Another Year Begins, and Something Ends(?)

It's the practice around here to post a picture or two of the Offspring on their first day of school on the Tuesday after Labor Day--so here they are. The careful reader will have noticed that the children are not sitting around the kitchen table, their hair in some degree of disarray and wearing clothing that is comfortable if not easy on the eyes. In fact...they appear to be outside.

What gives?

Well, as of today, the Offspring aren't being homeschooled (for all but a couple of subjects, including Bible)--they've enrolled in a new Classical Academy in the area.

I'll take a quick break here to tell you to feel free to fire all the invective, hate mail, charges of giving up, selling out, etc. I've probably uttered worse about the choice.

Yes, I still believe in Homeschooling, but more than anything, I believe in Parental Choice. The best choice for these parents of these children is to put them in this Academy--they have the resources to do the things we've always wanted to/tried to do. We don't. In particular, I don't have the resources to keep going at the rate I have been. Maybe I could've faked some of the abilities I don't have--there's enough great helps/curricula for homeschoolers out there, if I only had time/energy. In a sense, it's a choice between by health and the education of the kids.

As much as I didn't want to admit it (and I thank some friends' prodding, and my wife's patient endurance and encouragement to see it), God answered prayers I should've been praying and got us into this school's inaugural year. It's practically just what we'd have designed if we'd thought of starting an Academy. If this school existed when Frodo was 4, we'd have tried to get him in then rather than starting homeschooling. And we're not the only ones doing that--approximately 1/2 the students this year have been homeschooled up to this point.

I really do think that this is the best solution for us--not just for me, but this will equip the Offspring better than I think I could've. This year will be a probationary period...next year we may return all, some, or none of the children to the Academy. We hope (for their sakes) at this point that it's all. But time will tell.

So today, they boarded a school bus for the first time, very excited about the day (tho' less than excited about the unusually cold morning). They all came back unusually chatty about all their new experiences. Samwise and the Princess both have close friends in their classes, Frodo has an old Little League teammate in his, so that helps.

Making the decision to send the Offspring off is one thing, actually doing it, is another. Still, Mom and Dad handled the first day okay--it was rather a busy day, so that helped. We'll see if that continues. WonderMutt, on the other hand, just about had a nervous breakdown--all her charges gone, and the parents let it happen? She just couldn't believe it.

Sometime, remind me to sing the glories of school uniforms--I'm inclined to buy into the behavioral/cultural/etc. reasons for it, but I know and exult in the benefits for parents--monetary and ease, if nothing else.

"Singing, we're singing of you, ah, proudly too..."

Just got this great news:

Senate Bill 1017 has passed both the House and the Senate unanimously! The bill is headed for Governor C.L. "Butch" Otter, who has indicated his willingness to approve the bill.

This is a significant victory for homeschool freedom in Idaho. These amendments being adopted into the compulsory school attendance law to protect homeschooling will enable Idaho to avoid the danger experienced by California last year.

Senate Bill 1017 will do the following:

1. It specifically adds private home education in the compulsory school attendance law.

2. It removes the requirement that this private instruction has to be "comparable" to the public school curriculum.

3. It clarifies that homeschoolers do not have to teach any certain number of hours or days per year.

4. With this language added, the law allows other friends or relatives to provide the teaching--not only parents. This flexibility is important for times of crisis where parents want to continue homeschooling but need to have the support of someone outside the home to provide the instruction for a time.

Sen. Russell Fulcher and Rep. Bob Nonini sponsored and labored for this.

He did it!! Updated: It's Official!

A couple hours ago he finished writing for the afternoon, and I just finished typing it up--Frodo has passed his word count for NaNoWriMo!

Sadly, the OpenOffice word count differs from the NaNoWriMo's verification tool, so he has to come up with another 305 words by their reckoning to make it official. Which is fine, since his storyline still needs to be wrapped up.

Still, first time out of the gate, and Frodo nailed it with time to spare without breaking a sweat. A stand-up triple.

Way to go, champ.

NaNoWriMo

Over to your right, you'll notice some new graphics (Micah had nothing to do with them, excuse the blandness). What're they about? Well, it's November, which for thousands means, National Novel Writing Month. Some of you may recall that I gave it a shot. Sadly, energy, enthusiasm, homeschooling, and life in general got in the way, and I just didn't get that far. But I've been gearing up for this year's for a bit, and think I have a better game plan going in.

