I just downloaded Evernote, a program that promises to "remember everything, capture anything, access anywhere," and "find things fast." I'm interested in how it can help me in my homeschool and other aspects of life. I dabbled with a very basic program called Keynote for a while at one time and liked it (before I started homeschooling), but it's no longer supported and probably pretty out of date.
I'm especially hoping that Evernote will help me keep track of recipes I find online. I'll update this blog if I find it useful or not. Right now, it's Friday, and I think I've got to get out of this house for a while and go get a nice cold sugar-free coffee smoothie. Going pick up a couple of important things (we're out of Coke Zero!) at the store, and take my Kindle, my planner, and a crochet project. Not coming home until after the children's bedtime.
Friday, May 25, 2012
Thursday, May 24, 2012
Wrapping up the Year
Locally, the school year begins after Labor Day and goes until the middle of June! I've decided this is far too long. Bee and I are both a little burnt out. He did awesome on his standardized test, and, well, we're just ready to take a new direction. So, we are officially ending Bee's 2nd grade on May 31 and starting our pre-3rd grade summer on June 1.
We are not really stopping school (really, "school" is going on at all times), but we are taking a break from workbooks and structured learning. He'll be doing the library's summer reading program. We're going to work through a bunch of science experiements. And he is signed up for several camps.
The summer is going to be a nice time for me to re-evaluate our approach, decide what's important, and to get things ready for the next "school year," which can start right after Labor Day. I also hope to get the house in better shape, all the closets and drawers and cabinets organized, all the work that seemed nearly impossible to get down when I still had a toddler in the house!
We are not really stopping school (really, "school" is going on at all times), but we are taking a break from workbooks and structured learning. He'll be doing the library's summer reading program. We're going to work through a bunch of science experiements. And he is signed up for several camps.
The summer is going to be a nice time for me to re-evaluate our approach, decide what's important, and to get things ready for the next "school year," which can start right after Labor Day. I also hope to get the house in better shape, all the closets and drawers and cabinets organized, all the work that seemed nearly impossible to get down when I still had a toddler in the house!
Thursday, May 17, 2012
Exposing Homeschooled Children to Classical Music
Since we spend so much time driving around, many homeschool families use the car to squeeze in learning. Sometimes Bee reads in the car, and we also listen to Spanish music in the car. I've also been using to to expose my children to classical music.
I grew up playing the cello, and music was a big part of my life. I know a fair bit about music history and kept thinking and worrying about how I was going to make it a part of my children's lives too. They don't have to love classical music, but I'd like them to be literate in classical music. By the time they "graduate" from home school, I'd like them to be familiar with the different periods in Western music and the major composers and pieces.
I kept thinking about how I might do it. Should we devote a month to each musical period? Do a unit on one composer at a time? Wouldn't it be interesting to incorporate art as we study the different periods of music, since they tend to parallel each other? I have a pretty good collection of classical CD's, and I thought I might make a playlist. But how would I decide what to include?
All of this thinking resulted in my doing nothing. Finally, I decided just to buy a greatest hits album on the Internet and put it on my mp3 player. Then, we would just listen to it in the car once or twice a week. Maybe we would talk about it, maybe not, but they children would be getting familiarity with many of the most famous works of Western literature.
After a little bit of searching, I settled on The Fifty Greatest Pieces of Classical Music by the London Philharmonic. I will probably add some pieces to my playlist and remove some. For instance, Spring from Vivaldi's Four Seasons is so overused in our culture that I can hardly bear to listen to it. I'd like to add a piano concerto by Rachmanninov, Dvorak's cello concerto, amongst other things.
The great thing is that it's a good start, and the boys are really interested in it. I don't tell them anything unless they ask. Bee likes March of the Valkyries, a piece he had already heard. They both really liked Holst's Jupiter and want me to put the other planets on my mp3 player. Bug got very angry when Jupiter ended, and a nocturne by Chopin started. They definitely are paying attention to the different sounds and melodies they are hearing.
