Reading Aloud

On Monday I attended a seminar on writing by Andrew Pudewa and Andrew Kern.

 It was really a seminar on language and even more generally on homeschooling. But one (of the many) things that I got out of it was the importance of reading aloud to your children. As a Sonlight Curriculum user I have been reading aloud for years but it was nice to reaffirm the importance of doing it. Because of the busyness of life our Read-Aloud had been pushed to the bottom of the "get-done" list. So yesterday I told the kids to get a quiet activity and we read aloud for hours! This is what they did:

Annie colored, drew and made a friendship anklet.

Timothy played with his magnetix and created a windmill and a ferris wheel.

What did we read you wonder? Caddie Woodlawn's Family. It's the sequal to Caddie Woodlawn which is a part of our curriculum. I cried at just about every chapter! Of course that's just me! I cry easily.

And why is reading aloud so important? According to the two Andrews it raises a child's reading comprehension, listening comprehension and therefore their reading level! Not to mention their vocabulary and the ability to read aloud themselves. It's just good! And they said to keep reading to them, no matter their age. Don't stop once they can read for themselves. So I'm off to read some more. I encourage you to do the same!

Girl's Club

Annie is part of a girl's club which we helped start last fall. I had been wanting to do some home ec-y type of things with her and thought it would be much more fun to do them in a group. So after emailing some friends we put together a group of 4 families, 6 girls in all. It's working out beautifully. It breaks down nicely into 3 4-month quarters. We just finished up our first "unit" on baking. We covered the following:

October-- Pumpkin bread
November-- Corn bread
December-- Cookies

January-- Muffins

Making cookies

Natalie explaining how to tell if your baking soda is fresh

Girl's Club members

The girls have learned how to measure ingredients, the importance of preheating the oven, what to do to get ready to bake, the difference between baking and cooking, the different types of leavening, why sifting is important, and the different types of measuring utensils among other things. They are also putting together a nice recipe book. While the oven is baking the goodies the girls participate in a little lesson/story/activity. Then they get to sample their wares and often get a little play time while the moms finish cleaning and packing up.

Next we will begin a unit on Sewing followed by a unit on Cooking. I have to say the guys at home will be sad for us to be leaving baking behind. But now that the girls have learned many new skills, they will be able put that talent to work!

Big changes!

Whew! The fall was a blur of activity and zoomed past at breakneck speed! Our oldest son began high school and we thought it would be fun for him to play sports for a small christian school. He liked it so much that he asked to go to school there. It was a difficult decision for us to make but we decided that he could go ahead and start at the beginning of the second semester. That day is today!

When we began homeschooling we always said we would do it as long as the Lord called us to it. When people would invariable ask, "How long are you going to homeschool?" my response was always, "Well, we're doing it this year!" Early on my husband I and sat down and made a mission statement, named our school and came up with a "Why We Homeschool" document. In reviewing the document we had written, I feel confident that we have succeeded in preparing him for this day.

So over the Christmas break we bought books and uniforms, signed contracts and drafted a transcript. Today I dropped him off and I had the experience that so many parents go through when their child is entering Kindergarten. I got to postpone it 9.5 years!!! I'm proud to say that I did remarkably well. I held it together til I got to the car. It sure is hard to let them grow up!

I'm happy that he already has friends there. Two buddies were going to show him around, making sure he gets to his classes. He was beaming when I left. That's better than clinging to my knees, isn't it? Tonight I will try to keep the questioning to a minimum, praying that he'll want to share his experiences.

I feel unbelievably blessed to have been able to homeschool him all these years. We have made some amazing discoveries together and have had lots of deposits in the memory bank. I look forward to focusing on the other two I still have at home. My job as a homeschooling mom is not over yet. My class size just shrunk by 1/3 is all.

Friends and family are praying for us. It sure is nice to be part of a loving community where we are loved and supported!

Convention season is over!

After packing and unpacking for 4 different conventions, the season is now over! I have unpacked all my books and put my house back into a semblance of order. It has been interesting, as always, to meet new homeschoolers, to see who the next generation of homeschoolers are, help those who are confused, encourage those who are down, rejoice with those who have come back to give a hug because they had a good year (finally)! I love this job. As exhausting as it can be, I do love helping others homeschool their children.

Press on dear friends! Press on!

Time for HERI!

It is time for the Jacksonville HERI convention! If you have not registered, it's not too late! You can still register at the door! You can find out more about it by visiting HERI's website.

I am speaking on Friday at the very first time slot. It is #1 on the convention schedule. Come hear more about how Sonlight works (and learn some time-saving tips!) I will have a special drawing for workshop attendees.

If there is something specific you want to see, let me know! Send me an email and if I have it, I will bring it!

Summer school?

