seven hours a day being shown that that's not what gets them ahead. Will schools still turn out some kids who are intelligent, strong, well-read, and of good character? Yes, but I'm convinced that it's in spite of the school's role (and thanks to some wonderful, realistic, dedicated teachers) not because of it. Now, have we had academic growth this year? You bet your sweet bippy we have. I even wrote out a whole paragraph of cool stuff the kids do and know, but then I deleted it, because at this point it just doesn't matter. That kind of learning can happen anytime, whenever they need it. Character has to start NOW.
Y'all know Tex, he is my tough nut, my Contrarian, my challenge. He gets anxious, he gets overwhelmed, he panics, and he has a hard time sometimes coming back to center and letting anyone help him find a solution to his problem because he is convinced it's a problem so big that there is no solution. So the other day when I was puttering around the kitchen and overhearing Tex's end of a Skype conversation as he was gaming with a friend, I was bowled over by joy while listening to him. Something was obviously going wrong for this friend on the game they were playing, I could hear her hollering even through Tex's headphones, but Tex remained chill. In fact he said, "okay, calm down, take a deep breath... now, tell me what you were doing when that happened, and we'll figure out what went wrong." ???? !!!!! Oh my goodness, is this my child? This helper, this reasonable voice, this soother and problem-solver? And they did it, too, the two of them together figured out what the problem was and they behaved differently the next time so that it wouldn't happen again. I couldn't have been happier. Does it mean that he gets measurably less frantic when he is having a problem? Nah, we're not there quite yet. But now I know we'll get there, because the process is sinking in.
I can see it even more clearly in Noodle and Monkeygirl, whether because their personalities are easier or because they've been parented with more consistent kindness. Noodle is never scared to stand up for himself or what he thinks is right, even to another adult. He comforts his little sister and helps her joyfully when she needs it (as long he's not at a crucial point in his computer game, natch). He will take responsibility for his own care as much as he can rather than expect someone else to do it. He creates solutions with his friends to help things be fair rather than let one person feel unhappy or left behind. And even little Monkeygirl, princess-y though she may be, will grab a foam sword and rush to her brothers' aid if she perceives that they are being treated unfairly. She comforts her friends when they are sad and shares with them when they are feeling a scarcity (unless you want her favorite crown, then you are S.O.L., dude). She tells the truth even when it makes her look bad and apologizes without prompting when she knows she is wrong.
This is what I mean about how sometimes academics don't matter. If I could choose to have my children be of good character but short on book learning, I would pick that in a hot second over the opposite. Luckily, no such extremes are necessary, and my children can grow to have a good dose of both. But this is what I see lacking so much in schools, where the focus is on learning the material, and the character traits that we see as being most desirable in adults (and which I see countless news articles and friends lamenting the lack of in our children's generation) are barely nurtured at all. Far too often, in institutions of many kinds, obedience is more important than standing up for one's convictions; memorization is more important than critical thinking; working for the reward (good grades, praise) is more important than self-motivation. And for some children it's not enough for them to get a few hours of good examples at home (if they're even lucky enough to get that) if they're spending seven hours a day being shown that that's not what gets them ahead. Will schools still turn out some kids who are intelligent, strong, well-read, and of good character? Yes, but I'm convinced that it's in spite of the school's role (and thanks to some wonderful, realistic, dedicated teachers) not because of it. Now, have we had academic growth this year? You bet your sweet bippy we have. I even wrote out a whole paragraph of cool stuff the kids do and know, but then I deleted it, because at this point it just doesn't matter. That kind of learning can happen anytime, whenever they need it. Character has to start NOW.
Thursday, February 2, 2012
Be the tree
I'm not satisfied. That last post, that didn't feel real. Oh sure, it gave a nice glancing update into a few easy-to-tackle topics, but it didn't get to the meat of what we're working on around here, and how hard it is.
I'm torn on this. Part of me IS having fun, genuinely, and wants to focus on all that joy because it's what's most important. But I also feel like doing that does a disservice to others who are swimming upstream and having a hard time of it, because the last thing I want to do is gloss over the hard parts and leave those parents feeling that they're doing something wrong because they're not covered up in joy all the time.
Let me tell you about a night last week when I fought with Noodle, literally, for 30 minutes because he was angry at me and needed to show it. We had swords, and this was serious (he actually said that at one point when I was being too playful, he said "this is serious", and I collapsed in giggles because all I could hear was Ming-Ming the duck), and kiddo even got in a couple of good licks. And you know what, there were points during that fight when I thought "this is ridiculous, a million other parents would have shut this shit down immediately", and part of me wanted to do that. To send him to his room until he can "be nice" or walk away from his anger because as an adult I have that option and can explain all the reasons why he's wrong for being angry at me because I wasn't trying to upset him. But I kept at it. I kept parrying and using pillow shields and running away scared, I kept letting him charge at me out of genuine anger, because a smaller but stronger voice was saying, "if you don't show him how to love someone through their anger, who will? If you don't accept his anger and let him share that part with you, how will he ever be sure you love ALL of him?" And I told him, when he asked why I was smiling when he was so angry, that I had a choice in how I dealt with his anger. I told him that part of me wanted to get angry back, and make his anger go away by making him scared of me, but that I didn't think that was good for him. I'd rather let him show me his anger if he doesn't want to tell me about it, and hope that by doing that he'd know I'm okay with him being angry with me and eventually learn how to talk about it. Or at least we'd both be really good swordfighters. I realized that I had a choice: I could talk to my son about both of our feelings, or I could shut his down and risk him not sharing them with me in the future.
We've also let go of bedtimes, and let me tell you THAT has been a process. Not that we're done or anything, lol, just that it's been going on long enough for me to see it's not a quick thing. It started a long time ago with us declaring the weekend nights to be "No-Bedtime Bedtimes", then progressed as we all started to develop our own after-dinner flow on the weeknights, and continued as Daddy-O and I have stopped alternating nights of being responsible for each group of kids (the boys in their room and Monkeygirl in hers) and simply started offering to be available for nighttime cuddles and tuck-ins. It's extra hard because Noodle, with his Minecraft obsession, will often be up playing until 11pm, then he wants 15 minutes of cuddles and I'm not out of their room until Midnight, at which point there aren't enough hours before Monkeygirl gets up in the "norning", as she calls it, for me to feel rested and ready for the day. I know it will work out, but it's going to take a lot of finessing to make it happen.
In short, we've jumped feet first into what we call, for lack of a less formal-sounding term, "consensual living". We try to include the kids in decisions which involve them, to an extent that is appropriate for them and manageable for us. For instance, when I was doing doula work for a year, I had a couple of 24+ hour births that really upset my kids. They didn't know when I was going to have to leave to go help a mama, they didn't know when I'd be back, and I was largely unavailable while I was gone. They didn't like it. But we needed an additional source of income, so I offered up a compromise: I'd quit doing doula work out of respect for their needs, but I'd add back in a weeknight childbirth class that I hadn't taught since I got pregnant with the Monkeygirl. They felt heard and respected, they had proof that their voices matter, and our household still got what it needed in order to be able to "go".
The hardest part of all this, really, is fighting what I've been taught all my life and the knee-jerk reactions that result. The desire to make my children into people that are "no trouble" instead of people who ask for what they want and make things happen for themselves. Two days ago the boys were playing online games and Skyping with a friend, and that friend mentioned that another family we love was coming to their house to play. Tex immediately said "Mom, can you call and ask if we can come over, too?" Ugh, grimace, cringe. You want me to what, now? You want me to call and invite ourselves over to play??? Oh, the rudeness, the utter gaucherie of such a move! I told my son how wrong it felt to me, how much it bothered me to make that call. But God bless his persistence, he continued to ask and I was forced to think about why it was such a problem. The truth is that either one of these families would let us know if joining the playdate wasn't a good plan, so what was the harm in calling? So I did, stating upfront to the mom that I knew it was rude so that she would know I knew, because above all I didn't want to be thought of as inconsiderate. She asked her kids, she asked the other family, and they all said "are you kidding, if you come over we'll have enough adults to do the zip line!!" And a wonderful time was had by all. Including me, old Mommy Stuffypants.
So yeah, it's not easy, this Unschooling, consensual lifestyle. It requires a lot more listening, thinking, bending, and perspective-shifting than I ever expected to have to do as a parent. It requires me to acknowledge that, no, I do NOT always know what is best for my children, and that if I want more information I should go to the source. But thank God for it. Truly. I hate to think of the kind of mother I would have had to become in order to fit my family into the current popular model. I hate to think of the wall I would have had to build between my children and myself in order to be able to stomach forcing them to bend. Instead I like to think that we all do our share of bending, and that like a tree, it will make us stronger in the end.
I'm torn on this. Part of me IS having fun, genuinely, and wants to focus on all that joy because it's what's most important. But I also feel like doing that does a disservice to others who are swimming upstream and having a hard time of it, because the last thing I want to do is gloss over the hard parts and leave those parents feeling that they're doing something wrong because they're not covered up in joy all the time.
Let me tell you about a night last week when I fought with Noodle, literally, for 30 minutes because he was angry at me and needed to show it. We had swords, and this was serious (he actually said that at one point when I was being too playful, he said "this is serious", and I collapsed in giggles because all I could hear was Ming-Ming the duck), and kiddo even got in a couple of good licks. And you know what, there were points during that fight when I thought "this is ridiculous, a million other parents would have shut this shit down immediately", and part of me wanted to do that. To send him to his room until he can "be nice" or walk away from his anger because as an adult I have that option and can explain all the reasons why he's wrong for being angry at me because I wasn't trying to upset him. But I kept at it. I kept parrying and using pillow shields and running away scared, I kept letting him charge at me out of genuine anger, because a smaller but stronger voice was saying, "if you don't show him how to love someone through their anger, who will? If you don't accept his anger and let him share that part with you, how will he ever be sure you love ALL of him?" And I told him, when he asked why I was smiling when he was so angry, that I had a choice in how I dealt with his anger. I told him that part of me wanted to get angry back, and make his anger go away by making him scared of me, but that I didn't think that was good for him. I'd rather let him show me his anger if he doesn't want to tell me about it, and hope that by doing that he'd know I'm okay with him being angry with me and eventually learn how to talk about it. Or at least we'd both be really good swordfighters. I realized that I had a choice: I could talk to my son about both of our feelings, or I could shut his down and risk him not sharing them with me in the future.
We've also let go of bedtimes, and let me tell you THAT has been a process. Not that we're done or anything, lol, just that it's been going on long enough for me to see it's not a quick thing. It started a long time ago with us declaring the weekend nights to be "No-Bedtime Bedtimes", then progressed as we all started to develop our own after-dinner flow on the weeknights, and continued as Daddy-O and I have stopped alternating nights of being responsible for each group of kids (the boys in their room and Monkeygirl in hers) and simply started offering to be available for nighttime cuddles and tuck-ins. It's extra hard because Noodle, with his Minecraft obsession, will often be up playing until 11pm, then he wants 15 minutes of cuddles and I'm not out of their room until Midnight, at which point there aren't enough hours before Monkeygirl gets up in the "norning", as she calls it, for me to feel rested and ready for the day. I know it will work out, but it's going to take a lot of finessing to make it happen.
In short, we've jumped feet first into what we call, for lack of a less formal-sounding term, "consensual living". We try to include the kids in decisions which involve them, to an extent that is appropriate for them and manageable for us. For instance, when I was doing doula work for a year, I had a couple of 24+ hour births that really upset my kids. They didn't know when I was going to have to leave to go help a mama, they didn't know when I'd be back, and I was largely unavailable while I was gone. They didn't like it. But we needed an additional source of income, so I offered up a compromise: I'd quit doing doula work out of respect for their needs, but I'd add back in a weeknight childbirth class that I hadn't taught since I got pregnant with the Monkeygirl. They felt heard and respected, they had proof that their voices matter, and our household still got what it needed in order to be able to "go".
The hardest part of all this, really, is fighting what I've been taught all my life and the knee-jerk reactions that result. The desire to make my children into people that are "no trouble" instead of people who ask for what they want and make things happen for themselves. Two days ago the boys were playing online games and Skyping with a friend, and that friend mentioned that another family we love was coming to their house to play. Tex immediately said "Mom, can you call and ask if we can come over, too?" Ugh, grimace, cringe. You want me to what, now? You want me to call and invite ourselves over to play??? Oh, the rudeness, the utter gaucherie of such a move! I told my son how wrong it felt to me, how much it bothered me to make that call. But God bless his persistence, he continued to ask and I was forced to think about why it was such a problem. The truth is that either one of these families would let us know if joining the playdate wasn't a good plan, so what was the harm in calling? So I did, stating upfront to the mom that I knew it was rude so that she would know I knew, because above all I didn't want to be thought of as inconsiderate. She asked her kids, she asked the other family, and they all said "are you kidding, if you come over we'll have enough adults to do the zip line!!" And a wonderful time was had by all. Including me, old Mommy Stuffypants.
So yeah, it's not easy, this Unschooling, consensual lifestyle. It requires a lot more listening, thinking, bending, and perspective-shifting than I ever expected to have to do as a parent. It requires me to acknowledge that, no, I do NOT always know what is best for my children, and that if I want more information I should go to the source. But thank God for it. Truly. I hate to think of the kind of mother I would have had to become in order to fit my family into the current popular model. I hate to think of the wall I would have had to build between my children and myself in order to be able to stomach forcing them to bend. Instead I like to think that we all do our share of bending, and that like a tree, it will make us stronger in the end.
Sunday, January 8, 2012
In the Flow
I've been wanting to write an update for a while, if for no other reason than I've been havin' so darn much fun, but also not wanting to write lest I get overly analytical about our lives. That's a constant trap for me because I'm a psychology nut and kids are the best. experiment. ever! So sometimes I have to work very hard to get out of my head and just enjoy them. Today I'm giving myself a break. :-)
The kids are growing by leaps and bounds, some of them literally. I suspect that within the next year Tex and I will be sharing both shoe size and height. He'll turn ten in June. And I'm short. But still! He's growing in lots of other ways, too. Some of you know Tex personally and know that I sometimes find his personality to be challenging (and yes, I know, he's always sweet at your house, don't rub it in), and there's no question that he struggles with a certain awkwardness when it comes to dealing with other human lifeforms (let's just say I have a particular sympathy with Leonard from The Big Bang Theory), but he is a good-hearted kid who really does want to get along with his friends and have good relationships with his family. That it is shining through so bright these days is such a relief. :-) I see him trying to take a deep breath more often when his temper gets hold of him. I see him choosing, when his sister is annoying him for kicks as siblings sometimes do, to turn it into a game for as long as he can stand before asking her to knock it off. I see him trying to talk his way through arguments instead of headbutt through them. I hear him acknowledging his imperfections and laughing about them instead of getting angry and hurt. He's maturing, and he's doing it in part because he's surrounded by people willing to (mostly) talk him through it instead of only punishing him for it. I've known for a while now that school would have been inappropriate for Tex for this reason in particular. He has needed these years to overcome his difficulties in negotiating the social landscape of this world, and I can see that he's finding his voice and his place, figuring out what he's good at and what feels useful to him. I think he's starting on a big journey of finally having overcome the effect that preschool and our overly strict parenting style had on him (to clarify, we weren't the Pearls, we just were much more strict with the conventions than we are now and that wasn't a good fit for our unconventional child), and being able to really explore himself.
