Lest We Forget

Sorry if this is truncated or staccato but I'm in the midst of NaNoWriMo & roof repairs & general life chaos & blogging time has fallen to <0.

But since Remembrance Day is almost here & we're almost wrapping up our studies of World War 1 this term, I wanted to jot down a few of the resources I've found helpful:

The Teaching Company World War 1 by Liulevicius
36 lectures, large focus on social & political history. You'll want to supplement with maps & good chronologies of the various battles & main theaters of the war (this supplemental stuff is readily available online in numerous places)

John McCrae's War - NFB documentary about the author of In Flanders Fields. Note, this does have a few photographs of the excruciatingly brutal wounds that McCrae, as a doctor, would have been treating. They're brief and black & white of course, but they are horrific. As far as I'm concerned, very important for kids to see the real effects of a war. Also briefly mentioned is the fact that venereal disease was a large problem for the military, and that Canadians beat everyone (even the Aussies!) for their rates of VD. Ahem.

A copy of In Flanders Fields. I like this book version by Linda Granfield which includes biographical and historical notes, photographs and evocative paintings to accompany the poem. Ds did feel that it was a mistake for the editors to decide to break the poem up with the notes, rather than having them in front or back. Covers similar ground to the NFB doc. Technically this is a children's book, well suited to elementary, but I would not hesitate to give it to a highschooler, esp one who is not familiar at all with the subject.

Online: World War 1 movie clips from Canada at War. All are worth watching.
Most are under 10 minutes and cover life in the trenches, the nurses roles, battle scenes from Arras, France (location of Vimy Ridge).
The single long film is an NFB docudrama about Billy Bishop, the flying ace; very well done.

For the teens:
Vera Brittain's Testament of Youth
and/or Robert Graves' Good-Bye to All That
and/or Erich Remarque's All Quiet on the Western Front

For youngers & olders:
the last book of the Anne series, Rilla of Ingleside deals with life in Canada during WW1
Dear Canada: No Safe Harbour (Halifax explosion)
I Am Canada: Shot at Dawn


film:
Lawrence of Arabia
All Quiet on the Western Front (1930)
Gallipoli (1981)

More problematic for younger or sensitive viewers: Passchendaele. I'm a sissy & haven't seen it but mention it because it keeps popping up on lists.

Poetry - Loving this anthology: Anthem for Doomed Youth - Twelve Soldier Poets of the First World War by Jon Stallworthy. Excellent biographical sketches of the poets, photographs, illustrations, copies of their handwritten poems and analysis of style and viewpoints.

Combine it with Mary Oliver's A Poetry Handbook for a poetry unit.

World War 1 is one whose scale is hard to comprehend. For instance, in the Battle of the Somme, British casualties were 60,000 in ONE DAY. I type this out to remind myself because the mindnumbingly huge numbers somehow just do not want to register.

We have studied history pretty much every day this term but I've been careful to always schedule something lighter & completely different immediately after. For many weeks it was Great Ideas of Classical Physics. It doesn't matter what it is, but I think you need something to move the mind away after a while....

If you have other resources to share, please add them to the comments. Thanks

& at 11 am on 11/11/11, there's only one thing to do: REMEMBER

Vancouver Aquarium visit

When the kids were really young (like toddlers and preschoolers) we had memberships at the Vancouver Aquarium and Science World. They were both great places to hang out on rainy days, meet up with friends with their own kids, lots of room for kids to run around, check out animals, and learn things too. We used to go so often, in fact, that we kind of burned out. Well.... at least, I did.

But Hugo has been asking go to the Aquarium for months & we finally snuck in a trip yesterday. I probably should have tried harder to do it in May because the crowds are already picking up, but we still had a great time & renewed our membership. I'm not sure if we'll go back much during the summer but I anticipate a number of outings in the next school year.

The Vancouver Aquarium is a non profit research and conservation facility. While I have some quibbbles about their housing of large marine mammals (& that is also part of the reason we didn't renew - the deaths of the killer whales & Whitewings saga really bothered me) amd I still think the habitats should be larger, way larger (seemed to me that during past renovations they made bigger habitats and then got more animals. Um?), I do accept that this facility does offer some terrific opportunities for research, education, and conservation, and in the end, I do find that I can support a lot of what they try to achieve.

The parking though - holy $10 for all day! When I was bringing the kids out there for a fun play day several times a month, it was free. At ten bucks a pop, there's no way I could have afforded that back then.

answering: Why aren't your kids in school?

Nan at Wrath of Mom is talking about handling the 'why aren't your kids in school?' question and that desire to not only say "we homeschool" but also to explain why, and convey that we're, well, nice and normal and maybe not like the preconceived notions of homeschoolers you may have.

I've been homeschooling for well over 10 years & finally I think I'm getting a grip on this.

If people ask WHY - & most don't, btw - I say: It just turned out to be best for my family. And you can't beat the teacher student ratio! With a small laugh if I'm feeling particularly cheerful (which in this wet, cold, rotten spring is not very often. SHAKE FIST AT SKY!)

With that answer, even people with kids in school (let's face it, the vast majority) don't seem to get their hackles up and this ends up being a good place to kind of let the conversation politely drift away,  because if you go down the road of 'why' more than a few steps you come onto the highway of  I made choices different than yours and, obviously, I think my choices are better & yours stink of poo-poo!

