Month(!) in Review

Yikes, I really dropped the ball on posting. October was a very busy month for us, so I'll blame it on that. We've done all our usual work - Colwyn has about 8 pages left in his Singapore 2A workbook, so that'll get done this week, then we can start on the second half of his kindergarten math. He's pretty much done with Teach Your Child to Read in 100 Easy Lessons
, so we're moving on to using easy readers for his reading lessons (which we try to do for at least 10-20 minutes a day, in addition to our regular read-alouds).

We've been working a lot on science/history. We covered (the basics of) the formation of the Earth, composition of the Earth, plate tectonics, the start of life, early life, and evolution. Most of that was through the The Usborne Internet-Linked Encyclopedia of World History
. We used some websites for the composition of the Earth. Plate tectonics was covered in the Usborne book as well as through some Science Day hands-on activities with our homeschool group. To complement the Usborne book on evolution, we also read How Whales Walked into the Sea by Faith McNulty.

For Earth Scouts, we read When The Root Children Wake Up
by Audrey Wood. Then we brainstormed some ideas on how to take care of the Earth and used those to play "Mother Earth, May I?" It's pretty much just like "Mother, May I?" except the kids say, "Mother Earth, may I compost our kitchen scraps?" and then the kid playing Mother Earth tells them how many steps to take. They seemed to enjoy it, I think. We were supposed to go on a walk to look for creatures outside, but it was rainy, so I assigned that as homework. The week before, we had done a Recycled Art Day (which Dani planned and hosted), so the kids who participated in that got a Recycling Badge.

For book club, we read The Wind in the Willows
by Kenneth Grahame. We only read the first three chapters or so, but Colwyn (surprisingly) really liked it. I think a lot of it went over his head (due to the language), but it was so enjoyable to read aloud. Both boys participated really well during the book club activities and enjoyed playing outside with the other kids afterwards.

We also went on a field trip to the Aquarium, which was quite a lot of fun. The boys spent a lot of time exploring with Alex and Mila, which was nice. We toured the Beverly Fire Department last Tuesday and will do an encore tour of the Danvers Fire Department this Tuesday. That obviously led to many discussions on fire safety, but I think the boys were most excited about climbing in the fire truck.

Our homeschool group's Halloween Party was a big success, as well. We rented a room at Endicott Park and the kids played that "Guess the Body Part" game with cold spaghetti, a peeled tomato, hot dogs, lunch meat, etc. One of the dads entertained the kids with some acoustic guitar music, which was super nice of him. They played Red Rover and Duck, Duck, Goose - both big hits.

So, all in all, a pretty busy month. We also had various park days, playdates, and who-knows-what-else going on. I'm going to make a concerted effort to stay on top of the journaling, since it's a pain the butt to try to remember what happened over the course of a whole month. :)

Week in Review

This week has been a pretty slow week for us. Doug and I have been really sick (the kids just had sniffles), so I haven't been very motivated to do much.

On Tuesday, we got the boys' new bunk beds delivered, so that was an interesting experience. We did our usual reading lesson, and then because Doug was home sick, he helped them do a science kit we had - digging for dinosaur fossils. The kids have done similar activities before, but they still enjoyed it.

Wednesday was our big apple picking field trip and it went so well. I was really dreading it, because when I went as a kid, the branches were all so high and it was a real pain. So, I was imagining having to lift the kids up to pick apples. But we were pleasantly surprised when we got off the hayride to see that the branches were almost brushing the ground, and they were heavily laden with fruit. I think it took the boys maybe five minutes tops to fill their bags. When the hayride dropped us off back near the farm store, we got to have cider donuts and cider, and then each of the kids got some animal feed. I figured the boys wouldn't be interested since they typically hate farm animals (except our chickens, of course), but they ran off ahead of me and fed the chickens and the sheep. Fiona, for her part, loved the pigs and did not want to leave them. She kept oinking, though her version sounds more like a Frenchman laughing (ie - 'Hon, hon, hon!'). It was very sweet. When we got home, we did a reading lesson and called it a day, I was exhausted.