Both Tex and Noodle are into the online multiplayer games Minecraft and Roblox, just to name the top two. These are games where they get to create a character (a LEGO-ish fellow) and then go out into the various worlds to play games, fulfill quests, solve puzzles, or even blow things up. The boys watch videos on YouTube about their videogame passions and play together side-by-side at their computer stations. Noodle in particular is a computer whiz and gets such joy out of manipulating the computer to make it do what he wants. He wants to set up servers and install mods and add memory and learn how to build stuff and beat the game. There are days when he is at his computer almost non-stop! And honestly, yeah, it used to bug me, but he's getting so much out of it that I don't worry anymore. He's found a passion to pursue at the age of seven and I think that's awesome!
Monkeygirl is having a great time of it lately as well. She's four now, so she's finally old enough to sign up for our local TaeKwonDo classes, and after just a couple of classes she is having a ball and so excited about her class. Watching her confidence in class, her willingness to try over and over again when she doesn't get it right, her silliness and complete self-assurance in the face of language barriers, stricter discipline than she's ever seen, and high expectations is so thrilling!
My little Monkey is also having great fun learning math skills on the new Team UmiZoomi math app for the iPad, even practicing addition and subtraction skills. I have to give special thanks to my parents for buying us the iPad this summer for homeschool, and to our family and friends for keeping us in iTunes cards so that we can find new fun games to play. I can see the learning the kids are doing with this new tool and it's really fun for them. In fact Noodle now knows more about US geography than I do, thanks to a wonderful game called Stack the States. I've still got 'em on the nicknames, though. Yes, I take my victories where I can get 'em, why do you ask? We also all really enjoy the logic games like Where's My Water, World of Goo, Cut the Rope, and SpongeMarble. Since I think the most important goal for homeschooling is to help my children learn to think logically and independently, these games provide invaluable problem-solving skills. Fair warning: they also cause insomnia in adults as you try to get through just. one. more. level!
And if there are still any lingering concerns about their academic smarts and whether or not they are on par with the national standards, you can quiet your worries. Daddy-O watched an episode of "Are You Smarter Than a 5th Grader" with the boys and they did great! :-) They did that while on a trip to Nashville where they saw the scale reproduction of the Parthenon at Centennial Park, visited the children's science museum, and even attended a Predators hockey game. It was a great boys' weekend for them while Monkeygirl and I hung out at home.
Okay, I gotta go now. The boys are playing Just Dance 3 in the other room and I really want to go get my groove on! Hope you're all enjoying your journey!
The kids are growing by leaps and bounds, some of them literally. I suspect that within the next year Tex and I will be sharing both shoe size and height. He'll turn ten in June. And I'm short. But still! He's growing in lots of other ways, too. Some of you know Tex personally and know that I sometimes find his personality to be challenging (and yes, I know, he's always sweet at your house, don't rub it in), and there's no question that he struggles with a certain awkwardness when it comes to dealing with other human lifeforms (let's just say I have a particular sympathy with Leonard from The Big Bang Theory), but he is a good-hearted kid who really does want to get along with his friends and have good relationships with his family. That it is shining through so bright these days is such a relief. :-) I see him trying to take a deep breath more often when his temper gets hold of him. I see him choosing, when his sister is annoying him for kicks as siblings sometimes do, to turn it into a game for as long as he can stand before asking her to knock it off. I see him trying to talk his way through arguments instead of headbutt through them. I hear him acknowledging his imperfections and laughing about them instead of getting angry and hurt. He's maturing, and he's doing it in part because he's surrounded by people willing to (mostly) talk him through it instead of only punishing him for it. I've known for a while now that school would have been inappropriate for Tex for this reason in particular. He has needed these years to overcome his difficulties in negotiating the social landscape of this world, and I can see that he's finding his voice and his place, figuring out what he's good at and what feels useful to him. I think he's starting on a big journey of finally having overcome the effect that preschool and our overly strict parenting style had on him (to clarify, we weren't the Pearls, we just were much more strict with the conventions than we are now and that wasn't a good fit for our unconventional child), and being able to really explore himself.
Both Tex and Noodle are into the online multiplayer games Minecraft and Roblox, just to name the top two. These are games where they get to create a character (a LEGO-ish fellow) and then go out into the various worlds to play games, fulfill quests, solve puzzles, or even blow things up. The boys watch videos on YouTube about their videogame passions and play together side-by-side at their computer stations. Noodle in particular is a computer whiz and gets such joy out of manipulating the computer to make it do what he wants. He wants to set up servers and install mods and add memory and learn how to build stuff and beat the game. There are days when he is at his computer almost non-stop! And honestly, yeah, it used to bug me, but he's getting so much out of it that I don't worry anymore. He's found a passion to pursue at the age of seven and I think that's awesome!
Monkeygirl is having a great time of it lately as well. She's four now, so she's finally old enough to sign up for our local TaeKwonDo classes, and after just a couple of classes she is having a ball and so excited about her class. Watching her confidence in class, her willingness to try over and over again when she doesn't get it right, her silliness and complete self-assurance in the face of language barriers, stricter discipline than she's ever seen, and high expectations is so thrilling!
My little Monkey is also having great fun learning math skills on the new Team UmiZoomi math app for the iPad, even practicing addition and subtraction skills. I have to give special thanks to my parents for buying us the iPad this summer for homeschool, and to our family and friends for keeping us in iTunes cards so that we can find new fun games to play. I can see the learning the kids are doing with this new tool and it's really fun for them. In fact Noodle now knows more about US geography than I do, thanks to a wonderful game called Stack the States. I've still got 'em on the nicknames, though. Yes, I take my victories where I can get 'em, why do you ask? We also all really enjoy the logic games like Where's My Water, World of Goo, Cut the Rope, and SpongeMarble. Since I think the most important goal for homeschooling is to help my children learn to think logically and independently, these games provide invaluable problem-solving skills. Fair warning: they also cause insomnia in adults as you try to get through just. one. more. level!
And if there are still any lingering concerns about their academic smarts and whether or not they are on par with the national standards, you can quiet your worries. Daddy-O watched an episode of "Are You Smarter Than a 5th Grader" with the boys and they did great! :-) They did that while on a trip to Nashville where they saw the scale reproduction of the Parthenon at Centennial Park, visited the children's science museum, and even attended a Predators hockey game. It was a great boys' weekend for them while Monkeygirl and I hung out at home.
Okay, I gotta go now. The boys are playing Just Dance 3 in the other room and I really want to go get my groove on! Hope you're all enjoying your journey!
Wednesday, May 25, 2011
Wrapping It Up
So the "school year" is wrapping up, so it's time for another little update, but I'm finding it very hard to want to focus on listing academic achievements just now. I've been doing some pretty heavy reading the last couple of days, and it's really changing my focus. Or more accurately, sharpening it.
See, I'd like to lead off with the reassuring statement about how Tex has become a darn proficient reader now, in his own time, and is even starting to think of himself that way. We were going through our rarely-read children's books to find some to give away for victims of the recent tornadoes, and something happened that has never happened before: Tex wanted to keep books so that HE could read them. He's never talked about wanting to read independently before. Ever. He has clung to the idea of me reading to him for years, in fact I think he was planning to have me in the dorm room next to his if he goes to college, so that I could read text books to him at bedtime. :-) "Insecure about reading" doesn't even begin to describe him. "Hostile" maybe comes closer. So it's with no small amount of joy that I realized two days ago we had had a banner day: Tex told me all the jokes off his Popsicle sticks after HE read them himself. He didn't ask for help before trying, he gave it a shot and it made sense for him, he comprehended the words and was able to express them accurately to me later.
But that doesn't really change the basic fact that Tex is not naturally proficient at language-related tasks, and I really want to start actively playing to his strengths as a spatial learner. I love that he's brought himself this far and that he's starting to feel confident about something that's been a big challenge for him the last couple of years, but I'm also worried that I'm not doing enough to support that learning and help him feel powerful and intelligent. I feel like if he could take it to the next level, having some concrete tools to employ when trying to decode language, then he would feel even more self-reliant and independent, and wouldn't look to me to be his savior in these situations. But he's so resistant to any kind of pressure that I've been hands-off in order to let him know that I don't expect his brain to operate on my timeline. And that's kind of what the whole point of homeschooling was with him, was to get him to a point where he felt well-equipped to handle what would be expected of him in public school, and not feel abandoned or neglected. And that's not to say he would be forced to go to school once he reached that point, just that it wasn't an option until then. And now I'm seeing that with a little more focused work on my part, there's a light at the distant end of the tunnel. That's pretty cool. But more on that "urge to push" in a minute.
Speaking of reading, it turns out Noodle is just one of those kids who "get it". I was like that; I don't know what age I started reading, I just remember that words on a page made sense to me. It appears Noodle is much the same, as his reading has gone from basic C-V-C words last summer to full on reading of whole paragraphs at present. Of course he struggles with the odd word, but most of them just flow right in his eyes and out his mouth without a break. I realize now what a gift that is in this world, to have words just open themselves up to you. I think it will allow Noodle a lot more choice for a while, and I hope I don't forget that he still needs my interest in what he's learning even if he doesn't need my help.
Okay, now that the reading is covered, what else have we been doing? Well, the big thing that was coming up after my last entry was Disney World! I can't believe what a burst of imagination has come on the tails of that trip. The kids still watch the Disney behind-the-scenes videos on Netflix at least once a week, they talk about their favorite rides and what they're going to do next time when they're bigger (we're hoping to take another trip in 3 years or so), and the other day Tex and I even had a conversation comparing the strengths and weaknesses of Disney and Universal as we saw them. He argued that while WDW definitely has the best rides for kids his age, Universal had the more impressive architecture, citing Hogsmeade/Hogwarts in particular. I maintain that Universal should only get credit for having hired the staff from the movies to design the Wizarding World of Harry Potter, and that overall Disney does a much better job of selling their themes. Then he pulled out the Dr. Suess area at Universal and I rebutted with Epcot's World Showcase. In the end we agreed to disagree.
Anyway, it's been a fun surprise to me to see what caught each child's fancy at WDW. While we were at the Monster's Inc. Laugh Floor on our last night at Disney, and Tex got asked by a monster comedian what he wanted to be when he grew up, he answered without hesitation "a costume designer". Now, dressing up is something that Tex has always loved to do, and we maintain well-stocked dress-up boxes for all the kids, but it's like our trip to the theme parks really brought it to life for him. He focuses on the little details of the costumes he sees in movies and tv shows, and on figuring out how we can recreate them at home. This is one of those times I wish I was good at sewing.
But now, let's go back to the sharpening of focus I told you about. I suppose it's natural as one begins to live out the Unschooling lifestyle, but I've been thinking more and more lately about what is really important to us. I was in the bookstore yesterday and I picked up The Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother. I had heard about the book and it's author, and even read a couple of excerpts on the internet, heaping scorn on the head of the woman who would do such things to her child for the sake of being thought to be a good mother because her children were successful. For shame! But in reading the jacket of the *actual* book instead of just relying on the internet (funny how that works), I saw that this wasn't just a clueless, disconnected mother feeding her own ego. Amy Chua parented her daughters the way she did, forcing them to practice lessons and achieve greatness at the cost of their own relationship, because she thought that being successful was more important, would be better for her children, than having a strong relationship with her built on unconditional affection. Part of me feels overwhelmingly sad that she thought so little of herself, that being a whole person to her children seemed worthless, but that's not really the point. She wanted the best for her babies. And by her definition they have been successful, so I guess that's a comfort to... someone.
But here's the thing. I'm going the other way. I've made just as conscious a choice and I'm choosing the relationship. This is not to say I'm going to give my children everything they want in the hopes they'll like me, it just means that I'm choosing explanation and honest discussion over manipulation and extortion. I've recently discovered that the phrase "you're not your child's friend" really rubs me the wrong way. No, I'm not going to ignore the fact that I have more life experience and (hopefully, sometimes) wisdom than they do, but I'm not going to pretend that my voice is the only one worth listening to. I wouldn't do that to a friend. Not one I wanted to keep, anyway. So I'm not going to choose paths for my children and push them so hard down them that in my ignorance about my children's desires I push them away from me. I won't sugarcoat the realities of life, but I also won't pretend they don't have a choice about which lessons to learn on their own. I choose being a safe haven over being a driving force.
See, I'd like to lead off with the reassuring statement about how Tex has become a darn proficient reader now, in his own time, and is even starting to think of himself that way. We were going through our rarely-read children's books to find some to give away for victims of the recent tornadoes, and something happened that has never happened before: Tex wanted to keep books so that HE could read them. He's never talked about wanting to read independently before. Ever. He has clung to the idea of me reading to him for years, in fact I think he was planning to have me in the dorm room next to his if he goes to college, so that I could read text books to him at bedtime. :-) "Insecure about reading" doesn't even begin to describe him. "Hostile" maybe comes closer. So it's with no small amount of joy that I realized two days ago we had had a banner day: Tex told me all the jokes off his Popsicle sticks after HE read them himself. He didn't ask for help before trying, he gave it a shot and it made sense for him, he comprehended the words and was able to express them accurately to me later.
But that doesn't really change the basic fact that Tex is not naturally proficient at language-related tasks, and I really want to start actively playing to his strengths as a spatial learner. I love that he's brought himself this far and that he's starting to feel confident about something that's been a big challenge for him the last couple of years, but I'm also worried that I'm not doing enough to support that learning and help him feel powerful and intelligent. I feel like if he could take it to the next level, having some concrete tools to employ when trying to decode language, then he would feel even more self-reliant and independent, and wouldn't look to me to be his savior in these situations. But he's so resistant to any kind of pressure that I've been hands-off in order to let him know that I don't expect his brain to operate on my timeline. And that's kind of what the whole point of homeschooling was with him, was to get him to a point where he felt well-equipped to handle what would be expected of him in public school, and not feel abandoned or neglected. And that's not to say he would be forced to go to school once he reached that point, just that it wasn't an option until then. And now I'm seeing that with a little more focused work on my part, there's a light at the distant end of the tunnel. That's pretty cool. But more on that "urge to push" in a minute.
Speaking of reading, it turns out Noodle is just one of those kids who "get it". I was like that; I don't know what age I started reading, I just remember that words on a page made sense to me. It appears Noodle is much the same, as his reading has gone from basic C-V-C words last summer to full on reading of whole paragraphs at present. Of course he struggles with the odd word, but most of them just flow right in his eyes and out his mouth without a break. I realize now what a gift that is in this world, to have words just open themselves up to you. I think it will allow Noodle a lot more choice for a while, and I hope I don't forget that he still needs my interest in what he's learning even if he doesn't need my help.
Okay, now that the reading is covered, what else have we been doing? Well, the big thing that was coming up after my last entry was Disney World! I can't believe what a burst of imagination has come on the tails of that trip. The kids still watch the Disney behind-the-scenes videos on Netflix at least once a week, they talk about their favorite rides and what they're going to do next time when they're bigger (we're hoping to take another trip in 3 years or so), and the other day Tex and I even had a conversation comparing the strengths and weaknesses of Disney and Universal as we saw them. He argued that while WDW definitely has the best rides for kids his age, Universal had the more impressive architecture, citing Hogsmeade/Hogwarts in particular. I maintain that Universal should only get credit for having hired the staff from the movies to design the Wizarding World of Harry Potter, and that overall Disney does a much better job of selling their themes. Then he pulled out the Dr. Suess area at Universal and I rebutted with Epcot's World Showcase. In the end we agreed to disagree.
