Five Words That Describe Summer

Here at Blog, She Wrote we are still getting back into the groove of our learning routine. Preparing a house to sell and moving a homeschooling family of six to a new home takes a lot of energy! We had 27 book boxes from our former school space alone- and many more from other corners of the house. It turns out that it takes a lot of time to settle back down in a new home as well and aside from a few stray boxes in our new learning space, pictures on the walls, and the office/studio not being rebuilt and unpacked, we are about finished. Finally!

So, our attention has turned to our fall schedule and turning four children who have enjoyed much academic freedom over the last three months back around to focus on their education. We haven't turned on a dime, but we are moving steadily in that direction!

Yesterday, I used my handy smartphone to grab an idea from In Our Write Minds. I have Kim's blog bookmarked in my phone's browser and I knew I'd seen some writing prompt ideas. 12 Back-to-School Writing Prompts was just the thing to have my three younger kids work on some writing in the afternoon.

I gave them each a different assignment (sometimes modifying it) and it went beautifully. R12 had to choose five words that described her summer and tell why. I told her she could use the thesaurus to play with her words and she gladly accepted the challenge. She found words like "felicity" and said she had a pleasurable summer. And "interregnum" because summer is a vacation from school and because that was such a cool word.

I10 had to tell about something he'd done over the summer that he'd never done before. He chose to tell about building the lean to that he's working on in the backyard. This was after mulling over "moving" and he decided although that was fantastic, it wasn't fun enough.

J7 had to pick just three words that described his summer and write them down. He also had to draw a picture to match his choices. Moving made his list along with "scary" and "hot". Scary points to his recent experience with yellow jackets on his face. Standing still as he'd been told, he let them get a little too close. Thankfully, he did not get stung, but he is sufficiently freaked out. He now knows there is a limit to standing still! His picture is a stick J with his tongue sticking out (denoting how hot he is), with a yellow jacket near his face all the while standing next to a UHaul box.

Simple exercises that can turn into a great assignments. That's one of the best things about homeschooling.

Summer School 2012

Usually by this time of the year we've put up the school books in favor of more relaxation and the summer routine. This year, however, we are forging on having been held up more than normal for things like preparing our home to sell, keeping our home show ready, and being out for showings, home inspection and all that- not to mention the house hunting for our new home.

So, although we enter the summer season still busy and now preparing to move, we are going to have a steady diet of some structured school activities. I plan to keep these items handy and easily set aside during the move so we can land here on something familiar now and then.

What's in store?

We finally started the long suggested series Swallow & Amazons and we are hooked! We have the next two books in the series to enjoy when this one is finished. I see this one coming out at campfire time, lights out and let's settle down in the tent time, and relaxing on our new back porch time!

We are about half way through MOH Volume 1 so I'm taking the time to read from this daily. We may pick up some notebooking pages for narration, but we'll see how this goes.

Math- we'll be continuing on with our math studies as normal with Fred and living math. But first, two days of IOWA Testing are in order this week for the oldest three children.

We'll be doing some science through Nature Study this summer- always a hit while camping. I bring art projects as well for rainy afternoons (or mornings) as well. You can teach a lot of biology through nature study.

We'll be using Barb's (from OHC) Summer Sizzle study. One of our favorite camping spots has giant cottonwoods and she has a study on those in this ebook. 

The 4H County Fair is about a week and a half after we move so we'll be working on polishing up entries over the next few weeks. I'll make sure they are packed separately so we can get to them by fair time!

E13 has been working through the One Year Adventure Novel and having such a good time. He'll be continuing on with that this summer. 

Reading and more reading is also on the agenda! We'll be coming up with a book goal for the kids. My kids read a ton, but sometimes get stuck in a repetitive rut not reading new material but enjoying old favorites...all good stuff, but I'm going to challenge them nonetheless.

It's shaping up to be a busy season full of family adventure including birthdays, packing, camping, moving, and more camping with a trip to Dallas for me thrown in there. But we'll also be spending time together reading and pouring into the kids' passions. More on that another time.

What are your plans for summer school this year?

