Homeschoolers Wanted: No money needed!

The Bug started MEP Math (the reception year) today. It was a curriculum that I was a bit hesitant about, I guess because I thought "how good can it be if it is FREE?" After reading a lot of reviews and going over the entire year of curriculum myself, I decided to give it a whirl. The Bug loved our first day and was asking for more, so that is always a good sign. If you haven't looked at the MEP you can look at it here: http://www.cimt.plymouth.ac.uk/projects/mep/default.htm

The think that the amount of free curriculum and resources out there is amazing. Just yesterday I found a fabulous fall nature journal from the US Forest Service for kids ages 3-12. The entire site is geared towards nature study. It is totally worth checking out at http://www.fs.fed.us/fallcolors/kids.shtml. Of course, I also utilize http://www.starfall.com/ for the kids phonics and reading and closely follow the entire FREE curriculum at http://www.amblesideonline.com/. And at that, I found compilation books for 70% of the Year 0 recommended reading for under $16 incl. shipping on http://www.amazon.com/. The rest, of course, will come from the local library.

Free is not always substandard. Homeschooling on a tight budget CAN be a successful endeavor. It takes a little research, a lot of dedication, and a complete love for our children. How simple is that?

Best of all He loved the Fall....

“Best of all he loved the fall … the fall with the tawny and grey, the leaves yellow on the cottonwoods, leaves floating on the trout streams and above the hills the high blue windless skies" ~ Ernest Hemingway. Hemingway wrote this of our community and his words are so very fitting. There is no more spectacular season in Sun Valley, Idaho than the Fall.

In anticipation of fall, we spent the last day of summer up in the mountains communing with nature. The Bug got some fishing in with his Grandpa and we all walked to a beautiful waterfall. The Cat collected rocks, inspected a dead mouse, and found her usual collection of sticks. The Bug found a skeletal jaw bone (he thinks it is a dinocaur but I am betting on a cow) with teeth attached. The moon was a crescent in the blue sky and I took the opportunity to explain fractions to The Bug. He said "look mommy, it's a half moon". I told him it was a quarter moon and found a stick on the hiking trail to break in half then quarters. Such a simple way to learn fractions! He got it right off the bat. After getting home and cleaned up, we headed to one of the nicer steakhouses in town and the kids showed perfect table manners.... or as close to perfect as a 3 and 4 year old can get.

Learning comes so naturally to young children. Making every day a day that more knowledge is gained is the healthiest way to fuel the young mind.

Nature Lovers!

We started our Nature Journals today! Being that The Bug is just learning to write and The Cat is nowhere near writing, I had to help a bit. We spent the afternoon at the pond making discoveries and observations and then drawing them or gluing them into the first page of the journals. The kids LOVED it and I loved watching the innocent joy on their faces as they worked.

 

Artificial Associations vs. Independant Thinking

"Let him go and come freely, let him touch real things, and combine his impressions for himself, instead of sitting indoors at a little round table while a sweet-voiced teacher suggests that he build a stone wall with his wooden blocks, or make a rainbow out of strips of coloured paper, or plant straw trees in bead flower-pots. Such teaching fills the mind with artificial associations that must be got rid of before the child can develop independent ideas out of actual experiences." (pg. 196)

I was re-reading some of Miss Mason's writings on the early years and this one particularly stood out. It is so basic and yes so polar opposite of what we as a society are taught to believe. Parents are getting their little ones into preschool earlier and earlier.... some for academics, others because they feel their 3 year old is "advanced" or "accelerated" (I hear these alot!), and yet others for the socialization factor. Parents are pushed into placing their kids in preschool and in turn, the young children are forced into learning a plethora of things that a preschooler doesn't need to know. A young child should learn from their environment. A young child should be free to discover and make connections and observations on his own. Rather than memorizing random facts about the weather, he should be outside watching the storm roll in and see the lightening strike the hillside. That is something he will carry with him far more than he will looking at a cloud on a classroom wall in the weather station.

