Transcript Information for Justin's 2014-2015 Year

HAVEN'T INCLUDED JUSTIN'S BINDER, YET. THIS IS MOM'S BINDER ONLY. *World History 60 minutes *Bible 1 full credit : church attendance , 36.5 hours morning time (Bible memorization, catechisms, oral Bible reading), at least 30 hours of personal Bible reading *Physical Education: 12 1/2 hours of phys ed. 15 1/2 hours karate *Home Ec 7 hours (cooking, laundry, cleaning) *Community service: Bertha's Mission 79 hours *Geography 1 hour 22 minutes *US History: 3.4 hours memory work,12 hours documentaries, 14 hours read alouds *Grammar (extra SAT Prep vocab): 4 hours 40 minutes * Latin & Greek roots: 68 minutes *Child Evangelism (Good News Club and organization meetings for GNC): 31 hours *GeoScience: 1 full credit. Course description rough draft: If he's read the Phys Sci book PLUS all the geology--I would have him develop a "presentation"--paper, powerpoint, something--to show the geology and make that 1/2-1 credit of Geology. Then spend about a month doing the quarterly Phys Sci tests and some labs and have 1 credit of Phys Sci. It sounds like he's done 1 1/2-2 credits of work and just needs to finish it up and finalize it-- Including :nature walks, rock & gem shows (2 so far), discussions with enthusiasts, field trip to Blue Spring Caverns & Desoto Caverns. Students of physical science will learn to understand and explore the exciting, wonderful world around them. Topics include theory and practical observations related to atoms and molecules of air and water, the weather and the earth’s layers. We will investigate space, sound, light and Newton’s Laws. Students will discuss the principals and laws of physical science and learn on a technical level how God supports our life on earth. This course includes hands-on laboratory experience and an understanding of scientific methods. The science & dimensions of planet earth, maps & navigation, matter and minerals, mineral identification, the formation of rocks, earth's natural resources, plate tectonics, earthquakes, volcanoes, landscapes, weathering & soils erosion and deposition, earth's rivers, groundwater on earth, glaciers, restless oceans, earth's history, geologic time, characteristics of the earth's atmosphere, atmospheric moisture, air pressure and winds, storms patterns of climate stars and the universe earth and its Moon. resources used for geology: Fossils by smithsonian handbooks Rocks & fossils by Busbey, Coenraads, Willis, & Roots Paleontology articles from National Geographic The Fossil Book by Gary & Mary Parker Fossils a golden guide Dinosaur Encyclopedia by American Museum of Natural History Resource used for Physical Science Jay Wile's Exploring Creation with Physical Science Resource for Earth Science: Earth Science, Reviewing the Essentials by Thomas McGuire *Music: 51 minutes of singing hymns *Literature : 12 hours 23 minutes *Missionary biographies :7 1/2 hours *Apologetics :30 minutes *Christian Living :5 hours (reading books that improve the Christian life. Sibling relationships, family relationships, etc. Making Bros & Sisters Best Friends)

This is from the Public Domain Books for Homeschooling facebook page:

Charlotte Mason and CM-ish curriculum options. Many of these incorporate books that are available free in the public domain.

Charlotte Mason Curricula - when used as directed provides a generally authentic Charlotte Mason education.

CM Influenced Curricula - in and of itself does not provide a CM education, but incorporates some of Miss Mason's 20 Principles and sells itself as a CM Curriculum (generally speaking).

CM Adaptable Curricula - throw out the plans and busywork and use the booklists to implement an authentic CM Education.

