Back to School....

Locations for a degree in Meteorology (ignore the Chicken Soup book!)

Samuel has been researching colleges and universities that offer studies in Meteorology. He also informed me that he needs to be really good in Math and Science in order to do well in this career. He is so excited to be 11 years old and ready to start middle school!

Surprisingly he has taken ownership of 6th grade scheduling. In the back of my mind I was already planning a little more structure and for the past few weeks he has been looking through his Math 6 book and figuring out how many weeks he needs to finish it before his birthday next May. Last week he announced that he would like 6th grade to begin on August 5. He wants to get a feel for it before we go on vacation to Costa Rica!

Samuel has never ever been this excited about starting school....I think it has a lot to do with his friends - mostly home-schooled, and his age.

Unschooling was a very good season for us. I learned a lot about parenting, control and respect. Samuel loved the freedom and was able to step away a little and test a few boundaries. Now begins the season of morning structure and discipline (afternoons and weekends are still free!)

Astronomy

Samuel getting Neptune ready for his display...the sun is  to the right.

 First it was maps, then geography, then weather, then hurricanes and now...astronomy.  I don't really know when it happened or how it happens, but it does.  Samuel's interest in a subject grows and grows - and all the conversations at home revolve around this particular subject.  Right now it's astronomy!

Samuel made a schedule to organize his project for the Homeschool Academic Fair.

 For the last month he has been excited about presenting a project at the Homeschool Academic Fair in Cleburne (Texas) which he has named "Weather in the Solar System".

After planets and moons are painted they are left to dry and then labeled in a Ziploc bag.

You might be wondering what I had to do to make him want to do all this...and my answer is time.  Unschooling allows him the time he needs to work on what he is interested in.  If I stay out of the way he has time and space to think on his own.  That is a scary thought! Allowing kids to think on their own...

A few of the book/videos Samuel has chosen to use for his lesson plan - plus  space school  from  www.discovery.com

He's turning out to be such a teacher! He has created an astronomy lesson plan for 3 or 4 months of reading and videos that he presents to me once a week. Since we are of the  "young earth creationist" view it is interesting to hear him comment on the books and videos that have an evolutionary point of view. I would like him to understand both - not for discussion or debate - but for him to formulate his own belief (ouch!) He has also created a book where he summarizes with pictures and facts what we learned during the lesson.


By the way... He still works on math, bible ,world history, grammar, writing, reading, fine arts, piano and daily chores. Just not every day!

A Book Club for 5th Graders

Getting together to discuss a book is not always easy.  Should you discuss each chapter? Should you discuss each character? How many different ways can you ask "What was your favorite part of the book"?

And then there is the fact that this book club is for 10 and 11 year olds and they will tell you exactly what they think should be happening when they get together!

I confess I do not have any experience with book clubs and preteens but at the same time I did not want to require them to do book reports, vocabularies, grammar review, etc. I really just wanted them to enjoy good books and share.

One book was assigned per month and then we met on a Friday morning for a 90 minute activity and yummy snacks. Here is a list of the books that they've read so far and the latest one at the very end.

Eating chocolate candy while discussing the book was a real treat!

The video at the top of this post is a commercial they made for this book...

Each participant brought an item that reminded them of something in this book.

Big words, characters with "weird" names - pure fantasy!

Solving mysteries is no joke - they had to unravel one together and they almost ran out of time!

This book will be discussed in May.  I hope they enjoy it!

Reading Good Books

Finding good books for Samuel to read has been easy.  Instead of continually browsing the local bookstore I have been faithful to the lists provided by Drawn into the Heart of Reading and even though we do not follow the curriculum, these are mainly the books we choose from or that lead us to similar choices.

Here is a little sample of the books Samuel has been reading over the past few weeks.

When her grandfather is injured, 10-year-old Ellen Toliver replaces him on a top-secret patriotic mission. Disguised as a boy, she manages to smuggle a message to General George Washington. This is an unusually fine historical novel.

The year is 1597 and, more than anything else in the world, Sir Robert Wakefield wants a companion. Life can be awfully lonely for an orphan boy living with three strict and disagreeable aunts. When a lost puppy turns up one day, Robin is determined to keep him. And when his equally determined Aunt Isabella refuses, Robin runs away from home, puppy in hand. Little does Robin know, as he makes his way to London, the wonderful winter in store for him there.

Did you know that the man behind Hershey's chocolate used to work in an ice cream parlor? Or that he had to try over and over again to get his now-famous chocolate to taste as delicious as it does today? Milton Hershey's life wasn't always a bowl of chocolate Kisses. When he was in fourth grade, he even had to drop out of school and work to help his poor family make ends meet. Read all about how the man we know as the famous young chocolatier finally struck it rich -- in money, love, and chocolate!

These are the choices Samuel has made for "reading time" however during what he calls "free time" you can find him reading The Weather Channel, NOAA, National Hurricane Center and Wikipedia.

What do Jose and I read?
Jose comes home from work and builds beds and tables, refinishes concrete floors, paints walls, cycles, mows the lawn, takes care of the pool and then sits down to read the Wii. 
On the other hand, I read a little too much. Several books at the same time. Blogs, e-books, piano teaching books, Bible commentaries, self-help, parenting, and the list goes on. All these genres in a single day. Crazy!

Click the button below to see what other unschooling families are reading!

Pen Pals

Grammar is such a tedious task.

We love conversations, we love to read, we love to immerse ourselves in a good story whether it is in a book or on TV.

I already know that my sister "the writer" will criticize whatever it is I write - just like I criticize her music abilities...but we can still communicate and understand each other - and tell a few good stories.  She is so much better than I am when writing it down. I would choose the musical score for her words.

Samuel turns into a grump when we open up the grammar books. Sentence, nouns, verbs, adjectives. We study them one day and the next we have to start all over, in a grumpy mood. Needless to say, the grammar books now stay on the bookshelf.

Then one day he said "Mommy, remember you told me about pen pals?" I want to do it! Where can I find one?

Yahoo! to the rescue! I found a group of homeschool parents who share their child's information (age, gender) and then parents communicate with each other via email and exchange addresses.  The children then proceed to write each other via SNAIL MAIL.

This has been fantastic for Samuel.  A few weeks ago when he started writing letters he would dictate, I would write then he would copy it on the final page, in order to get sentences, punctuation and spelling right. Then addressing the envelope was totally new to him, but after one sample it was easy.  Now a month or two later he has 3 pen pals and writes his letters on his own.  He writes a draft, I edit, he does the rest.  This week I only made 2 corrections on one of the letters.

So I really think grammar can wait. He will probably need it to write papers in college.  I learned English grammar in graduate school - because all of my schooling had previously been in Spanish. I did have to edit a lot on my thesis - but so does everyone else taking that step!

We need experiences more than we need grammar!