A Fly On My Homeschool Wall

  Mister Man is my long, gangly boy-man right now.  He reads and draws.  He loves to be "my favorite kid" when I call, "Who wants to be my favorite kid?" as I'm asking for a favor.   He's gentle and smart. Mister Man grew academically and socially this past school year. Math He completed Teaching Textbooks Pre-Algebra with a 96% average.  When he asked for help, it was specific, and he understood the answer with minimal coaching.  He's a good student. Morning Meeting Mister Man was an active participant in all of our Morning Meetings.  He read, sang, answered questions, learned to lead music in 3/4, 4/4, and 2/4 time, memorized scriptures, and contributed spiritual insights to our daily lessons. It looks to me like leading music might actually be one of his gifts.  He picks up on the nuances of conducting simply by watching, and sometimes he even instinctively gets movements right.  He is graceful, and as his voice deepens, he's develop...

 This picture. This picture shows a great deal about both brothers.   This is Beowulf's enthusiasm and love pouring out on his brother.   This is also Mister Man as the oldest brother in the family, offering love, standing guard, and desiring deeply to care for his younger brothers and sisters. He's a care-giver. Like his dad. This year I'm seeing more and more effects of the trauma he's endured as a member of our family.  He's expressing more anxiety and stress than I've ever seen in him before.  I do understand that anxiety can also be the result of adolescence, but my mother-gut is telling me this is more than typical adolescent struggles. I've started him on a supplement that he says is helping him to feel more calm and able to sleep better.  In addition to that, Sir Walter Scott and I are working hard to help him process big feelings and understand that he is loved. As far as academics go, Mister Man has a very easy time learning.  He's ...

 I have tried innumerable ways to write the kids' assessments individually, but this year does not lend itself to individual recording.  It was a kind of sabbatical year. We rested from our usual labors, and we employed ourselves in an array of activities that all blended together into general growth. Morning Meeting This continued as usual because it is one of the anchors of our days--keeps us from flying away into chaos.   Half of this school year included the end of our Come, Follow Me Old Testament studies.  We also read the Old Testament portion of Egermeier's Bible Story Book as well as our usual rereading of The Jesus Storybook Bible in December.  As part of our studies, we sang a hymn or primary song every week at every Morning Meeting.  We memorized the primary scripture of the month And I chose a scripture each week to go with the  Come, Follow Me  lesson that we recited 3 times during each meeting.  We didn't really memoriz...

 As with all of the other kids, we started the year with big plans and had to simplify.  When things got rough, we put Latin, typing, language arts, journaling, and Book of Mormon on the shelf.  All Mister Man had to do each day was a math lesson and a handwriting lesson. When he finished his cursive practice book, we added language arts back in.  When he finished his math book, I asked him to do double language arts, but he asked if he could do Book of Mormon , and I said yes. At the end of the school year, he'd completed HWT cursive practice and Saxon Math 5/4.  He was most of the way through Lightning Literature grade 4, and he made good progress in his Book of Mormon journal.   Mister Man is a prolific reader.  Thank goodness he's willing to re-read books or I couldn't keep him satisfied.  He read hundreds of books--both quality and fluff--and he's well on his way to completing the Mensa grades 4-6 reading list. The trauma of the earl...

  Mister Man had kind of a rough year.  He's bright and articulate, but the trauma we've had around our house has taken a toll on my oldest boy.  I also gave him a lot of independent work in addition to our family studies, and he might have liked a little more mom-interaction to help him along his way.   Here was his plan as of last August: Academy Literature Grade 3 , Memoria Press Writing with Ease Level 2 , Well-Trained Mind Language Arts 3 , Core Skills English Recitation I , Memoria Press Cursive Kickoff , Handwriting Without Tears Arithmetic 3 , Rod and Staff Latina Christiana I , Memoria Press  (He will finish what he started last year, and then we will see if we can find a usable copy of Latina Christiana II --Memoria Press has revised the program and does not sell the separate versions any more.) Book of Mormon   No one is more fun to teach than Mister Man.  He is enthusiastic about everything!  He understands.  He makes connections....

Rose Red calls our oldest boy "adorkable." Between his glasses, his braces, his gangly body, and his 8-year-old sense of humor, he's often awkward and clumsy. But he has the sweetest heart. And a sharp mind. He's surrounded all day by siblings with emotional and behavioral challenges, and I would be lying if I said he's a perfect model for them to follow. He's definitely adopted a few negative behaviors in addition to his own little faults. We're working on them. In the mean time, he's growing and learning by leaps and bounds. I can hardly keep up! Mister Man studied: Literature:   Memoria Press Grade 2 Literature --completed.  In addition, Mister Man was part of my Elementary Read Aloud group, and we read some great stuff together.  He is a voracious reader--reading and re-reading books at a nearly alarming rate, including reading D'Aulaire's Greek Mythology several times over. Spelling:   MCP Spelling Workou...

Wednesday was hard, but also filled with the tender mercies of God. One of those was an impromptu visit from a precious friend who pulled her kids out of school this year in order to homeschool them. I have been filled with insecurity about our homeschooling this semester.  I'm just not certain I'm serving my kids the way they need to be served educationally.  My friend looked me in the eye and said, "They are so much better off at home.  They are so much better where they are.  Even doing less than what you're used to, you're doing more." My poor older kids had bags under their eyes and slumped shoulders from trying to corral the younger kids while I visited, but that visit buoyed my spirit more than I can describe.  I thanked my children profusely for serving me by letting me have that visit. (And I made cookies for my exhausted older kids.) We're still doing about half of the school that we're used to, and we're doing only about 10% ...

Mister Man spent months kitting this orange scarf that he proudly gave to Grampa Chad.  The good news is that Grampa Chad proudly wears it! Monday What a great day!  We had homeschool magic during Academy when our plan was to simply read a simple introductory book about the human body that inspired watching YouTube videos showing actual human systems and one video of a white blood cell chasing down a germ. The germ video was my favorite. The kids were alive with the wonder that only young kids can show when they wake to a bit of knowledge they'd not known before. During Symposium, the teens and read the first 55 pages of The Book Thief . Ummmmmm . . . this book is amazing! I don't know where it's going to go, but sometimes I lose my breath from the perfection of the prose, and I'm willing to take this ride. It's for our teen book club in mid-October. Water color painting by Little Princess--as assigned in The Good and the Beautiful Sir Walte...