A laid back Saturday

The Bug and I went on a little hike today. We gained bit of elevation... just enough to where the Aspen trees were starting to turn. I think the neatest thing we discovered, at least to him, was an old cottonwood tree with a woodpecker hole in it. It was the perfect opportunity to explain the differences in birds using the woodpecker and the swallows as examples. I think those are two birds he can now easly identify and knows the differences in. We also collected leaves, found a few rocks, a nice new walking stick (I think he has about 20 now scattered in the yard), and enjoyed the beautiful Fall-like day....

This afternoon, The Cat and I made cookies. She hasn't really been in to cooking and baking all that much, so when she seemed interested, I jumped right on it. It was really good practice for her on fine motor skills with the mixing and forming the dough balls and she was pretty proud of how they turned out. Of course, I used the cheaters method of pre-made sugar cookie mix and canned frosting... but to her, they were homemade and that is all that counts :-)

A truly CM kind of day...

Today was about as close to the Charlotte Mason Early years as a mom (or dad) could get. The Bug spent about 10 minutes on Starfall this morning for phonics/reading. This afternoon, we took off for a nature walk to the pond in our neighborhood. On the way there, the kids found animals and objects in the clouds and worked on this week's memory verse; "I am the vine. You are the Branches." John 15:5. At the pond we ran and played, looked for frogs, tried to catch a snake, and talked about the black storm clouds rolling in and that they mean it might rain. One the way home, I asked them to narrate this week's nursery rhyme (Jack and Jill) and we practiced inserting their own names in Jack and Jills places. We stopped to check out every grasshopper in the road and practiced our French vocab by saying 'bon jour' to ever single last grasshopper. Finally, we came home and the kids pretended to be grasshoppers in the grass.

I  get the biggest thrill watching The Bug and The Cat learn through living. This allows them to be kids. No desks, no co-ops, no lapbooks... just gaining knowledge in the course of life. A true living education. I don't understand the parents who put their preschool age children behind a desk, whether at home or in a school building, doing workbooks and learning about people or places that have no bearing on these formative years. The best thing we can do for our kids is let them explore, ask questions, give answers, play make-believe, learn good habits that stay with them for life, get to know God, to let them know we love them, and to give them a solid foundation on which to become an upstanding human beings. What more could we possibly want for our children?

Crisis Intervention?

Today I had a crisis of faith.... faith in homeschooling. The day started simple enough. The Cat was to start her first gymnastics class. She was excited. I was excited. It was to be a good day. We got the gym, which is a one room metal building, and she got a bit of jitters. And then the mom's were told to LEAVE. Go outside... into the parking lot, our cars... whatever. The tears started to flow freely from The Cat. I told the teacher I would stay in the corner, quiet as a church mouse. No go. No parents allowed to watch. Period. The cat began to scream "don't weave me mommy"... so I scooped her up and out we went. I felt like a total failure as a mom. Like I had done something wrong in her upbringing. Was homeschooling sheltering her too much? The other parents were a bit giggly at my obviously socially inept just turned 3 year old. I wanted to lower myself in my car seat and slither away. I ran every would've, could've, should've scenario in my mind as we drove away. The Cat said (sniffle) "it's okay Mommy".

And then it hit me! I am glad my baby wants to be with me. I am not the type of mom to leave her 3 year old in a strange place with strangers... in tears, no less. The other parents had no right to judge us. The Cat holds conversations with people of all ages. She is not shy a bit. She just needs to know her Mommy is there to catch her when she falls... and afterall, isn't that what Mommies do?

And off we go!

After a rough start a couple of weeks back, we are finally underway! We got held up a bit because of a curriculum choice that did not work for us. After hours and hours of research, I decided were a Charlotte Mason family and that I wanted boxed curriculum for our first year. I was sure Winter Promise was "the one". I ordered I'm Ready to Learn with great confidence. It came on schedule and looked for promising... but after two weeks, I quickly realized it wasn't going to work for us. I then took two weeks and put together my own curriculum with a strong Charlotte Mason influence and we got started this week.