Thursday was a park day, so we met at Endicott Park. There were a few moms there, all new members with only toddlers. It was interesting trying to make conversation since they don't have any older kids, but we managed. That afternoon, Colwyn did his math workbooks (which also included reading, as he's working on the number words). Then we did a page from his history book, though it was more earth sciences than history - composition of the earth, plate tectonics, continental drift.

On Friday, we did more reading, but mostly had a lazy day. In the afternoon, though, we decided to go into business selling eggs (we have a surplus from our chickens). The boys made signs and I filled a cooler with eggs, which we set out in the front yard. I told the boys that they could keep any money people gave us, figuring that would be a good way to move into learning about money. We also gave our neighbors some eggs as a gift, but they surprised us and gave us $5 when they returned the basket. The boys were thrilled!

Week in Review

Last weekend, we went to King Richard's Faire. We didn't think we were going to be able to go, since we usually get free tickets, but our 'source' moved away. Thankfully, we lucked out with a new 'source' and got enough free passes for all of us (admission is normally $22 per person or something like that). We watched a bunch of different shows, including two jousts, and had a really great time.

On Monday and Tuesday, we did reading and history (reading from the Encyclopedia of World History). We also went bowling with our homeschool group on Tuesday, which was a huge success.. we had a few families show up unexpectedly, families that we haven't seen since the spring. Hopefully everyone's gearing up for the 'school year' and will be more active. On Wednesday, we went on a cruise up and down the coast between Manchester and Marblehead with Mahi Cruises out of Salem Willows. I don't know that the kids listened to a whole lot of the narration, but it was definitely a fun experience. When we got home, we did more reading and did 'cookie math' - which is basically just us baking cookies, but the kids do learn about measurements.

On Thursday, we had Calvin over for a playdate in the morning, then did more reading and worked on our journal entries for this month's book club. The books this month were Friday was book club and was (surprisingly) a huge hit, as well. It was surprising because we tried out something new.. instead of all the moms sitting with the big kids while they presented journals, but the meeting being mostly free play, Jen had a few activities planned and also did a lengthy circle time where they read two books and had a discussion. While all that was going on, those of us with little ones hung out in the playroom so the babies wouldn't be disruptive. I was expecting Colwyn and Lachlann to resist, since they're normally very shy at book club, they they did really well. They sat for the whole circle time and even shared quite a bit of info. I was super impressed.

After book club, we came home and worked on a part of their math workbooks I'd been putting off. It involves pouring water from one container into many smaller ones, or filling up one big container with several smaller cups of water. We've done that activity before, but for some reason it came up again. I'd been putting it off because it's involved and makes a big mess, but we did it during Fiona's naptime, so it was fine. After that, they each did a few pages in their math workbooks, and Lachlann actually finished his Earlybird 1A book! Woohoo, Lachlann!

Homeschool Group

Our homeschool group is crazily busy this fall. September got off to a slow start, but this Friday (9/18), we're having our first Earth Scouts meeting. I booked a meeting space at the Hamilton Wenham Library since we'll have 10 participants, as well as a handful of observers. Next week, we go bowling on Tuesday (9/22) and on a cruise of Beverly/Salem harbor on Wednesday (9/23). Friday (9/25) is book club at Jen's. The following week, we have an apple picking field trip on Wednesday (9/30) and a toddler story time at Robin's on Friday (10/2) - though we'll probably skip the story time).

In October, we'll have science day, Earth Scouts again, book club, Recycled Art Day, an Aquarium field trip, a fire station tour, a Halloween Party, and a Lego day at my house. I'm responsible for five out of those eight things. Oh, and I also have Colwyn's birthday party to plan.

Oh, and we'll also try to get in as many park days as possible before the truly cold weather hits.

Yikes.

I'm really super excited about Earth Scouts, though, and will post more in depth about it after our first meeting.

Caught in the Whirlwind

Our lives are so busy, so full of fun and activity, that I shudder to think of what it would be like trying to cram preschool and kindergarten in there. Everything we do with the children is stuff we would probably do with them anyway, excepting the workbook pages Colwyn asks for (I imagine if he were forced to do workbook pages all day, he wouldn't ask me for any).

