Why Can't I Comment?!?

Well, here is when I should lead by example. I don't know how to comment on other people's sites, and finding out the answer is difficult. Or rather, reading long paragraphs is difficult.

Don't You Want to Learn ....

I was teaching Simone how to read her first words, "at, am, an." We were then poised to move onto three-letter words like "pat, pan, ham," but she didn't want to repeat after me. I asked her, "Don't you want to learn to read?" She replied,

"No, I want to learn how to drive!"

Slow down, little mama!

Apples or Shakespeare?

This weekend, the kids and I have an opportunity to experience something new. We can either attend an apple festival or a Shakespeare festival. I already know that lots of people are heading to the former and the long lines I anticipate do not enthuse me. But my kids aren't familiar with Shakespeare and anything renaissance fair-like. In fact, I myself have never been to a "ren fair."

Hmmm, I think I'm leaning towards all of us experiencing something new at the Shakespeare event. If it sucks or if the kids freak out, we'll leave! Simple as that.

Read Aloud and Comprehension

About 2 months ago I started reading the only child-oriented novel I have in the house, The Tale of Despereaux. I got it while rummaging through a used book section at the local maternity / baby consignment store. (No, we don't trade in our babies - we trade in baby stuff).

Simone liked it a lot! But she didn't seem to be remembering what was going on. This is another example of my adult mind expecting too much from my little girl's still growing mind. I've been an adult so long and have been used to memorizing what I've just heard that I forget that it took a while to gain these skills. I would be reading about different characters and she would ask questions such as "Who's that?" "That's the bad guy Roscuro." "Who's Roscuro?"

I became quite frustrated. It was partially the expectation factor and the other part was being tired at the end of the day, the time I would read aloud to her. But I thought it had to be something else! So I started looking at other books that might be appropriate for her attention span.

I tried Usborne's Illustrated Stories for Boys (I got it for Max, but it's fun for Simone too!) and she still asked questions like "Who's that guy?" "That's Sinbad." "Who's Sinbad?" Ay-yai-yai!

I turned to professional help and skimmed through The Read Aloud Handbook by Jim Trelease. Armed with ideas, I tried to get some books at the library. Operative word: tried. Max and Simone were so squirrely that I turned to the librarian for quick help instead of just looking for what I had on my list. "I need something more advanced than picture books, but not as long as Despereaux." She picked up a couple of suggestions for my situation and we came home with The Stories Julian Tells and Jenny and the Cat Club. They weren't on my list but I was in a hurry with my whining kids making so much noise in an environment that is supposed to be quiet!

Last night I eagerly started reading Jenny and the Cat Club to Simone. It's a book that has lots of cute pictures and is not too long. I tested her after 2 paragraphs to see if she was listening. She wasn't, or at least she wasn't owning up to it. Maybe she was too scared to answer based on the look on my face. Maybe she could tell I had a lot of hope riding on her answer. Maybe that shut her down. I read just a little longer and we went to bed.

Extremely disappointed and lost as to what to do, I read the Read Aloud book again - this time with much more concentration. Hey, maybe Simone gets her lack of comprehension from me! My goal is to find out how important it is that Simone is understanding what's going on. Turns out it isn't. You read to your infant even though they don't even know words, right!? In fact, one of the "DON'Ts" is to not quiz your child about what was read. D'oh! I was doing it all incorrectly!

Simone later that night was up because of a low-grade fever. I read to her again and it went so smoothly! She asked obvious questions but I just answered them anyway without irritation in my voice.

Sigh ... I have some relief again that I'm not messing up my kids' development!

Homeschool Convention 2011

We became members of HomeSchool Association of California so we could get discounted tickets to their conference, which was recently held August 4 - 7 in Sacramento. I went there to learn more about how I would go about in homeschooling our kids. The wealth of information out there is astounding! We already decided we wouldn't include religion in our schooling, but the other choices of curricula, method of teaching, scheduling, and whatever else I didn't know I'd need to know, were still looming out there. I had been hoping that there would be many vendors who could show me what textbooks look like, but there were barely any there. There were a few online schools, but they gave off this vibe of "we want your money more than we want your child to succeed."

