Snow Day!

We started school today, but the prospect of snow was in the air and it was hard to keep the boys on task. They kept running to the window to see if it was snowing yet.  Once the snow started to fall, we of course had to take a break to try to catch some of the first snowflakes of the season.  The snow wasn't sticking yet, so we were able to squeeze in a little more work.  Once the snow started to stick though, I knew there was no use resisting.  I could make them sit and listen, but their minds were on the snow outside, not on nouns and adjectives.  Why fight it?  We called it a snow day, donned our winter gear and headed outside for some of this . . .

There's nothing quite like the first snowfall.  I'm glad we could take the time to enjoy it.

Another Reason to Homeschool

Whenever I get into a conversation with someone about the fact that I homeschool our children, I inevitably hear something along the lines of, "Oh, I could never homeschool, it would be too much work." or "too overwhelming", or "I'm not organized enough." I've always thought those arguments were irrelevant, not because they weren't true, but because the benefits of homeschooling far outweigh the price we have to pay to do it. Today, however, I had a conversation that changed my perspective completely.

I was talking to a friend who has nine children, seven of whom are in a K-9 charter school, the other two are in High school. She was expressing the stress she experiences daily trying to help her children complete all of their homework. She described a typical evening having to stay up until midnight or later trying to correct problems, or answer questions, or generally keeping her children on task. Now, I probably see the pros of homeschooling and cons of public schooling a little more exaggerated than some, but I have often thought that homeschooling would be a little more difficult for someone with 7+ kids. It dawned on me however, as she was talking, that rather than making her life harder, homeschooling would actually make her life simpler. Yes, she would be responsible for teaching her children every day, but she is already doing that.  What she wouldn't have to do anymore is; worry about the expectations of 9 different teachers with completely different teaching styles, help her children to remember to finish their homework each day, get all nine children, up, fed, dressed, with lunches in hand, and back packs filled with all the necessary paperwork by between 7:00 and 7:45 each morning (after having stayed up until midnight the night before), not to mention all the social and emotional dramas that have to be dealt with on a regular basis because of events at school.

Granted, I only have 4 children to worry about at the moment, but we wake up the kids at 6:30 each morning so they can exercise, eat, dress, practice piano, and read their scriptures before we start school at 8:30. We then "do school" until noon, when we eat lunch and have an hour break. Some days, if we have had a late start, or a heavier load, we will then do some work from 1-2, or we will go to the library, or on a nature walk. We clean the house together from 2-3 and then we are all free to do whatever we like for the rest of the day. No "homework" (we've been doing that all day),  no lessons to practice, nothing but play or reading (for fun), or riding bikes, or drawing, or whatever we like. Fridays we don't do our "normal school". That is our field trip, or service project day so we have even less to worry about then. We are looking forward to adding another child to the mix in a few months, but rather than worrying about how we can keep homeschooling with one more little one, I realize that as our family grows, our kids age and are more able to work independently on their own education, and help more with their younger siblings and other duties around the house. Rather than segregating them from their family all day long, they work with each other all day and learn valuable lessons from doing so.

I will admit that my house is probably messier at 2:00 p.m. than it would likely be if I had no children filling it up all day long, but think of all the fun, and love, and learning (mine and theirs) I would miss out on if they weren't. There is a peace and joy that I get from homeschooling that I can't imagine I could find if my kids were only my own from 4:00 p.m. until bedtime every day. I still think the benefits of homeschooling far outweigh the price we have to pay to do it, but I am beginning to see that the price we have to pay may not be too high after all.

Our Homeschool Week

We completed our 7th week of school this week and I have to say it was one of the most productive weeks we have ever had.  We took the week off last week since we were half way through our semester to clean house and so that I could can our tomatoes and other vegetables before it froze.

Maybe the break was just what we needed to give us the energy to accomplish what we did this week.  We have made a curriculum switch this year.  Because I am having a baby in March I felt like I needed something that spelled it all out for me and the kids a little more this year.  I decided to give Sonlight a try because they are very literature rich and seem to mesh well with the Charlotte Mason approach to education.  We have been very happy with the move so far.

I. Mac and G. Diddy are working together doing Core 1+2 which is a one year condensed introduction to world history.  It has been fun working together with the boys and we have been learning a lot together.  Here is some of what we learned about this week.

