homeschooler's responses

This was posted at the Homeschool Library today and I found it amusing. A bit grouchy, but humourous nonetheless. I've been blessed to meet with almost 99.999999% approval for our choice to homeschool, but I realize not everyone meets that kind of attitude.

The Bitter Homeschooler's Wish List

From Secular Homeschooling Magazine,
Issue #1 Please stop asking us if it's legal. If it is — and it is — it's insulting to imply that we're criminals. And if we were criminals, would we admit it?

2 Learn what the words "socialize" and "socialization" mean, and use
the one you really mean instead of mixing them up the way you do now.
Socializing means hanging out with other people for fun. Socialization means
having acquired the skills necessary to do so successfully and pleasantly. If
you're talking to me and my kids, that means that we do in fact go outside now
and then to visit the other human beings on the planet, and you can safely
assume that we've got a decent grasp of both concepts.

3 Quit interrupting my kid at her dance lesson, scout meeting, choir practice, baseball game, art class, field trip, park day, music class, 4H club, or soccer lesson to ask her if as a
homeschooler she ever gets to socialize.

4 Don't assume that every homeschooler you meet is homeschooling for the same reasons and in the same way as that one homeschooler you know.

5 If that homeschooler you "know" is actually someone you saw on TV, either on the news or on a "reality" show, the above goes double.

6 Please stop telling us horror stories about the homeschoolers you know, know of,
or think you might know who ruined their lives by homeschooling. You're probably
the same little bluebird of happiness whose hobby is running up to pregnant
women and inducing premature labor by telling them every ghastly birth story
you've ever heard.

7 We don't look horrified and start quizzing your kids when we hear they're in public school. Please stop drilling our children like potential oil fields to see if we're doing what you
consider an adequate job of homeschooling.

8 Stop assuming all homeschoolers are religious.

9 Stop assuming that if we're religious, we must be homeschooling for religious reasons.

10 We didn't go through all the reading, learning, thinking, weighing of options, experimenting, and worrying that goes into homeschooling just to annoy you. Really. This was a deeply personal decision, tailored to the specifics of our family. Stop taking the bare fact of our being homeschoolers as either an affront or a judgment about your own educational decisions.

11 Please stop questioning my competency and demanding to see my credentials. I didn't
have to complete a course in catering to successfully cook dinner for my family;
I don't need a degree in teaching to educate my children. If spending at least twelve years in the kind of chew-it-up-and-spit-it-out educational facility we call public school left me with so little information in my memory banks that I can't teach the basics of an elementary education to my nearest and dearest, maybe there's a reason I'm so reluctant to send my child to school.

12 If my kid's only six and you ask me with a straight face how I can possibly teach him
what he'd learn in school, please understand that you're calling me an idiot. Don't act shocked if I decide to respond in kind.

13 Stop assuming that because the word "home" is right there in "homeschool," we never leave the house. We're the ones who go to the amusement parks, museums, and zoos in the middle of the week and in the off-season and laugh at you because you have to go on weekends
and holidays when it's crowded and icky.

14 Stop assuming that because the word "school" is right there in homeschool, we must sit around at a desk for six or eight hours every day, just like your kid does. Even if we're into the "school" side of education — and many of us prefer a more organic approach — we can burn
through a lot of material a lot more efficiently, because we don't have to gear our lessons to the lowest common denominator.

15 Stop asking, "But what about the Prom?" Even if the idea that my kid might not be able to indulge in a night of over-hyped, over-priced revelry was enough to break my heart, plenty of kids who do go to school don't get to go to the Prom. For all you know, I'm one of them.
I might still be bitter about it. So go be shallow somewhere else.

16 Don't ask my kid if she wouldn't rather go to school unless you don't mind if I ask your
kid if he wouldn't rather stay home and get some sleep now and then.

17 Stop saying, "Oh, I could never homeschool!" Even if you think it's some kind of
compliment, it sounds more like you're horrified. One of these days, I won't
bother disagreeing with you any more.

18 If you can remember anything from chemistry or calculus class, you're allowed to ask how we'll teach these subjects to our kids. If you can't, thank you for the reassurance that we
couldn't possibly do a worse job than your teachers did, and might even do a
better one.

19 Stop asking about how hard it must be to be my child's teacher as well as her parent. I don't see much difference between bossing my kid around academically and bossing him around the way I do about everything else.

