Hi Mama and Papa,

Since you both were concerned about what’s happening with the kids’ education, I decided to giving you an overview of some of what we’re doing now. (btw, I just now finished writing it and I can’t believe how much there is here for all my answers of we’re not doing anything formal… you can see why it took me a while to get around to this)

The kids are doing a unit about trees with their nanny, and lots of art with her. They have a scheduled day, library time, stretching time, quiet time, math time, etc, with her.

Kodiak has started Horizon math (level 2 book 2), which we are just doing ‘for fun,’ but in a more structured (ie, in order, only write the real answers in the book) kind of way. So far she already knows everything in it, but I think it will challenge her as we get through it and give her good practice/reinforcement. Jupiter has level 2 book 1, which is conceptually way beneath him, but good for putting what he knows in pictures/writing. Both have enjoyed workbooks in the past, but I just used the grocery store impulse buy ones and let them do them independently. Since those are too easy now, we’ve moved onto these.

We continue with the real math learning, which mostly happens in an organic way. Both kids like to make up problems/find problems in real life and then we do them verbally. I always ask if they want to see it written down. Kodiak generally does. Jupiter isn’t interested at first; usually he likes for me to give him a lot more problems verbally. I always create problems that follow the same pattern, starting easy, then getting more difficult, bearing in mind what he knows or has touched on in the past. Eventually they get too hard, then I tell him that writing it down will make it easy to see the pattern. That always gets him excited. Then we write down the new problem, leave the answer blank, and write all the other problems we did. I show him or he figures out on his own how to apply the pattern to the hardest one, then we do more on the difficult level. Both kids also like to use manipulatives. Most of our formal mathy ones (weights, abacus, etc) have been scattered to the four winds, but they make do with legos, lentils, tangrams, tinker toys, fingers, toes, and whatnot. Both kids can add and subtract carrying and borrowing tens, can multiply and divide (though don’t know notation for the long forms), understand fractions, understand symmetry, know many shapes, understand positive and negative integers and using number lines, can solve complicated story problems including time, speed, and distance with some help, can measure length and weight metric and ’standard’, can use a calendar, count money, create and read some kinds of graphs, and have other skills I’m forgetting to mention. Areas I bear in mind which need reinforcement/I am presently focused on: multiplying and dividing larger numbers, decimals, place value, properties of the unit circle, setting up written problems from a story.

The kids are going to do the Mad Science NASA program, a 6 hour course over 3 months. We’ve done Mad Science before and they hate going but always thank me for it on the way home. The classes have about 20-30 kids in them, ages 5-10 and involve reading, math, the scientific method, trivia, lecture, and fun experiments as well as classroom basics like raising your hand, lining up, sitting still, working in a group. On our own we’ve learned different kinds of soil, the water cycle, life cycle of salmon and the environmental implications in our area, native vs invasive species, gardened together, taken nature walks, made a sundial, used compasses, learned the directions, played with magnets, learned about volcanoes, climbed trees, made bottle rockets, etc. We’ve done experiments about pH, sound, light, heat, flight, polymers, electricity, potential and kinetic energy, states of matter, and the like. We have lots of books around the house with experiments for rainy days. We use the scientific method. Both kids are interested in anatomy and health as well.

I’m encouraging both kids to write more. Kodiak has to regularly write reports for her Girl Scouts badges and take notes during Girl Scouts. This is generally a fight, mostly because she is slow at writing and perfectionist about it, and is afraid to misspell things or make less than ideal letters. She loves to write in her journals, btw. To help with this, I’ve promised a calligraphy set for Kodiak (she would like to make pretty letters). She also helped me pick out two workbooks: Spelling Workout C and Write! which introduce parts of speech (which she knows about to some extent already), help with spelling confidence, and are generally fun. I do not force the workbooks, but we do them correctly and with pages in order. We do Mad Libs and come up with stories together.

Jupiter can write his name and can copy writing. He knows all the letters of the alphabet and the numbers. He likes to have someone else write things which he transcribes. He did not want a writing/spelling workbook, so I didn’t get him one.

