Halloween Week!

For Halloween week, I forewent (is that a word?) our usual school routine and focused on all things Halloween! Basically, it was a low-key week with a few fun activities.

A couple days before Halloween, we painted pumpkins. I figured this would be more fun for the kids than carving, and I was right. Both Rhonda and Sierra had an amazing time and were occupied with painting for quite a while.

On Tuesday, we went to the Rockwall Library's Enchanted Forest event. (I wasn't really planning on going, but we were at the library a week before and Rhonda saw the librarian getting decorations ready for it. She asked the librarian about it and got a flyer. She was really excited about it, so of course we had to go.) The girls had fun making crafts, eating treats, and listening to storytellers. The highlight of the night was definitely the Three Little Pigs puppet show. Sierra got really excited about it and squealed and laughed every time the wolf appeared. It was really cute!

The day before Halloween, I organized a little Day of the Dead unit study. We read the picture book My Family Celebrates Day of the Dead. We made traditional Day of the Dead bread with a skull and crossbones on it. Rhonda and Sierra really enjoyed kneading the bread dough. We watched this YouTube video of a Day of the Dead parade in Mexico. Both girls were very engrossed.

We talked about why people celebrate Day of the Dead, and how people honor family members who have passed away. Rhonda surprised us at dinnertime by suggesting that we honor her Grandma Rhonda. I was very touched that she came up with this idea all on her own. We found a few things to represent her, to put on our kitchen counter as a sort of hasty ofrenda. We had a couple of pictures of her, plus a reindeer decoration she had made.

We ended the day with watching Coco.

On Halloween morning, the girls got to wear their costumes to dance class. They had so much fun in their class parties. They even had a giant unicorn!

The kids had an amazing time on Halloween night. I thought they might have enough energy to go up and down one street, but we ended up staying out for more than an hour! It was really cold, but they didn't seem to mind it.

They loved coming home and eating candy by the warm fireplace.

It was a Halloween week to remember!

Preschool Weeks 6, 7, 8

We took a preschool break while Doug and I were in London, but it's been fun to get back into our study of South America. Rhonda has actually had an interest in South America for a while--she's often told me that she wants to go there, and pretends that she's going to South America sometimes when she plays. So it's been exciting for her to learn more about it.

Gluing the South America "stamp" into her passport.

We read a book called Tales Our Abuelitas Told, which has illustrated folktales from South America. Rhonda seems to be really enjoying it, and she loves the pictures. I'm enjoying it too, but I have to admit it's more fun for me to read a longer novel, so I'm looking forward to doing that in our Europe study. I think Rhonda likes the novels better, too--it's easier for her to remember and get invested in those stories.

I've been doing a good job keeping up with our daily reading, but I have to admit that I have not been keeping up with the crafts at all. With a toddler around, it's not easy to find time to do crafts! Plus, although Rhonda sort of enjoys crafts, the ones in the curriculum are usually above her level of ability. I think I may just let go of the crafts for now. She often does art projects with her grandma Michelle, who is great about letting the kids get messy, so I don't worry too much about lacking in that area. Maybe in a few months, she'll start being able to do more with the crafts.

But even though I'm not great at being a "craft mom," I have managed to do a couple of fun baking activities with the kids. (That's more my speed!) I let the kids help me make pumpkin chocolate chip oatmeal cookies the other day. Although I let Rhonda help me cook and bake pretty frequently, I've never let Sierra help before, but this time they both wanted to help and I was feeling patient enough to allow it. They had a wonderful time. Mostly they just played with the measuring cups and spoons, and sneaked small bits of ingredients into little concoctions when I wasn't looking. They were very entertained, and the mess actually wasn't too bad.

Rhonda and I made brigadeiros, a kind of Brazilian candy, to go with our South America study. She had a lot of fun playing with the extra sweetened condensed milk. She did a great job rolling the balls in sprinkles. Both Rhonda and Sierra loved eating them!

We've been playing a lot more games. I've been learning a lot about gameschooling and I want to get Rhonda started on it. Although "gameschooling" sounds like a cop-out, there are actually a ton of great educational games these days, and even "non-educational" games still teach kids a lot of great skills. I've been building our game collection little by little. I've found a lot of great games at thrift stores and discount stores. It's not always easy to find time to play games with Rhonda (again, a toddler who wants to grab cards and game pieces is a recipe for game disaster), but I've been making it more of a priority lately. It's also a fun way to get some one-on-one time with her. These three weeks, we've been playing Candyland, Chutes & Ladders, and the Disney matching game. (That matching game is really hard because it has about a million different cards. Rhonda has an amazing memory and actually beat me last time. I never let her win on purpose.)

We also recently played Spelling Bee Bingo (which doesn't require actual spelling, just letter recognition). Rhonda wanted to play the advanced version which has cards to read, but I told her I thought that would be too hard. She insisted she could read the words on the cards, so I showed them to her. I was pretty surprised how well she could sound them out! She got some right, and they're not beginning words.

Speaking of reading, I found the BOB Books for a good price at Costco, and when Rhonda saw them she wanted to read them. She read the first two all on her own! I was impressed. She was excited, but hasn't wanted to read more since then. I think once she decides to really learn to read, she'll take off. She has all the skills she needs, she just needs a little more motivation.

