Elantris Student Check-In

Our 14 year old has recently started homeschooling. We are following a TJEd model to the best of our ability.  Currently my son and I are reading Elantris by Brandon Sanderson.  In order to make sure that he is getting all of the important details out of the book, I made up this check-in form.  The discussion questions are not for essays, they are for discussion.  I thought I would post it, in case anyone else wants to check-in with their children reading this book.  In order to be able to discuss the topics effectively, and know if their other answers are correct it will be best for you to read the book WITH them.  This is not a test, they are welcome to refer to the book if needed.  This only serves as a tool to help them and you know that they are keeping track of the characters so that they can follow the plot better.

Elantris Check-In

Chapters 1-5

Characters-match the character to their description

• Sarene                                                        fallen Prince of Arelon
• Jaddeth                                                      Raoden's guide in Elantris
• Raoden                                                      widowed bride of Raoden
• Wyrn                                                         not very likeable, King of Arelon
• Hrathen                                                     called to convert Arelon in 3 months
• Galladon                                                   Lord of all creation
• King Iaden                                                servant of the Lord
• Dilaf                                                          kind Uncle of Sarene
• Kiin                                                          agreed to be assistant Hrathen

Definitions-match to the correct definition

• Sule                                                           the magic of Elantris
• Seod                                                          slave
• The Aons                                                   friend
• Hoed                                                          those that change people into Elantrians
• The Shaod                                                Elantrians who had succumbed to the pain

Discussion Questions

1. When Hrathen went to Arelon to convert the city, he found a man there, Fjon, who had led many of the people astray. It is said that he “ran a chapel without order” and that he bowed “before Arelish culture rather than bringing the people strength and discipline.”(p35) How can we make sure that we do not bow down to the culture of the world, but uphold higher standards? Do you think being liked and accepted was important to Fjon?

2. Do you think that the God Hrathen serves is good? Why or why not? What are the similarities and differences between his calling to convert Arelon and that of Christians in the last days to convert the world in preparation for the second coming of Christ?

2. How is Galladon helpful to Raodon?

3 Gangs in Elantris-Informative section

“Karata is both the harshest and most lenient of the gang leaders.” (p47)

She takes food PERSONALLY from new comers and rarely harms them. She's been caught 3 times trying to make it to the King's Palace. Karata has control of the palace in Elantris.

Aanden—tried to establish himself as King of Elantris. Claims he was a noble before. Claims to have a plan for freeing Elantris. He's brutal.

Shaor takes pleasure in controlling others—the most wild and morally corrupt find their way to him. They are scared off from harming others or stealing their food if they think they might fight back.

Snail Trail

I think I feel some Snail Trail coming on. Has anyone who is not in my family EVER heard of that game?

I was out pulling weeds today while the kids were busy playing with worms, spiders, and snails.  The snails were the big hit.

We learned lots of interesting things about snails that were news to me, one of which was that snails are hermaphrodites!  I also learned that they carry diseases and you should make sure the kiddos wash their hands really good after handling.

Check out this Snail World website where we learned all about snails!

Vikings!

We learned about Vikings last week as an intro to US History, as the Vikings landed in North America in around the year 1000 A.D., probably around Newfoundland, CA.  This week we are talking about Christopher Columbus.  The curriculum wanted us to move more quickly onto Columbus, but I have a house full of boys and Vikings are cool!

We checked out some books at the library on Vikings, one of which had some awesome Viking crafts, and today completed our Viking ships.  These are not quite as elaborate as the book, but pretty cool still!

Here are the boys playing with their ships. :)  The blue baby chair is Iceland, the blue yoga mat is the ocean, the green yoga mat is Greenland, and the caste across more water is North America.  (Pay no attention to proportions, exact placement, or what kind of sense it doesn't make to have a castle in North America. :) )  Pretty fun!

