Poor Little Neglected Blog

Luckily, it is only the blog that has been neglected, not the boys or their homeschooling schedule.  If anything, our schoolwork has been ramped up a notch, because Truman was ready for more.  More history, more science, more literature.  I had to do some research and acquire a few additional books and programs over the past month, because before we went to Ecuador and Florida, we finished a lot, including our chemistry program and many of our literature and history selections.  I was a little unclear about exactly what we would be doing when we returned, so I asked Truman what he was interested in learning, and took it from there.

I had to write out a list of everything that we are using, and bring examples, to our homeschool review with the district.  After my looooong curriculum review,  I was asked if perhaps I have planned too much?  On paper, it sure does seem like a lot for one 8 year old boy to accomplish, but in actuality, it is the right amount of work for the stage Truman is in.

Spelling lessons are so much harder when the dog is chewing on your toes.

Our schedule has us working for about half an hour in the morning at the dining room table, doing math, then taking a spelling test in the playroom while mommy is on the elliptical, another 20 minutes.  These were Truman's two least favorite subjects, and he was griping a little bit too much about them, so my solution was to do them very first thing in the morning, to get them out of the way immediately.  This is working so surprisingly well-I cannot believe it didn't occur to me sooner.  Henry sits at the table with us, where he is happily working through his math program (Right Start Level A), so we are all immersed in math early in the morning.  Before lunch Truman will also read some of his literature and narrate it to me (1/2 hour) work on his piano and music theory (with my help-about 20-30 minutes.) That is ALL that we do in the morning, besides chores. The rest of the time is Lego time, or outdoor time.
In the afternoons, after Henry has been dropped off at preschool, Truman and I snuggle up on the couch with tea and a warm dog, and spend several hours (about 2-3) reading history, working on our science projects, reading our literature selections, writing.  After Henry comes home we either do a lesson in our art program together, run around outside, nature walks, or free play.  So Truman is getting about 4 hours of individual attention to school subjects, 4 days a week.  16 hours a week total,  at the very most.  Truman is flying through all of his subjects, mastering everything, enjoying every last subject.  This doesn't include the hours that he spends reading alone, these books are also selected by mommy, and tie into our school work.  Anyway-why am I writing this...I guess because it was suggested in my review that we were doing too much (or working too far above grade level in some subjects, below in others), but also spending too little time per day.  It is my nature to bristle if anyone suggests that I am not doing the "right" thing, whatever that is, but honestly, I cannot say that I would change a thing about our schooling right now, not in the curriculum choices, nor the time spent.  I guess writing it down makes me feel better-I will just politely roll my eyes at their "suggestions" and continue on.

Week 14/15

I have let the blogging fall to the wayside, and I don't feel guilty about it...most of the time.  The purpose of writing down what I am doing was so that I could print it all off at the end of the year and have a record of our activities, I tell myself that skipping a few weeks will not affect the book in the long run.

We have finished our 14th and 15th weeks, doing all the usual activities, reading all of the usual books.  Truman and I are getting to the really good parts in English history, Knights and Castle building, Unscrupulous Kings and their Battles.

I have done an excellent job keeping up with the schedule that I laid out for us over Christmas, so that we could finish up several of our programs before the trip to Florida/Ecuador.  I haven't added anything new to our basic schoolwork plan, but I have thrown in a few extra books to be read, with Narration as our tool for assessing comprehension.  Meet the Great Composers, and Lives of the Musicians, Good Times, Bad times, and what the Neighbors thought.  We are still studying Beethoven, to switch to a new composer after the February Break.  


I have been reading two books that might gently change how we do a few things at home.  
Trivium Mastery, The Intersection of Three Roads.  Classical Education from Birth to Tween, by Diane B Lockman, and A Thomas Jefferson Education Home Companion, by Oliver Demille.


Trivium Mastery discusses our vanishing cultural heritage of classic literature, and the disaster that is public education.  This book also lays out a plan for giving your child a classical education, laying the groundwork for critical and logical thinking.  The Three Roads to acquiring a classical education are Language, Thought , and Speech, each section presents the do's and don'ts for assisting your child in his education. Following Charlotte Mason and Ambleside, Truman is getting a classical education, and this book and its lists do not differ much from what we are currently doing.  Lockman does have multiple chapters that I am rereading about the art of rhetoric and socratic dialogue.   Truman is still smack in the middle of the Grammar stage, which means we are gathering information, but these chapters have helped me learn how to interact with my student to  prepare him for the deeper thinking that is coming in a few years.


