War of 1812 - Battle of New Orleans

Too cute. Absolutely too cute. The girls really enjoyed this after we (finally) got to study the Battle of New Orleans. So much happened during this war! Francis Scott Key wrote The Star Spangled Banner, Dolley Madison saved the portrait of George Washington and our Declaration of Independence before the British came and burned and gutted the President's Mansion! What a tough chick! They had to paint the sandstone white on the Mansion b/c of the damage from the burning AND a hurricane and then it became known as the White House!

History is SO Honkin' Fun!

My 5th grade teacher, Mr. Tom Lewis, used to play this song for us on the record player. An afternoon favorite. He would sing along off key. I love it.

Art

A Hannah Toucan
Art inspired by the book she was writing before the book she is writing now.
She says we are going to print actual books of teh book she is writing now.
You know. Self-publishing at lulu.com!

Week 3 --- Check!

We made it through week three. Seems like with all the rain this week, we wanted to be lazy and do things like READ, and create ART and NAP all day. It was hard to concentrate!

If Education is an Atmosphere, then everyone in this homeschool should be learning, right? Even dear old mom! That's me! The girls are not interested in blogging, but I can tell you what I learned this week!

--> Be Who You Are. Tara asked me not to stop reading from Shakespeare's Twelfth Night. We're rather getting into it! Who knew it was so funny??? I guess people who read it. Ok, dumb question. Moving on. This week we learned that Viola is dressing up as a boy named Cicero and is working as a page for Count Orsino. Viola/Cicero loves Orsino. Orsino loves Olivia. And Olivia loves Cicero, not knowing he is really Viola, a chick. How humiliating would that be? MORAL: There are always consequences when you pretend to be someone you are not, negative consequences.

--> Choose Your Associates Well. In History we learned about Tecumseh, a Native American who tried to rally all of the Indian Nations to rise up against the new Americans (by now an independent nation from Britain). Tecumseh realized that the new Americans were pushing them farther and farther into "Indian Territory" and taking over their land. The Native Americans were losing resources, land, pride, their tradition ways, and were finding themselves very dependent on alcohol, which caused chaos and terrible decision making. Tecumseh was going across the United States unifying the Tribes to fight...and almost succeeded. Except while he was gone, his brother "The Prophet" allowed the tribes that had already assembled to steal some new American's horses, which caused a battle to take place before the Native Americans had a chance to build their army. "The Prophet" told his people he would cause the bullets not to hurt them. So when they fell dead, those who remained lost all faith in Tecumseh because of his brother. So the moral of the story is -- and Michael and I have learned this in minstry painfully--be very careful whom you build a partnership with.

-->God's Word is like TRUE and stuff! We are continuing our carpet ride through Turkey (aka, geography study of the Holy land!

The New Testament Christians hid out here in Cappadocian cities!

A temple inside one of the cities in Cappadocia.

This is Haran. Can you remember who lived in Haran?
It was ABRAHAM! These are mud huts. People for thousands of years lived in houses made of resources available to them. These now have cable and electricity, but are very good shelter. Obviously they have started bringing in like WOOD and SHINGLES from the looks of the background.

God's word says the ark came to rest on Mt. Ararat.
This is Mt. Ararat, which is in Turkey near the border of Iran. There are many theories on the "Ararat Anomaly" and if you have a few hours, google it. It is fascinating seeing top-secret, recently declassified photos through the years of what some believe to be the ark of Noah resting on the mount.

Nature Study

The House by Hannah (she drew it in reverse for fun)

A chronic problem with her art is that she gives incredible detail in the beginning and then gets tired, and rather than finishing another day, she slops off the rest of the picture.
The Tree & Baby Swing by Hannah
This is a favorite of mine. I just love that baby swing and what it represents to me when I look out the window every day.
The Tree by Hannah
Leaf by Hannah
A Rose by Mom. This was drawn using a kid's book on how to draw flowers. I can follow instructions but that could never come out of my head.

Our Family by Tara

Baby, Dad Mom by Tree, Hannah looking orangey.

I love that her sun is always cool looking!