We've also been listening to a podcast called Sing Along with Mandy. It's about 15 minutes of a mom singing songs. The kids enjoy dancing along with it, and she also does little clapping rhythm games that are great. Rhonda even joined in the last time we listened.

Preschool Week 5

We finished our study of North America this week.

I got caught up on a couple of the activities that I haven't had time for. We did a sticker activity in Adventures Around the Globe and talked about New York City. We learned about Canada. We did a little activity in Adventures Around the Globe where we were supposed to find the differences between two pictures. Rhonda was surprisingly good at it! There was one that neither one of us could find, though--I guess finding differences isn't my strength!

I skipped some of the crafts we were supposed to do, but we did make a Statue of Liberty torch. That was fun for Rhonda because she got to cut the little pieces of paper to go in the top to make "flames." (She likes to cut paper, but she's not very good at cutting particular shapes yet.)

We finished Little House in the Big Woods. I think Rhonda really enjoyed it. I had so much fun sharing one of my childhood favorites with her.

We read a book about Sitting Bull, A Boy Called Slow. I didn't know much about Sitting Bull, so this was an interesting read for me, too.

We finished Thirteen Moons on a Turtle's Back. 

Rhonda finished her North American animal project this week. We looked at pictures of baby deer and she drew a picture of one.

Rhonda had fun using the flag stickers in the Flags Around the World book. It was fun to see some of the different flags of North America.

Here are some of the supplemental books we read this week:

Too Many Tamales
We the Kids
The Golden Flower: A Taino Myth from Puerto Rico
Coyote and the Firestick: A Pacific Northwest Indian Tale
Arrow to Alaska

On another note, Rhonda memorized her part for the Primary program: "Go to church on Sunday." We had a practice during Primary this week and she did such a great job speaking her part loudly, clearly, and without any help. I think she might have been the only kid who had her part memorized (yet--we still have two more weeks before the program). I'm so sad I won't be able to see her in the program this year (we'll be in London), but her grandparents will take her so at least she'll still be able to participate.

Preschool Week 4

This week we did lots of reading about kids who live in the United States in Children Just Like Me. Rhonda really likes reading this book and gets excited to learn about the kids.

We continued reading Little House in the Big Woods. Rhonda's enjoying it so far. Sometimes she'll mention things to me from the book. She wants to be just like Laura. It's really cute.

We've continued to read Thirteen Moons on a Turtle's Back, and Rhonda really likes that book as well. She makes guesses about the stories based on the pictures. (She wasn't too happy to see a picture that didn't have a moon in it.)

We read about bison in the Animal Atlas. I was sad to learn about the history of the bison. There used to be tons of them in North America, until they were very quickly hunted almost to extinction by European settlers, and now there are very few.

We read some fun animal poems. I really like the animal poems in the National Geographic Book of Animal Poetry because they aren't just silly poems (although some of them are); there are plenty that I find very intriguing personally.

Rhonda especially loves to read the nursery rhymes out of Over the Hills and Far Away. I can't recommend this book highly enough to families with little kids! The illustrations are so beautiful and interesting, and I love that it includes rhymes from English speakers all over the world. Rhonda always asks for "just one more nursery rhyme."

We've also continued to read through the Illustrated Book of Mormon Stories. Rhonda used to have a hard time remembering something from the story, but now she always remembers something, plus she will often ask questions about the story while we read it. It's fun to see her engaging with the Book of Mormon stories so well.

Supplemental books we read this week:
Cinco de Mouse-o!
Song of the Swallows
Thunder Boy, Jr. 
G is for Golden Boy: A Manitoba Alphabet
Show Way

This week we started Sierra in dance class! I wasn't planning on putting her in dance this young because I don't think kids her age really need any structured classes, but the last few weeks she's been trying to participate in Rhonda's class. She loves it so much that I couldn't resist putting her in a class of her own! It's a mommy & me class so we get to do it together. She loved her first class. She did a lot of just watching, but she loved playing the instruments. She's remarkably good at following and copying actions.

Speaking of Sierra...she learned to climb out of her crib this week! So, we moved the top bunk out of Rhonda's room and put it in her room so she could have a regular bed. The transition has been smoother than I dared to hope. She loves her new bed! When we go in her room, she often points to it and chatters about it excitedly. She has no trouble going to sleep. She is so cute lying in it--she looks so tiny in such a big bed.

Preschool Week 3

This week we continued our study of North America.

We continued reading Little House in the Big Woods. We had fun talking about Christmas traditions. We also talked about the things we do and don't do on Sundays and compared them to how the Ingalls family kept the Sabbath. (If I were Ma Ingalls, I would go out of my mind trying to keep kids happy with their standards. They couldn't even play with toys--just quietly look at them.) We continued reading about the way the moon changes in Thirteen Moons on a Turtle's Back. According to our curriculum, we're supposed to be keeping track of how the moon looks each night. But Rhonda usually goes to bed before the sky is totally dark, since it's summer. Plus, I just don't think of doing things like that at night, so, oh well. I don't think Rhonda's quite good enough at drawing to accurately draw the moon, anyway.

We talked about the Sonoran desert and found it on our map. We read Over in the Desert, a book about the animals of the Sonoran desert.

We talked about Hawaii this week. We colored a picture of Hawaiian shirts in Adventures Around the Globe (I thought it was sort of a weird way to represent Hawaii, but oh well). It gave us an opportunity to find Hawaii on the map and talk about what Hawaii is like. It was especially fun for me because I got to tell her about my own trip to Hawaii as a kid, and my grandfather's mission in Hawaii.

