Sudoku

This is what my 11 yo did last night in bed before he went to sleep.



My husband loves Sudokus.  He does them to relax.  I, personally, find them very frustrating.  I tend to go more with stuff like Scrabble and crossword puzzles, but he likes numbers.  He graduated to Ken-Kens and then Kakuros.

Becky learned to form numbers by sitting on her daddy's lap and filling in the squares with him.  Now he plays his games on his ipad.  Often on a Sunday afternoon, you'll find him on the sofa with one or two children working on a Sudoku or Kakuro together.

So it is only natural that my son would think Sudoku was a great thing to do before bed.  By the way, I just happened to pull this book off shelf  the other day, after about a year of residence there; the book was partially filled in quite a while ago and then shelved and now it is recirculating.

Here's an article talking about how great Sudokus are for your brain.

Whiteboards

One simple thing that has inspired and helped us so much on our unschooling journey, is the presence of a couple of whiteboards in our house.  Blackboards are good too.

When I was growing up we had a big blackboard in what we called our Rec Room.  It was fastened to one wall and we played school all the time with it.  This is how I learned to read the summer before I went to Kindergarten.  My sister, who is 4.5 years older than me taught me, using some old readers we had floating around the house and that blackboard.  She just mimicked what her teachers had done and I learned to read!  We had that blackboard for decades and we did all kinds of things with it:  I loved to draw on it, we wrote down song lyrics or poems, we wrote notes to each other, we played hangman, etc.  When we were putting on shows for our parents, it became the marquee announcing the show!

When my kids were little and we were just starting on our homeschooling adventure, I had my husband paint the back of our kitchen door with chalkboard paint.  I used it to teach the kids phonics and simple math problems.  It was so handy and made teaching so easy.  I could do short little lessons while cooking!  And the kids liked writing with chalk much, much better than sitting at the table with a pencil and workbook.  I discovered I could write something there on the board and they'd study it on their own over breakfast.

Then we moved to our current house.  I put up a small chalkboard but it kept falling down!  Then we finished the basement and I had my husband put up a great big white board down there.  When I was feeling schooly that area was our 'classroom' and when I was feeling unschooly it was our 'learning center'!  LOL!  But the truth was I didn't like going down into the basement very much so it didn't get that much use.  Now it is pretty much abandoned.

The old abandoned white board has worn this grinning set of braces for many months now!

Instead we got one of those chalkboard/whiteboard easels.  That has been such a blessing!  It has gotten so much use over the years.  It is pretty beat up.  We use it a lot.  Sometimes for short lessons in math and Latin, sometimes just for fun.

The current state of the white board easel.  A little comic by Becky.

The flip side:  I think a friend of my 11 yo did these drawings.

My two youngest have little whiteboards by their beds.  They often write on them.

Now of course you do have to be careful with whiteboards.  I like to buy the low-odor variety of markers.  If you have little ones who might decide to decorate your walls with a marker, you probably want to put them somewhere hard to access.  One thing I've found for that sort of thing, is to keep all the markers on top of the fridge or some such place and then just take them down when your child requests and you can supervise any little ones OR when the little ones are napping or perhaps strapped into a high chair!  And one must be diligent about putting those caps back on tightly!

So something simple like having a white board or chalkboard to write/draw on has really encouraged my kids on a path towards literacy, been a wonderful creative outlet for them and is also very handy when I, the parent, want to impart some knowledge in a quick informal way.

35 Gifts Your Children Will Never Forget

This is beautiful.  Thanks to Willa for directing me to it via her blog.

Hannah

I wasn't very fair when I snapped this shot!  I just aimed the camera at her!  She's 20 years old now and a sophmore at college.

Interesting and Postive (mostly!) Article

http://www.stanfordalumni.org/news/magazine/2000/novdec/articles/homeschooling.html

Beautiful Illustrations

One of my favorite bloggers, Willa, has started a new blog.  It is a lovely idea.  Enjoy!

Unschooling Moments of the Week 11/26/10

I was really bad at taking pictures this week.

Monday - Becky and I went to a class given by the National Building Museum called City by Design.  It was totally cool.  The kids learned all about what a city needs and then they built all kinds of buildings and put them out on a huge rug that had streets and blocks, a river and a lake on it.  Becky built this:

She brought it home and has built a little area in her room for fairies.

Monday afternoon - Becky had her American Heritage Girls meeting.  They worked on their nature notebooks and also learned Christmas carols to sing at a nursing home.  Becky was so proud that they were learning Adeste Fideles in Latin.  "Mommy," she told me excitedly afterwards, "we're learning Latin!"

Here's her nature notebook:

Sean was home all day with the other boys.  Josh had lots of high school work to do and Will was studying like crazy for his CLEP test on Tuesday.  I thought Sean would be really bored, but he did okay.  He read some more in St. Patrick's Summer Catechism and Li Lun, Boy of Courage and he did some of his next math lesson too.

Tuesday - Josh and I had Latin but there was no art class, so Becky and Sean wound up going over to play at a friends' house in the morning.  Josh and I both got A's on our Latin tests!

Josh didn't have Biology in the afternoon but he found out he got a 94% on his last test.  Yippee!

Will took his CLEP test on Literary Analysis and got a score of 76 out of a possible 80!

It was a good week for tests!

Wednesday was all about getting ready for Thanksgiving.  Except that Josh had a session with his math tutor a day early (they usually meet on Thursdays).  He was actually really looking forward to it.  She was going to teach him about logarithms which is something he was really curious about.  Becky had her VT.

Thursday was Thanksgiving.  I hardly took any pictures.  Here are the two youngest playing with their corresponding in age cousins.

One thing that has been developing lately is everybody is into Rick's ipad including moi!  I am obsessed with playing Scrabble on it.  Sean loves playing Rayman on it because the controls are so much easier.  Becky loves to play sundry things on it.  She's also gotten into Scrabble!

I realize this blog really focuses on Becky a lot!  I guess because she's the youngest.  Also, she tends to do things that are more easily photographic?  Anyway,  I must make an effort to include ALL my kids.