P.S. Update: I already decided against that LDS curriculum I was thinking of using next year.  When it comes time to move beyond the Bible study included in our curriculum, probably next year, we will just add other scripture study as it's own curriculum.  I'll share what system we start using once we get to that point!  I do however like rotating Science, and Spanish most of the time.  Social Studies has now become more consistent and a base for our other subjects.  Even cooking :).  A couple weeks ago, chef Superman and I, made and served some patriotic layered white yogurt, raspberries, blueberries, and granola for the brothers.  

Rotating Subjects

So there is a fabulous LDS curriculum that I plan on starting next year for history, see curriculum here, and with  this curriculum they recommend rotating subjects.  Well, I'm not starting their curriculum yet, and when I do I may only do history, but I'm going to try subject rotation now.  I've been noticing Spanish is sort of suffering and science is sporadic SO here's the rotation.  Devotional (song, prayer, scriptures in one form or another), pledge, reading, writing and math daily and then one subject per week of science, social studies, and spanish.  I should also have listed instruments daily....but we're slacking on the daily-ness ;) of that as well.

Right now we're having a problem with Superman retaining his Spanish.  I think that emphasizing Spanish for a full week every three weeks will work better than Spanish once or twice a week as far as retention.  It's also way less stressful to me to have less subjects on my mind at once.  Hopefully I'll let ya know how it goes!

Random Flexible Homeschool Life

As it is in our home, life is unpredictable (as is any home with 5 boys ages 6 and under-or any home with one little person and a parent for that matter)  and so our learning time has to be flexible.  Plans and good intentions get us so far, only to be let go for an option that involves less stress or conflict, or to carry through with an idea that came along right then and just sounds more fun.

Today we started with The Pledge of Allegiance, a prayer, and a scripture story followed by some reading aloud.  We never do things in the same order, or even in the same room.  We then took a break that was supposed to be 10-15 minutes and turned into I think 45 minutes.  (A lot of this is due to the beautiful 3 week old addition to our family.  The kids of course didn't mind some extra lego time.)

When we finally got started again we did some math and a science experiment.  The PLAN was to then do writing before lunch BUT everyone had so much fun with the science I could tell they were too wound up and it wouldn't be fun or pretty to get them to sit down and do their writing.  The other factor was that during the science experiment I had put a masking tape finish line on the carpet and remembered how fun it was over a year ago to make masking tape roads in the front room.

  So we built a little town with masking tape roads in the front room.  So fun!  We're going to leave it up for a couple days and probably add a few more roads.  

 I still planned on doing writing after lunch.

During lunch Spiderman's ukulele showed up on the front porch!  Yea!  We've been expecting it for over a week and he was SO happy!   He now gets to start learning his first instrument!  I think cute Robin is hoping to play it sometime too. :)

Of course after lunch we couldn't go straight to writing!  They had to experiment with the ukulele. They didn't care about me looking up what notes to tune it to first.  THIS was SO fun.  All of the boys got on an instrument.  Big brother Superman has now decided he wants them all to be a band when they get bigger.  We had Robin on the piano, Baby J on the drum, Superman-ukulele, and Spiderman-guitar  (I love how they were all playing the guitar like it was an upright bass--it made me want to get one.)  They rotated a couple times and although musically there wasn't a ton happening, they did all get on the same rhythm a few times, and that was pretty awesome.

Since I had Baby A 3 weeks ago, Robin (will be 4 in Nov) has become one of the big boys in the house.  He is VERY musical and I'm excited to see what comes out of him when he's older.

 Can you get over how cute it is to have that adorable 1 year old on that big drum!  I love it. :)

After the park I put Baby J to bed and tuned the ukulele. Spiderman learned the C chord, and I played a little progression on guitar while I shouted out notes for Superman to play on the piano.  I hope this happens many more times! 

We never got to our writing, or the other "work" I had in mind for the day, but that is the beauty of homeschool.  You don't have to do EVERY subject EVERY day and you have this beautiful opportunity to create special memories with these little people that bless your life.  

P.S. This was our second weekly NO SCREENS day.  I hope to write more about this later!

