Homeschool - Week Three

Last week came and went without me. Actually, it was just really busy.

Mr. Easy Going did photos for a wedding this last weekend and will be uploading them. He's been practicing welding to get ready for the test will likely do that in the next week or so to become certified. It is really nice that he is so helpful in the business. He's now learning the other end of things like bidding and billing. There's a lot to learn in business. He's staying up with school work in the process too.






This is a little one at the wedding. Mr. Easy Going is getting good at his photos.



Designer video taped a dome raising. That's a geodesic dome house out shell being put together by a group of people. He took photos too. Then this last weekend he video taped a wedding. During all this he kept up on school work and this week will be spending all his extra time editing video and burning them to DVDs. He's really enjoying this work. I'll upload video when he gets them together.

Princess Shy is keeping up with school work and going to all the events in our lives too. She does great with taking care of everyone during these events. She took care of Little Miss and Caesar, our boxer during the dome raising and she took care of the maid of honor's one year old baby during the wedding and the gift table. She's really enjoying horse riding lessons too.








Princess Shy on Tino







Little Miss is loving school work. She bugs me every morning until I give in and do school work with her. It's not that I'm not teaching her, it's her insatiable appetite for knowledge. I just am having trouble keeping up with her. She has learned all of her numbers 0-12 and how to write them. She has learned the sounds of A and C and how to write them in cursive. It is amazing how well she is doing.

As you can tell, it has been crazy with events in our life. I'm really praying that it slows down so we can just do school.

Our first week in home school

This is the last day of our home school week. We typically only do "school" on Tuesday thru Thursday. Monday's are for personal exploration, typically the child's gift and Friday's are for play, catch up and individual time. I guess you could say that we unschool on Monday's and Friday's. This has worked very well for us the last couple of years.

Yesterday we added errands to the list of things to do, including going grocery shopping. It was a great education for all of us and a huge drain on the pocketbook. We are blessed to be able to buy groceries in such large quantities. We do know there are many out there that are going hungry. We try to find families to help along the way so we'll keep our eye out for a family to bless this winter.

Our first week went well. It's been busy but we're enjoying the routine of a schedule again.

Designer has stayed up with the higher standards this year and not been quite so resistant to all the learning. I think he is starting to grow up some too. He is really working a lot on his skills that he'll take into his adult life. We're really enjoying the videos and conversations.

Princess Shy is loving her horse riding lessons. She's doing quite well in her school work too. We're at a review phase but she's moving along quickly. It just seems that everything just clicks for her this year.

Little Miss has learned all of her primary numbers and how to write them. She is LOVING school this year. In fact, she keeps pestering me in the morning until I get it together and teach her. Once she learns to read I'm sure she won't wait for me anymore. She has such an appetite for knowledge. We're enjoying our time together too.

Mr. Easy Going has most of his school work done for the week. He'll finish it tomorrow. He's enjoying working in Dad's welding business more than the school work though. He will be doing his welding certification soon. He's ready but Dad would like to see him practice a bit more. It will be a huge help in the business too since Dad let his certification lapse in this area.

Tomorrow and Saturday I go for training using Spell to Write and Read. I'm really looking forward to meeting Wanda Sanseri and learning from her. We love the program so far too.

Saturday the kids and Dad are going to help grandpa with a dome raising. For those of you that aren't aware, a dome home is a home that is shaped like a dome. They are really neat and a bit different. They're building it in the hills of Silverton so it will blend into the surroundings quite well. I can't wait to see it all up. Anyway, most of the family will be there Saturday to build the shell of the dome.

I hope that you all have a great weekend. See you next week.

Homeschool at it's finest

Today is day two of our home school year. The kiddos are doing quite well. Here's what we have done.

Little Miss
We worked on numbers 0,8,6 and 9 using Cursive First program. Yesterday I only had her doing the salt box to write things but she wanted much more today. We went over proper sitting position for writing, how to slant the paper and hold it, how to hold the pencil using her Stetro Pencil Grip and then we started practicing. First we used the clock face to trace the number, then on to the salt box so she could see what she was doing. Then to get her started writing we used the white board with a pink marker and she still wanted more. So we pulled out the paper and pencil. She did quite well in using the salt box and on most of the numbers with pencil and paper. She had a little trouble with the number 8 when she didn't have a guide to use and she wouldn't slow down and listen to direction. Rather than push it today, we'll review it again tomorrow and every day from now on. We did some reading together and she helped me make lunch. I am surprised by how well she is picking up all of this stuff.

Princess Shy
Is still working on her school work. Today is moving along much slower than yesterday for her. I think she's tired though so I have to let her move at her own pace. Having her do the Cursive First with us in the morning is already improving her numbers writing in math. Her history was moving too slow so we moved her up a grade level and she is finding it much more challenging. She's working in Saxon Math, Heritage Studies History, Bob Jones University Press Science, Easy Grammar, Daily Grams, Bible and Spell to Write and Read.
This afternoon she'll be helping me to peel apples and we'll be making and canning some apple butter. She actually loves doing this so I'll let her put her own recipe together for an applesauce too and we'll can a couple jars of that too.

Designer
Is already done with his school work today. He is loving this year...okay, loving was a strong word. But he isn't minding school so much this year. He's using Saxon Math, Heritage Studies Geography, Apologia Science Physical Science, Easy Grammar, Daily Grams and the Spell to Write and Read. He does his work and moves on to things that really interest him.