Colwyn and Lachlann have been really productive on the art front. They draw and write incessantly. Lachlann's writing is mostly just scribbles, reminiscent of a heart monitor's readout, but Colwyn does a pretty good job. His favorite is making love cards, which usually include a nice drawing as well as some combination of the words, "Colwyn" "Mommy" "Amma" and "Lve" (he often leaves out the o). The other day he drew a remarkably detailed Captain Rex, which I meant to save but might have gotten tossed by accident. We live with a near constant litter of construction paper, it's hard to remember what should be saved.

This past week we went to tour the Salem Post Office with our homeschool group. It was the first field trip I'd planned for the group, and I was super anxious about it. Homeschoolers can be a bit.. flaky.. at times, and I was afraid nobody would show, and there I'd be at the Postmaster's door, looking like a total idiot. Well, thankfully, we only had one no-show, and the kids were all super well-behaved. I think the moms learned more than the kids, but not by much. Colwyn, of course, said that the only thing he learned was that post office workers like to go to Dunkin Donuts, just like us. Yeah, he's at that age.

We go to Jen's house every other week for book club. The boys have always played really well there during one-on-one playdates, but for the last four book club meetings, they've refused to play with the other kids. I suspect that Lachlann would, except that he doesn't want to leave Colwyn alone. They just sit with me in the living room, which is fine since they don't really complain, but it leaves me less able to talk freely. We plan on continuing to attend, in the hopes that they'll eventually get used to the group. I think part of the problem is that we now tend to have mainly 5-6 year old boys, and as you can imagine, it gets rather rowdy. I don't want to push them, but I also want to make sure they're exposed to groups like this. It's a delicate balance, and I don't always feel like I'm doing a good job.

North Shore Young Homeschoolers

Our homeschool group is getting bigger and better than ever. We've had seven families join in the last two weeks, which brings us up to 25 families on the Yahoo Group. Of those, I've met in person probably about half, maybe a little less. Not bad, all things considered. We had a planning meeting last night and three moms showed, which was a little less than I was hoping for, but it actually worked out really well. One of the moms decided to take over planning field trips, and we're going to aim for a factory tour (probably Necco or Garelick Farms) in February. Jen offered to host quarterly parent workshops--the first of which will be in March, on storytelling (she'll have a guest speaker come and everything). We also have planned a small Imbolc event at my house, a Valentine's Day party, and a family game day.

The main issue is still getting people to attend. This past Friday was supposed to be science at my house, and we had a lot of RSVPs.. there were supposed to be 13 children coming over, in addition to my own. In reality, only five kids came (three families). It was fine, and we all had a great time, but that just illustrates how.. flaky.. homeschoolers can be. I mean, I can flake out with the rest of them.. but it does get kind of tiring when I'm doing all this planning. When I sent out the meeting minutes, I included a little blurb about how Jen and I are fine with somewhat informal attendance for the co-op, but that for big events where there will be a speaker, tour guide, or people preparing amounts of food based on RSVPs, that people need to take their RSVPs seriously. I really hope I didn't offend anyone, but what else can I do?

Truck Day

This past weekend we went to Endicott Park's truck day. We usually go to about two of these a year, sometimes more. Colwyn learned about construction vehicles, fire safety, rescue vehicles, police equipment (including less than lethal weapons), and sewage trucks. He also learned about waiting in line, consideration for others, and taking turns. He got to learn about shared community experiences.



What did Lachlann learn? That trucks, in the hands of children, are very, very loud.

Yikes.

I know, I know. It's been way too long. To be completely honest, we haven't been doing a whole lot of homeschool-y stuff lately.

Well, that's not entirely true. We've been busy, but so much of we do is educational but isn't directed homeschooling, so sometimes I forget that I should be blogging about this stuff.