During our study of each continent, we'll do a cute little animal research project. For her North American animal, Rhonda chose the white-tailed deer. She drew a picture of a deer, and we learned what it eats, where it lives, and what its predators are. I was surprised by how excited Rhonda was about this project. She kept asking to work on it. She was excited to learn that humans are one of the deer's major predators, because she can draw humans!

Rhonda has been really into helping me cook lately. She helps make pancakes some mornings, and has learned how to stir well (without making a mess). She asked to make cookies this week, so I let her do a lot of the work. She's learning to measure ingredients accurately.

This has been a really good week for chores. We've been diligent about doing them every day, and Rhonda has gotten better about doing them. I've been trying to guide her through them more, which helps. She also enjoys it when I time her and she can see how fast she does a chore. I've learned that the best way to help her keep her room clean is to just not keep any toys in there. Of course, toys do migrate into her room, but I think if I go through it every week and move toys to the playroom it'll be a lot easier. She still has plenty of things to entertain her in there during quiet time (books, stuffed animals, her dollhouse, the "doll suitcase," and quiet books). If she really enjoyed having her room messy, I would probably be more lenient about her cleaning it, but she actually hates having a messy room and enjoys playing in her room much more if it's clean.

Here are the supplemental books we've read this week:

Over in the Desert
One Morning in Maine
Over the Hills and Far Away (a couple of nursery rhymes a day)
The Legend of the Indian Paintbrush by Tomie DePaola
The Legend of the Bluebonnet by Tomie De Paola
What Can You Do with a Paleta? 
Gathering the Sun: A Spanish Alphabet
Diego Rivera: His World and Ours
Jingle Dancer
Abuelita's Heart

Preschool Week 2

Week 2 was our introduction to North America. It was really fun to pick out picture books for this unit of the curriculum. It made me realize how truly diverse North America is. To be honest, I don't always think of North America as having the cultural diversity of, say, Europe, or Asia. But there are a lot of very different cultures here, from Native American to Mexican to Caribbean to Eskimo. Plus, there's a lot of diversity in the land, with deserts, islands, forests, ice caps, mountains, and so many others. I only wish we could cover more!

We started reading Little House in the Big Woods, which is a lot of fun for me because I loved that book as a kid (and still loved it when I re-read it not too long ago). I love picturing what life was like back then. I think it's interesting to read it with Rhonda, because I'm not sure how much she really understands of it. I don't know what she's picturing when I read about a pig being butchered, or butter being churned, or even Laura playing with a pretend doll that's just a corn cob. (Can Rhonda imagine a life without dolls?) I'm glad there are some pictures in the book to give her at least a little bit of reference. She always listens attentively.

To go with our Little House reading, we made homemade bread and homemade butter (just like the Ingalls family did!...If the Ingalls family had had a KitchenAid.) Rhonda loved making her own little loaf of bread, just like Laura.

We started reading Thirteen Moons on a Turtle's Back, which has Native American stories about the different moons of the year.

We two crafts this week. One was making a suitcase from a cereal box. I had a lot of fun making this craft. (Rhonda had a lot of fun cutting and gluing scrap paper, and then putting stickers on the suitcase when I finished making it.)

At the end of the week we made papel picados out of tissue paper and hung them on the wall in our playroom. 

We read some other books about the United States that I found at the library: 

The Scrambled States of America

The Scrambled States of America Talent Show

My Grandfather's Coat

Johnny Appleseed

L is for Lone Star: A Texas Alphabet

Unrelated to school, Rhonda asked to have a "cookies and milk tea party." I thought this seemed like a reasonable request, and she kept asking for a few days, so I invited over a little friend of hers. Michelle loaned us a kid-sized table and chairs, a little plastic tea set, and a cupcake ferris wheel. We made sparkle sugar cookies and got both chocolate and regular milk. The girls dressed fancy. They had the BEST time! They sat at the table for ages and poured endless cups of milk from the little teapots. Sierra also enjoyed herself, and even managed to drink out of her own teacup with very little spilling. 

Rhonda had a really fun time with all our activities this week. I found it a little difficult at times to fit everything into our schedule, but I love having really fun things planned out for her. 

Preschool Week 1

Our first week of school was a fun introduction to the world.

We learned about maps and read Me on the Map several times. Rhonda drew a map of her room, and she made a "Me on the Map" flip book where she drew pictures of her planet, continent, country, state, town, house, and herself. We also read about maps in some of our main curriculum books. We made a pop-out globe from Adventures Around the Globe, which was a great way to see how a flat object can represent a round object.

We read How to Make an Apple Pie and See the World almost every day, and we did activities related to it. We went to the store and I let Rhonda pick out any kind of apples she wanted. (Of course, since she's 4, she wanted every kind of apple.) We were supposed to taste-test them, but I skipped that activity since I was skeptical that she would try any and then I would have a bunch of apples with little pieces cut out of them.

At the end of the week, we made our own apple pie! I wasn't sure how I wanted to do this activity, because nobody in our house is a huge fan of apple pie and I didn't want tons of leftover pie. I thought about giving it away, but I wanted Rhonda to at least have a chance to taste it. So I found the perfect solution: apple hand pies! They were easy to make and very tasty. (I did offer Rhonda some of the apple when I cut it up for the pies. She didn't want to try it.) Both kids ate parts of their pies.

