So what else is new, right? Speaking as someone who was born and raised in southern California I would like to say that I am very glad we now live elsewhere. The recent court decision involving a parent's right to homeschool their children is just amazing to me - amazingly stupid.
This morning I saw a report about it on Fox News. I had heard about it before this morning, but one of the comments made by a woman with an organization to help protect children really shocked me. She said (I'm paraphrasing here) that judges need to have the ability to demand that children are put in either public or private schools if the children are in danger. She also mentioned that there are 500,000 children who have been identified as being "in danger" in homeschool situations. Who these children are, she didn't say. But after the report I realized that what she seemed to be saying inbetween the lines is that children who attend public or private schools are not in danger. I never realized that this was the case, but am so very happy to hear that children who attend public and private schools, and their families, apparently live in Shangrila!
Are there problems in some homeschool families? Yes. Are there problems in some public/private school families? Yes. Should these children be helped? Of course! But I have yet to hear anyone say that all children in public or private schools should be homeschooled when something terrible happens to a child - or because of a child - who is in public or private school. Remember Columbine? And if you really want to be realistic, there does seem to be more problems with children in public schools than with those who are homeschooled.
If you follow the logic that is apparently being used in California you might come to some interesting conclusions. Alcohol would be outlawed because of those who abuse it and subsequently injure others. Tobacco would be outlawed because of the harm done to the smoker and to those around them. In fact, we wouldn't really have to think at all as the government would think for us, telling us what we should and shouldn't do because we really can't figure that out for ourselves. Wait a minute! Maybe that's why they want all the children in public schools - so that they can be conditioned to have the government think for them. Hmmmm.... I just wonder.
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Friday, March 21, 2008
Thursday, March 13, 2008
Learning to be Messy
It's funny. Sometimes I don't know who learns more in the course of a day - me or our son. Take this morning for instance. It was time for art and a review of the primary and secondary colors. I know that he knows those like the back of his hand, but I wanted him to get painting. You see, our son is one of those kids who never liked getting dirty.
I remember his first birthday. We gave him a cupcake, took off his shirt, and let him go for it. But he didn't. He poked at it, but never really got messy with it. He really has gotten better with getting messy. Now I'm the one who has to loosen up a bit.
I guess I was spoiled by his innate neatness. But now I know that it's really good for him to get messy so I have to let him. It's not like there's anything that can't be cleaned up - our son included. It's amazing what the Lord will use to teach us more about ourselves and to help us over our little hurdles so that we can be free - and be messy!
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I remember his first birthday. We gave him a cupcake, took off his shirt, and let him go for it. But he didn't. He poked at it, but never really got messy with it. He really has gotten better with getting messy. Now I'm the one who has to loosen up a bit.
I guess I was spoiled by his innate neatness. But now I know that it's really good for him to get messy so I have to let him. It's not like there's anything that can't be cleaned up - our son included. It's amazing what the Lord will use to teach us more about ourselves and to help us over our little hurdles so that we can be free - and be messy!
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Tuesday, March 11, 2008
Life!
I bet you thought I disappeared for good. Nope! Just been busy with life! It's really not hard to have happen - especially when you're homeschooling a gifted child.
One thing that I've come to see as a constant in our homeschooling journey (it's been about seven years now) is change. If you've read the history of our homeschool on the website you know what I mean. We've been through a number of schooling methods and curricula, all in an attempt to keep up with the ever changing needs of our highly gifted son. Just last week we made another one of those changes.
In talking with those who don't homeschool, they just don't understand why I go to the lengths I do when it comes to schooling our son. First of all I look at it as a privilege and not as the arduous task that they seem to think it is. Well, some days it does feel rather overwhelming, but that's okay. All I have to do is think about what our son would be facing if he were in public school. It wouldn't be pretty. Just thinking about it makes me thank the Lord that we have the honor of being able to teach our son at home.
So this is the second week of our newest schedule and things are actually going much better than I had hoped. Not that I thought things would be bad, but you never know exactly how "change" is going to be taken. This time, at least, it was embraced and for that I am very thankful. When I think about the fact that by law our son will need to be actively educated for the next nine years I take every success as a huge bit of encouragement and lock it away for later when things might get a little bumpy. But for now I'm just trying to enjoy each day that I have with our son as I watch him grow and learn. I really couldn't ask for anything more!
