Art in Bloom

Paul just returned from a week-long work trip and I am still alive! This is thanks in no small part to the help of my wonderful friends and especially my mom. She was here almost every day, carting kids to and from various activities and helping me through the crazy dinner hour. She even took pairs of kids to stay overnight to give me (and them) a little break!

When she took the girls overnight, I used the opportunity to do some activities with the boys that I wouldn't dare do with all five kids in tow. Audrey is a bit of a ticking time bomb right now, and Edith is just an unpredictable two-year-old. Without them, I felt safe bringing the boys out to Jimmy John's for dinner followed by a quiet trip to the library to pick out chapter books and get their very own library cards!

On Thursday morning, I was feeling really brave and decided to check out the opening day of Art in Bloom at the Minneapolis Institute of Arts. It's an annual exhibit that I have always wanted to see but have never before had the opportunity. So why not bring three boys, one baby in a stroller, to a museum on a crazy busy opening day of a super popular exhibit?? Nobody's crazy here, nope, not me!

It actually went really well, except for a bit of fussiness from Blaise. Without the girls, we were able to linger in front of each floral arrangement and compare it to the painting it was created to represent. We asked questions and pondered and discussed... I felt like a total boss homeschooling mom! Since those moments are few and far between when I'm out in public with the kids, it was nice to once feel like I was doing something impressive.

 

In the first room, I had a woman approach me to ask if I was homeschooling. She told me that she homeschooled her kids a generation ago and all these years later was so thankful for that time with her kids. She was so encouraging and inspiring to me! Then throughout the museum we constantly had smiles and way-to-go's sent in our direction.

Of course we still have many (many, many, many) crazy days and I often find myself wanting to pull my hair out, but it was a lovely morning of encouragement and beauty to give me a boost as we close out this school year!

 

It's Official

"Merciful and gracious is the Lord, slow to anger, abounding in mercy."
 -Psalm 103:8, our quote of the year

This is the year we've all been waiting for... the year where I fill out my official Letter of Intent to Homeschool in the state of Minnesota! Up until now, we have had no requirements, no paperwork, no nothing. For all our school district knew, Max didn't exist. But now he's registered at Merciful Heart of Jesus Academy, i.e. "home". The others are still unofficial, but this was a big step for me! I've made a real commitment, signed a piece of paper and turned it in. We are a homeschooling family for real.

Following Pope Francis' lead, we have chosen the theme of mercy, with St. Faustina as our Saint of the Year. As always, the kids were greeted with crowns bearing their grade level and were forced to pose for pictures. This year, although they weren't happy about it, you sure can't tell by looking at them! We then had pancakes with whipped cream and raspberries from our neighbor's garden, prayed a Chaplet of Divine Mercy made out of chocolate chips, decorated our quote poster for the year, and painted a simplified Divine Mercy image. If any of you remember my experience at the start of last year, you'll be glad to hear that this year has kicked off on the exact opposite foot. I am pumped to start exploring and learning with my kids, I have a clearer understanding of my goals, and it sure doesn't hurt that we actually have space to create an inspiring and organized environment.

Our day of traditions continued when we went out for pizza with Grandma at our favorite joint, Tommy Chicago's. The kids always receive a picture book as a first day of school gift, and after dinner Grandma brought them to the fountain outside the restaurant to read all of their books to them. They loved it! But it started getting a bit chilly so Paul and I grabbed hot chocolates for them from the Caribou Coffee nearby. Then they really loved it!

I can't say enough how excited I am for this year. Last year was a tough one, with lots of burnout, lots of long and difficult stretches, but we powered through and stayed strong. I'm so glad we did! This year is already looking to be joy-filled, jam-packed with learning and peace and love!

Max, Grade 2

This year Max wants to learn: Cursive, Ancient History, how to paint like Leonardo DaVinci
His goals are: To read a chapter book, to craft a diamond sword in Minecraft
Important moments: Beginning First Reconciliation and First Communion prep! WOW!
First Day of School book: The Legend of the Indian Paintbrush, by Tomie DePaola

Lucian, Kindergarten

This year, Lucian wants to learn: Math, anything involving patterns and numbers, Science (especially experiments), cooking
His goals are: To learn how to pump on a swing, to beat Daddy in Chess
Important moments: Being in a different class from Max at co-op and doing great!
First Day of School book: The Giving Tree, by Shel Silverstein

Audrey, Preschool

This year, Audrey wants to learn: Painting, coloring, reading, everything her brothers are doing.
Her goals are: To teach her baby sister to walk, to jump higher than Daddy
Important moments: Starting Good Shepherd (no more nursery for this girl!)
First Day of School book: Are You My Mother? by P.D. Eastman

 

 

 

Looks Like Learning

Though I frequently use the term "homeschooling" to describe our family's school choice, a more accurate term would probably be "home education" because rarely does our home resemble anything close to a "school" setting. There are no desks, few worksheets, plenty of chaos. In fact, I know for certain I would fail as a teacher in a traditional setting; my organizational skills are nowhere close to what they would need to be to lead a classroom of twenty-five kids! It's a high calling, that one.