20 Stop saying that my kid is shy, outgoing, aggressive, anxious, quiet, boisterous,
argumentative, pouty, fidgety, chatty, whiny, or loud because he's homeschooled.
It's not fair that all the kids who go to school can be as annoying as they want
to without being branded as representative of anything but childhood.

21 Quit assuming that my kid must be some kind of prodigy because she's homeschooled.

22 Quit assuming that I must be some kind of prodigy because I homeschool my
kids.

23 Quit assuming that I must be some kind of saint because I homeschool my
kids.

24 Stop talking about all the great childhood memories my kids won't get
because they don't go to school, unless you want me to start asking about all
the not-so-great childhood memories you have because you went to school.

25 Here's a thought: If you can't say something nice about homeschooling, don't say anything!

from http://www.secular-homeschooling.com/001/bitter_homeschooler.html

Fondue!

I haven't posted here lately because we just didn't have anything very interesting to share. We took a little break from studying various countries, and we just focused on phonics (A Beka Letters & Sounds), drilling addition facts, reading (A Beka Fun with Pets), and writing practice.

We're going to return to our 'round the world studies tomorrow, but we finished up Switzerland last night with Fondue for dinner. I hadn't had fondue for a while, and I'd forgotten how fabulous it is!

We used this recipe:
http://www.foodnetwork.com/food/recipes/recipe/0,1977,FOOD_9936_8793,00.html

We dipped pieces of baguette, yellow pepper, and apple in it. mmmmm
And then Lindt chocolates for dessert.

back to the routine

We took about a week off (with a little reading and a little math sneaked in) for a visit with grandparents. Now it's back to the schooltime routine.

I've been really focused on 1st grade dd, and I need to work at including preschool time for 3 year old dd. She's been doing puzzles while we work, and she colors, but I do need to work with her a bit more.

thoughts on Children Around the World

I really like the idea of Winter Promise's Children Around the World. Much of it is over dd's head, so I've been supplementing with library books. I had planned to use it again when my youngest is old enough to participate. But I'm beginning to think that it's not quite the program for us. For families who just want to learn a little bit about a bunch of different countries, it might be perfect. But we want to move to Europe.

This week, the focus is Switzerland and the Netherlands. Yet the guidebook has the kids reading about Iceland and Scandinavia. This seems confusing.

Instead of purchasing Children Around the World, I really think I should have looked at the map, chosen a country for each week of our school year, reserved library books and music for each week and googled a few recipes.

Swiss Week

We've been reading Look What Came from Switzerland and another children's book about Swiss culture and geography. Dd has been listening to an abridged audio version of Heidi. I didn't want to do the abridged version, but the complete version is about 8 hours long and I thought she might lose interest. I want her to have a pleasant acquaintance with Heidi, so that in a few years when she reads the book, she will already know it's a great book.

We had raclette for dinner tonight.
http://paisleyteacup.blogspot.com/2007/10/raclette.html

We continue to use Letters and Sounds and Math U See. We began reading A Beka's Fun with Pets, and I'm going to stick with A Beka reading books for the rest of the year. I love the way some phonics drill is included in the reader. I'm really considering buying an ABeka math book. For handwriting, dd has been copying her Bible verses from church.

Our homeschool corner

We do most of our school time at the dining room table or on the couch. I finally organized an area to keep all the homeschool stuff together; it's a corner in the dining room.

The magazine holders are really handy; I have one for each girl's schoolwork.

why did I buy a guidebook?

We read library books about the geography and culture of Ireland.We read Irish fairy tales. We listened to Irish music. We ate Irish and British food.

And after 2 weeks I realized I didn't open the guidebook once. It is too advanced for dd anyway. Focusing on geography, culture, stories, and food is adequate -- and I could have done it all with free library books.

Schooltime weeks ending October 5

Migraines have limited my computer time the last couple weeks, but I seem to be recovering.

I think we're going to stop using Explode the Code and use A Beka Letters and Sounds instead. It is colorful and dd enjoys it more.

In math, we're drilling addition facts and moving through Math U See. We're on lesson 5. Each "lesson" has almost a week's worth of worksheets.

Dd reads aloud to me every day. She read Cat in the Hat to dh.

Handwriting: Bible verses, letters to church class teachers and Grandpa.

Audio books: dd has been listening to the first Boxcar Children book, Paddington Bear, and Winnie the Pooh.