Vowel Song

(To the tune of "London Bridges")

I know the names of the vowels

A - E - I - O - U

I know the names of the vowels

A - E - I - O - U

Teaching Money

I didn't write this poem and I'm not sure who did, BUT I like it!  Sing it to the tune of "Skip to my Lou" or just recite it.  You could easily just end after the quarter verse if you prefer.  

We did something the kids really enjoyed that would work for auditory, kinesthetic, and visual learners.  My kids know the song pretty well, but are still working to identify the names of the coins correctly.  SO, today we got out each coin while we sang the song, as well as a piece of paper with each coin amount on it.  As we sang the song, we would hold up the coin, and then the number of cents for each coin with the appropriate lyric.  It was fun, hands on, and instructive.  They asked to do it again later in the day.

 Happy homeschooling!

MONEY POEM

Penny, penny, easy spent,
Copper brown and worth one cent.

Nickel, nickel, thick and fat,
You’re worth 5. I know that.

Dime, dime, little and thin,
I remember—you’re worth 10.

Quarter, quarter, big and bold,
You’re worth 25, I am told.

Half a dollar, half a dollar,
Giant size.
50 cents to buy some fries.
Dollar, dollar, green and long,
With 100 cents you can’t go wrong.

Enjoying Learning Again!

Every family's educational journey is so different, as it should be.  We learn as we

go.  We learn from our feelings, from our children's feelings, from learning styles,

and discovering what works for us as Mommy's and teachers.  Every parent is after all

a teacher.  Every child is too for that matter.  

(I'm trying to remember these

things in stressful moments....aka "teaching moments.")

I finally decided yesterday that for next year, I'm bringing "Superman" back home, after what will be a

total of 3 months in public school.  I may very well choose to send him or another child back to public

school at another time, but for now, this is what puts my heart and mind at ease and I am 

looking forward to it.

Here are a few pictures from a little tactile activity we did last week.  We started out doing letters

in some flour in individual cake pans then went to the next "station" and wrote

names and drew pictures with spaghetti noodles.

"Spiderman" is so big and suddenly very interested in learning to read and write.

Wish I could remember the story about his noodle picture....

SUPER happy "Robin"! :)  He made that "d" on his paper himself modeled after the "d" on 

the book next to him. :)

He keeps surprising me lately with his little 3 year old coordination!  

I could be because it's still so difficult to understand his speaking that I forget

how much he's growing up!

The noodle thing could be a fun way to change things up with spelling words too!

Lately I'm learning a few things that make OUR home learning work better for us.

1.  Don't always do school at the same time or same location.  

Again, this is totally tailored to THIS Mommy and her boys.  It probably goes against every other homeschool thing you've ever read.  We do school here and there, upstairs at desks or on the white board, downstairs at the snack bar or kitchen table or once every week or two, at a table at the library during story time.  

2.  I don't have to stick to anyone's curriculum to be a good teacher with well rounded children.

Curriculum can be lovely and helpful, but for me, they can also be stressful.  For half of

this past school year we did our best to almost exactly follow a curriculum and 90% of the time

we did it at desks.  WELL, that is wonderful for some families, but that led to burn out for me, and the kids were not looking forward to learning.  I can focus on the things that are important for my child to learn, when they are ready to learn it and if they are especially into one subject I'm going to let them run with it.  Basically now I'm just

taking helpful ideas from our curriculum and finding other supplementing things that I like from the library and internet.  

[Example:  Our curriculum has a week long plan for teaching each letter sound that incorporates Science, reading, character, and Bible.  I now prefer to let my child choose the next letter he learns,

get library books that go along with, use some of the curriculum sheets, maybe bring in movies

on a topic that starts with that letter and also include a letter that we are reviewing the second half of the week.  Too much planning makes me crazy!  I've gotta fly by the seat of my pants, and go with 

everyone's moods to keep feeling alive.]

3.  It helps me to be accountable to someone.  
I figured this out through public school and I will apply it to our homeschool by using a local charter school program that is set up for homeschoolers.  They have an independent learning program
that I can use where for one or two subjects I will need to let someone know every couple weeks what we have done in that subject.  That will be tremendously helpful to me.  They also have fun free kits we can use, like Rosetta Stone access, a typing game, and an astronomy package.  Fun, fun.

