Journey North Mystery Class - Approaching Midpoint - NOT TOO LATE TO JOIN IN

We are almost approaching the midpoint of the Journey North Mystery Class: A study of sunlight and the seasons, but it is NOT too late to join in!
Next week we will begin to receive the longitude clues, so we had to update our display area to include some useful tools. Can't wait to see how well we do locating the mystery classes!

Home Education: Between the Extremes

This video is FABULOUS!
I can't tell you how many conversations I have had to walk away from - IRL and online - when the topics of labels gets brought up. Whether it is educational labels, spiritual labels, nutritional labels - WHATEVER. Why do people have to get so angry when someone makes a choose that is varied from theirs? Why do some people feel compelled to impress their beliefs on others as the one and only path? Why do LABELS have the power to tear apart friendships?

Crystal Outcomes

For some reason no crystals have formed in the sugar jar. There looks like there is some collection on the bottom, but no formation. Salt one is growing though.

Piquing Interest in Learning

In an attempt to engage the teens in the house today in a project that I thought they could really get into, I picked a topic that I knew they both would like and added a bit of constructive as well as destructive properties to it.

They began on Brain Pop! watching a video on crystals and completing the quiz together ~ they had one answer that they did not agree on and they both turned out to be incorrect! Then we went to the experiments section and decided to try it out. For a competitive twist I gave KM sugar and DN salt, so they can see whose crystal forms first and what property differences they might have. I also choose to veer of course a bit from the original instructions -- I had them use nearly boiling water, so that it would dissolve to a solution better and they would not need to "shake" every so often. There are plenty of variations of growing crystals with sugar and salt all over the web, just be sure to check the sites before you send your kids there!







Once the jars were set aside to begin growing, I took out some geodes to bash! They had a good deal of success and got out some of those pent up teenage frustrations!

With DN here for the week and learning more about how our household works on a regular basis, this was the perfect opportunity for him to engage in an educational activity where he was interested in the subject and did not feel intimidated by the process or institutional feel of learning. He asked some really great questions and when I wasn't sure on an answer he saw that we could find the answer together. Although he has difficulty admitting it, I could tell that he was enjoying himself and learning at the same time.

Sometimes in order to engage the learner, all you have to do is take advantage of an aforementioned interest area. Paying attention to the actions of a child can pay off in so many ways. Even a child who is extremely resistant to any form of "schooling", "learning" or other educational jargon will give you hints about what might interest them. You may notice that when they are walking to the car and they tend to kick the rock ever so slowly, they always seem to be staring at the ground, you find rocks in the washer and in piles in next to the bed. This is a HUGE indication that for some reason his child is interested in rocks, geology and earth science. Now your challenge will be to present it to the child in a way that will really catch their attention.

Don't push too hard and when the child is done - THEY ARE DONE! Sometimes that means that they will stay on a topic for months and sometimes that means that they are only there for a few days or even hours. Pushing them to continue a study that they are no longer interested in or that they have learned enough about is not going to do anything, but make them more resistant the next time you try a learning sneak attack.

Good Luck and PLEASE feel free to post any helpful tips or ideas for encouraging the resistant learner!

CurrClick - Presidents' Day FREEBIES

CurrClick - Presidents' Day Freebies - This is a direct link to the 5 Free American History Packets they are offering during their President's Day Sale!

Purple Hair and Aliens.....

You NEVER know what is going to show up around here!

What outcome are you looking for?

I have been speaking to a lot of people recently about the direction that their children's educational paths have been taking. To me, this is an incredibly individualized endeavor that needs to be worked and tweaked to fit each family child. It should be something that is allowed to flow like a river and the child should have the freedom to meander through the twists and turns of life.

One thing that is often forgotten about when one begins down this uncharted path is to really think about what outcome they desire at the end of the journey. This might be something that is really overwhelming for a parent of a four year old to think about - where do I want my child to be in 14 years? - but it really is necessary. I don't mean that you need to pick your child's career or the type of haircut they are going to have. I mean think about the type of person you would like them to be and what attributes you feel are really important for them to be "successful" adults.

I, for one, wish more than anything that I had made the decision to homeschool my daughter when she was younger, however I was at least lucky enough to come to this conclusion before irrevocable damage was done. At 10 my daughter was taken out of 5th grade mid-year and we began our journey. I still had a good amount of time to fix many of the problems that the public school had caused. It has been very interesting since then, we have been on this journey and have taken paths that we never imagined were there.

We started out very much in a "school at home" state, but have evolved over the last 3 years and have moved farther and farther away from the institutionalized mind set. We have moved more towards a system of learning that fits our family. We are fairly happy people around here, but lately we have been evolving again and taking a look at what else we need to change in order to let in more light, love and happiness into our days.

We are taking a few weeks off -from EVERYTHING- in order to really work on ourselves. We will be doing some self-reflection, meditation, yoga and reconnecting with each other. Our lives have gotten so busy and hectic over the last few months and I really feel like we may have wandered a bit farther off our path than I am comfortable with. We are going to focus on what values are truly important to us and what things CJ and I feel are extremely important to convey to our children.

