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!
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