TV Sick-O-Meter and a Few Books

Here is how I knew I was sick. I was lying in bed watching Sesame Street. And my 14 year old, my 12 year old and my almost 8 year old were watching it too. And I didn't care. It seemed like a reasonable way to pass the rest of our lives. Sesame Street was actually the viewing highlight, which at the time didn't bother me but in retrospect I find depressing.

Once I'd hauled myself off to the doctor's for an industrial strength antibiotic - the kind that requires permission from the capital - I improved sufficiently to remember books.

Here are the books I read. They have no complex commentary because I don't want to be out of bed that long.

Shadow Tag by Louise Erdrich. Awesome if you like art and crumbling marriages in your novels, and I do.
Secret Smile by Nicci French. Lame but better than kids TV.
The Little Women Letters by Gabrielle Donnelly. Great-great grandaughter of Jo discovers letters in the attic. Silly but diverting.
A Day in The Life of a Smiling Woman by Margaret Drabble. Short stories. Depressing.
Never Let Me Go by Kazuo Ishiguro. Very readable . And that isn't meant to be faint praise. Awesome if you like restraint combined with weird in your novels, which I do.
All That I Am by Anna Funder. A desperation read which I found surprisingly good. German refugees between the wars. Spies. Bravery. Etc.

There.

Homeschool Reverb #11 - The Zombie Project

My zombie project of 2011 is particularly shameful, seeing as how I did all the planning and most of the purchasing for this project nine months ahead of time.

However, instead of a Term 4 glorious flowering of interest, knowledge and admiration for Picasso, complete with biographies, art lessons and unit studies, everyone has simply said things like "I already know about Picasso and his phases." and "He's the dude who painted Guernica." and "Do I have to ?"

The exhibition is on until March. I imagine I will find the initiative to drag us off - us meaning minus Snowy - to see it before it ends. It takes around 12 minutes on the train to get there. We will make it. I think.

Homeschool Reverb #11 - Do Over

If you could have one moment  that you could do differently in 2011, what would that moment be?

Trying to remember a year full of moments is an impossible task for me; I'm no Proust. I know what I'd do over though.

Lucy's 8th grade year was one of shaken confidence for me. Partly this was due to the sudden introduction of school into our lives, partly to worrying over high school. Lucy must do more! It must look more like school! We must use curricula! It was time to buckle down! With a textbook!

Trouble is, with our dear Charlotte Mason chucked unceremoniously out the window, the year became a grind. 

9th grade will be simple. Simple, but with complex material. Lucy and I will go back to a CM style of education with plenty of books strong in a narrative voice, plenty of written narrations, plenty of time outdoors and working on real life skills - they call it food and textile technology at school in that mania for all things fancy, we call it sewing and cooking - a few outside classes and end of term exams to pop into a portfolio. 

As far as do overs go, this one's a cinch, going back to a style that has worked for Lucy for years, one that speaks to her strengths and temperament, one that will take her through high school perfectly efficiently and rigorously...

Click on the swooning lady at the right to visit Rebel Homeschool for links to more do overs and blog prompts.

Homeschool Reverb #11 - Turning Point

Did you have a turning point in 2011? A point where homeschooling became easier, or conversely, more difficult?

Did your circumstances, your mindset or your child/children's mindset suddenly click into a new groove with a certain subject or with your homeschooling routine?
Did unexpected life circumstances throw up new obstacles? Maybe you and yours had more than one turning point. . .

You could call it a new groove. The school groove.

Arwen has been at home with me for the last 12 years, except for the one year of preschool where she managed to meet her best friend and cry every single time I dropped her off. When I say 'at home with me', I did allow her out now and then! Dance, gym, co-ops, classes, friend's houses, sleepovers. Her education, though, was firmly in my hands.

Earlier in the year Arwen came to me and said she wanted to go to school. We tussled over it for a time, this desire of hers for a new adventure, a wider circle. For  a while I thought I could 'fix' it with  the right activities, the right homeschool friends - where were these friends ? - the right teaching style.

My own turning point came when I allowed myself to accept that home education was not meeting my daughter's needs and that turning myself inside out to try was not the answer.

We've enrolled her in an all-girl school, one with a performing arts program. She's already dancing in a school ensemble and the school has been nothing but helpful and positive at the prospect of a homeschooled child in their midst. "She shines." a teacher told me.

School starts in February. Grade Seven. A gaggle of girls from all over the place, little fish suddenly in their very big pond.

At times I've felt like Houdini, turning myself inside out to accept the value of a schooled education, albeit one that is chosen by the student, without diminishing my love and great respect for a home education. A big task as I enter my tenth year of home education, for Snowy and Lucy remain happily at home.

For more turning points and blog prompts, please visit Rebel Homeschool or click on the swooning lady button on the right of this page!