2nd & 3rd grade launch!

UPDATED from the first post....  plans have changed a bit this week and I'm even more grateful for what the Lord has brought together for our kiddos now....

I'm excited for our big two this year....  It's going to be a great year.

And it's going to be just about as different as can be from what I've dreamed about....  since last fall, I had in my mind that we would be homeschooling our kids together with another dear family nearby.  I thought we'd rent a small apartment to be the little schoolhouse for these 7 students every day and they would have an English teacher come to teach them and a Chinese teacher to divide up the big and little kids so that everyone gets both languages.

But then those friends went back to Canada to give birth and we decided not to rent a schoolhouse (alone? of course not!) and we never found a teacher willing to come and bless our kiddos as their teacher.  (Only the Lord knows how I'll be able to continue in language study myself now that I'm the homeschool teacher... but we just might be able to swing it still, by the Lord's grace!  I hope so!)  And...  the *wonderful* apartment home the Lord blessed us with is just cooler than we imagined getting to live in.

Now... shockingly...  we have a four bedroom home (Matt and I are in the new, little bedroom and the large bedroom upstairs is a fully devoted schoolroom.)  OK- this is all so far a rewrite of the post below that's all about our school room- sorry.   I am so grateful though.  It's working super well!

For the morning, John and Vivi are going to preschool now!  The local preschool in our complex decided to accommodate us crazy foreigners and allow our kids to attend for only half days.

Isaiah and Marian meet with their Chinese language teacher for nearly 2 hours, 4 days a week.  Then for five days, they will do 3 English subjects a day and memory (which is only 15 minutes, so it doesn't count as one of their "subjects"- those are all about 20-30 min.)  In the afternoon (again, 4 days, not on Wednesdays) they also meet with a Chinese math teacher for 1.25 hours of class.

Here's their weekly assignment sheet that they will get every Monday and cross off as they finish lessons.  Fridays, they need to turn these sheets back into me, with their parts on the right filled out.   Hopefully, it will be a sweet record to keep.

For their English lessons, we'll try to run our lesson time on "pomodoros":  25 or 30 minutes on task and then a 5 minute break but I'm not bothering to introduce the term pomodoros...  we just call them subjects or classes....

Bible:
It's not on the kids' weekly assignment sheets because Bible as a subject is covered more in family devotions than in our homeschool time.  I also have a weekly sheet that's equally unprofessional as the kids' sheets- it's my own weekly homeschool planning sheet.  On that page, I have these categories for our Bible learning:  Reading in the Word (discussion), Memory Verse (this one thing is from their memory time in school), Song, Catechism Question, Prayer.  We try to do morning devotions together every morning before breakfast.  This is usually a quick time of reading and prayer.  Then, 2-3 nights per week we try to do extended family devos with songs and longer discussion.  I'm glad Bible is more a Family Devo's thing than a Homeschool subject b/c that way Matt gets to lead and be involved more (although he's great about discussing history and checking on other subjects with the kids too.  #Ilovemyman.)  

Language Arts:  (they'll probably get 3-6 lessons of LA a week in the following categories)
Reading-  what the kids read independently (or Marian still reads to me)
Grammar- a workbook, complete a few lessons
Spelling-  just covering the Fry Words, spelling test
Copywork- a poem, a hymn or a verse each week
Writing- a letter (to family or friends or guests in our home), a journal entry, or a story

History:  
I love Tapestry of Grace.  I just love it- the organization of it, the excellence of academics, the Charlotte Mason with a bit of Classical tinge,  the humility and rootedness of the theology undergirding all of it.   But we're not using it b/c it's a bit more labor intensive than I can afford this year since I'm still hoping to get in some serious language study myself.  So...  these two are doing Veritas Press's Self-paced history course for the ancient world.   We're still using Tapestry's suggested read alouds along with the VP course since they're both chronologically anchored but I don't have to plan the history lessons at all.   This is my best shot at language study time!!

Science:
We'll look a bit more at the 106 Days of Creation Studies, from Simply Charlotte Mason.  This simple plan relies heavily on Christian Liberty Nature Readers.  We also have several Usborne books about Water, Outside, Weather and Apologia about Zoology and I just got two free apps on bird identification (National Geo.)  and plant identification (Leafsnap)....  my plan for science is pretty wide open at this point.  We might get to a more developed plan at some point or we might just leave it fairly open, fill it with as many living books and explorations as we possibly can squeeze in.

Memory:  
Every week, we're trying to tuck in a new Fighter Verse (we love the app for iPad, which includes a song for each verse!) and I'd love to be able to get them in Chinese and English but I don't know if that's going to work?  We'll see...  For our family time, we're also trying to memorize the New City Catechism.