_____________________________________________________
Charlotte Mason Curricula
www.amblesideonline.org
www.livingbookscurriculum.com $
www.simplycharlottemason.com $
www.charlottemasonhelp.com
www.materamabilis.org (Catholic)
milestonesacademy.com (LDS)
_____________________________________________________
CM Influenced Curricula
www.heartofdakota.com $
www.trainupachildpub.com (formerly Epi Kardia) $
www.winterpromise.com $
barefootmeandering.com/site/wayfarers (CM + Classical) $
amindinthelight.blogspot.com (CM + Classical)
www.mfwbooks.com (Neoclassical but leans CM in K-2) $
_____________________________________________________
CM Adaptable Curricula
www.oldfashionededucation.com
www.sonlight.com $
www.bookshark.com (secular) $
www.buildyourlibrary.com (secular)$
www.fiveinarow.com $
www.livingbooksforlife.com $ (K-5 Canadian)
_____________________________________________________
CM Subject Specific Resources (not Complete Curriculum)
www.queenhomeschool.com $
bfbooks.com (Beautiful Feet) $
www.jellybeanjar.org $
cherrydalepress.com (Languages) $
shiningdawnbooks.com $
handbookofnaturestudy.com
www.blessedheritage.com (African American History) $
barefootmeandering.com $
www.teachingwithbob.com (Reading/Phonics)
joyfulshepherdess.blogspot.com/…/all-my-charlotte-mason-rea…(Reading/Phonics)
homeschooljournal-bergblog.blogspot.com/…/simple-grammar-fr…(grammar)
www.pennygardener.com $
www.raceforheaven.com $ (Catholic)
www.homeschoolingdownunder.com $ (Australian Resources)
www.ohthatssimple.com/books.html $
cottagepress.net/ $ (Classical Liberal Arts)
wholesomechildhood.com/thetutor/ $
_____________________________________________________
CM Adaptable or CM Influenced Subject Specific Resources

Standard Math Instruction (preferred by Miss Mason)
http://www.cimt.plymouth.ac.uk/projects/mep (MEP Math)
miquonmath.com $
Math Mammoth $
Right Start Math $
Math-U-See $

Living Math Instruction (Not preferred by Miss Mason)
www.ztwistbooks.com/lof $ (Life of Fred)
livingmath.net

Science
www.apologia.com $
sassafrasscience.com $
logospressonline.com/noeo $
slphomeschool.wordpress.com $ (Glory of Kings)

Arts
harmonyfinearts.com $
www.riverbendpress.com $
remembrancepressbookstore.com $ (sketching and homemaking)
enrichmentstudies.com $

History
www.truthquesthistory.com $
www.nothingnewpress.com/books $
www.home-school-curriculum.com/learning_series $ (Trail Guide to Learning)
harmonyfinearts.com
ureadthru.wordpress.com (claims to be CM but is really just living books with busy work)

Geography
A Child's Geography $
www.knowledgequestmaps.com $ (Map Trek)
http://home-school-curriculum.com/ $ (Geography Matters)

General Resources
https://www.facebook.com/groups/PublicDomainBooksForHomeschooling

(Picture: The Homework by Simon Glücklich)

November 2015 update

I think it is about time for an update on this blog.  I have enjoyed going back and looking at my pictures and posts from the past.  I plan to, one day, come back to this post and see what we were doing in 2015. :-)

    Of course we've been super busy;  in addition to having the Amish working on our house, we have several activities in which the boys are now involved.  Mondays and Wednesdays  Justin sings with the SCCA (Stone City Christian Academy) high school choir.  Monday's class is 45 minutes and Wednesday's is 30 minutes. I usually take the opportunity to take Jonathan and Ryan to the library during that time or to finish up some schoolwork while we wait.

 On Tuesday evenings for 1 hour, for fitness the boys attend a Christian martial arts class (KICKS: Kids in Christ Kicking Sin).   Fridays we volunteer at Bertha's Mission in Mitchell, a food kitchen where we serve the people in our community.

 Yes, we are busy, but we've also simplified in a lot of ways, so that we still have plenty of margin in our lives.  One way that I have simplified is to use computer based software for Justin's & Jonathan's maths, Justin's typing practice and Koine Greek class, and for Jonathan's guitar lessons.  It has been a wonderful decision because it has freed me up to do housework and has helped them to really enjoy their schoolwork.  Jonathan, who used to despise math, actually said, "Mom, I really do enjoy and understand my math now."  "Yay," is what I have to say about that!

