Our Homeschool Banquet

Each spring for the last two years a homeschool friend organizes a banquet for our group of homeschool kids and families.  It's a wonderful way to mark each year of learning.

Our group and families and friends gather in a wonderful donated space and share dinner.

Each kid/family displays some of their projects or studies over the past year.  AH had a couple of displays.  Here he is explaining his High Altitude balloon display to his cousin and uncle while Dad looks on.

AH stands before his big project: the results of his study of the spread of communism

AH poses with his Amma and Afi (the Icelandic words for Grandma and Grandpa).  The room was filled with many sets of grandparents, uncles, aunts, cousins and good friends who came to celebrate the homeschooler in their lives.

It's so important that everyone dresses up!

It is such a wonderful way to end a year and to see what our friends have been up to!

A Controlled Burn

AH taking a video of the burn

I got a call during AH's swim lesson yesterday.  A family friend wanted us to know that his company was going to be doing a controlled burn in our area and we were welcome to come watch.  Well, who can pass up a fire? We took a lunch and some books along with us to the burn site.  When we got there our friend, Eric, came over to explain exactly what they were planning to do and why.  Then we sat back and watched the crews go to work.

Burning the dead plant material clears the way for new growth while adding nutrients to the soil.

There are 2 crews: each crew consists of one person starting the fire with a torch and another with water gun.  The crews work opposite one another.

The trees were sprayed down with water to protect them.

Our friend Eric.

It was amazing how fast the ground turned black!

Pasta Day

It seems that without meaning to, I've been writing along a theme lately. It's an over-used proverb, but for me it holds true: It takes a village to raise a child. This phrase has become a joke of sorts but when you think about it, it is very wise.
I, alone, could not give my kids the varied experiences they have been given. My daughter and, soon, my older son have had the experience of helping others in a far away place. Our church and many committed adults have allowed my kids learn about another culture and share our many blessings with people who don't have as much. Friends and their families bring different viewpoints and perspective to many issues. Musicians share their music with my family when we attend a concert. Actors tell stories to my children in a way I never could. My daughter shared her love of maps with AH when she invited him to her college cartography lab and taught him to make a map on the computers there.
I am always happy when someone volunteers to share a skill or experience with us. One good friend, Cathy, did that recently when she invited AH and me to her home to make homemade pasta and Alfredo sauce. AH is a pasta fiend, and was very excited to try this.

Cathy was great! She had AH working right alongside her. He mixed ...

and kneaded...and rolled. He shredded and measured. AH had a blast! He also had the satisfaction of sitting down at a table of people knowing he had helped to feed them. The pasta was delicious, but the sharing of a new experience was priceless and will not be soon forgotten. I am blessed that my "village" is so willing and eager to help!

Thank Goodness for Rachel

I'm often asked how I can teach my child every subject. The questions are asked as if we learn in a vacuum. I suppose most people think that homeschoolers must be all alone at home all the time. AH and I strive to be out in the community: both the general and the local homeschooling community. The homeschoolers I know read blogs, Internet sites, books and magazines for inspiration and help. They love to share what they learn. Most of my inspiration and ideas come from others who are homeschooling themselves. The most helpful suggestion I've ever received came from Rachel, a homeschool mom in St. Paul who I found myself working with during the Minnesota State Fair. What wise ideas did she impart? She simply recommended a book, Right-Brained Children in a Left-Brained World: Unlocking the Potential of your ADD child, by Jeffery Freed and Laurie Parsons. AH doesn't suffer from ADD (we've had him tested) but he is extremely right-brained. Rachel also has a right-brained learner, so I immediately requested the book from our library. I read the book with interest, not thinking it was going to change our homeschooling lives, and was intrigued with the author's ideas. It was the chapter on spelling that changed everything for us. AH has had an extremely hard time with spelling. His is atrocious! We've tried all sorts of systems and books and methods to no avail. Here was one chapter of a book that unlocked the mystery of spelling. I remember thinking to myself, "Could it really be this simple?" As the author suggested, I chose a word that had multiple syllables and that he wouldn't know how to spell: Cartography. I spelled it out on a sheet of paper like so:

Cartography

I called AD in from another room and asked him to study the word and make a mental image of it in his mind. I gave him 20 seconds. Then I covered the word and asked him to spell it. Without much hesitation, he spelled it correctly! This is a child who had difficulty spelling the word from! The author then tells you to ask the child to spell it backwards. I thought there was no way AH would be able to do that, but I tried anyway. With that mental image in his mind, AH spelled it backwards correctly! I cried that day and almost everyday that we work on spelling. It's fun to see the pride on his face when he remembers how to spell a word. And, yes, he can still spell cartography correctly!

Thank goodness for Rachel! Sometimes inspiration is sitting right next to you.

Post Cards!

Who doesn't love to get mail? We rarely get "real" mail. By real, I mean letters, personal notes and post cards. (Bills don't count...I get plenty of those!!) AH has discovered the pleasure of receiving mail. Last week I put out a plea to my facebook friends to send AH a post card from their home state or a state they were visiting and he would research each state as he got them. 3 days later we had our first post card from Barry in South Dakota!

Then the cards really started pouring in!

That's when I noticed that AH really loved this project. I made up two notebooking pages where AH could tape a post card and list some interesting facts about that state. We printed out state flags, license plates and state quarters on sticker paper and AH cuts them out and adds them to his notebooking pages. I really got a lot of ideas from Jimmie's 50 States Notebooking lens at Squidoo. AH loves the stickers. In addition to those items, AH researches each state to find the year of statehood, state motto, capital city, other cities, and any notable rivers and/or mountains and records it on the notebooking pages.

He has gotten up every morning since we've gotten these postcards to work on this project before anything else. He hasn't done this since our baseball project! It's a miracle!

Below AH looks up the state motto of South Dakota which is : Under God, the people rule

South Dakota notebook page 1:

The plan is to gather all the sheets into a 3 ring binder and, hopefully, learn about each state as they come in. We have a pile to go through already, but it won't take him long to get through it if his enthusiasm holds. I have a feeling that as long as those post cards keep coming that won't be an issue!

Thanks to my dear friends for all your help. Your effort is making learning fun for this 11 year old!

A Halloween Dilemma

It had all the makings of a disaster.

I have an 11 year old son who likes to trick or treat. I also have an 18 year old high school senior who plays football. A section semifinal game was scheduled for 7pm, October 31st.

Like I said. The makings of a disaster.

First off, who schedules a game on Halloween for goodness sake! And then, who schedules it for 7 pm on Halloween night?

Apparently the Minnesota High School League does. And as a parent, how was I to handle this? I really didn't want to miss the game (it is his last year, after all). I also wanted my 11 year old to be able to trick or treat and have fun.

Thank goodness for friends! We've known this family for years. It's not easy to find a family who have almost the same spread of ages that we do! It's come in handy since the older boys have played baseball and football together since 6th grade. They were in the same boat. They live very near the high school, and invited AH to trick or treat in their neighborhood so if there was trouble, we could be there quickly. We outfitted the younger boys with cell phones, and sent them off trick or treating with instructions to go home right after they were done.

They two boys had a blast alone! They had quite a load of candy after canvassing the neighborhood and they got to play video games after they were done. I called at half-time asking if they wanted me to pick them up so they could watch the rest of the game. "No Thanks, Mom! We're having fun!"

I was having fun watching my oldest son catch 5 passes for 128 yards and one touchdown! AD was definitely having a great time out on that field and I was there to see it all. The team went on to win and are scheduled to play next weekend in the section final.

All the makings of a disaster. But a great night was had by all!

That's my oldest son, AD, in red running in for a touchdown