Anyway, it's been a fun surprise to me to see what caught each child's fancy at WDW. While we were at the Monster's Inc. Laugh Floor on our last night at Disney, and Tex got asked by a monster comedian what he wanted to be when he grew up, he answered without hesitation "a costume designer". Now, dressing up is something that Tex has always loved to do, and we maintain well-stocked dress-up boxes for all the kids, but it's like our trip to the theme parks really brought it to life for him. He focuses on the little details of the costumes he sees in movies and tv shows, and on figuring out how we can recreate them at home. This is one of those times I wish I was good at sewing.
But now, let's go back to the sharpening of focus I told you about. I suppose it's natural as one begins to live out the Unschooling lifestyle, but I've been thinking more and more lately about what is really important to us. I was in the bookstore yesterday and I picked up The Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother. I had heard about the book and it's author, and even read a couple of excerpts on the internet, heaping scorn on the head of the woman who would do such things to her child for the sake of being thought to be a good mother because her children were successful. For shame! But in reading the jacket of the *actual* book instead of just relying on the internet (funny how that works), I saw that this wasn't just a clueless, disconnected mother feeding her own ego. Amy Chua parented her daughters the way she did, forcing them to practice lessons and achieve greatness at the cost of their own relationship, because she thought that being successful was more important, would be better for her children, than having a strong relationship with her built on unconditional affection. Part of me feels overwhelmingly sad that she thought so little of herself, that being a whole person to her children seemed worthless, but that's not really the point. She wanted the best for her babies. And by her definition they have been successful, so I guess that's a comfort to... someone.
But here's the thing. I'm going the other way. I've made just as conscious a choice and I'm choosing the relationship. This is not to say I'm going to give my children everything they want in the hopes they'll like me, it just means that I'm choosing explanation and honest discussion over manipulation and extortion. I've recently discovered that the phrase "you're not your child's friend" really rubs me the wrong way. No, I'm not going to ignore the fact that I have more life experience and (hopefully, sometimes) wisdom than they do, but I'm not going to pretend that my voice is the only one worth listening to. I wouldn't do that to a friend. Not one I wanted to keep, anyway. So I'm not going to choose paths for my children and push them so hard down them that in my ignorance about my children's desires I push them away from me. I won't sugarcoat the realities of life, but I also won't pretend they don't have a choice about which lessons to learn on their own. I choose being a safe haven over being a driving force.
Wednesday, February 23, 2011
Catching up and looking forward
It's been months, I know. Sometimes I don't post because I'm busy, sometimes because there's just not much new to report. Lately it's been the former, for sure! Seems like ever since the holidays started we've just been going-going-going around here and I don't have 30 minutes together to sit down and post. But it's getting ridiculous even by my loosey-goosey standards, so here we go! As usual, forgive the bouncing around, I guess when I go this long without posting I forget what all I want to report. :-)
Tex is just amazing. No, the kid isn't the most socially able, and I admit I have a hard time with that, but his brain is freakin' awesome!! He has an innate understanding of mathematics and physics that I could never even dream of having. He can recite (and more importantly, understand) Newton's Laws of Motion, he's still doing multiplication and division in his head for fun, and he's started exploring geometry and angles now as well. A lot of this new geometry information comes from doing woodworking with his grandfathers and uncle, and the physics knowledge gets a workout as both Tex and Noodle recently designed their Pinewood Derby cars for Cub Scouts.
Also for Cub Scouts, we recently went on a Fire Station Field Trip with a homeschool group, and let me tell you how much my boys impressed me. The tour leader, Tory, was asking kids about what to do if there's a fire. Tex is an old hand at fire safety, so he piped right up with the "stop, drop, and roll" technique if one's clothes are one fire. But then Tory asked, "what do you do if there's a fire in your house?" And oh, my Noodle. I wish you could hear his squeaky little voice explain: "well, you could... well, this wouldn't really be possible, but if you could get a big jar and put it over the house, then the fire wouldn't have oxygen and it would go out!" Tory's response: "Get this kid an application." ;-) They then had a great time exploring the whole fire house and three different fire trucks.
In other news, both boys are now reading very capably. It obviously comes very naturally to Noodle, while Tex has to work a little harder, but they're both doing really well. I'd say that Noodle is a little above grade level and climbing fast, while Tex is right at his grade level. The great news is that Tex still loves a good story, and we're about halfway through the newest Rick Riordan book, The Lost Hero, which picks up where the Percy Jackson books left off, but now with a Roman bent instead of Greek. This has really captured Tex's imagination and just today he asked me to pick out some books on ancient Rome and Greece at the library. He also wants to add some ancient Greek and Roman dates to our timeline, like the building of the Colosseum and the eruption of Vesuvius, so we need to get some thumbnail pictures printed out to go with those dates.
Tex's love of dinosaurs and World War I and II aircraft has recently been rekindled as well. We recorded a couple of shows off the Military Channel, one on Pacific theater WWII aircraft and one on the European theater, and he's been watching the show Dogfights with his grandfather again. It's been a couple of years since I've seen him staging dogfights with his toy planes, so that's been a treat. And he's really looking more into the paleontological side of dinosaur study, and says that he'd like to be a paleontologist when he grows up. There's no doubt in my mind that he'd be great at it with his attention to detail and ritual, seems like those traits would be useful in a profession that requires meticulous cataloging of findings.
Noodle's big obsessions lately have been animals and Club Penguin. A new series of shows have become popular in our house: Dogs 101, Cats 101, and Pets 101. They detail the characteristics and needs of a variety of species and breeds of animals, and since the thing Noodle wants most in the world is a pet of his very own upon which to lavish large amounts of love and time, this is good preparation for him. We've made multiple trips to PetSmart for him to look around and design the correct habitat for a variety of animals including hamsters, fish, lizards, hermit crabs, dogs, and cats. He also plays "puppies" with his friends a lot, and they'll make themselves a doghouse and get bowls of food and water and have a grand old time. Of course the "teacher" in me makes note of the fact that this meets the national standards of learning about animal habitats. ;-)
And who have I forgotten? Oh, yes, the Monkeygirl. The silly, smart, loud, joyful, kind Monkeygirl. She is such a blessing on our house!! Of course at 3 years old she's learning through play all day long, so it's hard to make up a laundry list of all she knows. But she's got numbers, letters, colors all down pat, and lately she's been pointing to words and asking me, "Mommy, what dis say?" She's also an excellent singer, and we are treated to choruses of "Old McDonald Had a Farm" all. day. long. Sometimes we just get "eieio, eieio, eieio" for a minute straight, but sometimes she regales us with the sounds of llamas, roosters, and even babies on the farm. Monkeygirl's sense of humor is amazing, and her compassion and concern for others is truly beautiful. I love to see her and her brothers interact because the love shining off them when they're together makes my heart feel full to bursting! Oh, and the Sunday School coordinator at our church tells me repeatedly that she is the most articulate 3 yr old she knows, which is always nice to hear.
So, we have a big adventure coming up in a month and a half. We are going to Walt Disney World!!!! I cannot wait to get my kids in those parks and watch them have a blast. Tex is charged up about Epcot with all its futuristic rides, Noodle is charged up about the Kim Possible Secret Agent mission in Epcot's World Showcase, and Monkeygirl is just barely aware that we're going to be going on a special trip one day. I'm excited to see all the live animals at Animal Kingdom and go on the safari with the kids, and yeah, okay, I'm also excited to be a Kim Possible secret agent. I know that whether it's planned or not this trip is going to provide some huge learning opportunities for my kids. It already started tonight when I explained Tom Sawyer island in Magic Kingdom, and the fence-painting scene that inspires the WDW cast members to hide paint brushes all over the island for visitors to find and exchange for prizes. So there ya go, a little bit of classic literature with your vacation planning. ;-)
Tex is just amazing. No, the kid isn't the most socially able, and I admit I have a hard time with that, but his brain is freakin' awesome!! He has an innate understanding of mathematics and physics that I could never even dream of having. He can recite (and more importantly, understand) Newton's Laws of Motion, he's still doing multiplication and division in his head for fun, and he's started exploring geometry and angles now as well. A lot of this new geometry information comes from doing woodworking with his grandfathers and uncle, and the physics knowledge gets a workout as both Tex and Noodle recently designed their Pinewood Derby cars for Cub Scouts.
Also for Cub Scouts, we recently went on a Fire Station Field Trip with a homeschool group, and let me tell you how much my boys impressed me. The tour leader, Tory, was asking kids about what to do if there's a fire. Tex is an old hand at fire safety, so he piped right up with the "stop, drop, and roll" technique if one's clothes are one fire. But then Tory asked, "what do you do if there's a fire in your house?" And oh, my Noodle. I wish you could hear his squeaky little voice explain: "well, you could... well, this wouldn't really be possible, but if you could get a big jar and put it over the house, then the fire wouldn't have oxygen and it would go out!" Tory's response: "Get this kid an application." ;-) They then had a great time exploring the whole fire house and three different fire trucks.
In other news, both boys are now reading very capably. It obviously comes very naturally to Noodle, while Tex has to work a little harder, but they're both doing really well. I'd say that Noodle is a little above grade level and climbing fast, while Tex is right at his grade level. The great news is that Tex still loves a good story, and we're about halfway through the newest Rick Riordan book, The Lost Hero, which picks up where the Percy Jackson books left off, but now with a Roman bent instead of Greek. This has really captured Tex's imagination and just today he asked me to pick out some books on ancient Rome and Greece at the library. He also wants to add some ancient Greek and Roman dates to our timeline, like the building of the Colosseum and the eruption of Vesuvius, so we need to get some thumbnail pictures printed out to go with those dates.
Tex's love of dinosaurs and World War I and II aircraft has recently been rekindled as well. We recorded a couple of shows off the Military Channel, one on Pacific theater WWII aircraft and one on the European theater, and he's been watching the show Dogfights with his grandfather again. It's been a couple of years since I've seen him staging dogfights with his toy planes, so that's been a treat. And he's really looking more into the paleontological side of dinosaur study, and says that he'd like to be a paleontologist when he grows up. There's no doubt in my mind that he'd be great at it with his attention to detail and ritual, seems like those traits would be useful in a profession that requires meticulous cataloging of findings.
Noodle's big obsessions lately have been animals and Club Penguin. A new series of shows have become popular in our house: Dogs 101, Cats 101, and Pets 101. They detail the characteristics and needs of a variety of species and breeds of animals, and since the thing Noodle wants most in the world is a pet of his very own upon which to lavish large amounts of love and time, this is good preparation for him. We've made multiple trips to PetSmart for him to look around and design the correct habitat for a variety of animals including hamsters, fish, lizards, hermit crabs, dogs, and cats. He also plays "puppies" with his friends a lot, and they'll make themselves a doghouse and get bowls of food and water and have a grand old time. Of course the "teacher" in me makes note of the fact that this meets the national standards of learning about animal habitats. ;-)
And who have I forgotten? Oh, yes, the Monkeygirl. The silly, smart, loud, joyful, kind Monkeygirl. She is such a blessing on our house!! Of course at 3 years old she's learning through play all day long, so it's hard to make up a laundry list of all she knows. But she's got numbers, letters, colors all down pat, and lately she's been pointing to words and asking me, "Mommy, what dis say?" She's also an excellent singer, and we are treated to choruses of "Old McDonald Had a Farm" all. day. long. Sometimes we just get "eieio, eieio, eieio" for a minute straight, but sometimes she regales us with the sounds of llamas, roosters, and even babies on the farm. Monkeygirl's sense of humor is amazing, and her compassion and concern for others is truly beautiful. I love to see her and her brothers interact because the love shining off them when they're together makes my heart feel full to bursting! Oh, and the Sunday School coordinator at our church tells me repeatedly that she is the most articulate 3 yr old she knows, which is always nice to hear.
So, we have a big adventure coming up in a month and a half. We are going to Walt Disney World!!!! I cannot wait to get my kids in those parks and watch them have a blast. Tex is charged up about Epcot with all its futuristic rides, Noodle is charged up about the Kim Possible Secret Agent mission in Epcot's World Showcase, and Monkeygirl is just barely aware that we're going to be going on a special trip one day. I'm excited to see all the live animals at Animal Kingdom and go on the safari with the kids, and yeah, okay, I'm also excited to be a Kim Possible secret agent. I know that whether it's planned or not this trip is going to provide some huge learning opportunities for my kids. It already started tonight when I explained Tom Sawyer island in Magic Kingdom, and the fence-painting scene that inspires the WDW cast members to hide paint brushes all over the island for visitors to find and exchange for prizes. So there ya go, a little bit of classic literature with your vacation planning. ;-)
Friday, October 1, 2010
The Eagle has landed!
Psssst! Don't tell Tex, but I think he may have crossed over into being a confident reader! I noticed yesterday that when his brother was playing a video game and couldn't read something, Tex didn't hesitate to lean right over his shoulder and read it aloud for Noodle. And when I complimented Tex on being such a great reader and helpful brother, I actually got a smile instead of a sullen look or loud, contrary "I am NOT a good reader, I HATE reading!" And then today I was spelling out a word I didn't want Monkeygirl to hear (for the record, "princess", because that's just the kind of mama I am) and Tex immediately piped up with the word! Something about the wiring from Tex's ears to his brain works SO much better than the path from eyes to brain. He's always been able to repeat almost word for word any information that he hears and is interested in, and can remember it long after it has lost its tenuous grip on my synapses. In any case, I was stunned to hear him put it all together so fast, and thrilled for what this confidence could mean to him in the coming months of learning. I don't know that any of my kids will ever be the bookworm that I am, but I'm hoping they'll at least consider reading to be a useful and painless tool for growth.
In other reading news, we've begun the Harry Potter series. I'm rereading the entire series and I'm pretty sure we won't be going beyond the second book for a while. Which is fine, as there are a lot of other wonderful books out there to explore and read. But even after just a week of reading, Tex is really enjoying Harry Potter. I overheard him yesterday trying to teach Noodle how to ride a broomstick and play Quidditch. :-)
In other reading news, we've begun the Harry Potter series. I'm rereading the entire series and I'm pretty sure we won't be going beyond the second book for a while. Which is fine, as there are a lot of other wonderful books out there to explore and read. But even after just a week of reading, Tex is really enjoying Harry Potter. I overheard him yesterday trying to teach Noodle how to ride a broomstick and play Quidditch. :-)
Thursday, September 16, 2010
I think I'm getting the hang of this now!
Unschooling, that is. It's been quite an adventure, I must say, and it's certainly still a work in progress. Carrying the freedom over into our parenting has been a particular challenge, but one that I think is going to have to happen because I can't see how it would work to Unschool during the day and then revert to "what I say goes" behavior once we hit the dinner table. How confusing that would be for our children! It IS an effort, especially with Tex's argumentative nature to make all our work seem pointless some days, but I'm seeing enough overall progress in our relationships and the happiness of our home to remind me to keep the faith.