As I've mentioned in previous posts, we love to use these trivia cards to help us learn interesting things about science, history, art, Greek & Latin roots.  I usually try to quiz them in the mornings after we have our devotions.  I have added quite a bit of them to our collection since I last posted about them! 

Margin is so important, because it gives the boys time to draw & create interesting things.    Justin drew this bird, created the moving vehicle below it, made the Lego owl magnet and owl drawing:

J

 Ryan made this marble face:

 Jonathan's :

Ryan's left & Jonathan's right portrait drawings:

                           I still think that literature-rich life doesn't just enhance, but IS the very best education for a child.  Thank you, Charlotte Mason! Though you have been deceased for a long time, I appreciate you for introducing your educational philosophy to me!

Nature exploration is imperative for us!

    

We've also attended some interesting seminars this year.  I took Justin to an apologetics seminar by Frank Turek, the boys all attended a martial arts seminar taught by Bill "Superfoot" Wallace, and we also took the boys to a Rock and Gem show a few months ago.  

A fun thing that happened the rock and gem show was that one of our close friends who is a fossil collector showed up at the same time and gave us a tour and introduced us to a lot of people.  Justin bought the large trilobite there.  He loves fossils.

I also have tried to stay informed about what I need to continue doing to educate them in a way that will prepare them for the future.  But I have learned a couple of things that, to me, are very important:

Children are individuals - not factory model molds.  My children are each, as individuals, a whole person.  To me that means that every part of their lives is educational, not just the math & grammar parts.    These parts of their lives, though important, are not the only parts that need to be educated and nurtured.  They need plenty of time to think and to explore their own interests. I believe that God created each one of them with their very own talents that need to be fed. I believe that our home is a natural setting, and they will see how to handle "real world" things by being here and in the community- like housework and yardwork, balancing checkbooks and managing money, how to interact with and minister to people in the community, and what to do when the plumbing needs fixed.  I firmly believe that living life in a natural way, using the world, good books, and real life as our classroom is and has been the one of very best decisions that we as parents have made for these boys. I'm so thankful that God has given me the opportunity to be their mother!

The child who doodles all. the. time!

Jonathan doodles all the time and on everything- even his math scrap paper!

Post Christmas Update

We started back to normal  this past Monday. We were ready for it. The boys all mentioned being ready to get back to serving at Bertha's Mission. It had been closed for 2 weeks, and we missed the week before that because of sickness.  I'm not so sure they would admit being ready to get back to doing school work, but I personally like routine.

 Pictures I took for the home-school yearbook.  They weren't extremely excited about having to have their pictures taken:

  

I'm trying to teach Justin at least one day a week to cook a meal.  The main dish was some type of delicious pork recipe that I found on pinterest.  I figured if we make something really tasty, it will be encouraging to him.  He was really proud of himself at the dinner table.

There is a story about the picture with Ryan holding his copy-work. I told him that he could choose a paragraph from one of his favorite books to copy.   Well, this is what the paragraph says:

"And he drew the bowstring, and let fly the sharp arrow.  Antinous, motionless with surprise, sat with his head turned toward the doorway and his drinking cup poised in mid-air.  The arrow struck him in the throat.  Blood gushed from his mouth and nostrils, and he pitched forward on his face."  (From The Adventures of Ulysses)

Now you know why he is grinning that way.  Boys!

 The doodle picture is a picture that Jonathan drew while at the mission on Monday. The man is Pastor Bob, and the others are the other ladies who volunteer.  There are a couple of people not pictured because they weren't there that day, but he intends to add them in.  The ladies at the mission want to put it up on the wall. The lady with the blonde hair and the big grin was a really great resemblance!  Especially her eyes.

November 2014 Update

My updates have been pretty pathetic, but in my defense, things have been pretty busy lately!

Thankfully, my work load has lightened, and things are looking much better.  Long story, but now that we've been able to replace some house-hold appliances that had bitten the dust, I don't feel so overwhelmed.