As for 'real' schoolish stuff, we really haven't done too much in the last month or so. We do the occasional page in our Singapore Math book, we write letters/draw pictures and send them to friends and family, we watch Between the Lions and Zula Patrol, and have endless discussions about what letters words start with.

We did get to take a fun tour of the Danvers police station, which I think Kristine and I may have liked better than the kids, but whatever. Doug and I also took the boys to the Beverly fire station's open house, which was really fantastic. The kids got to climb in fire trucks and ambulances several times, they got to watch firefighters slide down poles, and they got to examine CPR dummies. Colwyn got to climb in a van filled with gear for water rescues, so he got to check out the wet suits, flippers, a giant motor, flash lights, masks, and all sorts of good stuff. We also brought home bags overflowing with goodies. But the best part of all was the jaws of life demonstration. We got to watch the firefighters totally dismantle an old car, and.. wow. It was so cool. Colwyn really got that they were practicing what they would do if there was a bad car accident and someone was trapped inside, so that was good.

But, like I said.. that's about it. We've been doing playdates here and there, and we try to make it to storytime every week. We've been keeping up our every-other-week library trip and we've gotten some great books lately. I'm still keeping track of everything we check out in an Excel spreadsheet, in preparation to reporting to the school district, although that's still two years away.

Colwyn's birthday is tomorrow, so we're planning on going to Imajine That and meeting up with Mary, Charlotte, and Sam. Then on Thursday, we have a playdate scheduled with Heidi and her kids, who are also homeschoolers. Then on Friday, we're hoping to get together with Jen and her boys, which will be our first intentional playdate since her baby was born two months ago. Colwyn is psyched to see Calvin, and I'm looking forward to obsessing over homeschooling and childbirth and all the other fun stuff we haven't gotten to talk about lately. I also planned a meeting for next week for the homeschooling group I'm starting up. Dani said she's going to attend, and hopefully some others will too. I'll mention it to Heidi and Jen this week and maybe they can come too. We'll see.

Catching Up

Here's a little bit of what we've been up to:

Creating a passport for Colwyn:



And one for Lachlann:



Measuring things:


Baking a cake for Daddy's birthday:



Having lunch at the park with Paige:



Going to Salem Willows with cousin Daniel:



Measuring the length of an apatosaurus, using a chalk line to illustrate:



And drawing life-size apatosaurus, T. Rex, and Colwyn footprints:



That's not to mention all the other fun stuff we've been up to.. you can see pictures of hot air balloons and helicopter rides at this Shutterfly album.

We've also done our usual workbook pages, craft projects, library trips, and other goofy stuff.

Fieldtrips Galore

We've had three big fieldtrips in the past week, what fun. I already talked about our trip to the wildlife sanctuary, so that's one down.

Last Wednesday, I took the kids into Boston to the Scooper Bowl at City Hall Plaza. We went with Jen, Calvin, and Miles, and took the Blue Line in from Wonderland. The boys had a great time on the T and it was so cute seeing Colwyn and Calvin sitting next to each other, looking out the window, pointing out planes and the tracks and other trains going past. Getting out of the subway station was not fun, though, as the stop wasn't handicapped accessible and we had strollers with us. In fact, the first trip up the escalator was downright dangerous and I feel like an idiot for even trying it. Then we dragged our strollers up another flight of stairs, each carrying our youngest child while the older kids went up in front of us. Blech.

The actual event was pretty fun, though. It was packed and hot but we got to taste a lot of delicious ice cream. The kids had fun playing and running around, and we saw two young kids (I dunno, maybe about ten years old?) playing guitar and drums, and their song selection was great (I'm blanking on what it was, but it was older music that you really wouldn't expect ten year olds to know). Very cute.







On the way back, Colwyn and Calvin talked even more, and Lachlann slept in his stroller, even with all the commotion on the T. It was a lot of work, but a really fun outing.

Our other outing was on the weekend, June 10th, I think. We took the kids to the Dragon Boat Festival on the Charles River. Aside from watching the boats on the river, which Lachlann loved, they got to see a demonstration of drumming and martial arts. There were a lot of craft type activities set up, but Colwyn wasn't really interested. We did get to sample a lot of Asian food, including my favorite, Pad Thai. Mmmm. Dad came with us and we met up briefly with his friend, Peter.

