Homeschool Fog

Homeschool Fog

Last night I went to hear Todd Wilson, founder of Family ManMinistries, speak.  He, his wife and eight homeschooled children, travel together in an RV around the country and minister to other homeschool families.

Last night’s theme was the Homeschool Fog that so commonly keeps us from seeing the light of truth.  This fog is made up of the lies that we fall prey to believing, lies that the enemy and the “experts” would have us believe.  To combat these lies, Mr. Wilson reminded us of three TRUTHS that we must remember.  What follows is from my notes, and subsequent thoughts, on his talk.

1.  Parents are the best teachers.

Why is it that we feel perfectly comfortable teaching our children until age 4 or 5 and then suddenly we feel inept because they reach society’s set “school age”?  From creation, parents have been the primary teachers of their children.  Somewhere we began to believe that education required an expert.  Todd reminded us that God chose us as the specific parents for our children.  No one has a more vested interest in the success of our children than their parents.  When we are in the fog, we mistakenly believe that we are not qualified to educate our own children.

      2.  Home is the best place for the child and life is the best classroom.

A classroom full of children cannot get individual attention no matter how skilled the teacher. We have the unique blessing of being in “school” 365 days a year.  Learning does not just happen when we are around the table with the math book open.  Learning happens constantly.  As homeschool parents, we can embrace life as our classroom and find educational opportunities everywhere.  Personally, this sometimes drives my children crazy, but I am instilling a love to learn attitude rather than a “check that off the list” mentality.  Surrounded by the fog, we will often think that if we miss a day of book learning, no education has occurred.

 

      3.  EVERY child is a masterpiece.

God made each child a unique masterpiece.   When public schooling became mainstream, there had to be a way to measure progress so tests, grades, standards, honors classes etc. were created.   These are all arbitrary.  In homeschool, all our students can be A+ students because in spite of our efforts, our children will become exactly what God created them to be.  We cannot allow ourselves to believe the lie that there is a magic age for a child to begin reading or to start algebra.  Floundering in the fog, we believe that we have failed if our child isn’t reading by age ten.

Mr. Wilson was a pastor for 10 years before beginning this ministry.  Humorously, he told us that he never had a person come to him for prayer and guidance because they never learned the Pythagorean Theorem.  This story was a wake-up call to remember what is truly important when educating our children.  Two main points that he covered were: teach them to trust God and teach them to love their future spouse and children.  This is best done by example. 

Remember, in a homeschool, school is in session 365 days a year, seven days a week, 24 hours a day.  Our children are watching how we handle situations in which we must trust God.  Are we stressing out about financial instability or praying through it?  Are we griping about how bad the political climate has become or teaching them that throughout history God has been in control through similar eras?

How do we speak to our spouse?  Do we love and respect as the Bible instructs?  Our children are watching and will play this out in their future marriage.  They will also mimic our parenting style.  Do our children feel loved?  Do they see you enjoying them?  Do you smile at them?  Ask your child, “do mommy and daddy enjoy having children”?  Their response may surprise you.

Todd Wilson does an excellent job of ministering to families.   He reminds us to keep God first and plant the light of truth in the sand for when the fog sets in.  These truths and the Word of God will be a beacon when the enemy and the experts are spreading fog into our homeschool.  We must remember that parents are the best teachers, home is the best place to be and that every child is a masterpiece created by God.  By having “school” in session 365 days a year, our children can learn to trust God and learn how to love their future wives and children.  Our job is to remember these truths and live these truths out as examples for our children to follow.  Our children should be enjoyed while in our home. All too quickly they will be grown and gone.  Don’t get lost in the fog.

Sunrise on the Beach-A Field Trip

We have been studying astronomy for science using Exploring Creation with Astronomy by Jeannie Fulbright and have learned some very interesting things about the universe.  One thing that we learned was that you could sometimes see Mercury at sunrise and sunset. Since we live so close to the ocean, a field trip to watch the sun rise sounded like a great idea!  I am thankful to my friend Lanaya Gore for suggesting the trip and letting us tag along.