And finally, my oldest daughter, Hannah is home from college.  I don't even have a current picture of her.  I'm determined to take one and post it! But I have to wait for her to wake up!

Fundamentals of Unschooling

When people are first intrigued by unschooling it is usually because they recognize the basic fact that children are natural born learners and that they learn much faster and with much less conflict if they are allowed to pursue the things that have ignited their interests.  But I have found that a lot of folks are stymied by how to actually put unschooling principles into practice. I, myself, struggled with this for many years.  I find that many unschoolers are into deconstructing formerly held assumptions.  They seem to concentrate on working through the process of exploding concepts about children and freedom instead of focusing on the 'how to' aspect.  They also tend to be ideological in their approach to unschooling which can make them state things in absolutes.  Or they tend to talk in rather abstract maxims which are hard to translate into nuts and bolts, daily practicalities.

I am a nuts and bolts kind of person.  So here is my take (and your mileage may vary, because ultimately everyone finds their own way) on how to unschool:

1.  Relationship - the very core of unschooling is your relationship with your child.  Work on cultivating a close, warm, affectionate, open, joyful, intimate, honest relationship with your child.  Know your children deeply and be responsive to their development.  As a Catholic Unschooler I think I need to openly work on cultivating my relationship with God.  Actually, I think the proper order of relationships is God, spouse, children.  If you have vibrant relationship with God, it will spill over into your other relationships.  A healthy loving relationship with your spouse makes a beautiful home for your children to grow up in.

2.  Modeling - the job of the unschooling parent is to model good habits and a love for learning.  Let your children see that you are always trying to deepen and expand your own education.  Eventually, they will follow suit.

3.  Develop wholesome, healthy, practical rhythms for your family - chaos doesn't usually breed good things.  Like the Bible says:  there is a season for everything.  Let this rhythm develop organically based on you and your spouse's natural proclivities, external obligations that shape your day and week (like when dad has to be at work, etc) and what allows good habits to develop when it comes to the basics like prayer, sleep, hygiene, good nutrition, exercise, etc.

4.  Create a learning atmosphere in your home - surround your children with things that will broaden, inform and intrigue them.  Go to the library regularly or give them access to books in some other way.   Read to them.  Put up pictures, posters and quotes on your walls that will attract and edify.  Have lots of stimulating conversations.   Listen to all kinds of music.  Watch movies, lectures and educational TV together.  Play games. Go on field trips and nature walks.  Create projects together.  Do science experiments. Take classes. Join clubs  Google stuff.  Raise pets. Attend concerts and plays. Volunteer together.  Garden. Travel.  Pursue hobbies, etc, etc.

5.  Patience is key.  Sometimes we can go through slumps.  It happens to everybody.  People get sick or plans fall through or sometimes life just falls into a lull.  People need both busy and quiet times to be balanced and to be able to absorb and process what they are learning and experiencing.  Some children develop academic skills quickly and others bloom later.  So try to be patient with life's pacing and your children's unfolding development.

6.  Deal with the issues your family encounters - if you have to do end of the year testing or present a portfolio to your county then tell the kids that and shape your learning atmosphere to accommodate that aspect.  People have all sorts of creative ways to handle these things!   If your in laws are really nervous about their beloved grandchildren's education (which by the way, I think is a completely natural response) then deal with that graciously and realistically.  If your husband thinks math can't be unschooled then you might have to compromise.  If you are uncomfortable with not approaching a subject more formally, bring that to your family's table and work out a solution.

7.  Journal your days - this will keep insecurities at bay and will make you realize the tremendous amount of learning that goes on daily.

8.  Respect your child's learning style - some kids thrive on order.  They love workbooks.  Or they go through a stage where they love workbooks and then they change on you!  Some kids want to do everything themselves, others want you to sit right next to them and guide them.  Some kids work best in short focused spurts of time, others disappear for hours working on something huge.  Some kids learn to read by writing, some by just sitting next to you while you read to them, others want you to teach them.  Some kids are really hands on and others just want to read or talk.  Some kids show a natural talent for something early on, others seem to be generalists.  Some kids are introverts, some are extroverts.

9.  Have regular talks or meetings to assess and tweak what's going on in your household.

10.  Cultivate a spirit of gratitude in your own heart.  This will lead to joy and wonder which are prime characteristics of those who love to learn.

More Free Curricula

Cool blog that also happens to have a list of free education resources.  H/T to Jess and the Free Curricula thread going on at the Well Trained Mind board right now.

I like the beginning paragraph: 

All education is self-education.  Period.  It doesn’t matter if you’re sitting in a college classroom or a coffee shop.  We don’t learn anything we don’t want to learn.

To me, the fact that people from all over provide FREE education to other people who'll they'll never even know reflects a profound aspect of mankind capsulized by Aristotle so many years ago:  All men by nature desire to know. And people instinctively recognize this and respond generously to each other.

Latin Advent Calendar

I got this link in an email from Classical Academic Press.  We use Latin for Children and love it!  It is a (mostly!) painless way to learn Latin.  I love how creative CAP is when it approaches teaching; challenging and FUN!

I am hoping to put this calendar together before Sunday, the first day of Advent.  Hopefully, a child or two will help me.  Right now, though, I've got to get my Thanksgiving turkey stuffed and in the oven!

Happy Thanksgiving, everyone!  Deo gratias!

Wordless Wednesday, 11/24/10

My 9 year old's deer bone collection!

Mouth Noise Art

One rabbit trail my kids have gone on, especially, my 11 year old, as a result of their enjoyment of animated cartoons and videogames is an interest in voice actors.  They pay attention to the people who do the voices for the different characters.  They admire Mel Blanc and Frank Oz.  This has also extended to creating sound effects.  They learned about Fred Newman from watching Between the Lions.   My 11 yo frequents Fred Newman's site and had taught himself a lot of sound effects noises as a result.  Sometimes it can be a little annoying to live with, I'll admit.  But right now it is his passion.  He and his older brother also think  Dee Bradley Baker rocks.

