LIGHTS

31.  LIGHTS-homeschool co-op and it's leaders.

Our first day at the local homeschool co-op was today.  What a great group of kids and moms!  Em is taking a bible class with the youth pastor, PE, and world geography.  Her favorite was PE!  Rach's classes are Spanish, PE, and oceanography/lapbooking.  Her favorite was Spanish class, and her Spanish name is Josephina.  I get to play too!  I'm a helper in Chemistry lab and oceanography/lapbooking.
After classes are done, the kids are able to play games with their friends in "chess club."  There is, of course, chess available to play and a variety of other board games to choose from.
The morning FLEW by, we had so much fun!

Today's science lesson

30.  Moth dissection!

You KNOW you're a homeschooler when...

you see this creature and it's web attached to the hose you are about to use and run into the house to tell the children to "Come, quick, there's something I want you to see!" despite the fact that it creeps you out!  (Yes, I know that's a run on sentence, lol)

Black and yellow argiope

The girls came outside to check out the spider in question and told me they had already seen it in my flower garden!  So, Emily decides to "google it" and figure out what kind of spider we were looking at.  It's an orb web spider called a black and yellow argiope   My first concern was to find out if it's poisonous or potentially harmful.  It's not!  In fact, it's a beneficial animal to have around since it eats pests in large quantity.  I love impromptu science lessons!

Now, if we can just get rid of the woodchuck living under our front stairs...anyone have a "have a heart" trap we could borrow to catch him?

The Creative Zone

Today's project was making a sculpture with modeling clay.  The girls chose to work together and created a nesting pair of bluebirds.

The artists

The art

Keepers pinning ceremony

Today, friends and I celebrated 9 months of achievement for six precious girls.  We were able to recognize them for finishing projects in the following categories, rubber stamping, cookie baking, latchhooking (by far the most time intensive!!), and soapmaking.  For these projects, they received a gold pin. They also received a silver pin for work in learning sign language.  In addition to the pins, they earned the patch for learning the goal and purpose of this group, as well as memorizing the following verse.  To this you were called, because Christ suffered for you, leaving you an example, that you should follow in His steps.  1 Peter 2:21 This all is part of the Keepers at Home  group we joined in October.  

The girls are anxious for the ceremony to begin!

I was blessed to have a turn to pin my girls.

Six precious girls, learning to be Keepers at Home.

It's been awhile...

Hmm, it's been almost a month since I've blogged.  We've had some wonderful family times and have been busy trying to finish school.  We will be DONE tomorrow, June 15th.  YAHOOOOO!  We are looking forward to a bit of R & R for a few weeks, before July hits!

The month of July is going to be a bit crazy, but good crazy.  We will be spending a week at Camp Good News.  I'm excited for this opportunity to volunteer in this ministry. Then comes VBS two days after we return from CGN.  I will be teaching bible to the 1-2 graders.  I love this age group! Our theme is Saddle Ridge Ranch, I'm sure it will be a great week! And somewhere in there we will try to squeeze in a few school days!  We need to keep up with math facts and handwriting at the very least.

A few pictures of what we've been busy doing:

Cousins having fun in the sun!

A short but sweet visit with Nana.

Grand-dad playing with his granddaughters.

We helped celebrate Tim and Laurie's anniversary.  We went to eat at the Sebago Brewing Company and played at Deering Oaks Park playground.

We finally got out the fishing poles and discovered there are fish in this lake...

a 13 inch largemouth and...

a 3 inch "snack"

I finally got a picture of the nesting loon!

I don't know if it's a male or female, they take turns on the nest.  And no, I didn't get as close as this picture suggests.  I have a great zoom on my camera!

And, Em and Rach finished their latch hooking projects!  They have worked diligently on them since January.  We will be finishing it to a rug this week, but I had to share the project with all the stitches finished.  They worked HARD!

Well, I guess I'll sign off for now...until next time.

Artistic Pursuits

We are using this book for Art:

One of the things I really like about this curriculum is that it introduces many media types. Today, we used gouache paint for the first time. I've never heard of it and never would have just picked it up on my own to try. But the colors are bright and vibrant.

Another reason I chose to use Artistic Pursuits, is that I can teach art! I'm not artistic or creative, but the girls really love to draw, paint, sculpt, etc. So, with each lesson, they are learning art history, learning about different artists, and methods of creating art.

Here are the artists and their creations:

Cardinal nest cam

We have really enjoyed watching Molly, the owl, and her owlets via a live nest cam. Today we discovered a cardinal nest cam. In the nest are three newly hatched chicks.

Video chat rooms at Ustream

Curriculum

Part of what I'd like to do with this blog is to talk about our homeschool adventure. First, let's talk curriculum. A friend recently blogged about her curriculum choices, and I realized I like to know what others are doing, and why they have chosen what they've chosen. Another friend, who is considering homeschooling, asked me "how do you know what curriculum to choose?" And my answer was "Trial and Error!" At least that's been true for me. We started out with Sonlight 100% , but I quickly found out that some of it didn't work for us. So each year, right around January, I start thinking about the following year's curriculum. It's a process that I enjoy (mostly) since I am really able to reflect on what worked for us, what didn't work, and what we need to tweak to work better. Homeschooling is a learning experience for me as much as it is for the children.

So, all that to lead into what we are using and why :)

Each girl is going to continue with piano lessons. They have enjoyed learning from Miss Amanda, who is great with them!

For art, we have been using Artistic Pursuits and taking art classes with Miss Nicki. Love this combo!!

In math we will continue to use Math-U-See, because it just works well for us.

For the past several years, I have been using Sonlight for History/Geography and Read-Alouds. I will continue to use this curriculum, however, the girls will be *combined* and using one core. This will be a big change, but one that is necessary for my sanity. I think it will give us a chance to get deeper into the material if we choose to and time in our school day to learn other things.

We are looking forward to using Apologia's Zoology for science this year. I like that it is all encompassing, and easy for me to pick up and teach. It's also written to the child, so the girls can pick it up and read it themselves.

Language Arts currently is a smorgasbord of workbooks. This is the area where I struggle to find a balance. I don't want them doing busy work, I want them to be challenged and learning, and I definitely don't want tears each day over what we are doing! I am still considering and researching our options for next year.

One new goal is to devote more time to teaching E and R homemaking skills. Not only will these skills be necessary for the future, but once the girls have some of the skills "mastered", they will be a great help to me in keeping up the house!