The other main part of "memory time" is what our kids are memorizing from the Classical Conversations (CC) app.  The idea of classical education, the trivium, and even catechism learning is that since kids are so good at memorizing things in their early years, we ought to take advantage of this natural ability, this stage of development, by giving them lots of good things to memorize that they can digest and use and understand all the inter workings of later, as they grow.  "It's like laying logs in the fireplace of their minds.  Later it will take flame." (That's how the New City Catechism explains teaching young kids.)   So, we use the CC app to memorize Geography, History, Math and Science.  For the Timeline they are learning a parallel version- a similar song- from their VP history course.  And for English grammar, I just can't put my kids through learning English like that.  I love English too much.  And I love my kids waaay too much.  Charlotte Mason's approach to learning the art of language is just more winningly beautiful to me.

For us, Latin doesn't make the cut.  We will be working on English, Chinese, and the minority language around us.  Once we're swinging well in all those, I'm eager to study Greek with our kiddos, or possibly Hebrew.  That would be sweet to track with the translators who are currently working to translate the Good Book from Hebrew into our neighbors' language!

One other tiny bit to mention:  I know there are better-researched educators out there than I am, but I am not comfortable with some of what I see in the Classical Education world of what seems like stockpiling so darn much in our kids' minds that it is - in my opinion- too disproportionate- with what they actually know, comprehend, what they thoroughly understand at their ages.  I want my kids to "get" that the point of education is understanding, not regurgitating.  Also, Sonya Shafer has a great post over at simplycharlottemason.com about the pledge of allegiance which reminds me of why I value living stories and narration (I know, I'm a CM junkie :)  ) and not only, or not toooo much mere memorization.

How well do you know The Pledge of Allegiance? I’m pretty sure most of us can recite it.... But how well do you knowThe Pledge of Allegiance? Try putting it in your own words.

No, don’t just keep reading here. Stop and try to put The Pledge in your own words. Go ahead. I’ll wait.

Did you do it? Now, here’s the $10,000 question: Which of those exercises displayed true knowledge?

Piano:
We're using PianoMarvel and so far we're very grateful.  The kids feel motivated to keep advancing through these video and even Vivi has been able to sit up to a few little lessons!  I'm wanting them to practice at least half hour a day.  I can see that this lacks a little from meeting with a teacher but we are thrilled with the amount and the way that the kids learning is fitting into our lives and budgets with this teaching method.  So grateful!  (And if you want to go get your free trial or subscribe to piano marvel too, then you could use the Piano Marvel link right here or this one to see about taking them up on a free trial and we will benefit from your subscription too!  Yea for all of us!!)

Specials:
Once a week I want to leave open time to cover some special stuff....  Honor class (to discuss character, virtue, manners), Art or Music Appreciation, Handicrafts (Isaiah's loving wood carving and Marian is learning some sewing).  Today we wrote letters to our Compassion kids.  And then there's always baking together or iPad play time as pure reward for awesome diligence for the week of studies.   (They get 15 minutes-  I'm stingy screen time  for our kids, there's just too much LIFE to be lived!  But for our kids, 15 min is normal and they hardly think to ask for more and I'm super happy that's our pattern.)

Chinese, Math, minority language:  (I put them together b/c they're both taught by Chinese teachers.)  Chinese in the morning (4 days, no Wed) and math is the same in the afternoons )no Wed. Our kids are both math minds, doing very well in local textbooks, even the tough level stuff.  We're so thrilled for both of them and so glad that they can advance at their own comprehension speed since their class is just them and a teacher.... they don't need to go anyone else's speed.
For minority language class, the kids have game time 2 afternoons a week and I'm hoping to arrange a language exchange for them with local kiddos 2 more afternoons....  the more play the better.  I'm so glad for how quickly they are learning this local language already!
I didn't even put the minority language on the sheet for the kiddos because the goal at this point for them is simply conversation.  They'll have no assignments but just exposure and opportunity to practice and play in this beautiful new language!  I'm amazed and crazy joyful happy for how motivated and how much progress they've already made in their third language!  Thank you Lord for this!

My Read Aloud:
Following Tapestry of Grace's suggestions mostly to fill out factual history with fiction alongside it... And we'll throw in a few books for fun too...(the goofy Mrs. Piggle Wiggle right now!  Thanks to BookEnds!!!)

On Fridays I'll do a memory check with them and we'll plan if there's something worthy of making a presentation to the family... a memorized poem or summary of history or sharing a science discovery.
I'm also excited to hear from the kids on the right side of their weekly assignment sheets:  J.O.Y. goals are Jesus, Others, Yourself...  How can we show love, make beauty, serve for eternal gladness?

