Isn't homeschooling grand?

Today Gabby has been a blob in a chair -- all day. Almost all day, I managed to pry her up for a trip to the Y. I got my times wrong, though. Lap swim had ended by the time we showed up. Woops.

So a blob in a chair all day with the exception of a failed attempt at exercise. And a brief lunch of macaroni and cheese -- but even at the dinner table she was sort of blob-ish.

So, I guess the chairs have changed but the blob has remained the same.

She CAN'T do her work. She's said it many times, in a quiet voice, in a loud voice, in a moaning voice. She's tried many voices.

I have told Gabby that I am happy to help her if she has a specific question about a specific assignment, and she loses the attitude.

I got a clear response,

"Then I am never going to do any of my work again at all!"

You can guess what voice she used there.

Art Show

On Friday Gabby brought her bird journal to the Quakertown library for a homeschool art show. It was a simple gathering but cute. We had finger foods and plastic champagne glasses with sparkling grape juice. We walked around and looked at the other children's art. It was especially fun when the little kids would see us admiring and run over to tell us all about their pictures. Gabby's much to shy for that, although she would have done it if it was required. Heaven forbid she ever not do exactly what is expected of her!

We got some good ideas for future projects - Jackson Pollock style painting on canvas, newspaper collages, and pottery.

It got a bit dull for the boys - I had William and Fielding with me. To be honest, I was bored too after awhile. We spent some time just playing in the children's area of the library. Then we went home.

Gabby's journal was a beautiful addition to the show. I'm so proud of all the work she did on it. I hope she's found a new hobby for herself.
Here are the pictures from the day.

Novice birders

Our obsession with Big Red and Ezra inspired us to use our election day-off from school for a little birding. This was our first attempt and I can't say it was a failure because we all came home happy but it was not an amazing success in terms of quantity of birds spotted and certainly not in terms of birds actually identified. We did see birds and named a few and perhaps most important of all, played at a playground for awhile.

I took the kids to Peace Valley Park- a lovely spot for birding, exercising, and enjoying nature, about 20 minutes from our home. We brought our binoculars and Peterson's field guide and warm jackets since it was pretty chilly outside. The field guide was donated to our homeschool by my parents since they had an extra. The binoculars also came from my parents, but not so recently. They bought them when I was in 3rd grade. My teacher, Mrs. Eleanor Franey, encouraged all the parents to buy the students binoculars when we were doing a bird unit. I don't think that unit was part of any curriculum the district had put together. Mrs. Franey was just an incredible teacher who taught beyond the basic and opened up the world for her students. Maybe it is lame to be using a 25 year old pair of binoculars, but I think it is pretty cool that my kids are watching birds with them. Thank you Mrs. Franey!

Just a few tips if you ever go birding with kids:
1. The noise of the stroller will scare birds away,
2. The skipping and running children will scare birds away,
3. The singing children will scare birds away, and lastly
4. If in the unlikely event that you have met some stalwart and fearless bird who has withstood your efforts at family birding, your children will never agree on what bird in the field guide it actually is.

We met a few such birds. The robin and the blue jay and the vulture were easily agreed upon. However, we may have seen several tufted titmouses with no tufts, an eastern phoebe, and some brownish bird with a bright yellow mark no one could agree on.

The final birds of the trip were the best and thank goodness everyone accepted my classification as "great blue heron." So beautiful and graceful. A happy way to end it all.

Here's a shot of my best birders.

We're addicted!

Yesterday we checked out a link our homeschool group sent out showing a live feed of a red-tailed hawk in Ithaca, NY. The hawk, known as Big Red, is a 9 year-old female and the camera is set above her nest. She has 3 eggs. One had already hatched and yesterday afternoon we got to see the second hatch. The camera runs all day and there is a chat running at the same time.

The kids and I have had a hard time peeling ourselves away from it. Even now, as I type, I have an uneasy feeling that something exciting might be happening in the tab next to this one -- should I just click over to check....?

Okay, I'm back. Big Red is still just sitting on her babies. That is what we see most of the time. Here she is with a vole, a pigeon, and a sparrow. And if you can't tell, she's not chatting it up with them -- those are dead animals she uses for food, for herself and the babies. That fact grossed out several of the people chatting yesterday. I'm not sure what they expected -- delivery from Dominoes?