Banana Spider by Tara

Tara and I miss that banana spider. RIP
Garbage Pickup by Tara

THIS TOTALLY CRACKS ME UP!
SO much for NATURE study in the CITY!

The Lake by Tara (acrylic paint)

It is so pretty in person.

Today's Quote

"I am beginning to suspect all elaborate and special systems of education. They seem to me to be built up on the supposition that every child is a kind of idiot who must be taught to think." -Anne Sullivan (Helen Keller's teacher)

Classroom Management

I was talking to a public school special education teacher yesterday. She is in year 2 as a teacher and is in a new classroom this year. She used to be a teacher's aid, so she has observed teachers for years and noted areas of general incompetency. We had a great conversation about all it takes to get a classroom ready for students and how to start the year off right. It brought back a lot of memories from when I was a Christian school principal and how hard it was for us to get our classrooms organized, decked out, and streamlined before the students ever arrived.

I have the benefit of knowing my students before the first day of school! I also live in the homeschool environment, so I can take all summer, if need be, to lesson plan (I don't) or organize last year's mess (I do) or decorate (not much) or pre-study (I do) or get inspired (I do! I do!).

School week 1 went fabulous. School week 2 was almost a complete bust.
Monday was productive.
Tuesday we were gone from 10:15 to 4:00. That cuts out a huge chunk of the day.
Wednesday we had therapists, drop-in visitors, plus getting to know a new baby.
Thursday we had more therapists, drop-in visitors, appointments, and new baby.
Friday we had a play date, activities, etc.

Part of managing a classroom is making sure that the work spaces for the students are organized and the processes are streamlined. A big part of classroom management is making sure the schedule works for everyone. Two weeks of school gives clear insight into what needs tweaking. So this morning I worked on the schedule.

A big factor in my schedule is that I am a crazy night owl. I think a lot of people go through this. No matter howe exhausted you are at 6pm, you get a second wind about 8 or 9PM and find yourself up until 2AM. Which makes it impossible to get up at 6AM to jog on the treadmill. My kids stay up reading. And I am thinking, "Why am I so notorious about getting up at 7? I have teenagers! Even public schools are starting at 9 cuz teens stay up late and need to sleep til 7:30 or 8!"

So the first adjustment: start my day at 7 with a workout and shower before everyone else gets up. Get girls up at 8. Get baby up at 8;30 for meds and bottle at 9. Follow the 9,1,5,9 schedule for him with a midnight bottle for extra hydration. Reformulate the schedule based on that. The reformulation comes in where I am working with the girls solely while baby is napping and when he is playing (playing spiderman and trying to injure himself, the girls do independent work). And then build the schedule off of that.

Lessons

I have signed Hannah up for art classes at a studio in Plano that does classes for homeschooled students. Today we went and toured the facility and looked at examples of the art she will be doing. It will be a cultural study. She will have 30 minutes of instruction each week on a new geographical location, the traditional art of that culture, and the medium of the week. Then she will have an hour to create. I really thought the art examples done by kids in after-school care LAST year (the same study) were exceptional, but they were downplaying the work. Hannah has an eye and I don't comprehend it because I am not artistic or creative at all. So it blows my mind. Tara is also a good artist, but she wanted to take swimming lessons. Hannah will have her lesson every Wednesday at 1PM.

I signed Tara up for swimming 3 at the Frisco Athletic Center (across the street from where one of our USA Olympic female gymnast trains, consequently) for a month or so. I want to secure her spot for the following months through to Christmas, but I can't predict what class she will need to be in, so I need to call and find that out. Tara does very well in her lessons and zoomed through Swimming 2 in 2 weeks and had 2 weeks to just get some one-on-one instruction while the other kids worked on swimming 2 stuff. So she is excited!

I also signed baby Gabe up for Parent & Me swim, which just puts the baby in the pool, teaching the child to be comfortable in the water. He is a FISH. For all teh aspirating that boy does on liquid and food, he always holds his breath in water. Go figure! However, the immunologist told me his immunodeficiency means I have to cancel his lessons. So I will use the $37 for that and put it toward Tara's lessons for October/November I guess.