We're running school 4-5 days a week.  Saturdays are just no fun for us to go to the park or run errands and we're planning  (hoping!) to be busy as a family with the sports company once that's running so we're taking one day off every other week.  Homeschoolers can do that!  Yipee Hooray!

Tucking Marian into bed this evening, day #2, she thanked me for teaching her.  I smiled at her and she nodded, "I'm so excited for homeschool this year."

Me too, babe.  Me too!

Kindergarten for John & Pre-K for Vivi!

How amazing that this pair is up and off to school already!  Well...  off to school as in...  they're beginning.  They're at home for school and that's a joy for me!

***  So much for that week and half! Plans have changed and now John and Vivi are in morning preschool (for John, his kindergarten year) in our complex preschool.  ***

3 hours of Chinese in the mornings.... then a reading lesson with mom, for John.  We're well into 100 Easy Lessons to Teach Your Child to Read (which worked like a charm for Isaiah and not so super great for Marian... but it looks like it's hitting near target for this guy).    For reading lesson time, Vivi's free to play!   I will go over a Kids' Foundation Verse (from the Fighter Verse app.) with them both in English and Chinese (I'm meeting with a tutor for help on our weekly verses- in all three languages!)

Two afternoons a week, the little two will get to join the biggies and one other friend who will have a minority language class with us.... That will basically just be game play time in this next new language.    I hope it will be a cheery fun time for all!

And that's it.  That's our plan for Kindergarten and Pre K for our sweet little two!  I'm so grateful for a way to keep them engaged in books and life-learning hopefully, growing bilingually, and just covering the basics and keeping it simple.  The Word and reading lessons and not too much else but a bunch a fun.....  that sounds like a good kindergarten year to me!  May it be Lord.... by your grace, for your glory!

a new school room!

Isaiah's starting Third Grade and Marian begins Second Grade in just over a week!  We had hoped to start earlier but 我们束腰装修房子。  (It just sounds better in Chinese. We're doing some work at our house to make room for a new school room!)

So, we moved to this town thinking that we would educate our kiddos alongside another family whose kids are perfectly matched age-wise with our learners.  We thought there'd be a tiny school, we'd rent a small apartment for our 7 students (Arrow Academy, gotta jump on a chance to use Arrow... for something :).  But those guys wisely headed back to their home country for mama to give birth to their fifth little one.  So we're at it alone now.

We sure don't need to rent a separate space to school our four, but with not an overly spacious 3 bedroom apartment and the reality of no libraries, no kids museums, no place else to go for class time, we wanted to try to rig some way to have a designated learning place for our kiddos.  Our little two will meet with a Chinese teacher while I try to teach the big two their English subjects and we just wanted PLACE for all of this....  Plus, Matt's little start-up company got registered in our home (this is a huge grace from the Lord, that this was approved!!).  We thought we'd be paying for rent for two other little places..... but now, no extra rent at all!

With all this, we decided to finish off one patio off our upstairs.  It came ready to be finished- had three walls and most all our neighbors have finished off that patio as a room already.  We got the basic model home (which we were thrilled for, to get to design things to suit us best) and with the money we're saving from not needing to rent and from going with the trash-truck movers (not really, but they were so bad to our stuff... good thing they were so cheap!) we are finishing off that needless patio to turn it into a little cave-like room for Matt and I (it's not too spacious and the ceiling is quite low- but it works!!).  That means the first glorious room upstairs will be the new school room.

Friends, I still feel shocked to enjoy this room so much, and that this beautiful place is in our very own home!  I've never been in a room that I think would make a nicer school room for our kids than this....

Our apt. was a 3bed- 2 bath.  Now the upstairs room will feel more like a second living area.  A wide open, spacious, gracious, lofted-cieling (incredible, eh!?   Here in China? Yes, amazing isn't it!?) family room/school room.  Our new little bedroom is off that back hallway- near the door to the bathroom.

The big room is so much better as a school room than as our room.  As it is now (we're just half way through building the new room) I rarely go in our room all day long.  But it is such a light, bright, beautiful room, it's a pity to not have an excuse or an opportunity just to be there.  But as the school room.... we'll be there lots :)

The whole deal is a gift- that we're able to build it, the kids all enjoying the process of watching the workers, the cute little bed shelf we'll have over in our new room, and the fantastic new space for our family.... space I'm also super eager to fill with cute neighborhood kids playing and learning together...

We are so grateful for this gift from the Lord!!