History: We read about the Mycenaeans, the Trojan War, and about the Canaanites and Philistines.  The boys loved the story of the Trojan horse.  The book talked about how no one is certain whether the story is fact or fiction.  I. Mac was so interested to know that he said he couldn't wait to get to Heaven so he could ask Heavenly Father if it really happened or not. . .

Geography: Our focus this week was on Southern Europe.  I. Mac particularly is getting really good at locating different countries on the map.  We studied specifically about Albania, Bulgaria, and Greece.  It is sad to realize how little I know.  The nice thing is that through homeschooling I am gradually filling in the gaps in my own education.  I didn't know that Albania and Bulgaria were communist countries from the 40's until the 90's.  It is always interesting to note that when a country becomes communist, one of the first things they do is outlaw religion.  It also baffles me that there are so many countries who have tried the communist/socialist "experiment" throughout history and in every case it has ended in complete failure.  The majority of the citizens are reduced to abject poverty and a few elite live in luxury.  Why is America so anxious to give away our freedoms and try this same failed system again?  It's chilling to think about.

Literature:  We read a couple of Aesop's Fables this week.  Our favorite was probably "The Travelers and The Purse".  We also read two poems by Robert Louis Stevenson.  He is one of our favorite poets.  We finished reading Ginger Pye this week.  This was deffinately a favorite.  The boys fell in love with Jerry and Rachel and Uncle Bennie and were anxious for the safe return of Ginger.  It was one of those books that we were sad to see end.

Independent Reading:  G. Diddy and I. Mac have both been working on lessons in The Writing Road to Reading, using Teaching Reading at Home as a guide for their spelling and reading instruction.  For those of you who don't know, I. Mac is dyslexic and has struggled so much with learning to read.  It has been hard for him, but we just switched to WRtR this year and he seems to be improving in leaps and bounds.  They finished List H this week.  I. Mac began reading The Matchlock Gun for his "Free Reading"  and G. Diddy is reading The Big Balloon Race.  The fact that I. Mac is reading a book like this is proof that his reading is improving dramatically.  I think he is really feeling good about his progress too.

H. Man is doing Core 6 this year.  It is the first year of a two year study of world history.  It has been nice, because so far he and his brothers have been studying the same time period.  Here is some of what he accomplished this week.

History: He study about Ancient Greece, their alphabet, the olympics, their Gods, and about life in Athens vs. Sparta.  Athens and Sparta interested him most.  He decided he definitely would not have wanted to live in Sparta and started a new game of Civilization where he was the city of Athens.  He is also reading an Historical Fiction called Theras and His Town, about an Athenian boy who is taken to Sparta after his father is lost at war and has to adjust to life as a Spartan.

Current Events:   I have started having him read a news magazine with the intent of having him do a weekly report on something of local, national, or international significance.  The problem was that too much of it wasn't making sense to him because there were so many terms he didn't recognize.  We are a politically active family and have many discussions about government and politics, and H. Man is a very bright boy, so I assumed he just knew the things we knew.  But we finally picked an article to read and discuss together, and I had to explain things like ACLU, NRA, McCain-Feingold, Labor Unions, etc.  Even if no reports are written and all we do is read and discuss an article each week, I can tell this will be a very fruitful endeavor.

Literature:  H. Man and I are reading together a couple of pages of poetry each day from Favorite Poems Old and New.  We are also reading God King, which is about a young Egyptian Pharaoh who has to escape from Egypt because there are people in his government trying to kill him.  This is during the Kushite Dynasty when the Assyrians are at the hight of their power and are taking over all of the surrounding countries.  It has been a fascinating read.  This is one aspect that I really like about Sonlight. Even though H. Man could easily be reading these books on his own, they schedule Read-Alouds so we have the chance to read and discuss things together.

Math:  He did four lessons in Saxon 7/6.  He does these mostly independently with the D.I.V.E. cd's.

Latin: We are two weeks behind in Latin, so we completed lesson 5 this week.

Writing: He did two assignments in Writing Strands this week.  Writing has always been the one subject  H. Man has resisted, but he successfully completed a creative paragraph this week, and although their was some frustration to begin with, I think he felt a sense of accomplishment once he was finished.