Summer Library Fun

This year's NY State Library summer theme is Stories around the World- uh or something like that. The kids signed up for the reading program and have been doing the craft days at the library on Tuesday afternoons. E12 has been a volunteer to help and the other kids have enjoyed doing the crafts. We'll miss the last one due to our camping trip (in fact this post was scheduled), but the summer fun continues. I managed to get their book lists into the children's librarian today- only I forgot the library is closed on Saturdays in the summer. Don't ask...anyway, hopefully she finds them in the book drop! Don't worry, our book drop is a slot in the door that lands in a bin that you can see through the glass door.

They issued a paper with all kinds of Around the World activities.

This provided a great morning of entertainment at our house! I happen to really enjoy the book list.

The crafts have been from around the world and the god's eye project inspired a whole lot more of them! That blue one there is J6's. He's an expert!

We still have more summer reading fun ahead. I've planned a lot of things for our week long camping trip. You know...just in case things get a bit slow. There will be projects available!

Summer Schedule

Ah summer time...what's better than warm weather and a tree swing with a leisurely afternoon? Now that we are all well into summer, I'm sure we've had some great lazy days and some more difficult days given all the free time. Sometimes I find my children have a little too much leisure and that can lead to some grumpiness all around. Relaxing is good...idleness not so much!

A favorite playground at a local State Park

 R11 and I have been reading Little Women together and I found Chapter 11, "Experiments" to be a great illustration of what I'm talking about. In the book, it's the first of June and the girls have some time off from their regular duties- the older girls work and the people they work for are off on holiday. The girls all want leisure as much as they can have it and though Mrs. March argues that it would not be satisfying, they insist and she says they can have their experiment. By the end, everything is a mess and the girls are in a poor mood based on various mishaps and the fact that Hannah and Mrs. March also take the last day off just to prove her point. In the end, Mrs. March gives out this advice and we'd do well to take it to heart even today!

"...Have regular hours for work and play; make each day both useful and pleasant, and prove that you understand the worth of time by employing it well. Then youth will be delightful, old age will bring few regrets, and life become a beautiful success, in spite of poverty."

When I set out to explain our "summer cards" I used this example and read the chapter aloud to the kids. I love the way good books often give us such sound illustrations of wisdom to live by! I already had a list of things I wanted the kids to work on this summer- at their discretion. However, most of the time they were not choosing those things. Which is fine. Only they were not doing well with wandering on their own after a while. Enter Carisa's Summer Challenge 2011. She recently posted about how she was tracking things she wanted her kids to do and she has a list of rewards based on their choices which she records on a chart. I'm not really a token economy kinda girl, so I tweaked things for our home and here are the results.

I went ahead and used Carisa's forms and printed four sets and color coded and laminated them. Now the kids just flip through to remind themselves of a great activity.

Rewards- summer treats are things like ice sticks, popsicles, the occasional trip to and ice cream shop. I tried to tune in to the things my kids would really enjoy.

Still working on one for R11. You'll notice too that I changed the point value based on age and ability to hang in there.

How's it working? Well I just finished the cards finally and I'm happy to report it has given my kids motivation to make better choices and things are humming along well. The younger kids will be rewarded sooner and I think it will encourage them to keep going. The lists include items I know they love and items I want them to stretch themselves with. Now I bet you are wondering what's on the lists!

E12:

• NXT Challenges- from his books or websites
• chronological Bible reading- he has taken on reading the Bible in the order of when the books were written
• Alice animation projects
• Current Events- reading God's World News and The Learning Network. He also likes to read the VT football blogs to keep up with the Hokies.
• Reading Book from the Classics List- there are many too choose from. He must read 2 classics.
• Vacuum the upstairs- without being asked
• Falconry- read and study his packet
• mow grass- can be done early on a day that is scheduled for mowing (he mows with Dan- we have two mowers and it's Dan's dream come true)
• LEGO Building
• Building Toy Challenge- go for tall structures for find another challenge to conquer 
• Computer Programming- with Scratch or GameMaker
• Reading Books- free read

R11:

• Sewing Journal
• Art Journaling
• Craft Projects
• Hand Sewing
• Pen Pal Letters
• Reading Books from the Classic List- she must read one this summer
• vacuum upstairs
• Reading Books- free read
• Machine Sewing
• Dolls- dollhouse play or American Girl
• Miss Bliss blogging

I9:

• Starry Night Software
• Reading- free read
• LEGO Building
• Building Toys
• NXT Challenge- beginner level
• math play- we have lots of playful math activities
• math puzzle website
• hand sewing- now and then he has a project
• pen pal letters

J6:

• Reading- free reading on his own
• Read to Mommy!
• Building Toys
• Snap Circuits
• Science Kits
• math play

Common Activities: These are items all the kids can choose from. The chores are ones that are not necessarily on their regular list, but they may be ones I'd like to see done without me asking- a little habit formation going on here.

