Tuesday, April 5, 2011

Notebooking Pages

There are so many resources for homeschooling families on the Internet. I start looking at one thing, and then I follow a link, or two, or seven, and along the way I discover all sorts of tools I hadn't known about. 

Here's one I've just found.  I've not used it yet, but I'm interested in the resources it provides.  It's called NotebookingPages.com.  The idea is that you and your child use pages (sort of like scrapbook pages, really) to keep track of what they're learning.  The pages provide a framework for organizing basic information about a person or place or event.  And there is (or can be) creativity in making one's own page or even filling in a pre-designed page.

It looks like there are some potentially helpful suggestions on how to use notebooking to facilitate learning.  I"m thinking this looks like it'd be very useful for younger kids -- it reminds me of something I once saw demonstrated at a local Waldorf school where teachers showed how the kids built their own textbooks as they learned.  I can see there might be some useful applications for older kids, too.  I think C would be turned off by anything that looks too canned or repetitive or is reminiscent of filling out useless worksheets. 

But I like the idea.  And having some prepared notebook pages could come in handy. Hmmm, maybe those art and composer ones would be good for an easy way to frame art and music appreciation.

Sunday, April 3, 2011

The Daily Schedule or lack thereof

I've read a lot of homeschooling blogs and sites that set out daily schedules.  I can see the advantage to using that sort of scheduling -- certainly helpful for homeschooling younger kids where predictability is so important, and probably a great sanity-saver for a mom homeschooling multiple kids.

But because we came to homeschooling first as a reaction against a school world that C had come to hate, our goal from the outset was to have the continuation of her education look and feel different to her.

At first, I envisioned that we'd be at the kitchen table by 9am, sorting out what her tasks were for the day, etc.  Of course, C's migraines --which were still recurring frequently at that point -- usually hit in the morning and she wasn't functional at all until after lunch.  So that went out the window.

It also became apparent that with C so resistant to the idea of anything that seemed even remotely connected to the idea of "school," if I planned to sit down and talk about "school" or its optimistic synonym, "learning," she'd show up cranky and determined not to enjoy it.

So, our "schedule" such as it is evolved in part by necessity due to the migraine thing, and  by my wanting to step back and let C come to the learning when she was ready.  That's what we've used over the past year, and it's worked well.  Better and better all the time, in fact.

Each Monday (or Sunday evening) I give her a lesson chart for the upcoming week.  It sets out each subject and it has each subject broken out into suggested work for each day, but C knows that it's up to her to decide how to use the daily work so that she has all of the work done by the end of the week.  It's up to her to keep track of what she's done and what is left to do as the week goes by.  In reality, I see that C pretty much follows the daily chart.  But -- to my "likes to feel like she has options" kid, it's important to her that she can choose when she does what.  There are quite a few days where she'll get involved in something and enjoy it and keep going so before she realizes it she's finished the week's reading or watched a full set of video materials, etc.

I also stopped worrying about what time C gets up.  Some mornings she wakes up with a migraine and goes back to sleep.  Others she'll lie in bed and read a bit before getting up.  (And I never complain about reading, ever.)  So, she gets up at her own pace, has breakfast, and then she starts in.  Although in the "institutional school" days she'd dread doing homework and procrastinate and fuss and make herself miserable about the mental weight of the work still to be done, now she seems to have realized that if she just does the work, she'll have the time afterwards to enjoy and work on her own fun things.

And, most amazingly to me, more and more often I see that the line between "work" and "fun" is getting blurrier and blurrier.  She'll enjoy a Teaching Company lecture so much that she'll listen to it again while she's drawing.  I'll find her lying in bed reading her World History book just be cause she became engrossed.

Of course, C may not realize that I do have a scheduled lesson plan and I'm keeping track, too. I've learned not to get to wedded to a schedule, because as soon as I do, something requires changing -- a sick day or two will throw things off, or I'll want to let C learn more about something she's loving so I'll let her take more time with a subject.  I remind myself that flexibility is key, and if learning is taking place -- and more importantly, if ENJOYMENT of learning is happening, then the schedule doesn't matter so much.

Saturday, April 2, 2011

In Which We Learn About Cathedrals and Enjoy It


I have been meaning to write a series of posts about the curriculum we're using for C's 9th grade year.  And I keep meaning to write a lot about how I've set up her study of World History.  It's going beautifully and we are both learning a lot.  I've incorporated a lot of visual tools in our course, because I've seen how C responds so well to information presented visually.  If there's humor involved, too, so much the better.

I'll get back to that topic soon.  But today, I want to remember to report how excellent this video is.  It's "Cathedral" by David Macaulay (of "The Way Things Work" fame), and it provides a terrific and enjoyable way to learn how and why gothic cathedrals were build they way they were. There are beautiful sequences in actual cathedrals, combined with animated sequences that explore a story of a fictional gothic cathedral being built.  In a charming and totally accessible way, this video provides a lot of information about the historic period, the relations between the church and the community,  and the architectural elements in cathedrals and why they are they way they are.

C enjoyed this so much that she has already watched it twice.

It's available on DVD, but if you're willing and able to watch a video, you can probably find it for far cheaper.  I highly recommend this.  (By the way, we watched "Castle" too, and though we liked it, we both liked "Cathedral" better.)