I was poking around their website last week, and out of curiosity, checked out their Young Writer's Program. Inspiration struck, and we've now canceled about 1/3 of our normal school stuff for November for an exercise in Applied Language Arts. I've always admired (and wanted to be) one of those homeschool parents who throws their gameplan out the window because their kids were interested enough in something that they just focus on it for a few weeks. Just couldn't find anything to do like that.

The people over at NaNoWriMo have really done a great job with their Young Writer's Program, they have some age-appropriate workbooks to give guidance through the process; they allow parents/teachers and the writers to set their target goal instead of having something set; and there's enough fun stuff on the site (when traffic's low enough) to keep the writer's amused when they need a break from their work.

The kids are really into the idea--which I love, because they typically approach a writing exercise like a series of inoculations. Frodo and the Princess are both a few words ahead of their daily quota, Samwise is at about 50% (his brain works like mine, I expect great strides in Week 4). Arnold's annoyed because I'm not involving him--call me cruel, but if the kid can't read, I don't think he should be trying to author a book (I'm sure even Dan Brown could work his way through a Boxcar Children novel).

We've got a 4 day vacation this week that's gonna louse up our schedule a bit, but on the whole, I'm thinking that having the kids do it with me--and having to keep their enthusiasm up, is really going to help me. Not to mention, really don't like the idea of hearing "Frodo, you've met your writing targets for 2 weeks now, your Father's still trying to catch up to Week 1."

So in addition to my official NaNoWriMo widget down below, we've got the little graphics for the three kids and our collective word goal, to advertise our progress (nothing inspires like the pressure of many, many people seeing your fail).

2x the Laundry

Somewhere between the births of Frodo and Samwise, we were given a lot of advice on how to handle the change between one kid and two. It's a compulsion for parents to pass on this kind of thing to the newbies (one I share, much to my chagrin). One of the tidbits that stuck with me (and that I've passed along, come to think of it) was to think of each additional kid as "doubling the laundry (and every other chore)." To prepare oneself for the second, or third, or fourth, bundle of joy, you needed to think of life with twice as much laundry as you had--while technically not true, the workload seemed that way. Ditto for cooking. Ditto for cleaning. And so on.

Now frankly, I don't really remember things being that way--but maybe that's because we were prepared for it. I remember an uptick in duties with Sam, not really with the Princess, and then another with Arnold--'tho given his personal entourage of medical challenges, that might be the source of a lot of it, so I'm not sure that counts.

Fast forward to a month ago, when we started the 2008-09 school year, and Arnold joined the ranks of the formally educated (not formal enough for some of his grandparents to stop carping, mind you). Wow. I could not, cannot, and probably will not believe how much more work things are this year. Yes, part of it is the larger course load the other three are taking--but it really all seems to be coming from the time needed for Arnold. And yeah, it feels like twice the laundry.

I.am.exhausted. By the time four o'clock rolls around, when (94% of the time) we're done with everything, you practically need a spatula to scrape me up. I'm pretty sure I've never looked forward to weekends as much as I have the last few.

Thankfully, Arnold's a very bright boy, and he's picked up a lot of what we're doing so far faster than the others. On the other hand--he's very demanding. Now that he's started school, he wants to be doing a lot of it--now. He doesn't complain about the workload (unlike the others), he complains if I don't give it to him quick enough. Thankfully, he is easy to satisfy--and he's becoming more understanding about me spending time working with the others--once he's done his lessons for the day, he's more than content to stop and play.

Please don't get me wrong--I'm not complaining (intentionally), nor do I have any intention of quitting. Mostly I'm surprised. I really didn't expect this, I knew this year would be harder, I just didn't realize how much so. If there was any part of me thinking I was sufficient for the task, it's been killed (and stomped on, cut into tiny bits, broiled, revived and killed again).

The obligatory First Day of the School Year Photos

Very serious scholars all...

Arnold joined the ranks of the official students this year--older than any of the rest of the quiver at 4.5 years (to the day). He was more than a little excited--almost rabid, actually, I could barely take a bite of breakfast without him showing me various pages from the workbooks he was going to be using.

Yeah, the photos came out a little dark--not sure why, I assure you, their workspaces are adequately lit.

Generally.

Typically.


Unless they're bugging me.

That time of year again...

Our homeschool P.E. classes started today, GRTF schools in the area start tomorrow, and we should be done with our '07/'08 coursework next Thursday, enabling us to start '08/'09 work on the following Tuesday. (I don't know what my parents are so distressed about when it comes to our schedule--look, the kids get a whole 4 days between 'school years').

