HomeSchooling
That is part of the beauty of all literature. You discover that your longings are universal longings, that you're not alone and isolated from anyone. You belong. - F. Scott Fitzgerald
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weekend farmers.
We had a barn full of them in Virginia. We’ve been thinking about having them here ever since we moved in. And then Hannah finished their beautifully-crafted home. But trips to Virginia and North Carolina took priority. This weekend changed all of that, however. And our family spent Saturday acquiring six new creatures/pets/providers. Chickens. We’ve got ’em. We drove waaaay out in the country to this adorable farm. What I really intended to purchase was four hens. Four grown hens that could immediately begin providing sustenance in the form of oval deliciousness for our family members. I didn’t really care what they looked like, so long as they dropped edible…
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The New Game
This fall The School of Keigley has a transfer student arriving. And her name is Riley. She’s spent the last two years attending a local private school and is now heading home for her junior year. Which means, I have to do something I have never done before. Instruct a high school student. Actually, that’s not the truth. I spent six years teaching high school students. But most days that feels like another life. And, anyway, I have never actually been in charge of all aspects of teaching a high school student. So when a couple of women who lead a local homeschool co-op offered an evening class covering all…
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homeschool this week
I have been homeschooling at least one child in our family for the past six years. It took me a long time to realize that homeschool (school at my house) did not have to resemble main stream school in any way. I didn’t have to set up desks or ring a bell or take traditional tests or teach four years of history covering only the Civil War. I didn’t need a dress code and lessons need not be fifty-two minutes in length, eight times a day. And now I am in the middle of continually realizing that my homeschool (school at my house) need not resemble anyone else’s homeschool either.…
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the state of things
I know it’s not summer yet. I know it isn’t. But around here – it sort of feels like it is already. And we are all finding it pretty hard to concentrate. What with all the bright sunny days. And the introduction to the world of fishing with Daddy. And discovering that all of the kids are pretty great fisher people. (Since they can’t all be fishermen. You know, due to their gender and all.) And birthday celebrations that include baby dragon hunting and carrying maces around the lake trail and cake consuming and present opening. And visits from friends. And trips to the zoo. And picnics in the…
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as the pendulum swings
If you have read this blog for any length of time then you already know a-plenty about me. You know that I love a list. And I have a fondness for schedule. Let me tell you this, I can plan the mess out of something. I make a mean routine. I am a first-rate organizer. I draw it up in colorful coordination. Little squares, circles, colors assigned to each child, a day per activity. If there was a thrown-down for planning, I could take you. But, uh, I have a little problem that no amount of planning seems to solve. I think you call it follow-through. I mean, ask me…
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little rewards
Our friend Bob is an artist. He’s a great additional grandpa. (The kids refer to him as Pop-Pop. That is, when they aren’t referring to him as the “maker of the finger paint you can eat”.) He’s a minister. He’s our friend. And he has written a children’s study of Lent and wanted us to give it a test run. Which we have been doing. And in so doing, we had a short history lesson about pretzels. The word means “little reward” in Latin. The shape resembles the crossing of arms that monks would do as they prayed. And now you have had a little history lesson as well. The…
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question. answer.
“Momma, why don’t we ever eat at Burger King?” some back seat voice politely inquired over the gentle strains of Bach playing on our car’s stellar sound system as our family traveled the highway to yet another culturally enlightening event. Wait. Most of that first sentence was a lie. Can I just start over? “Momma, why don’t we ever eat at Burger King?” some back seat voice screeched over the sounds of the Avett Brothers and the other four mostly shouting children as our family traveled the highway in our shamefully dirty Suburban to the grocery store or to the dumpster or on some other errand our life requires. Before…
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The Burgess Animal Book For Children: A Book Review
The majority of books that I read to the kids for school purposes come from a list on Ambleside Online – our primary homeschool curriculum source. Last year we read Thornton W. Burgess’ Bird Book for Children so I was already familiar with this author’s style. Burgess creates animal characters and a storyline for his creatures. In The Burgess Animal Book for Children the woodland animals gather each morning to attend school with Old Mother Nature, who serves as the teacher for both the animals in her school and for the readers of the novel. Each of the forty chapters covers several animals in the same family group and describes the habits and characteristics…
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Progress That Is Slow Is Still Called Progress
So much of homeschool seems like a Grand Experiment to me. I mean, I won’t really know if my work was a success or a failure until the kids graduate. Maybe not even then. I might not know until Berg is thirty or Mosely is married with kids of her own or Piper Finn is running her own small country. In other words, I won’t know if this project called homeschool worked until it is too late. Tell me, what other job works that way? Anyway. I feel as if some school projects seem as open-ended as school itself can seem. Take, for example, our School of Keigley Nature Notes…
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Wanted: Your Ideas
Now that she can write, London loves to express herself through words. And you know I love that. She has started keeping a journal that she writes in while she is in bed at night. It is precious to me. Filled with paragraphs of ideas and thoughts. A page filled to bursting with a retelling of her day and how she thought it would turn out one way when it really turned out a different way. A listing of all the places she would like to visit on her upcoming daddy-daughter date. And lately, she has been leaving little notes for me all over the house. And I love finding…
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Not Too Early
March has literally just begun. We’re talking – the earliest of the single digits of the month. Spring has not officially started. Does that mean that it is too early to drive over to Lowe’s and buy five of the cutest little green resin Adirondack-style lawn chairs? Is it too early to let my adorable toddler son lounge in the lawn chairs set up semi-circle in the front lawn for a windy breakfast of a warm bowl of oatmeal? Or to hang out in the warm afternoon sun with Bergen and take a long series of silly, mostly unusable camera shots? Tell me, is the beginning of March too early…
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Try This At Home
At heart, I want to be a no television, live in the woods, everybody drink from a shared tin cup we dip in the stream outside of our door, type of family. Or so I like to imagine. But I married this guy and he likes movies and big televisions and gadgets. And, uh, I sort of have found that I love gadgets too. Plus, as much as I love the idea of a Laura Ingalls Wilder existence, (and I do love the idea – I mean, I named a kid after the Wilder family so that should prove something) I know that I would soon grow weary of an outhouse…
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Let Them Eat History
First copyright – 1931. Newspaper clippings of Paul Harvey articles slid between the thick, yellowed pages. A postcard dated 1969 and addressed to my mother before her last name was the same that mine used to be. The Searchlight Recipe Book. The binding is almost off the black and red cover and the paper tabs denoting recipe categories are torn and rugged. This was first my grandmother’s cookbook. And then it was my mother’s. And now it is mine. “Who will get this cookbook next in our family, Momma?” London asked. “I guess you’ll have to take turns with it,” I answered, hopeful that one day my girls would want…