4.  Find out about free local programs and see how they can spice up your homeschool.
Next to our city library we have a literacy center.  They offer reading classes for elementary students as well as math tutoring for older kids.  The reading classes put them groups according to reading level and meet twice a week for fifty minutes.  I will be taking my two oldest to these classes to give them a little outlet together and to give me that little guaranteed bi-weekly time to focus on my little ones.  We'll probably go to the library next door and read together, or maybe go play at a nearby park sometimes.

Reflection on our public school experience

Things I have learned from "Superman" being in public Kindergarten since the end of February:

1.  I miss him when he's gone.

2.  In public school they have to stay on topics for a long period of time to make sure everyone gets it.  This has advantages and disadvantages.  Reinforcement is good to a degree, but at some point if something is totally easy for your child, you are just wasting time.

3.  Consistently revisiting things your child has learned throughout the year really helps them retain it.  I could use some improvement in this area.

4.  When you child is gone to school for hours and comes home with a bunch of things to do (homework, piano practice, soccer sometimes, dinner, and always wanting to play with friends) it's easy to become a drill sergeant parent.  "Superman" feels this and even said to me yesterday, "When can I get my own house.  I'm tired of being told I can't do stuff and getting time outs."  This is a result (at least partially) of the time crunched, drill sergeant parent business.  I REALLY don't want that kind of relationship with my children.  I don't want to be the schedule keeper all the time.

5.  I learned that I like being accountable to someone for doing our reading.  It really helps me stay consistent.

Why I am currently leaning toward homeschool again for next year:

1.  6 hours a day away from Mom and family is a lot for such a young child. 

2.  I believe that spending more time with your family allows you to all know each other better and be closer.  (I am not at all concerned about lack of socialization between neighbor friends, church, homeschool group and sports).

The next two are currently the ones I feel the strongest about....

3.  I feel that in general, homeschooled children have more of an opportunity to find out who THEY are and what THEY love.  What do THEY want to learn about and why?  

4.  We can move at the pace of each individual kid.  I don't have to wait for 30 other kids to be proficient in one area. As soon as my child gets it, we can move on to the next concept and he has an opportunity to excel.  At the same time, he won't KNOW he's excelling.  He won't feel superior to another kid in his class, and if he needs to move slower, he won't feel inferior.

5.  There are many resources in our community to give me support as a homeschooling mother.  There's a library literacy program as well as many other library programs.  There is also a charter school with free kits for independent study on topics my 6 year old is especially interested in.  (They also give you access to a typing program, and Rosetta Stone for Spanish).  Doing some things through that school will give me someone to be accountable to in a no pressure, not stressful kind of way.  

6.  Less of a schedule to stick to....learning things will be done earlier in the day, so he will have more time when friends are home from school to play.  Also, sometimes he will get to play with homeschool friends earlier in the day and already feel socially fulfilled.  I won't have to run my life by the school bus....if Dad wants to see us for lunch, we're free to do that.  

A few mixed feelings:

This past week "Superman" has really enjoyed public school.  He still says he will not be sad if I decide to do homeschool next year.  I'm glad for that but it's still fun that he enjoys school.  At this point I'm feeling that being slowed down in his learning potential and the one thing after another evenings outweigh the fact that he enjoys school.  I can always change my mind later. :)  It's nice to feel you have a choice.

I plan on homeschooling through the summer with the children.  I figure by the fall, I will know for sure what I want to do next year.

12 Ways to Encourage Learning and 5 Rules of Engagement

Here are some good things I copied off of the site I linked to in the previous post.  Twelve ways to encourage children to learn:

1. Provide a safe and loving atmosphere for learning. More support, less pressure.

2. Create magic and anticipation. Provide inspiring materials.

3. Expose children to inspiring music, great art, good books, etc.

4. Read as a family on a regular, consistent basis. This has great benefits .

5. Inspire curiosity and then leave them to the wonder of experimentation and self discovery.

6. Leave plenty of time for thinking, playing and being with family. Avoid too many lessons, clubs and classes.

7. Remember that play is the work of children.

8. Be patient with the learning process.

9. Learn to recognize and respond to Sparks.

10. Learn and live the Five Rules of Engagement.

11. Enjoy learning yourself.

12. Share what you are learning with our children.

Here are her Five Rules of Engagement to help keep the children excited about learning.