Academics are going well, such as they are. Tex's reading continues to improve, and his love of stories is growing and growing. We're three quarters through The Tale of Despereaux and Tex is thoroughly engaged. (Can I pause for a minute and tell you how much I LOVE reading to my children??? Granted, there's not much I like more than reading anyway, but being able to read aloud and have someone giggle with me is just priceless. I don't think I'll ever want to stop!) He's always been so adept at focusing on the story and building his own pictures while I read, it amazes me. Plus he likes my French accent. :-)
Tex continues to advance in math, as well. He's adding three-digit numbers, continuing to memorize the multiplication tables, he's understanding more about decimals and integers, and his fractions are really coming along. Oh, and our timeline! I admit I've been lax about adding items to it, but not a week goes by that Tex doesn't have a suggestion for something that should be up there. Last week he suggested I add the start dates for the Korean, Vietnam, and World Wars; this week he wants the first space flight and the moon landing to be written down.
Noodle is picking up reading, as well, at his own pace. He told me the other day that "I'm not reading, I just see the words and they make sense". Well. Okay, then. Noodle is also getting interested in addition, and most days will do me the favor of letting me know what x + y equals. Yesterday he told me that his Papa told him 8+8=16, then he asked what 8+9 equals. "Well, if you had 8 and 8, and that's 16, and then one of those numbers grew one more, then what would that be?" "Seventeen!" he exclaimed, with a huge smile on his face.
Both boys are enrolled in Taekwondo now, as well. Noodle is surprising me with his enthusiasm! This is my little guy who usually isn't a "joiner", doesn't really have much use for someone telling him what to do, and gets along quite well doing his own thing, thankyouverymuch. But he works hard in Taekwondo! Tex finds it more of a struggle, frankly, especially since his class is more fitness-focused and disciplined, and Tex would prefer a lower-pressure environment. But he's starting to make progress after a few weeks of classes, now, and I think he's feeling the reward of his persistence. In any case they both promised they would stick it out until Noodle's birthday in November, and I'm hoping that by then they'll be over the awkwardness and sure about whether it's something they want to stick with or not.
Monkeygirl is having a blast, I must say. She's almost three and has such a spirit of confidence about her! I love that I can see that for what it is: not willfullness or cheek, but a positive sense of self that empowers her to say "this is the way *I* like things, and my voice matters, too!" I can't help but think of the benefits she will have, growing up as my most free child. The only one never to have been schooled (both her brothers were in preschool by this age), the one who has experienced the least amount of yelling and strife in the house, the one with the fewest limits on her joy. Like our Noodle, Monkeygirl has an amazing sense of humor that she loves to share with her family. She's also beginning to explore letters such that she can now identify a handful reliably (O, T, M, B, A, X, Z, F, H, and Q, at the very least) and even some of their sounds.
Both my boys are also official Plants vs. Zombies lovers. Once again the persistence comes out in ways I would have never imagined. And before anyone scoffs at the limits of learning that a video game can spur, go play that game yourself, mister/ma'am! LOL It requires fast, strategic thinking and even makes MY heart beat faster! I'm proud of how they've stuck with it and learned to make decisions based on what kind of obstacles they're facing. So there. I've said it. My children have learned a lot from zombies. :-)
Academics are going well, such as they are. Tex's reading continues to improve, and his love of stories is growing and growing. We're three quarters through The Tale of Despereaux and Tex is thoroughly engaged. (Can I pause for a minute and tell you how much I LOVE reading to my children??? Granted, there's not much I like more than reading anyway, but being able to read aloud and have someone giggle with me is just priceless. I don't think I'll ever want to stop!) He's always been so adept at focusing on the story and building his own pictures while I read, it amazes me. Plus he likes my French accent. :-)
Tex continues to advance in math, as well. He's adding three-digit numbers, continuing to memorize the multiplication tables, he's understanding more about decimals and integers, and his fractions are really coming along. Oh, and our timeline! I admit I've been lax about adding items to it, but not a week goes by that Tex doesn't have a suggestion for something that should be up there. Last week he suggested I add the start dates for the Korean, Vietnam, and World Wars; this week he wants the first space flight and the moon landing to be written down.
Noodle is picking up reading, as well, at his own pace. He told me the other day that "I'm not reading, I just see the words and they make sense". Well. Okay, then. Noodle is also getting interested in addition, and most days will do me the favor of letting me know what x + y equals. Yesterday he told me that his Papa told him 8+8=16, then he asked what 8+9 equals. "Well, if you had 8 and 8, and that's 16, and then one of those numbers grew one more, then what would that be?" "Seventeen!" he exclaimed, with a huge smile on his face.
Both boys are enrolled in Taekwondo now, as well. Noodle is surprising me with his enthusiasm! This is my little guy who usually isn't a "joiner", doesn't really have much use for someone telling him what to do, and gets along quite well doing his own thing, thankyouverymuch. But he works hard in Taekwondo! Tex finds it more of a struggle, frankly, especially since his class is more fitness-focused and disciplined, and Tex would prefer a lower-pressure environment. But he's starting to make progress after a few weeks of classes, now, and I think he's feeling the reward of his persistence. In any case they both promised they would stick it out until Noodle's birthday in November, and I'm hoping that by then they'll be over the awkwardness and sure about whether it's something they want to stick with or not.
Monkeygirl is having a blast, I must say. She's almost three and has such a spirit of confidence about her! I love that I can see that for what it is: not willfullness or cheek, but a positive sense of self that empowers her to say "this is the way *I* like things, and my voice matters, too!" I can't help but think of the benefits she will have, growing up as my most free child. The only one never to have been schooled (both her brothers were in preschool by this age), the one who has experienced the least amount of yelling and strife in the house, the one with the fewest limits on her joy. Like our Noodle, Monkeygirl has an amazing sense of humor that she loves to share with her family. She's also beginning to explore letters such that she can now identify a handful reliably (O, T, M, B, A, X, Z, F, H, and Q, at the very least) and even some of their sounds.
Both my boys are also official Plants vs. Zombies lovers. Once again the persistence comes out in ways I would have never imagined. And before anyone scoffs at the limits of learning that a video game can spur, go play that game yourself, mister/ma'am! LOL It requires fast, strategic thinking and even makes MY heart beat faster! I'm proud of how they've stuck with it and learned to make decisions based on what kind of obstacles they're facing. So there. I've said it. My children have learned a lot from zombies. :-)
Saturday, August 14, 2010
Whose principles are these, anyway?
There are many challenges to Unschooling, and I think this one might just be the biggest for me so far. It's the idea that one kind of learning is as valuable as any other kind of learning, because different people need different information, and learn different things from the exact same presentation of information. That parents should not dictate the majority of their children's educations.
Now, I realize some of you are going to find this to be topsy-turvy, but bear with me for a moment. Let's take Tex as an example, and his process of learning to read. Now, y'all should know in advance that I love reading. Reading is the thing I do when I don't have to do anything else. If I sit down in front of the tv, or to eat, or on the toilet, I feel I am lacking if I don't have a book or at least a magazine for my companion. Tex, on the other hand, has always valued the story, but not so much the process of reading. He knew his letters when he was 2 (because he asked, and we answered) and he knew the sounds they made when he was 4 (because they taught that in preschool, and sometimes he wanted to know). He's had a good reading basis and as his parents we did everything we could to help him along in the reading process. He's played reading games on the computer and the kitchen table, we've read Easy Reader books and story books and chapter books, because reading is very important to us. The challenge is this: until he was naturally ready to read, all the games and encouragement and quizzing and pressure, all they really did was make him feel that he was less than a child who could read. Oh, he loves the stories and would have someone read to him all day long, probably, if any of us had that kind of time and vocal stamina, but reading has been a by-the-by sort of thing for him. It just wasn't something he needed to do, and it wasn't something he wanted to do, and I don't think our pressure and desire for him to read made him learn any faster. What they did do was make him feel slower. Noodle is reading now, at 5 1/2, words that Tex didn't figure out until last year, and he's done it with none of the pressure, none of the coaching, and none of the feelings of inadequacy.
I hate sports. I'm not really good at any of them, I don't like learning the rules and regulations, I don't even like watching a great many of them. The Olympics are just my sports-speed: lots of variety and they only happen once every couple of years. I understand the importance of exercise and its value to the body, but beyond that I just don't. like. sports. But... just because I don't see the fun in them doesn't mean I shouldn't smile when my child tells me that his favorite team won the game, or celebrate when he climbs a rock wall all the way to the top, or bowls a better score than he ever has before, or finds the baseball card he's been after for months. I don't value sports, but I shouldn't discourage my kids from enjoying them.
So I have begun to see how it is that parents can damage their child's healthy sense of wonder and inquisitiveness by how we value different things and expect or demand our children to do the same. Do I think it's important to finish a really tricky level of a video game? Heck, no, I don't. But have I watched my husband stay up until 2 a.m. trying to get all gold stars on Mario Kart? Oh yes, I have. And I don't shame him for it. It's his life, it's his sleep deficit, they're his priorities. Why would I not allow my children to have the same freedom in as large a portion as they feel secure in handling? That's key, by the way, that you don't give children more freedom than they are capable of feeling secure with. And that's not a coded way of saying "as much freedom as they can have and still make the right choices according to MY values", it means that I have to watch my child to see if they are loving the freedom or feel they are being left to twist in the wind.
So it started this summer that we removed restrictions for "screen time": tv, video games, and computer time. We had originally only allowed them to have, maximum, about 45 minutes of video game play at a time, but when the restrictions were lifted I noticed that my kids have quite a spirit of persistence, WHEN it's something they are motivated to complete. They spent hours in focused work, figuring out the little tricks for each level, getting faster. We had discussions of teamwork, and the difference between encouraging and discouraging your playmates, and how to handle the frustration of losing. Why should I tell my son that it is more important to finish a chapter in a book than it is to finish a level on a video game, simply because I do not value video games as much as he does, and when he is learning so much from playing them? Is it fair to interrupt my child in an activity which he considers urgent, and engaging, and worth his time, in order to have him participate in an activity that I find more worthwhile? Assuming that health and safety are not at issue, WHY do parents have such a hard time letting children develop their own values?? WHERE did we get the idea that our children are supposed to grow up to like and value the same things that we do??
It's not easy, this shift. I have had to realize that joy is the most important thing. The joy my son gets from completing a level on LEGO Batman is the same joy I get when I finish reading a really good book, so why would I want to deny him that joy simply because it wouldn't be joyful for me? I wouldn't be very happy if someone insisted that I had to play video games all day long, if they found them to be more valuable and had that sort of authority over me. So it become a matter of giving my children the freedom to find their own joy, and not to judge if what brings them joy is not something I would have chosen for them. It is choosing to be a joy enabler, instead of a joy crusher.
Will I have limits on this? Clearly. I hope my children will not find joy in damaging the body or mind of another living creature, or themselves for that matter, and in those kinds of extremes of course I would take action. But I shouldn't care too much if they want to spend their time watching Wallace & Gromit and Fantastic Mr. Fox for a year, especially since I don't know if it could potentially lead to them designing and filming their own stop-motion animation and eventually a career in the film industry. I hope my children will come to know the power of Christ in their lives and work hard to be who He has called them to be. But I shouldn't worry too much if they do as I did and spend years exploring the possibilities, even if those years extend beyond mine and I never see them come to Christ. In fact it will be much better if I simply choose to live my life according to the principles I have chosen, to follow Jesus and love all my fellow men with the abundance and faith which He has shown to me, rather than shaming others (my children included) for not finding the same answer I have found. I would hope that as my children grow and become more mature, that they will take more responsibility for the care of the space we share, and be more conscientious of the work they create for others. But I shouldn't take 60 seconds from both our days and interrupt what they're doing to clean up a mess which I could have cleaned up in 10 seconds because doing so was valuable to me.
It probably sounds foreign to many of you. A few of you probably don't understand how this could NOT lead to children who are entitled brats. My only response is that if I ever feel I'm being taken advantage of, then I will discuss it with my housemates and trust in our love for each other to help us find a solution that works for everyone. I'm not out to coddle my children or remove all the strife from their life. I just think it makes a difference when you believe in what you're working for, and that my children should have the opportunity to feel that sense of purpose rather than having to work almost exclusively towards goals that I have chosen as the most worthy. I'd rather they get to be themselves all their lives instead of spending years trying to find joy in my expectations. And if I can just get that tattooed on my hands I might have a prayer of remembering it next time I find a swath of LEGO, ripe with value and sharp edges, all over our playroom floor. And when I DO remember, I will feel the joy of being successful at something I value: peace.
Now, I realize some of you are going to find this to be topsy-turvy, but bear with me for a moment. Let's take Tex as an example, and his process of learning to read. Now, y'all should know in advance that I love reading. Reading is the thing I do when I don't have to do anything else. If I sit down in front of the tv, or to eat, or on the toilet, I feel I am lacking if I don't have a book or at least a magazine for my companion. Tex, on the other hand, has always valued the story, but not so much the process of reading. He knew his letters when he was 2 (because he asked, and we answered) and he knew the sounds they made when he was 4 (because they taught that in preschool, and sometimes he wanted to know). He's had a good reading basis and as his parents we did everything we could to help him along in the reading process. He's played reading games on the computer and the kitchen table, we've read Easy Reader books and story books and chapter books, because reading is very important to us. The challenge is this: until he was naturally ready to read, all the games and encouragement and quizzing and pressure, all they really did was make him feel that he was less than a child who could read. Oh, he loves the stories and would have someone read to him all day long, probably, if any of us had that kind of time and vocal stamina, but reading has been a by-the-by sort of thing for him. It just wasn't something he needed to do, and it wasn't something he wanted to do, and I don't think our pressure and desire for him to read made him learn any faster. What they did do was make him feel slower. Noodle is reading now, at 5 1/2, words that Tex didn't figure out until last year, and he's done it with none of the pressure, none of the coaching, and none of the feelings of inadequacy.
I hate sports. I'm not really good at any of them, I don't like learning the rules and regulations, I don't even like watching a great many of them. The Olympics are just my sports-speed: lots of variety and they only happen once every couple of years. I understand the importance of exercise and its value to the body, but beyond that I just don't. like. sports. But... just because I don't see the fun in them doesn't mean I shouldn't smile when my child tells me that his favorite team won the game, or celebrate when he climbs a rock wall all the way to the top, or bowls a better score than he ever has before, or finds the baseball card he's been after for months. I don't value sports, but I shouldn't discourage my kids from enjoying them.
So I have begun to see how it is that parents can damage their child's healthy sense of wonder and inquisitiveness by how we value different things and expect or demand our children to do the same. Do I think it's important to finish a really tricky level of a video game? Heck, no, I don't. But have I watched my husband stay up until 2 a.m. trying to get all gold stars on Mario Kart? Oh yes, I have. And I don't shame him for it. It's his life, it's his sleep deficit, they're his priorities. Why would I not allow my children to have the same freedom in as large a portion as they feel secure in handling? That's key, by the way, that you don't give children more freedom than they are capable of feeling secure with. And that's not a coded way of saying "as much freedom as they can have and still make the right choices according to MY values", it means that I have to watch my child to see if they are loving the freedom or feel they are being left to twist in the wind.