We don't really want to go down that road. I used to want to go down that road. I used to be an evangelical homeschooler. I used to care.  If I saw a glimmer of interest (or even a mild hesitation about school as the de facto only way to educate children) I used to try to stoke that fire, to get the person interested in alternatives, in this wonderful thing that they too could do.

Now? I don't care if anyone else homeschools. People pretty much have to throw themselves at my feet begging for a hint of how this is possible and whether they could somehow do it, and if I'm feeling particularly magnanimous I might give them the link for BCHLA. Maybe.

And as for the clarifications of 'but we're not religious, young earth creationist, reclusive polygamists!' I don't particularly care what people think so it doesn't bother me if they choose to assume I'm a weird religious person (actually, I kind of get a giggle about the possibility that someone thinks of me that way). I guess I could wear the Dawkins scarlet letter A t-shirt at all times in public. Or a "what would evolution by natural selection do?" t-shirt. But I don't really care enough to make that effort. (though, now that I think of it, I really want the t-shirts)

I'll tell you a common follow-up question that still trips me up: "What grades are the kids in?"

Long pause while I hum and haw & desperately add & subtract in my head and, if the kids are there they gape blankly at me, telegraphing: "Gee Maw, we ain't never heard of them things? What is they, Maw?"

Yeah, helpful kids, mine are. They seem to not give a damn what people think. I don't know where they got it from.

I've now decided that truth is the best policy here:

"We don't do grades. That's the beauty of homeschooling: we can follow our own levels. The kids are 16 and 13 years old.

Now git off my land before the second wife sics the dogs on ya."

backyard ballistics - potato cannon

On Sunday I tweeted:

Oh NO, I forgot that with spring comes my uber annoying neighbor and his frigging stereo playing full blast outside while he putters. JERK!

A few hours later, I strongly suspect HE tweeted:

Oh NO, I forgot that with spring the weird homeschoolers who live behind me start blowing things up in their backyard! JERKS!

You too can disturb your neighbours with creations such as the tennis ball mortar, or, Hugo & Roo's latest, the Potato Cannon aka the Spud Gun.

What you need is this book: Backyard Ballistics, a bit of spare change for supplies (but really, they're reasonably priced!), and some neighbours to annoy (optional!)

The Potato Cannon calls for pvc but we had a bunch of abs left over from fixing the bathroom. Instructions and supply lists are clearly laid out. Hugo & Roo had a hard time finding a "flint & steel lantern sparker" and finally, after rambling through the aisles of Canadian Tire for several hours (distracted by a bunch of other things, no doubt) they came home with something else (to the shouts of Improvise! Adapt! & Overcome! Like a Marine!)

This is a universal ignitor kit for BBQ's. Here it's already been installed into the cap end of the cannon.

Here's the ignition in action:



Here's everything all assembled. The purple tin is hairspray, which is the fuel that's ignited to launch the potato.



Here's Hugo loading the cannon. The potato has to be large enough to just barely fit into the barrel. In fact, the edge of the barrel is sharpened so you can take a large potato & hammer it in.

Then you push it in with a broom stick.

The target? Our shed. I came out to photograph and video the events and asked Roo "so how hard does this thing launch the potato? Is it actually going to destroy the shed?"

And he just laughed maniacally and said "I don't know!!!"

I blame excessive exposure to the abs cement fumes for his utter lack of concern for the shed.

I mean, yeah, the shed has been derelict and has risked the censure of the international community, and diplomats have been dispatched asking it to clean itself up, fix that leaking roof and for gad's sake, replace that facia board so you're not such an eyesore! But to just go on in and start shooing at it? Seems a little extreme to me..... I abstained from the voting.....

And finally, here's a boom!



And here's another:



What a satisfying boom! And the potatoes were really flying! We even messed around with targetting and had a couple good runs and aiming directly for the lock on the door.

Here I am risking my life to film from the perspective of the target. I got an EmbedPlus thingamajig for it so that if you click on the SLOW button in bottom left, you can see the cannon's recoil in slow mo. Go on! You know want to!



The shed survived by the way.

Busy Bees!

Honey bee populations are in danger around the world.

A serious problem in Europe and the United States for decades, sudden bee colony losses are now surfacing in China, Japan and along the Egyptian Nile in Africa.

This is a big deal because:

Bees are integral to agriculture: Of the roughly 100 crop species that provide 90 per cent of food worldwide, the UN food agency estimates 71 are pollinated by bees.

source

The UN has just put out a report noting the global spread of honeybee collapse. Some possible causes are pesticides, parasites, viruses, fungi, & decreased plant diversity.

Of course the causes are important to sort out but in the meantime, here's how YOU can help your farmers, your neighbourhood orchards, your own fruit trees AND have a perennially fun science unit at the same time.

Enter: MASON BEES

Photo from BC Ministry of Agriculture

Mason bees are small native bees. You might have seen them & thought they were large flies. According to Wikipedia, there are over 130 species of mason bees in North America that are active from spring through late summer.

Mason bees are great pollinators and they're docile - you can observe them with little fear of being stung. Ours have been very brave, letting us approach and examine them quite closely.

In nature, they like to make their nests in small holes in trees and they need a bit of mud to seal up the egg cells, so your garden needs to have some source of moisture.

If you want to encourage populations of mason bees, you should provide a special house, like this:

Photo from Beediverse.com

These tubes are disposable (which helps prevent parasitic overwintering). You can make replacement ones out of plain paper, rolling it around a thick pencil.