Enjoy!  I'm excited to start applying these things along with the "spark station."

Thoughts Rolling Round and Round

 (Warning: this post is just me sorting out thoughts and is pointless for anyone else to read ;))
I've been pondering....my kids are young.  There are many homeschool methods that don't do any structured learning until age eight.  In the mean time, the children learn on their own, by living and exploring.  

I think I didn't initially go for this idea because the condition on which I get to homeschool our children (my husband says) is that they are not "dumb" as compared with other children their age.  Also, I did find a Christian curriculum that I really like, which I have talked about several times.

Well, after hearing of TJED twice in the same day last week (I  had also heard of it before of course) and learning that they don't do much schooling until age 8, I started pondering.  Whenever something comes up several times in a short period, I figure the Lord could be trying to tell me something, so generally I will look into that thing.  Also, I read an article this last week about exploratory learning through projects.

My brain is going round and round with ideas of loosening up our curriculum and focusing on the learning games, practicing reading, and writing just through letters and stuff. OR I could just do the parts of the curriculum the children enjoy, and the scriptural things, plus more exploratory learning time and materials.  Some of the blogs I've looked at just add math to an otherwise very loose and exploratory learning time.

I'm all over the place.  Here's what I want.  I WANT my children to love learning.  I WANT them to be able to learn creatively, and especially at their young ages I don't want to stifle their ability to do so by learning in such a structured way all the time.  They do enjoy learning things when it's in their own way.  I think it could be a cool and fun process to just let them teach themselves with experiences and materials that I help provide.

For now, I am going to create a "spark station" or something like it.  I like the idea of them only having access to it at certain times so that they are more excited about learning time.  Not sure how I'll pull that off yet though.  I am going to make sure that I am available for any self motivated learning ideas the children have, i.e. going on a walk and making a story with pictures, playing store, writing a letter to a relative, etc.  Also, we will continue, no matter what, to have a daily set aside learning time.

Outside of those things, I have a split personality because there ARE a lot of things I love about our curriculum.  It will be interesting to see what these thoughts all turn into.  

I am looking at putting "Superman" into a 1 day a week charter school for fun group electives next year or the year after.  Largely because he has wanted to play violin since he was 3 and they have a group violin class.  Also, they have a music/drama class that I think he would LOVE and a lego robotics class.  Maybe I'll try to go check that out in person sometime very soon to help me decide if I should wait until he's older.

Pasta Art Gallery

Well, time to finally put those colored pastas to use!  We did this on a Saturday, and big brother "Harry Potter" got to join in the fun.  He always enjoys getting a glimpse into our homeschooling.  (Side note for any who don't know, "Harry Potter" is my almost 12 year old step-son and is mostly with his mom AND he just switched from a regular elementary school to a charter school!)

Admiring his "train track"!

Busy creating...

Time for glue

"Superman" constructing his "ladder and slide."

"Harry Potter" wanted to test out something we had done when he wasn't with us....(click HERE to see the post on art with milk and dish soap as well as how we dyed our pasta)

The finished products of all of the children up in the family room, our current art gallery.

               :)  I love this wall!

Sun Time

This is from part of the week we learned about the sun.  The line "Spiderman" got to memorize, and the theme of his scriptures and mini-devotionals for the week was, "Jesus is the light of the world."

(These ideas came from the still fabulous curriculum we use, My Father's World)

Our science (aka fun learning activity) was to make a sundial.  I made the dough ahead of time and we made the sun dial together.  The kids marked the lines in the dough (you could also use clay) and I wrote the time.  It was fun and cool for them to see how you can tell time from where the sun is in the sky.  It was about 10:30am when I took this picture of the sun dial....the shadow falls a little before our line for 11am.

