Ordinary Time

Yes, you read that correctly. I am sharing a photo of G. and L. before they head off to school.  School being the community college where J. works. And this was yesterday, I didn't get a picture of Y. this morning, but it wasn't her first ever day of school because she took classes last year. Technically it was L.'s first ever in-person day of school because she took an online Introduction to Archeology class over the summer. But you get the idea.  They are all taking dual enrollment classes which give them both high school and college credit. This is what D. did his last two years of high school as well. Needless to say, with these three being the youngests life is going to look a lot different at home this school year. Those with classes go to school with J. first thing in the morning, stay all day, then come home with him at the end of his work day. There are a lot fewer people around during the day here at home.  The other significant change is that after years, we wo...

We always do some sort of museum trip to kick off our school year. Usually this happens on the day after Labor Day, which, I think, is when school should start. This year is a bit different. A homeschool mom arranged a group price to see the exhibit that's in the area which had an original print of The Great Wave, so I jumped at the chance. Today was our day to go see it. Because we were with a group, we also had one of the museum directors give us an introduction to what we were going to see.  The actual name of the exhibit is Hokusai and Ukiyo-e: The Floating World at the Mcininch Art Center at the Collage of DuPage. This was a very well done exhibit. The first gallery has the history of the artist and the art form, another gallery had a lot of various prints and other Japanese art. This was where The Great Wave is exhibited. There was a street scene recreating early 1800's Edo (Tokyo) that you could walk through. A third gallery held an immersive manga exhibit because Hokus...

I don't often feel old. I'm sure having six children still at home with my youngests being sixteen has something to do with it. Many of my friends who are my age have been empty nesters for a decade or so now. When I stop to think about it, it makes me realize how far outside the norm we are.  But sixteen is pretty darn close to being at an age when children start going their own way. With homeschooling, I am pretty much done with the heavy lifting years. G. and L. will be juniors this coming school year, but they will be moving more towards dual enrollment at the college where J. works. My role has become a maker of suggestions and a finder of resources. At this point, everyone has taken charge of their educations. But technically we still homeschool, so I stay in the various groups. It pays off because next month we got discounted tickets to see a special art exhibit in the area, but that is really one of the few reasons I stay. The other reason is that I do have 28 years of ...

Over the weekend I did something to the muscles over my right hip and could barely move for several days. Monday was definitely the worse, with yesterday being a little bit better, but that was probably because I didn't really try to do all that much. Today there is still a little twinge, but I'm functional again. Yesterday, when I was doing all that much except sitting uncomfortably, I binge read Eleanor Oliphant is Completely Fine by Gail Honeyman. Yes, I'm a bit late to the party since it was published in 2017, but I rarely pick up super popular books at the time they were popular. I don't actually know why I put it on my library reserve list, but I think I came across a synopsis and it sounded interesting. I ended up really enjoying the book. I really liked the character of Eleanor, including her disdain for texting shortcuts. If you don't know the book, the character of Eleanor is the story of a person with significant past trauma including being in care for mu...

I have been advertising quite a lot for the different programs I offer at Bittersweet Farm LLC. One of those is Pony Phonics, where a child would play games (with the ponies), practice reading (with the ponies), create stories (about the ponies if they like), and do a lot of other types of hands-on reading readiness and support. After teaching children for decades, I have quite a few effective activities that I used with my own children, and which helped them become excellent readers.  I was thinking today while cleaning stalls (it's an excellent time to think, by the way) about why I think this type of learning is so helpful. I decided it was the sheer physicality of all of these hands-on experiences. Our brains are wired to move through space and to remember the things we do while moving through space. It's why the concept of memory palaces is so effective. It combines movement with ideas.  Sometimes I listen to a recorded book while I'm cleaning stalls. Even months late...

This past weekend was so full that I'm going to take a couple of days to write about it. I showed you Sunday's doings all ready, so now we'll head back to Saturday night.  As you know, we're reading through A Suitable Boy this year at teatime. (We're on page 985 out of 1349 for those keeping track. Maybe we'll finish it by fall.) A small subplot is that a couple of the characters are in their university's production of Twelfth Night by William Shakespeare. I did a brief synopsis for everyone at that point in the story, but also realized that this half of my children aren't nearly as familiar with Shakespeare's plays as the older half were. I had a brief moment of being sad about this.  You need this back story to understand why, when I saw an advertisement from a local theater company that they were opening a production of Twelfth Night last weekend that I immediately went and bought eight adult prices tickets. (Sadly, no student rate, which is proba...

Last week I finished reading, Life in Three Dimensions: How Curiosity, Exploration, and Experience Make a Fuller, Better Life by Shigehiro Oishi. It had many interesting parts in it, though it did continue to be in essence a list of various psychological studies. I had mentioned this when I introduced the book previously, but since the studies moved into ones I hadn't heard of, that was okay. (There are some psychological studies that I will be thrilled if I never have to read another synopsis of ever again.) In fact, some of them were so interesting, I marked them as something I might want to share with you, my readers. Then I realized that maybe a full week's worth of posts dealing with studies found in this book isn't really what people want to read, so I have chosen just one of them. This particular excerpt made the cut because it also touches on another favorite topic of mine which is reading good books out loud to your children.  I'll dive in. "While at the U...

