First Week of School, 2017

8th grade, here we come!

May this year be more successful than this selfie 

we tried to take with the chihuahua.

It's been an awesome week and our schedule has a nice flow.

Lu takes the goats out to pasture 3xweek. He's out there for 3 hours, so he takes an assignment with him. "Cambalacha" is the afterschool program we run from our home, where Lu will be acting more as a facilitator than a participant. I started the program when he was a few months old, so he's been a part of it his whole life. It will be beautiful to watch him come into the role of "tallerista". On Wednesdays we'll go out for some yoga, ping-pong, kayaking and lots of swimming. "Free Time" is for Lu to go hang out downtown with his skateboard *if* all Mon-Wed schoolwork is done. Anything incomplete from Thursday or Friday will get done on Saturdays. This system helps keep the motivation high for getting the job done!

But what about having the freedom to take as long as you like on something if it's interesting? Well, we've done that too, but Lu needs to work on turning things in on time - an important skill in life. This involves being realistic about how much time you have to do something, planning how you're going to do it in that amount of time (again, realistically), and doing the best you can in the time you have. So, that's what we're working on this year. I *do* imagine us going back to a more time-relaxed way of learning, with lots of lounge-y reading and discussing. But then again, there are goats and chickens and jobs to be done, and only so many hours in the day....

 Most of what we're doing this year requires me to read ahead 

and prepare discussion questions. So, lots of homework for mama.

For algebra, we're continuing with our resource 

from last year - Great Courses, videos and workbook.

For the next couple weeks, 

Lu is participating in self-defense classes.

Cooking and guitar continue to be his main passions.

He'll be apprenticing at a French bakery/restaurant on Saturdays,

and practicing at home (yum!).

Our schedule is a guide, flexible, not written in stone. Activities are changeable, but we *are* trying to do 5.5 hours of school a day over fewer days (990 hours in 38 weeks vs. fewer hours/day over 40 weeks), for longer vacations, because, as much as we love homeschooling... ... ... we REALLY like vacations 😄

Having this as a clear goal that we both agree on, as well as the "Free Time" agreement, is already proving to be very positive for maintaining good attitudes in a headstrong teenager and a not-the-most-patient mother 😉

We are both enjoying the resources we are using (score!) and all the physical exercise we're getting. Lu is excited to start facilitating workshops. Our little farm is producing lots of awesome, organic food. Life is good. 💚 And these new emojis on blogger are fun 😜 Lol.

Hope you're having a great start to your year, 

and thanks for stopping by!

7th grade. Check.

Today is officially our last day of 7th grade. Lu will still need a few more days to finish his final project - a compare/contrast essay about the American, French and Russian revolutions. But other than that, we are D O N E.

This was our sixth year homeschooling. Every year I seem to blog a little less. Our academic activities/projects are less and less photo-worthy, and they also take a lot longer, so there's not as much variety. It's a lot less taking nature walks, and a lot more trying to wrap our heads around algebra and chemistry. We also recently got chickens and started a vegetable garden, so our little farm is growing and giving us more work.

Tinich is undecided on the chickens.

And maybe a little jealous :)

But really, this year, I haven't written as much because it's been a difficult year. So difficult, I sent Lu to public school for a few months. Hormones and attitudes were raging, and it felt like I had to learn (in about one second) how to be the mother of a teenager who took the place of my baby boy from one day to the next. Well. It was a bumpy ride, but it was one of much growth. 

We've learned so much about love, patience, acceptance, respect, and communication.

These last months, since returning to homeschooling, our objectives have been more about creating harmony in our day-to-day, our home, our family, and ourselves. Academics took a backseat, but we still covered our 7th grade bases. 

We studied a little chemistry with different online resources like these videos - http://www.periodicvideos.com/ and this site - http://www.softschools.com/facts/periodic_table/

Lu completed this workbook that I found in an old box of books from when my mom was a teacher in the 80's, dated but clear and thorough, and something Lu could do on his own, while out with the goats.

We got halfway through our algebra course and then circled back to review. We'll do the other half next year.

(I had no idea how to do this a year ago. lol)

Lu mostly does art through the after-school program we run from our house two afternoons a week, but sometimes we do art on our own.

 Here's Lu with the other kids from the program, performing with the "diabolo" in their circus show.

We did lots of creative writing over the last couple of months. Lu remains very passionate about cooking and playing the guitar. We do yoga, go swimming, and dance regularly. We used this list of 100 words for spelling and vocab - http://www.houghtonmifflinbooks.com/booksellers/press_release/100middle/ and got quick at finding words in an actual, for real dictionary. But WHY MOM? He argued that it was ridiculous when we have online dictionaries. I insisted, and he later actually confessed that he enjoyed looking up the words. Like, he really actually said it was "fun". So, see, you never know. 

Try it, it might work. 

(I need to go look up synonyms for "actual and actually" lol)

Besides our regular viewing of (lots of) history and science documentaries, we also watched movies about growing up, life and its difficulties, freedom, passion, compassion, love, loss... and I'm recording them as school activities because I think we learn a lot from the right movies at the right time. Here's the list, in the order we watched them:

Whale Rider

Ixcanul

Ratcatcher

To Kill a Mockingbird

The Outsiders

Earth to Echo

Rainman

The Color Purple

Awakenings

Little Big Man

What's Eating Gilbert Grape

Juno

O Brother, Where Art Thou

Dead Poets Society

Les Miserables

So, it's vacation time :happydance: !!! And, despite goats, chickens and adolescence, we had a productive homeschool year.

See you in January, when we embark on our 8th grade adventure, and start preparing for high school!

***If you're struggling with a just-turned-teen, don't worry, you'll get the hang of it. Just remember to breathe and try not to take it personally (that's the hardest part). Good luck!