The girls brought sketch pads and colored pencils to capture the moment.

 

 

Significant cloud formations made for beautiful colors but obscured our potential view of mercury.

We searched for shells and shark's teeth and Lanaya read from the Psalms.  It was such a beautiful morning it was hard to leave. 

What better way to top it off, breakfast at the Golden Arches.

Haiku ( and my first blog post from the phone)

Haiku is a fun form of poetry to work on with kids. Traditional Japanese haiku follows a 5-7-5 syllable pattern. Here is a link with more info.
http://www.kidzone.ws/poetry/haiku.htm

While on vacation in Lanark Village, FL we used things we saw in the area as inspiration for our haikus. Here are a couple examples:

Gliding, gliding, Scoop!
Tilt your head and swallow, GULP!
Pelican dinner.

Scallops in the grass
So many blue eyes watching
You can't hide from me.

Grasshopper on the Road

Yesterday I read the book, Grasshopper on the Road, by Arnold Lobel with my seven year old son.  Even though the audience for this classic story is the beginning reader set, there are valuable lessons for us all.  This is especially true now that life seems to be racing at the speed of light.  We often miss opportunities God has placed in our path because we are moving to fast, focusing on the tedium of the day or isolating ourselves from others.


Grasshopper decides to go on a journey.   Along the way he meets various characters who are too busy to enjoy the life around them.  The first group is a group of beetles who are part of The Morning Club.  They like all things "morning" and nothing else.  Grasshopper is made an honorary member until he says that he also likes afternoon and evening time.  At that point, he is kicked out of the club.

Another character grasshopper meets is the housefly.  Housefly is too busy cleaning all day to enjoy the beautiful day outside.  He is even sweeping the dirt on the road! 


Then there are the dragonflies who are constantly speeding around and never slowing down long enough to notice what is going on around them.   Three butterflies miss great opportunities because they do the same thing EVERYday at the same time EVERYday and in the same way EVERYday.

And so it goes.  Grasshopper continues to meet character after character who are missing out on some of life's best things.

A great discussion followed this book reading.  We talked about how each character was probably missing out and why that was so.  We discussed ourselves or others we know that exhibit traits these characters have.  We talked about how we could miss out on God's best for us if we are not willing to walk out in faith when called to do so.

One of the great blessings of homeschooling my children is getting to curl up next to them so often and enjoy great literature.  From first readers to the classics, I relish them all and the special moments they allow us to share.

Planning...

....another year of home education.  As we begin another year the children will be 14, 9 and 7 years of age!  I am amazed that we are starting our eighth year of education at home.  What an adventure it has been!  I dislike assigning "grades" to the children but if they attended traditional school they'd be entering 8th, 4th and 2nd grade.  With such a broad span of years, I'm often asked, "What curriculum do you use?" 
Here is what I'm planning for the upcoming year.

First and foremost, PRAYER.  I am convinced that God has called us to educate our children from home. It has become a lifestyle for us.  Therefore, I must remember to always rely on Him to provide the resources we need.  It is often tempting to compare what we are doing at home to what our traditionally-schooled friends are doing.  This often ends with me worrying that we are not doing enough, not following a proper scope and sequence etc.  However, as soon as I begin to fret, God puts something in my path to assure me that I am following His will. He is faithful to me, I must remain faithful to Him. My part is to remember to put Him first each day and to call upon Him for guidance. 

And guidance is what I am concentrating on this year with Reese.  Reese will be completing his first high-school credit this year in American History.  YIKES! It is important for me to get him working more independently and taking on more of the responsibility for his own education. We will be using Sonlight's Core 100 for History, Bible, Geography and Literature.   The Institute for Excellence in Writing will supply the instruction for composition with the American History Based Writing Lessons, Volume 2.  Grammar and vocabulary will be incorporated into the writing assignments. We will team up with the Delcharco family in this venture and to do literary analysis on the books we read. All of this combined should supply a very thorough high-school level American History course.