So it looks nothing like a classroom, but our home is full to the brim with learning! We have about an hour of dedicated school time each day, sometimes less if the little ones are especially needy, but we fill our time and space with learning opportunities. I thought I'd give you all a sneak peak, via Iphone snapshots, at what learning has looked like in our home so far this year.

Right now I am using the program Five in a Row, in which we read a picture book each day for five days and do different activities related to that book. I have even created my own "Five in a Row" units out of books that happened to interest the kids. If a book is particularly rich we might read it for eight days! If it falls a little flat, we finish it in two or three. One of our favorites was The Story of Ferdinand, during which we experimented with cork, acted out a bullfight, ate olives and other Spanish food, and watched the Disney cartoon version of the story.

Ferdinand the Bull liked to sit just quietly under the cork tree

Does Ferdinand's cork raft hold him up?

Then my mom took the boys to see the play Zen Ties, based on the book of the same name by John J. Muth. We decided to create our own Five in a Row using that book because the kids loved the story! We made our own chicken noodle soup, made panda faces out of paper plates, had our own two-person spelling bee, learned some simple Chinese characters, and (probably most important) talked about how to treat people who are difficult to get along with.

 

 

Another one of our favorite resources this year has been the Story of the World by Susan Wise Bauer. We are working our way through ancient history, and Max is enthralled! The book takes us on a whirlwind tour through thousands of years of history, and the accompanying activity book is chock full of extensions. There are four books in the series, and we plan to return to Volume 1 in four years and dive much deeper into the history. But for now, the boys are enjoying meeting all kinds of exciting people from all different times and places. 

King Max wearing the double crown of Ancient Egypt

Regular visits to the library are an indispensable part of our education. I keep my ear out for topics that the kids want to learn more about and search out books on those topics. Plus we keep a constant stream of new picture books coming in and (often thankfully) going back again. We also use the library as a resource for new CDs and audiobooks. I honestly don't know how I could homeschool without a library card! We have a reading curriculum that I'm using intermittently with Max as his interest in reading increases, plus we are enjoying the Bob Books phonics readers- perfect for my results-oriented, perfectionist son who no longer glances at a book and instantly says, "I can't read it." I have a feeling we will soon have a reader in the house!

For math and science I am not using any formal curriculum, but since I have naturally curious children, the opportunities to learn abound! We did lots of backyard exploring in the fall, but now that we've moved indoors for the colder months, the Legos and chess board are suddenly getting tons of use. I am not joking when I say that I have to pull them away from hours of Lego play for meal times... many days they would forget to eat were it left up to them.

The longer I'm at it, the more I'm convinced that the greatest gift I can give my kids in their education is the time and space to explore. There are many days that I doubt myself and wonder if I should spend more time on worksheets and memorization, then I see them knee-deep in leaves and Legos and I know that they are becoming life-long learners.

I hope you've enjoyed this little peak within our walls. Feel free to drop by and see the chaos in action; the pictures only show a carefully selected piece at a time. In reality we are not always smiling, but we are always learning!

Blind taste-tests: learning about the senses!

Backyard exploration... I had no idea there were so many bugs out there

Playing with math manipulatives: sorting, counting, and building a farm

Volcano!

Our morning routine: breakfast and a game of chess before anyone else wakes up

Have I told you I'm reeeeally bad at chess?

Making up our own math games involving dominoes and playing cards

Teaching My Fish

"Be who God meant you to be and you will set the world on fire" -St. Catherine of Siena

You probably wouldn't guess it from looking at them, but these pictures document my worst day yet of our homeschooling journey. In fact, while it got nominally better after that day, I came dangerously close to throwing in the schooling towel after the first two weeks. It's probably a good thing I wasn't blogging then because I would have written something halfhearted, trying to sound positive about the whole thing. A little ways out (and a few normal to awesome weeks under my belt) I have a bit more perspective on what went wrong, what I could have done, and what I just had to live with. 