In the fall, the cocoons can be collected from the tubes. In fact, many experts recommend it so they can be washed (to remove mites which are formidable parasites) & carefully dried. This is a neat opportunity to examine the cocoons.

When temps in the spring are steady around 10C, it's time to put the cocoons in small box (to protect from birds & rain). Make a hole in the box & place it near where your prepared mason houses & clean tubes are set out. Within 3 days you'll see bees emerging! They often hang around after hatching so you will have many chances to observe them.

If you're not sure if you have any mason bees in your neighbourhood, or you want to augment the population, you can purchase cocoons for release.

For more information about mason bees:

Bee Gardens - PDF. how to make your garden inviting to bees. Includes instructions on make your own bee houses & plant selection.  From Lifecycles

Let me tell you 'bout the bees! - PDF. 8 page printable covers information about honey bees & native pollinators. Thorough & engagingly presented. From Lifecycles 

Photographic chart of  mason bee life cycle from Xerces

Also at Xerces - native bee biology and  teacher resources

Beediverse.com - you can buy habitats, books (we have Pollination with Mason Bees by Margriet Dogterom) & even cocoons! But before ordering cocoons, contact Dr. Dogterom to find out if they're suitable/available for your area. You may also wish to contact your local provincial/state agriculture office to discuss native bees.

BC Agriculture Fact Sheet on the Blue Orchard Mason Bee

and good old Wikipedia

I hope you give mason bees a home in your garden!

friends shouldn't let friends blog with Sean

Connery, that is.

Especially a young Sean Connery. I was watching From Russia With Love while putting the finishing touches on the It is good enough to be kind post, and first of all, that meant many typos (I think I caught them all the following morning).

But also, I worry a bit about the content.

I worry that it comes across as something of a "mediocrity manifesto" and this is not what I meant to convey at all. We are, after all, plugging away with the Well Trained Mind (heavily modified, I admit), which is not an academically wussy plan.

But homeschooling, and education in general, are just a part of raising a child. I think that for too many parents, the education aspect - especially strict academics - becomes the overwhelming focus of parenting. This is true whether we homeschool or use public or independent schools.

We obsess about methods, early-entry, curriculum, levels, grades, FSA's, french immersion, entrance exams. Are they at the right level? Are they ahead? Are they behind?

Of course we want to prepare our kids for their future. We want to give them all the tools possible to have a happy and healthy life.

But when we get carried away, when education becomes the primary lens for viewing our children, we lose sight of the person.

It's as if we're raising students, instead of raising people.

Our kids are not their education. They're not their marks, or their grade level. They're so much more than that.

And so when we get those panicked moments about homeschooling, I suspect we're focusing in too tightly on this one aspect. We need to pull back a bit, expand the size of our viewpoint and consider how the child is doing as a whole. (And as Linda Clement suggested in the comments in the prev post, lie down on the living room floor until the feeling passes.)

Finally, my statcounter has gone crazy; I know people are here and I've recevied several thoughtful emails, but only a handful commented on the blog ......

 

:-)

Bookstore Binge

For Amelia:

-for her Lightning Lit course:
Frankenstein
Ivanhoe
& a new reading copy of Pride And Prejudiceas the one we have (& which she's already read more than once) is too big & cumbersome for study

-& for fun Cranford

For Hugo:

Martin the Warrior
Artemis Fowl: Arctic Incident
Stormbreaker
& Journey To The Centre Of The Earth (pictured with Hugo's arm if you look closely. He is reading it right now& only dropped it on the photo pile for a few seconds with a finger holding his spot)


For me:

The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo
Odd Mom Out

What are you guys reading?

It is good enough to be kind

If you're having a big panic moment about homeschooling, worrying that you can't do this, that you're not doing enough, that you're not doing this right, this is a post for you.

First of all, if your kids are 5 and 2, just take a deep breath and relax. You are not allowed to panic when your kids are at that age. I saw a post recently on a message board from a mom who was 'unable' to do lessons with the 5 year old and the only bright light on her horizon was that the 2 year old was going to be going to a daycare/playgroup thing for several hours a day in few weeks and that was the only way she could envisage getting homeschooling 'done' with the 5 year old. That is not a homeschooling issue. That is a creative parenting issue. (If, on the other hand, your kids are 16 and almost 13, like, say, mine are, you are allowed small panic attacks.)

It seems to me that most panic issues arise when we start questioning ourselves and the solution is to go back and look at our goals.

Why are you homeschooling? Your reasons will be unique to you, and will not apply to your friend, or the family at the co-op. What makes sense for them, may not make sense for you.

Most families I know homeschool for some mix of the following reasons: dissatisfaction with the social milieu of the schools; dissatisfaction with academic standards of schools/pursuit of academic excellence; asynchronous kids (skills don't fit easily into a grade level); desire to provide individualized learning; special needs children; extension of attachment parenting/integrated family lifestyle. Each family might rank these differently, some may not apply at all. Each family will approach their child's learning differently.

And the panic attacks happen when we forget about our definition of success and get caught up in someone else's. Their success might mean scholarships to a major university. Someone else's success might mean a student who is an enthusiastic and curious learner. (not that these two ideas are mutually exclusive but they might 'look' quite different in an 18 yo learner, and even more different in a younger pupil). Another family might define success as ability to get a satisfying job and support themselves and family; this might be entrepreneurship, vocational training, pursuits in the arts or sport.

