May Unschoolers Support - Page 3

[Arduinna]

Originally Posted by Joan

It's pretty cool, isn't it? I can't tell the number of times my kids have said or done something and I think, "How do they know THAT?" It's amazing what they pick up just from living.

[mama in the forest]

I'm sorry too, Ruthla. I'm sorry you had to go through that. Shake it off, baby.

[Millie Ivy]

Originally Posted by momazon4

and the 2 older 2 do a token amount of independant book math and make sure to read a bit everyday(which they would do anyway) to make their dad(my ex) believe they "do" school.

I've really enjoyed reading this thread!

nak
lol, this sounds like us, although ex doesn't ask, and ds1 and dd like what we do, it isn't forced or anything. But he bugs them every now and then re: school, and having them be able to spout what "work" they are doing helps.

[mama in the forest]

Today has been the most gorgeous spring day! Soft winds & not hot.....my kids spent the day running around & jumping off hay bales. Wheeeee!

[Ruthla]

We went shopping to get birthday party stuff, then came home, put it away, and started working on the bikes. DD1's old bike is too small for DD2 (It literally hasn't been ridden in several years) and needs a lot of maintenance- definitely more air in the tires, and I'm not sure if it needs anything else. I need to see if the seat can be raised to fit DD2 properly.

In the shed, we noticed a boys' bike that I later discovered is my 13yo cousin's outgrown bike. At the very shortest, it's the right height for DD2- we worked with that one a little but then we saw that it also needs some air in the tires. DD2 will ask Zadie (my Dad) later tonight if he has a bike pump so we won't have to schlep the bikes anywhere to fix them. Tomorrow morning, the plan is to get some food started for Shabbat and then walk to the park for more bike practice. The boys' bike is usable even though the air is a little low, so we'll use that one if my Dad can't get the other bike working tonight.

[carolm22117]

My boys have been gone all day, programming robots. We leave tomarrow afternoon for the 'Botball competion on Saturday morning. Its a 5 hour drive and registration starts at 8am saturday morning, so we got a hotel room for tomarrow night rather than have to leave at 2am!

They've been building and programming these robots for about 8 weeks now and we're all really ready for it to be finished.

Its kinda funny. DH showed his boss the pictures of the robots and was telling him what the kids have been doing and he (boss) was just amazed at it. I've gotten that reaction from other people too. Is learning to build and program robots really that amazing of thing to do? They did it just for fun! LOL!

Son#1 also decided he wants to learn to play his dad's old violin. We found a homeschoolers summer orchestra, so he's gonna participate in that this summer.

Its been a busy day around here!

[Monkeygrrl]

so i dont have a whole lot of time to post (i am supposed to be doing my schoolwork *sigh*)...but i wanted to join in this month...

we have 7 kids...16yo is graduated and will start college this summer...15yo goes to ps...and 13y, 10y 9y, 4y, and 11mo are unschooled...

we go to various parks 2-4 times a week (as it works out) and we go skating twice a week...

in between that there is work for the adults, and school for me...so we stay busy...

its very cool to be reading what others are doing, knowing that this life is workin for them too...

peace...

[UnschoolnMa]

We babysat for a friend today because public school was out. There were video games, websites, transformers, and legos all around. Dd spent much of her morning doing some long division and finding equivalent fractions. We found a stack of workbooks that had been stuffed into the china hutch, and she'd checked out a division book at the library. Then Dd and our little friend walked to the store nearby for some chocolate. Had an interesting moment when the little girl wondered what my sabbat altar was for.

After the kids went home we ran to the library and grocery store, and came home to make dinner. Now it's pouring rain and the kids are upstairs waiting for the long new episode of Grey's Anatomy, and Dh and I will watch CSI. We might make some brownies. My head has been killing me, and I have convinced myself that cocoa will help.

[minxin]

Hello, may i join the group? I'm a single mom, ds is 4. He has so many interests right now, it's hard for me to keep up sometimes! His current obsessions include dinosaurs, Godzilla movies, being a Jedi(love this one!) gardening, pirates, Captain Underpants, robots, and anything art-related. He's really motivated to learn to read and write right now, so he can write scripts for the Godzilla movies he creates! Lately he prefers "how the movie was made" bonus features to actual movies!

He's been working on learning letter sounds lately, and a few days ago he told my mother "Nana! B sounds like buh. B is for boobies!" He just weaned a month ago (my mother thinks BF is "weird and gross") and she was mortified. I told him he was correct, and he said that B is also for big butts! (my mom is obsessed with being thin, i'm a curvaceous woman, and i'm trying to keep him away from that way of thinking)

We come from a very NOT AP family, with a lot of public school teachers, so i get a lot of flak. But we are having a blast just living our lives and having fun together.

[mama in the forest]

Everyone's having such a fun time! Robots & legos & dinosaurs.....all good.

Happy unschooling today!