The air seems filled with possibilities, plans, hopes, aspirations--actually, I guess it's mostly expectations. Which gives me the chance to use one of the many great lines from The Phantom Tollbooth, which we started reading at lunch today.

Expectations is the place you must always go to before you get to where you're going. Of course, some people never go beyond Expectations...

As they say: it's a nice place to visit, but I wouldn't want to live there--I plan on enjoying my two-week stay in Expectations, before I let the Whetherman hurry me along to something beyond Expectations.

The Things You Find Yourself Saying

To a nine year-old struggling with his vocabulary list:

Well, yes, I suppose you could say there is an evanescent quality to candy.

Leave some laying on the kitchen counter if you doubt.

My tongue can't multitask

Just finished giving a spelling test (while grading a grammar test) with one child demanding I start his spelling test and another semi-patiently waiting expectantly to me to dictate a literature passage to him.

As Butters recently said, "Ow! That hurt my brains! Ow!"

Learning from that Kid and His (Imaginary?) Friend

I've been reading lately about comic strips helping kids become better readers (if for no other reason, they'll invest more effort into understanding unfamiliar words/phrases/ideas so they can get the joke), so last week I plunked down a few bucks for a Calvin and Hobbes collection. It's truly the rare moment over the last five days when that book has not been open in someone's hands (except for school or dining time...pretty much).

Of course, the downside to this is that Samwise is taking Calvin as a role-model.

So getting a link to this article in the mail this week was quite well-timed, "Everything I Ever Needed to Know About Public School...I Learned in Calvin & Hobbes Comic Books" by B.R. Merrick. Now, I'm pretty sure I wouldn't sign on to everything Mr. Merrick says about Calvin, Hobbes or Public School--but as I read over it again, I can't think of a single thing he gets wrong.

Particularly worth your time is "list, in order of importance from worse to worst, the life lessons I, and all the other non-fictional Calvins out there, learned from former-factory/now-corporate government schools."

Sadly, not so sure those strips are that funny anymore.

Leap Day

I remember back when I was in the State Indoctrination Centers as a kid, it was typical for them to do something special on that intercalated day in February. Classes, on the whole, were canceled in lieu of activities. Movie day (using actual projectors); I remember one year which was unseasonably warm our elementary school had a track meet kind of thing; or something along those lines.

I didn't make any plans for the day for our little academy--I got behind after being taken out with a kidney stone for a couple days last week, and am just too unorganize to have thought of it before this morning anyway. Honestly, I don't really have any ideas what we could do to commemorate the day--other than having the Princess propose to someone, I guess--and that'll only happen over my rotting corpse.

What kind of things are you and yours doing to mark this 'bonus' day?

Help Wanted

a fellow homeschooler sent me a piece from Alpha Omega Publications' Homeschool View

Now accepting applications―

Family seeking fun-loving, godly homeschool teacher. Applicant will be responsible for providing total educational development and daily personal care for children of multiple ages. Applicant will assume the following roles: cook, housemaid, nurse, taxi driver, administrative assistant, accountant, athletic coach, social director, computer technician, household and automotive repairman, gardener, course instructor in multiple subject areas and grade levels, and various other responsibilities. This is a full-time position―approximately 120 hours or more per week.

Qualified candidates must be able to work well under pressure, multi-task, and prioritize work loads while maintaining a friendly, enthusiastic attitude. Quick thinking, good memory, and a varied background in extensive subject matter are a must. Promising candidates will be resourceful, adjust easily to distractions, and display creative, hard-working leadership abilities. Organizational and problem solving skills are a plus. Previous teaching experience and/or college preferred, but not required.

If you're interested in working in a fast-paced, ever-changing environment, this is the position for you! For more information on this exciting opportunity to earn fulfilling, one-of-a-kind rewards, please apply in person today.

If this was in the paper/on monster.com I wouldn't have thrown a résumé at it--there's no way on God's green Earth I fit these qualifications. And yet here I am.

What was I thinking?

Field Trip

I was waiting to download the pictures of this field trip before I blogged about it, sadly, all the pictures were blurry, of only a slice of someone's face, or both. So, I'll just write a little bit about it.