I think it's normal for us to worry about our kids and when we undertake to homeschool them, we're taking on a big job. There's nobody else to blame. Families whose kids are in public school can complain that the teachers are not doing their jobs, the school boards are squandering money, the governments are not adequately funding them, etc. The families who send their kids to private schools do so, among other reasons, for the sense that they've done all they could. From an article on private schools in The Economist:

“If things don’t turn out the way parents hope, they want to know they have done everything possible for their child,” says the headmaster of one venerable English day institution, when asked what exactly his school offers that is worth £16,000 a year.

The homeschool parent has none of those guarantees.

The homeschool parent can't 'blame' anyone. We have to be clear in our goals and expectations, and when they don't work out - because they don't, not always - we have to be able to accept that there are no guarantees in parenting, just like there are not guarantees in life. 

I'm probably not the only homeschooler to be more than a bit awed by the Chinese & Indian students in the documentary Two Milllion Minutes (view the trailer here). These kids are hungry for success. In the face of such dedicated commitment to academic pursuits, it can be scary to consider whether our kids are underachievers. But as much as financial success and high academic achievement are valued, one thing homeschoolers are good at recognizing is that success comes in different packages. It doesn't always mean an academic degree, wealth, or fame.

And so I come back to my blog title, a quote from Stephen Fry's introduction to What Ho! The Best Of P G Wodehouse

It is good enough to be kind. It's good enough to make people laugh.

(ETA Feb 24. Hmmmm. I don't know why I mangled this quotation. I am re-reading this intro now & it actually is: 

It is enough to be benign, to be gentle, to be funny, to be kind.

My apologies to Stephen Fry for misquoting. I think I conveyed the gist though.....)

Fry's intro to that book is powerfully moving. He talks of his confused and troubled youth and this lesson that he learned from PG. It is good enough to be kind. It's good enough to make people laugh.

At the end of the day, what will matter to you? What is a life well lived?

Define your success. Keep a firm vision in your mind and don't let it be swayed by others. And help your kids develop their own vision of success and the fortitude to be true to it.

For more on this topic, check out Simple Homeschool's blogpost: I want to homeschool but don't want the responsibility 


ETA - turns out I have more to say about this

How to add physical activity to your homeschool

This is the time of year we can't get away from the fitness challenges, the Live Right Now campaigns, the resolutions, the full gyms, the streets full of huffing joggers navigating puddles or snow drifts - depending on climate.

And over the past 18 months, there's been a flurry of interesting reports (see links at bottom) about the effects of prolonged sitting on our health.

The gist is this:

The longer people spend sitting, the more likely they are to die prematurely, regardless of their fitness levels  (emphasis added)*

Eeeeeeeek. It turns out that even if you're fit, even if you get lots of exercise, the more of your day you spend sitting, the greater your risk of premature death.

So that got me thinking about homeschooling, and our lives, and how lucky we are that we can try to counteract some of the damage of sedentary activities such as poring over Latin grammar and Algebra (not to mention spending too much time on the computer!)


Keep lessons short & build in regular physical activity breaks

Some of the research indicated that even simply standing up from a chair can counteract the negative effects of prolonged sitting. But why not do more? Simple chores such as emptying and loading the dishwasher, running downstairs to move laundry from washer to dryer, or crawling under the bed to rescue the latest issue of Calliope magazine are fast & simple breaks to get the body moving in only a few minutes before returning to our lessons.

Exercise while waiting

When teaching more than one student, it is not uncommon for one kid to get stuck and be waiting for assistance from the parent. A common way of dealing with this is to just advise the kid to 'move on to the next thing that you DO know how to do & I'll help you with the difficult thing later'. Or just 'read quietly & don't disturb us'.

Instead, how about suggesting a bit of physical exercise:
Run around the perimeter of the house. 
Do 50 jumping jacks. 
Get a skipping rope & start skipping.
If you keep a skipping rope handy by the door, anyone (including parents!) can quickly grab it,  head out a few feet & just skip.

It clears the head and gets the heart pumping. And who knows? Maybe while the student is jumping and wiggling around, all of a sudden they themselves will figure out what they were stuck on & turn out not to need your help after all.

Get rid of the chair 

Consider using an exercise ball instead of a chair. The gentle rocking motion requires your abs & glutes to remain engaged. And you can always roll away for a bit of a stretch. For those of us who hunch over a computer keyboard for excessive chunks of the day, stretching your upper back on a ball is blissful.

Or get an adult sized jumping ball like this.  You can sit on it & hop between desk and bookcases and go in search of the missing book/pencil/ruler all on your hoppy ball.

Some students also really enjoy bouncing or wiggling on exercise balls during memorization drills or narrations or review & many report that they learn better when able to move like this.

Plan short & simple exercise sessions into your at-home lesson schedule

We've been trying a few sessions from Do Yoga With Me & so far they're great! Free, easy to follow and with a minimum of woo-woo.

Use a Wii Fit or similar for some quick physical activity at home

Use a treadmill if you have one. If you download audio books and listen to assigned literature readings (or Teaching Company Lectures) on headphones, you can exercise and get smart all at the same time.

Nature walks and nature study 

A staple in Charlotte Mason style education, nature study is of course a wonderful way to not only anchor studies, but to provide a good dose of healthy exercise. Depending on the age of your kids and your academic goals, however, you may not be able to fit in prolonged outings on a daily basis. But there's nothing like getting outside, even for a brief time.