Despite not seeing as many books as I wanted to, I got a much better understanding of how I want to approach teaching the kids. I was particularly impressed with giving our kids a classical education. It seemed to be more organized than other such methods as Waldorf, Montessori, Thomas Jefferson, and Unschooling. I learned about mini-methods like afterschooling (which is what I originally thought I would do) and carschooling!

I don't know if the presenters were just used to addressing kindergarteners, but some speakers talked to us as if we were 5 years old. The Waldorf lady thought it imperative to show us firsthand how kids sing a song and move while learning their even numbers. I left after 30 minutes because I didn't want to do a third song and dance. I noticed that these speakers talked a lot about what happens up to 5th grade, but became vague in the middle school years. But maybe it was a time-crunch that affected their presentation. This was also true of the classical education lady.

I'm not a fan of the child-directed movement called unschooling. Maybe all the uncertainty of when to teach what is unsettling or maybe I legitimately don't think a child should have that much control in our relationship. Interesting thing though is that I recently have let Simone guide our approach to phonics. But I think it's more of my figuring out her learning style. For example, she doesn't want to do the busywork of repeating 5 times the /k/ sound for the letter "c", nor learning the extra poem lines.

The HSC Conference had a superduper sale that started at 8am on one of the days. I was so set! I had an excel sheet of books I wanted to buy, how much they cost on Amazon, on Ebay, and if they were available at our local library. I scored some sweet deals and found a lot of childrens books for prices as low as $0.25! All in all, I paid $21 for about 2 grocery bags of books. We still haven't read through everything.

While I went to lectures, Michael took care of the kids. And with confidence too! He just required that I give him instructions of when and what to feed them. He had hoped that they would sleep everytime I left, but he did well taking them to the designated play spaces and to the hotel pool. We found out how much of a fish Max is when they visited the pool for he jumped in with gusto while Michael wasn't paying attention. Max sank for a few seconds before Michael got to him. Max was still a happy camper and after coughing out the water, he continued splashing and kicking around the water while Michael held onto him.

If I have the opportunity to go to another convention, I will first check out the vendors and see if they're worth meeting in person. I think I'm lectured-out and for now, my research mainly consists of going online and reading forums and reviews. The super sale, however, was so kick ass that I think I might by a day pass for just something of that nature.

The convention also served as a mini-vacation. Simone loves to go to hotels and, while her needs are easily met, we are going to wow and pizazz her with our trips to hotels as much as possible. Observe her glee when we hung out at our room ...

Max wanted in on the fun ...

Simone happily obliged by wrestling with her brother.

Max had fun in the room, wandering around the mess.

We don't know what he was doing here, but his facial expression is so hilarious! He was looking at the TV, but he usually has a more affectionate gaze towards it.

Too Excited

Simone is only 4 years old and in preschool. When homeschooling at this stage, there is nothing really formal I can do. Even for classical and traditional homeschoolers. The thing to do is to just expose her to the world - the real world and not the virtual one on the TV or the computer.

Some moms might be excited about this because there's not much planning to do. I am relieved that we started researching homeschooling early and there's no panic in our engagement with it. But the addictive personality in me kind of wants to get all into schedules and buy curricula / unit studies! Because it's not necessary for preschoolers, I have this extra energy that I feel I need to dispel. That's why I'm blogging. As I'm finding out about the homeschooling community, reading reviews, interacting socially with local homeschoolers, I want to write about our experience.

I did start on a phonics program with Simone. She's into it - not enthusiastically so, but into it for a few minutes a day. I'm trying to not push her too much because I'm afraid of putting her off the entire learning process. We started out (2 weeks ago) at 3 minutes a day and I think we're now at 7 minutes. We did the short-vowel sounds, and are 1/3 through the consonants. We're doing about 2 consonants a lesson session. I'm using Ordinary Parents' Guide to Teaching Reading and am not following the script at all. I did for the first lesson. Halfway through the second, Simone was so over the having to learn a poem to remember the short-vowel sounds. Can't blame her - it isn't catchy at all. After each letter, we read from the BOB books. The BOB books are like the incentive for learning the phonics.

I still don't know Simone's learning style, but I'm glad I haven't squashed her interest in learning ... yet.