We made a passport for Rhonda to put her continent stickers in when we learn about a continent. I also took a picture of her and printed it to put in the front.

I'm learning that the crafts in this curriculum are a little above Rhonda's level. She probably just needs more practice using scissors, glue, etc. The crafts usually end up with me doing the craft, and Rhonda cutting up and gluing scrap paper next to me. I don't really mind it (for now, anyway), because I enjoy doing the crafts and Rhonda has fun doing her own thing. It's good practice for her fine-motor skills. If I start getting tired of doing the crafts, I may stop sometime during the year, but usually there isn't more than one craft per week.

We read a lot of fun books throughout the week that I found at the library, including:
A Cool Drink of Water
What We Wear
Whoever You Are
Can You Say Peace? 
Glass Slipper, Gold Sandal
Mapping Penny's World

I also discovered a gorgeous international nursery rhyme book that is illustrated by tons of famous artists and illustrators, called Over the Hills and Far Away. I got it out of the library, but then I just had to buy it! (I got it for cheap on Thriftbooks.) We'll read some nursery rhymes from different places throughout the year.

First day of school!

Monday was Rhonda's first day of school! I couldn't tell you who was more excited, me or Rhonda.

We did have a little snafu first thing in the morning, though. Apparently, when I told Rhonda that today would be her first day of school, I didn't communicate clearly enough that it would be school at home. 

I guess I thought, since we have been "doing school" for a little while now, she would automatically think that it would be more of the same. But she doesn't live under a rock. She knows about actual, real schools. (We have one literally one street down from us.)

So, she was pretty disappointed that she wasn't getting to GO to school. But she recovered from the disappointment quickly and then enjoyed our day together.

I asked her the night before what she wanted for breakfast for her first day of school. I told her she could pick, since it was a special day. She picked M&Ms. After some discussion, we agreed on pancakes with M&Ms on top. She loved her special breakfast so much that I got a genuine smile for a picture! (Pretty rare for a 4-year-old.)

Before we started schoolwork, I couldn't resist taking a traditional first-day-of-school picture in front of our front door (sans backpack and cutesy sign saying what grade she's in, because I'm not a fun Pinterest-y mom). Of course, we couldn't exclude Sierra.

We started with many of our regular morning time things: song, prayer, Book of Mormon story, and a new Spanish word ("la escuela," of course!). Then we got to get out our fun new school stuff!

We read Me on the Map and How to Make an Apple Pie and See the World, then looked at the animal atlas and talked about the animals we saw. Then we read some additional books about the world I picked up from the library:
Glass Slipper, Gold Sandal: A Worldwide Cinderella
Whoever You Are
Can You Say Peace? 

Then Rhonda drew a map of her room. I really underestimated how much she would enjoy this activity. (She's sort of hot and cold on drawing and coloring.) She needed some help thinking of what things to include on her map, but once she got going, she was all over it. When she was done, she wanted to draw a map of our town! I didn't even suggest this--she got the idea from the book.

The big rectangle with stuff in it is her doll suitcase, which she is very into lately, so it took up a lot of space on the map. In very artistic fashion, Rhonda made the most important things the biggest. 

After drawing, we had a reading lesson and some Reading Time. ("Reading Time" has come to mean a time when the kids get to pick the books.) We read Magic Tree House, Frog and Toad All Year, and a couple of board books that Sierra picked out.

Later we went for a walk, which I will not do again this entire month because it was absolutely boiling outside (and it was only 11 am), and we picked up some trash around the neighborhood. (Another activity that I really underestimated. These kids love to pick up trash! Or at least they enjoyed it this one time.)

Our school day was low-key, but definitely fun. My favorite thing about it was that Rhonda and I (and Sierra--she was actually pretty involved today) got to spend some time together doing things we both genuinely enjoyed. In twenty years, she probably won't remember the things she learned or the books we read this year, but I know she'll remember that quality time.

2019-2020 Curriculum!

You guys, I could not be more excited for what I have planned for this school year!

I've been eagerly anticipating Rhonda's first "official" year of homeschooling. (Actually, this technically isn't her first official year, since she's still preschool age, but...it's official according to me.) Last year, I felt that she was too young for a lot of structure, so we just had our morning time, did chores, and tried to read as much as we could.

However, going into this year, I wanted to incorporate a little more structure. Not because I think it's necessary, but because I think Rhonda would enjoy it. She really likes having activities planned for her, and I think she especially enjoys the attention and one-on-one time she gets when we do things together. When I don't plan for one-on-one time with her, sometimes it doesn't happen.

So, for a while now, I've been on the lookout for easy preschool ideas that will keep us all learning and having fun together, but don't have a lot of specific academic requirements. I definitely want to keep her first year of homeschool fun and exciting.

I was really excited to find Build Your Library. It was just what I was looking for: a laid-back, but easy to plan curriculum for preschool/kindergarten. (It's geared more toward kindergarteners, but I think Rhonda is a little intellectually advanced for her age.) This curriculum does not require any reading skills or math. However, with all the great books and activities that are included, Rhonda will undoubtedly be learning a ton.

I have to admit, I'm also excited for what I'll be learning! This curriculum is focused on learning all about the world. There's a lot I don't know about the world myself, so I'm really looking forward to learning with Rhonda.