Social activities: Saturday night Bible class, Tuesday morning class, and Sunday night children's choir.

Irish Weeks

We've spent 2 weeks studying Ireland, and I still don't want to move on!

We've read books about Ireland:
A to Z Ireland, by Justine and Ron Fontes
Look What Came from Ireland
Ireland in the Children's Own Words, edited by Susie Brooks

and Irish Stories:
Tim O'Toole and the Wee Folk, by Gerald McDermott
Fair, Brown, and Trembling (and Irish Cinderella story), by Jude Daly (this book was VERY popular with dd),
Clever Tom and the Leprechaun, by Linda Shute

We went to a family friendly Irish pub to eat Fish and Chips, followed by Sticky Toffee pudding.
At home, we had a British Isles dinner with English bangers (sausages) and colcannon (mashed potatoes with bacon and cabbage). Dh made "bubble and squeak" from the leftover colcannon. (I could eat bubble and squeak every day.) We also had welsh rarebit twice. These foods were all immensely popular with our children -- and with us. (Welsh rarebit is going to be served at our home quite frequently.)

( Colcannon recipes:
http://www.foodnetwork.com/food/recipes/recipe/0,1977,FOOD_9936_22600,00.html
http://www.ireland-information.com/irishrecipes/colcannon.htm

Welsh rarebit:
http://www.foodnetwork.com/food/recipes/recipe/0,1977,FOOD_9936_26813,00.html

picture of a British version of sticky toffee pudding
http://stickytoffeepudding.com/ and a recipe we haven't tried yet: http://www.recipezaar.com/113993

bubble and squeak
http://www.anenglishmaninamerica.co.uk/british-bubble-and-squeak-recipe.php

Irish brown bread:
http://paisleyteacup.blogspot.com/2007/06/irish-brown-bread-easy.html)

Irish music:
http://flameofwine.com/ Lasairfhiona, a celtic singer from the Aran Islands

Now we need to make a lapbook (migraine kept me from googling for pictures) and then we move on to Switzerland.

England Lapbook

This is only our second lapbook, so we are definitely amateurs. But it was fun!


On the left is the open lapbook (with all the flaps/mini books closed), and above is the lapbook with some of the flaps opened.

We have British government, England's capitol, maps showing England, Great Britain, the United Kingdom, and Europe, English Food, dd's favorite stories from England, and English landmarks. On the back of the file folder, dd drew a picture of a tea party.

We need to add the flag, and some more landmarks,

Schooltime week ending 9/22

I posted on Monday, and then Homeschool Blogger wasn't working on Tuesday, so I moved my blog here. Now I'm finally catching up with what we did all week.

Phonics: 5 pages
Math: workbook from Walgreens, and Princess flash cards
Reading: library books about weather, Animals Should Definitely Not Wear Clothes, Go Dog Go
Writing: practicing c and d, a letter to a Bible study teacher at church
Looking at: library books about England,
Lapbooking: making a book about England. We included government (queen, PM, parliament), landmarks (White Cliffs of Dover, Stonehenge, Big Ben, Buckingham Palace), food (cotswold cheese, afternoon tea, bangers and mash, fish & chips), stories (Paddington Bear, Alice in Wonderland, Mary Poppins, Winnie the Pooh, Peter Rabbit), capitol city (London), language, flag, and maps (England, Great Britain, United Kingdom, Europe).
Listening to: Alice in Wonderland, Paddington Bear, The Lion the Witch & the Wardrobe

Explode the Code

For the most part, dd has enjoyed the Explode the Code series. We're on book 6 now. One frustrating thing for her is that the vocabulary is larger than her own. Words like "harbor" and "battleship" are words she's never heard before (not words you use often when you live in the desert). So although she's able to read them, she needs a lot of one on one time with Mama to complete these pages because she just doesn't know what the words mean. Other new words recently have been "hornet", "bandit", "varnish", "dart", and "stork". It's great to learn new words, but it does make Phonics more difficult than it has to be.

Favorite Blogs

http://inashoe.blogspot.com/ This lady often has free shipping codes for Christianbook.com

http://www.mom2my6pack.blogspot.com/ This woman is hilarious! As funny as Erma Bombeck!

http://www.sophysfavoritestuff.blogspot.com/ Ok, it's mine. It's a useful (to me) list of my favorite stuff.

http://paisleyteacup.blogspot.com/ Yes, this one is mine too. I started it to share the details of our trip to Ireland in June 07. I like to think I'll start posting at least once a week. When I have energy at night to do more than stare at the television screen. I think that might happen in the year 2020...

http://braintrainjoys.blogspot.com/ another Winter Promise Children Around the World mom

Supplementing the England Week

Winter Promise's Children around the World program is excellent. But it's for third grade and up (it seems to me) and dd is only first grade. So this year I am treating it like the Pirate Code -- not rules, just a sort of guideline.