Friday, our field trip group went to check out Air St. Luke's, one of the local airborne medical transport companies. This was a great field trip. The staff were incredibly friendly and welcoming (which is pretty great considering more than a few were in the middle of a 24 hr shift). Gave us a pretty casual, but informative, tour of their facilities and one of their helicopters. The kids were able to crawl into the patient compartment, where an EMT talked to them about what happened there; and then the pilot showed them around the cockpit (each kid got to sit in the pilot seat for a few minutes). And unlike other field trips we've been on--no one seemed concerned the kids would break anything (considering we're talking a $7 million aircraft, that's pretty impressive). Then, on a whim, they took them over to the ambulance and another EMT talked them through that. All the kids had a blast--which was good considering the gray, cloudy, almost rainy mid-50's morning it was.

While the kids were checking out the helicopter, the other pilot called me over and asked me if I wanted to look at the engine. I have no idea why this happens to me (okay, not true, I know exactly why--I'm generally the only man in the group). Last year at the PBS station, the engineers called me over to look at a control panel none of the other parents/kids saw. This time it was the engine (looks smaller and wimpier than my wife's Mercury Villager's--which just made it all the more impressive, IMHO). While he was showing me the bonus stuff we were able to talk about homeschooling--the pilot's moving soon and there aren't any private school options like he enjoys where he is--challenges, benefits, regulations, etc. So we were both able to get something out of the day (I hope I helped him anyway).

First Day

You ever have one of those weeks where everything--and I mean everything you start or intend to start just doesn't work? Well, I'm having one of those (getting better, tho--I think). So the homeschooling I was so looking forward to getting underway with on Tuesday? Mostly started today. Some parts will start on Monday (Deo Volente)...others will start sometime after that.

We've taken more time off this summer than we usually do, and the kids are having a hard time readjusting (me, too, come to think of it...and because things were so strange this morning, no coffee since we finished the pot at work 'round 4:30!)--particularly the attention-span-deprived Samwise.

We got a little workbook on letters and sounds for Arnold to start using--not a serious preschool curriculum, just something on paper for him to do. He loved it, you could really tell he liked sitting down with the others and have me work on a sheet with him.

Anyhow...we've started. By the grace of God, we'll persevere. Here's the obligatory/traditional first day of school blog pictures--enjoy! (you can really tell that Frodo likes me interrupting his thinking for this, huh?)

Still Psyched

Got the Bauer books this weekend--it looks even better than I remembered. Hadn't looked through the Activity book before, and am very impressed with it--think about getting it, Mist. Still have some more books to get, but am getting closer... :)

Portrait of an Artist and a Young Man

Samwise is proudly displaying his award-winning picture and his award for placing first in a local restaurant's Back-to-School coloring contest. (that's an unnecessarily convoluted sentence, but, eh...) That backpack is chock full o' school supplies (yay!)

He was so excited when we got the phone call today--and rightly so--he literally shook with excitement as he told the news to his Grammy and Mom on the phone. :)

Way to go, pal.

Getting Psyched

One of the best pieces of advice we ever got on Homeschooling was to remember who's in charge--the parents, not the materials used. Expressly, this dad (who graduated 2 HS'ers before it was cool) said, "Take dominion over the curriculum." (I'm sure his expression and devotion to Rushdooney are purely coincidental)

Especially after watching several friends slavishly follow along with the book/video/whatever and wondering just what role the parents were playing in their education beyond flashing their MasterCards, we've always striven to do just that. Usually just in minor ways, because the stuff we bought was pretty good to begin with, but sometimes we seriously deviated (which was always a lot more fun for me)

Well for Frodo's work this coming year, we've stepped up our dominion taking and have come up with a totally custom-built package that should play to his strengths and chop away at his weaknesses. And, as an added plus, should save us $400 or so (while giving him the same amount, if not more, work).

I've just placed the first order, The Story of the World: History for the Classical Child by Susan Wise Bauer. This is so much more promising than the anemic Bob Jones text he's used before. Can't wait 'til Sept. 4^th!

Always good to have a reminder

of why I do what I do.


(If only all the Christian bloggers encouraging people to use GRTF schools would move beyond their bogus "salt and light" arguments and deal with this issue...)

Hey, Crafty-types!

(and I'm not necc. looking for crafty like a fox)

If you were going to attempt to attach a pipe cleaner to a rock, what type of bonding agent would you use? Not surprisingly trusty old Elmer's School Glue doesn't do the trick.

Proud Papa Moment

The Princess read today for the first time :). It was originally scheduled for Wednesday, but blood, sweat, tears, patience, etc. had to be spent along the way.

Doesn't matter now. It happened. I saw it, I heard it. Time to build on it.