Here is the recipe we used for the dough (again from our curriculum), you can of course make it any color you want.

In a pan mix:

                                 1 to 1-1/4 cups flour

                                 1/4 cup salt

                                 2 T. cream of tartar

Combine and add to the pan:

                               1 cup water

                               1 T. oil

                               a few drops food coloring

You could take this lesson so many different directions with different ages.  You could do this as part of a Native American unit for history, a unit on seasons or one that includes moon phases, planets, and meteors, or just sometime when you're working on clocks and telling time.  

My favorite thing is that it tied it into Heavenly Father.  The sun is the light of the world just like Christ is.  And just like the sun shines indiscriminately on all people, Christ's love and the gift of the atonement are available for all people everywhere.

Weeds and seeds

Some of these pictures are repeats from our family blog....I just really like them :)

This web was PERFECT and beautiful...."Superman" drew it in his sketch book.  It is has been a good web to look at and see how spiders catch their food.

                      A couple weeks ago we learned about plants and seeds, and how plants reproduce and grow.  We ran into this perfect weed in the midst of spreading it's seed.  So cool right!

 All of the kids pulled out some of the seeds.  On the way home we saw a lot of this seed blowing around among other plants.

Pictures to grow on.

Loving learning from God and his creations!

Loving Homeschool

I feel the need to express in words what I hope is being captured through this blog mainly through pictures.  I LOVE homeschooling my children.  I LOVE my children, I LOVE the time I have with them.  I LOVE having the time to get to know them all individually, to learn their learning styles, how their minds work.  I love seeing what things excite them, what things make them feel creative, and what things make them feel accomplished.  I love pretending with them, cuddling with them (at times....I don't love them hanging on me--two TOTALLY different things ;)) reading to them, and finding fun and interesting learning in everyday life.  I love learning about values and how the Lord works with them as part of their curriculum.  I love that I can use curriculum, and that I don't have to use curriculum.  I love the feeling that I'm unschooling while also being structured, that we can take days off when we need to or when someone's mood would make school less than ideal that day.  We will still learn!  My five year old will still tell me how many flies were in the house if I've killed 4 and there are 3 more flying around.  We can still learn about how to control our emotions and be kind on a day when we don't sit down at the desk.  And what is more important in life, learning how to be happy, or learning how to spell?  In this journey of home-learning, family-learning, God-parent-child-learning we call homeschool, we WILL learn spelling and reading and math, AND we will learn that if we push something too hard, it's not worth the sacrifice of happiness.

I am so fulfilled in life right now, just being on earth, and learning how to really be separate from the world.

A Story from the Kids: Star Wars Fighters 1

Star Wars Fighters 1

     Anakin Skywalker leads Obi Wan Kanobi in the forest.

A skunk jumps down from the trees and Anakin slices it.

Obi Wan doesn't know where Anakin is.

                                                 R2-D2 is trying to find Anakin also.

Finally Obi Wan and Anakin find each other again.  They hear something in the woods.

What they hear is a bear!  A polar bear!

They creep up on the bear...

And they slice him!  It is hard to fight the polar bear!

They try and try and finally cut off its arm.

The polar bear dies and they have to make sure there are no more bears.  

There is only one more.

R2-D2 rolls over the last bear and hurts it until it stops fighting.

Master Yoda gives Anakin and Obi Wan a mission to protect the Republic.

Anakin and Obi Wan go to help the Republic.

On their way there, they see R2-D2 and one of the kids from the Republic. 

They are almost to the Republic and Anakin and Obi Wan protect R2 and the child well from some enemy droids along the way.

They get hungry and stop to catch some fish, to kill and eat.

After they eat an enemy droid kills Obi Wan!

Luckily Obi Wan comes back to life!

Then Anakin dies from an enemy droid!

The child is still happy!

Anakin comes back to life and turns into Darth Sidious (Darth Vader's master) and kills everyone (except the small, happy child and Yoda).

Then Darth Sidious turns into Darth Vader, who turns good and brings R2 and Obi Wan back to life with the force.

~THE END~