My daughter Injane made a video, about the missions to the Auca Indians of Ecuador. It brought tears to my eyes. She plays guitar and sings the song in the video, too.
And to think that InJane didn’t even know her way around a computer last year! (She kept saying she had no interest in it). Now she is making videos and music… I’d better think about getting a computer with more ram and a better processor!
This is for my young son, who has not been feeling well. It’s also been difficult to concentrate on the books while the sun is shining and the birds are calling him, outside. Hang in there! Remember not to look at the mountain– just do what you know to do right now. 
Cartoon by Dave Walker. Find more cartoons you can freely re-use on your blog at We Blog Cartoons.
I am by nature an extremely organized person. This can be good and bad. It’s good when I have assignments or goals. It’s bad when I’m working with less organized people, lol. Lots of sparks fly from time to time.
Honestly, I don’t know how “unorganized” people homeschool. I’d go to bed every night in terror, hoping that my work done by the “seat of my pants” worked. I’m too high-strung for such dangerous living! Plus I have this terrible propensity of throwing away papers. I really don’t know how it happens, but for some reason, I’m always throwing away papers we really need to keep, like insurance documents, receipts, etc…. sigh. So I have a few boxes where I toss EVERYTHING in now, according to subject.
OK, so anyway, I have a very, very, VERY organized desk. I actually have two of them (one for school and one for my writing jobs). This is the desk where we establish our homeschooling “base.” To prevent clutter (and me losing paperwork), I keep the desk stripped bare, save for the current lessons and current books on which we are working. Other books and notebooks (like textbooks, score keys, etc) are stored on a bookshelf. When a child finishes a book, I put the expired lessons on the bookshelf and take out the new ones, and put it in its proper shelf on my desk.
This is a wild looking desk, I know. The base is a very old teacher’s desk we acquired from an old school building. It’s HUGE and it weighs a ton. It takes two men or three of us girls to move the thing. The top is a plywood box that my husband made. I drew up the plans of what I thought I needed, and he constructed it. It is the best organizer I’ve ever had.
I’ll be posting more about our curriculum and actual routine, but right now I just wanted to give curious onlookers an idea of how things look. You can see slots in the desk. These things hold the kids’ notebooks (they do not write in workbooks, they write their answers in spiral notebooks– this saves money), their charts (we keep track of exactly when they work and what they work on), journals (we have food/physical activity journals and music journals), and their Bible verses notebooks (more on that in a second). In these slots, I also store printed-out answer keys, extra printer paper, and extra notebooks.
I also have Goofy– my mascot– on the shelf. Everything has a particular place so that if it goes missing or undone, I know about it immediately. The kids fill in their own journals– for example, they must practice a musical instrument or work in music theory at least 30 minutes a day, four days a week. So in their music journal, they write down exactly what they have worked on, and for how long. I’ll be blogging about the books we use for such purposes in future posts. I think we’ve now got this thing all down to a science, lol.
About Bible verses. My pastor came up with a brilliant idea: he has the children write ten verses from the New Testament four times a week, in their best handwriting. Then, the children must read these verses aloud to a parent. It is AMAZING at how well-educated my kids have become from this. They have large portions of the Bible memorized and understand the doctrines. This requirement also fulfills: handwriting skills, oral-reading skills, spelling, grammar, and literate sentence structure. And because it is a discipline and because it is the Word of God, it is helping the children with their character and reasoning skills, too. My kids are all excellent spellers, readers, writers, and they all have scholarly skills in the understanding of the scriptures. I highly recommend this for any homeschooling parent.
Now about textbooks. We use the Abeka books, but have supplemented their education with a wide variety of books, DVDs, computer software, and field trips. Homeschooling is, essentially, our life right now. We have a structure upon which we homeschool– a philosophy of education, if you will. It is heavily based on reading and on history. Everything springs out of that, really. We do not read fiction books anymore. I think my youngest, who is now 11, read his last fiction book last summer. Why am I against fiction books? Well, why read fiction when there are so many interesting and edifying non-fiction books to read? The problem is that public schools and libraries are filled to the ceiling with mind-melting drivel that does nothing to educate the young.