Thanks to price shopping on Thrift Books, Half Price Books, and Amazon, I got almost all the required books for the year for less than $200. And it's a lot of books. This picture only includes what I got shipped in one day--still a lot more to go!

I love that the curriculum includes a few reference books, a few chapter books, and lots of picture books. I think it will be just the right variety for us. After looking at all the books I got in the mail, I'm very happy with the quality of the books. None seemed to be chosen just for the sake of having a book from a specific country or continent--I think all of them will be truly enjoyable to read.

I'm definitely unleashing my inner nerd as I get ready for the school year. I've been looking for tons of extension books in the library and making lists of books we can add to the curriculum. I've been on the lookout for different food and craft ideas from around the world, plus additional activities like documentaries on Netflix. I know Rhonda will enjoy this curriculum, but I think I'll enjoy it even more!

Aside from Build Your Library, we will continue doing our morning time, and we'll dive into Exploring Nature with Children (a collection of nature walks that I bought last year, but we've been sporadic about following it, so this year I hope to use it every week). We'll keep doing dance. I'm thinking about adding some kind of math element--perhaps just doing a very simple and fun math activity a week. We'll also continue to learn to read with Teach Your Child to Read in 100 Easy Lessons.

I'm also considering what else we can potentially add to the school year. I don't want to overdo it, but this curriculum is only thirty weeks, so that leaves a few extra weeks of school year time to do other things if we want. I'm planning out a unit study based on Christmas around the world that I'm really excited about! I'm going to try to pay attention to Rhonda's interests and perhaps try to make a unit study surrounding them.

I know my enthusiasm might slow down and some things will end up falling by the wayside. If we only end up doing thirty weeks of school, I think that's okay! But if Rhonda enjoys our school activities this year as much as she enjoyed everything we did last year, she might actually be disappointed to take breaks from school! (We actually never stopped any of our school activities over the summer.)

Morning Time

I've mentioned that we don't have a lot of structured learning time for our preschool this year, but there is one thing I do structure, and that's our morning time. I learned about the concept of "morning time" from Pam Barnhill, and the basic idea of it is that it's a time you have dedicated each day to learning that the whole family does together. I'm only teaching one kid (although Sierra certainly likes to find ways to be part of it!), so I see it as my opportunity to add just a little structured learning time into our day so I do the things that are most important to me.

Our morning time is probably only ten minutes long at the most, which I think is good for this age. I only include things that Rhonda and I both enjoy, so that she's always excited to have morning time. I do usually try to do it in the mornings after breakfast, although we sometimes end up doing it at other times of day. For Rhonda, I think she just views it as a special time that we get to snuggle up and do something together, which we don't always get at other times.

This is what our morning time looks like right now:

1. Primary song. I'm just going through the Primary songbook and singing the ones I know in order, so that I never get bored singing the same one. I used to try to teach Rhonda a song, but she doesn't like to be required to sing, so now I just sing to her.

2. Prayer. I noticed that, like most little kids, she would often say the same things over and over again in prayers, so now before we pray we plan the prayer together. I ask her, "What do you want to say thank you for?" and "Who do you want to say please bless?" She does often say the same things and the same people, but I try to encourage her to think of different things and people sometimes. I give her the chance to say the prayer, and if she doesn't want to then I say what we planned together.

3. Poem. I read the day's poem aloud from A Poem for Every Day of the Year. It's not a kids' collection of poems, but I think it's great for kids to hear beautiful language in poetry even if they don't really understand it. (I think kids' poems can be great too, but I'm personally really enjoying this collection so it's a great daily ritual for me, too!)

4. One page from the Illustrated Stories from the Book of Mormon. I read her one page and then ask her to tell me one thing she remembers from the story. Sometimes she needs a lot of help remembering something, but I try to challenge her to think of just one thing (I don't think it's a problem of memory or attention, just the challenge of putting it into words). Then I'll usually go back and re-tell the part of the story again in my own words. I think she often doesn't understand the stories very well the first time so she likes the repetition.

5. A Spanish word from Spanish At Home. I read out one Spanish word and a phrase with the word in it. I'm not trying very hard to teach Spanish (I'm not willing to dedicate the time or money to that currently), but I'm trying to incorporate it into our day whenever I remember. (Which isn't very often, but at least I'm reading one word a day!) Sometimes Rhonda repeats the word, but I don't require her to.

If Sierra is cooperating, I try to have a half hour of reading time right after morning time. We've been reading Magic Tree House books lately and Rhonda is really into them! I started just reading one chapter a day, but she's been insisting we read several chapters at a time and today we actually ended up reading the entire book because she never wanted me to stop. It's exciting to start being able to read chapter books with her! What are your favorite chapter books for younger kids?

As you can imagine, it can occasionally be challenging to do morning time with a toddler running around. Usually I'll pull out a puzzle or our little keyboard--something that can occupy her for a few minutes of time. I also think consistency has really helped; the more we've done morning time with Sierra around, the better she's become at entertaining herself for a few minutes.

I've experimented with adding other things to our morning time, but this is what works for us right now. I plan to add more in September. It's important to me right now that Rhonda really enjoys our morning time and that we have an opportunity to ease into "school." I've learned that it works best for Rhonda if I don't require her to do very much. My only true requirements are that she listens, and that she's reverent during the prayer. Obviously, this will change as she gets older. She's definitely the sort of child who prefers to observe, and I want to give her space to do this and not make morning time stressful for her. It's a time that we both love and value in our day.