So it started this summer that we removed restrictions for "screen time": tv, video games, and computer time. We had originally only allowed them to have, maximum, about 45 minutes of video game play at a time, but when the restrictions were lifted I noticed that my kids have quite a spirit of persistence, WHEN it's something they are motivated to complete. They spent hours in focused work, figuring out the little tricks for each level, getting faster. We had discussions of teamwork, and the difference between encouraging and discouraging your playmates, and how to handle the frustration of losing. Why should I tell my son that it is more important to finish a chapter in a book than it is to finish a level on a video game, simply because I do not value video games as much as he does, and when he is learning so much from playing them? Is it fair to interrupt my child in an activity which he considers urgent, and engaging, and worth his time, in order to have him participate in an activity that I find more worthwhile? Assuming that health and safety are not at issue, WHY do parents have such a hard time letting children develop their own values?? WHERE did we get the idea that our children are supposed to grow up to like and value the same things that we do??
It's not easy, this shift. I have had to realize that joy is the most important thing. The joy my son gets from completing a level on LEGO Batman is the same joy I get when I finish reading a really good book, so why would I want to deny him that joy simply because it wouldn't be joyful for me? I wouldn't be very happy if someone insisted that I had to play video games all day long, if they found them to be more valuable and had that sort of authority over me. So it become a matter of giving my children the freedom to find their own joy, and not to judge if what brings them joy is not something I would have chosen for them. It is choosing to be a joy enabler, instead of a joy crusher.
Will I have limits on this? Clearly. I hope my children will not find joy in damaging the body or mind of another living creature, or themselves for that matter, and in those kinds of extremes of course I would take action. But I shouldn't care too much if they want to spend their time watching Wallace & Gromit and Fantastic Mr. Fox for a year, especially since I don't know if it could potentially lead to them designing and filming their own stop-motion animation and eventually a career in the film industry. I hope my children will come to know the power of Christ in their lives and work hard to be who He has called them to be. But I shouldn't worry too much if they do as I did and spend years exploring the possibilities, even if those years extend beyond mine and I never see them come to Christ. In fact it will be much better if I simply choose to live my life according to the principles I have chosen, to follow Jesus and love all my fellow men with the abundance and faith which He has shown to me, rather than shaming others (my children included) for not finding the same answer I have found. I would hope that as my children grow and become more mature, that they will take more responsibility for the care of the space we share, and be more conscientious of the work they create for others. But I shouldn't take 60 seconds from both our days and interrupt what they're doing to clean up a mess which I could have cleaned up in 10 seconds because doing so was valuable to me.
It probably sounds foreign to many of you. A few of you probably don't understand how this could NOT lead to children who are entitled brats. My only response is that if I ever feel I'm being taken advantage of, then I will discuss it with my housemates and trust in our love for each other to help us find a solution that works for everyone. I'm not out to coddle my children or remove all the strife from their life. I just think it makes a difference when you believe in what you're working for, and that my children should have the opportunity to feel that sense of purpose rather than having to work almost exclusively towards goals that I have chosen as the most worthy. I'd rather they get to be themselves all their lives instead of spending years trying to find joy in my expectations. And if I can just get that tattooed on my hands I might have a prayer of remembering it next time I find a swath of LEGO, ripe with value and sharp edges, all over our playroom floor. And when I DO remember, I will feel the joy of being successful at something I value: peace.
Monday, August 9, 2010
First Day of "School"
So the public schools went back in session today, which always puts me in the frame of mind to get our learning kicked back into gear as well. This doesn't really mean anything other than me being less on the computer and cleaning up the house and more available to say "yes" to board games and setting up projects and going places. I may also strew more learning toys about in strategic locations and invite more involvement into my own projects, although in truth I'm making it a personal goal to be more open to assistance in my "grown up responsibilities" at all times.
I was astounded today to see how much Noodle's reading has progressed! It all started when we were returning from MonkeyGirl's parent/child gymnastics class (she's SO excited to be back!!) and the boys asked if we could play Silly Sentences when we got home. Sure, we can do that! So we get home, set out the puzzle-style words designed to fit together in a limited number of ways (articles only attach to adjectives and nouns, and nouns to verbs on the other side, then prepositions, which feed back into articles), and off they go putting sentences together. We don't take turns, we just all do our best to make the silliest sentences we can. Stuff like "The furry, blue banana climbed on the sad, scary duck." Except the game doesn't include commas, which bothers me. They have periods, why don't they have commas for multiple adjectives?? Yes, I am a grammar nerd. Learn to love it.
Anyway, back to the Noodle, he was doing a great job reading almost all of the words in the game, and even with the pieces that had pictures on them (nouns and colors) I could see him moving his lips to sound out the accompanying words. Then after lunch we played another game, it's some pirate octopus treasure game with beginning and ending sound blends that you can mix up to form multiple words (sw- goes with -ing, -ap) and again Noodle worked to sound out his own words and mine. We played that game three times!
Tex played with us once and in contrast to last year when he was still working hard to read each blend, most of them come to him quite instantly now. He's still not ready to give up the security and speed of someone else reading to him, but I'm confident that he is making steady progress. He is certainly interested enough in storytelling! We're almost finished with the last of Nick Riordan's Percy Jackson books, and I'm curious to see where we'll be going after this. Tex definitely likes to have adventure in his stories, so I'll probably continue in my hunt to see what sort of series are out there that would appeal. My particular challenge is to find something that might be interesting to both the boys, as our books usually end up being bedtime material and it's easier if they're both engaged. The big hits over the last year were the Star Wars junior novelizations, the Narnia series (though we stalled out at Voyage of the Dawn Treader), and How to Train Your Dragon. I may try to talk them into The Tale of Desperaux next, since it's funny and adventurous (AND has illustrations, a big draw for Noodle). Or we may finish The Odyssey if they want to continue the Greek theme, or D'Aulaires Book of Greek Myths. So many options.
Tex and I also had a fraction discussion today. This kid loves fractions. He was telling me how much of his banana he had eaten, and he started with an estimate of 3/4, then said "no, it was a little more than 3/4, I think. Like two and a half thirds." I came back with "oh, ok, so that would be 5/6". He thought about that for a minute and said "thank you for making that a simpler fraction, but do you know what? Even though what you said makes more sense, it's actually much easier to say 'two and a half thirds' than it is to say five sixths." I couldn't even argue with that. The word "sixths" is a pain in the tokhes and should be avoided at all costs.
I was astounded today to see how much Noodle's reading has progressed! It all started when we were returning from MonkeyGirl's parent/child gymnastics class (she's SO excited to be back!!) and the boys asked if we could play Silly Sentences when we got home. Sure, we can do that! So we get home, set out the puzzle-style words designed to fit together in a limited number of ways (articles only attach to adjectives and nouns, and nouns to verbs on the other side, then prepositions, which feed back into articles), and off they go putting sentences together. We don't take turns, we just all do our best to make the silliest sentences we can. Stuff like "The furry, blue banana climbed on the sad, scary duck." Except the game doesn't include commas, which bothers me. They have periods, why don't they have commas for multiple adjectives?? Yes, I am a grammar nerd. Learn to love it.
Anyway, back to the Noodle, he was doing a great job reading almost all of the words in the game, and even with the pieces that had pictures on them (nouns and colors) I could see him moving his lips to sound out the accompanying words. Then after lunch we played another game, it's some pirate octopus treasure game with beginning and ending sound blends that you can mix up to form multiple words (sw- goes with -ing, -ap) and again Noodle worked to sound out his own words and mine. We played that game three times!
Tex played with us once and in contrast to last year when he was still working hard to read each blend, most of them come to him quite instantly now. He's still not ready to give up the security and speed of someone else reading to him, but I'm confident that he is making steady progress. He is certainly interested enough in storytelling! We're almost finished with the last of Nick Riordan's Percy Jackson books, and I'm curious to see where we'll be going after this. Tex definitely likes to have adventure in his stories, so I'll probably continue in my hunt to see what sort of series are out there that would appeal. My particular challenge is to find something that might be interesting to both the boys, as our books usually end up being bedtime material and it's easier if they're both engaged. The big hits over the last year were the Star Wars junior novelizations, the Narnia series (though we stalled out at Voyage of the Dawn Treader), and How to Train Your Dragon. I may try to talk them into The Tale of Desperaux next, since it's funny and adventurous (AND has illustrations, a big draw for Noodle). Or we may finish The Odyssey if they want to continue the Greek theme, or D'Aulaires Book of Greek Myths. So many options.
Tex and I also had a fraction discussion today. This kid loves fractions. He was telling me how much of his banana he had eaten, and he started with an estimate of 3/4, then said "no, it was a little more than 3/4, I think. Like two and a half thirds." I came back with "oh, ok, so that would be 5/6". He thought about that for a minute and said "thank you for making that a simpler fraction, but do you know what? Even though what you said makes more sense, it's actually much easier to say 'two and a half thirds' than it is to say five sixths." I couldn't even argue with that. The word "sixths" is a pain in the tokhes and should be avoided at all costs.
Wednesday, July 21, 2010
I Ain't Scared of Third Grade!
I have to admit, at first I was a bit apprehensive. We've just gone whole-hog on Unschooling, and here I am whipping out What Your Third Grader Needs to Know, worried beyond reason that there is going to be something life-changing in there, one thing that Tex NEEDS to know and cannot get without me sitting him down and telling him about it, and probably doing worksheets. Frankly, I wouldn't mind a bit, I love doing worksheets and seeing how many answers I can get right, 'cause I'm a smartypants like that. :-) But if there's one thing Tex can't stand it's being led down a path he's not independently interested in traveling, so it was with much trepidation that I opened up this "helpful" book.
Turns out I had nothing to worry about! Without further ado I present to you our third grade goals:
Language Arts
- continued reading of folk/morality tales, mythology, and fantasy (specifically mentioned are Tales of the Arabian Nights and Norse mythology)
- explore other genres of literature, particularly biographies
- grammar focus is on parts of speech, sentence structure, punctuation
History
- World focus is from the Roman Empire through the European exploration of North & South America
- National focus is on the original colonies through the American Revolution
Art & Music
- continued experience with and discussion of art and music, particularly how they can convey emotion, a story, etc. I would also like to tie music and art to any historical periods in which he is interested.
Mathematics
- using correct mathematical notation. Lately I've begun writing down equations as Tex and I have solved real-life "word problems", since it's what I do if I'm solving one on my own, too, and I imagine continuing that will spark him to do the same eventually.
- practice, practice, practice all the math he can, including the maths of time, money, geometry, and graphs
Science
- Life Sciences - keeping ecosystems in balance (may include applied experiments such as a terrarium, or discussions of food chain interruptions, or following of the Gulf of Mexico oil spill); also the nervous system of the human body
- Physical Sciences - beginning to gather an understanding of: electricity, forms of matter and how to measure them, molecular vocabulary, astronomy
- biographies of scientists in any field of interest
So, that's it. Granted, I winnowed it down to the key focuses without worrying too much about the details, because I don't think it matters whether we read Pollyanna or The Tale of Desperaux if either way we get the same message of working hard and sticking to your principles in the face of adversity. But by and large these topics seem to be ones either A) lend themselves to being learned at any point in life, such that we could cover the Renaissance this year if that is where Tex's interests lie, and save the Middle Ages for another year when he is more engaged, or B) are so vital to being a functioning member of society that he can't help but learn them as a part of his daily life, such as grammar and the mathematics of time, area, or money. So I'm not really worried. If Tex wants to delve into WWII this year instead of the Roman Empire, I'm going to be okay with that. If Egyptian mythology catches his fancy instead of Norse, I think that's workable, too. Most of all I have faith that there's nothing Tex can't learn if he is motivated to do so, and that therefor anything he doesn't learn must be something he doesn't need badly enough at this time. That doesn't mean I'm going to take down our poster about punctuation until he asks for it, or that I'm going to avoid putting the electronics kit on the kitchen table too see if it catches his eye, it just means that I'm going to help him explore his interests to whatever depth he chooses without judging their worth according to the needs of my own life.
In other news, we've seen a recent surge in Tex's reading confidence lately. Just a few weeks ago he was still insisting on us reading everything, but lately he's started to take the initiative and read things for himself, only needing to spell out to us the occasional word. It's actually astounded both myself and Daddy-O some of the words he does NOT need help on. Tex would probably still tell anyone who asks how much he dislikes reading, but hopefully those days will be numbered as his confidence continues to grow.
I'll be back soon to post a little about some processes and projects I'm thinking of trying this year, to help make our learning time rich and memorable!
Turns out I had nothing to worry about! Without further ado I present to you our third grade goals:
Language Arts
- continued reading of folk/morality tales, mythology, and fantasy (specifically mentioned are Tales of the Arabian Nights and Norse mythology)
- explore other genres of literature, particularly biographies
- grammar focus is on parts of speech, sentence structure, punctuation
History
- World focus is from the Roman Empire through the European exploration of North & South America
- National focus is on the original colonies through the American Revolution
Art & Music
- continued experience with and discussion of art and music, particularly how they can convey emotion, a story, etc. I would also like to tie music and art to any historical periods in which he is interested.
Mathematics
- using correct mathematical notation. Lately I've begun writing down equations as Tex and I have solved real-life "word problems", since it's what I do if I'm solving one on my own, too, and I imagine continuing that will spark him to do the same eventually.
- practice, practice, practice all the math he can, including the maths of time, money, geometry, and graphs
Science
- Life Sciences - keeping ecosystems in balance (may include applied experiments such as a terrarium, or discussions of food chain interruptions, or following of the Gulf of Mexico oil spill); also the nervous system of the human body
- Physical Sciences - beginning to gather an understanding of: electricity, forms of matter and how to measure them, molecular vocabulary, astronomy
- biographies of scientists in any field of interest
So, that's it. Granted, I winnowed it down to the key focuses without worrying too much about the details, because I don't think it matters whether we read Pollyanna or The Tale of Desperaux if either way we get the same message of working hard and sticking to your principles in the face of adversity. But by and large these topics seem to be ones either A) lend themselves to being learned at any point in life, such that we could cover the Renaissance this year if that is where Tex's interests lie, and save the Middle Ages for another year when he is more engaged, or B) are so vital to being a functioning member of society that he can't help but learn them as a part of his daily life, such as grammar and the mathematics of time, area, or money. So I'm not really worried. If Tex wants to delve into WWII this year instead of the Roman Empire, I'm going to be okay with that. If Egyptian mythology catches his fancy instead of Norse, I think that's workable, too. Most of all I have faith that there's nothing Tex can't learn if he is motivated to do so, and that therefor anything he doesn't learn must be something he doesn't need badly enough at this time. That doesn't mean I'm going to take down our poster about punctuation until he asks for it, or that I'm going to avoid putting the electronics kit on the kitchen table too see if it catches his eye, it just means that I'm going to help him explore his interests to whatever depth he chooses without judging their worth according to the needs of my own life.
In other news, we've seen a recent surge in Tex's reading confidence lately. Just a few weeks ago he was still insisting on us reading everything, but lately he's started to take the initiative and read things for himself, only needing to spell out to us the occasional word. It's actually astounded both myself and Daddy-O some of the words he does NOT need help on. Tex would probably still tell anyone who asks how much he dislikes reading, but hopefully those days will be numbered as his confidence continues to grow.
I'll be back soon to post a little about some processes and projects I'm thinking of trying this year, to help make our learning time rich and memorable!
Monday, July 12, 2010
Radical Unschooling
Ha! Scared you, didn't I? I know, I know, Unschooling has gotten quite the poor treatment from the media lately, and any of you who have seen said treatments are probably thinking "Oh Lord, what is Brownie trying to do to those kids NOW?" But I'm convinced, y'all. I'm all in.
