..and here we are on a school day doing what we believe is important work; Fighting against discrimination. We were in and out of the State house. We were at the state capitol and talked about the marriage rights not as a gay issue but as a civil rights issue. We do not believe that the government should have laws that discriminate.

Madlibs!!

Sure they're obviously good for teaching parts of speech but you know what, Johanna has been hiding a hidden skill; her handwriting!
There she was asking for parts of speech and how to spell things when I looked over the sheet and what do I see? Perfectly written letters all small and fitting on the line provided.
School teachers have no idea how lucky they are that she is homeschooled. My beautifully stubborn little girl who knows herself so well she does not need to prove anything to anyone.

Our own game show

The kids created a game I like to call, "the point game" It started off with me trying to get them to stop fighting in the car and with them bickering about some arbitrary points they were assigning to things.
So our game involves questions and points. It's kind of like that game show with Drew Carey, Whose line is it anyway?" b/c just as in that show, "The points don't matter. Just don't tell my kids that.
The kids tell me the points they want and I give them a question worthy of that value based on their age. Sounds official doesn't it?
Johanna prefers just regular questions whereas Michael likes me to ask him to spell things.
The nice thing about this game is that there can be no cheating b/c you are allowed to ask for answers or help b/c that is considered research.
So a game might go like this:
Johanna: "I want 3 points"
Me: Ok what is your full address
Whereas a 7 pointer might ask which president freed the slaves.
My favorite answer to: What do the 13 stripes on the American flag represent? came from a very confidant Johanna when she said, "The 13 original continents."
Also since the last gubernatorial election we have had some conversations about the role of government and we talk about freedom. So some of questions are based on that.
Today after a great day at birthday party where the kids bounced in a bounce house played on the playground, did lots of running and enjoyed cake and hot dogs my kids piled into the van buckled up and Johanna said, "Now what were we talking about? oh yeah the governor"
she got 10 points!

The intrepid Air and space museum

What an amazing day! As I drove my van down the west side highway I saw it in all it's hugeness. I yelled, "Look!! look out Michael's window! there it is the ship. We're going to go on that ship!! Holy cow it's soo big!!!"

Johanna asked what the baby planes were doing up there. Later she would see they were not baby planes at all. A lesson in perspective I suppose.
We went to the museum for reciprocal day b/c we are members of the Newark museum. I probably never would have thought to go otherwise or would not have wanted to spend the money.
However for "free day" it was worth a shot. The kids got feel for how incredible it was to be on ship that big. The flight deck was jaw dropping and yet inside the ship was so little b/c of all the narrow hallways. Bunk beds that went to up to 5 were a huge hit with each declaring no one had to be on top or bottom!
I'm not one who keeps the guns play under wraps so the kids got to play "good guy bad guy" and pretend they were firing off the big guns. I didn't tell them that the bad guys at the time were the Japanese b/c I don;t think we needed that much history. It was more for the enjoyment of the ship and honestly I would have felt very uncomfortable b/c there were Japanese tourists on the ship. I wasn't ready to field those sorts of questions. Luckily my kids were happy to have an unnamed "bad guy" that they could shoot unencumbered by guilt.

It was an amazing experience.

While Johanna is parked firmly in the "I hate handwriting camp" Michael really wanted to learn to write his name. I thank Handwriting without tears for the simple instructions; "Start at the top" I never thought it mattered which way a kid wrote as long as they got the letters on the paper but boy what a difference starting at the top makes. Although I still can't used to the strange way they line the paper.

No more inching along the wall

Remember my little wall cling on? Well 4 weeks into skating lessons the kid can move. She can even go backwards.
Michael is having a bit more trouble but he keeps on trying.