Decision One: To Include or Not To Include Jesus

Now that Michael and I were more or less on the same page regarding our kids’ education (or rather, we had started thinking concretely about it and were coincidentally happy to be on the same page), I was excited to start researching how I would homeschool them. I had never come across homeschoolers. The only time I remember seeing homeschoolers in the media were the two kids that Nicole Kidman taught in movie “The Others.” And it seemed as if that was the norm back in the early 20th century if you were affluent ... and British ghosts (kidding. :P ). It turns out that when people think of homeschoolers, they think of ultra-religious freaks who want to shelter their children from the sight of female ankles. Who knew? I didn’t!

I do know that I don’t want to talk about Jesus! I talked about him, his father and his holy spirit enough during my childhood. While my friend in public school was taking cool classes in hand-drawn animation, I had to learn about the 7 sacraments. Sacra-what is what I’d answer if you asked me today what the seven were. My philosophy on religion is that the only message I need to take from it is, “Be nice.” No need to kneel when the priest says “Hey” and no need to clap your hands when he says “A hi dee ho.”

My daughter Simone, now age 4, has asked me about Jesus. She likes going to church with my parents whenever we visit them. She even asks for it! She likes dressing up and seeing other people, I think. One Sunday mass, she saw a statue of a tired, bloody, young man whose hands and feet were nailed to a giant lowercase “t.” “Who’s that, Mommy?” she asked. Unprepared, I took a few seconds before uttering a few “umms” and a “let’s see how do I explain this …” I finally said, “That’s Jesus. He was a nice guy that some other people beat up.” Luckily she was quiet as she soaked in this information. And even luckier for me, the choir started singing and the priest and his entourage walked down the center aisle - enough entertainment to distract Simone.

I think that’s about 75% of what I want to tell Simone about Catholicism. The stories detailing Jesus’s kindness are the other 25% I wouldn’t mind telling her. Like his inclusion of the dregs of society and how he healed people. I want to ignore the whole “It’s harder for a rich man to pass through the eye of a needle than to enter heaven” thing.

So decision one in our homeschooling curriculum. No Jesus or Mohammed or Buddha as revered authorities on how one should act.

Why Homeschooling?

Before I had kids, I imagined that my participation in their education would be my helping them with homework after a long day at school. I wouldn’t correct their homework as perfectly as my mom did, but I would be there to answer their questions and help them when they got stuck.
But life happens not in the way I intend it.

Soon after I gave birth to Simone, Michael entered the Coast Guard. I made the connection that Simone would become a military child who must move to a new school every few years. I worried more about her social situation. Will she be welcomed or bullied at her new school? How will she handle having to leave the friendships she’s established. Will she want to stay with her high school friends and thus prompt me to stay at a base longer than Michael (i.e. the family will be separated?) I didn’t yet think about what she would be learning. I soon did, however, when I realized we could be sent to the South!!!

I had heard a statistic about California’s education being ranked as low as Mississipi’s. Since this had been addressed on the news, I assumed that the reporter was trying to say the two states were not producing well-rounded academic kids. I then imagined that Simone might be stuck in a poor public school depending where we’re stationed! So after researching the No Child Left Behind test scores of each state, I found that it would be advantageous to be stationed north of the Mason Dixie line instead of south of it.

But Michael has long warned of the inability to predict the direction of your military life. We could put in a request for all yankee states and not get a single preference based on what the coordinator (called a “Detailer” in the Coast Guard) decides. When I started thinking seriously about how I would safeguard my kids from below-standard education, Simone was 3 and Max was a few months old.

I went to the Library for help and found a couple influential books. One called And the Skylark Sings With Me: Adventures in Homsechooling and Community-Based Education and the other was Hard Times in Paradise. I picked up the first one because the family who wrote about their daughters’ education were major travelers and they were still able to get a well-rounded, if not exceptional, education. The second one was actually not about education at all. It was about a family just merely trying to survive. The children in the book happened to be homeschooled and I thought it was a grand idea, but not one that Michael would like. Boy was I wrong! Instead of my just afterschooling the kids, Michael thought it might be great if we homeschooled them starting in middle school! Wow wow wee wow! We were envisioning a grand and ambitious schooling career for our kids and I was super-excited!