Let me start at the beginning. I get super excited for the start of each school year. I make crowns for the kids, I wrap up their school supplies, together we choose a saint and a quote for our year. This year it is St. Joseph of Cupertino, chosen by Max for his gift of levitation during prayer. At first I was a little unsure of this saint as our school saint... he wasn't known for his brains; in fact, he failed at a lot of things he tried to do. What kind of role model was that for our school year? And then it hit me: he's perfect. He was an incredibly holy man who loved God with his whole heart. Isn't that what I want for my kids? One of the great things about homeschooling is that my children don't have to strive to meet academic standards before they are ready so I am free to focus on what really matters: faith, values, and character development. So Joseph of Cupertino was added to our litany of saints and I began praying for his intercession in our schooling.

Then I started hearing friends talk about reading levels and math curriculum. I saw teachers on Facebook posting about their classes, and I began to panic. Max isn't reading yet! He doesn't know all of his basic math facts! He's behind! I pulled together the different parts of my curriculum with the goals of reading and math at the top of my list, edging out inspiration and love of learning.  It had been easy to follow the trails of Max's interests when he was in preschool and kindergarten; no one expects a kindergartner to be a fluent reader, and a four year old who is obsessed with the Hobbit sounds really impressive! But suddenly there were expectations, and frankly I was terrified that my son would be labeled "behind" his peers when I know how brilliant he is. As Albert Einstein so perfectly stated it, "Everybody is a genius. But if you judge a fish by its ability to climb a tree, it will live its whole life believing that it is stupid." I love that homeschooling allows my children to learn at their own pace, without being labeled or put into a box. 

But for some reason (pride, I'm guessing) I was still trying to put my kids in a box. The first day of school started and I had the kids sit down and practice writing the letter 'a'. Max balked. Lucian ran away. Audrey wanted a snack. And Edith cried. I spent the rest of the day fuming, mad at myself for failing on my first day, mad at the kids for not doing what they were told. I'm sure Max was dumbfounded. School for him had always been the highlight of his day. "School" meant the time when we learn about things that are interesting, and while Max is interested in a lot of things, writing the letter 'a' is not currently one of those things. 

After a few days of powering through my original plan for the week, I threw in the towel and started from scratch. I loved homeschooling last year, why had I psyched myself out enough to almost ruin it for everyone? With such a rough start it took awhile to get back into our groove, but I'm happy to say that we're on track once again. I am listening to my children, working with their interests, and having a grand old time. We have kept some of my original curriculum pieces in a drastically modified form, and I have discovered the wonder that is Pinterest to find better ways to inspire my kids to learn those things that I do believe are essential.

And I tell you what, Max is on the road to reading. He still has a long way to go but we are making steps at his pace, and he never needs to think that going slow is a negative. Even more important to me, though, is that he is once again telling anyone who asks that school is his favorite time of day.

Time for School!

Max, Kindergarten (5 years old)

Lucian, Preschool (3 years old)

A month into the school year, and I'm finally getting around to posting about our experience so far! It was a crazy, exciting September, but things have finally settled down around here. Our school year started as soon as we got back from Ely, and we kicked it off with a pizza party and ice cream with Grandma and Grandpa Radecki and Uncle Ben. For the second year, the kids each received a book as a start-of-school gift... check out what we chose for Max (I'm a sucker for anything by Don and Audrey Wood), Lucian (Currently, his life's goal is to be a garbage man) and Audrey (Did I say I love Don and Audrey Wood?)

The morning after our pizza party, the kids woke to crowns and wrapped-up school supplies. It's amazing how exciting a package of washable markers is if it's wrapped in colorful paper! Then I unveiled our motto and patron saint for the year. After lots of thought and prayer, I decided on this for our motto:

"I want to do everything, even the smallest things, for the greater glory of God."

It is a quote by our patron saint of the year, Dominic Savio. He was a student of St. John Bosco, and he was well known for being compassionate, charitable, kind and virtuous even as a young schoolboy. What better example for our family as we begin our journey into the world of schooling? Max took a great interest in him right away, and I look forward to learning more about him as the year goes on.

So far, I love our school time together! It seems that our best days are the ones where we spend the entire morning at the kitchen table. Lucian comes and goes, Audrey is constantly underfoot unless she's napping, and Max is soaking up information like a sponge. I love teaching my children, but most of all I love learning with them!