on-hand modern

weird science: naked egg experiment

did you like science as a kid? i thought this was so interesting.

how to do it: submerge an egg in vinegar for at least 24 hours.

what happens: the vinegar dissolves the egg shell.

what's weird about it: the membrane inside the shell remains intact. you can hold the egg, sans shell, in your hands. it feels sort of squishy but solid, like J-ello. and it's transluscent.

biggest surprise: once the membrane is pierced, it's just a regular old egg again with a runny white and raw yolk. (but you probably shouldn't make cookies with it.)

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diy: wooden learn-to-read wheel

this little wheel is a fun and gentle way for beginning readers to begin to practice sounding out words. turn the wheel to make different words (silly words are okay too) and the child will be thrilled to discover how many words he can read just by changing a single letter/sound. start with two-letter words first and move on to three-letter words when the child is ready.

to make the wheel you will need the following supplies available at your local craft and/or hardware store:

• 2 wooden disks (they should be about 1/4" thick and measure about 2" and 4" in diameter)
• 1 wooden peg (you will be cutting this down, buy a couple extra just in case)
• chalkboard paint
• wood glue

begin by painting the disks with chalkboard paint. when they are dry, drill a hole the same diameter as your wooden peg through the center of each disk. stack the disks one on top of each other and thread the peg through the disks. mark where you will need to trim the peg so the end is flush with the back of your bottom disk. cut peg with a small hand saw.

assemble the wheel by threading your shortened peg through the smaller disk first. apply wood glue to the hole of the larger disk. slide it onto the peg and allow to dry.

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home educating series: journaling

i'm not great at explaining the hows of homeschooling or exactly what it is we do all day. but olivia's journal does a pretty good job of *showing* you. i find it fascinating to page through. it isn't divided by subject and includes everything from her daily to-do lists to field trip reports to recipes she's tried, sketches of important historical figures, notes on a research topic of her choice, spelling lists of words that are relevant to her, memory work (scripture mastery), and so on. right now she's working on an on-going collaboration with her grandparents: they write down stories from their personal history and she edits and publishes them into books (see second photo). 

asher has a journal too. but at this age he's not that into it.

do you journal at all? i suppose ye old blog is sort of my version. there's something to be said for good old-fashioned pencil, paper, and tape though.

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home educating: liberty memorial field trip

sick toddler in arms today, but here is a quick photo of our field trip to the world war I museum here in kansas city last friday. we ended up staying...FIVE HOURS.

fascinating. sobering. but fascinating.

what field trips do you remember from when you were a kid? i'd love to hear your ideas.

[family photo by grandma kris, in town for a short visit last weekend]

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home educating series: our back-to-school photos

[third grade / kindergarten / 2 years old]

pretty much making me smile this morning.

have a great weekend!

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Homeschool Series: what do you call it?

don't laugh, but i've recently taken a cue from my sister and started using the term home-educating instead of home-schooling to describe our family's approach to learning at home. maybe it's a silly thing, but i feel like it fits us better. and not that we have to have a label, but sometimes i need that reminder that the process of one's becoming educated doesn't (shouldn't?) have to look--or feel--like "doing schoolwork". it can be more organic than that, child-led, spontaneous, unpredictable, interesting, relevant, fun.

people ask me how we do it, and i'm never sure how to answer that. we try a lot of different things. some of them work and some of them don't. at the heart of it all, there's this element of growing trust between us. i trust that my children want to learn and try to give them the freedom and opportunity to do so. they, in turn, trust me to do the best i can, be present and compassionate, make adjustments when needed, and just generally not screw them up too much.

i can say that it's both terrifying and exhilarating following a path that isn't mainstream. we're just figuring it out as we go. and maybe that's why giving a name to what we do seems important to me right now? i find that i'm constantly asking myself: what is this we're doing? are my children getting the right opportunities? what exactly is an education anyway (i know it isn't the same as a diploma or a degree, though more often than not the terms are used interchangeably) and how do we get it?

pause.

are you educating at home? what do you call it? does it matter?

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it only looks like a tornado

i thought you might like to see some photos of a typical morning around here. well, not *exactly* typical. about five minues later the sirens started.

maybe you've heard about our wild weather here in the midwest? we are grateful to have avoided the worst of it--or more accurately, it has avoided us. we are mindful of our neighbors in joplin, MO (about two hours southeast of us) where the destruction and loss of life...well, you've probably seen the reports.

anyway.

not to change the subject, but i caved and let olivia start reading the fifth harry potter. i guess i decided it might be dark and scary, but at least it isn't real.

she's pretty into it, can you tell?

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Homeschool Series: reading chapter books aloud with children

Obviously, reading chapter books aloud isn't just for homeschooling families! But it's a great way to foster literacy so I'm including it as part of this series. Getting started can seem daunting, so today I'm sharing 5 strategies for success:

At what age do I start? This varies of course for each child, but in my experience, around age 4 is a good time. You can certainly start earlier if you like, but in that case I recommend it as a secondary activity (I hate to call it background noise, but that's sort of what I mean) while the child is quietly engaged in doing something else. Don't expect the child to sit still for long periods of time in the beginning. Start with short reading sessions at first and work up to longer ones as the child's attention span grows over time.

What time of day is best? Again, this varies with each child. Currently our routine is to read aloud at bedtime as the children are winding down for sleep, but in the past we've also had success reading first thing in the morning (snuggled up in bed together), over breakfast, or during quiet time in the afternoon. Experiment with different times of day to see what works best for you and your child.