Both kids have some basic computer skills and can browse the internet for games, play movies, and research toys on line. Jupiter can’t read yet, but he can find exactly the Lego set he wants, and tell you the price, the code, how many pieces it has, what set it goes with, and on and on. Kodiak knows how to Google subjects of interest and read up on them.

Kodiak enjoys reading and often stays up late at night with her books. She reads short chapter books and can tell me the plot, make guesses about what will happen next, tell me the funny parts, and read passages aloud. I have never formally taught her to read. She can sound out words and has sight words. She still makes lots of mistakes, but is at about grade level. (btw, Rachael dropped some assessments by for me and is a qualified administrator, so we can find out for sure. But honestly, I’m not concerned about this). She can read instructions in her other books, on games, and can read websites that interest her and figure out instructions on forms.

Jupiter got interested in reading about 6 months ago. He enjoys reading repetitive books with words he can guess or recognize on sight, and when motivated will spend hours with that, looking up words he’s seen before by reciting the book and following along, then matching the pattern of letters elsewhere. He didn’t make the leap to phonics until recently, and now he can sound out short words if they fit a pattern he knows. My approach has not been a daily beating of the head against the wall, rather I have reintroduced skills and concepts briefly and repeatedly, at intervals of days and weeks, in the context of regular life, only pursuing them when the spark is there. We’ll have weeks of seemingly nothing, then one day of learning what school would consider months worth all at once.

Kodiak is taking piano lessons and Jupiter is taking ‘not-lessons’. Both kids actually enjoy practicing and while last year it was a huge fight to get them to practice, this year it’s been really easy.

The kids like maps and geography. We’ve made maps before, and use them on an ongoing basis. I recently got some cool maps… a huge National Geographic atlas, an illustrated flip chart. The kids have had a United States puzzle for a while. We have a game called ‘Hop-Off’ which they love which is basically hop scotch with the United States, and they like to play it as Twister as well. We also play a United States version of Sequence, which reinforces capitals and state names with their shapes. We often get the globe out as well. Since I’m probably taking the kids to Romania and the UK this Spring/Summer, we’ve been touching on those areas from time to time.

The kids have been learning about the solar system on and off. We’ve done the thousand yard model of the solar system, learned about the different planets, and learned what makes the days and seasons, why solstices and equinoxes happen, etc.

Both kids did their white belt test in Aikido. They’ll get the robes and belt they’ve earned. Sensei made it pretty clear they passed, though the results are not official. In the past few months they’ve gotten much better at bahaving in class, and they are both motivated and focused to learn. They also took a soccer skills class last term as well as continuing with gymnastics. We go roller skating a couple times a month (well, they go with their Nanny now), it’s an independent social time for them as well as good exercise for Kodiak. Jupiter doesn’t like to skate. Kodiak is going to have her first Horse Riding lesson soon, and may continue with that if she likes it.

Both kids love documentaries… we watch a lot of Nature and similar films. Kodiak especially likes things documenting historic events and people (she was really into the story of Typhoid Mary, likes History Detectives), and Jupiter likes documentaries about people and current events. For instance, Jupiter stayed up late to watch one about Ralph Nader, and enjoyed one about Percy Julian quite a while back. It’s in my plans to get these kinds of documentaries on a more regular basis now that I have Netfilx and the time to watch with the kids, since the topics can be pretty heavy and need interpretation for the kids.

I have a time line set up (we made it out of tape across a 12 foot span of wall… there are 5 different lines for different parts of the world, and another for pre-human history. We have color coded areas of interest, and cards to write political and economic events/people/cultural stuff/discoveries/natural history on and tape to it). The kids are really excited about this. We’re going back and think about the people and places we’ve touched on and put them on the time line… and continue putting stuff on the time line as it comes up of course. We also got a fun new set of books all about what it would be like if you lived in the time of… you name it. So far we’ve read the one about the great SF earthquake of 1906.

Sometimes we listen to Spanish tapes. The kids like to repeat the phrases. I’m trying to get the kids interested in watching their favorite movies in Spanish, which they used to like doing but lately hate. They know some Spanish phrases and a tiny bit of Japanese (mostly counting to 10 from Aikido class).