This afternoon he is working on a logo for his business, Awesome Filming. He has a video that he's working on for a friend and is enjoying that. He takes video, pictures and music to create a video/DVD for people. He does excellent work and is learning a lot about editing video, pictures and laying down music tracks on the computer. When he has his web site up, I'll share the site with you all.

Mr. Easy Going
Is working with Dad today. He has been working full time all summer and really enjoys learning how to weld, use all the equipment and run the business. He'll be doing school work in the evenings after dinner. He decided that he would take this year off of college and continue to home school. We are looking for an investment mentor for him to learn from since this is a strong area of interest for him this year too.

This evening he will probably unpack some of his pickup parts and get that organized. He's going to be taking apart his 89 Corvette and using the parts to build his 63 Chevy Pickup.


That's our second day of school. Hope you enjoyed it as much as we did.

The Start of a New Home School Year

We started our home school year today. Summer went by so quickly.

We just moved about two weeks ago and are not unpacked yet but school books were found, so we started today. The children are excited (or not) to get started.

Designer, now 15, was probably the least excited about actual "school work". He is much happier since he's almost done with his assignments already. Maybe I need to rethink his abilities?












Princess Shy, now 13, was rather happy but, as usual, not showing any emotion about it all. She has a lot of work because that is what she asked for. We'll evaluate as we go. 













Little Miss, now 5, was the most excited and was not happy that I, Learning Coach, was not quite prepared for her. We did get our salt box set up, her SWR (Spell to Write and Read) and Cursive First ready. She isn't quite ready for pencil and paper because those small motor skills require a lot of control. She did quite well with the salt box though. We did the first four numbers, 0, 6, 8, and 9 this morning. She learned the clock face style and did quite well.



If you get a chance, come join us as we journey into a new year.

A long country drive leads to hydrogen/solar powered cars

Yesterday went well. We picked up Designer from his friend's house and went for a drive in the mountains and back home. We love to do the drives. It's like everyone is captive and we have some of our best conversations during that time.

We started talking about something we saw on the Science Channel (which is a favorite in this house) on a show called Eco-Tech. If you get the channel and have a chance to watch Future Fuels, it is quite an interesting show. Anyway, we started talking about converting our own cars to solar/hydrogen power. The savings to our pocket book would be the number one reason but then it has zero ecological footprint and would help get rid of dependence on foreign oils.

We came home so that we could start researching hydrogen fuels and solar power sources. It is absolutely amazing at what is available on the internet. If you go to Google video and type in hydrogen there is something like 4500 videos on the subject that range from two minutes to a full hour long.

I know that most of us parents are not thrilled with game consoles but I have to say that there is one great feature on the PlayStation 3 You can surf the internet with it. We were able to watch videos from the You Tube and Google on our big TV as a family and discuss each one. We must have watched an hour of videos.

After watching quite a few the boys decided to try some things that we had seen about creating hydrogen. We had empty plastic bottle and water but no electrical wiring. We'll probably pick up some today and do an experiment with that. Learning Master and the kids love doing this kind of stuff. Hmmm, Dark Oak Woman, you would be so proud with all the unschooling we are doing this year.

Obviously this will be an ongoing project for the year. I encourage each of you to show your children how to see pictures and videos and news stories on their favorite topics by using Google. It really has some incredible features for kids to learn from.

Children say the funniest things

I had to share this.

Little Miss is going through a stage where she eats all day long. After eating for the last hour Daddy started asking her where the food was going. He squeezed her arms, her tummy and then picked up each foot as if checking to see if the food was there. All the while she was holding a bag of popcorn.

Little Miss looks at him with this big smile and says, "Yeah, I've got room left for popcorn."

Those are the moments that I wish I had a video camera to record the whole thing. It was way too funny.

Friday's and Monday's are official unschool days

We have decided to do book work three days a week and unschool the other 4 days a week. The kids say the other two days but they learn on the weekend too.

Today we went to the college to get a parking permit for Mr. Easy Going. He starts classes on Monday. While we were there we decided to find all his classes. He doesn't want to admit it but he is a bit nervous. I think being able to find all his classes will help that a bit. I'm excited for him but will miss him during the day too.

Then we went to home school swim in Stayton. We had a blast. There were 9 kids there today. The lifeguard took the older kids to the deep end and took the rope down for them to swing into the pool. The older teen boys were challenged to climb the rope and drop into the water below. It was really high up there but the boys had a blast. I had to laugh because when we left the lifeguard said he was going to see if he could work every Friday because he had so much fun with the kids.

Little Miss and Princess Shy actually went down the water slide all by themselves today. The first time I put Little Miss on my lap and went down the slide with her. She loves that thing. So, she asked if I would stay at the bottom and catch her so she could go on her own. I wish I could have had the camera to see her face. She was so excited, happy and scared all in one look.

Princess Shy only went down once. We barely talked her into it at the last 10 minutes of time. She is my child that will NEVER try anything daring. She is very sensible and QUITE reserved. This was a huge thing for her. She's not a risk taker by any means. She enjoyed it but I'm not sure she would have done it again even if there was time. She is becoming a much better swimmer too.

Designer went to stay the night with a friend tonight. He designs characters and his friend loves to take pictures and piece them together to make movies. It will be fun to see what they come up with. I'd love for Designer to narrate one of the movies they do. Maybe I'll get them to upload one to You Tube some time soon.

Now we're all exhausted and ready to eat and drop in front of a TV. I wonder if there are any decent movies out?...

You all have a wonderful weekend.