To Whom It May Concern, I am writing to share my family’s experience and to perhaps give support to the position that HB2827 is misguided and should not move forward. We have homeschooled our twelve children for the past 28 years. Before I continue, I realize that the number of children we have and the fact that we homeschool might lead some to make generalizations about our family. Because homeschooling encompasses a wide variety of beliefs and views of the world and because there is a stereotype that only conservative Christians homeschool, I feel I need to address these possible generalizations because homeschooling is very much a non-partisan issue. We tend to vote Democrat and our views of how society works are very liberal. While we are Christian, we belong to a progressive mainline church, and we certainly have never homeschooled for religious reasons. I am also aware that much of educational theory and thought is based on outcomes. Therefore, I am going to start with outc...

Tomorrow when I have a bit more bandwidth and a bit more time, I'll be writing out our family's experience with homeschooling in Illinois to be submitted as evidence in opposition to HB2837. I'll post it here, too, but I will be calm and balanced.  Tonight? I'm not feeling terribly calm and balanced. You've been warned.  Here's the short version. There is an organization who has an agenda to make homeschool more regulated in all 50 states. Illinois is one of the least regulated states, so obviously we were in their sites. They just needed to find a shill to bring forth the legislation, which they did in the form of three Democratic legislators.  What is most disturbing about this bill is its vagueness which in turn would pretty much give District Boards of Education carte blanche to regulate the homeschoolers in their district however they see fit. For instance, a truant officer would be allowed to come to a family's home and demand to see a portfolio of wor...

I realized this morning that last week, on the 9th and the 11th, was the nine year anniversary of Y.'s and R.'s adoptions . Nine years feels like a pretty significant amount of time. I'll admit that there were quite a few years there with R. that I didn't think we'd survive to nine years. But after two years of finding the correct cocktail of seizure meds, I'm happy to report that they are still working. I don't actually like to think about the post-ictal psychosis years. They were hard. It was a journey to bring these two girls home and our family wouldn't be complete without them.  Y. also had a big day today in another way. She started her first college classes at the community college where J. works. Many of our children have done dual enrollment college classes for which they received both high school and college credit. I'm excited that Y. gets to start doing this as she's ready and I think she'll really enjoy it. She said her first day...

It seems we are back to our regular schedule now. People have done schoolwork, J. is back to work, children are back to their weekly cooking, I did some EFL training online today as well as paying the bills, and I have a conference proposal and research project work sitting on my desk just staring at me.  The trouble with having been sick for much of the break is that it's hardly a break. At least not one that feels as though it counts. I want a vacation do-over.  There are some fun things coming up that I'll be sharing as they get closer, so this moving back into regular life isn't all bad. And some children are definitely happier with a routine as well.  We also have a solution for keeping things too dull and humdrum. We have ponies. Ponies who are really cute, but who also have too many brains inside those fluffy heads. When I headed out to the barn yesterday morning this is what I was greeted with. Oh, Buddy. It seems he pushed against the lowest stall guard strap unt...

It's always nice when children create things that I can share and use as a blog post.  K. has become interested in video editing, so I decided to take advantage of that fact and asked him to create a video with some of the animals here on the farm. I think he did a terrific job. K. also decided that he would like to learn to do watercolors, so has been doing a bit of painting this school year. Here is the painting he did this afternoon. And Y. has also been making things. Here are a few of the pumpkins she crocheted so our church could use them as centerpieces for their monthly community dinner. This is her own design. She has an amazing ability to look at something and intuitively understand how to crochet it 

<<But then this is the part that I just loved. Not only did it [doing some sort of tangible, creative activity] cause students to flourish, but they noticed an upward spiral where creativity led to positive feelings that were then carried forward to the next day's pursuits and continued. So they linked it to being able to be more engaged in learning in the classroom. And this was a study done by Tamlyn Connor and Colin DeYoung and Paul Silvia called Everyday Creativity as a Path to Flourishing, which I think was the other thing that really needs to be highlighted and then I'll stop. Flourishing, like it's not just to make you feel better, but to make you flourish, which to me is what helps students to really do well in school because now they're in a very positive spiral.>> (f rom The Sheepspot Podcast, episode 110) This little bit of conversation caught my attention this morning as I was cleaning the barn. I'm always interested in the intersection betwe...