I am often asked if I school through the summer, or if I school year round. My answer to that is no, mamma needs a break too! But that doesn't mean I don't use a summer routine. I first learned about it from a book called Sanity in the Summertime. Here is what I do:



Make a list of what I want to accomplish this summer. This may be school-related (drill math facts), spiritual (memorize scripture) and fun (make pretzels). I start by making my list


Here is what is on my list this summer:

Kids:

· Scripture memory
· Science experiment: corn and beans
· Sustained Silent Reading
· Read-Aloud (RA books from SL)
· Music practice
· Read: Do Hard Things
· Go to IMAX movies
· Start girl’s club
· Camps? Possibilities: volleyball, soccer, sail, art, surf, church

Sheila:
· Read: Senior High: A Home Designed FormULa
· Look into Power Serve
· Look for requirements at universities
· Look up Bright Futures
· Set up record-keeping for HS
· Zone work: declutter/clean
· Look up CC’s transcript service
· Plan Essentials


After I make my list I then create a summer calendar on a sheet of foam core (my husband brings them home from work so I recycle them by using the other side.) Then I add in dates we'll be gone and fill in the days with the things we want to do. I have a weekly template that this year looks like this:


Monday-Stay home and work! (I'm heavily decluttering and deep-cleaning by zones. More on this later).

Tueday-Cooking day (where we make fun things like pretzels, donuts, ice cream sandwiches)

Wednesday-Beach day (we invite friends to join us so it's more fun)

Thursday-Field trip day (free movies, IMAX movies, parks, zoo, etc) This used to be craft day at my house but my kids are getting bigger and want to be on the go more.

Friday-Youth group activity day (I have 2 kids in youth group this year. They have activities planned such as rock climbing, baseball game, etc).

Here is what this year's calendar looks like. We keep adding to it as things come up. It helps the kids to know what is coming up in the upcoming weeks.


I am using Flylady's zones to focus my deep cleaning and decluttering. If you haven't met the Flylady (Marla) then you need to! We are trying to get the house on the market so I want to be able to make it shine and look less crowded.

The Nina and Santa Clara

We studied US History through 1850ish this year (Sonlight Core 3, CC Cycle 3) so when replicas of Columbus' ships came to the St. Augustine City Pier we had to visit them! I was expecting them to be quite big (ok, huge in my mind) but really they were astonishingly small! They crossed the Atlantic in THESE?!!?

Here you can see the two boats from bow to stern.


Preparing to board. See the square-rigged sails? We were told they were designed for downwind sailing only. Remember that Columbus didn't have an engine, so if he was relying on sailing when the wind was at your back, then no wonder it took so long to reach the new world!


The gal you see in the background is one of the crew. She has been on board for two years. This is the Nina. The Santa Clara, (on the right of the picture, port to this boat) which is also called the Pinta, had about 30 crew on board in Columbus' time. We were told the men lived on deck, and that the hold (down below) was for storing supplies, food and animals. THIS deck! Notice the lack of shelter... Columbus' quarters were behind the tender (small board stored on the deck). There was one hatch that went down below (the only ventilation) and only 4 ft headroom. I was surprised to see the large tiller beneath the poop deck. I always pictured them steering the boat with a big wheel ON the poop deck (think: pirate ship) but that was not the case with these two boats. The current crew is 7 onboard the Santa Clara and although it is a replica it does have cabins, an engine, radar, GPS, etc. So this crew isn't roughing it too badly. We chatted with one guy on the Santa Clara who had just boarded the ship in Sebastian. They are still looking for crew if anyone is interested...
Checking out the stern of the boat. See the size of those blocks? The boat is all block rigged so that no one has to climb up to let down the sails. That came later apparantly. This visit to the boats really made the book Pedro's Journal come to life!

Care to visit? Here is the 2009 schedule. Check and see if they are somewhere near you!

DATES	PORT	LOCATION
Feb. 3 - Feb. 15	San Diego, Ca	Kona Kai Marina, Shelter Island
Mar. 12 - Mar 15	Republic of Panama	Flamingo Yacht Club
Apr. 15 - Apr. 21	Stuart, FL	Harborage Yacht Club & Marina
Apr. 24 - May 3	Daytona, FL	Inlet Harbor Marina
May 6- May 17	St. Augustine, Fl	City Marina
May 22 - May 25	Beaufort, N.C.	Maritime Museum
May 29 - May 31	Lewes, Delaware	City Docks
June 5 - June 7	Kingston, New York	Maritime Museum
June 19- June 21	Oswego, New York	West Pier adjacent to maritime museum
June 26 - June 28	Algonac, Mi	Clay Township Historical Society
July 2nd - July 5	Alpena, Mi	Great Lakes Maritime Heritage Center
July 9 - July 12	Petosky, Mi	Petosky City Marina
July 16 - July 19	Muskegon, Mi	Heritage Landing
July 22 - July 26	Marinette, Wi	Nest Egg Marina
July 29 - Aug 2	Waukegan, Illinois	Waukegan Harbor
August 5 - Aug 9	South Haven, Mi	Maritime Museum
Aug 12- Aug 16	Chicago	Navy Pier