Dd has just discovered audio books.
This week she is going to listen to Alice in Wonderland. I ordered Paddington Bear (read by Stephen Fry!!!!!) but I don't know if it will arrive this week.

About Lapbooking

http://www.squidoo.com/lapbooking

and how to make really simple mini-books: http://www.squidoo.com/lapbooking/#module2314219

and a note about a lapbook resource:

I downloaded Cindy Rushton's Let's Make a Lapbook e-book. I paid $9. There are quite a few rather obvious suggestions ("you'll need to choose a topic", "You'll need scissors") as well as nineteen pages of advertising her other resources. I was anxious to see and use the instructions for making small books to attach to a lapbook. There aren't any. There is a list of links to other people's websites that tell you how to make mini books. For me, this was not a worthwhile investment.

Monday, England Week

Schooltime today:
Explode the Code book 6 p. 14 and 15
Math: Princess flash cards with addition problems. I wrote all the answers on post it notes and she matched the answers to the problems. This was her first time doing math that way and it worked well once we got past the new-activity drama.
Reading: Ice is...Whee, by Carol Greene (this author has quite a few books in the early reader section at our library, and dd loves them). I think I only helped her with one word.
Handwriting: practicing the letter b.
Listening, Looking at: two books about England. England by Michael Dahl, and Look What Came from England, by Kevin Davis. We're looking at these together, getting ideas for a lapbook.
This afternoon DD will spend an hour or two listening to audio books, either Boxcar Children or Alice in Wonderland.

English Food

This week we are studying England. We began with an English dinner/tea last night.

We had cotswold cheese with tomato slices (cotswold cheese is available at Trader Joe's. It's a double gloucester cheese with herbs. Fabulous on a sourdough bread sandwich with tomato slices), sausages, scones, crumpets, and biscuits (that's "cookies" to the Americans in the audience).

Of course we had tea to drink. We listened to the soundtrack from Pride and Prejudice (the REAL one with Colin Firth).

The kids all enjoyed the menu very much, but of course this is a not at all an unusual menu for us.

First and Second Week

Phonics (Explode the Code book 6), pages 1-11.

Reading: Nutcracker book from WP LA, Library books, Ten Apples Up on Top, Go Dog Go, Young Reader's Bible, Snow Joe, I Am Sick, When I am Scared.

Science: Blast Off, Bones, Our Planet, Watch It Grow (dd read these to me, with a little help)

Writing: letters to Grammy, Grandpa, two to Sunday School teacher, 2 memory verses, extra practice on letters s, a, n, d.

Math: three lessons in Math U See, online worksheets from Math U See (doubles, +2)

Listening to: Wrong Way Wendy, How to Make an Apple Pie and See the World, Me on the Map, and Boxcar Children audio books.

Children Around the World: Made a Lapbook with Name, Address, Phone Number, City, State, Country, Continent, Planet, country's leader. On the cover we added details about our culture: pets, house, music, church, games, language, clothes, food. Talked about culture, introduced and drilled continents.

Our Curriculum 2007 - 2008

School began on September 5! We're using

FIRST GRADE DD:
my own adaptation of Winter Promise's Children Around the World with lapbooking (CATW is really geared for third or fourth grade, see winterpromise.com)
Math-U-See Alpha (as well as workbooks from Walgreens),
Disney Princess stationery for Handwriting (letters to Grandma, this week's memory verse, letters I notice she needs help with),
Simply Science by Nora Gaydos, (other books to be added later),
Explode the Code Phonics,
lots of library books to read aloud, and audio books for listening.

3 YEAR OLD DD:
Letter of the Week (very simply. Introduce the letter, drill an A Beka Flashcard, and read the suggested library books) http://www.letteroftheweek.com/preschool_age_3.html
Lauri puzzles,
and some A Beka and Kumon workbooks.

1 YEAR OLD DD:
Her main accomplishment is looking absolutely adorable. And napping during schooltime. Theoretically.