Now before you think I am some kind of dictator— I am!!! Muahahahahahah! OK, ahem, well… my kids HAVE read fiction. Actually, for the first five years of schooling, I allowed fiction books. I’ve usually stuck to the classics (Black Beauty, Flat Stanley, Swiss Family Robinson, Robinson Crusoe, and the Laura Ingalls Wilder series, which are non-fiction books but read as fiction). And if my kids want to read a fiction book today, they may after it is approved. But they really don’t want to anymore. Why read about weird stuff like sorcery or talking mice, when the adventures of Daniel Boone (written by the man himself) and the exploits of missionaries (like John Wesley and Hudson Taylor and Elisabeth Elliot) are so much more compelling (not to mention character-building)? Garbage in, garbage out, I say. To us, homeschooling isn’t a means to an end, it is the journey of life itself. I am being homeschooled as I homeschool. It’s a way of life.
More later…
My eldest daughter graduates in a few weeks. She’s been “homeschooled” her entire life. I guess this officially makes me a veteran homeschooler! Wow, that time went fast. 
Only three more to go…
Some folks ask me about our schooling techniques, etc. Of all the blogging I do, I really don’t blog much about homeschool. I’m not sure why. I guess it just doesn’t interest me enough. Now, if you had caught me 10 years ago, I was CRAZY about homeschooling; I might have blogged about it then. But now, it’s just another segment of our lives, kind of like washing the dishes or working in the gardens. Our homeschool has settled into a routine, and there aren’t too many exciting (read: disastrous) events to detail. Perhaps when something becomes so effortless and organized, you know you’re doing OK.
Well, I’ll just blog about it a little. No pressure; I’ll just chit-chat about our routine, why we do it, what works for us, etc. Hopefully you parents who homeschool will find something useful. I’ll break it up in a number of posts, to retain readability.
My husband and I decided to school our kids ourselves because we both realized the corruption of public schools and were wary of the social engineering of modern education. We’d read a lot of books and also remembered a lot of our own experiences. There was NO WAY we were going to send our children, day after day, to be indoctrinated into secular humanism, the fallacies of evolution, values clarification, and “health” classes (euphemism for Perversion 101). Public school was very stressful for me as a kid; I desperately wanted to learn, but school was so socialized that the consuming issues were your hairstyle, boyfriends, and the latest acne treatment. I wanted something different for my kids.
For the first few years, we sent the kids to a private school in the church. It was a classroom environment, but it lacked the one-on-one education. And the curriculum (ACE) was terrible. Eventually, the school organization was completely revised, and we opted for something called an “umbrella school.” Basically, we pay tuition for an administrator to maintain all records and tests scores, but we parents teach the children and supervise their work at home. I think it’s the best of both worlds, actually. I do no administrative work, but I get to work with the kids. We have assigned books, so I don’t even need to worry about the curriculum. We dumped the lousy ACE and have had good success with Abeka. We have purchased the books from the tuition monies, and we share the books among us, so the financial burden is decreased. (The children do not write in the workbooks; rather, they write their answers in notebooks).
The children are tested every week by the administrator. They must score an 85% average or better, per subject, or else they repeat the book. This helps us maintain a schedule and standards, and encourages accountability among us. I have stricter standards, where I expect my children to get 90% or better on their tests. On the harder subjects, such as Algebra, I am pleased with 85%; but in history, science, and language, there is no excuse for them to score below 90%. We work very hard at home and I will not tolerate slackness. Now, everybody has a bad day or week, so we are very flexible. That’s what makes homeschooling so successful- the parents are well aware of the child’s abilities and therefore expects the child to meet certain goals. There is no “dumbing down” in my home. Some criticize that I am too militant, but tell me, how many moms have Ivy League professors practically knocking on your doors, hoping your kids attend their schools? My kids are well-educated and very self-disciplined, and it shows in their demeanor and communications.
Well, I gave the body of why we homeschool, and of our general philosophy. I’ll talk more about our routine, our organizational habits, and other tidbits in posts to come.
Camie’s Kitties is having a fundraiser to help cats Lilly Lu, Mu Shue, Iris, and their “mommie” who lost their home in a fire. We found out through Daisy the Curly Cat blog. This is how it works:
…we would like for everyone to post their favorite Knock-Knock joke with a picture to go along with it on their blog, and we will donate $0.50 for every blog that participates.