May Highlights

May was a really fun month for us! At the end of April, Mom and Dad came to visit us. We went to see Hamilton, fulfilling a major dream for me. We had lots of other adventures, including a bread and chocolate tour of Dallas and taking the kids to parks, libraries, and bookstores all over town.

After my parents went home, we took a weekend trip to Utah for a family wedding. We also got to visit the Pralls. We loved seeing family and the kids had a great time. Doug got to be a groomsman in the wedding and he gave a great toast and had a lot of fun.

Toward the end of May, it really started feeling like summer! Our neighborhood pool opened, and we also got out the backyard unicorn pool, which the kids have loved.

For Memorial Day, we went out to Tyler State Park with some friends. We swam in the lake and had a potluck lunch. I had a major planning fail and didn't bring swimsuits! I'd assumed that the lake would have a shore, and that the kids would just wade out into it rather than actually swimming. Well, the lake was so high that it went all the way to the sidewalk, and there was no shore to speak of. It was more like a swimming pool. Thankfully, the park had a store nearby and we found swimsuits for us all. It was worth it! Rhonda had so much fun that she didn't want to leave. Sierra didn't really swim (we didn't have a swim diaper for her), but she had a blast running around.

May Cookies! I got to do three different cookies in May:

May Books! 

The Seven Principles for Making Marriage Work by John Gottman. I really liked this book about marriage and it made me really grateful for the marriage I have.

All the Money in the World: What the Happiest People Know about Getting and Spending by Laura Vanderkam. I was actually looking for a different book by Vanderkam at the library, but this was the only one they had and it piqued my interest. I liked the way it challenged the advice commonly given by finance experts. This book doesn't really give specific advice; it just offers different ways of looking at money in our lives.

Wired to Create: Unraveling the Mysteries of the Creative Mind by Scott Barry Kaufman and Carolyn Gregoire. I didn't enjoy this one much, although I did end up finishing it because it was so short, and I kept expecting it to get better. (The page count you see on Goodreads is misleading; a vast number of pages at the end were dedicated to the list of references. The page count of actual content was under 200.) It took me weeks to finish it, though. I couldn't quite figure out why the book was so boring, but I think I just don't like creativity being analyzed down into discrete categories of the "kind of person" who is creative. Much of the information wasn't really applicable to a creative person. Some of the chapters were just about the kinds of personalities that creative people tend to have--but you can't just change your personality to try to be more creative. Even that does sound like it would be interesting, but it just wasn't. I personally prefer a more mystical approach to creativity, because I think creativity is mystical. As much as these writers tried to convince me that they have creativity down to a science, I don't think modern science understands creativity nearly as much as these authors seem to think.

Emma by Jane Austen. I haven't read this book in years, and I was delighted to find that I still loved it even upon re-reading. However, I was more uncomfortable with certain things. I'm looking forward to discussing this with my book club next month.

No Doubt About It by Sheri Dew. I think Sheri Dew is such an amazing, inspiring person and I loved this book.

The Gown: A Novel of the Royal Wedding by Jennifer Robson. This novel about the women who embroidered Elizabeth II's wedding dress is just as wonderful as I hoped it would be. It was also more serious than the subtitle would suggest; it is, after all, a post-World War II novel. But don't let that deter you! It was a great story. However, it is a novel--none of the main characters are based on real people, mainly because we know next to nothing about the real women who embroidered the dress.

Their Eyes Were Watching God by Zora Neale Hurston. I've been meaning to read this book for years and I absolutely loved it. That said, I'm not sure everyone would enjoy it. The story is very sad (for good reason). At times, the culture that Hurston is writing about is hard to understand. But it really made me think about our country and its past. I read it on paper, but if I would recommend to most people to try an audio version. Hurston writes all the dialogue in a strong dialect which was hard for me to get used to reading with my eyes.

Save Me the Plums: My Gourmet Memoir by Ruth Reichl. I love Ruth Reichl and was eagerly anticipating this memoir of her years as the editor in chief of Gourmet magazine. This was such a fascinating read about the way she first completely revamped the magazine, then tried to save it in its final years. Reichl is an amazing writer and the way she tells this story makes me wish very badly that Gourmet were still around and I could subscribe to it. I think I want to be Ruth Reichl when I grow up.

This was a great reading month for me! All the great books I was reading kept up my momentum and I read a lot more than I usually do. Here's hoping I keep up the streak!

What we (don't) do for preschool

I tell people that Rhonda is homeschooled for preschool. And, well, that is objectively true: she's not going to an outside preschool.

But honestly? She's not really getting "schooled."

When it comes down to it, my philosophy for preschool this year is kind of to not really do preschool.

Now, there are certain "school-ish" things I've been doing, more to get her excited about learning and to ease us both into the homeschool life. We have morning time everyday (more on that later), we go on nature walks (when we can), and I've been putting a lot more emphasis on chores and what one might call "life skills" (learning to cook, clean, and do things for herself like get dressed and brush her teeth). We read aloud a lot (still not as much as I would like because #toddlerlyfe). We've been playing in sensory bins lately. She also takes a dance class.

To some people, this could seem like a lot of activities for someone who supposedly isn't "doing school," but conspicuously absent from this list are the things that one might typically expect a child to be taught in preschool: reading, writing, and basic math (or at least numbers).

