They really graduated...

When I just checked in at our little homeschool blog here, to see about getting in a new post, I thought it was just about 5 months ago that I last posted.  Wrong.  That's one year + five months.  And I didn't even know it.... yikes.

But my kids really did graduate.  Isaiah finished 4th grade summer 2016 and Marian finished 3rd.  In math, they have completed Chinese textbooks to (M) beginning 5th grade level and (I) beginning 6th grade level.  Super stars....  Now to work on English!!!

John's graduation pic from Chinese preschool (which, along with English phonics work at home with me, we counted as his first grade year) is on our family blog in July 2016 I think.  He's adorable and he's doing great... not an eager reader, but I think he's doing fine, especially when I weigh in that he is confidently bilingual.  I'm ok if he's not (yet :) ) the top of his class... oh but wait- he's the only one in his class at home, so he already is!  I love this sweet John Boy.  And Vivi is usually happy to take a stab at any simple word and doesn't feel the least bit intimidated by an early reader book.  I love that optimism and happy heart in her!

This fall we are in the states for our first ever semester of school here.  Matt is taking a huge and heavy and wondrously rich load of classes at RTS and the kids are at Libertas Academy, a hybrid school where they get 4 classes (writing, history, science, and speech and logic- for M and J/ Debate and logic for Isaiah) on Mondays every week, and then 4 days of assignments to work on at home.
Isaiah is in 5th grade, Marian in 4th, John in 2nd, and Vivi in Kinder.

The big three are using IEW for writing and I think its great for this semester but I don't think we will continue with it on our own back in China.  We will be continuing with Analytical Grammar and Beyond the Book Report  / Writing with Skill.  (Probably do WWSkill in 5th-6th grades and AG/BBR in 7th and 8th).

I love the Debate stuff Isaiah is learning from (The Argument Builder) ... and the Apologia textbooks the big two are enjoying. For history, I think we will carry on with Mystery of History, volume 4 when we head back...  I'm also looking forward to starting up with an online Humanities course for Isaiah in 7th grade.  We'll probably end up going with Logos School or Wilson Hill for this.   I love the integrated way they weave history/geography/literature/philosophy and intertwine and root it all on a solid Biblical foundation.  

The big two are doing Life of Fred for Math which suits us well...  I'm not yet super confident that the kids are really learning from it, but I need to be working more closely with them (like "Crossing the Bridges"  the review check points in Isaiah's Fractions book.  I love the set up of these books!

And for Chinese.... I found as free downloads online the BEST curriculum for our kids to learn Chinese.  I am So Grateful for this b/c we've had a hard time finding teachers in China that would be willing to flex with us and not have an exact textbook.... because no textbooks fit our kids!  They are not on grade level with Chinese kids in reading and writing and they are not foreigner English speakers trying to learn a foreign language.  This series of 12 textbooks from beginner to advanced was written for English speaking kids of Chinese parents who live overseas.  It's wonderful!

Hopefully I'll get to a more detailed updated plan for our homeschool path....  My hopes and aims for where we're heading for middle school and, with the benefit of some hindsight now, the way I want to take John and Vivi through elementary homeschool years.  I've been working on this grand plan for a while....  post coming soon!

2nd and 3rd Grade Graduation!

We had a joyful celebration last night in our home...  celebrating our big kids finishing a great school year with their Chinese teachers.  We'll have a Creative Arts Concert sometime this summer that will be with some English speaking kiddo friends.  But this time was special for the kids to celebrate their Chinese learning and to honor and thank their tremendous teachers.  They've done so well this year!  The Lord has sure blessed us with these fantastic young ladies as a Chinese and a Math & U teacher.

I just have to rave a little.  Our big guy is in 3rd grade and his teacher has been supplementing a standard 3rd grade level math book with the Chinese Olympic Math textbook.  Each kiddo also filled out three mental math practice drill books in this past semester.  They've been working hard, and it's been paying off.  Olympic math is a high level, logic heavy math book that kids all over the country feel enormous pressure to attain to.  Their sweet teacher Eldonna put the Olympic math problems at the bottom.  Isaiah conquered this whole poster of problems and the two biggies at the bottom in seven minutes!  (Ok, there were a few errors, but on the whole, he knows how to go after these problems and he did super well :)  The bottom problem... it breaks down into 4x25x4 (which he can do in his head) and then times 64....  sweet smarty boy!