Back to Living Waters Homeschool
One thing that I've come to see as a constant in our homeschooling journey (it's been about seven years now) is change. If you've read the history of our homeschool on the website you know what I mean. We've been through a number of schooling methods and curricula, all in an attempt to keep up with the ever changing needs of our highly gifted son. Just last week we made another one of those changes.
In talking with those who don't homeschool, they just don't understand why I go to the lengths I do when it comes to schooling our son. First of all I look at it as a privilege and not as the arduous task that they seem to think it is. Well, some days it does feel rather overwhelming, but that's okay. All I have to do is think about what our son would be facing if he were in public school. It wouldn't be pretty. Just thinking about it makes me thank the Lord that we have the honor of being able to teach our son at home.
So this is the second week of our newest schedule and things are actually going much better than I had hoped. Not that I thought things would be bad, but you never know exactly how "change" is going to be taken. This time, at least, it was embraced and for that I am very thankful. When I think about the fact that by law our son will need to be actively educated for the next nine years I take every success as a huge bit of encouragement and lock it away for later when things might get a little bumpy. But for now I'm just trying to enjoy each day that I have with our son as I watch him grow and learn. I really couldn't ask for anything more!
Back to Living Waters Homeschool
Sunday, October 7, 2007
What Now?
When we began reading information on gifted children things really started to fall into place for us. We had gotten to a point of being tired almost all of the time. It seemed that every waking moment was spent trying to keep our son challenged. After we began reading about gifted kids we understood why we were tired all of the time and why it seemed as though we were the parents of three boys instead of only one.
Virtually all gifted children have extra energy. For some (like me) that energy is focused inward and the thought life becomes very vivid. I remember when I was in school how I was bored to tears, but I’d sit and behave in class because my mind was busy “elsewhere.” Our son’s energy, however, is focused outward. He can and does sit for hours if he is interested and engaged in what he’s doing, but if he’s not, he starts looking like a runaway super bouncy ball. The funny thing is, that even when he gets like that and needs to get his “monkey” energy out, he’s listening to every word you say.
At this point in our son’s education, I was becoming rather nervous. I now realized that we were dealing with a highly gifted child and that he truly required being challenged or he would get bored and we’d all be sorry. So I turned to eBay and ordered a full first grade curriculum. When it arrived I traipsed upstairs with the books and my notebook. I began mapping out our school year. While I was doing this our son came up for a visit.
“What’cha doin’?”
“Your new school books are here and I’m trying to get organized.”
“Oh! Science!”
He grabbed the science book and read it cover to cover three days in a row. So much for my planning! At that time I really had nothing to model our homeschooling on besides my public school experience. During those three days I knew that something was going to have to change. I went into fly-by-the-seat-of-your-pants mode.
I began looking on the internet for information about different style of homeschooling and was amazed at what I found. There were many, many different ways to teach at home, and not all of them looked like public school at home. I was starting to feel a little encouraged.
One thing that I knew we needed was a way to teach without spending big bucks on a full year’s curriculum every eight weeks or so. So we decided to give the Charlotte Mason method a try. This worked well for a while. Our local library became our home away from home. Our son and I would curl up with a good book and learn about all sorts of things. But our son isn’t one to sit still for too long day after day. We needed something a little more hands-on and since I wasn’t terribly experienced at the whole homeschooling thing yet, I went back to the internet for help. It was then that we first heard about The Weaver curriculum – a curriculum that is designed for multi-children households, but perfect for a single child who spans several grade levels. We made the switch and were in for some fun!
Back to Living Waters Homeschool
Virtually all gifted children have extra energy. For some (like me) that energy is focused inward and the thought life becomes very vivid. I remember when I was in school how I was bored to tears, but I’d sit and behave in class because my mind was busy “elsewhere.” Our son’s energy, however, is focused outward. He can and does sit for hours if he is interested and engaged in what he’s doing, but if he’s not, he starts looking like a runaway super bouncy ball. The funny thing is, that even when he gets like that and needs to get his “monkey” energy out, he’s listening to every word you say.
