We've Got it Figured Out (I Think) for 2013

I really believe that I've got the 2013 homeschool method figured out--at least it looks that way, sitting here at the end of 2012.

We're going to do a very relaxed form of homeschooling that borders on the edge of unschooling, with strong tendencies toward the Charlotte Mason method and classical.  Partly cloudy in the east.

Seriously, I've tried a "preview" here in December of a slightly new way of doing things (for us), and it seems to be working like gangbusters with my highly-gifted, quirky, brilliant, and somewhat behaviorally-challenged child.

(Note: Georgie's birthday is at the very end of December, so I like to start our school year the first of January to fit her age. With that said, we're not doing "grades," since she's all over the map.)

But here's a summary of what we're going to do:

• Read lots of books. Lots. Fun library books on every subject, poetry, and chapter books of every kind. This year, in 2012, she's listened to nearly 30 chapter books (we just read Alice's Adventures in Wonderland/Through the Looking Glass in 2 days). Every morning, or the night before, I select the books we will read that day. If she wants any extras, I usually read them too.
• Do one copy-word every morning. I write down a word for her to copy, and she does. That teaches her handwriting, phonics, and spelling at once.  As the year progresses, we can move up to sentences.
• Follow Life of Fred for Math.
• Keep going with The Story of the World for History.
• The human body and plants for Biology, then go on to Earth Science later in the year.
• Write down her thoughts on stories, but without her knowing it. She doesn't like to perform for the notebook.
• No tests.
• No desks.
• Lots of field trips and great teaching moments with real people. 
• Lots of playtime. She is a natural inventor, and she often creates games based on our history or science lessons. 

Through her narrations and games, I have no doubt that Georgie is absorbing everything I read to her, and retaining it with an awesome memory.

The main challenge is reading her all those books (which she ravenously demands I constantly do) while my two-year-old bangs me over the head wanting attention! But that's another issue for another day. 

Right Now

We finished The Hobbit this weekend. In all, it took me about 9 days to read it to her. I guess that's the "Tookish" side of me, for that was certainly an adventure.

But not as much so as you might think.  After all, Georgie and I have read over twenty chapter books this year, including everything we could find by Roald Dahl and all of the Chronicles of Narnia. Paddington didn't quite hold our interest, which was fine, but she truly loved The Hobbit, and rarely gave me a moment's rest between installments.

We also started Pimsleur French this week. Georgie seems to like it, but Lily, naturally, is absorbing it best. 

I'm currently reading For the Children's Sake by Susan Schaeffer Macaulay, and I'm so glad that I am, because this book--an outline of the Charlotte Mason method--very much confirms to me that I'm on the right path with Georgie. Lots of books--good books--and lots of playtime, with the thread of Christian truth throughout.  That's it. No worksheets (although I think we'll still do the geography pages).  Teach mechanics of the 3 R's at her pace and level, and let her read and explore her way through life, with my guidance.

I love that. I know already that that works best for my super-gifted child (gifted in every sense, including OCD and hyperactivity, but with a spooky attention span and memory). I want her to love learning every day of her life, and I never want her to feel that her first 18 years are a sentence that she has to get through before real life starts. Real life has already started, and there are real people in it and real things to do.

I want her to be an avid learner at 5, at 55, and at 105, Lord willing.

I want her to always get a thrill from learning new things; I want to teach her how to teach herself, and I never want her to quit reading because "she knows everything," or because a certificate says she's free to stop learning.

Right now, she sees the withholding of books as a punishment. May she always feel so.

The Nutcracker Nuts

This Saturday, we went to see a live performance of "The Nutcracker Suite," performed by the Jackson Purchase Dance Company. 

It wasn't the Moscow Ballet, by any means, but it was good enough for us. We'd never taken the girls to a live ballet before, and all-in-all, it was more than a success.

In fact, Georgie was spellbound the entire time.

I didn't have time to get her a storybook of the plot beforehand, so I was glad that they printed a synopsis of the plot in the program. She had me read it to her twice before the show started, and she did fine following the story through the entire thing, as did I.

This theater setting was rather informal, so she was free to stand up and move all she wanted as the story washed over her.