So encourage your kids to pop outside, smell the air, hear the birds. They can take a short walk, a quick bike ride, even a brief stroll through a yard - & why not rake some leaves, pick some weeds, carry one bucket of compost - these tasks are kind of fun when you only have to do a few minutes' worth & there's no actual expectation of 'finishing'. After all,  you have to get back to your lessons :-)


Got more ideas? Please share!

& now a blurry snap of Amelia and myself on the chair lift last night. It was a great night for snowboarding. 

Stay healthy!

**Sitting and screen time: how they affect your health

Sitting takes toll on body 

Too much sitting after work harms heart

Poetry Friday - Taylor Mali

Do folks still do Poetry Friday? I mostly gave up because I was always late, always remembering about it on Sunday morning when getting around to reading other blogs..... But look, here I am. On Friday: And I have a poem for you by Taylor Mali.

And not just any poem - a clarion call to our students, & to us.

the late birthday movie

For the last number of years we, en famille, have gone to a movie to celebrate Amelia's birthday. This year we're several weeks behind, but finally we went yesterday to see The King's Speech (no, I won't link to the official site because the previews are so extensive these days that they give away the entire film. So there. Consider this my little protest.)

I was going to tell you all about how great it is, & how much we enjoyed it & how it's not at all your typical historical costume drama (not at all), but I've now got distracted over its American rating.

R?

R??!!!


Oh fer crying out loud. So it's ok to blow off people's heads, to have violence and gore and jump scenes to terrify kids and those films get PG or maybe PG 13. But say "fuck, fuck, fuck, shit and tits" and it becomes R for language? (Oh dear, I hope I didn't wreck it for you by letting you know that people swear in it. They do.)

Sensibly & reasonably, in BC it's rated PG.

It is a slow moving film, not a lot of action and might not keep the interest of young ones who've been reared on ADD tv. On the other hand, it's about an interesting time in history. Plus any child who has learning challenges etc would definitely benefit from seeing it. My bottom line is: show it to your older (10+?) kids. They need to see that people in absolutely privileged circumstances can still have lives that suck big time (including a truly evil nanny story), and that people of all ages often have to struggle to achieve things. Add brilliant acting, nice pacing, Colin Firth, Geoffrey Rush, Helena Bonham Carter & a fab supporting cast, and it all makes a wonderful package.

A couple good science things

First, bringing this up from the comments in the science post last week - L from Road Schola recommended this wonderful & quirky Periodic Table of Irrational Nonsense Very hilarious, though not all very child safe, so pre-read pls before setting your munchkins free to chortle.

Secondly - & completely child safe! - is Project Feeder Watch. It's not too late to join for this year's season (though you'll want to do it quickly as official watching starts on Nov 13)

"traffic jam at suet" northern flicker & downy woodpecker - Oct 14, 2010

Many of you may have heard of the Christmas Day bird count & other one day counts. This is sort of like that, except it's way cooler because it runs for 6 months!

Project Feeder Watch is a joint program, run by Bird Studies Canada & the Cornell Ornithology Lab.

Canadians sign up here
Americans sign up here

Basically, you need to pick a section of your property which you'll observe, put something there which attracts birds (feeder with seeds or suet is customary but it could also have a bird bath or shrubbery with berries etc), select two consecutive days & each week keep a tally of what birds you observe. You don't need to stick glued to the window - some people observe before & after work, some for 5 minutes at the top of every hour etc. Complete instructions on how to pick your observation days (you do need to stick to those weekdays, but it's ok if you miss some due to trips etc) & how to count the birds (that's actually very important & there are very specific instructions for counting the birds) & report them (online or mailed in) are all in the Research Kit package.

We pick days which we know we're going to be home, & the table where we do our schoolwork is right beside the window on our viewing area, so we just keep an eye out while we work.

(of course that does mean that when I grumble at my pupils to stop.staring.out.the.window.and.for.pete's.sake.please.just.do.your.work., they say but mom! I'm counting the birds! For science. Think of the SCIENCE! in an injured tone.....Then I tell them we're going to do unit on physics, specifically FORCE, or maybe ACOUSTICS - yes, let's see how LOUD I can yell......For SCIENCE!!!!)

Ahem. Where was I?

I do recommend that you get a basic birding book which identifies the birds in your area, as well as a copy of previous year's Feeder Watch data. The data lists the top 25 species observed at feeders in each geographical area. Odds are overwhelming that birds at your feeder will be on that list; so if you're not yet good at identifying birds, this list will help narrow down the possibilities.

Binoculars are nice if your site is large & a camera is very handy. If you are not good at identifying birds quickly, taking a photo is one way to 'catch' the bird & figure out what it is later.

All ages can participate & for homeschoolers, there's an entire section of resources, including several downloadable pdf resources with curriculum links & learning resources.

The data collected by Project Feeder Watch is used by scientists to track population trends. Feeder Watch results are published in scientific journals and contribute to a greater understanding of our environment.

There is a small fee to participate but it includes a subscription to a journal, & a variety of other goodies. Well worth it.

"Ha ha! I have eaten all your suet!" pileated woodpecker - Oct 3, 2010

Argh at science (again!)

Homeschooling science is such a pain - not because of the subject, but because of the dearth of academically solid, interesting & easy to implement materials. It's the last that's the real hurdle.

If you want creationist fairy tale stuff - it's abundant.