First of all, we have plunged full force into a new stage of life: high school.  It really blows my mind. It just seems like yesterday that I was just teaching phonics and creating home-made play dough crafts.  Now here we are learning Algebra!

I have been pretty relaxed over the years about everything, but right as summer rolled around, I felt a real urgency to learn about how to document high school.  I feel like each child needs a custom education catered to his learning style, his God-given talents, & his interests.  This calls for being very intentional about everything we choose to use, each activity we pursue, and what life skills we choose to teach them.

So,  I've been trying to squeeze in some reading.  These books have been so helpful.  They have given me the gift of freedom and peace of mind.

This year was wrought with some financial hurdles that seemed very difficult to overcome, and I have been and do pray constantly that the Lord would show us what to teach the boys.  Thankfully, I was able to find something really amazing: a Christian website offering FREE homeschooling courses.    I wouldn't say our home-schooling this year has been 100 percent free, because we have spent money on some items, but I would say it has a lot less expensive because of the internet.

First of all,  I had bought a Saxon math book at the quarter store a couple of years ago because of all the rave reviews I had seen in the home-school community about it.  I wanted to look over it to see if it was something we'd be interested in using.   The book was above Ryan's grade level at the time, but since it was only a quarter, I figured why not get it and see if it would be something we'd be interested in using?   It was helpful because it showed me that I did want to use it for Ryan.  I went ahead that year and bought the proper grade level for Ryan.  Ryan has done so well with Saxon math, that I have used it ever since for him.  I wanted to use it this year too, but I really didn't have a lot of money at the beginning of the year to go online and order it.  What a blessing to find that the math book that I had purchased at the quarter store all those years ago was the very math book Ryan needed for this year!

Ryan is continuing in Abeka Language Arts this year.  I already had a Language book, his readers, history, & science here at home.

I also found Scholastic Dictionary of Spelling at the thrift store for a quarter! It has over 15,000 words in it, and we use it to make lists on SpellingCity.com, which is also free.  Justin & Jonathan do 15 words per day (instead of per week) and Ryan does 10 words per school day.  I believe this is a great program, because it gives them the freedom to learn a lot of words at a very fast pace.

For Justin and Jonathan, we are using Easy Peasy All in One Homeschool and Easy Peasy All in One High School for both Math and Language, and also for Justin's Music Appreciation course.  All that is needed for most everything on the Easy Peasy websites is a computer, paper, pencil, & printer ink!  Those have been a real blessing because the math comes complete with video instruction.

Another perk is that EasyPeasy also has printable grading spreadsheets & attendance records.

For history, we use what we call "living books."  I have blogged about my love for living books in the past, but to recap, living books are real, literary rich books written by authors passionate about a topic.  I have been able to find great books at thrift stores, used book stores,  & ebay for very little costs.

These books tell history in a whole-world-history style (what was going on around the world during the same time as famous events):

Justin writes a short report each day summarizing what he has read.   I use a sort of rubric (point system) to grade his reports.  It has been an easy and effective way to have him pay attention to what he has read, and for him to show me his work.  This system is great for any type of book that I want him to summarize.

For Jonathan and Ryan, I have them read a portion of their book, then they are required to narrate (tell) to me what they read.  This gives them oral practice, so that they will eventually transition into writing reports.  I have specific criteria for choosing historical books.  If I see positive comments about them over and over, I will check into them.  So far, the following books have come highly recommended:  the older Landmark books, the older Childhood of Famous Americans, Genevieve Foster's books, and G.A. Henty's historical novels.

I have recently learned how well real books help a child to retain information.  We were using the Noggin cards (mentioned below) to learn a new set of historical facts, and I asked the question: "Who invented the cotton gin?"  Ryan piped up, "Eli Whitney."  It wasn't because he had memorized it from a textbook. It was because he knows a lot about Eli Whitney because he read a biography about him.