What I did on my summer vacation

People often ask me if we stop during the summer. Are you kidding? we get in our best learning in the summer.
Our summer was chock full of trips to the shore where the kids went fishing and crabbing and jumped waves and made sand castles.
There were camps attend; Music camp which stunk b/c my kids were the only ones enrolled. Theater camp where Johanna said her big line,(after much prodding from the other kids on stage) "Holy cow" in play the class wrote themselves; there were the day camps at the museum; Colonial food camp was a big hit, what with making butter and tea bags. There was Reduce reuse recycle in colonial times camp and Gargoyle camp for Michael, whose theater camp got canceled b/c of low enrollment (If only music camp did the same thing)
Johanna passed the deep water test and was allowed to go down the slides at the pool. My big regret is that I never brought a camera to capture her jumping from the diving board or splashing in off the slide.
Theater camp, besides being fun, also gives us a taste of what it's like to have to get ready right away in the morning. It was hard for 2 weeks and I am glad I don;t have to do it for 9 mos.
so no, homeschool doesn't get time off for the summer or even snow days. Even with the bit of sit down academics we do, I save for it for "nothing else to do" kind of moments.
..Yet somehow in those flung together brief moments, Michael has learned to recognize words like Cat, Pen , Hen, Michael,Johanna, hot and pot.
and Johanna can skip count by 5s and 2s and sort of by 3, In the big picture though I think bike riding, ice skating and swimming take priority over the academics for now. If a child's work is play I want my kids to have all the play tools available to them.
Next semester..jump rope!

Love the canal museum! Love homeschool days!

Here's a little secret. On the top floor of the Crayola factory is the canal museum. Why is this a secret you ask? I don't know. we've been to the Crayola factory twice and each time I tell someone how much we LOVE the canal museum I am met with, "we've been there I didn't know about that place.
So in case you didn't know,I'm letting the cat out of the bag. We are not an especially crafty family. Everything my kids paint turns into a body art competition. Paper is cut for the sheer thrill of cutting and not so much for making anything. So while it's fun to do some out of the ordinary coloring at The factory and of course seeing crayons get made is great, the canal museum is our favorite part.
There are boats and an awesome water table where I really want to push all the kids out of the way and make a really wavy stream; sheer will power keeps me from doing this. I let the kids make their own formations and I live vicariously through them.
There are pulley systems and a tain table. Johanna loves dressing the donkey. when the weather warms up we can go on an actaul canal ride with a doneky (this part does costs extra but the museum is included in the price of admission, which during homeschool month was only 6.50)
So while i would recommend the Crayola factory I would HIGHLY recommend spending more upstairs! but don't leave without your free model magic!

A little more ecclectic than unschooly these days.

I got a nice deal on a program called, "ABC teach" on the homeschool buyers Co op. It was 20 dollars for a year membership. So every morning my kids find a word search or dot to dot on the table for them. The cool thing about the dot to dots is the choices. I can choose count 2s or 3s or 5s. or even words or the alphabet. I'm having so much fun playing around with all the worksheets...aggh did I just say, Work sheets? I meant puzzle games. I have to figureout how to do some of the other ones.

Michael is also now old enough for Starfall so he loves that. The kids are also enrolled in some classes this fall. Both kids are taking music and ice skating lessons and Johanna is taking swimming lessons also. Michael is once again a swim class drop out!
These swimming and ice skating lessons seem the most important to me. The more you can do the more options you have for play. No need to sit on the sidelines b/c you can't skate or swim. My kids will be able to get in on the action. I'm not sure if learning how to skate is the same as riding a bike; Once you learn you never forget, but I like to think these skills will help them when they become parents as well. They can help their own kids along the ice and enjoy lots of fun together b/c they will know how to play lots of things! I am not looking to make little athletes out of my kids. I want only for them to have little background so they can go off and feel secure in any type of activity.
Bike riding, swimming, ice skating all the things a well rounded childhood are made of...oh and don't forget the work sheets!

On the move

Were you ever moved to tears by the sheer determination of your child?
I was crying watching Johanna inch her way along the wall. No she did not want help and she could do it. Inch inch inch...then she let go and was so proud to move her feet across the ice. she turned to the kid behind her and joyously yelled, "I did it" She turned back around ; inch inch "I can skate!!" she beamed. What she could do was ever so slightly move her feet so she didn't need the constant support of the wall.
Tears poured down my face as she inched along.

This week Johanna also learned to ride her 2 wheeler. Last year we tried the "Hold the seat and run until the kid takes off" method but she just fell over and over. We put the wheels back on and stopped pushing her.
This year, as she she clanked down the driveway 3 bumps with her very well worn training wheels She noticed she was staying in the middle. So we took the training wheels off to see how she would do. She took off riding. The first night she had trouble actually getting on the bike and going but once on she could ride.
The next morning I lowered her seat and she could balance easier and off she went, an independent bike rider.