At this point in our son’s education, I was becoming rather nervous. I now realized that we were dealing with a highly gifted child and that he truly required being challenged or he would get bored and we’d all be sorry. So I turned to eBay and ordered a full first grade curriculum. When it arrived I traipsed upstairs with the books and my notebook. I began mapping out our school year. While I was doing this our son came up for a visit.
“What’cha doin’?”
“Your new school books are here and I’m trying to get organized.”
“Oh! Science!”
He grabbed the science book and read it cover to cover three days in a row. So much for my planning! At that time I really had nothing to model our homeschooling on besides my public school experience. During those three days I knew that something was going to have to change. I went into fly-by-the-seat-of-your-pants mode.
I began looking on the internet for information about different style of homeschooling and was amazed at what I found. There were many, many different ways to teach at home, and not all of them looked like public school at home. I was starting to feel a little encouraged.
One thing that I knew we needed was a way to teach without spending big bucks on a full year’s curriculum every eight weeks or so. So we decided to give the Charlotte Mason method a try. This worked well for a while. Our local library became our home away from home. Our son and I would curl up with a good book and learn about all sorts of things. But our son isn’t one to sit still for too long day after day. We needed something a little more hands-on and since I wasn’t terribly experienced at the whole homeschooling thing yet, I went back to the internet for help. It was then that we first heard about The Weaver curriculum – a curriculum that is designed for multi-children households, but perfect for a single child who spans several grade levels. We made the switch and were in for some fun!
Back to Living Waters Homeschool
Sunday, September 30, 2007
Kindergarten in a Flash
As I said last time, after our son devoured his full year of pre-school a very short amount of time, I purchased a full year’s kindergarten curriculum. There were worksheets for him to use, and I knew that I could find lots of interesting things on the internet that could supplement what we would be studying. When the curriculum arrived we were both rather excited.
Up until this time, everything that I had read about children our son’s age was that their attention spans were about 15 – 20 minutes and that a child shouldn’t be expected to go beyond that point. Unfortunately, our son hadn’t read any of that and was quite unaware that he was supposed to last that length of time. Our first day of kindergarten was quite interesting for both of us. Our son loved the curriculum and wanted to look at all of it right then. I explained that we would take it in order and, disappointed though he was, he acquiesced. We got through the first lesson. I started to wrap things up for the day, but our son had other plans.
“More, Mama! Do more!”
“Honey, we’re done for today.”
“No! Do more!”
Well, what can you say to an eager learner? I rolled up my sleeves and we ploughed on, and on, and on! After three hours I told our son that we needed to stop for the day.
“No, Mama! More!”
“No, no more for today.”
“Mama, please!”
“Mama needs a break, Sweetie.”
At this our son gave me the once over, rolled his eyes in disgust as if to say, “Wimp,” and he toddled out of the room. It was then that I knew that we were in for quite a time. After another six weeks and the completion of the kindergarten curriculum, I was about at my wits end. It was then that I started reading up on gifted children, and my eyes were opened.
Back to Living Waters Homeschool
Up until this time, everything that I had read about children our son’s age was that their attention spans were about 15 – 20 minutes and that a child shouldn’t be expected to go beyond that point. Unfortunately, our son hadn’t read any of that and was quite unaware that he was supposed to last that length of time. Our first day of kindergarten was quite interesting for both of us. Our son loved the curriculum and wanted to look at all of it right then. I explained that we would take it in order and, disappointed though he was, he acquiesced. We got through the first lesson. I started to wrap things up for the day, but our son had other plans.
“More, Mama! Do more!”
“Honey, we’re done for today.”
“No! Do more!”
Well, what can you say to an eager learner? I rolled up my sleeves and we ploughed on, and on, and on! After three hours I told our son that we needed to stop for the day.
“No, Mama! More!”
“No, no more for today.”
“Mama, please!”
“Mama needs a break, Sweetie.”
At this our son gave me the once over, rolled his eyes in disgust as if to say, “Wimp,” and he toddled out of the room. It was then that I knew that we were in for quite a time. After another six weeks and the completion of the kindergarten curriculum, I was about at my wits end. It was then that I started reading up on gifted children, and my eyes were opened.