For math we will continue using Teaching Textbooks.  However, I am also going to purchase Life of Fred for him to read.  I've heard great things about this series and since math is not a favorite in this household, it may be just the thing for us. Apologia Science has become a favorite of mine. This year Reese will be doing Physical Science.   I will be starting All About Spelling with Sophie and Drew and will probably have Reese follow along as we do need to improve his spelling skills.  Finally, for electives, Reese will continue his music lessons by starting drums this year at Christ's Church Homeschooler's, play tackle footbal with the Junior Development League and will most likely attend a homeschool PE class at the YMCA. 


Sophie and Drew are close enough in age that I can combine many of their lessons.  They will share Sonlight's Core C (recycling that from back when Reese used it) which will cover Bible, History, Geography, and Literature (readers and read-aloud books) with a focus on World History.  Both children will get even more history along with elementary Latin at our co-op where I will be co-teaching a class we call Friends, Romans and Countrymen.  Will be using Prima Latina from Memoria Press, along with other resources and activities to reinforce the lessons . 

I'll also combine Sophie and Drew for science using Apologia's Exploring Creation with Astronomy by Jeannie Fulbright.  (Many thanks to Lanaya Gore for loaning me that book.)  This is a living book that uses the Charlotte Mason philosophy of narration and I just love that.  So I guess our nature study will be of the stars this year.

For the Language Arts I'll be using  All Things Fun and Fascinating from IEW with Sophie.  Drew is still working on proficiency in writing so he will continue with copy and dictation exercises.  I use Explode the Code to reinforce phonics and as I mentioned earlier, we will start All About Spelling this year.  I'm also going to try Junior Analytical Grammar that I picked up second-hand from the HERI Bookbuster. 

For art and music appreciation I'm planning a six week rotation much like we did when we tried Classical Conversations a couple of years ago.   The first six weeks will be picture study Charlotte Mason style a few of the master artists work and simple drawing instruction/practice. The next six weeks will be studying a few of the great composers and VERY basic music theory.  I'll be working on my plans for this over the summer break.  But is hard not to jump right in and start.

Physical Education at the YMCA, piano, violin, football and Girls on the Run will round out the plan for the younger guys.

Whew!  When I sat down, I thought this would be a quick post. Now that it is all in writing, I guess I'll have to actually follow through on these grand plans. 

Summertime Art

Summertime in Florida this year has been filled with some smokey days.  There have been wildfires burning throughout the state and the smoke became so bad that we had to remain indoors.  To bust the boredom and keep the kids from spending all their time in front of a screen, we worked on some drawing skills using a few great books.  Ed Emberley has a wonderful selection of simple drawing books that even the reluctant child will want to try.  His website is a treat too. Check it out here.

   Our neighbor, Luka, and Sophie hard at work honing their skills.

 

Sophie is using another series of books called Draw, Write, Now.  This series is slightly more difficult than the Emberley books since it uses more complicated shapes and lines but it is done in a very non-intimidating format.  The author, who states that handwriting is an art form, pairs a brief sentence or two about the subject being drawn that can be used as copy work for your student. The Draw, Write, Now series includes many subjects from animals to history making a great addition to your child's studies or just for fun on a smokey summer day in Florida.

Run Sophie, Run! and Drew too!

Sophie participated in her second season of Girls on the Run(GOTR).  This program is aimed at teaching girls 8-12 about healthy eating, exercise and body image.  They train over a 10 week season and then complete a 5K.  Here is Sophie with our neighbor Kellie.  Kellie was her running buddy for the GOTR 5K.

After completing the GOTR 5K, Kellie trained with Sophie to run in the Memorial Day 5K in Orange Park, FL.  This was a more "official" race because Sophie wore a timing chip on her shoe.  She did a great job and her chip time was 30:46!  She was in the 10 and under category and came in 5th out of 25 runners in this category. 

Sophie's success inspired Drew to jump in and complete the one-mile fun run on the spur of the moment.  He ran the whole way and finished in under 10 minutes.  Way to go Drew!