Lewis Flies a (Homemade) Kite

Assignment for Landry Academy's History of Airpower Online Class with Lt. Col. Doremas

Les Mis

Anna and I had a wonderful afternoon with friends watching the Rep's production of Les Mis.  There's just something about a live performance that is so exciting.  We've been singing and playing the music for weeks now.

(Being the demanding homeschool teacher that I am, I made her get Monsieur Hugo's book read before we went.  I, however, am still working on it.) 

Teen Pact Little Rock

The three eldest had a great time in February focusing on communication and government at a one day Political Communications workshop.  It was our first time to hang out at our state capitol, and we all learned a lot!

Don't Be Puffy

A little learning is a dangerous thing:

Drink deep, or taste not the Pierian spring:

there shallow draughts intoxicate the brain,

and drinking largely sobers us again.

--Alexander Pope

HT: Moneychanger, Franklin Sanders

Training

To be in the weakest camp is to be in the strongest school.
--G.K. Chesterton, Heretics

For All Speech Students

Eloquence is so speaking as not merely to convince the judgment, kindle the imagination, and move the feelings, but to give a powerful impulse to the will" 

(Broadus, Preparation and Delivery of Sermon)

ht: blog and mablog

Short, Sweet, and to the Point

Education is useless without the Bible.--Noah Webster

Miscellaneous Wisdom from American Presidents

Just in time for the 2012 presidential election, we recently finished a simple study of the American presidents.  Here are a few tidbits of wisdom some of these men have shared with us all:

"History, in general, only informs us what bad government is."--Thomas Jefferson

"The Bible is the rock on which our Republic rests."--Andrew Jackson

"The means of defense against foreign danger historically have become the instruments of tyranny at home."--James Madison

Historic Fun

Ian, Anna, and Lewis have thoroughly enjoyed their monthly history class with Ms. Sara this semester.  After emptying boxes from a recent Azure delivery, Anna looked at the pile of cardboard and saw an artifact instead of trash.  After many happy minutes spent with scissors and scotch tape, she ended up with this original rendition of a menorah.

Both our families enjoyed a review presentation dinner
where the students each talked about a different Old Testament character from their studies.
(Snow White was a bonus not in the original curriculum.)

 Emily and Mary Kate did a cute theatrical production depicting the rivalry between Hannah and Peninah.

Toward the end of our evening together, 

Lewis covered the history of Saint Nicholas with some bright young students.

The Mysterious Boy--by Ian, age 10

Once upon a time there was a boy who could pick up cars.  One day he was gone, and his parents looked and looked for him but could not find him.  He had gotten on a train heading for the rain forest--where he dug a hole and put a trap door of mud, leaves and moss.  He lived there for three years, but one day he thought about his mother and father.  Then he said bye to his home and got on a train and went home.     

THE END

To College . . . or Not

Here's another example where I'm pleasantly surprised that this kind of thinking is already going mainstream!

Westminster Sing-Along

Since the beginning of the year, we have been working on learning the Westminster Shorter Catechism. However, instead of it being the raw act of will one might expect from such an undertaking, it has been great fun for all of us thanks to the work of Holly Dutton. I don't know much about Holly or the presbyterian church she serves as music director, but I do know that she has done a great job using her guitar to put the questions of the Westminster to pleasant, memorable music. We are still slowly working our way through the Child's Scripture Catechism (to which I linked once upon a time), so we alternate days between the two works. However, the Scripture catechism is not set to music that I know of, so Westminster days are the kids' favortie, and we are progressing much more quickly in that area.

www.reformedmusic.com

Geography Games

Thanks to the crew over at Life in a Shoe for introducing me to this site:

http://www.sheppardsoftware.com/states_experiment_drag-drop_Intermed_State15s_500.html

Bible Time

Here's something that has worked well for us over the last year or so. After Ian and Anna reached a reading level that would make perusing the Scriptures for themselves somewhat feasible, I started having them begin their school day with some independent Bible reading. I leave the decisions as to what section and how much of Scripture they read entirely up to them. Currently, Ian bounces all over the place reading whatever suits him at the moment, and Anna has started in Genesis and worked/skimmed her way to Acts thus far. I will occasionally ask questions about what they read (especially if the reading time seemed a bit on the short side), and they will occasionally ask me questions as they come across things. I don't generally insert my teacherly self into that time too much, though. All in all, the kids seem to enjoy exploring God's word, and I suspect they are gleaning more than any of us realize.

Economics Crash Course

Titus watched all of this rather lengthy video entitled "Money as Debt," and though he disagreed with some of the assumptions, he found it so helpful as a general overview that he asked me to post it here. I tried the embedding trick I just learned when posting Gianna Jessen's video, but I couldn't get it to work for me this time. Back to the Help Desk for me.

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-9050474362583451279&hl=en

Ten Plagues in Verse

Blood and frogs and lice and flies;
Death to the cattle and boils on the hides;
Hail and locusts, followed by night;
Death to the firstborn showed God's might.

Homestead Traditional Crafts Village

These guys had a booth that caught my eye at the homeschool convention. The brochure they handed me for their spot in Texas was equally impressive. I may use some of their crafting kits or their music for the kids sometime, and I'd love to stop in there if we're ever in the area.

www.cfeeschool.com

Keeping All the Plates Spinning

Our math time today reminded me of a little tidbit I've been learning over the past year or so: a multitude of responsibilities for Mom means greater opportunities for initiative in the kids. It's easy to view the little ones' needs, the kitchen work, the laundry or whatever as an impediment to the older kids' education. However, I find that precisely because I can't sit and hover at their elbow during an entire lesson, they seem more apt to apply themselves and get it done.

Everyone knows the frustration of trying to convey something to a child who is not mentally engaged. Something that's been working for me lately in that situation is putting distance between myself and the stalled-out learner, i.e. moving on to other tasks on my list. Once on their own, the kids suddenly realize they'd better kick it into gear if they ever hope to get their studies completed and move on to other things. If I tell them that they must get a certain amount done before they can come to me with questions or for checking, that seems to help, too.

Of course there are times they need my undivided teacherly attention for a while, but it's good to realize that my need to be about many things is also helping train my children's character and intellect.

Homeschool World

Well, now I've fully experienced my first homeschool conference. I volunteered at registration for nearly three hours, checked out the exhibition hall, attended a couple workshops and general sessions, and did the used book sale thing (dibs on which provided my selfless motive for volunteering). The thing I enjoyed most was hearing Andrew Pudewa. He makes a lot of sense.

http://www.excellenceinwriting.com/

I'm not jumping on his writing curriculum bandwagon at this point, but I am thinking of trying to dig up some of his talks somewhere for Titus to hear. He does well with the differences between male and female learning styles, the importance of music to cognitive development, and prioritizing the twin pillars of the classics and mentoring in education. What's more, he is a homeschooling father of seven who does not have access to television in his home.

Learn Those Books of the Old Testament

A friend introduced me to this great Scripture CD from Sonlight. The music is much more interesting than your typical children's fare, and the words are only Scripture. It also made learning the books of the Old Testament very simple for our kids, and I just found out the grade 1 CD has a recording for the New Testament books. There are audio samples on the website.

www.sonlight.com/2B03.html