Well, a long time ago, my family suffered a house fire, so I know what it feels like. My parents did not have any home insurance on the house, and we lost everything. Thank God no one was hurt, but it was a scary experience.
So we decided to join in the event and help someone help the family. Our family cat, Fuzzy, wanted to join in on the activity. His human, Sniffy (my son’s Internet nickname), came up with the joke.
Good grief! Is it just me, or does it take horrendously long to upload a video to YouTube these days? I have noticed that it takes 2- 3x longer to upload a measly video! Maybe I should try out Flickr’s new video feature.
Anyway, the kids wanted me to take a video of their kooky cat, Fuzzy. He’s quite the clown. My husband says h acts so strangely because he was taken away from other kittens at such a young age (4 weeks).
My son, inspired by Daisy the Curly Cat, bought some Temptations and catnip. I have to admit, I’d had my doubts about how tempting Temptations really are. I thought it was just that Daisy was a well-trained cat. She is probably a well-trained cat, but WHOA HEY, Fuzzy loves those Temptations! Maybe we can even train him! I doubt he’ll acquiesce to wearing pink bed jackets… but we can always try.
Here’s a little video of Fuzzy testing out catnip for the first time. Weirdness, feline style.
I came across this very interesting self-quiz on History is Elementary.
A few weeks ago as I was visiting many of the teacher blogs I have on one of my blogrolls at History Is Elementary I saw The Privilege Meme over at Confessions From the Couch. I thought it was interesting.
Miss A explains this meme is to help examine privileges/social class. The meme comes from What Privileges Do You Have?, based on an exercise about class and privilege developed by Will Barratt, Meagan Cahill, Angie Carlen, Minnette Huck, Drew Lurker, Stacy Ploskonka at Illinois State University.
If you participate in this blog game, they ask that you PLEASE acknowledge their copyright.
—> To participate, copy and paste…then unbold my responses to make your own.
Bold the items that apply to you:
1. Father went to college
2. Father finished college
3. Mother went to college (one year, secretary school).
4. Mother finished college
5. Have any relative who is an attorney, physician, or professor (English teacher)
6. Were the same or higher class than your high school teachers. (same)
7. Had more than 50 books in your childhood home. (most belonged to me, lol)
8. Had more than 500 books in your childhood home.
9. Were read children’s books by a parent. (up until my mother remarried, when I was 5).
10. Had lessons of any kind before you turned 18
11. Had more than two kinds of lessons before you turned 18.
12. The people in the media who dress and talk like me are portrayed positively.
13. Had a credit card with your name on it before you turned 18.
14. Your parents (or a trust) paid for the majority of your college costs.
15. Your parents (or a trust) paid for all of your college costs
16. Went to a private high school
17. Went to summer camp (flag corp)
18. Had a private tutor before you turned 18
19. Family vacations involved staying at hotels
20. Your clothing was all bought new before you turned 18
21. Your parents bought you a car that was not a hand-me-down from them
22. There was original art in your house when you were a child
23. You and your family lived in a single-family house.
24. Your parent(s) owned their own house or apartment before you left home
25. You had your own room as a child
26. You had a phone in your room before you turned 18
27. Participated in a SAT/ACT prep course (I don’t think they existed in the olden days)
28. Had your own TV in your room in high school
29. Owned a mutual fund or IRA in high school or college
30. Flew anywhere on a commercial airline before you turned 16
31. Went on a cruise with your family
32. Went on more than one cruise with your family
33. Your parents took you to museums and art galleries as you grew up.
34. You were unaware of how much heating bills were for your family.
I scored five. Wow. I guess I wasn’t privileged. However, I am raising my own children differently. I think I can give my kids a score of 14. So that’s better!
How did you do?
We’ve managed to avoid all the stinking, nasty flu bugs and colds this year. Until now. I made the mistake of taking my youngest to the grocery store with me. Young mothers filled the grocery stores, and several of them had stuffed their young children into the carts while they shopped. These kids were hacking up their lungs, crying, and some looked deathly ill. The mothers cared not as they briskly strolled down the aisles. All they said was, “Hold on, we’re almost done.”
We tried our best to avoid them, but these kids seemed intent on hacking into the atmosphere.
Which brings me to today. The kid I brought with me to the grocery store is sick. Hacking. Has a test tomorrow, too. GRRRRRRRR.