Here's a link to another Shutterfly album with pictures from the Festival as well as the Scooper Bowl, Wildlife Sanctuary, and others: http://share.shutterfly.com/action/welcome?sid=8Absm7ho0bNmH7.

Busy and Not Busy

We're pretty much recovered from our long weekend to D.C. You can read all about it over at my other blog--the link is right off to the side. We visited the National Zoo, the Natural History Museum, and the Air & Space Museum's annex. We had a great time, and I think the kids learned a fair amount.

Because things were so crazy around here leading up to our vacation and then during it, we haven't done a whole lot this week. We weren't able to make it to our regular playgroup because the car was in the shop.. again.. but we did go over to Mary's house for a playdate.

So, yeah. I don't really have much to write about, but it had been a while since I posted last. And plus, I wanted to point out my other blog so you could read all about our vacation if you're terribly bored or something.

I'm really hoping for some nicer weather so we can go back outside. It was so nice in D.C., and we came home to rain, snow, and temps in the 40s. Yuck.

Creating Rockets and Coloring Eggs

So we are pagan homeschoolers! ;) Here the kids are coloring eggs for Ostara.





Our mega project for the week was transforming a box into a space ship. We cut a door out of the back and a windshield out of the front. We left the windshield as more of a flap and attached a string to it so Colwyn can pull the string from inside and the windshield will open. We also made several dials and Colwyn taped them to the inside, just underneath the windshield.



I printed out a bunch of pictures of planets and nebulae and whatnot, and we taped those inside to serve as windows. We wrote the kids names on the ceiling, and punched holes to make constellations. Colwyn and Lachlann both colored on it quite a bit, too. For the first time, Colwyn spontaneously told me he was making certain letters (of course, they didn't look like letters, but it's the thought that counts).



We attached a metal measuring cup to the box with a string for Colwyn to use as a radio, and a spare paint roller became a telescope. Even Maddy got in on the fun.



This week we're probably going to go the zoo, either with our homeschooling playgroup or without. I'm not sure what we're doing for our other playgroup, so we'll see. We're leaving for a long weekend in DC very very early Thursday morning, and I'm so excited to take the boys to all the museums. Whee! I've got to remember to show him DC on the globe and on the states puzzle, and I think I'll also see if I can find a simple map of the city for him to look at.

We're Back on the Dino Again

Despite a short-lived fling with space, Colwyn really only has one obsession in his life again.. dinosaurs. We finished painting the planets (although Doug and I are still arguing over whether Venus is blue or red.. anyone know for sure?), but I still haven't been able to convince Colwyn to participate in gluing them to the display board. I even printed out little labels--they're still sitting on my printer tray. So for now, I have several half-planets taking up way too much space on what I call my Homeschooling Counter of Clutter. Here's a picture, just for the hell of it.



You can see our huge number of crayons, the bowl of polished stones we use as math manipulatives, the real math manipulatives (multicolored bears), our globe, a few workbooks, lots and lots of paper, our Dino ABC book, the states puzzle, some tongs, scoops, magnets, eyedroppers, magnifying glass, dustpan, lots of puzzles, a few board games, play dough, and the poor planets. For those of you with a good eye, you'll also see a book written by Doug's aunt.

You won't see the dinosaur fossils (they're hiding behind the stones), the majority of our craft supplies (they're on the bottom shelf, in drawers), or the two books on science experiments we just checked out from the library. We got Mudpies to Magnets and Flash! Bang! Pop! Fizz!. The first book I had heard about on MDC, but the second one was recommended in this book, which lists tons of great books. We haven't tried any of the experiments yet, but I've flipped through the books and can't wait to start.

Back to the dinosaurs.. last week we did a lot of activities with those ever-present reptiles. I drew a picture of a triceratops skeleton and cut it into pieces (tail, spine, ribcage, back legs with pelvis, front legs with shoulder blades, and skull) and Colwyn glued it back together on a piece of cardstock.