Marian's Olympic math problem was like this:  You see 10 heads in a field and you count a total of 26 feet.  How many of the heads are chickens (2 feet) and how many are rabbits (4 feet)?    She nailed it:  3 rabbits and 7 chickens... and I still don't understand the straightest way to figuring that out!

We love this teacher!  

Our homeschool motto hasn't yet changed...  I do hope it will graduate with these kids from high school and into life beyond!  "Hard Work and High Spirits for His Glory"

The kids both read a selection from their Chinese textbook and recited a few verses from Psalm 103 (v. 11-13).  We had memorized the whole Psalm in English but only shared these few verses with the friends at our graduation gathering.  

This sweet Chinese teacher has only been with us for the past two months and I hope she'll stay with us for years to come.   We love her so much!  She's getting married early June and our girls will get to be flower girls for her... which they are over the moon happy about.  

We won't have any English "show" for this year... but the kids will participate in a Creative Arts Concert with other english speaking friends sometime this summer.  It has been a neat thing to hear them brining pieces together from their history class, the literature we read aloud in the afternoons and Bible...  so sweet to see them growing and learning and loving to read and loving the Lord.  Now... if we could just see more of loving each other!  

Oh we have a painful bickering crew on our hands... but we love them still!  If you pray for any one thing for our family, I would ask for the Lord's help for our kids to learn to wait and speak kindly with each other and generally, to lighten up and laugh and show love to one another.  We struggle so sadly much in this area!

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...

1st grade: Isaiah's second semester

We travelled for through the states to see family and friends from Sept 1, 2012  through mid Feb 2013.  The time there completely covered Isaiah's first semester of homeschool 1st grade and Marian's kindergarten (though, had we been in China for this time, she would have been in Chinese preschool, the highest grade.  She's set to graduate this summer.)  Of course, I had high hopes that we would be able to keep up with some consistent chunks (a month here, several weeks there) but it was pretty much a wash.....  We read lots.  Lots of me reading aloud for the kiddos- some American Girl series Josephina, that I found at a thrift store- and Things Outdoors and Christian Liberty Nature Reader (1st book) as well as several beginning readers (both Veritas Press readers and online readers  which were much easier.)  

I had ordered My Father's World 1st grade basic set and I think I probably should have asked for commission for recommending the curriculum to so many people before I even had my own set in hand.  It looked like everything I would want to do with my kids and I love how they present themselves as CM and Classical methodology.....  But I guess, perhaps, 1st grade was their low spot?  I believe MFW starts their history route in 2nd grade and I'm guessing that's where it gets really good.  I wasn't so impressed with the 1st grade set I bought.  The entire thick "Bible Notebook" I bought was blank pages with a few lines for kiddo print at the bottom.  I'm sure I should have known that it would be a huge blank book, but I missed it somehow and was a bit disappointed with the whole set overall.  The Bible Reader?  Unnecessary.  There are a bazillion sufficient Bible readers out there with much better art work than that one!

So....  I started picking up the homeschool resources recommended to us as we met with homeschool friends around the country.  And one friend (thanks Christie S!) introduced me to homeschool books on ebay for cheap!!!  Yea!!!

We've just returned to China and I have brought a fair bit of resources with us....  The Mystery of History vol 1-2, Story of the World 1 (and CDs to listen to!), Apologia Science 1-2.  And lots of readers.... many from Jeanne at Book Ends (man, I love her!)

I'm realizing that a homeschooling mama has got to keep her eyes square locked on some trusted curriculum guides and not let herself be blown around, judging her/ her children's progress by what other homeschoolers are doing.  I am SO grateful for Ambleside Online.  Have referenced that and am running towards these goals now for the rest of 1st grade with Isaiah:  

Daily-Penmanship/ Copywork.  CM actually recommends print but Isaiah has taken off very well with Cursive First's program to be writing very nicely in cursive.  Perhaps it sounds ridiculous but I really think he'll be fine with this... we will try to do copywork in both print and cursive (probably alternating days.)  

