Texas Weather

OK, you've probably heard the jokes. "When you're in Texas, if you don't like the weather, just wait five minutes." Well, here's the evidence. It was 80 degrees when I got home from work last night, and here's a pic from the backyard this afternoon. Yes, that's snow. And it's about 25 degrees. Sheesh.

Doing Time with Library Thing

For the past week or two my computer time has seen me with single-minded focus. I must get all my books onto Library Thing. The LT love affair started simply enough. You enter a few books, see who else has them, find out what they have on their shelves that you covet... Soon I purchased the Lifetime Account (only $25 for forever, what a bargain!) This enables me to finally have a list of every single last one of my books. Easier said than done...




Why am I suddenly in such a rush? Why, Yule is coming of course! You see, we moved house recently (OK, it was over half a year ago...) Anyway, due to various circumstances, the majority of our worldly belongings made it to our new abode only last month. Now, we have a lot of stuff, so much so that I'm almost embarrassed. We will hopefully be having a garage sale in the not too distant future, but if not, there's always Freecycle, right?

OK, my story's off track. The bottom line is, we have no place to put The Tree, and it seems that my stacks of books, which do in fact have lovely bookshelves on which to go, are first in the long line of Things Which Must Be Put Away. Because, apparently, some furniture belongs to the spot in which they are currently residing...

The Renaissance

Wow, it's been a month since I posted. Not that I haven't been feeling a wee bit guilty about it in the back of my mind or anything...

Of late, I have been somewhat frustrated in my preparations for the upcoming homeschool study of the Renaissance. We breezed through Pre-Columbian Americas and had a nice unit on Exploration and Discovery, after I spent a late night organizing (rearranging and condensing) the lesson plans I had found and synthesizing them with our library books.

Now we have hit the Renaissance. According to the 'master plan,' we should have started last week. I'm not really bothered by this except that when we go for a few days without working on a little of everything, it's hard to get back into gear.

According to our guidebook, we are to learn about Islamic Scholars (like Avicenna), Florence and the Medici, Artists of the time (Da Vinci, Michelangelo, Botticelli et al), Courtiers, Machiavelli, Gutenberg, Martin Luther and the Reformation, John Calvin, and the Counter-Reformation, and that's just for the 'Continent.' For England, there's Henry VIII, Elizabeth I, James I, Charles I, the English Civil War, Charles II and the Restoration of the monarchy, James II and the Glorious Revolution, William and Mary, and the English Bill of Rights. For Russia we have Ivan the Great, Ivan the Terrible, Peter the Great, and Catherine the Great. And that's just the history! We've also got science, art, literature (Shakespeare and Cervantes!) Maybe you can see why I'm a little out of sorts...

There is so much going on here, I can't seem to squeeze in the word 'synthesize.' I have a great personal interest in this time period (well, and history in general!) so it's hard to get something together for a fifth grader when I know so much additional information. I want him to be as astounded and amazed as I am by all the changes that took place during this time. Maybe this is unrealistic.

I was finally chastised by my husband (don't be too Virgo about this - you'll never have it perfect enough) and a coworker who is a homeschool graduate (this won't be the only chance he'll have to study the Renaissance). So I started to slowly eliminate books from the 'to read' pile. Which is probably a good thing - if anyone in my area wants a children's book on the Renaissance from the library, they are out of luck. I cleaned out the three closest branches. So I'll assuage my guilt by returning some of them tomorrow. I have a good general plan, and we'll read only the best books I found plus a few passages out of a few more, and we'll just have a lot of discussion.

Wish me luck.

Blah Blah Blog

OK, it's been quite a while since I posted. Sorry about that... We've been holed up here in homeschool land for the past three-and-a-half weeks. My sincerest apologies to everyone that I have ignored, i.e. not responded to in a timely manner, during our 'adjustment period.'

Things have gone really well considering that our decision to homeschool came at the proverbial eleventh hour. I've found some great (& free) resources online with ideas and starting points for lesson plans, and I've made a fabulous (if I do say so myself) spreadsheet detailing the books we'll need throughout the year along with the branch of the library at which they are available.

I'm still working four days a week, so we have had to do some creative thinking to fit everything into a reasonable timeframe. The first week saw me in super high-stress mode as I tried to keep track of everything we were starting while trying to make decisions about what we would study when. Then my wonderful husband came home with the simplest solution ever - a teacher's plan book. Of course it was too obvious for me to think of myself.