What should I start with--any suggestions? In the beginning I recommend books with short chapters and lots of illustrations. Books with a bit of humor are good too. To that end, I recommend works by Roald Dahl, Beverly Cleary, and E.B. White as first read-aloud chapter books, but any book/author that captures your child's attention will do.

Keep in mind when making your selections that it's okay to take into account your own preferences as well. Slogging through a book with a too-precious storyline or a writing style that makes you cringe just because your child liked the artwork on the cover isn't conducive to a successful long-term read-aloud experience.

What about reading aloud with older children? Reading aloud as a family can be a great experience with children of any age! I remember reading aloud on long car trips as a teenager, and my husband still enjoys being read to while he drives. Of course the trick is when you have multiple children of different ages and at varying comprehension levels--what then? In that case, just choose any book that is engaging and well-written, even if some of the language is beyond a younger child's understanding. He/she will still be able to follow most of the plot, and at the same time be exposed to complex speech and sentence structure that sets the stage for future literacy.

What if I fail? You probably will sometimes. We're all busy families. We don't always have time to read aloud. And even when we do, some reading sessions will inevitably go more smoothly than others. The important thing is to keep trying. Be consistent and persisent, and you will have success!

Now it's your turn. What suggestions do you have for reading chapter books aloud with children? Any experience, wisdom, and/or book recommendations to share? Please do!

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Homeschool Series: what we did for spring break

 

heck yes, homeschoolers get a spring break. or at least these ones do.

the bad news is that we had to cancel our plans for a little mini-road trip when we found out last-minute that the temple in st. louis was CLOSED for cleaning. [womp-womp.]

the good news is that--thanks to a heads-up from kelly--i bought a bike!  it's pretty! it has a basket! it cost less than $100! not only that, but it makes me want to write with exclamation points! (sorry, no pictures yet, but rest assured that so far we are very happy together.)

we also bought a little bike seat for scout to ride in. she screamed the first time she rode with me (no, really, SCREAMED--citizens for miles around have now been advised to keep a close eye out for what is believed to be the notorious Suburban Bike-Ride Kidnapper), but then k met up with us after work, and of course she loved it, and even fell asleep shortly after he took over. (eyeroll. thanks for making me look bad again, kid.) she is papa's girl, that one. no doubt about it.

i estimate we rode around 10 miles on friday alone, which i think is pretty good with little ones. asher did have one pretty major wipe out--luckily, with only minor injuries--so there were some tears. but then i could have cried too on a couple of those hills. thank goodness for gas stations and band-aids and beef jerky.

other spring break highlights:

• snow on monday, but the rest of the week we had perfect spring weather.
• we made a leprechaun trap and ate green ramen noodles.
• k cooked corned beef.
• we went to mi ranchito on taco tuesday. (tacos for $1!)
• our daffodils started blooming.
• olivia had a friend stay for a late-over.
• we watched megamind two nights in a row.
• we started scout on a new anti-fungal med. fingers crossed.
• we finished the pie. (for the record, we did take some one to meredith and the other nurses at the hospital on sunday.)
• we ate outside a lot.
• we went swimming. and to the park.
• we made some progress on book 4.

that about sums it up for us. what did you do for spring break? or if it hasn't happened yet, what are your plans?

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homeschool series: fine motor and pre-writing skills

i love this line art that happened during church a few weeks ago.

asher's fine motor control has improved by leaps and bounds in the last several months. at the beginning of the school year, he was just barely making scribbles, and now we have safari animals and cowboys on (vampire?) horses.

i know there are lots of ways to encourage fine motor development (important for pre-writing and eventually writing) in preschool-aged children, but today i want to talk about a couple of favorites:

dot-to-dots and mazes.

we like the ones from dover. but any book of mazes or dot-to-dots will do. the key is to start with really easy activities and slowly graduate to more complicated ones. if in doubt, err on the side of too simple rather than too complicated. the purpose of the exercise is for the child to learn how to hold a pencil, apply the proper amount of pressure, and move it up, down, and across the page easily; the critical thinking skills needed to solve increasingly complex puzzles are (for the purposes of this exercise anyway) secondary.

here's what a typical pre-writing "lesson" might look like at our house:

--complete a simple dot-to-dot picture of a giraffe.

--color the giraffe.

--read about giraffes in a library book, children's encyclopedia, or science magazine.

simple. but a lot can be accomplished in just those three steps: fine motor development, yes. but also math (number recognition and sequencing), art, reading, and science.

a lesson like this might take anywhere from 10 minutes to an hour, depending on his mood and the day. i try to pick a time when we're both in the right frame of mind, and if we miss a day (or a week) i don't sweat it. there are times when he gets so engrossed in solving mazes, that he does 3 in one sitting and then spends the next hour coloring them. the next day he might look at books for less than 2 minutes and never pick up a pencil. and then there are the days when i think, "we should really work on fine motor skills today" and i find him in his bedroom, already engaged in his latest lego creation, and i realize--

i'm redundant.

anyway. is any of this interesting to you? i wrote this whole post and now i think it might be like, "duh. dot-to-dots and mazes. brilliant. next she's going to tell us about these amazing new things called pencils."  

i should probably just stop talking and ask you: what fun things do you do with your pre-schoolers to encourage fine motor and pre-writing skills?

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