Phonics.  Reading, reading, reading.  Oh to see him learn to Love to read!!  More VP primers and good literature (Frog and Toad/ Little Bear/ etc)  ...  Aim to develop good narration skills in him.  Biography (Trial and Triumph by R. Hannula)

Bible memory verses.  Fighter Verse app on ipad is perfectly fantastic!!!  Daily family devotions in AM/ PM is sufficient for Bible instruction for now.  

Math.  I'm hoping to have a Chinese helper teach Math as they do in China but we are also enjoying the Math Mammoth workbooks as well.

Chinese.  Reading aloud and practicing narration again.  The same tutor for Math will teach him Chinese reading and writing.  He's already off to a fantastic start- bilingual in speaking/listening at 5-6 yr level.  

Weekly-Art-  probably 2-3 times per week.  Drawing with Children activities/ exercises.  Chinese art instruction books

Piano-  a teacher will come to our home.  Independent practice 20-30 min daily.  Pursue other ways of learning (itunes?  friends who play?) as well and additional songs to practice.  

An Artist and a Composer to study (Thank you Simply Charlotte Mason) We’ll start by listening to Bach, Mozart, Chopin, and Stravinsky looking up info to learn about them online.  For picture study (artists)  we’ll study John James Audubon, Carl Larsson, Maxfield Parrish, P. Buckley Moss.

Geography- Ann Voskamp’s Geography.   Paddle to the Sea.  Explore / navigate the globe and maps on walls.  

Nature Study.....  ahhh.... to figure this out for our city lives!  (animal flashcards? hopefully we’ll be able to drive to a park for leaf and bug collecting/ observing)

He loves biking, roller blading, baseball, legos, drawing, play sword fights... So let’s pursue some new handicrafts:  gardening, crocheting?, letter writing / emails?

Details-
Discuss/review calendar.... seasons.... years/ months/ weeks

Learn Chinese money

Review telling time.  

Our Modified List based on CM's "A Formidable List of Attainments for a Child of Six"   (And too, Isaiah will be turning 7 almost exactly at his starting time for this semester and we will still be filling in what’s needed to meet these very few, super simplified accomplishments!)

1. To sing or recite beautifully 6 verses, poems, and or hymns
2.   Isaiah adds and subtracts very easily for numbers 1-100 (plus or minus a single digit)
3. Reading... still needing lots more practice!
4. To copy manuscript and cursive writing...  he took really well to cursive first!
5. To know a caterpillar’s life cycle

Much of the other goodness that was listed on CM's original list, Isaiah has learned at least bit and pieces of in Chinese at preschool (seasons, directions, a few nature observations) and we've covered them briefly at home.  I know this semester we will go deep into much more of that, especially in studying Ann Voskamp's Child's Geography book.   

The Plan: Homeschool on the Road (yikes!)

We'll be arriving in the states in about five weeks.  I'll be meeting our first grade curriculum a week or two after the time we probably should have started studying through it..... so much for the luxury of time to plan!   It looks like our family will be staying in probably 20+ different homes this fall but we'll have a few long stretches (several weeks) in 2 of those locations so that's where our chances are best for getting into a bit of a routine for homeschooling...

But I'm super excited for our launch into this adventure in homeschooling.  This month Isaiah graduated from Kindergarden, enjoying simple science lessons, speaking Chinese like a local and really excelling in math.  He started piano lessons this spring with a stellar teacher that comes to our home once a week...  and I finished going through the 100 Lessons to Teach Your Child to Read with him in March.

This fall we'll be working on the My Father's World 1st grade basic package...  aiming to cover 5 subjects a day:

1. Bible 
2. World (geography and prayer-  I'm really excited to be spending more time in prayer with our kids for the projects and the people we get to support and for governments and needs in our world) 
3. Math
4. Literature:  Reading living stories,  Comprehension (Narration-  Simply Charlotte Mason has great tips for narration and living stories)
5. Alternate between Handwriting & Science

Of course, this will all be supplemented with lots of intentionality to develop more handicraft skills and with vitally important attention to character and personal development.  

Isaiah will be starting with Math Mammoth at the second grade book after I finish just a few chapters on telling time and American money from the first grade book.  Marian is looking ripe and ready for the first grade math book.  How fun!

this spring

Summer is totally here now so it's about time I get this note posted to record our fun spring of learning! It just struck me that we have about one more month of preschool here before summer... and then we'll (finally) launch into the long-awaited, highly anticipated journey of homeschooling!  I'm so excited for that!  (Do you hear the ridiculously naive optimism there?  :) )

So, this spring...