As we take this time to figure out what we want for our future, let us know what types of hopes, wishes and dreams you have for your families!

Getting ready for Valentine's Day

 The Littles came over on Friday and we did a simplified version of these great Heart Suncatchers for Valentine's Day!

You Tube Pick of the Week - KM

All this snow makes it much easier....

to make snowball bunkers!

How much is enough?

I think when you start to loose sight of your yard...it might be enough for a while, but of course we are suppose to be getting another round coming in this weekend! We are trying to still LOVE the snow!!! We just really need somewhere to put it!

Sometimes you need to step away!

The other morning KM was busy getting some work done before a friend was coming over to go sledding. She had gone through most of it, but when she got to her Algebra she seemed to hit a wall. Math is generally one of her favorite subjects and she usually breezes right through it, but for some reason she just couldn't focus. She was making silly mistakes and really just needed to step away. So she finished up some vocabulary, had lunch and waited for her friend to arrive. After her visit, she went back to her Algebra book and finished it up in no time, with very little error. 

When you see your child is having trouble with something that normally comes easy to them, you need to think about the situation and the results you are trying to reach. If your child is not focused and in a learning mood, then really you are just wasting time. Sometimes you just need a break. Let the student walk away, take a break and return to later on

Journey North Mystery Class: A study of sunlight and the seasons

Starts today, but it is not too late to get in on the learning!!!

Journey North Mystery Class: A study of sunlight and the seasons

So I have gotten a few emails and many comments on the yahoo group lists about this site being difficult to understand. We have done it a few times now and I have never had a problem with it, but I figured I would post the description that I sent along to one of our local lists -

Ok here is the premise of the program - 

There are 10 mystery class locations that over the next few months you are trying to locate on the globe based on their photoperiods. 

So every Monday the student writes down their sunrise and sunset time and calculate the photoperiod for your location, to obtain a base point. 

You then go onto the site on Friday and get the sunrise and sunset times for the 10 mystery class locations. You enter them into your log, calculate their photoperiod, and then plot them onto a line graph. 

In March they start giving out additional clues that help you to locate the cities. 

The teacher guides - Packet 1 - http://www.learner.org/jnorth/tm/mclass/PracticePacket1_Latitude.pdf

Packet 2 - http://www.learner.org/jnorth/tm/mclass/PracticePacket2_Longitude.pdf

explain the background info on the photoperiods, longitudinal and latitudinal clues, the earth's pattern of rotations and more. 

Hope that makes it a bit more clear.

Regulation in Home Education

I had to share this incredible installment of the Unplugged Mom Radio show on Regulation in Home Education. CLICK HERE FOR THE 1/28 BROADCAST.

Here is an excerpt from my email that she speaks of during the show - 

I have been meaning to contact you about something I heard on one of the archive shows and I keep forgetting to do it, but after hearing about your speaker for next week, I wanted to be sure to get a question in ahead of time as I am not sure I can be up that early...we are just not morning people in the winter. 

So anyway, I was listening to the archives and I heard Desiree's comment about Massachusetts laws being so strict. As a board member of our state homeschooling organization I hear from people all the time who are concerned because they are moving here or are thinking about homeschooling here. We are constantly listed as a "very difficult state to homeschool in", so I am curious why people feel that our state is such a difficult one. I have heard from some that it is just the fact that we are an "approval" state, but the thing that a lot of people don't seem to realize is that though this is true, there are no "laws" or "homeschooling regulations" here. The guidelines that are followed are based on case laws and therefore are up for interpretation. I also think it has a lot to do with people's intimidation of authority figures and a lack of willingness to bump the system, even if only by standing up for their own rights. So my question for the constitutional expert would be "From a constitutional standpoint, why would Massachusetts be considered a strict homeschooling state?"

I was very impressed with this show and the connections that were made for me are profound! 

Busy, Busy, Busy, but not too much to report!

Things have been going very smoothly around here lately. KM has been keeping up with her lessons and staying very busy with ice skating, theater, sketching and spending time with her friends. We are enjoying the flow of things lately and the occasional snowstorm to keep us in the house for the day is a wonderful winter bonus!

We have been starting our days off with household responsibilities, yoga and meditation. Then after lunch we work on lessons and this leaves the late afternoon and evenings free for her to spend however she likes. It seems to have worked out that Tuesday and Thursdays are VERY light lesson days, to accommodate for ice skating - and spending the rest of the afternoon with one of her very best friends - and theater. When CJ is home he has been taking her skating at a more local place on Wednesday afternoons. This leaves a lot of the main lesson times to Monday and Friday which seems to be giving a natural flow to our week.

She has chosen to do her research report for this session on owls - BIG SURPRISE to those who have seen her lately! We have decided that she will follow the outline form that the writing mentor used with her in the fall. This method focuses on researching, getting the info down, and then editing and cleaning up the content. As I have written what feels like hundreds of posts on our thoughts about writing and the writing process, I will not go into length about it again. I will say though that I have noticed a huge improvement in her open responses now that she has no writing "guidelines" and just has to present the information clearly.

Other than that, there is not much else to report as it is pretty much status quo around here - Just enjoying our family, home and learning - all together! Hope you can find some time to do the same!