A while ago we all got into Bobby Mcferrin.  My 11 year old took it one step further and is now very much into beatboxing a la Taylor McFerrin.  He works at it frequently, though we do keep requesting him not to beatbox at the dinner table!  He knows all these technical terms and he sounds like a speech therapist when he talks about vocalized or aspirated sounds and using your voice box, etc.  It actually takes a lot of thought, effort and practice to get those sounds and beat right!

All this creativity with mouth noises reminds me of my favorites:  Mel Torme and Ella Fitzgerald.  I loved scat when I was growing up.  I saw Mel Torme's son, Steve in concert at a nightclub a long time ago.  I also saw Ella once.  I had lawn tickets at an outdoor theater.  It was pouring rain the whole time and I totally ruined my clothes standing there but no one left because of the weather.  If you were a fan of Ella, a little rain wasn't going to stop you!

My kids enjoy scat as well.  Currently my 15 yo is into Scat Man John.

 So from watching such shows as Bugs Bunny, Phineas and Ferb, Between the Lions and getting into video games, my kids have explored all kinds of things:  animation, production, music, etc.

This listing here is just a small slice of all the interests, passions and learning that have unfolded from watching some TV shows; a little example of how TV has broadened and enriched our family life.

Gilbert!

When this magazine arrives at our house, I have to wrestle for it with my 18 year old son.  We both love it and want to read it cover to cover right away!

This magazine has gotten my son started into Chesterton.   He's listened to Orthodoxy and The Man Who Was Thursday on audio and has been reading Father Brown stories.  All as a direct result of this magazine.

So if you want to give your teenager a nice stocking stuffer this Christmas I highly recommend this witty, intellectually engaging, charming magazine.

Classic English Language Arts

My 15 year old son, another teen and myself all meet about once a week to study history, literature and writing together.  One resource we are currently using is Robert Einarsson's Traditional English Sentence Style workbook.  We are enjoying and appreciating this resource very much.  It explains everything very clearly, concisely, systematically and yet deeply.  And Prof. Einarsson provides it for free!  I think that is awfully generous of him.  Thank you, Professor Einarsson!

Thoughts on TV (Part 3)

In the last two posts I tried to establish that:

 1) a lot of TV consumption is problematic and

2) life holds natural limitations on how much TV children consume.  These limitations come from the parents lifestyle choices, the daily obligations that call one away from the TV, how the parents model their own attitudes and practices when it comes to TV viewing and lastly, discussions among the family members and day to day diligence on the part of the family to remember to use prudence in their TV viewing choices.

Prudence is a crucial word!  Prudence is one of the four cardinal virtues (the others being fortitude, justice, and temperance).  Cultivating these four virtues allows one to live a moral life.  I think of prudence as practical wisdom.  One way children learn the virtue of prudence is to be allowed to practice making choices within the safety of their home.  Learning how to watch TV prudently is a life skill in this day and age, I think.

But let's go back to to the unschooling assumption that a child can't self regulate unless given freedom.  I want to examine this.  I don't know if this is always true.  I think it might be frequently true, but from my own life experiences, I don't think I buy that it is always true.

For example, my husband's family put no limits on TV watching.  In fact, his father was a mailman and when he'd get home in the early afternoon, the TV would go on and stay on.  My husband was allowed a TV in his room.  His parents' home was the kind of house where there was always a TV flickering in the background.  And they also didn't seem to censor much at all (though back in the days of just network TV, that wasn't the issue it is today.)  I, on the other hand, grew up in a household where we were not allowed to watch TV during the school week.  The one exception was that we got to watch Bewitched on Thursday evenings after dinner. On the weekends we were allowed some TV.   Saturday morning cartoons were nirvana for me and my sisters.  Something we really looked forward to!  Sunday mornings we usually got up and ate a big breakfast and didn't go to Mass until noon, so we'd often watch movies (if there was a good one) on Sunday morning.  They always seemed to be playing Tarzan or at least that is my most vivid memory.  Sunday evenings were a TV tradition.  My dad made milkshakes for us and we sat and watched Wild Kingdom and Disney. This actually spurred me to get my homework done before then.  I hated the feeling of it hanging over my head when I was trying to enjoy my milkshake and TV.   In the summer we did watch more TV during the day when it was hot (only a couple of rooms had A/C in the house I grew up in.)  But the point is that there were strictly enforced limits on when, what and how much TV we were allowed to watch.

So we both grew up in different households with different approaches to TV and yet neither of us are the types to watch a lot of TV.  My husband and I both tend to just watch a few particular shows we like.  And there really aren't all that many of them.  My husband watches a little bit more than I do.  We both like the convenience of being able to record shows and watch them when we have time.  So somehow we got to pretty much the same place even though our upbringings were different.

I did not rebel against my parents TV rules.  I understood why they didn't want me watching so much TV.  They wanted me to run around outside, or play in the big playroom they built for us, or read, or do other wholesome things children ought to do!  I think that while my husband found his own center in terms of his approach to TV, probably very much in line with unschooling philosophy, I found my center because I developed sensible TV viewing habits as a child in my home.  And I am okay with that!

And this is where I have a real problem with the unschooler's assertion that a child will self-regulate if given enough freedom.  This may or may not be true.  Some children will self-regulate.  I've got two of those kind!  Some children will really struggle with this.  I've got three of those!  I think each child is an individual with strengths and weaknesses.  I think sometimes freedom in TV consumption can play into a child's weakness and instead of self regulating which leads to free choices, it can lead to bad habits that a child can't break free from.

In my own little experiments in giving my children much freedom, I've seen how too much TV consumption brought out the worst in their characters.  It made them materialistic, selfish, rude and cranky!  However, we don't encounter these problems when the freedom to watch TV is seasoned with parental prudence.

This is already too long.  I still haven't gotten to how TV has blessed me/us!  Maybe next time!