First, what IS Radical Unschooling? Well, basically, it's letting my children spend their days however (within the boundaries of safety and reality) they want to, trusting that they will learn what they need to learn in order to get by and even succeed in the world. It's me backing off on controlling the details and instead worrying only about controlling the environment so that it can be safe and stimulating. It's living our home life by the principles we find most important rather than a list of rules that can be challenged and broken by kids as well as adults. Speaking of which, I could use some help on the basic principles. Try as I might, the only one I ever come up with is "Be considerate of others"; it seems to cover a multitude of conflicts we usually have (not cleaning up dishes/wrappers, sibling arguments, yelling at a child to come do it NOW without any regard for the activity in which they were engaged, etc.) without being too wordy or sounding too hard.
Now, I must admit to a little bit of subterfuge. I was reading Sandra Dodd's Big Book of Unschooling right as the last "school year" was ending, so I decided to test the ideas by implementing them as temporary, Summertime rules. We told Tex and Noodle that they no longer had to clean up a room to play videogames, there were no restrictions on their tv time, and over the course of a few weeks we loosened up on meal times and food suggestions. We did all this with the idea that, if it didn't work, we could always go back to living by the rules when the "school year" started up again in August. But I don't think we're going to. The kids have responded so well, and our house is so much happier, I think that, as Alice Cooper said, "School's out forever". :-)
But relax, that doesn't mean we don't have responsibilities. In fact on the parents' part this is going to mean a lot of very conscious choices. If we're not going to dictate our children's food choices then we'd better only have food in the house we're okay with them choosing, possibly over and over again. If we're going to let them make their own learning choices then we can't guilt or shame them for not being interested in reading, writing, or science, any more than we'd do if they weren't interested in art, sports, or musical theory. Basically, if we're going to create an environment where they get to make their own choices, then we need to do what we can to make sure the limited choices they have are safe, largely healthy, and supported. Soon enough they'll be out in The World where there are millions of choices, a great many of them unsafe, unhealthy, and insupportable. I want them to have some practice before they get there.
First, what IS Radical Unschooling? Well, basically, it's letting my children spend their days however (within the boundaries of safety and reality) they want to, trusting that they will learn what they need to learn in order to get by and even succeed in the world. It's me backing off on controlling the details and instead worrying only about controlling the environment so that it can be safe and stimulating. It's living our home life by the principles we find most important rather than a list of rules that can be challenged and broken by kids as well as adults. Speaking of which, I could use some help on the basic principles. Try as I might, the only one I ever come up with is "Be considerate of others"; it seems to cover a multitude of conflicts we usually have (not cleaning up dishes/wrappers, sibling arguments, yelling at a child to come do it NOW without any regard for the activity in which they were engaged, etc.) without being too wordy or sounding too hard.
Now, I must admit to a little bit of subterfuge. I was reading Sandra Dodd's Big Book of Unschooling right as the last "school year" was ending, so I decided to test the ideas by implementing them as temporary, Summertime rules. We told Tex and Noodle that they no longer had to clean up a room to play videogames, there were no restrictions on their tv time, and over the course of a few weeks we loosened up on meal times and food suggestions. We did all this with the idea that, if it didn't work, we could always go back to living by the rules when the "school year" started up again in August. But I don't think we're going to. The kids have responded so well, and our house is so much happier, I think that, as Alice Cooper said, "School's out forever". :-)
But relax, that doesn't mean we don't have responsibilities. In fact on the parents' part this is going to mean a lot of very conscious choices. If we're not going to dictate our children's food choices then we'd better only have food in the house we're okay with them choosing, possibly over and over again. If we're going to let them make their own learning choices then we can't guilt or shame them for not being interested in reading, writing, or science, any more than we'd do if they weren't interested in art, sports, or musical theory. Basically, if we're going to create an environment where they get to make their own choices, then we need to do what we can to make sure the limited choices they have are safe, largely healthy, and supported. Soon enough they'll be out in The World where there are millions of choices, a great many of them unsafe, unhealthy, and insupportable. I want them to have some practice before they get there.
Tuesday, May 18, 2010
Second Grade Goals Analyzed
At the beginning of the year I wrote a post that included the basic national goals for second grade year. I would like to go back now and make note of what Tex covered in relation to those.
Language Arts
Geography/History
Fine Arts
Mathematics
Life Sciences
Physical Sciences
Language Arts
- continuing to read fables and folktales to illustrate good character and principles
- label basic parts of speech (noun, verb, adjective, etc.) and learn about abbreviations/contractions as well as antonyms/synonyms
Geography/History
- be able to identify continents, some large countries and major cities, a few oceans, rivers, or other bodies of water, and some major mountain ranges
- have some understanding of ancient world history and the discoveries of important civilizations (Babylon, Egypt, Greece, Rome, India, China, Africa...)
- early American history - basically any and everything -- from the natives to the first explorers, colonists, Western pioneers, and up to the Revolutionary War -- in which they are interested
Fine Arts
- as much hands-on experience as possible -- take kids to see performances or put on some ourselves, listen to poetry read aloud, see and discuss artwork and architecture
- introduction to different instruments and how they are classified into groups
- anything about the parts of a song, how plays are written, mediums of visual arts, etc.
Mathematics
- practice, practice, practice, in fun and useful ways
- memorization of basic addition and subtraction tables, skip counting, evens/odds, Roman numeral introduction, adding and subtracting time on an analog clock, learn HOW to +/- 3-digit numbers, and begin memorizing multiplication tables
- always practicing geometry, money, measurements, fractions, and word problems
Life Sciences
- human body - cells into tissue into organs into systems
- life cycles of animals/plants and how they relate to the seasons
- lots of hands-on experience with animals, plants, and nature
- biographies of important zoologists, animal activists, doctors, etc.
Physical Sciences
- the products of chemistry such as plastics, hands-on simple chem experiments
- how meteorologists gather data, how weather systems form
- the history of astronomy and how stars can be used to find direction, and how/why the sky changes with the seasons
- the behavior of light and sound, other physics basics
- simple machines, introduction to basic engineering and technology
- more awareness of the Scientific Method in everyday play
- biographies of important scientists
Thursday, April 1, 2010
Spring fever!
I love winter, and this year's was a spectacular specimen. Thanks to El Nino we had multiple snows that stuck, when in the last four years we've had none that did so for more than a few hours, so the kids really got some wonderful snow playtime. Unfortunately the main thing we discovered is that if you're going to go play in the snow, it really does pay to have all that "snow gear" that we never see in stores down here in Alabama. After a few good days of playing in the snow, freezing feet (no snow boots) and wet legs (no ski pants) were enough to get my kids over this snow business and ready for Spring. (Secretly, it's left me with a desire to plan a skiing trip in the next few years, complete with enough gear to keep us warm for hours of playing, but I'll tuck that away for now and get on with the point)
We have SO enjoyed the nice weather we've had the last couple of weeks. We've been out playing at parks, playgrounds, our own backyard, the Botanical Gardens with their new "tree house" exhibit, anywhere we can think of. The tree houses in particular have been a great source of learning, from their structure to the features of each, and even the physical skills needed to make use of them. One house even led to a discussion of pioneer living. We're also talking about the life cycles of different plants, why some we have to plant anew each year while others (like our beloved tulips!) come back on their own. And thank goodness, I remembered the butterfly hatching house I snagged on clearance at Target last fall and will soon have Painted Lady caterpillars for the kids to study and raise, AND I remembered the butterfly life cycle poster I bought online on clearance (do you hear an echo?) which I can display while the butterflies are shacking up at our place to help the kids keep up with the process. We also have a friend whose family is trying to hatch praying mantises (manti?), so with any luck our garden will be bursting with beneficial insects this summer!
Further academic news? Today while waiting for me to be free to read to him, Tex decided to just give it a whirl himself. I found this great Star Wars Clone Wars graphic novel at the library the other day when Monkeygirl and I dropped by while the boys were in P.E. at the Y, and it's really the perfect thing for Tex. Lots of picture cues, the words aren't too hard (he stumbled over "circuit" today, but who wouldn't? That word is crazy!), and lots of frames with stuff like guns going "zzzack!" and beasts saying "grrrr" and R2D2 saying "bwooooop". He can have read enough words to increase his confidence, but also get enough of the storyline from the pictures to enjoy it even when he can't read the words perfectly. I always thought comic books would be a good fit for him, I just hadn't found the right ones yet. We'll see where this leads. I can tell Tex's reading confidence is growing, which to my mind is the final hurdle to him being a mostly independent reader. Oh please, please, tell me that light at the end of the tunnel is NOT a train about to spoil my party! LOL
Also, good results with the book I mentioned in my last post. Every issue isn't solved yet, but there is MUCH less violence and much MORE willingness to talk to find solutions that are acceptable to all. It is hard as a parent to make that switch in my brain to acknowledging that having a five-minute discussion at an inconvenient time is still a better choice than having a full-fledged meltdown at a normal time, but more than anything it cements in my mind that Tex is a child who can not be parented in the "old school" fashion. This is a child who sees how Daddy-O and I treat each other, with good humor and flexibility, and his rigid mind sees no reason whatsoever than the rules should be different for his interactions with us. On one hand it's nice to know that this sort of experience will benefit him no end as he grows and forms relationships with many different people in different roles, so that he'll expect and give respect in equal measure, but it does make it necessary for us to give up that image of our family working like a well-oiled machine with Daddy-O and I at the head and our three wee ones following lovingly and dutifully behind as they trust us to know best. On second thought, though, that sounds kind of creepy... I think I like our way better. ;-)
We have SO enjoyed the nice weather we've had the last couple of weeks. We've been out playing at parks, playgrounds, our own backyard, the Botanical Gardens with their new "tree house" exhibit, anywhere we can think of. The tree houses in particular have been a great source of learning, from their structure to the features of each, and even the physical skills needed to make use of them. One house even led to a discussion of pioneer living. We're also talking about the life cycles of different plants, why some we have to plant anew each year while others (like our beloved tulips!) come back on their own. And thank goodness, I remembered the butterfly hatching house I snagged on clearance at Target last fall and will soon have Painted Lady caterpillars for the kids to study and raise, AND I remembered the butterfly life cycle poster I bought online on clearance (do you hear an echo?) which I can display while the butterflies are shacking up at our place to help the kids keep up with the process. We also have a friend whose family is trying to hatch praying mantises (manti?), so with any luck our garden will be bursting with beneficial insects this summer!
Further academic news? Today while waiting for me to be free to read to him, Tex decided to just give it a whirl himself. I found this great Star Wars Clone Wars graphic novel at the library the other day when Monkeygirl and I dropped by while the boys were in P.E. at the Y, and it's really the perfect thing for Tex. Lots of picture cues, the words aren't too hard (he stumbled over "circuit" today, but who wouldn't? That word is crazy!), and lots of frames with stuff like guns going "zzzack!" and beasts saying "grrrr" and R2D2 saying "bwooooop". He can have read enough words to increase his confidence, but also get enough of the storyline from the pictures to enjoy it even when he can't read the words perfectly. I always thought comic books would be a good fit for him, I just hadn't found the right ones yet. We'll see where this leads. I can tell Tex's reading confidence is growing, which to my mind is the final hurdle to him being a mostly independent reader. Oh please, please, tell me that light at the end of the tunnel is NOT a train about to spoil my party! LOL
Also, good results with the book I mentioned in my last post. Every issue isn't solved yet, but there is MUCH less violence and much MORE willingness to talk to find solutions that are acceptable to all. It is hard as a parent to make that switch in my brain to acknowledging that having a five-minute discussion at an inconvenient time is still a better choice than having a full-fledged meltdown at a normal time, but more than anything it cements in my mind that Tex is a child who can not be parented in the "old school" fashion. This is a child who sees how Daddy-O and I treat each other, with good humor and flexibility, and his rigid mind sees no reason whatsoever than the rules should be different for his interactions with us. On one hand it's nice to know that this sort of experience will benefit him no end as he grows and forms relationships with many different people in different roles, so that he'll expect and give respect in equal measure, but it does make it necessary for us to give up that image of our family working like a well-oiled machine with Daddy-O and I at the head and our three wee ones following lovingly and dutifully behind as they trust us to know best. On second thought, though, that sounds kind of creepy... I think I like our way better. ;-)
Sunday, February 28, 2010
How to Keep Your Child from Exploding
This entry is going to revolve around some struggles that Tex has had for most of his life, which are a large part of the reason why we chose homeschooling for him in the first place. Along with a diagnosis of mild Sensory Perception Disorder which makes certain activities and concepts more challenging for Tex, he also has a certain, shall we say, lack of social graces which can make interacting with others a little awkward and confusing. Tex is not at his ease when dealing with new social situations, he struggles with wanting to be funny and "cool" and it just not coming naturally to him, and he is often unsure of what people expect from him and how to convey his own very rigid expectations to others. We have a lot of fits and arguments at home due to these issues, and it is exhausting for the whole family. Not that Tex isn't a fabulous and wonderful child, he IS, he just also happens to be very emotionally challenging. I've gone back and forth lately over whether he actually needs to see some kind of therapist to help him with his anxiety and frustration, but eventually (with the help of the less-inclined-to-tinker Daddy-O) decided that what he needs is time and closer guidance. Which is all well and good considering that intra-and interpersonal relationships are kind of my bag (degree in Social Work), but still, it's different when it's my own child I'm trying to walk through these delicate situations, which usually involve (you guessed it) ME! And I challenge any therapist out there to be calm and constructive when their client is whacking them with a lightsaber.
After a particularly hurtful battle last week I went to the bookstore seeking comfort and assistance. I browsed the Parenting section thinking "they haven't written the book yet for the kind of hell I'm in, knowing I have the skills to help my child and having no idea how to put them into practice", when voila! I came across The Explosive Child by Ross W. Greene. "Explosive, yes, that fits," I thought, flipping through the book. I saw enough that first night to warrant bringing the book home, and it is just exactly what I needed. I've long felt that having children should be much more like learning to live with a roommate than it should be like training a pet, so Greene's Collaborative Problem Solving routine is exactly the kind of thing I'm looking for to help us find a mutually satisfying solution to the big issues we face in our home. No "I'm the parent and I pay the bills so we do it my way" because A) frankly, making that stick is more trouble than it's worth and B) it doesn't really teach my kids the kind of life lessons I'd want them to retain, anyway. I want my kids to believe that they CAN change their situation in life, in ways that are effective and considerate of others, and I realize that in order for them to have that belief they need to see it in motion and even practice it themselves. So I'm excited to have a new resource helping us help Tex as he navigates the social minefields coming his way.
I had a fun moment watching Tex play and show off his understanding of math concepts. The kids were playing restaurant and Tex asked me for my order, I gave it, and he was ringing up my total when I said "wait, wait, I have a coupon!" Without even batting an eye (because he knows his Mommy and her love of coupons) he said "okay, ma'am, your coupon is for 50% off, your total was 4 dollars, and 50% is half, so half of four is two. You owe me two dollars, ma'am." I mean, come ON!! I know it's basic, but the kid goes from percentages, to fractions, to division with perfect understanding of what those concepts are! And he's not even 8 years old!