Ah the joys of the outdoors or not

So outdoorsy we homeschoolers are; Aren't we? Well if by "we" you mean, "the kids" then yes.
I am not the outdoorsy type. Sure it looks like we are b/c I consider time outdoors essential for optimum growth of young bodies and minds.
Touch the leaves, feel the grass between your toes, climb a tree, feel the breeze, see the butterfly, all awe inspiring just not to me.
The day we took the strawberry pictures I reached down and saw a snake in between the plants. I let out a scream and ran far up the path. 2 other mothers said, "what happened?"
"A snake" I cringed. The other mothers were crestfallen. I had let them down, my own homeschooling brethren. I was not calling the kids over to inspect this cool specimen, I did not wrangle it Crocodile Hunter style. I wouldn't even pick strawberries in that row again.
"A garter snake! It was a garter they don't even hiss" I was told. I do not care if they hiss or not. they slither and wiggle and are in fact SNAKES...so I hightailed it to the end of the aisle where my homeschooling license was abruptly revoked.

Math at a snail's pace

We played counting games and had snail races as we caught more and more snails on the crab traps.

JP Licks...

When we got home from Boston Johanna wanted to write a letter to Jp Licks .
It was a painstaking ordeal b/c writing is not her favorite thing to do and she struggles with letters like, "S" and "W". Also the letter, she was writing, needed to have punctuation, which isn't really something we have gone over at all.
I wish I had taken a picture of the letter but I did not. Anyway, she wrote and told them how much she liked the ice cream and she asked a question about the decoration tea cup ride which you could sit in but it said, "Please do not spin". Johanna was curios about this b/c it didn't spin anyway so she wanted to know why it said that.


Well can you believe that wonderful Josh over at JP Licks wrote her back? A very nice handwritten letter. He thanked her and explained that the tea cup used to be an old ride. We didn't actually get the answer to her question but it was first and foremost so kind of them to write her back.
I am so impressed that I want to tell everyone who heads off to Boston to please stop by JP Licks and enjoy some nice homemade ice cream!

Wordless Wenesday

Make way for us!!

I don't remember how old Johanna was when we got the book, Make way for ducklings but I do know that right after reading it, for the first time, I thought, "Hey this would make a great field trip!"
...and it did!
It was a day trip many years in the making. Everytime I read that book I planned in my head going to Boston and following the route of the ducklings. The funny thing is I didn't realize that many people before me had the same idea.




Finally my kids were at an age to appreciate the "tour" I had someone willing to come along and help navigate.
I was thrilled to learn that there would statues of almost all the ducks; Mrs. Mallord, Jack, Kack, Lack,Mack, Nack ,Oack, Pack and of course quack!
No Mr. Mallord though and we assume it is b/c he did not take the same trip.
The kids quacked up Mt Vernon street and we all thought better of trying to cross over to the Charles river since we would now be crossing a 4 lane highway. Mrs. Mallord at least had some help from officer Micheal. We just pointed and said, "this is where they crossed"

Our nagging question since reading book was, "Do ducks really eat peanuts?" In NJ they are always fed bread so we brought peanuts nd do you know what? Boston ducks love peanuts! They would eat them right out of our hands. (We did learn later we were not supposed to feed the ducks but we honestly did not know it at the time)




We rode the swan boats and ate JP licks ice cream (Oh wait that wasn't in the book)
I am so thrilled that this trip came to frution.
Since it rained the 2nd day we only saw Paul Revere's house and The old Norht church (And a really cool automated port a potty) but by then the kids were soaked and really done walking around in the rain.
this is a trip I defiently plan on doing again..who's with me! Quack!!

I can't wait for Monday

I am going to call my nephew on Monday, say around 10 or 11am. Monday is his first day of not going to school.
Friday was his last day of school. Oh he hated it there and didn't want to go back. I wish every kid who begged, "Please don't make me go" could hear back, "OK" what a collective sigh of relief that would be.