Now occasionally Big Red gets up and we get a glimpse of those fuzzy-feathery little angels beneath her. Actually, they're a little clumsy and very amusing to watch. Not really angelic. But certainly out of this world, the human world.

Sometimes we get to see them with their dad. Yes, this is a very happy little family. Papa - Ezra - doesn't spend much time at the nest. But he hunts for them and occasionally gives mom a break. He takes a turn on the nest so she can hunt. I love that. The moderator said that he is always in the vicinity, keeping an eye out for trouble. He will defend his nest if he has to. I love that too.

The site is maintained by the Cornell Lab of Ornithology -- the same guys behind Project Feederwatch. They had to install the cameras and microphones 70 feet high. Here's a video that gives you an idea of what it took -- with some good footage of the happy couple as well.

For a little while yesterday, both hawks took a break from parenting and we had a great view of the hawklings. I started screaming, "Gabby, Bri, come quick, come quick! Everyone, hurry!" Max was totally freaked out, but I think the girls knew what the commotion was all about. We are just so into this, it is on our minds all day. We were even inspired to go birding. We went to the beautiful Peace Valley Park. I'll post about that this afternoon.

Poor Max received little trumpeting and banners when he came home from work. We were too absorbed in the Hawk Cam to listen to him talk about his day. Here he is:

"Pay attention to me. I'm cute too!"

I'm not sure if today will be any different. I checked on Big Red first thing this morning. Chick 3 is supposed peck its way out this afternoon. I'm sure we'll all be there.

Here's a visual timeline of our current homeschool "curriculum."
Three eggs
One chick out. Feeding time

And now there are 2!

A peak inside. When this was live, we could actually see movement in that egg! It is now about 1/4 pecked away.

A few more birds

Gabby has been doing a beautiful job on her bird journal. The bird above is a male house sparrow. It is maybe a bit too yellow, but she's just learning how to mix colors for the first time. The other details are great. Here are a few more examples:

Another chickadee, Gabby loves these. A male and female (we suppose) hang out together by our pinecone feeders quite often.
We saw a red winged blackbird for the first time, not at our feeders, but during an early morning run last Saturday. Its red stripe stood out as it perched on the very top of a tree. A nice reward for exercising.

It looked like a male and female cardinal were building a nest in the pine tree by our window, but we think they abandoned the site. We still see them flying around and snacking though. Gabby hasn't painted the female yet.

A junco. A sweet-looking bird, despite its "trashy" name. Gabby worked hard on the wing here.

Gab's first international fair

Friday was Gabby's first international fair. She'd been preparing for weeks on her country, Australia. She borrowed several books from the library and I've been having her read books by Australian authors for Language Arts studies. She did a lot of research on the web as well.

The fair was at Calvary Bible Fellowship Church in Coopersburg and was almost an all day thing. Set-up began at 1pm and we ended with a potluck from 6-7pm.

I was proud of Gabby for taking responsibility for her presentation. Most of the countries were shared by families -- and that was great -- but I wanted her to work independently. She did the research. She typed it all up. She created all her own handouts. She arranged her presentation board and set it up when the got there. And she wrote her talk. She had to give it 3 times for about 20 people each time. BIG accomplishment for a my shy little girl!

I did her cooking for her, but that wasn't really part of the fair anyway. The "international" part of the potluck was optional. Some families just brought casseroles. I thought it would be fun to bring Australian dishes. Turns out, though, Australians don't eat very differently than us. So I made a beef soup. Many years ago it would have been made from kangaroo tail, but it is illegal to kill kangaroos now. I also made ANZAC buscuits, a traditional cookie. Those turned out really good. Here's the recipe:

INGREDIENTS
1 cup rolled oats
3/4 cup desiccated coconut
1 cup plain flour
1 cup sugar
125g (4oz) butter
2 tablespoons golden syrup (I used maple)
1/2 teaspoon bicarbonate of soda
1 tablespoon water

Preheat oven to 300F (150C)

Mix oats, flour, sugar and coconut together.
Melt syrup and butter together.
Mix soda with boiling water and add to melted butter and syrup.
Add to dry ingredients.
Place 1 tablespoonfuls of mixture on greased tray (allow room for spreading).
Bake for 20 minutes.
Loosen while warm, cool on trays.
(makes about 35)

Gabby found the recipe here.