• play outside
• weed the sunflower garden
• water the sunflower garden
• weed the front flower bed- new work going in there soon
• 4H Fair preparation- these are due on Monday morning
• riding bikes
• dust- with permission
• take laundry upstairs
• tidy living room
• tidy their bedrooms
• audio books- we have many to choose from
• cooking school- offer to help cook or expressing an interest in doing a meal

Here are some other fun summer ideas I've come across in the last few weeks. Over at Simple Homeschool there were two posts that interested me.

 5 Ways to Encourage Summer Learning 
 5 Outdoor Summer Science Projects 

Some of you might be wondering what happened to our Summer Adventure Boxes. These are a somewhat modified form of the adventure. Each child has a list of things to explore. They are just not all related to one theme. I have found that sometimes my kids need a break from even a structured theme and I definitely needed a break from organizing an adventure this year. 

The summer cards are just a way of helping my kids to make some edifying choices at some point during their day. We are mixing it up with a "game streak", trips to the playground and parks, my own art and science projects here and there, and of course some family camping trips.

How is your summer going?

CurrClick Live Classes

I'm sure most of you have been over to CurrClick from time to time. They sell downloadable curriculum from various publishers- everything from lapbooks to unit studies to Evan Moor ebooks. I really enjoy their weekly freebies which come in handy some weeks.

This year they've started to offer something new called the Live Class. A few months ago they had Water, Water Everywhere as their weekly free offering and I so wish I had paid attention. Not knowing what a Live Class really meant I passed it up and I regret that decision!

After reading up on them and noticing a few others at FIAR trying them out, I signed up for three so far. Right now they are offering some classes for as little as a dollar and many are about $5. I don't know how long the good times will last, but if you are looking for a summer adventure I would definitely consider a Live Class. The nice part is that the class is independent and you don't need to be real time with the instructor. So, you can sit at the computer and work on the class when your time permits.

Right now R9 is part of the Felicity Book Club. She is studying the book Happy Birthday, Felicity! She gets to work on a notebook weekly, participate in the forums (under my name because I wasn't clever enough to make one up!), and watch the class videos. Each week there is a project and some notebooking to do in addition to the reading of course.

E10 really, really wanted to take a math class, but most of them were tutorial helps rather than a challenge. There are a few Algebra classes they he's not quite ready for yet and when I found the Geometry class I knew it was for him. He can hardly wait to get started. It's a geometry review for 5th to 8th grades and think there will be some things to challenge him. He'll get to work out assigned problems for the day and email the solutions to the professor. He'll be able to see the problems worked out video if he needs help. This is going to be a very cool addition to the math journal! I'm looking forward to see how this goes.

It is a tradition in our homeschool to begin each new year with our favorite FIAR title- Night of the Moonjellies. We have such fond memories of our first row of this book just after E10 had broken his arm one summer and our pool visits were cut short. I had just received my trusty FIAR volume 1 manual and I was eager to begin. After 3 years we love it as much as ever but it is harder to discover new things in there. But it is so worthwhile to visit them again each year. This year we will do the live class on Nim's Island as part of our tradition. The kids adored the book and loved the movie. We are excited to join in this class and some really fun ocean work!

Starting in September is Strange Science: Planet Earth and I'm eager to sign up for this one. We have not done much indepth earth science and I think the kids will enjoy it. Some of the coolest earth science stuff is going to be covered. Each class typically needs a minimum enrollment so get on over there and sign up for classes!

Beating the Summertime Blues- A Review

I recently read an WeE-book from The Old Schoolhouse entitled Beating the Summertime Blues.

What a great little book! The author, Kim Kautzer, touches on everything from Mom Time to Outings to Keeping Cool to Projects and Creative Writing.

If you need ideas on how to keep your summer productive, this is the book for you. The author's idea is that summer time is no reason to have chaos reign since kids need some routine even in the summer.

I'm looking forward to implementing some of Kautzer's ideas as I put together our "Summer Schedule" and "Adventure Boxes". The kids always enjoy our summer adventures so stay tuned...