I am grateful beyond words for the sweet preschool our kids are at.  Joyful Preschool is run by a local group of believers in Christ so the instruction is all in Chinese but the classmates that our kids play with there are from all over the map (Australia, South Africa, England, Korea, Hong Kong, Singapore) so they also get some interaction in English with friends at playtime.

This will probably sound really silly to others, but we've had our kids in preschool here for mornings M-F for years now and usually I've thought that this was simply their time to learn Chinese.  I know they're playing, doing cute crafts, singing songs... but I had very low expectations that they would really be learning much else, anything substantial.  But I was wrong!  Yipee!

Isaiah especially has learned so much this spring.  Matt and I both spent time with the big two over Chinese New Year Break (Jan- Feb) going over double digit numbers....  43 is forty three kind of thing.  It was strange to us how difficult it seemed to be to them.  They were doing better in Chinese than in English!  But very soon into this semester, they both took off.  There's no hesitation on numbers now for Isaiah and usually not for Marian (though she sometimes still gets 43 and 34 mixed up.... that sort of thing).

But Isaiah has really blasted into the math world with surprising speed recently.  He often likes to ask  "what's 4+10"  or "whats 10-7?".  In April (I think) he asked me "what's 7-9" and I thought he'd be blown away with that one......  I told him "negative 2" and he told me I was right.  But I was sure he had no idea what the negative deal really was.... again, I was wrong.  I don't know where he's learned it, but he really does get it.  And I thought it was his teachers in his kindergarden level math class at school that must have taught him, but they thought it must be us at home....  He was introduced to negative concept at school but he's far past his class in it evidently....  we are just so excited to see him learning and loving math so well!

So this spring, as I realized that our big two especially are learning so much, and their days are full of class and book time already I've simplified our homeschool goals for this season to just this:

**Bible verse review, hymns at home
**8:30- 12:20 morning preschool:  lots of excellent math, Hanzi (Chinese characters), crafts, songs &
    exercises, nature observation, China culture...
**Reading lesson with both,
**Piano lesson (weekly) and piano practice daily for Isaiah  (God has provided a wonderful teacher who comes to our home and opens each lesson with prayer:) )

That's it!  It's been fun and it's been super exciting to see them both becoming readers.  We've stuck with the "Teach Your Child to Read in 100 Easy Lessons" book by Engelmann and have thoroughly appreciated it.    I think I already wrote about how I forgot about this resource that had been recommended and then I got it, and thought we couldn't use it since our kids were so far past where that book starts.   I wish so much I would have started those lessons with Isaiah a year earlier!  It is what it is though... He finished all 100 just before he turned 6.

It worked great to breeze through the beginning and make the most of the latter lessons.  I was feeling so stuck at the slow sound-it-out spot we were at... but Isaiah is well past it now.... and Marian is well on her way.  Thank you Lord!

What a joy to learn together, to serve my kids in learning to explore and marvel at our world and it's Maker!  Oh God be glorified in our learning together!

some of his drawings

art school

Isaiah and Marian got to attend art school during their summer vacation from AM Chinese preschool.  What a blessing these sweet young girls were to teach our kids and inspire them so!

The first morning we were about 5 minutes late and I joked, "we'll have to tell the teachers it was because traffic was so bad during our commute."  The problem is:  the art school door is straight across the hall from us-  about 6 steps from our front door.  Truly, the perfect set up for this busy house of kiddos!

The first day Wang Laoshi had Isaiah and Marian draw a little something, just to guage where they were at.  They looked at a fake pear in front of them and tried to draw it.  Immediately she notice, "oh, so she's got lots of imagination and he's more of a realist."  Yep.  She nailed it.

She missed the other aspect about our boy, that perhaps since he's a realist, he likes to correct most everything that, in his view, is skewed a bit.  The other day he was sitting at the table and asked Matt and I, who were standing in the kitchen, "do you know how much water you're supposed to drink every day?"  Matt answered, "a lot."  And Isaiah corrected his dad:  "No, more than that."