Here's a pictorial view of our process...

the patio- with three walls.  The door was maybe 5.5 feet tall...

in the building just beyond you can see our neighbors have already built in their patio-rooms

our nice construction guy (who worked alone with his wife for almost the entire 2.5 week project) jackhammered up just the right amount of cement floor to lay down the floor heating (water tubes) and then recover with cement to make it nearly match the floor one step down from the original two steps that led out to the original patio.  If I could only explain how chabuduo (literally, "about", it means Not exact, Not precise) jobs are here usually, you'd know that it was a treat to see the floor completed so well!  

see the floor all one level from the first step?  :) 

Our kind worker friend, Mr. Yang, is about 5.4 I'd guess.  And the ceiling looks a bit goofy or angle but it's only the sides that have low, low angles to them, the rest of the roof is flat and just high enough for me to nearly flat palm it.  It's cozy and sweet....  and here's my favorite part....

the window sill - bedside table.   Pintrest said that small bedrooms need built-ins and that's handy b/c this one built-in was ready to go from the railing that was there earlier.  

Look at these amazing cleaner helpers!  

And I guess I have to have two favorite parts...  I love the floor!  Who knew that cheap fake wood could look so nice!?  I am one grateful mama!

UPDATE:  This room is such a sweet provision for our family!  We could live just fine in a 3 bedroom place... but with Matt's company running in our home, and our 4 kids homeschooling (and our super desire to get to do co-ops with homeschooling friends here), it is a fantastic gift to have a place for everyone!  Today, the second day of school, Matt was sick in bed all day with sinus trouble. I am so happy we could close him in a private place and give him some rest while all the madness continued just outside his door!  The little kids with their Chinese teacher upstairs and the big kids for English lessons with me and piano and history lessons all running on computer downstairs...  It worked!  I'm so happy-grateful-humbled-amazed....  such a gift- this space!!!

Maybe I'll get around to posting pics of our new bedroom all moved in and of the new school room.... but honestly, pretty pics of our home are sometimes hard to come by.  Guess I'll just have to eat my pride and post some regular life pics.  I'll try!  I'm sure eager to share what a joy and a blessing this home is to our family, sports company, homeschool kids and homeschool community!  

that second semester...

...or third trimester.... or whatever.

It was a mess.   Chinese New Year vacation and a passport-run (+vacation) for our family to Hong Kong.  Then we learned the kids' brilliant Chinese teacher didn't yet feel ready to return to teaching from maternity leave (her baby was 3 months.  I totally get this!  But we didn't expect it and we were unprepared.)  By the Lord's grace, we had a sweet teacher step in for about 6 weeks of Chinese and Math with our big two (John and Vivi were finishing well at their local Chinese Christian preschool.) And by the end of March we were mad with moving.... our hose in total disarray, good-byes every day with dear friends.  All of April was driving across China, hoteling while we house-hunted, and then more moving/dodging repairs/cleaning/unpacking.

So by the beginning of May I think we did a bit of homeschooling again...  But right now, honestly, I can't think of what it was!  Language arts in their Scott Foresman workbooks, copy work on Bible verses, math worksheets printed off the web (their normal math is to go through a Chinese textbook so I just kept running with the next lessons in a format I could explain to them!).  We barely touched science, except for reading aloud nature stories (easy science exposure from the Christian Liberty Nature Readers.)

I know that I skipped doing any more history.  We started the year doing ancient history with Tapestry of Grace and I LOVE ToG.  But for a dozen other reasons (Grandma and Grandpa's visit at Thanksgiving time would be a great time to study America and then we learned we would be moving to join up for school with a cool Canadian family, so this was our chance to grab for America lessons!), we switched to a unit of American history.  The Best Read Aloud for American history that we enjoyed-  40 Acres and A Mule.  5 star.  For the third trimester of Isaiah's 2nd grade year and Marian's 1st grade year...  yea, no history at all.   I think they're still breathing though...

We memorized Ephesians 6:10-18, the Armor of God.  And we really need to revisit Kevin Hartnett's unbeatable poem Honored be Thy Wondrous Word to keep those two passages parallel in our hearts and minds.  Lord may your Word be sharp in our souls, bearing fruit for your glory in and out of our lives!

Our kids have been busy bees this summer (since those last few months were so scattery) and they've both finished and gone beyond their math textbooks for grade level and they've been working on more Hanzi and pinyin still for Chinese.  It's super cool to see how excited and motivated our kids are to study the other language around us here.  Their pumped and ready to aim for being trilingual kiddos.  Isaiah's set his goal for Christmas, to be able to converse freely with all his local friends :)

This write-up doesn't encourage me so much...  so maybe I'll just end it quick.  I'm really looking forward to our next semester though!  It is not going to be at all what we imagined... but it's going to be good.  I trust the Lord for that...