It Has Begun

It has begun.

This school year marks the beginning of my last 13 years of teaching.

Let's pause and let that sink in for a minute.

Yeah.

I only have 13 years left before I retire.

Amazing.

Anyway.  Moving on.

We started our new school year on Monday, and for the first time, all four kids are "officially" in school.

I have two 5th graders, a 4th grader, and a Kindergartner.

All of the books that are scheduled to be read in the first 12 weeks barely fit on the school shelves in the living room,

(although some of these books will carry through the whole year)

(The top two shelves are alphabetized by author, and the bottom row of over-sized books is too.)

and our school cupboard in the kitchen is full of the workbooks and notebooks we use (almost) every day.

(Workbooks are grouped by subject, and notebooks are color-coded according to each child's signature color...which also happen to be their favorite colors.)

Am I organized?  Why, yes, yes I am.

Maybe a little bit too organized?

Maybe.

But I'm OK with that, and so is my family.

It helps keep the chaos under control, and everyone knows where to find what they need.

And if they can't find what they're looking for, I know exactly where to tell them to look!

***

(Can anyone guess what song is now stuck in my head?)

My Saturday Morning

After breakfast and chores were done Saturday morning, I curled up in my favorite chair to work on scheduling a few more books into our fifth grade curriculum.

My children had the entire house available to them for playing with their little plastic Cowboys and Indians...

and they chose the space right at my feet.

Organization and chaos...

Isn't that how Saturday mornings are supposed to be?!?

Kindergarten Plans

On Monday I told Isaak that he will be starting Kindergarten next year. He was very excited that he will be finally starting school just like his sisters, and for the rest of the day we heard all about his ideas for what he is planning to do once he starts Kindergarten.

On Tuesday I spent most of the day on the computer, searching for and researching books for 5th grade (but that's another story), and every time I went downstairs for something, he would ask me, "Are you working on my Kindergarten?"

On Wednesday morning, as I sat at the table correcting Math and Grammar for the girls, Isaak brought up the subject again. "Mom, I don't think I'm ready to start Kindergarten yet." I told him that was OK, that we could wait a while. He sat quietly for a few seconds then responded, "OK, maybe tomorrow."

This evening I asked him to get out some kid plates for dinner, and he told me, "I got two plates and then two more so there would be four, because two plus two equals four." I thanked him and had him set them on the counter for me, and he asked, "Mom, am I supposed to know that already, or will I learn that in Kindergarten?"

The Fight Against Fuzz

I do not regret reading any of the books that I read in my childhood. At least not that I can remember at the moment!

I'm sure that some of the literary choices I made were less than stellar, but none were really awful, bad books. Part of that, I'm sure, is due to the fact that I was finding my reading material in our little library in Peru (yeah, that would be the little library on the missionary base), and therefore must also partly be due to the fact that any book I checked out had to make it past "Aunt" Teresa*, the former-nun-turned-missionary-librarian.

Aunt Teresa scared all of us kids, I think. She was a tiny woman even from a child's point of view, with short cropped gray hair and a no-nonsense attitude. She ran that library. She might have even been officially in charge of it. NO ONE crossed Aunt Teresa. If she didn't approve of a book I was trying to check out, she would call my mom to make sure it was OK if I walked out with it. It drove me crazy, and eventually Mom told her that I could check out anything I wanted and they (my parents) would look at it before I read it. And yet, although I was in awe of her, there was a certain sparkle in her eyes that made me feel like I was her favorite among all the kids that passed by her desk. My speed-reading, book-devouring little self certainly kept her busy, at least!

My girls read just like I did as a kid; fast and often. And, just like their mother, they read far above their grade level, which is where my battle begins...and where I begin to appreciate Aunt Teresa's efforts at a whole new level.

Our school curriculum is heavy on reading. (Imagine that!) We have multiple books for each subject, as well as "free reading" books and scheduled literature. We have books for Kindergarten through 5th grades on our shelves, and I've started collecting books for 6ththrough 12th grades as well. It would be an understatement to say that we have a lot of books.

And it is precisely because we have a lot of books that I keep a list in my purse of all the books on our school shelves. It's printed in a font about this big, and it's currently 9 pages long. I started it a few years ago because I kept coming home with books I was looking for...only to find a copy already sitting on our shelves! I am constantly updating the list: when I pull a book off the shelf to get rid of, that book gets deleted from the list, and when I find a new treasure, it gets added to the print-out before it gets shelved. It's a system that has worked well for me, and I've successfully kept it to "only" 9 pages. (So far!)

The other day I entered some new books into my list, and in the process decided that one of the books, although harmless enough in subject matter, wasn't worthy of "living" on the school shelves. (I call these kinds of books "fluff" books. They are books that are mindless, quick reads, with nothing to grow on. They have little, if any, educational value and contain nothing worth thinking about later. They are books with no "meat" to them, only "fluff".)

I told the girls that I had decided that it was a "fluff" book, and that if they wanted to keep it they had to squeeze it onto their shelves. They kept it, and later, one of them asked me why I had called it a "fuzz" book, yet put a similar book on the school shelves.