The kids work on story telling and dramatic play with their puppets and other toys, and sometimes make and act out skits or come up with songs. Jupiter especially loves to build things from his own imagination and from instructions. He can do complex Lego things above his age bracket without trouble. He likes to figure out how things work. Kodiak’s interest in animals continues. She pores over magazines and books about animals.

So here I’ve just touched on what we’re doing in the different areas, but truth is they don’t feel separated out like that on a daily basis. While Minke and I do not follow a set curriculum, I hope you can see that we *do* have things in mind which we focus on, and the kids *are* learning. I haven’t even mentioned here the things he is doing with them, since I’m not around for it.

We opt for an approach of relaxed encouragement, and feel that our kids are thriving. We have been through many transitions in the past year, and have had to work really hard and sometimes focus in places other than the next thing the kids might learn, or getting the newest materials for them. Sometimes I’ve felt I’ve had to spend too much time on errands or work rather than on the kids. But they have made it through that, and the hard work has paid off in a more organized home, enough money to buy them more focused time, and a basic continuity of life which has helped them adjust to the divorce really well. They are happy kids, overall.

The kids get the experience of working toward goals and ‘having to’ do things in other arenas than learning the basic skills of math, reading, writing, and the like. They get this in their play, whether it be building a very challenging Lego set, getting to the end of that novel, and they get this in their chores, Girl Scouts (I’m trying to get a boy’s campfire club put together for Jupiter this year) and sports classes.

As far as the three R’s, I believe that the schedule set forth by the schools for those skills makes a lot of sense in the classroom setting, but is not as critical in a home environment. A child in second grade who is not reading near ‘grade level’ will fall behind in all subjects. Not being able to read a math story problem fast enough will result in that child missing assignments, tuning out, and giving up…. in addition to not learning the subject. This applies across the board, to math skills, critical thinking skills, writing skills… if one is weak, it will create a negative feedback loop, causing that child problems all through school, and probably for life, just for being a few months behind the curve.

However, at home, it’s a different story. If a child can’t yet read on a fifth grade level, but she loves science, she can still DO those ‘fifth grade’ science experiments. If a child isn’t much for reading on a first grade level yet, his mom can read him the instructions for that ‘third grade’ math workbook, and he can do the problems. Eventually the other skills catch up, because they become more interesting, the child is more developmentally ready, or to progress to the next level in an area of interest, it’s necessary.

Pushing on these skills creates resistance, and when a child is not developmentally ready for the next step, just makes him feel stupid and frustrated. When working in a preschool years back I remember part of the curriculum included learning to use the calender. I taught this every day, exactly as prescribed. Some kids got it, others didn’t. Some kids got it the first day, others 3 months later. Was it my teaching? I doubt it. Kodiak learned how to use a calendar because we had one on the wall and she liked the pictures so she looked at it lots. Every now and then we’d mark a special day and mark them off until it came. It didn’t make sense to her until one day after we’d been playing battleship. She noticed that it was a grid, like in the game. She had also recently started to be able to read some words, and she realized that the days of the week were across, and that they corresponded to the numbers below, and that the numbers followed a pattern across, then down on the next row… suddenly she could use it. If I’d spent the past three months working on that calender with her, she might not have gotten it until that day. And if she had, I’d have attributed it to all my teaching. Jupiter learned about calendars because he devised his own method to count days until going to Daddy’s house! Most learning seems to me to come when connections are made, when the person is ready, or there is a perceived need. I try to create an environment and talk with my kids in such a way that I’ll facilitate those connections.

As for the testing, it is no longer required that test scores be submitted. It is required that the kids be tested, and we have not yet met that first benchmark, which comes at the end of third grade. Rachael has offered to administer the tests if we choose to do them. She is a certified primary school teacher and thinks the kids are doing just fine. If the kids were in school Kodiak would be starting second term of third grade, and Jupiter would be in first grade. Minke and I are philosophically opposed to the state mandate of registration, especially because of the military industrial complex’s hold and right to our children once they are entered into the system. We do not see the benefit to the children of enrollment, either.

So, I hope this has put your minds at ease a bit…

Love,
Joy