Oh, one other thing we've been enjoying lately is that I'm reading Percy Jackson and the Olympians: The Lightning Thief to the boys and Tex is now all interested in Greek mythology. He even told me the other day that he'd like to learn Greek so that he could read the myths, but was pretty stoked when I told him the libraries will have books of Greek/Roman mythology written just for kids his age, instead. He really enjoyed looking at the Greek section of a giant encyclopedia of mythology he found on our shelves, but it was more an index of characters and creatures than a collection of the stories. It will be nice to have my memory refreshed, since I keep confusing Ariadne with Arachne, and Perseus with Theseus, and can never remember which names are Greek and which are Roman! Plus I have a comic book of The Odyssey I'd love to whip out. ;-P
After a particularly hurtful battle last week I went to the bookstore seeking comfort and assistance. I browsed the Parenting section thinking "they haven't written the book yet for the kind of hell I'm in, knowing I have the skills to help my child and having no idea how to put them into practice", when voila! I came across The Explosive Child by Ross W. Greene. "Explosive, yes, that fits," I thought, flipping through the book. I saw enough that first night to warrant bringing the book home, and it is just exactly what I needed. I've long felt that having children should be much more like learning to live with a roommate than it should be like training a pet, so Greene's Collaborative Problem Solving routine is exactly the kind of thing I'm looking for to help us find a mutually satisfying solution to the big issues we face in our home. No "I'm the parent and I pay the bills so we do it my way" because A) frankly, making that stick is more trouble than it's worth and B) it doesn't really teach my kids the kind of life lessons I'd want them to retain, anyway. I want my kids to believe that they CAN change their situation in life, in ways that are effective and considerate of others, and I realize that in order for them to have that belief they need to see it in motion and even practice it themselves. So I'm excited to have a new resource helping us help Tex as he navigates the social minefields coming his way.
I had a fun moment watching Tex play and show off his understanding of math concepts. The kids were playing restaurant and Tex asked me for my order, I gave it, and he was ringing up my total when I said "wait, wait, I have a coupon!" Without even batting an eye (because he knows his Mommy and her love of coupons) he said "okay, ma'am, your coupon is for 50% off, your total was 4 dollars, and 50% is half, so half of four is two. You owe me two dollars, ma'am." I mean, come ON!! I know it's basic, but the kid goes from percentages, to fractions, to division with perfect understanding of what those concepts are! And he's not even 8 years old!
Oh, one other thing we've been enjoying lately is that I'm reading Percy Jackson and the Olympians: The Lightning Thief to the boys and Tex is now all interested in Greek mythology. He even told me the other day that he'd like to learn Greek so that he could read the myths, but was pretty stoked when I told him the libraries will have books of Greek/Roman mythology written just for kids his age, instead. He really enjoyed looking at the Greek section of a giant encyclopedia of mythology he found on our shelves, but it was more an index of characters and creatures than a collection of the stories. It will be nice to have my memory refreshed, since I keep confusing Ariadne with Arachne, and Perseus with Theseus, and can never remember which names are Greek and which are Roman! Plus I have a comic book of The Odyssey I'd love to whip out. ;-P
Wednesday, February 3, 2010
Design Central
Oh, Tex and his grandiose plans. He's had them since he was born, I think, and reality never does quite live up to his expectations, but he keeps plugging away. I've been fascinated to watch the evolution of several projects this week.
There was the allosaurus we made last year, with the crushed-aluminum foil skeleton and heavy, baked-on polymer clay. The foil would crush closer together every time we squeezed more clay on, leaving air pockets and saggy clay that eventually drooped off the form. Tex tried again using a foil skeleton and a lighter plastic clay, this time making a velociraptor, but the air-dry clay shrunk where it wasn't well-smoothed and revealed gaps. Finally, two days ago we constructed a skeleton out of wire coat hangers. I did the grunt work, of course, bending and snipping the wires according to Tex's specifications and holding the frame steady while he worked clay onto it and shaped it into a velociraptor. He gave the velociraptor teeth, a pattern to his skin, a bumpy ridge on his tail, a curved second toe-claw, and three feathery plumes on his head. Even the positioning had to be precise, with the tail acting as a cantilever to the beast's head so that his whole spine was almost parallel to the ground. This kid knows what he is doing! And I am happy to report that after two days' drying time Tex's velociraptor is standing upright on his own power as well as having a flawless complexion with no gaps! Can't wait to see how this guy is going to be painted in the next couple of days.
Tex also has an abiding interest in costuming. No surprise given his backstage-crew parents, but it has taken forms I never would have suspected before having children. In the last few years we have made together: a dilophosaurus costume, complete with painted long-johns, sculpted foam head, and Jurassic Park-style neck frill; an oviraptor costume, using a balaclava as the basis for the head and adding a feathered back ridge and tail to the dilophosaurus long johns; and an unfinished R2D2 that sits in the corner of my room awaiting inspiration. We have now begun the long process of designing and creating next Halloween's costume!!! I suppose I should be happy that we've moved off dinosaurs but finding out my next challenge is going to be a robot by the name of General Grievous, from Star Wars Episode III, sort of made me long for a functioning pterodactyl costume order. But we must press on...
So Tex spent much of last week or so Googling "General Grievous" images to find the form he'd prefer and angles that allowed us to get a good look at how things really go together. Then he and I took a trip to the home improvement store yesterday. We investigated plumbing fixtures, tubes, wires, pipes, dowels, tried things on, speculated on form vs. function, and finally walked out with the makings of two matching lightsabers: two 9" turned table legs for the handles, to be painted in a pattern of silver and black, and a 1 1/2" dowel to be cut in half, painted green, and used for the blades. The costume itself is going to take a lot more work and trial-and-error. There were some great plumbing parts that we think we can use as the basis for the feet, then use copper tubing wrapped in black duct tape to form the metal toes. The arms and legs will be the biggest challenge, while the face we're confident can be made from pieces of PVC pipe cut into semi-circles and glued together before painting. A cloak will most certainly be used to great effect. At this point I'm just happy Tex decided to settle for two-armed mode instead of four-armed, but even there I don't want to hold my breath! One thing is for sure, we will probably use all 9 of the months he's allotted us.
In the meantime we have a smaller costuming goal: wings. Tex wanted to dress up as some Transformer from Beast Wars today, and this guy apparently has eagle wings. The closest thing we have in this house is Monkeygirl's pink fairy wings. Definitely not beast-ish. So again we bust out the wire coat hangers, the wire cutters, the last of our stash of brown pleather, and a boatload of craft glue. Tex designed the wings himself, explained it to his poor, old Mother's tired brain over and over until I got it (he finally had to get out the string, cut it, and have us both pretend to be wings connected by the string in the way he wanted before I understood), and consoled me when I completely mucked it up by forgetting to make the wings in mirror images so that the right side of the fabric would face out. He even found the solution: making the wings smaller so that I could cut the correct mirror from one and then trim the other to match.
And lest you think that we're all makeup and show tunes around here, I have more reading progress to report. Tonight at bedtime (historically Tex's worst time for trying to read, and who can blame him after a long day?) I was reading aloud from Watch Out for Jabba the Hutt when out of the blue Tex took over and read a few sentences, without hesitation and with perfect comprehension: "Anakin and R2-D2 fly together in a spaceship," "Yoda is one of the most powerful Jedi. He is small but very strong and wise," and "He is big, bad, and cruel, but his son, Rotta, loves him!" Whew, it's just nice for me as a mom to know that all those crazy letters on the page are starting to make easy sense to him now, and that he's gaining in confidence every time he reads successfully.
There was the allosaurus we made last year, with the crushed-aluminum foil skeleton and heavy, baked-on polymer clay. The foil would crush closer together every time we squeezed more clay on, leaving air pockets and saggy clay that eventually drooped off the form. Tex tried again using a foil skeleton and a lighter plastic clay, this time making a velociraptor, but the air-dry clay shrunk where it wasn't well-smoothed and revealed gaps. Finally, two days ago we constructed a skeleton out of wire coat hangers. I did the grunt work, of course, bending and snipping the wires according to Tex's specifications and holding the frame steady while he worked clay onto it and shaped it into a velociraptor. He gave the velociraptor teeth, a pattern to his skin, a bumpy ridge on his tail, a curved second toe-claw, and three feathery plumes on his head. Even the positioning had to be precise, with the tail acting as a cantilever to the beast's head so that his whole spine was almost parallel to the ground. This kid knows what he is doing! And I am happy to report that after two days' drying time Tex's velociraptor is standing upright on his own power as well as having a flawless complexion with no gaps! Can't wait to see how this guy is going to be painted in the next couple of days.
Tex also has an abiding interest in costuming. No surprise given his backstage-crew parents, but it has taken forms I never would have suspected before having children. In the last few years we have made together: a dilophosaurus costume, complete with painted long-johns, sculpted foam head, and Jurassic Park-style neck frill; an oviraptor costume, using a balaclava as the basis for the head and adding a feathered back ridge and tail to the dilophosaurus long johns; and an unfinished R2D2 that sits in the corner of my room awaiting inspiration. We have now begun the long process of designing and creating next Halloween's costume!!! I suppose I should be happy that we've moved off dinosaurs but finding out my next challenge is going to be a robot by the name of General Grievous, from Star Wars Episode III, sort of made me long for a functioning pterodactyl costume order. But we must press on...
So Tex spent much of last week or so Googling "General Grievous" images to find the form he'd prefer and angles that allowed us to get a good look at how things really go together. Then he and I took a trip to the home improvement store yesterday. We investigated plumbing fixtures, tubes, wires, pipes, dowels, tried things on, speculated on form vs. function, and finally walked out with the makings of two matching lightsabers: two 9" turned table legs for the handles, to be painted in a pattern of silver and black, and a 1 1/2" dowel to be cut in half, painted green, and used for the blades. The costume itself is going to take a lot more work and trial-and-error. There were some great plumbing parts that we think we can use as the basis for the feet, then use copper tubing wrapped in black duct tape to form the metal toes. The arms and legs will be the biggest challenge, while the face we're confident can be made from pieces of PVC pipe cut into semi-circles and glued together before painting. A cloak will most certainly be used to great effect. At this point I'm just happy Tex decided to settle for two-armed mode instead of four-armed, but even there I don't want to hold my breath! One thing is for sure, we will probably use all 9 of the months he's allotted us.
In the meantime we have a smaller costuming goal: wings. Tex wanted to dress up as some Transformer from Beast Wars today, and this guy apparently has eagle wings. The closest thing we have in this house is Monkeygirl's pink fairy wings. Definitely not beast-ish. So again we bust out the wire coat hangers, the wire cutters, the last of our stash of brown pleather, and a boatload of craft glue. Tex designed the wings himself, explained it to his poor, old Mother's tired brain over and over until I got it (he finally had to get out the string, cut it, and have us both pretend to be wings connected by the string in the way he wanted before I understood), and consoled me when I completely mucked it up by forgetting to make the wings in mirror images so that the right side of the fabric would face out. He even found the solution: making the wings smaller so that I could cut the correct mirror from one and then trim the other to match.
And lest you think that we're all makeup and show tunes around here, I have more reading progress to report. Tonight at bedtime (historically Tex's worst time for trying to read, and who can blame him after a long day?) I was reading aloud from Watch Out for Jabba the Hutt when out of the blue Tex took over and read a few sentences, without hesitation and with perfect comprehension: "Anakin and R2-D2 fly together in a spaceship," "Yoda is one of the most powerful Jedi. He is small but very strong and wise," and "He is big, bad, and cruel, but his son, Rotta, loves him!" Whew, it's just nice for me as a mom to know that all those crazy letters on the page are starting to make easy sense to him now, and that he's gaining in confidence every time he reads successfully.
Saturday, January 23, 2010
The Scientific Method
So it came up this week that Tex has the Scientific Method as a part of his Scouting requirements, and although they get a healthy dose of it from The Mythbusters I'm always happy to take opportunities to use it in real life. So. Noodle is a nut for "experiments". This mostly just means mixing stuff together, and it doesn't even have to be sciencey (yes, it's a word, so hush) stuff, it can just be bubble bath and water. But on this particular day he wanted to repeat the experiment of the day before by mixing baking soda with various liquids to see which ones could make it bubble the most. He though chocolate and strawberry syrups mixed together had a good chance at the title. So we chose five liquids: the syrup mixture, fresh lemon juice, pasteurized OJ, honey, and filtered water. Noodle helped set up five separate samples of baking soda, and Tex joined in at this point to help me use litmus papers to test each liquid. The fresh lemon juice got the biggest reaction, turning the litmus paper a dark red almost immediately. Next on the list was the OJ, while the syrups, honey, and water all appeared to be rather neutral. We devised a system to rate the reactions, listing a "1" as no reaction, a "2" as a mild bubbling, and a "3" as a very fizzy reaction. After adding water to one sample of baking soda and recording a "1" reaction, we dipped litmus paper in the solution and it immediately turned a deep bluish-green.
Then the real fun started! The honey and syrups had to be thinned with water after our initial attempts resulted in little baking soda-covered balls of viscous liquid, but still rated as "1" reactions. The pasteurized OJ was rated a "2" for its light fizzing. The lemon juice was the clear winner with a big, bubbling foam that threatened to overtake its container! Then Tex and I wondered if fresh orange juice would have a different reactions than store-bought, so I grabbed what I thought was an orange and sliced it open only to find that it was really a grapefruit. Oops. Well, no matter, the Mythbusters make mistakes all the time, so we decided to include fresh grapefruit juice in our sample, too. We then squeezed some fresh OJ and tested both with litmus paper. The color of the litmus paper dipped in grapefruit juice was quite as dramatic as the lemon. The orange juice was less so, but more acidic than the pasteurized variety. Tex and I compared the blue base paper with the red lemon paper and noted that the biggest reactions came when combining the substances that had the most dramatic color changes, and from that he predicted that the grapefruit juice was going to have the biggest reaction of the two new liquids, but that the fresh OJ would have more of a reaction than the store-bought. And boy was he right! Noodle couldn't get over the fizz of the grapefruit juice and had a blast mixing it with baking soda, then mixing the lemon and grapefruit juices and adding them together. Two happy guys. :-)
Then the real fun started! The honey and syrups had to be thinned with water after our initial attempts resulted in little baking soda-covered balls of viscous liquid, but still rated as "1" reactions. The pasteurized OJ was rated a "2" for its light fizzing. The lemon juice was the clear winner with a big, bubbling foam that threatened to overtake its container! Then Tex and I wondered if fresh orange juice would have a different reactions than store-bought, so I grabbed what I thought was an orange and sliced it open only to find that it was really a grapefruit. Oops. Well, no matter, the Mythbusters make mistakes all the time, so we decided to include fresh grapefruit juice in our sample, too. We then squeezed some fresh OJ and tested both with litmus paper. The color of the litmus paper dipped in grapefruit juice was quite as dramatic as the lemon. The orange juice was less so, but more acidic than the pasteurized variety. Tex and I compared the blue base paper with the red lemon paper and noted that the biggest reactions came when combining the substances that had the most dramatic color changes, and from that he predicted that the grapefruit juice was going to have the biggest reaction of the two new liquids, but that the fresh OJ would have more of a reaction than the store-bought. And boy was he right! Noodle couldn't get over the fizz of the grapefruit juice and had a blast mixing it with baking soda, then mixing the lemon and grapefruit juices and adding them together. Two happy guys. :-)
Thursday, January 21, 2010
Just keep learning, learning, learning
I love this life. There is nothing better than being able to have my children around me and watch them learning. Sure, there are days when I would happily duct tape them all to the couch just to get a half-hour of uninterrupted Quiet Time, but I can wait a couple years until they're more capable of giving me that gift. ;-)
Only problem is: if I don't blog more often, I totally forget all the stuff I was going to mention! We've done SO much the last few weeks since getting back into our homeschool schedule after the holidays, and I'm going to try to remember as much as I can.