On a side note...Will thinks that moms homeschool so that they can give themselves the education they always wanted.  I am not sure if he meant this as a criticism or not, but it is terribly true in our case.  Truman is getting the education that I didn't get, the education I have come to believe all kids deserve, and I am certainly learning right along with my 8 year old.  Every book that we are reading is new to me, every single one! I am even learning math from a totally new perspective...3rd grade math for the first time, world history for the first time, and I am loving every second.  My role is not exactly that of teacher, because Truman and I are basically on the same level of education following this route.  I am more of a facilitator, guiding Truman towards what I and all those dedicated mommies out there have found to be the very best of resources.  Sometimes I get nervous thinking about everything that I do not know....and the huge responsibility of educating my little people. Thank goodness there are so many other homeschoolers who have laid out the path for me, and survived to blog about it.


A Thomas Jefferson Education is also about the demise of public education, and about the hoped for revival of a culture of family and leadership.  The authors' ideas about an education steeped in classics and leadership opportunities also doesn't deviate much from what we are already doing.  The appeal of this book is that there are several chapters on Mentoring; ie. mentoring your own child, or finding someone else to assist you in educating your kids.  This book helped me to understand that the older my kids get, the more responsibility they can have for their education, and gave a few pointers on helping them to get to this point.  


Our school year is pretty much half way done, our routine is established, and Truman is doing an awesome job with his reading.  He is reading most of his schoolbooks on his own, except for the history books, because I love these as much as he does.  The literature read alouds we are zipping through, because these dark, cold winter nights leave us little to do except read in bed after the nightly games.  We have spent a couple of weeks working on an attitude adjustment (Truman whined about every single thing he had to accomplish in the morning-getting up, getting dressed, brushing his teeth.) We have found a decent solution that mommy patiently implemented, and it starts with Truman getting directly out of bed and into the shower, to wash off all of the whininess before the day starts.  This small change has benefitted our homeschool drastically, and the dear boy has stuck to it pretty well, because even he can see that everything goes much more smoothly when the whining hasn't driven mommy to the edge first thing in the morning. 


Today is Saturday, and I think we will eat cake for breakfast to celebrate.

Week 13

Who starts back to school on December 28th, barely 3 days past Christmas?!  Homeschoolers who take a lot of breaks, do!  Of course, my poor boys don't know that all of their friends are still out of school for the winter break.  To be fair, we began reading some really neat books this week, the 2nd term of our year, and we couldn't wait to get started.

I am pleased that we are mostly on track with everything...although if we skip a day at all, I am determined that we make it up the following day, because I want to have a definite end date for this year, and I want it to be before July!  (Note*  We did deviate already....Daddy had a surprise day off on Friday, so we moved all of our Friday work to Saturday, when Dad was on call.  New Year's Day, on a Saturday, my kids were doing schoolwork....some might call that child abuse, haha!)

Week 13 work!

Literature

• New Book, read aloud by Mommy-Wind in the Willows- a copy that was Aunt Amy's when she was a girl, nicely illustrated!
• New Poetry book! Favorite Poems of Childhood, 2 read-The Land of Nod and The Cat of Cats.
• Otto of the Silver Hand, read aloud by Truman, and narrated by Mommy!  Truman is able to critique my narration, and he digs it.  Come to find out, narrating is harder than you might think...especially when Mom is thinking of all the work to be done rather than listening to the story.
• Farmer Boy, Truman reads to himself.

Spelling

• Lessons 47, 48, and 49.  Given by mommy on the elliptical, to Truman laying in a patch of sun.

Math

• Lessons 42, 43, and 44.  I cannot believe we are not further in this....
• Sum Dog-many games on subtraction facts on this free, fun website. 
• Truman has learned to play Dominion, a  rather complex card game that uses his math skills.  He held his own playing with three adult men, so I think he is doing fine even if we are not further in our curriculum.

Geography

• A Childs' Geography of the World, VM Hillyer.  We made a geography notebook, and defined one term in it, drew a globe, identified hemispheres.

History

• For the next week or so, we are reading a chapter a day out of An Island Story, they have all been about King Alfred and his adventures, we read 18, 19, and 20 this week.
• The Little Duke-First half of Chapter 7- I wish we could read this faster than half a chapter a week, it is a very good story.

Science

• Burgess Animal Book-chapters XXV and XXVI
• Chemistry-States of Matter experiments (2 chapters), and Truman helped Henry with his Color Science kit from Christmas

Other

• Christmas Thank-you notes. We do not have too many to write, just 4, but it sure takes a long time....
• Beethoven chapter in Lives of the Composers, Beethoven sections from Story of the Orchestra.
• Big News-Truman taught Henry how to play chess, using No Stress Chess, and they have been playing several games a day!

Kind of a lot of work for a three day week, but we were snowed in, remember.