For factual memory work, we are using Noggin game cards.  I use one card for history & one for geography each week.  There are seven questions per card.
I plan to purchase more of these when we get through the ones we already have. They also have other subjects available.  I am also still using Latin & Greek roots as well for memory work.
  

For science, we use Apologia.  They are written in a conversational style, and they also have a lot of hands-on experiments available.   This year Justin is doing physical science, Jonathan is taking General Science, & Ryan is learning about Botany.  One of the things I love about them is that they teach Christian apologetics/worldview training alongside the science.

Justin documenting the results of his experiment:

 Jonathan and Ryan are completing a Thomas Kinkade drawing course together.  It's actually a LifePac pace, so it is extremely easy for them to just do it themselves.  Here is a picture of Jonathan giving Ryan a drawing lesson. This was on their own free time without anyone telling anyone to do it:

Another drawing lesson (not from the Thomas Kinkade book)

This year we joined our local home-school group.  If we were to do everything available to us through the group, we'd never be home.  We plan to be involved in some field trips and some activities that they will offer in the future.  Here are a few of pictures of our field trip to Huber Farm on October 3rd.

Last, but not least, we have been involved in serving our community with Bertha's Mission on Mondays.  It has been an excellent ministry for us. I told Michael the other day that I believe our community involvement is just as, or maybe even more important than the things they learn in textbooks.

We meet a lot of neat people this way, and we enjoy it very much.  An ex-Marine turned pastor, widows, disabled veterans, elderly, and lonely people who just wanting someone to talk to them.

This past week we met a lady there who serves at a different time than we do.  Her sister, who serves with us, told her that she really needed to meet the boys.  She came in early during our shift just to meet the boys.  She is an avid fossil collector who used to travel to schools to show her collection.  She was so excited to show the boys, and was so pleased at how much they love fossils that she actually gave them several pieces.

We also finished up our fall Good News Club this week.  There are "hidden" (hidden to the boys, but not hidden to me) benefits to being involved in this ministry as well.  Yes, we are sharing the gospel with little children, but the boys are learning some very valuable lessons:  How to serve others, how to lead singing, how to do a skit, how to teach memory verses and tell  Bible & missionary stories, how to give a short devotional, and how to lead someone to Christ.

Well, that is all for now.  Hopefully it won't be next year before I post another update.

2014 summer reading, narration, and copy-work

I have used year-round home-schooling for several years.  There are some awesome reasons for doing it-one of them being continuous learning.  Summer education can be light, but very useful.

This summer I am having the boys continue with math, but dropping all other formal curriculum.  They will still be doing language arts and learning an assortment of themes, but it will be accomplished differently.  

They have joined the summer reading program at our local public library, and are reading books from a reading list that I created.  I require them to read 45 minutes per day, and  I am also having each one of them complete a form I prepared, summarizing what they have read. 

Just a few goodies from the summer reading program.  There was also a beanbag ball; it's around here somewhere.  They love doing this.  It gives the boys and me a lot of opportunities for some free/cheap dates together.

Justin and Jonathan are reading the same books and completing the same forms.  

Justin's summary: 

Tortured for Christ by Richard Wurmbrand

Jonathan's summary: 

The Door in the Wall by Marguerite De Angeli

Ryan is completing a different book list and form.  He narrates what he has read to me, and then I create a cursive writing practice sheet using his narration. 

Ryan's narration below -handwriting part not completed yet- from Treasures of the Snow by Patricia St. John: 

 I  used this site to create the cursive writing practice sheet:

  http://www.worksheetworks.com/english/writing/handwriting/handwriting-cursive-copy-old.html )

Here are Justin and Jonathan's first batch of library books from my list.  I was so thankful that the library carried these titles:

Physical Education

Physical Education for us at this point in our life involves learning the skills needed to play most popular sports.  I am currently using a book called The Ultimate Homeschool Physical Education Game Book by Guy Bailey. This particular game is called Soccer Pirate. We also use Youtube to learn moves I am not familiar with.