If Rhonda were really interested in learning to read, I would teach her now. And to be honest, I have been a little impatient in the past and started trying to teach her, but she quickly lost interest and didn't want to do reading lessons after a few days, or just goofed around instead of following my instructions.

Rhonda knows all her letters and their sounds (or at least, she's learned all their sounds in the past even though she may have forgotten them by now because we don't review them all the time). If she were ready to read, she could read. She has all the necessary building blocks to start; she just doesn't want to start building.

And from everything I've read, that's perfectly okay and normal. The Read-Aloud Handbook taught me that many children actually aren't cognitively ready to learn to read until the age of six or seven. Rhonda can certainly wait until at least kindergarten age to learn to read. And let's be clear: if she were in public school, this wouldn't even be her last year of preschool. Since she was born in December, she still has one more year of preschool before she would be admitted to a kindergarten class. So the way I see it, I have at least two years that I must force myself to calm down about whether or not she can read before I can allow myself to freak out and convince myself that she will be the only adult of her generation who never learned to read and will live under a bridge the rest of her life. What I'm saying is, I'm cool, guys. 

I'm also definitely not convinced that there's any good reason to start teaching handwriting before a child even gets a handle on reading. It doesn't even make sense to me. Certainly, a child who doesn't learn to write until the age of six could very quickly catch up to her peers. Now, again, if Rhonda really wanted to learn to write, I would help her. She has shown some vague interest in the past, but I've tried to let it just be natural instead of jumping in and making her do writing drills.

As far as math, all I feel inclined to do at this point is help her read numbers up to 100. Sometimes we do really basic addition. And when I say we "do" it, I don't mean I sit her down at the kitchen table and start writing out equations. I mean that maybe she's playing with blocks, and I say, "Oh, you have two blocks. Here are three more. How many do you have now? One, two, three, four, five. Five blocks! Two plus three is five." She may not even participate in this conversation (although she does, more often than not). These are the kinds of things that I think most parents do without even thinking about them.

Next year, I do have a lot more fun stuff planned (more on this to come!), but I'm still not planning on teaching reading, writing, or math--or at least, I'm not planning on making a plan. I'll look for more informal opportunities to teach math, and when Rhonda decides she's ready to read, I'll start teaching her at whatever pace she likes.

I do admit, although I'm not too worried about the math and writing, I'm not nearly so easy-breezy about waiting to teach reading; the thought of letting Rhonda decide when reading instruction will happen kind of gives me heart palpitations. Our society does not smile kindly upon late readers, especially homeschooled ones. But the mantra that always calms me down is something my mom said to me: "No child that loves books as much as Rhonda does would not learn to read." And that's the truth: Rhonda just loves books. I know few children her age who love books as much as she does. She would love to be read to for hours every day, and at some point almost every day she can be found quietly sitting and looking at books. I have no doubt that someday, she's going to say to herself, "I have just got to know what these words say, and I don't want to have to wait until Mom is ready to read to me. I want to read it myself!" And whenever that day comes, we'll start learning to read.

Why homeschool?

The question "Why do you homeschool?" is one that has so many answers, I hardly know where to start. As a new homeschooler (and one that doesn't get questioned very often since my oldest is only preschool-age), I haven't really honed my answer yet. There are so many reasons that I homeschool, ranging from reasons specific to my child, reasons based on my own experience, reasons based on what I know about public education...the list goes on.

But the other day I was reminded of an experience from my childhood that helped crystallize one of the major reasons I want to homeschool, in my own mind.

Sixth grade was the last grade I was ever in public school. One thing I was very excited for in middle school was taking a middle school science class. In elementary school, we didn't have science--just "social studies," which somehow was supposed to encompass history, science, culture, and I don't even know what else. But middle school was different. Middle school had an entire hour every day devoted specifically to science!

When I entered the science classroom the first day, I looked around in wide-eyed wonder. The room was lined with what looked to my eyes like a serious laboratory: there were sinks (presumably for washing chemicals off one's hands), beakers (presumably for mixing potions in), and complicated charts and posters (presumably based on the science we would learn in class). I was pumped. I was going to do real science experiments!

The first day of class wasn't quite what I envisioned: rather than breaking out the chemicals, we were lectured in lab safety. However, despite that, my excitement only grew. We were learning about how to be safe around chemicals and other science stuff, which surely meant that we would be knee-deep in chemistry, biology, and physics in no time!

For what felt like weeks, we continued to drill the lab safety rules into our heads. We made posters about lab safety. We memorized rules. (It was probably only a week or two, but to me it felt like ages. Also, did we really need a week or two to memorize rules like "Keep your goggles on at all times"?) Surely, once this was over, we would get to the good stuff!

No such luck. The only actual science thing I remember studying that year was the way you draw mountains on a map. (Another thing I remember so distinctly that we must have spent weeks working on it.) I can think of few science subjects that would be less interesting to an 11-year-old than how to read maps of mountains, yet apparently this was a vital topic in sixth grade.

We didn't mix potions. We didn't drop objects off the tops of buildings (like they did in my beloved Sideways Stories from Wayside School). We never so much as washed our hands in those ever-inviting sinks. Ironically, we never actually had reason to follow the rules we spent the first two weeks memorizing.