We've also been sorting his toy dinosaurs a lot. We'll sort them into herbivores and carnivores, or we'll sort them by species. Colwyn always wants to sort dinosaurs that we only have one of (like parasaurolophus), so we usually have a few T. Rexes stand in. He's also been playing this strange game that I think he picked up from Charlotte. He'll ask you to be a dinosaur and roar, and then he'll say that he's a race car and vroom loudly. When he vrooms at you, you're supposed to act scared. If you can fall over backwards, even better. Colwyn recently saw Charlotte and Mary acting out a scene from Cars, so I think that's where he got the idea.

Yesterday we took the kids to the Aquarium. I had a feeling it was going to be busy, and it surely was. It's funny, each time we go, the kids find something else to be totally fascinated with. This time, they spent a while looking at a tropical fish tank that had a unicorn tang in it. When we went outside to look at the seals, we noticed that there were some turtles in what we call the "sick fishy room." There was a big sign next to the window explaining how some baby turtles don't start swimming south soon enough, and get sick from being in the cold water off the Cape. They drift around until someone rescues them and brings them to the Aquarium. After getting nursed back to health, they're brought to Florida or some other warm place. Colwyn was quite taken with them, and loves telling everyone how the turtle doctor is going to make the turtles better, then bring them to Florida to see his Grandma and Lang Amma (although his stories include the turtle doctor running up to us and saying, "Oh my goodness!" even though we didn't actually see any staff in the "sick fishy room").

Last week we went over to Jen's house to play with Calvin and Miles and bake bread. The kids played really well together. Colwyn stuck with the trains mostly, but Lachlann had fun playing "tag" with Calvin and Miles. We kneaded the sourdough bread for a while, and after it was done, had a delicious snack.

Today we had everyone over here. Colwyn and Lachlann got to play with Calvin and Miles and Thomas and Aidan. Colwyn is definitely warming up to his new friends.. both Colwyn and Lachlann cried when they had to leave. I hate to see my boys sad, but I'm so glad they like the other kids. They all play together nicely, which is great because it lets us moms chat rather than breaking up fights or chasing the kiddos around.

Life Gets Crazy

Things have been a bit crazy this last week or so.. that's my excuse for not updating, and I'm sticking to it. I do have quite a few things to share, though. We'll start with the boring and work our way to the fun stuff. :)

I know I've said that I'm not into worksheets, and I stick by that. However, Colwyn got a random workbook for his birthday, so occasionally he'll take it out of the craft drawer and want to do some pages in it. Here's what he did today:




We've been steadily working on our dinosaur ABC book, as well. We're up to Iguanadon so far. Colwyn now knows whether the following dinosaurs are meat eaters or plant eaters: apatosaurus, brachiosaurus, corythosaurus, deinonychus, edmontosaurus, fabrosaurus, gigantosaurus, hadrosaurus, and iguanodon. He knows that giganotosaurus was bigger than T. Rex, and that brachiosaurus's nose was on top of its head. :)

Last weekend, we took the kids to the Museum of Science again. This time, they were healthy, rested, and fed, and thankfully the museum was a lot less crowded. Colwyn didn't spend as much time with the dinosaurs as I had been expecting, but he did really like an archaeology exhibit, and enjoyed looking at the model exhibit. We also had some fun with stop animation in the animation exhibit, and he looked at a few random things through a microscope.



The other really cool thing we did was make a volcano out of playdough, a paper cup, baking soda, vinegar, and red food dye. We filled the cup about halfway with baking soda (more would have been fine.. in fact, we refilled it later), then used playdough to turn the cup into a volcano. While the boys and I were doing that, Doug added some red dye to a cup of vinegar. Here's what our volcano looked like:



When we poured the red vinegar into the baking soda, it bubbled over and nearly looked like lava. If you're patient, you can see a video of it here. But I'm warning you, it's quite a big file and will take a minute or two to load even on broadband. The kids seemed impressed, but I think Doug and I actually had the most fun. Oh well. :)