Unschooling Moments of the Week - 11/19/10

Becky enjoyed playing with some pipe cleaners this week.  This is a muscle man on the beach with a girl in a bathing suit feeling his biceps (Don't know where she got this concept but I had to shut myself in the bathroom to cover up my guffaws for a while after she explained it to me!!).  The muscle man has a dog on a leash.  And unbeknownst to the girl there is a little mouse by her feet.  So what do you think will happen when the dog spies the mouse????

This is a man on a flying trapeze with a handy dandy pipe cleaner net beneath him!

This is a mountain climber scaling our dog's pen!

This week had a lot of ups and downs.  Sean, Becky and Will all came down with nasty colds AGAIN!  I keep pushing zinc and echinacea at them but it doesn't seem to be helping.  We've been fighting and trading colds for weeks, it seems. I am about fed up!!!  Here's a picture of Sean playing with the accordion app on his dad's ipad.  It is very cool.  Sean longs to learn accordion.

So poor Sean came down with a fever over the weekend.  Becky was still okay so we attended our 4H sewing project which was very cool.

Monday, though, Becky wasn't feeling so well, so we kind of laid low.  We missed Art class Tuesday morning.  However, we did make it to the 4H business meeting Tuesday evening.  Wednesday we went to our support group's monthly meeting where Becky showed off a monkey she had hand sewn.  The kids put on a show and tell every month.

She gave it to Sean as a present.

Thursday. . . . I have no idea what happened yesterday.  My back was really hurting me.  I spent a lot of time driving the older kids to and fro for things and limping in and out of grocery stores and banks, etc

As for the high schooler:  He went to a football game with his dad on Monday night.  He rode the subway solo for the first time down to his dad's office.  They then went to the game.  The traffic was awful and they got there late.  It was cold and rainy and their team lost in a really humiliating way.  He didn't get home until almost 1 a.m.  We had to get up and to Latin class where he could hardly keep his eyes open.   Next he went to Biology.  He came home and had to do some math homework as well.  High school is tough!

He did not get the history and literature stuff we had planned to do this week (partly my fault; I'm being lazy and behind too!).  He did get all his math done for his tutor.  But he had another Biology test this Friday which he had not even begun to prepare for.  He's having trouble with Biology even though he really likes the subject.  It is a tough class.  He got an 87 on the last test.  What brought him down was his essay.  He really needs to work on his essay writing skills.  So anyway he crammed for this test.  This time he focused really hard on the essay by writing out an essay beforehand (she'd given them the general topic).  He was supposed to describe the digestive system, making sure to use all the vocabulary words.  He worked really hard on this and he thinks he got full marks on it or close to full marks.  However, on the multiple choice/fill in the blank section he only got a 78.  (The teacher had quickly checked it before he left class.).  I do think he's learning a lot about how he works (he's slow and methodical and needs to allow a lot of time for things) and he is learning that he needs to plot out a schedule for each week and STICK to it.  That's the hardest part!  (For me too!).

Anyway, this weekend he gets to go on retreat with his teen group from church, so I think he'll have fun with that.

Friday morning - I did finally get some penmanship, math and Latin done with Sean and Becky.  Becky started reading My Father's Dragon on her own initiative.  Sean is reading Li Lun, Lad of Courage.  I suggested it.  He seems okay with it.  He's also read a couple of chapter of St. Patrick's Summer Catechism.

So much more went on but I can't think of it right now.  I need a nap!

Thoughts on TV (Part 2)

In the last post, I established that too much TV consumption can indeed be bad for children.  I'd like to unpack the unschooler's typical response to a person new to unschooling who is hesitant about letting go of restrictions on TV viewing for their children.  Keep in mind that I'm an unschooler and we watch TV in our home!

The typical response to someone's question about TV viewing are as follows:

You have to give children real choices in order for them to learn balance.  Or to rephrase it: a child will never learn to self-regulate unless you give them the freedom to do so.

Well, first of all, this does not address the questioner's concern but actually subtly changes the question.  The questioner is worried about the effects of too much TV and the answerer sidesteps that and seems to be more concerned with giving children real choices.  Personally, I think it is better to acknowledge that yes, too much TV consumption could have harmful effects but that in the unschooling worldview this is less dangerous to the child than denying them the ability to have control over this aspect of their life.

Is this true?  Is denying the child control over their TV consumption more dangerous then the negative effects of lots of TV watching?  I would assert that the questioner is concerned over the impact that too much TV viewing will have on the child's character and development, whereas the answerer is more concerned with the child's autonomy.  So they are not quite talking the same language.  To the unschooler, the child's freedom is the basis of the child's character and development and therefore until that is allowed, the other things that might influence the child are seen as secondary in importance.  I think unschoolers have a point here.  I see it especially as a Christian.  God gives us free will, even though He loves us unconditionally and our wrong choices may lead us to a life of eternal damnation!  In fact it is because of his unconditional love that he allows us this freedom!  I think that shows how important freedom is!  However, God also sends us revelation and grace to help us make the right choices.  We have to openly partake of those gifts of His in order to learn what the right choices are.  So God, as a parent figure, which is certainly how He revealed Himself to us, (if you are a Christian) gives us guidance through revelation and grace, through His love, to help us grow in freedom.

So how can a parent do the same for their child when it comes to something like TV viewing (which is seeming trivial but really isn't at all!)  We need to give them freedom but also our own version of revelation and grace.  I think unschoolers have a good point when they say that arbitrary rules about TV can deny the child the ability to make their own decisions about how much TV they watch.  I think it can lead children to sneak TV watching or to resent the restrictions put on them thus leading to alienation from the parent.  When a child breaks a rule in the family, the typical response by the parent is to get punitive about it.  This usually impacts the relationship between parent and child.  I think children once out on their own can unconsciously or consciously rebel against their childhood rules and get into bad TV viewing habits.  They may over consume because they never had the chance to learn self-regulation.