Will she go on from this moment to be the Prima Ballerina of Moscow, or even Murray? I don't know, and I doubt it. But she now knows what a ballet is, what the purpose behind ballet lessons are, and that stories can take many forms, including dance.

She knows Tchaikovsky's name, and recognizes many of the tunes from the suite. And she can rehash the story to you any time you want.

Another great classroom-free day of learning!        

Rainbows

Georgie and I just had a rainbow puppet show.

She came downstairs in her pajamas, discovered rainbows all over my bedroom, and announced that it was time for the "rainbow puppet show." So, I sat in a chair and sang "What A Wonderful World" while she proceeded to do a very sweet shadow-puppet performance over a brilliant patch of rainbow.

Then we had a good discussion about rainbows and about how light can bounce off reflective surfaces like mirrors.  We talked about light going through a prism and bouncing into 7 different colors, which we named in a fun chant. 

Beats sitting in a classroom, any day.

An Introduction to Our Antics

So, here we are at blog #1, and time will prove whether we will return.  I have a rather sad history with the one-page-at-a-time journal, with intervals of five years or so.

But I'm deeply convicted that I should be doing a better job documenting my little ones' childhoods. I'm lousy at taking pictures, and even worse at videos, but these little years are passing far too quickly. So recently was Georgie in that little premie warming pan in the hospital. Now she's almost 5. Lily (2 1/2) is running, climbing, and asking to read.

So, again, here we are, and I'll start with just a brief description of each child, beginning with Lily:

Lily is the quintessential two-and-a-half-year-old. She pesters and rallies for attention, which she rarely gets enough of, I'm sorry to say.  She looks like a precious moments doll, but walks like she's wearing mud boots.  She amazes me by answering Georgie's history questions and parroting French language, but will look right at me and ask me where I am. She forgets where her very limbs, food, and sippy cups are, regardless if they're right in view. She loves to love, and is a natural mother, taking great care of all her baby dolls. She will even change a banana peel's "diaper" if given the chance.  She also has a fiery temper, and we're working on "not hitting." Working, but not yet succeeding.

Lily loves to be read to, and she's great with building blocks (Duplo, etc.). Her fine motor is great, and she has little trouble taking things apart and putting them back together.  She has torn books, but she's really becoming good at turning pages by the corners.

She's a super Dave Ramsey fan.


Georgie is not the quintessential almost-five-year-old.  She's tall enough to be 7, and smart enough to be in college. Well, after she masters reading--which she has a great grasp on for her age.  She can read any three and four-letter words, and many five-letter words.  She can copy well, and is a good counter and budding mathematician.

But there's much more to her than that.

Georgie, beyond a doubt, is gifted. That sounds snooty, but she is, according to all the lists I've found of "gifted criteria," like this one.

This "giftedness" gives her a super attention span and memory.  We've almost finished reading The Hobbit over this past week, and she begs me to read it throughout the day.  Begs.  I mean, I read until my saliva glands start trying to climb to the top of my head and bang for me to stop. And still I read. And read. And read.  But I think it's awesome that such a little child would want to hear this great classic.

And I have no doubt that she will remember every word of it. After all, she still remembers the plot line and characters of The Magician's Nephew, which we read around 8 months ago. 
At the end of the year, I'll post a list of the books we've read in 2012. Should be interesting.

But her superbrain isn't all a bed of roses. She has all the textbook (ha, textbook) traits of marching to her own beat that go with it.  Yes, I'm proud of her uniqueness.  But part of that difference involves rage tantrums, usually triggered by something so small as an object not being in its usual spot. Call it OCD or whatever you will, she has it.  Lavender helps, as does sorting mixed beans into separate containers. Whatever works.

Anyway, the purpose of this blog is not to gain a great fan base for me, my family, or anything that we're doing, but simply to document my kids' childhoods, and also to have a nice web-based homeschooling journal that I can print out as needed.  And I'll also be able to see over time how we will, inevitably, switch back and forth between rigid structure and complete unschooling (child-led learning).  Most likely, we will keep the middle ground, known as "relaxed homeschooling."

That's it. If our antics are able to help anyone else, all the better.

Peace!