If you want dry, scientifically correct stuff - it's abundant.

If you want interesting, engaging, scientifically correct materials, with lessons laid out, & clearly organized material lists so that you can just 'grab & teach' - well, good luck with that.

Last year I picked up two units of Ellen McHenry's chemistry materials. The Carbon Chemistry binder had been gathering dust all this time & I decided in Oct to crack it open for a fun diversion.

I really like lots about Ellen McHenry's materials - while it's all just a general intro, the text is not dumbed down, the little cartoons are fun, the thumbprint guys make a nice break in the text. For middle school/junior high, it's just the right touch. Here's a snap of a page from the chapter on Carbohydrates:



So we were breezing along a few chapters earlier & get to this:

Scientists guess that crude oil was formed by the decomposition of plants and animals under great pressure a long time ago. (A world-wide flood would certainly have provided the right conditions for the formation of crude oil.)

GUESS? Scientists GUESS?

No, scientists do not guess. It's not in their job description. Theorize or hypothesize - yes. Guess? No.

And don't tell me that it's just simpler say 'guess'. This is in a unit teaching alkane hydrocarbons, distillation, and isomers - I don't think we need to dumb down words for an audience that can handle this content.

I think this is part of the general attempt to weaken scientific work by introducing huge doubts into everything science does. We see it constantly in the creationist camp's perversion of the term 'scientific theory'. It's just a theory, dude! That means it's like a guess! Um, NO. It's not the same thing at all.

And the flood? Really. WTF?

It's a double shame because the paragraph where these two sentences are would stand just fine without them. I'm still trying to figure out whether they're an after thought to pander to the creationists/young earther readers or whether it's actually the author's viewpoint & she couldn't stop herself from sneaking it in.

(ETA - when I bought these materials over a year ago, there were no hints at all on her website. I have since had a look around & she mentions her involvement with the Dominion Science Center. Ding, ding, ding. First of all, any mention of the word 'dominion' now raises my hackles - & it's not even because TD Bank holds our mortgage; hang around with homeschoolers or evangelical Christians or libertarians long enough & 'dominion' will have that effect on you too. Secondly, the Dominion Science Center says: " science center that gives credit where credit is due-- to the Master Designer who has given us a world that delights and amazes us everyday, a world brimming with beauty and diversity..... We'll be on a mission to present only good fact-based science at our center. If we showcase theories, they'll be labled as theories, not facts. Now that's good science!" No, that is BS. And yes, they misspelled "labelled".)


If I had known this then, I would not have bought her materials. As it is, we will plug on & finish up because there is so much fun stuff in there. But I hope I don't have to grit my teeth & attack pages with sharpies too many more times.

p.s. Is there anyone out there compiling lists of excellent, rigorous, secular science materials?


link to Ellen McHenry's website

learning does happen all the time ... but there's no reason why you can't also schedule specific learning time.

New homeschoolers often worry about schedules - are they doing too much? Too little? Should they schedule at all? Should they just go with the flow?

The last two questions, of course, are not scheduling questions at all - they're philosophy of education questions (well, actually, philosophy of life), and the answers to those questions will also influence the answers to the first two questions.

The Well-trained Mind has lots of schedules. So many in fact, and so rigorous, that the authors wrote a "but" entry on their website, entitled: Schedules (Or: A Few Thoughts on Expertise, Curricula Selection, and When to Ignore The Well-Trained Mind)

By the time Amelia was in 1st or 2nd grade (no, I really can't remember exactly), I did start scheduling, for several reasons.

1) my kids both needed intensive language help. I have the kids who even with intensive instruction/phonemic awareness/vision therapy etc struggled with reading for.a.long.time. Once the reading dragon was slayed, the spelling dragon arrived.....

2) I figured that if I made it part of our routine at that age, it would be easier to transition to adding more & more work later on. I knew by the time Amelia was around 6 that we would not be pursuing unschooling, but rather would try to do an adapted classical education, so there would eventually be many subjects piling up on her, and a growing workload. Getting into the rhythm and pattern first on a small scale & then just adding subjects has worked for her. Hugo, as the second guinea pig in my experiment child, has not known anything but our school schedule. This doesn't prevent him from being totally bewildered by it whenever we return from a break.

3) I think my kids actually like the fact that I'd lay out a sched in advance, tell them what we would do, & then do it together. I'm not a spontaneous type of person so I need to plan out activities, crafts, science demo's, field trips, read alouds. In other families those things just seem to happen. In mine, if I don't plan them, they might not. My special power appears to be an endless capacity for wasting time ..... I need to crack a whip over ME to get anything done.

So when they were younger, we started small, with committing a certain number of hours in the morning (9-11 for us) for 'school'. It wasn't 'sit & do these dull worksheets' - it was just the time that I'd set aside, that we'd all set aside, for learning together. It was lots of fun things like science & history & art & read alouds + math and phonics. BUT no field trips, no social gatherings, no errands, no phone calls (turn the phone right off & have it go to voicemail), no email, no chores, no "I just have to do ....." & me getting distracted with something during these hours. This was time for me to focus on the kids & do something fun together. We didn't always take the full 2h, & sometimes things spilled right over into the afternoon if there was great fun with an art project or mucking about with baking soda & vinegar etc.