I think the pivotal word here is 'arbitrary.'  Being arbitrary is not the proper way to model God's help to us.  I think when parents are being arbitrary they may be denying the children the right to grow in self-control.  But there are lots of variables that enter into family life when it comes to making lifestyle choices.  For instance what if the parents despise TV and they simply won't  have one in their household.  I knew a woman who was like this.  Growing up the TV was always on and it grated on her nerves terribly.  She decided when she had her own home she would not have a TV in it.  Fortunately for her, her husband agreed.

Or what if one parent knows that she herself doesn't have control over her TV viewing habits, feels that she is rather addicted to it, and therefore would prefer to live without one.  I know people who use TV as a drug almost to hide from the world.  It's healthier for them to actually do without completely.

What if the parents are trying to simplify their lives and think not having a TV would do that.

Well, the child born into such a household simply isn't going to have the opportunity to learn this particular aspect of self-regulation, but that's okay in my book.  They'll get to learn self-discipline in some other way.  My kids don't go to school, so they don't live with the 'have to get up and get someplace on time every morning ethic' that I grew up with.  I could be afraid that they'll never learn this ethic because they didn't have to deal with it in childhood.  And maybe they will have trouble getting up to go to a job someday as a result, but I don't think this fear should spur me, the parent, to decide my child ought to attend school.  We made the decision to homeschool and my poor children have to live with our family lifestyle choice.  Hopefully things will work out for them!

But the questioner who is asking about unrestricted TV viewing has probably already accepted the TV as part of her life.  When she thinks of lifting limits she has this fear-based vision of her children never getting off the couch and their minds being stuffed full of advertisements and crass behaviors.  And of never having an original thought again in their lives!  However this isn't really a realistic vision!  There are many factors that naturally limit TV viewing.

1)  The family culture and natural rhythm of that particular family's life  impact control over something like TV consumption.  For instance, if the family lives on a farm and absolutely must get up and tend to the farm animals and whatever they are growing, every day.  They simply don't have the option of sitting down in front of the tube much.  Or perhaps the family runs a business out of their home that the children participate in.  Or perhaps the family is involved in a lot of outside activities such as classes, volunteer work, co-ops.  What if the family can't afford to pay for cable or satellite and just gets a couple of stations as a result.  Well, that will limit consumption too.  So all these factors naturally control the amount of TV consumption but not in an arbitrary way.

2) Another factor that can limit the child's TV watching is the role model the parents play.  Do the kids see the parents watching lots of TV?  Is there a TV in the parents' bedroom?  Does a parent get up and turn on the TV first thing in the morning?  Does the parent use the TV to relax in the evening?  Children watch their parents and model their own behavior on them.  If children see their parents taking time to read a book, or take a walk or attend to housekeeping or work on hobbies, the child will pick up on that.  So if a parent models responsible TV consumption, this also will tend to teach the child self-control.

3)  Another important factor is the parent and child's interactions about the TV.  Does the parent talk about possible negative effects of too much viewing?  Does the parent present other attractive activities for the child to do in lieu of TV watching?  Do they ask the child what they think?  A parent can say something like:

"If you are going to watch TV now, may I read to you after lunch?"

Or "Let's go to the park now and you can watch the show later."

Or "Right now we've got to run to the grocery store so we can make dinner for the new mommy with twins like we promised, but later on we can have some hot cocoa together and watch the movie"

Or, "Sweetheart, you've been watching TV for a while now, when do you plan to go outside to get some fresh air?"

So all these factors figure into how much TV is actually getting watched.  The amount of TV watching can vary from season to season and from week to week or even day to day.  If the weather is lousy outside or someone is sick, consumption can go up.  If the weather is lovely and everybody's healthy, chances are other things have come up that are more appealing than TV watching.

All this also applies to computers and video games by the way.

Next time, I'll post about how TV has been a blessing to our family!
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Thoughts on TV (Part 1)

I was over lurking at the Radical Christian Unschoolers forum.  Or maybe it is Christian Radical Unschoolers!  I can't remember.  Anyway, I don't usually hang out there but I was avoiding writing my NaNoWriMo novel so I was surfing the net.  Well, the age old (relatively speaking!!!) question of kids watching too much TV was asked.  It is a very frequent topic on these forums (fora???), as far as I can see.  Anytime I dip into any unschooling forum it seems to be a hot topic.  It usually goes like this.

Someone new to the idea of unschooling:  But if I let my kids do whatever they want, they'll just spend all their time watching TV.   Isn't that bad for them?

Someone who already unschools:  Kids need to self-regulate.  If you impose arbitrary limitations on them, you are not giving them real choices.  You have to trust the child.

This same thing goes on in many variations.  So many people are worried about too much TV (or videogames, etc).  It is very hard for them to wrap their minds around the unschooling perspective on this.  In one conversation a woman is asking about how she wants her children to have balance in their lives and if they spend all day watching tv, won't that be counter to that?  The answer she gets is that unless children can make real choices they will never be able to find balance.  Another person answers, in part, 'where is the harm in watching a lot of TV?'

So here are my thoughts on this hot topic!  Feel free to disagree!

First of all, I'd like to address the harm in watching too much TV:

1.  Obesity - sitting on the couch all day is bad for your health, especially growing bodies that ought to be up and moving!

2.  Vitamin D deficiency - this is a growing problem because folks spend too much time indoors.

3.  TV is a passive activity.  It does something to the way your synapses connect in your brain!  Too much TV can literally change your brain waves!

4.  All TV is propaganda or didactic in one way or another.  Letting your kids watch lots of TV is basically letting them be raised by pop culture created by Madison Ave, people who see your child as not human but as a market to be exploited.  Or programs created by folks who have a decidedly different point of view than a Christian one.

5.  Watching too much TV can make kids cranky because they get all this adrenalin stimulation but none of the accompanying physical exercise that ought to go with it.

6.  I have observed that a lot of TV watching makes kids think their own entertainment is the highest good.  Everything else in life comes in second.

7.  There are often quite objectionable things on TV.  It becomes a problem to always be censoring or explaining morally objectionable stuff.