We got a microscope for Christmas, and it has already yielded hours of entertainment and learning. It is a compound microscope, so it can view both slides and 3-D objects with its different light sources. We've examined the difference in crystals between table salt, kosher salt, and sugar. We've looked at dead bugs up close. Today Tex and I made our own slide with mold from an old croissant (it's not bad housekeeping, it's science!), and another with water from the toilet (nothing in the water moved, which I found wonderfully reassuring), and plan to get some pond water next time we're out and about, and examine it for beasties.
Noodle was busy experimenting with some acids and bases to see what happens. Tex bought some Pucker Powder at the science museum last week and I noticed that a main ingredient was citric acid, aka the stuff that Noodle likes to mix with baking soda and water and watch it bubble. Noodle begged and pleaded and got Tex to part with one teaspoon of his Pucker Powder to see what sort of reaction it would yield. Unfortunately it didn't do much other than make colored water, but it was worth a shot! We then moved on to squeezing lemon wedges onto the baking soda, and that got a much more exciting reaction! So much fizzing! Noodle was very happy until he discovered that lemon juice and cuts on one's finger do not mix well. Sometimes science hurts. :-(
What else? Well, a couple weeks ago we had an Alabama snowstorm, which means we had actual snow that stuck on the ground and could be made into snowballs and tiny snowmen. Of course the kids had a blast, and we got out our magnifying glass to observe the crystal formation in the snowflakes. We were also completely tickled to discover that one of our nearby ponds was completely frozen over, a phenomenon I've never seen in this town. We went to explore and see how thick the ice was. I thought it couldn't be more than an inch, but after banging and digging with sticks and rocks for a good while we had to stop because we couldn't get farther than about 3 inches deep. Knowing it was that thick, I decided we could risk a little "skate" around the rim where I could actually see the dirt and grass underneath the ice. We talked about ice safety and listened to the faint creaks from the ice as we walked around the edge. The boys would have stayed all day but MonkeyGirl thought landing on her bottom on the cold, hard ice lost its luster after about a dozen times.
We've also been making a concerted effort to be sure the kids get their "P.E." every day. Of course some days that's as easy as going to a park and letting them run and climb until they're sweaty and worn out, but Tex also attends a homeschool P.E. class at the YMCA every week and attends Little Gym's homeschool class once a week as well. He's really improved his body strength and can now do a pullover on the bar and a straddle roll, and in P.E. he's started making home runs in kickball and doing better on the Presidential Fitness events. We have also begun, as a family, to use our new Wii Fit Plus that we got for Christmas every morning. Tex especially loves it and gets some good aerobic exercise doing the hula hoop, short jogs, and obstacle courses. It's a nice way to get him moving first thing in the morning.
And finally, our reading progress. I mentioned that Tex had finally had his lightbulb and realized that he could read, but I think he's been a little disappointed that every word isn't easy to read. So I mention to him that he's going to have to practice to get better at it, which is usually met with a rant about how "I don't like reading, I'm never going to read, you're going to have to read to me forever!" LOL But the other night when he lamented that he couldn't read Star Wars on his own and had to wait on pokey ol' Mommy, I mentioned it again, "honey, the more you practice reading, the more confident you'll be, and the more you'll be able to read, and before you know it you'll be flying through whatever books you want to." He seemed to think about it for a moment and then said, "ok". And since then he's been doing more spontaneous reading on his own and not taking it so badly when he's not immediately correct. We even, Tex, Noodle, and I, played gummi words for about 45 minutes yesterday and they both did amazing. I bought these cards designed to help you recognize "word families", so they have things like "___ight", or "___ump" on them. So then we just took our gummi letters and made "bright", "light", and "plump rump" (Tex's favorite). Even Noodle was doing great with the families like "_at" and "_ig". I wouldn't be at all surprised if they were both reading independently over the summer!
Only problem is: if I don't blog more often, I totally forget all the stuff I was going to mention! We've done SO much the last few weeks since getting back into our homeschool schedule after the holidays, and I'm going to try to remember as much as I can.
We got a microscope for Christmas, and it has already yielded hours of entertainment and learning. It is a compound microscope, so it can view both slides and 3-D objects with its different light sources. We've examined the difference in crystals between table salt, kosher salt, and sugar. We've looked at dead bugs up close. Today Tex and I made our own slide with mold from an old croissant (it's not bad housekeeping, it's science!), and another with water from the toilet (nothing in the water moved, which I found wonderfully reassuring), and plan to get some pond water next time we're out and about, and examine it for beasties.
Noodle was busy experimenting with some acids and bases to see what happens. Tex bought some Pucker Powder at the science museum last week and I noticed that a main ingredient was citric acid, aka the stuff that Noodle likes to mix with baking soda and water and watch it bubble. Noodle begged and pleaded and got Tex to part with one teaspoon of his Pucker Powder to see what sort of reaction it would yield. Unfortunately it didn't do much other than make colored water, but it was worth a shot! We then moved on to squeezing lemon wedges onto the baking soda, and that got a much more exciting reaction! So much fizzing! Noodle was very happy until he discovered that lemon juice and cuts on one's finger do not mix well. Sometimes science hurts. :-(
What else? Well, a couple weeks ago we had an Alabama snowstorm, which means we had actual snow that stuck on the ground and could be made into snowballs and tiny snowmen. Of course the kids had a blast, and we got out our magnifying glass to observe the crystal formation in the snowflakes. We were also completely tickled to discover that one of our nearby ponds was completely frozen over, a phenomenon I've never seen in this town. We went to explore and see how thick the ice was. I thought it couldn't be more than an inch, but after banging and digging with sticks and rocks for a good while we had to stop because we couldn't get farther than about 3 inches deep. Knowing it was that thick, I decided we could risk a little "skate" around the rim where I could actually see the dirt and grass underneath the ice. We talked about ice safety and listened to the faint creaks from the ice as we walked around the edge. The boys would have stayed all day but MonkeyGirl thought landing on her bottom on the cold, hard ice lost its luster after about a dozen times.
We've also been making a concerted effort to be sure the kids get their "P.E." every day. Of course some days that's as easy as going to a park and letting them run and climb until they're sweaty and worn out, but Tex also attends a homeschool P.E. class at the YMCA every week and attends Little Gym's homeschool class once a week as well. He's really improved his body strength and can now do a pullover on the bar and a straddle roll, and in P.E. he's started making home runs in kickball and doing better on the Presidential Fitness events. We have also begun, as a family, to use our new Wii Fit Plus that we got for Christmas every morning. Tex especially loves it and gets some good aerobic exercise doing the hula hoop, short jogs, and obstacle courses. It's a nice way to get him moving first thing in the morning.
And finally, our reading progress. I mentioned that Tex had finally had his lightbulb and realized that he could read, but I think he's been a little disappointed that every word isn't easy to read. So I mention to him that he's going to have to practice to get better at it, which is usually met with a rant about how "I don't like reading, I'm never going to read, you're going to have to read to me forever!" LOL But the other night when he lamented that he couldn't read Star Wars on his own and had to wait on pokey ol' Mommy, I mentioned it again, "honey, the more you practice reading, the more confident you'll be, and the more you'll be able to read, and before you know it you'll be flying through whatever books you want to." He seemed to think about it for a moment and then said, "ok". And since then he's been doing more spontaneous reading on his own and not taking it so badly when he's not immediately correct. We even, Tex, Noodle, and I, played gummi words for about 45 minutes yesterday and they both did amazing. I bought these cards designed to help you recognize "word families", so they have things like "___ight", or "___ump" on them. So then we just took our gummi letters and made "bright", "light", and "plump rump" (Tex's favorite). Even Noodle was doing great with the families like "_at" and "_ig". I wouldn't be at all surprised if they were both reading independently over the summer!
Better late than never
Here's an entry from Daddy-O about a pre-Christmas trip to Atlanta:
Brownie and I decided to break up the trip to Atlanta (technically, Gwinnett County/Lawrenceville/Duluth) by stopping at the Tellus NW Georgia Science Museum. For being next to the middle of nowhere, that place ROCKED! There was a gorgeous collection of prehistoric creature skeletons (including a T-Rex, Edmontosaurus, and mosasaur), huge minerals/crystals, many planes, trains, and automobiles...and the little kid section was pretty big. Thanks to our having a membership to the science museum here in town (which is very mediocre and basically a scienced-based, educational, indoor playground), we got in to the museum for free. It was an absolute hit for the whole family and will likely become a regular stop whenever we travel to ATL.
Brownie and I decided to break up the trip to Atlanta (technically, Gwinnett County/Lawrenceville/Duluth) by stopping at the Tellus NW Georgia Science Museum. For being next to the middle of nowhere, that place ROCKED! There was a gorgeous collection of prehistoric creature skeletons (including a T-Rex, Edmontosaurus, and mosasaur), huge minerals/crystals, many planes, trains, and automobiles...and the little kid section was pretty big. Thanks to our having a membership to the science museum here in town (which is very mediocre and basically a scienced-based, educational, indoor playground), we got in to the museum for free. It was an absolute hit for the whole family and will likely become a regular stop whenever we travel to ATL.
Brownie here: Tex and I spent some quality time with the skeletons of prehistoric creatures. I asked him to explain to me the difference between bird-hipped and lizard-hipped dinosaurs and we went around the room classifying each. We found that the pterosaur had a completely different-looking pelvis than any of the other skeletons. And we learned that dunkleosteus is pretty intimidating even when he's a fossil. After that the kids had a blast excavating dinosaur skeletons and especially enjoyed the water feature where you get to "pan for gems". Tellus has little bits of lapis, tiger eye, quartz, jade, malachite, jasper, and other shiny bits buried in sand, covered by running water, and you have to scoop some up and find the gems buried inside. We left with a small bagful that they are planning to use to decorate a small trinket box or something similar.
Friday's big adventure was to drive to I-285, hop onto the MARTA rail, take it to Midtown, visit the Federal Reserve Bank, and back. In case you didn't know, it was raining like crazy on Friday. Thankfully, the MARTA station was only half a block from the Federal Reserve so it wasn't far; but even after hanging out at the visitor's center for about an hour, our clothes were still quite damp. Then we had the pleasure of running back through that rain to the station. But since the Fed was free, two of the three kids rode the rail for free, and parking was free, it was a fun, educational activity to fill the day with the boys. While the Federal Reserve was our "destination," Noodle's primary interest was in riding his first subway car. He was been very interested in the driving capabilities in the Sim City 4: Rush Hour set. He loves to build a city of infrastructure and then drive/pilot cars, trains, planes, and boats on the screen. The anticipation of finally riding in a subway train had Noodle absolutely giddy.
Friday and much of Saturday was spent at the relatives' home. Well, more specifically, in their basement. They had the Wii set up there and it was the boys' first exposure to RockBand/Beatles RockBand. After all the playing, Tex has been singing numerous lines from the songs. Although he had mild interest in "Ticket to Ride" and "Drive My Car" a couple of years ago, the only songs he actually sings to himself are ones from Depeche Mode and Duran Duran along with "Smoke on the Water." Now he's going around singing verses of "Eight Days a Week" and "Yellow Submarine," and thankfully only a few lines of "I Am the Walrus."
Me again: the kids, especially Tex, have really been enjoying singing lately. Tex is getting more confident with singing aloud in the car and even when he's listening to music in his headphones. He does pretty well! I'm toying with asking him whether he'd be interested in singing with the children's choir at church.
Monday, December 14, 2009
Will wonders never cease
It seemed too early to say something when, not two days after my last post, Tex discovered that he does NOT, in fact, suck at reading. However, since we've now had several days of increased confidence and improved reading, I'm going to go ahead and call it: Tex is A Reader! The lightbulb went off one evening as he had just completed an email to his Papa regarding their plans for the upcoming Sunday playdate. He had written, almost entirely by himself, the subject line of "What to do Sunday", and then the sentence "What's your plan, Papa?". He even had it correctly punctuated! About an hour later Papa replied, and Tex sat down to read it. There were several sentences there, but Tex just started breezing right through the words, reading most of them automatically and stopping to sound out a few, only needing close assistance with two or three. He was halfway through the email when he literally stopped short, shouted "I'm reading!", and then kept going, completely tickled with himself. The following day he said "Mommy, I think I'm a proficient reader now." I told him I was so glad that he was feeling confident in himself. In reality I was relieved all the way down to my toenails, but I can't let him catch me caring about stuff like that or he feels pressured. ;-)
We have some big plans coming up. We have family in Atlanta, GA, and a Christmas party there soon. We plan to take the leisurely way down, stopping at the Tellus Science Museum in Cartersville, which includes exhibits where you can dig for fossils or pan for gold! We're planning to have tons of fun. Then during our time in ATL we will visit the Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta Visitor's Center to get an idea of the history of our nation's money and see cool stuff like where they shred the old bills. At the end of the tour the kids will even get a bag of shredded money to KEEP! Why do I see a raid on Scotch tape in their future?
We will also be taking a trip on the MARTA subway system at Noodle's request. Thanks to all his city planning decisions in SimCity he's developed an interest in all public transportation. Today we were out at a park feeding cracked corn to the geese, and I heard Noodle's squeaky voice yelling "Mommy, I saw a city bus! It's different from a school bus!!" But his big interest is light rail and his big Atlanta wish is to ride the subway. He was just disappointed to hear that Atlanta doesn't also have an elevated train or monorail we could ride for purposes of comparison. Guess we'll just have to plan a trip to DisneyWorld and ride the monorail there. Whoops, I think I just heard DaddyO's heart grind to a stop at the thought of shepherding 3 young children through the Magic Kingdom, better go check on that. ;-)
We have some big plans coming up. We have family in Atlanta, GA, and a Christmas party there soon. We plan to take the leisurely way down, stopping at the Tellus Science Museum in Cartersville, which includes exhibits where you can dig for fossils or pan for gold! We're planning to have tons of fun. Then during our time in ATL we will visit the Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta Visitor's Center to get an idea of the history of our nation's money and see cool stuff like where they shred the old bills. At the end of the tour the kids will even get a bag of shredded money to KEEP! Why do I see a raid on Scotch tape in their future?
We will also be taking a trip on the MARTA subway system at Noodle's request. Thanks to all his city planning decisions in SimCity he's developed an interest in all public transportation. Today we were out at a park feeding cracked corn to the geese, and I heard Noodle's squeaky voice yelling "Mommy, I saw a city bus! It's different from a school bus!!" But his big interest is light rail and his big Atlanta wish is to ride the subway. He was just disappointed to hear that Atlanta doesn't also have an elevated train or monorail we could ride for purposes of comparison. Guess we'll just have to plan a trip to DisneyWorld and ride the monorail there. Whoops, I think I just heard DaddyO's heart grind to a stop at the thought of shepherding 3 young children through the Magic Kingdom, better go check on that. ;-)
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