Back to Living Waters Homeschool
Monday, September 24, 2007
Our New Blog Home!
Well, I've finally made the move with our homeschool blog. If you've been a reader of ours you will no doubt have noticed that my consistency in posting has been rather lacking. Well, I'm going to make an effort to post at least once a week to our new blog. I can't make any promises, but that's what I'm shooting for! You can also subscribe to this blog by scrolling to the bottom of the page and clicking on "Subscribe to: Posts (Atom)."
With our son's ninth birthday fast approaching, I've been thinking about our homeschool journey lately. Not only has our son learned a lot, but I've learned a lot, too - about our son, about our family, about myself, and about homeschooling. I'd like to take a look back at our beginnings. Well, our formal homeschool beginnings.
Our children's journey of learning really does start at birth. I remember the times we would spend with our son on the floor, playing with brightly colored toys. At nine months of age our son was sitting on my lap at the computer playing a Dr. Seuss game. Even so, when I think of our homeschool beginnings I have to fast forward to when our son was the ripe old age of 2 1/2.
By this time he knew his shapes, his colors, his numbers, and was doing addition in that little head of his. To be honest, part of my motivation for starting his "formal" education so soon was because I was running out of clever ideas for him, so I figured a nice pre-school curriculum would be of great benefit. Well, it was a mixed blessing.
I still remember when the CD-Rom arrived. There was a full year's pre-school curriculum on it and I quickly printed out the first four weeks' worth of lessons. Each day's instruction was to last about fifteen minutes. I bought poster board and made up posters to decorate our school area. I was so excited I could hardly stand it! Then the day finally arrived. We were going to start school!
We sat down at our son's little table, which was a wonderful fit for him. I felt like my knees were up around my ears, but that was fine. We were going to have fifteen minutes of school time, which would hopefully satisfy his insatiable appetite for learning for a bit longer than that so that I could take a bit of a mental break. So we began...
After about fifteen minutes, I told him that we were done for the day. Well, he had other ideas. That first day of school we covered a week's worth of lessons. It really was exciting to see him devour the information, but at the same time I got a little concerned. It only took him about six weeks to get through a full year of pre-school curriculum. It was at this point that I knew something funny was going on. Much praying ensued, along with the purchase of a full year's kindergarten curriculum. Our adventure had officially began!
Back to Living Waters Homeschool
With our son's ninth birthday fast approaching, I've been thinking about our homeschool journey lately. Not only has our son learned a lot, but I've learned a lot, too - about our son, about our family, about myself, and about homeschooling. I'd like to take a look back at our beginnings. Well, our formal homeschool beginnings.
Our children's journey of learning really does start at birth. I remember the times we would spend with our son on the floor, playing with brightly colored toys. At nine months of age our son was sitting on my lap at the computer playing a Dr. Seuss game. Even so, when I think of our homeschool beginnings I have to fast forward to when our son was the ripe old age of 2 1/2.
By this time he knew his shapes, his colors, his numbers, and was doing addition in that little head of his. To be honest, part of my motivation for starting his "formal" education so soon was because I was running out of clever ideas for him, so I figured a nice pre-school curriculum would be of great benefit. Well, it was a mixed blessing.
I still remember when the CD-Rom arrived. There was a full year's pre-school curriculum on it and I quickly printed out the first four weeks' worth of lessons. Each day's instruction was to last about fifteen minutes. I bought poster board and made up posters to decorate our school area. I was so excited I could hardly stand it! Then the day finally arrived. We were going to start school!
We sat down at our son's little table, which was a wonderful fit for him. I felt like my knees were up around my ears, but that was fine. We were going to have fifteen minutes of school time, which would hopefully satisfy his insatiable appetite for learning for a bit longer than that so that I could take a bit of a mental break. So we began...
After about fifteen minutes, I told him that we were done for the day. Well, he had other ideas. That first day of school we covered a week's worth of lessons. It really was exciting to see him devour the information, but at the same time I got a little concerned. It only took him about six weeks to get through a full year of pre-school curriculum. It was at this point that I knew something funny was going on. Much praying ensued, along with the purchase of a full year's kindergarten curriculum. Our adventure had officially began!
Back to Living Waters Homeschool
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