8.  If you are into attachment parenting there is a danger in kids getting too attached to TV and not attached to you!  You can counter this by watching TV with your child, I suppose, to a certain extent, but if your child wants to watch lots of TV and you have other things to do, there is the real possibility that the TV becomes the babysitter.

9.  It makes life more complicated in terms of trying to get yourself or other children to various things like sports, dance lessons, play dates, etc.    When the TV show ends (or when you can safely pause videogames!) becomes the determiner of when things can get done.  This very often can lead to tension and resentment.

So there ya go.  Nine reasons why a lot of TV really is harmful for you!

Sir Ken Robinson

I had never heard of this guy but someone on a yahoo list I'm on just posted this animation.  I love it!  Real food for thought.

Check this video out.

Wordless Wednesday

Playing the 'comic game.'  They are writing a comic strip, alternating drawing panels.  

Unschooling Grammar: Parts of Speech

One thing I appreciate about unschooling is how efficient it can be.  One thing that annoys me about traditional schooling is how inefficient it is!

Take your standard grammar program.  The way, year after year, the same things get retaught.

One thing I've discovered is that it is easy as pie for your kids to learn the parts of speech without all that drudgery.  It involves two resources:

1.  A parts of speech poster you stick somewhere on a wall so the kids can see it.  A poster like this perhaps.
http://www.amazon.com/Eight-Parts-Speech-Chart-Charts/dp/0768210704

Our poster is actually one that our Latin teacher made many years.  So you don't even have to buy one.  You could sit down and make one up yourself!  And maybe even your child could watch or even help you with it!

The second vital element are these:  http://store.madlibs.com/

If you begin playing Mad Libs with your child from ages say 4 to 7, they will learn their parts of speech without any drudgery or focused lessons from you.

We've usually got a Mad Lib book open on our infamous family room coffee table where strewing abounds.  We'll go months not doing any and then we'll go a for a good stretch where we do a few a week.

Touchstones

This is a program that we used last year in a very informal co-op with some other unschoolish families.  I kind of miss it this year.  It was fun getting together regularly with liked minded moms and I appreciated the positive experience my teens were having.

This program's goal is to teach and guide students into learning how to think via Socratic discussions.  I led the youngest group.  I did use the program from October through December but I grew uncomfortable with it after a while.  It was too open ended.  Young kids are in a formation period and need clear, safe answers.  They don't do well with ambiguity, I don't think.  I thought the program was trying to rush kids into analytical thinking before they were developmentally ready for it.  It seemed a real strain and the kids weren't having that much fun.  The only lesson they liked was a picture study.  That got them going, but otherwise it felt artificial.  So after Christmas we changed our meeting to a little art club.

The middle school aged kids and the high schoolers continued, though.  I wasn't involved in the middle school group because I didn't have any kids that fell in that age group.  They did seem to have trouble getting those kids going.  It could be that just some of the kids were shy and there was one particular student who was very outspoken and emotional so that became a little strained too.  So perhaps it was just the chemistry of that particular mix of kids.  But again, I think it might be that the kids were just not developmentally ready for it.

The most successful group was the high schoolers, and frankly, I think this is because Socratic methodology and analytical thinking are completely what a teenager's mind is all about!  Asking questions and wrestling with possible answers!  The ages ranged from 14 to 18.  These teens had enough experience behind them and enough information to draw on so that they didn't feel threatened by others countering their views. And their minds actively sought to distinguish and define ideas.  The little tidbit of thought or the ethical issue presented engaged them and got them excited and really thinking.  It was often exhilarating!

The best thing though was what I saw my teens doing after the meeting.  They'd bring up the discussion later with the family at the dinner table.  I'd see them reading Wikipedia on Francis Bacon or thumbing through an old copy of the Dialogues of Plato leftover from my college days.

Now other people might have different experiences with this program.  You might find the elementary and middle school levels are great.  But I really liked it at the high school level for several reasons:

1.  It was a fun time hanging out with other teens!

2.  It honed the students' ability to discuss provocative issues politely.

3.  It enhanced critical thinking.

4.  It didn't require lots of homework from the teens.  They simply came in, read an excerpt or article and then  were asked questions to get them thinking.  The atmosphere was relaxed and encouraging.

5.  It whetted their appetites to learn more on their own.

This last reason really resonated with my unschooling heart.  I was glad we weren't doing some on line class where the kids would have to slog through a course on Aristotle or read volumes of dense language they weren't really into.  To me that's what college is for!  LOL!  I can see that really burdening and turning off a teen.  Not all, of course; some kids are very academically oriented and thrive on that approach.  But mine wouldn't.  Instead the program, in a very enjoyable way, got my kids interested in philosophical and ethical issues and made them want to search out more knowledge on their own.

I liked that.

From the Top

We enjoy listening to this radio show and have watched some of the TV shows as well.  I just found out it has its own website!

Aesop's Fables

We had one of those naturally unfolding unit studies with Aesop's Fables.

We went to see a show put on by Jim West's Puppets.  It was a fantastic show and the kids were fascinated by both puppets and Aesop.  We got into reading Aesop's Fables.  Actually this isn't exactly the edition we have.  Ours is older and hard back and has no cd.  We also liked Ann McGovern's retellings.  We also got into Arnold Lobel's own fables. 

Finally, we had fun putting on these plays.  I highly recommend this resource even though it is rather obscure.  It is great for your own kids, playdates, play groups and co-ops.

If you the parent or an older student are interested in Aesop's Fables from a more scholarly point of view,  you might enjoy this collection of 358 of these ancient stories.

P.A.C.E

I'm posting about this resource because I am in mourning.  I've been thinking about it lately.  We used it years ago.  I wanted to pull it out and maybe use it with my younger kids and . . . .I can't find it!  Where, oh where did I put it????  This happens to me so often.  I'll think I've been organized and stored things away only to find that I didn't!

The version I had was the old one, I believe, because I don't think it was particularly "Catholic' in flavor.  But the link is to the latest edition which has been revised.  I'm tempted.  Should I buy it again????

