Pressing On

I cannot believe I actually fed my children slurpees, or rather FRZNCLDS, AGAIN. But after 10 months, great grades, and 11 years of the same reward, I couldn't say no.  I did suggest smoothies and most agreed that those would probably taste better than slurpees, but the novelty of the slurpees was key to the "reward" aspect of the whole event. Why oh why does the iPhone distort the corners of photos? I'm very proud of my kiddos this year.  It was a year of recuperation and just "getting it done" most of the time, and they all pulled through amazingly.  It was a thankful year. A very wonderful part of every year is our read-alouds.  I make a lunch that will take as long as possible to eat and I read for as long as it takes - usually a couple of chapters of some (hopefully) juicy book.  We laugh, we are shocked, we are surprised, we are sad to say good-bye to the friends we've met in each book when we are done. Since we have done so much Sonligh...

This may be either the most inspiring post you've ever read or the most inane, depending on whether you are a homeschooler or not.  Math is one of those subjects for homeschoolers that rarely gets solved without sweat, tears and sometimes blood. Another would be writing - but one miracle at a time! Seriously, who knew math could be so easy!  We have tried nearly every math curriculum available to us, both American and Canadian over the last 11 years, but it wasn't until last year that my 5-9th graders hit the sweet spot, and by that I mean a visible lack of sweat, tears and yes, blood. Of course it came in it's least expected form, or else I would have found it earlier. The zeitgeist of math (and other subjects) these days is that it must be taught intuitively, in that the child should discover for himself the algorithms and principles in order to understand and be inspired.  What this looks like in practice is teaching 3 different ways to do subtraction.  Or giv...

Ah, to be buried in throes of wrapping up the year and planning next year.  What a privilege! I've been completely ignoring my blog, but thoroughly enjoying doing the regular old stuff I wasn't sure I'd get to do again, this time last year. Here's the start of next year's school taking place in my basement: It's so fun to open up bins of books that feel like old friends and to be thinking about introducing them to another one of my students.  It's not so much the math books, even though Rightstart Math is brilliant, it's largely the years and years of Sonlight books that flood my memories when I crack open a bin. The great snuggles, the laughs and plot twists, interesting discussions, just the adventures we've been on together all over the world and every time period, give me a little thrill as I pull out a stack of readers and read-alouds for this year. We are studying North American history/Renaissance and explorers over the next couple of ...