L. has decided to work through the physics textbook that's been kicking around the house for a while. Now, I never took physics, nor had I any interest in ever taking physics. I still don't have an interest in learning physics which is what I would have to do in order to help L. if she decided she needed help. We agreed that I could help with basic types of math questions, but I was in general not going to be of much use and L. would have to understand she was on her own. I'm thinking this was perceived as a benefit of studying physics. All I have to say is thank goodness for the Internet.  But this isn't really what this post is about, but merely an introduction as to why L. had a physics textbook to be laughing at. Yes, laughing... with enjoyment. This seemed unusual based on I did know about physics. When L. showed me the paragraph in question, I agreed that it was indeed pretty amusing. Here it is: "The conversions required by the following examples do not have...

I mentioned last week that H. has decided to work on math again. We got stuck last spring when her book started to introduce multiplication. She was having none of it and I wasn't going to push it. So when she wanted to go back to math, I did need to take a deep breath. But a break can do wonders and so far she is managing the difference between the number of times we add something together versus the amount of each thing added together. (For instance 3+3+3+3=12 is the same as 4, threes or 4x3=12.) The ability to deal with a number that doesn't actually appear in the addition version is new. It's kind of a big deal.  I was reminded earlier today how far we've come when I was discussing the the idea of numeracy with a homeschooling mother. It made me remember those years where H. could identify and understand only the numbers one to four. Five was beyond her. I actually had come to resign myself to the idea we might never get beyond four. (Note that numeracy, the idea of...

It was a bad news day yesterday between yet another school shooting and China announcing that they have closed their inter country adoption program. I don't actually have words yet for either, but maybe by tomorrow I'll have something to say about the latter. We'll see.  Instead, I'll talk about our first day of school. As first days go, this one was pretty smooth. Everyone worked on math. Sometimes being confronted with math after a break is... challenging. This went smoother than I had expected. H. even decided to do some math. I had decided that school for her would be driven by her own choices. Towards the end of last year, we reached something in her math book that she didn't immediately understand, so she announced she was done. I said okay and she put it away. I didn't even mention it to her this morning, but of her own accord, she had her math book and wanted to know what to do. I'm happy to report that the thing which was so upsetting last spring wa...

As usual, we kicked off our school year by going on an outing. This year we went to the Brookfield Zoo with friends. It was a gorgeous day, sunny and not too hot. I accidentally left my phone in the car, so the few pictures I have are taken by others.  K. and L. The marmoset was a particular favorite today and we spent a long time watching him.  The Canada geese were very interested in our picnic lunch, but though a couple came fairly close, none were aggressive.  And the sleeping snow leopard was so cute and fluffy. The sleeping position also made us laugh because it was nearly the same way that Juniper sleeps.  It was a great day and everyone enjoyed it. Tomorrow morning we get up and start the official school year. The first day is far more discussing plans and sorting out our schedule more than anything else. Some people are not overly excited, but I think even they will survive. This also means I will be beginning year 28 of my homeschooling career. 

We started reading A Suitable Boy by Vikram Seth this week at teatime. I had forgotten how many characters the book is filled with and how many of them appear in the opening chapters. Even my very experienced listeners were having a little difficulty keeping everyone straight. I ended up paying more than once to review who a character was and how they were related to everyone else. There are some family trees in the front of the book for reference and I may yet photocopy them so everyone has a reference sheet. I think by today everyone had begun to find their footing.  I also want to preach a brief sermon about how valuable reading good books out loud can be. It is more than just hearing a good story and becoming familiar with the sound of written English. It also provides myriad of opportunities for learning other things as well right at that moment.  The book is set in India in 1950, several years after independence from Britain. So far, in the four days we have read aloud, ...

Usually about this time in the summer I'm writing vaguely whiney, anxious posts about needing to plan for the next school year and wondering if I have time to get everything done. Not this year. I have moved into unfamiliar homeschooling territory with just sophomores on up doing school. It's not that I'm not familiar with homeschooling high school, but that I'm unfamiliar with homeschooling only high school. So we're trying something new this year. It is definitely time to start giving the responsibility for education over to my high schoolers. I find that by doing this in high school, when I'm there and can offer support, then when they head to college being in charge of themselves is little different.  I presented my new plan at dinner tonight and told everyone to start thinking about what they would be interested in learning this year. Then we could sort things out through August and be ready for school in September. Everyone was pretty amenable to the idea....

I'm more tired than normal. On Monday and today I spent all day at a weaving class learning a weave structure that was pretty cognitively challenging to figure out initially. Yesterday I caught up on the things that didn't get done on Monday and had dinner with two good friends, putting me home a little later than usual.  But does being tired stop me from writing a slightly opinionated post? No, no it doesn't. It is actually the catalyst as my margin in a bit thinner than usual.  And what has irritated me today? The idea that to educate a child, all you need is a good curriculum. As I read about new homeschoolers asking over and over (and over and over and over) for a good curriculum that is going to teach their children everything they need, I'm actually surprised I haven't started to scream out loud at the insanity I it all.  Because here's the deal, while a good curriculum can be a fantastic tool, without a good teacher (and for homeschoolers, I'm assumin...