I've decided that 'character' is going to be a theme for 2011.  I believe that I stressed this more with my older ones and haven't as much with my youngers.   And truth be told my youngers are bit spoiled, I think because, well ,because of birth order I think!  And the fact that I'm older and less energetic might have something to do with that as well.

Anyway, the way I recall using this resource is that I'd read the reading about whichever virtue we were studying as a read aloud over breakfast.  Then we'd have a discussion about it.  Then I'd read the various suggested projects to go along with it.  Sometimes the kids didn't want to do anything, but sometimes they did.  Sometimes we'd do something all together and sometimes one child would be interested in something but another child wouldn't so each would kind of go off and do their own thing.  Sometimes a child would not be interested in doing a project right then but later in the day or even the week, they'd remember about it and want to do it.  It was all good in my book.  To me presenting the idea of the virtue in a story and then discussing it was the meat of the program and everything after that was icing on the cake (to mix food metaphors!).

Long List of Free Resources!

This is a link to a post on my other blog.  This is such a great list that I feel the need to 'put it out there' as much as possible!  Have fun browsing and exploring!

Unschooling Moments of the Week (and some Schooly stuff too)

Unschooly first:  Becky and Sean made paper airplanes, flew them and then ranked them!

.

The Winner!

Becky harvested different components of hand me down doll furniture to make one beautiful doll bed!

Current most favored doll.  Her name is Mary.

Cube project from Art Class

Scratch art from art class

Our family Thanksgiving Tree.  A few more leaves have been added!

Some schooly stuff:  Seano's copywork

Becky's math

Seano's Latin

Advent School

Advent is the beginning of the new year, liturgically speaking.  For the last few years we've had 'Advent School.'  This has been emphasized in some years more than others, but usually we consciously focus on doing fun stuff and things that are preparatory for Christmas.

I've already started thinking about it and here are some of my thoughts:

Read alouds:  I've been reading aloud Bible History every morning at breakfast, though this isn't written in stone. During November, I read St. Elizabeth and the Three Crowns to B.  For Advent school I'd like to read The Little Apostle on Crutches which I got some time ago from Catholic Heritage Curriculum.  The kids and I really enjoyed King of the Golden City from CHC last Lent/Easter.  In fact we've enjoyed many of the books and resources at CHC so I am hoping The Little Apostle proves a hit also.

I also have arbitrarily announced that in December I will be reading David Copperfield aloud to anyone who wishes to hear it.  I love that book and have read it at least 3 times and now I just feel moved to share it with my family.  I think it will be a cozy winter eve book!

We do work on cursive, math and Latin anywhere from 1 to 4 days a week.  I think it would be fun to change up how we do this.  Instead of working on cursive, I thought I'd try Unjournaling; a book that keeps popping up as I cruise the homeschooling/unschooling internet world.  So maybe the time is right to try it out?  For math, I think I'm going to suggest playing math games and reading neat math literature instead of working through the textbooks as we have been doing.  For Latin, I think we might stick to the books we've got but maybe I'll try to splice in games, audio-visual stuff and more fun translating.

We'll also focus on gift-making, cleaning the house (and maybe earning some extra money for gifts), Christmas/Hannukah arts and crafts, decorating the house and focusing on the reason for the Season!

Wordless Wednesday

TVTropes

This is a newly discovered website my 15 year old is fascinated with.  It might be a bit adult so I don't recommend it for anyone under 15.  The site does warn you if you are stumbling into an area there that might be 'less than family friendly.' So you might want to check it out before your teens do.  My kids are very self-censoring, so I don't worry so much about that kind of stuff (though I do keep an eye out for any problems).  But in spite of the above caveat, the site is a very cool trove of information and analysis on every kind of story that exists!   I mean everything from classic literature to graphic novels to comic books to TV sitcoms.  If the world is telling a story in some way, shape or form it has gotten included in TVTropes.

What it basically teaches is literary analysis and critical thinking.  It's hard for me to even describe it accurately.  A trope in this sense of the word is a theme or device used in a story.  Contributors from all over the world have identified tropes and then have developed lists of the various stories that use that trope.  So under one particular trope, you'll find everything from Homer to Archie comics! It's really fascinating and fun!

Music Theory

My oldest son taught himself loads of music theory using this free website.  Enjoy!

Writeguide

One program we have used with success and will probably use in the future is Writeguide.http://www.writeguide.com/  When my older kids got to the age when we were thinking ahead to high school, and indeed, when they were actually working through their high school coursework,  I found it very hard to assess their writing in an objective way.  I either was amazed at how brilliant they were (looking at their written work through proud mama glasses!) or I would focus on everything they did wrong, like spelling and run-on sentences (overlycritical mama glasses!).  And they felt a bit of resentment too, when I tried to constructively give advice or pointed out errors.  So it was best to bring in a third party!  I looked around at lots of options and settled on Writeguide.

The number one reason why I like Writeguide is that you can choose what you want to do.  It isn't signing up for a class where the writing coach becomes a teacher assigning writing projects.  Instead they present different types of writing assignments and you can choose which ones you want to work on and how long you want to work on them.  You can also choose your topics.  I like that so much is left in the hands of the student.  It makes it very easy to design your own course of study.

The daily back and forth of the e-mails felt a little awkward at first but once you get to know your writing mentor and get used to that process, it becomes easier.  I also liked the fact that you have to send an e-mail a day because it made us focus on writing instead of procrastinating (something we are most inclined to do!).  That external structure helped us stick to our work.

My kids have enjoyed Writeguide and I think it helped them to grow and hone their writing skills.

Wonderful Unschooling Words of Wisdom

from long time unschooler Leonie.  Check out her blog.

Unschooling Moments - Thursday Journal

This is just an example of how journaling helps you see how much learning is going on even though it isn't formal.  


* Child-initiated

S up 1st (8:00) - *continues to work on recreating Flight of the Bumblebee on garageband by playing it slowly and then manipulating it digitally so it will sound right when he speeds it up.

W (8:30)*wakes up, practices guitar including his audition piece, goes to Mass

J  (9:00)*wakes himself up, showers, gets a bowl of cereal and then starts on math.  He meets with math tutor today.

