Homeschool on the Run!

Chuckles is now extremely passionate about ice hockey.  For the first month she started talking about it I didn’t take her seriously.  Then when she started taking books out of the library about hockey and reading them cover to cover…I started thinking this might be a real interest.  Then she started memorizing names of ice hockey players and begging to get her lessons.  Another month went by and I was speaking to another homeschooling mother who mentioned she had a daughter (also 10) who started playing hockey and LOVES it.  She said that I had better get started if she wants to be in a team as try out were in a month.  So I started making some inquiries and signed her up for a few classes.  Now she is crazy about it.  She has a coach who was on the Polish Olympic team, trains 4 times a week minimum and has been trying out for travel teams.

One of the issues you have when you homeschool is that most team sports occur through the school and for that reason we have focused on individual sports like swimming, gymnastics and tennis.  Ice hockey was completely off my radar.  Chuckles was inspired to try hockey after she read the book The Mother and Daughter Bookclub.  Cassidy, one of the girls in the book club played hockey and the rest is history.

It has been great for her and she is at it with gusto which has translated into other areas of her work.

April 27th, 2010 | Category: Family | Comments (2)

I just came back from the MassHOPE homeschooling conference in Worcester, MA.  It was held in a large convention center and buzzing with about 2000 Christian homeschooling families of various denominations.  Downstairs was an extensive vending area with booths representing all areas and subjects, jam packed with rich and exciting materials.  Upstairs were approximately 8 different speakers per session to choose from, giving talks pertinent to the homeschooling community or anyone desiring more information about homeschooling. 

I went primarily to hang out with friends and check out the scene…and maybe pick up a few materials here and there…and get a handle on what I wanted to do next year.  I wasn’t expecting to learn as much as I did and find so many fantastic materials.

What most impressed me was a talk by a homeschooling mother, Dr Rebecca Keller.  She discovered that the most effective way to teach science was to teach the basic principles of physics and chemistry well in the Elementary years and to link the teaching with all other curriculum areas.  For example when you teach the atom, also link it to the Latin root of the word, Dalton, the elements, exponents, Hiroshima, the sun and that Swiss halogen collider that is up and running or whatever… and then you link atom to molecule and do the same thing with molecule and then cell.  What happens is that the information stored with each concept becomes very rich and well linked so that later on when a teen is understanding with the workings of fluorescent lamps or x-ray  machines there will be a lot of information at her fingertips to make the new learning easier to grasp and be able to apply the knowledge in understanding or answering test questions.

Montessori elementary curriculum does not include physics and I now have impetus to design a Montessori style physcs album.  Without a basic understanding of physics, it is difficult to come to understand many things we see around us such as geckoes walking up walls and how the eye works. 

I also was impressed by Andrew Pudewa and his presentation of research on music and brain development.  I felt compelled to invest in more classical music and dusted off my Tone Bars when I came home.  Meanwhile Bach and Mozart have been playing non stop in my household to make up for lost time.  Speed will start taking piano lessons again.

I also became quite excited by the Sonlight literature based history program and will invest in the US history core 3 and 4 as the books are fantastic and Chuckles is reading everything in sight right now.  If she loves reading herself through history this way and choosing related activities I will continue through the program going forward.  We also have some great ideas about traveling the US and visiting places we read about.  I am going to get the world history readers and read aloud books too to supplement Speed’s unit studies.  He is learning about Ancient Egypt right now just in time for King Tut’s exhibition arriving in NYC.

So I came home full of beans, ideas and happiness.  It was so nice to have a break and hang out with some favorite people.  I hope to go again next year.

April 25th, 2010 | Category: Family | Comments (2)

I just came back to my blog after a long hiatus.  I have 433 spam.  How depressing.

Tomorrow is Destination Imagination Instant Challenge day and I am packing our snack bag.  It’s been so long since I blogged and so much has happened. Rather than recounting what we have done I thought I would just start again.

Instant Challenge day is held at Masuk Highschool, a large highschool in Monroe, CT.  I helped organize the challenges last year and I remember the classroom I was assigned to.  It was an advanced calculus classroom.  Very bland, stuffed with steel desks and chairs with the occasional mass produced poster on the wall.  Math is fun…trust me.  I felt like I was in jail.

I prepared our little Rising Stars team of 5-7 year olds.  I explained to them what they would see in a school designed for teenagers.  Most of these kids have never seen a school.  This little team is going to go from room to room doing little building assignments and skits where they have to solve a problem.

Chuckles and her 3 team mates are in the Middle School category.  Their challenges are more technical.  They will be making launchers, sorting machines and bridges. Chuckles can’t wait.

I need to get a good sleep too.

January 16th, 2010 | Category: Family | Comments (3)

We spent the day at our weekend house as we were getting some new curtains installed.  Taking the children out of their usual learning environment  and into the weekend house was very difficult.  Speed was jumping up and down twice as much as usual and decided that it was the weekend.

My curtain lady couldn’t believe it.  Every second sentence was…his energy is amazing.  If only I could bottle it up.  Of course I was thinking the opposite!  He was jumping all over the place.  He couldn’t walk 5 steps in a row without giant leap/swivel turn/donkey kick combinations.  Then she told me that children never calm down as they grow older.  Once they have a temperament they are set.  She wanted me to know that I shouldn’t hope to have a calm child.  I wanted to say that my child is calm (sometimes…when he plays with his Lego and watches TV), but the evidence wasn’t in my favor.

All I can say is that I am glad he is a bright little kid and that he takes a lot in while he is jumping all over the place.  I have set work that we usually finish over the day.  He has plenty of time to leap and bounce and do what his body dictates and I’m fine with it.

More or less.

September 17th, 2009 | Category: Family | Comments (2)