What your homeschool life looks has everything to do with your personality. I disengage very easily. I'm an introvert. I live quietly in my own little head. It takes an effort for me to do this sort of thing & the only way to make sure that my kids would get this attention from me was to create a time & place where it is just what we do. As time has gone on, that time has expanded of course & most days now we have a full sched right through the afternoon (& by then I'm exhausted and just want to hide in a cave)

{cliche alert!} Everyone needs to find their own way.

I do think that there are two dangers on either extreme of the spectrum:

The first is not just recreating school but making your homeschool like an uber school boot camp, with even more rigorous adherence to schedules than the most rigorous school out there. One of the primary reasons for homeschooling is that with the low student to teacher ratio, you gain huge flexibility in instruction times: you don't need to spend an hour on math if your student got it in 5 minutes. If your student didn't get it, you can spend all week on it, breaking it down & teaching in different, unique ways. Enjoy the freedom you have to teach when & how you need to.

The other danger seems primarily to afflict families who have young children, families who are deeply into the 'benign neglect' run free, radical unschool model, families with moms who crave adult conversation and contact, families in communities with many social field trip & drop-in opportunities; these families sometimes fall into a pattern of never having time to start or complete projects - even if these are lessons & projects that their kids actually want to do.

Most long term homeschool families stumble about, tweaking things endlessly, trying to find our golden mean.

Some of us should know when to stop tweaking though. Like last January, I decided to by a smaller daytimer, ostensibly because it would fit in my purse better. Ended up not using it at all. SIGH. So in August I bought a new one, week at a glance, 8" x 6". That's the format that works for me & no more messing with it!

It's by Pierre Belvedere, Made in Italy & looks just like that but mine is pink!

Learning, computers, zen & more

A couple blogs I heartily recommend for their lucidity, and calm, inspired guidance.

Study Hacks:
"Study Hacks explores strategies for building a life that is both remarkably accomplished and remarkably enjoyable. Its primary audience is students, but at least half the content is non-student specific, and the site enjoys readers of all ages."

Zen Habits:
smile, breathe & go slowly

Study Hacks guest blogged on Zen Habits recently in a wonderful convergence of ideas about life & learning.

Study Hacks also recently tackled the issue of computers in learning:
Is Allowing Your Child to Study While on Facebook Morally Irresponsible?

I'm just going to paste in the actual link because that title is actually a bit more punchy LOL -
http://calnewport.com/blog/2010/06/10/is-allowing-your-child-to-study-while-on-facebook-morally-equivalent-to-drinking-while-pregnant/

you’re less productive when you’re constantly switching your attention; that is, the claimed benefits of multitasking are false. Researchers at the CHIMe lab, however, have found that the impact of electronic multitasking goes beyond the momentary sense of distraction, it can also create permanent changes in the brain.

The current crop of undergraduates, who went through high school in an era of Facebook and smart phones, is suffering from serious concentration issues. ..... simply incapable of giving the task at hand more than a few minutes of concentration before seeking what the Times article aptly described as the “dopamine squirt” that comes from discovering a novel stimulus.

And the issue for us parents is that we need to make a choice about what our kids do with their time & it is our responsibility to be aware how their online habits may be permanently changing their brains.

Those interested in this subject may want to check out the PBS Frontline documentary Digital Nation. We watched it en famille when it came out earlier this year. Roo & I both found it kind of shallow & we noticed lots of soundbites and quick camera changes - all to keep the distracted viewer's attention, we guess, which is pretty ironic given the subject. BUT, it is a good overview of the topic.

Also, check out Office Zen - focusing on one task at a time where you can download a free podcast which covers:

Why focusing on one task at a time is better than multitasking.
How to clear away distractions and set up the perfect productive environment.
How to practice staying focused and develop awareness.
How to get rid of clutter and create a “desk sanctuary”.
Other tips that have been proven to work.

Routines, routines, routines

In some homeschooling circles, routines are scoffed at. I can't be tied to a routine or a curriculum or a schedule, people will say. I'm a free spirit.

(Implying not so subtly that those who do follow a routine are anal retentive obsessives.)

I struggle with routines, not because I'm a free spirit, but because I'm an undisciplined slob. I like the *idea* of routines more than I actually like the routines. Similarly, I like the *idea* of being fit much more than I like actually running to get fit. (btw, Amelia & I are C25K'ing & Hugo has just joined us this week. More about that another time.)

But one thing that occurred to us early on in our parenting career is that kids remember the stuff 'we always do' much more than the 'one of'. So they'll remember the day in, day out dinner 'routine' (even if it's kind of chaotic and disorganized) much more than some special event you arrange once in a blue moon.

Similarly, our kids want to go to the same campground each year - it's 'what we do'. We 'always' do it. Well, we haven't always done it & we won't always do it, but do it enough times, and it becomes a general family memory of holidays.

Just like they'll have a general blob of family memory of debates during dinner and rather breathless first weeks of homeschool where we can't find pencils and the schedule is all wrong and mom keeps drinking too much coffee.

Routines need not be squelching or annoying or sour. You can slot really fun things into your routine.

For example, last January, Amelia and I decided to make a routine of having a girls night every Friday, where we'd hide from the guys with a DVD player and watch ER chronologically (the WTM way, LOL), starting with season one. (the guys either watch something on their own - usually Star Wars, Star Trek or similar, or work on a model plane, or invent things in the workroom)

And so, here we are: Week One of 2010-11 school is over, Friday night has rolled around again, we will be putting our books away any moment, & Amelia and I are looking forward to some quality time.