I asked her if she had learned anything from the fluff book (hereafter known as a "fuzz" book!), and she said, "Well, no, but it was fun!" Then I asked her if she had learned anything from the other book. "I already knew about most of it...but in the end Mr. X learned that he shouldn't be rude to strangers, and ... OH! I get it! One of the people in the book learned a good lesson that we can learn too! That's why it's not a fuzz book and the other one is!"

I think Aunt Teresa would approve!

*All of the kids on the missionary center called the adults "Aunt" and "Uncle". It was like having one really big family. :)

Mike's 6:30 a.m. Discovery

My husband is ever-so-thoughtful.

I came downstairs just after 7 this morning,

and as I was drinking the latte he made for me,

he told me he had taken some pictures on his phone of something

I would probably never see for myself in my lifetime.

***

The suspense built, and he pulled out his phone to show me pictures of...

***

...our early-risers doing their math.

At 6:30 in the morning.

(I don't get up that early,

which is why I'd never see it for myself.

Ha ha. Very funny, Mike.)

I am so spoiled!

Of Chess and the Study of the English Language

There's nothing like a nice game of chess before breakfast...

...if you can talk your big sister into playing with you!

*** *** ***

Jaela and Macey began studying Latin and Greek roots this year, and although Anya won't officially begin the full program until next year, she has been learning along with them. They learn four new roots per week, then do a comprehensive review at the end of the week. During this week's review:

Anya: Hey, Mommy! Curro, cursum is just like corro in Spanish! Run! (Then, a few minutes later...) And Mommy, I haven't been pathos very bonus lately.

Translation for those of you not "up" on your Greek and Latin roots: Pathos means feeling, and bonus is good.

Personal History, American History...and a Little Math

Since we moved to the east/south and started visiting historical sites, I have been trying to remember whose North Carolina log cabin home I visited when I was in 8th grade. I remembered that it was a former president's birthplace, and I thought we went there on a field trip, but I couldn't remember any of my classmates being there.

Today the light bulb finally went on, and everything became clear again. It turns out that I don't remember any classmates being there because they weren't. It wasn't a school field trip. When I asked Mom about it, she reminded me that she, Randy, and I went with Ruby Knapp to visit James K. Polk's birthplace in April 1990, and she sent me this picture.

(Randy, Me, and "Aunt" Ruby Knapp)

Thanks for the picture, Mom!

It just so happens that this week in American History, Jaela and Macey are learning about James K. Polk, the eleventh president. Today I opened our Illustrated Encyclopedia of the Presidents of America to the pages about James Polk, and read that:

James Polk was the eleventh president, and his political career began after he moved to Tennessee from North Carolina, where he was born. (That was my "ah ha!" moment.) I pointed out to the girls that:

Me: He was Governor of Tennessee for a while, but he was born in North Carolina. That's whose cabin I visited when I was a kid!

Macey: (completely innocently) Was he still governor when Mommy visited his home?

Ahem. Insert short math lesson here involving dates from the mid-1800's and a certain birthdate circa 1976.

There. Aren't you glad we cleared all that up?

Jamestown Through Jaela's Eyes

Powhatan Indian Village:

Ships at anchor:

Riverfront Discovery Area:

James Fort:

(The musket firing demonstration...he fired, she jumped!)

(Self-portrait in the bathroom on the way to the van)

Jamestown Through Macey's Eyes

Powhatan Indian Village:

Ships at anchor:

Riverfront Discovery Area:

James Fort:

(The musket firing demonstration...she jumped as she took the picture!)

Jamestown...Just the Facts

Jamestown was very hands-on, and fun for everyone. There was a museum inside (no pictures allowed), and outside there were four places to visit and experience: Powhatan Indian Village, three replica ships at anchor, a Riverfront Discovery Area, and James Fort.

Powhatan Indian Village was set up with different sized homes, complete with beds, fire pits, and feathers, arrows, and animal pelts of all kinds hanging on the walls. There were places for the kids to grind corn like an Indian would have, and they were free to try out the beds, touch the pelts, handle the (unsharpened) arrows, and explore every nook and cranny.

Inside the village there were deerskins stretched out for the kids to scrape with oyster shells, and along the walkway nearby, they had an example of a hunter's camp set up, along with a garden area.

Due to the flooding from the Nor'easter, we couldn't explore the ships. So we took pictures as we walked past them, and headed to the Riverfront Discovery Area where they had examples of Indian canoes in different stages of completion. After we had examined a water-filled finished example, the kids got to grab oyster shells and assist in scraping out a canoe-in-progress.

The fort was just as hands-on as the Indian village had been. There were armor and helmets to try on, character actors to talk to, cannons to check out, a musket-firing demonstration, a storehouse, church, homes, and gardens to explore, and an armory full of swords, spears, pistols and muskets. We spent most of our time at the armory, where the man in charge was very patient with the kids' questions and requests, and was very knowledgeable about 17th century soldiery. He even had the entire first two paragraphs of the "Instructions of the Marchall for the better enabling of a privat soldier" memorized, in 1611 Old English!

That concludes the summary of our trip to Jamestown; where we went, what we saw, and what we did. In other words, just the facts. Coming soon will be two separate pictorial blog posts entitled:

Jamestown Through Macey's Eyes

Jamestown Through Jaela's Eyes