[Ruthla]

Originally Posted by minxin

He's been working on learning letter sounds lately, and a few days ago he told my mother "Nana! B sounds like buh. B is for boobies!" He just weaned a month ago (my mother thinks BF is "weird and gross") and she was mortified. I told him he was correct, and he said that B is also for big butts!

Maybe you should try encouraging him to say "b is for bananas" or something like that!

[minxin]

Originally Posted by Ruthla

Maybe you should try encouraging him to say "b is for bananas" or something like that!

That's what my mom said too. It was hilarious at the time, because she's so hardcore anti-bf. He actually learned the term "big butt" from her, because she's always talking about how horrible her own butt is!
We did have a conversation about it being impolite to talk about body parts in public.

[carolm22117]

We leave for the robot competition at noon today. Boys are programming,programming,programming!! At noon, I am going to make them stop even thinking about it and just relax and enjoy the trip today, the hotel stay and pool tonight and we will worry about robots again tomorrow morning.

They have done nothing all week except trouble-shoot,programprogramprogram, tear down, start over, rebuild. Its been intense. They totally love it, but I can see them starting to stress about it. I really hope we can decompress today and just have fun tomorrow. Its going to be a beautiful weekend, we're going to be on a college campus for the day, we'll be with all our new friends that we made through this competition. Its allllllll good!

Wishing everyone a beautiful May weekend with their beloved ones!

[KaraBoo]

Cool, Godzilla, robots, pirates...my kind of thread! LOL

Today, we all went to look at apartments (we're moving). We looked at three. DD, 8, took her camera so she could take pics and help us remember certain features about each place we visited. We were tired, though. We walked home, snacked on popcorn and are basically vegging out until dinner. I'm making her favorite: soy chicken wings (wings cooked in soy sauce/anise/ginger)!

Later, we're going to make brownies (again) and strawberry fool (again). LOL We plan to watch "Blast from the Past" tonight. And now that I've been reminded of Godzilla, we might drag out our Godzilla box set and have a marathon. DD's favorite is "Godzilla's Revenge." LOL

Oh, dh bought a cool game for us on his last trip: Carcassonne. We've been enjoying it, making it sort of a co-operative game by helping each other out. We have the river expansion pack and it makes it more fun.

ETA: We ended up watching Ghostbusters. Now, we're online looking at old Ghostbusters cartoons on youtube.

[cottonwood]

Just a to you all.

We had a funny experience the other day... my husband has just started up on a new ultimate frisbee team, and we go to watch him play, and the kids run around the park and we throw a frisbee back and forth. There was this fellow there following around a toddler who looked like she could be his daughter or granddaughter, and she kept toddling over to us. My kids are really friendly and out-going, so they start talking to this guy. So of course, as is typical the only thing he can think to ask them about is school. "So, what grade are you in?" My eight-year-old said "we don't go to school, we're homeschooled." He takes a moment to absorb this startling information. "So what are your favorite subjects?" Classic! I couldn't quite hear my son's answer, but I gather he was confused because we don't talk about "subjects". The man looked concerned then said, "Well, you do stuff like reading, writing, and 'rithmetic, right?" My son is jumping around doing cartwheels and flips while he's considering his answer. I know he's probably thinking to himself, what the heck is "rithmetic"? Finally he says cheerfully,

"Well, we play poker a lot!" That's my boy.

[mama in the forest]

Well, we play poker a lot!" That's my boy.

: That's hysterical! Gave that man something to ponder on, I'll bet.

[lillbeetle]

unschooling VS homeschooling?

Hey everyone!!

My DS turned 3 in March, and we have always known we would "homeschool". But what it sounds like from this thread is that we lean way more towards "unschooling". I'm not sure, so maybe you all could clear this up for me.
I've always thought home schooling was where you just don't send your child to school and allow them to learn in a natural, non-conformist, interest-based fashion. I want my son to experience and learn from life, not school. Is this unschooling instead?
Does home school always involve an accredited program? Does unschooling always involve not following an accredited program? If you are unschooling but maybe want to prepare your DC for college (should they choose to go because they want to be an astronomer, film maker, chef, etc.....) How do you make sure they are prepared to enter and be accepted into the higher education system?
I'm asking because it definitely sounds like we are unschoolers, but we also want to prepare DS to be able to take things like chemistry classes and such at the local college when he is in his teen years (if he wants to).
Is this possible with unschooling?
Thanks for your input, and for reading this ramble.

[Ruthla]

Whoohoo! We have a bike rider!! We spent about an hour at the park and she's still very wobbly, and can't ride very far, and doesn't have much control over the bike, but she can get it started and pedal about a dozen yards or so before having to stop. And she can stop without hurting herself!

[Mamma Mia]

Aww!! Congrats to your dd! Learning to ride a bike was so hard for me!

[KaraBoo]

Yah! Awesome