I do want to sign them each up for private music lessons, and I think I will start that for Bug this coming fall. I think it's great to know how to read music and to understand how music works, and the best way to do that is to sing or play an instrument. At the same time, I don't want it to be a high pressure situation.
I think that this coming school year, we will get tickets to children's concerts put on by the local symphony. It really is fun to have 2 children that are old enough to do such things.
I grew up playing the cello, and music was a big part of my life. I know a fair bit about music history and kept thinking and worrying about how I was going to make it a part of my children's lives too. They don't have to love classical music, but I'd like them to be literate in classical music. By the time they "graduate" from home school, I'd like them to be familiar with the different periods in Western music and the major composers and pieces.
I kept thinking about how I might do it. Should we devote a month to each musical period? Do a unit on one composer at a time? Wouldn't it be interesting to incorporate art as we study the different periods of music, since they tend to parallel each other? I have a pretty good collection of classical CD's, and I thought I might make a playlist. But how would I decide what to include?
All of this thinking resulted in my doing nothing. Finally, I decided just to buy a greatest hits album on the Internet and put it on my mp3 player. Then, we would just listen to it in the car once or twice a week. Maybe we would talk about it, maybe not, but they children would be getting familiarity with many of the most famous works of Western literature.
After a little bit of searching, I settled on The Fifty Greatest Pieces of Classical Music by the London Philharmonic. I will probably add some pieces to my playlist and remove some. For instance, Spring from Vivaldi's Four Seasons is so overused in our culture that I can hardly bear to listen to it. I'd like to add a piano concerto by Rachmanninov, Dvorak's cello concerto, amongst other things.
The great thing is that it's a good start, and the boys are really interested in it. I don't tell them anything unless they ask. Bee likes March of the Valkyries, a piece he had already heard. They both really liked Holst's Jupiter and want me to put the other planets on my mp3 player. Bug got very angry when Jupiter ended, and a nocturne by Chopin started. They definitely are paying attention to the different sounds and melodies they are hearing.
I do want to sign them each up for private music lessons, and I think I will start that for Bug this coming fall. I think it's great to know how to read music and to understand how music works, and the best way to do that is to sing or play an instrument. At the same time, I don't want it to be a high pressure situation.
I think that this coming school year, we will get tickets to children's concerts put on by the local symphony. It really is fun to have 2 children that are old enough to do such things.
Tuesday, May 15, 2012
caterpillars
Keeping and releasing caterpillars was something I had planned to do every year with my children, and I did it once when Bee was about 2 haven't gotten around to it for the past 6 years. But the great thing is that, in my now toddler-free home, I do not have to worry about anyone grabbing the container and shaking it (as happened to my praying mantis egg sac one year, thanks Bug).
Friday, May 11, 2012
Bee learns Danish
I have to say, we seem to be leaning more and more towards unschooling. Friday is "games day," where we only do flash card reviews (takes about 20 minutes maximum), and the rest of the day is for playing games, field trips, or free play.
Today, Bee chose to study Danish on his own initiative with his father's Pimsleur Danish Compact cassette tapes. He did the entire unit 1 and learned several words and phrases! I had thought Pimsleur would be too boring for him. I never would have dreamed that he would have done that all on his own. He keeps saying that he wants to learn "all the languages in the world." I am so happy that he is enthusiastic about his language learning.
Today, Bee chose to study Danish on his own initiative with his father's Pimsleur Danish Compact cassette tapes. He did the entire unit 1 and learned several words and phrases! I had thought Pimsleur would be too boring for him. I never would have dreamed that he would have done that all on his own. He keeps saying that he wants to learn "all the languages in the world." I am so happy that he is enthusiastic about his language learning.
Wednesday, May 9, 2012
More Parent Well Being
Christine, of the Welcome to my Brain blog, has a great post today called Permission to Like Yourself. As a nerdy homeschooling parent of 2 brilliant little boys, I find that academics are always the easiest part of our day. I love to learn. They love to learn. I'm good at helping them learn mostly because they effortlessly. It's the other parts of parenting that scare me, the parts that every parent, home schooling or not has to do, raising a child of good character. Accepting, liking, and loving ourselves seem to me to be the basis of all of that.
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