Now that's not such a bad routine, is it?

What about you? Do you have routines? Do you have rewards for yourself in your routine? Do you have routine ways to reconnect or stay connected with your loved ones?

Homeschooling 2010 - days 2 & 3

Here are a couple tips for newbies to homeschooling.

1) don't schedule 5-6h of lessons + an outside activity which takes you out of the house for 4h + go shopping for runners for a 12yo boy whose feet have suddenly grown 2 sizes - all on ONE DAY. Something will have to give.

Maybe none of you suffer from the delusion that you can stuff at least 30h of stuff into a 24h day if you just.pack.efficiently. I not only suffer from this delusion, it's been getting worse each year. I need that little gizmo Hermione had in The Prisoner of Azkaban which allowed her to be in two places at the same time. Let me know where I can get one, please.

2) Printers will just suddenly roll over and die when you need them most. It's review week for Hugo, I've got worksheets to print out & instead of doing them, I've spent a large chunk of time arguing with the printer. (The only upside to this is that it means I've not spent any time arguing with Hugo; the printer is taking up all my energy).

Soon it will be time to make a decision regarding continuing to debate the merits of printing in color without smears, or moving to plan B: kick it to the curb & get another printer. But this generates yet another dilemma: buy online - pro: it's fast, click, click, click! & I love to shop online (no people you have to talk to!); con: there will be a delay in delivery & I need the darned thing this week. OR go to store: - pro: get it right away; con: must actually leave house & potentially have to speak to someone.

Just realized that a printer is remarkably like an 'almost teen' boy. You keep sending them to clean themselves up & they keep coming back saying "I did it!" and you keep saying "That's not good enough! Do it again!" I've got the printer running a self check & a cleaning for the billionth time. If that doesn't work, I'll move on to threatening it with a USB cord.

first day of school yesterday

And we all survived! Yippee. 179 to go.

Loved this:



I have an index card taped to my doorbell saying:

No thank you!
No Sales
No Gas Contracts
No Missionaries

The sign btw comes from a CBC news story on water heater rentals. Seriously? Who knew? I'd have never guessed that people rent water heaters. But apparently they do & it's a cut-throat business too.
CBC News - Consumer Life - Water heater rental battle on social media

Hey - my roof is leaking.... do you think I can rent a roof?

Teaching history the WTM way - with Calliope Magazine as a supplement

The Well Trained Mind way of studying history calls for a chronological approach:
Year One - Ancients
Year Two - Medieval
Year Three - Rennaissance
Year Four - Modern

Repeat three times for a 12 year course of study. Each time you revisit a period, you go more deeply, with more emphasis on original documents, and making more connections with events and themes in other areas and time periods.


Calliope, published by Carus Publishing (which, if you have young kids you might recognize as publishers of Cricket & Babybug magazines; & whose big claim to fame is a) great content & b) no advertising!) is a wonderful history magazine, officially aimed for kids 9-14, but in our house it appeals to a much larger age range. Each issue is usually dedicated to a time period, though occasionally they do an issue on a theme instead. Calliope is a great resource, but it can be hard to work it into your curriculum, since it jumps all over place on the timeline.

The trick to this is to subscribe to it early on in your homeschool career, so that you get an inventory of it. When it arrives in your mailbox, greet it cheerfully, drop it on the coffee table and let it be pleasure reading for anyone who wants to pick it up. Then put it safely away in a magazine folder on your book case.

In August, when you're planning your history year, dig out your spine text (such as Story of the World & Kingfisher Encyclopedia for the younger students, and Susan Wise Bauer's new history books for the older ones). Plan out your history spine (see the planning post earlier this week) and then pull out your stocked up Calliope magazines.

They conveniently list the time period on the cover.

First, pull out all the issues which are relevant to your time period & put the rest away.

Second, put your extracted issues in chronological order.

Third, put a sticky on each issue with the Schedule Week # & Spine Chapter Number which ties into the readings you'll be doing. Make a notation on your subject planner for the appropriate weeks indicating Calliope as supplementary reading.

Fourth, file all the extracted Calliope magazines in a separate magazine box, in the order which will match your spine reading. Anyone is allowed to read any issue at any time, but an issue taken from this box must be filed back in the correct place. (insert here whatever threats required to assure compliance from your kids!)

Here's our stack from last year (Medieval ages, from the fall of Rome right up to the Age of Exploration)

Take advantage of savings: use Code N565 order two magazine subscriptions and save $14. Go here to read more about Calliope and the other magazines avail, & to subscribe.

Reading and Watching

Amelia and I have been indulging our appreciation for period drama historically accurate film adaptations of important literary works.

Ahem. It's educational, people.

First, North & South. Amelia properly read the book first.

Elizabeth Gaskell's works are a part of any good survey of Victorian British literature.

I went straight to Richard Armitage.

Swooooooooon.

Then, Jane Eyre. Again, Amelia properly read the book first.

I've read it several times already & was happy to carry on straight to Toby Stephens.

Wonderful.

Both DVD's are 4 hour adaptations, with the North & South conveniently divided up into hour long episodes. Jane Eyre is on two discs & is not conveniently divided so you need to commit two hours at a time. NOT a hardship, I assure you.


For a fun diversion, if you've already seen North & South (because you don't want plot spoilers now, do you?) check out North & South summarized in motivational posters.

Feel free to chime in with recommendations. I'm thinking of Cranford and Wives & Daughters next .....