I'm finally staring to feel like we may be able to keep our heads above water school-wise and still be able to enjoy life. Now all we need to do is get our store website going...

Birthday Excursion

Monday was my birthday, and it so happens that I work for a company that gives you the day off, PAID, as a 'gift.' So, son went off to Nana's to help prepare the traditional birthday cake, and husband and I went shopping. Not your typical birthday shopping, mind. We went Book shopping! The most important kind of shopping there is. The only caveat was that we were looking for textbooks and supplementary materials for this year's venture into homeschooling, due to start next Tuesday. We had previously purchased Books To Build On, by E.D. Hirsch, which recommends a ton of books to go along with the Core Knowldege curriculum we will be using. We scavenged through three local used stores and came back with three textbooks and a stack of 28 additional books from the list. All for less than $100. Through this, I seem to have discovered that my book buying sickness extends to buying books that aren't just for me. (You'll just have to imagine the evil grin...)

For Fellow Bunnyphiles

In lieu of a well thought-out and meaningful blog post, I thought I'd share a cute video I saw on YouTube.

Homeschooling Part 3

We did it. We withdrew our son from school on Friday. He is ecstatic. My husband and I are cautiously excited (we're both Virgos,) and figure the worst that can happen is having to get on the waiting list to get back into the charter school. (We decided it was worth the drive if necessary.) We purchased the requisite copy of What Your Fifth Grader Needs To Know, and a couple of teachers from his charter school gave us the list of books they will be using this year as well as a review book for 'The Test.' You know, in case we get the urge to download it at the end of the schoolyear... We also talked to his chess club sponsor who suggested we continue to come to the tournaments. She said we could still sit with them even if we were our own 'team.'

Thanks again to everyone who posted a comment with suggestions and support.

Homeschooling Part 2

Wow. I really would like to thank everybody for all of the comments. I never expected this kind of response, but I am very grateful for all of the information and support provided.

I wanted to address some of the questions posed, and provide an update to our current position, decision-wise. First, I absolutely agree with you, Daryl, that fear and doubt are holding us back. My husband and I get excited every time we talk, but then the inevitable "are we really going to do this" will arise. We have finally spoken with our son frankly and seriously about the possiblity of homeschooling, and he seems to be mirroring what we are feeling. He acts excited, and then he says he isn't sure. I believe that what he's most worried about is maintaining current friendships.

Secondly, I would like to thank Unique for reminding me about the "What Your XX Grader Needs to Know" books. I had managed to forget (how, I don't know, as it had been a major selling point for us) that the Core Knowledge curriculum that our charter school uses comes from these books.

As I was fretting about this publicly, my husband was quietly going about his research. As we pored over all of your comments, he kept saying, I have that link saved, and that link, yes I read about that... He also found a list of reasons to homeschool that really hit home. After our son read the list, I asked him what he thought. His response, complete with big grin, was, "I'm thinking about homeschooling!"

I must say that I already knew, in my heart, everything ya'll have said. I just wasn't able to bring it to the surface and put it all together. After discussion, I think I have to admit that the inept 'grads' I have met or known were just victims of bad parenting. I had forgotten so many things in my worry. My cousin homeschools, and their daughter is wonderful. My in-laws (that we live with) are UU, and they have a homeschool group at their church. And, I actually used to work with the woman who led the homeschooling charge here in Texas!

It was so enlightening and inspiring to read all of your comments, especially the 'we did it, you can too' ones. I have to say that they reminded me that maybe, just maybe, we wouldn't be all on our own.

I do need to address the comment by Cygknit, as she has known me for a looooong time. It is more a question of how everybody's needs would fit together as a family with all of us managing to stay sane. (Tips on alone time for the parents, anyone?) Because I know I would do a good job teaching even though I'm not a 'professional.' (A friend at work made me feel really good when I told her about our recent thoughts. She said, 'Wow, you'll be great, can I come, too?") You know you would be great, too, Cygknit. You may have forgotten our plans from some time long ago to have our own small community with our friends.... Ahem, I believe you were going to be the teacher...

As it stands now, if we can all get just a little past our nervousness, I think we are most likely going to be trying homeschooling this year. We have to make the official decision by Friday, I think, so that we can withdraw from the charter school.

Thanks again, everyone, and, I'll 'keep you posted' :)