I pulled Bri out of school to come with us, so the whole family got to come, minus Max who had to work. Each kid got a passport that was stamped at each "country." Gabby wanted a stamp that represented Australia in some way, but we couldn't find one at the local craft stores. So, I made one. Yes, I really did! It was so fun. And simple too. All you really need is a rubber eraser, a pencil, and an exacto knife. I think I'm going to make more, perhaps for an arts unit with Bri and Gabby. Here's my stamp:
And the website that taught me how to do it.

Here are a few pics of the event:

Her table with Fielding (This is where he was still excited about the event. Not too many countries later, he was less enthusiastic.)
The flag shown here is the Aboriginal flag
You can see the didgeridoo that Gabby made from a wrapping paper roll sticking out on the right and the cookies are on the left.
Gabby's big show!!!

The birds!

a few pinecone feeders and a recycled peanuts container bird feeder out our (foggy) window

We are doing Project Feeder Watch. We just started -- with hardly a month left in the season. Kind of lame, I know, but we're trying.

I had heard about Project Feeder Watch (PFW), but didn't think too much about doing it as part of our science curriculum this year. In the fall, however, someone from the homeschool group shared a pdf workbook that PFW makes available to homeschoolers. There were a lot of great ideas in it. I thought it would be a cool addition to our schoolwork.

We'd only just moved into our new house, and we were so new at homeschooling, and there was Thanksgiving, then Christmas... I didn't get around to signing us up until January. (There is always something getting in the way of my good plans!) The online information said there might be a delay in getting our materials to us. There was, about a month, maybe a little more.

It's okay, though, the nice PFW people are applying our fee to next year's program. (It was only 15 bucks, anyway.) We are getting a feel for the whole thing in this last month. It's great. Like a practice run. We'll be pros come November when it starts all over again.

Gabby, Fielding and I made some feeders and hung them on a few trees outside. We've got binoculars by the window and our bird chart on the wall. Gabby and I get so excited when we identify a bird.

Gabby has an additional project, along with watching, counting and reporting birds. I had her read about John James Audubon and begin a bird journal. I bought her a sketchbook and water colors. This week she painted a black-capped chickadee. We've done very little art this year so I hope this makes up for it a little bit. She seemed to enjoy herself and I was so impressed with the result. Maybe this will be a life-long hobby for her!

The History of the World!

We finished off our evolution unit with Gabby creating a picture book, illustrating the different periods of time in earth's history. It was a fun little project for her. She had to imagine what different early creatures looked like. Once her pages were complete, she asked me everyday, "Can we bind my book today?"

We laminated it at U.S. Toy and bound it at Staples. Here's the final result:



































I know some Christian families find the concept of evolution offensive to their faith. I have never been offended by it, though. I love learning about the world and how it works and came to be. I found the sections in our textbook fascinating that told about the changes in earth's atmosphere and oceans and the early photosynthetic organisms. Such tiny animals, making such huge changes in the environment! To me, I find the richness of life and its intricacies evidence of God's hand in it all. I wonder at His power, His intelligence, His creativity in setting all these things in motion. As Gabby and I read her chapter on Darwin, we talked about the controversy of The Origin of Species in his day and in ours. I hope to support her learning, in the sciences and in the Gospel. Some day she'll have to make her own decisions about what she believes. And I hope she'll be well-prepared.

reading The Giver

Last week Gabby finished up her final diarama for The Giver series. During the month of January she read all three books by Lois Lowry: The Giver, Gathering Blue, and The Messenger. For each book she had to create a diarama of an important scene and create a key, noting symbolic elements.

If you have never read The Giver, it is a story of a boy, Jonas, growing up in a futuristic community in which most diversity has been genetically engineered-out and many of life's most important choices are made for you. There, life is peaceful and easy. True feelings - anger, love, passion - have all but disappeared. The novel is about Jonas' discovery that there might be more to life than what he's lived. It won the Newbery medal in 1994.