Now, I can't say I blame our teacher for not wanting to hand dangerous chemicals to a pack of unruly 11-year-olds. Perhaps she even had cool experiments planned, but concluded that we (aka the other kids, because I was busy trying to prove how mature and rule-following I was so we could get to the good stuff) were too rowdy and would never follow the rules. And she was probably right. If we'd been allowed anywhere near chemicals, someone in that class probably would have had to go to the emergency room.

But I don't want my kids to have to spend a year quietly decoding boring mountain maps while they're waiting for something interesting to happen. (Not that mountain maps are objectively boring--but if you're a kid who wants to pour some chemicals into a beaker and instead are forced to read mountain maps for weeks on end, they are definitely boring.) With homeschooling, we get to do the interesting stuff. If my kid says they want to do a real science experiment, we can. Because we're not working with a class of thirty insane kids. And honestly? I'm pretty excited myself to pour some vinegar over baking soda.

Problem Solving + Staying in Bed

I recently read the book How to Talk so Kids will Listen and Listen so Kids will Talk by Adele Faber and Elaine Mazlish, and so far, it has truly changed the way I parent day-to-day. I've read a few parenting books in my day, and usually I'll think while I'm reading, Wow, these are great ideas! This book is really going to help me! But then, in the moment I actually need those brilliant ideas, I don't remember them. This book is different. I still make a lot of mistakes, but I also remember what to do a lot, even in moments when I'm frustrated or angry.

One of the things the book recommends is to problem-solve with your child, when it comes to a recurring problem that you haven't been able to fix using smaller strategies. You sit the child down (in a peaceful moment, not at the time the problem is occurring and everyone is cranky), and you say, "Look, we have a problem. You don't want to stay in your room at night after we put you to bed. But Daddy and I want you to stay in your room. So, let's come up with some ideas of how we can solve this problem."

(Okay, yes, this is exactly the problem we were having.)

You get out a piece of paper and a pen and you write down every idea. THIS IS IMPORTANT, PEOPLE. Sorry to yell, but personally, I didn't think this would be all that important with a child that doesn't know how to read yet. But guess what? Kids that don't know how to read still love to see an adult treat their ideas as important enough to write down.

You might say, "How about you go to bed half an hour earlier?" Probably, your 4-year-old will protest, but you'll say, "We're not deciding what to do yet. We're just writing down ideas." Excited by the prospect that everything will get written down, your 4-year-old may come up with this brilliant solution: "I'll keep getting up." You bite your tongue and write it down.

Finally, when all your ideas have been exhausted, you read through the list with your child. Both you and the child have veto power: if anyone doesn't like an idea, it gets crossed out. If you both like it, it stays.

Whenever I've gone through this process with Rhonda just the two of us, we've managed to come up with a good solution. This time, I was kind of stumped. I didn't really have any good ideas. Thankfully, I'd involved Doug this time, and he had a brilliant idea: What about a sticker chart (like the kind we used with potty training)?

That was the winner. And guess what? It worked. Most of the time, Rhonda stays in her room at night! When she gets 7 stickers (currently; I plan to increase the amount gradually), she gets to have a special outing with Doug or me.

I tell you this not because I think I'm a brilliant parent who just does everything right--honestly, I just want this here so that in a year, when I'm probably due for a re-read of How to Talk so Kids will Listen, I can look back on this and remember that this actually works. Kids want to be part of the solution! They want to have control over their lives (surprise, surprise).

In fact, I've been using this strategy so often and so successfully that the other day when I was complaining about how Rhonda doesn't always stay in her room during quiet time (a time I desperately need for my own sanity), Rhonda looked at me and said, "Mom, I want some solutions."
"Huh?" I said helpfully.
"We need some solutions! Like with bedtime!"
And I realized that this time, she was asking me to sit down with her and make a list of ideas. It blew me away! Quickly, we decided together that she could also get a sticker for staying in her room during quiet time. So far, it's worked--and I really am staying much more sane. Even a 4-year-old can take some responsibility to make things work.

New Blog!

Hi family and friends!

I haven't been blogging for quite a while now, but I've been thinking it would be nice to have a little place to chronicle our adventures in homeschooling, parenting, kid stuff, etc. and possibly share it with family or anyone else who's interested. My pictures often get lost in the black hole of the hard drive that holds our millions of pictures (all the good and bad ones, including the 462 pictures I took of the kids swinging on the swings that one day), and although I like to use Instagram to share pictures, I often find myself wanting to write more than people actually want to read on Instagram (including me).

I've learned from experience that I have a terrible memory when it comes to my kids. When I was pregnant with Sierra, and shortly after she was born, I kept asking myself, "When do babies start eating solid foods? When do they roll over? When do they crawl? When do they sleep through the night?" Despite the fact that I had already gone through all of this with Rhonda, I hardly remembered a thing about babies. There are many things I've already forgotten that I wish I'd written down somewhere.

Now that I'm doing preschool at home with Rhonda, I've been itching to record what we've been doing. I write it down in a notebook at the end of the day, but I don't write much, and it feels kind of impersonal, more of a record if the Authorities come calling (which they obviously wouldn't for preschool, but whatever). I do write in a journal, but that's just for me, not really for family stuff.

So, the idea of the blog was born: a place where I could chronicle our activities with plenty of pictures and plenty of words, with the plus that family and friends could take a look if they were interested, and a nicely condensed and curated collection of memories I can look back on in the years to come (when I'll surely be asking myself, "What the heck did we do for preschool?"). Welcome to Hubbards at Home!