Together as a family, we continue to do our "School Opener"  which consists of reading from the Book of Mormon (we read what is being studied in the LDS seminary for the year), memory work (we are following this memorization program this year and are loving it), and a family read aloud, which right now is The Secret Garden.  Our family read alouds, continue to be one of my favorite aspects of homeschooling.  I think it is the boys' too, because they are constantly trying to make "deals" with me, such as they won't do any schoolwork unless I read another chapter, and other creative attempts to lengthen our time spent reading together.  We also finally got out together on a Nature Walk.  Although I realized yesterday that we forgot to do science this week, it felt good to get as much accomplished as we did.  Now if only all weeks could run as smoothly as this one. . .

Outdoor Hour Challenge: Autumn Series-Cattails

I have been missing Nature Study with the kids, and finally decided we needed to make room for it again in our busy schedule.  We chose to start with the first of Barb's Autumn Series Challenges and study Cattails because I was certain I knew where to find some.  Our search didn't prove to be as prosperous as I had hoped, but we had a wonderful time nonetheless.  We went to one of our favorite nature study locations, our local river trail.

For some reason I was under the impression that I knew just where there was a large patch of Cattail growing.  We got to the spot and there were no cattails just lots of these plants.  I'm not sure what they are, but they are pretty.

We continued up the river, but never did find any cattails.  We saw lots of golden grass,

and these prickly plants,

but no cattails.  We got to a bend in the path where I told the kids we would turn around if we still didn't find any cattails.  There weren't any there, but we did find a little side path that led us right down to the water's edge.

The kids were thrilled.  Skipping rocks is better than cattails any day. . .

Once the boys depleted the supply of skipping-quality rocks, we headed back.  At the very top of the hill, quite a ways from the water, we finally found one small patch of cattails.

Of course we had to take home a souvenir of our find.

All-in-all it was a very rewarding day.  Spending time in the crisp Autumn air, playing with rocks, searching for an elusive treasure (a.k.a. cattails).  What better way is there to spend a beautiful October afternoon?

Wordful Wednesday: Six Little Words

I haven't participated in Wordful Wednesday's for a while, but this one sounded intriguing and fairly simple.  The assignment was to describe your life in six words.  It is a lot harder than you might think to sum up your life in six words, but here's what I came up with:

"Following Christ, treasuring marriage, cherishing motherhood."

If you want to participate, or see what others had to say click here.

Come Listen to a Prophet's Voice

This weekend was the 179th semi-annual conference for The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. We got to spend 10 hours (counting last Saturday's session for the women, and this Saturday's session for the men), being spiritually fed by the leaders of our church. Conference Weekend is always something that I look forward to with anticipation and am sad to see it end. This weekend was no exception. I don't have much time to expound right now, but I just wanted to share a few of my thoughts from this Conference.

There were two over-arching messages that I took from this Conference. The first was the importance of personal revelation from the Lord in our lives. So many of the messages seemed to emphasize our need to learn to receive and rely upon insight from the Holy Ghost. Heavenly Father has given us a marvelous gift to allow us to know His will for us in our lives, and to ultimately help us to return to Him someday. It is vital that we learn how to use it to guide us through our earthly journey. The second main message I left with was the necessity of teaching our children. We can't leave anything to chance in the raising of our children, if we want them to be able to grow up faithful in this increasingly troubled world. The talk by Elder Christofferson in Sunday afternoon's session was one of my favorites. In it he warned us of the need to provide constant daily spiritual experiences for our children. He cautioned that "the adversary is not neutral in his approach with our children" so we can not afford to be neutral in our teachings of our children.

I also thoroughly loved President Thomas S. Monson's Sunday Morning talk. It was all about service. The main message of the Savior's earthly ministry was of love and service. If we are to be true disciples of Him, we must learn to love and serve our fellow-men. Service and love seem to be the legacy of President Monson's life as well. I feel a renewed desire to find ways to serve others around me more often and to help my children to do so as well.

I love conference. I love the opportunity it gives me to gain insight into the areas I need to improve on in my life right now. I love that the "main messages" others received from this conference will be different that what I received because of what the Spirit emphasizes to each of us as the most important things for us to learn and do to help us become what we need to be right now. I love that Heavenly Father still loves and speaks to us and has provided a Prophet to lead His children today as He did in the past. I love the peace and hope I feel as I hear the words of the Lord's chosen servants. I can't wait to re-read and ponder all that was said this weekend. Until then, if you want to listen to it, you can go here.