It is not a series in that one must read the books sequentially or even that the stories depend on one another in any way. Each is its own story. However, the major characters in the third book, The Messenger, come from the other two -- The Giver and Gathering Blue. A final installment, Son, will be released in October. I can't wait.

I loved reading The Giver with Gabby. We discussed things we liked about the community and things that made us sad. When we read about the community's "climate control", Gabby said, "My favorite season is winter!" We tried to imagine what it would be like to never know snow or cold or Christmas. We talked about how we felt when we learned what it meant to be "released."

We didn't discuss as much about Gathering Blue or The Messenger, although both books have worthy themes. I just let her discover them on her own. The Messenger has a beautiful Christian message buried within it. Gabby's diarama shows the scene of Matt's atonement within the forest.

Here are her completed works:
The final scene in The Giver

Jonas and Gabriel

from Gathering Blue

Khira appearing before the council

Matt in the forest, The Messenger

Home sick

It's tough to school when sickness hits the home.

In the wee hours Sunday morning Gabby started puking. She had gone to bed not feeling well. It started with a bad stomach ache at her swim meet. She almost went home early, but persevered. It was around 4 in the morning when Max and I heard her in the bathroom. (Yay! She made it to the bathroom!) I cleaned her up and sent her back to bed with towels and a bowl. She threw up one more time maybe an hour later. I stayed home from church to take care of her.

All day her tummy hurt but she managed to keep water down until just before bedtime. Then one more vomit. Poor kid, she always cried "No!" when she throws up. As though some evil person is torturing her.

That was it, except for a lingering stomach ache.

Yesterday, we didn't do much for school. I read a couple sections aloud from the biology text. I encouraged her to read more in House of the Scorpion but she said reading made her feel worse.
Now it is Tuesday. Gabby's stomach still hurts on and off and I would say her mood is fairly sour. Again I read a couple biology sections to her. She will finish the pages I've assigned in House of the Scorpion, but I'm afraid I won't get her to do more.

If she was in public school I would have kept her home yesterday and today. Bri would have brought her school work. I'd have expected her to be caught up after 3-4 days.
It feels harder to "catch up" with homeschool, though. Each day we do the maximum that we can do. (Or that I can get her to do, depending on how you look at it). She's not a particularly fast worker. She's actually pretty slow -- smart, definitely, not at all lazy, just needing more time. I guess you could call her thorough and careful, a perfectionist.

Those qualities always made bricks and mortar school hard. Gabby felt frustrated with how much time she needed to complete assignments and afraid to bring in anything less than perfect. What child can do 3 hours of homework a night?

Homeschooling has changed things. I feel like a weight has lifted from us. The homework/school project/this things is due when? weight. Now I allow her as much time as she wants to complete assignments. I think we do less of some kinds of work than the children over at the middle school. We never do busy-work, for example. But we do more projects, reading, and discussing.

If I get get Gabby to do a math chapter assessment and take a few notes for her biology project, I'd consider the day a success. Even with no geography or any language arts besides reading. But I'm not sure I can make it happen, though. And should it really matter? I don't know.

But I'm looking around the house and I can tell you the situation is not good. I haven't done laundry, dishes, or cleaned at all today. Apparently Gabby is not the only one who doesn't feel up to working.

And it's all downhill from here

Today we went on a snow-tubing trip to Bear Creek, organized by someone from our homeschool group. Gabby and I had never been before. She was quite nervous -- not being a thrill-ride type of person. I was sure it would be fun, though. I even pulled William out of school to join us. The slope was open for 4 hours and the time flew by. We had a great time. Can't wait until the next trip!

Harrison Bergeron, jr.

This week Gabby and I read the story Harrison Bergeron by Kurt Vonnegut. It is a short piece of science fiction that takes place in a world where absolute equality is enforced. Ballerinas wear weights to make them less graceful and people hear disrupting noises whenever their thoughts wander dangerously. Everyone has to be handicapped in some way.

For Gabby's assignment I asked her to rewrite Harrison Bergeron so that the story took place in a school. She had to come up with her own characters, some new handicaps, and a similar and yet unique storyline. Below is what she came up with. Minus the spelling mistakes, I think it is fabulous!