B -  I wake her at 9:00 a.m., *checks e-mail, eats breakfast.

I read aloud story of Tobias in Bible History.

S reads next chapter in St. Patrick's Summer Catechism.

After breakfast *B starts looking at parts of speech poster up on wall.  This reminds her of Mad Libs.  We've been doing these off and on and there is a pad on the coffee table.  B wants S to participate so we do two Mad Libs.

B does some practice writing words that begin with f in cursive.  She does very well.

B does lesson 21 orally in Getting Started with Latin.  It explains about 1st, 2nd and 3rd person sing. and plural.  She does well.

S does list of prepositions that take the accusative in Latin.  That finishes up Ch. 25 in LfC.

B does one subtraction problem with borrowing and two expanded notation problems.  Doesn't quite get the expanded notation thing.

S copies over a paragraph about Clara Barton in cursive.  Not bad, could be neater.

W *practices piano

B and S *play with photobooth program on mac with much hilarity

J *reads web comics and looks at pics of signs from John Stewart Rally while I correct his math lessons.

B *played games on Webkinz

S does half a lesson of Saxon math

W to metro to piano lesson, J to math tutor

B *got old rug with picture of town on it.  She got out trucks and was playing 'town'

S *played with his keyboard

B and S *watched recorded Fetch with Ruff Ruffman and Phineas and Ferb.

S *practices playing Flight of the Bumblebee on the piano.   Picks out tunes on the penny whistle.

B * makes a book by cutting up pages and stapling them together.  She's drawing faces and calling it 'facebook'.

J *reading more webcomics after tutor session.

B *finished making key chain out of gimp.

S* phone call with his friend Jack.  They like creating video games together.

W * listening to The Man Who Was Thursday on audio.

S*scanned B's 'facebook' into art site he goes to.

W* practicing lots of of music

B and I work on Thanksgiving Tree poster.

J * still reading those web comics!

S* is majorly into beat boxing and making sounds a la Fred Newman.  He perfected his water drop sound.  It really sounds just like a drop of water dripping!

S is a wiz!  I asked him if he could scan a picture of me and his dad into the computer and put it on facebook and he did it.  He even edited out some spots that somehow showed up on the picture.  He's amazing.

J and I did some Latin homework.

We all put up what we are thankful for on our thanksgiving tree.

Read aloud to B and S about Numa Pompilius from the Story of the Romans.

Read Jo's Boys to B

B* in the last couple of days, B's interest in playing violin has surfaced again.  She took it out of the case and wanted to show me all the parts of the violin.  I had to guess the names and then she corrected me if I got it wrong.

W and S * W showed S Librivox which he is really excited about.  The went through the different samples, especially Shakespeare plays and listened to the different readers, laughing a lot about how the talent of the volunteer readers vary so much.

Our thanksgiving tree:

Alexander's Amazing Adventures

I am just revisiting this resource for my youngest child.  These are wonderful audio stories that teach virtues in a really clever and meaningful way.  My older kids listened to these over and over again for years.  Somehow we seemed to have lost many of the tapes over the years.  And then tapes started being old hat anyway and we preferred CDs.  Then our last tape player broke and we never got it fixed.  Lately, I have been thinking about how much my older kids learned from these audios and feeling regret that my younger kids have missed out.  So I got my husband to check out their website (I was too sleepy at the time. LOL!).  It's different from before when I bought the cassettes 10 years ago.  You have to sign up and join their site for $50.00; then you have a choice of downloading the stories for your MP3 player or getting them on CDs once a month.  I opted for the CDs because to me having to download and make our own CD just added another layer of complexity that I don't deal with well.

So this resource does appear to be pretty pricey, however, my older kids did listen to the tapes again and again for years and it looks like now you get lots of information, advice, activities, etc from their website.  I've read a couple of the Eyre's books and they are excellent.  The Eyre's are Mormon, but I never read or heard anything that conflicted with the Catholic faith.  They just teach good old fashioned family values in an entertaining, clever and surprisingly profound way.

So check out Alexander's Amazing Adventures in the kingdom of Inlandia and learn about things like honesty, self-discipline and chastity and laugh a lot too while you (and your kids!) are learning!

Wordless Wednesday

Halloween

All Saints Day Party (She's St. Elizabeth of Hungary)

All Souls Day

My paternal grandfather and grandmother and my brother

My maternal grandmother (I'm writing my NaNoWriMo novel based on her)

My Mom and Dad.  I miss them so much.

Greathall Productions

We met Jim Weiss last year (or was it the year before?  Time flies so. . . ).  He was invited to our parish's school and the folks that run the school were nice enough to remember that some members of the parish homeschool.  So we got invited too!  My family was the first to arrive (a miracle in and of itself!) and Jim Weiss came over and talked to us and had us sit in the first row.  My kids were awestruck.  They love him.  He absolutely radiates kindness.   What a wonderful man.  He then proceeded to completely hypnotize a huge roomful of school children with his amazing storytelling abilities.

Every year at least some portion of my children get a cd or two (used to be cassette tapes a long time ago!!!) in their stockings.  He is rather a Christmas tradition around here.

So check out Greathall Productions and strew some learning in your stockings!

Temporary Slow Down

I've been so enjoying writing this blog!  All these ideas and thoughts that have built up in the over dozen years I've been thinking about all this stuff, are just pouring out of me!  It is a great release.

However, I have committed to writing a 'novel' for NaNoWriMo and since I have very limited time to spend on the computer anyway, my time will be even scarcer.  So I see an inevitable slow down ahead.  I'm still planning to post some, though!

Wish me luck on my writing adventure!

Calendars

I like to give my kids calendars for Christmas.  You can get calendars that focus on all kinds of things.  Word-a-day, math, artists, countries, etc.  My youngest daughter likes the Doodles calendar.  One year one of my sons was really into M.C. Escher.  He really loved the Escher calendar I got him that year.  So strew some interesting calendars this Christmas!