Texas Virtual Academy

The boys (and I) will start our new school year tomorrow. A teaching job never came available for me, so we're homeschooling again this year. Thankfully I found a program that takes a big load off me - Texas Virtual Academy (TXVA).

TXVA is an online public charter school. The boys will receive all their books and supplies (minus paper and pencils) next week sometime, and we'll be on our way! In the meantime, I'll be doing "Learning Coach" training and new family orientation, and they'll be testing in math and reading proficiency for the beginning of their year. (They'll test again at the end of the year and their progress will be measured.)

They each have a teacher who plans their lessons, conducts online classroom sessions, and grades their work. All I have to do is follow her plans and guide the boys through their lessons. The burden of planning and searching for curricula I'm happy with is no longer on me!

Jacob will study math, English/language arts, science, social studies, health, PE, art, and music.

Caleb will study math, English/language arts, science, social studies, health, PE, art, and Latin. He has music on his schedule, but I'm going to have it changed to Latin, which he'll study for the next 3 years if we stay with this program. (Jacob will start Latin when he reaches 6th grade.)

Since it's public school, the boys have to "attend" 180 days, and they're required to work approximately 6 hours a day on schoolwork. I will have to be diligent with recording their attendance and progress each day, but that's just something I'll need to work into our daily schedule.

It's going to be interesting to see how this works out. The boys are excited, but I'm not sure they're grasping the amount of work they'll be doing now. When I homeschooled them on my own, I taught the basics: math, English/language arts, science, and social studies. Now they'll have health, PE, art, and music/Latin thrown into the mix - things I never really felt much like pursuing on my own.

Stay tuned!

My 10-Year-Old Encyclopedia

That's my Caleb. He loves to read fact books - almanacs, record books, etc., and not so much just straight informational nonfiction. He has surprised me a few times lately by telling me something he read that pertains to what we're studying. Last time I asked him, "How'd you know that?", he responded with, "Well, I read a lot!"

We're studying whales in science right now. Today we were reading about blow holes and whale spouts and such. He chimed in with, "I read once that some whales have two blow holes." I never knew that and wondered if he remembered correctly. As we continued reading in our textbook, it said that baleen whales (blue, gray, humpback, etc.) have two blow holes; toothed whales (orcas, dolphins, sperm whales, etc.) have just one. Too cool! And kudos to Caleb for remembering something like that! He's got a mind like a steel trap sometimes.

I think we might turn this into an opportunity to learn further, if we can. He's learning how to research topics, and since Friday is our library day, I just might have him look up something on whale blow holes and see what is the purpose of having two. Knowing him, he won't think of this as drudgery. He's already noticed the row of World Book Encyclopedias on the shelf next to his favorite fact books and has gone so far as to look through one or two.

Tomorrow during our review (before we continue on with the day's lesson), I think I'll ask him why he thinks some whales need two blow holes. Then I'll suggest we spend a few minutes looking into it when we go to the library this week. I can't wait to find out why myself!

Back to School!

This was our first week of school. Overall things went really well. Monday was a long day for us because it took a while to get everything organized in between subjects. I think we finished up a little before 3:00. Most days we're through around 1:30.

Daily schedule:
9:00 - AWANA
9:15 - language Arts (journaling, spelling, Wordly Wise/vocabulary, grammar)
10:15 - snack/break
10:30 - math
11:30 - science
12:15 - lunch/break
1:00 - history

On Mondays and Wednesdays, we add beginning piano. I spend a few minutes going over a finger exercise or music theory concept, then they take turns practicing.

On Tuesdays and Thursdays, we'll be adding geography. Jacob has a basic map skills workbook he'll be working from. Caleb has a world geography workbook that we'll use over the course of two years or more. I hope to get started on that next week, after I get our scanner/copier set up. (I want to keep Caleb's workbook for future reference, so we'll be using photocopied pages.)

Fridays are short days. We do AWANA, language arts, and math. Then we go out for lunch, spend some time at the library, run any errands, and stop by ALDI for the next week's groceries.

Jacob had a meltdown a few days this week because he wanted to play instead of do his schoolwork. Both times I sent him to his room until his attitude was better and he was willing to work. The first day (Monday) he cried loudly, trying to distract Caleb from his work and trying to get attention. I warned him that he'd get a spanking if that continued, so he hushed. The second day (Wednesday) he cried again, but not nearly as loudly as before. Hopefully he's seeing that he's got to do his work and that throwing a fit isn't going to get him out of it.

I came up with a way to reinforce positive school behavior, and hopefully it'll work. I call it "School Spirit Stickers". Each day, whoever had the best attitude for school will get a sticker. At the end of the week, whoever has the most stickers will get to choose where we go for lunch on Friday. Of course, there will be limits on where they can choose. If I give them free reign on that, we'll end up at Cici's Pizza every week. Some weeks will have Cici's for a choice; other weeks will have Panera Bread as a choice; most weeks will have McDonald's, Wendy's, and Braum's, though. I may need to come up with a weekly schedule of restaurants so they won't accuse me of rigging the list each week. I should probably have the boys list their favorite restaurants, then divide them evenly each week...

Tuesday we went out to the pool after we finished our work, but we didn't get to stay long at all - maybe 20 minutes. When we left the house, the sky looked fine. But by the time I pulled into the parking lot, we noticed how dark the sky was to our north. I kept a close watch on the weather while the boys played with their new diving rockets. The clouds kept getting darker and rolling in a little faster. Soon the wind picked up, and before long the water in the pool was white-capping. Not long after that, thunder started rumbling, so the boys and I hurried out of the pool. After we got settled in the car, we saw a few bolts of lightning strike in the distance. Not much happened after we got home, just a lot of wind and thunder and hardly any rain.

Yesterday we invited some friends from church to spend the afternoon with us at the neighborhood pool. We spent about two hours out there - the weather was perfect! Tricia and I really enjoyed relaxing in the water or sitting poolside and chatting. The boys had fun swimming after their diving rockets or playing with the pool Frisbee. Some other friends from the neighborhood joined them for a bit. We'd like to have them out again before the pool closes for the season. Thankfully the management has extended the season to late September instead of Labor Day.

All in all, it was a great first week! If only the rest of the school year would go so smoothly...

Springtime at the Zoo

I'm so ready for spring! Yesterday was picture perfect! The temps were in the mid-70s and the sky was cloudless. I took the boys to the zoo and we studied some of the insects in Bug U (for our science lesson) before eating our picnic lunch and seeing some of our favorite animals. We skipped The Hill (as usual), the reptile building, the monkeys, the tigers, and the far reaches of The Wilds of Africa - and it took us 4 1/2 hours to see everything else, including a 20-minute ride on the Monorail Safari. I guess if we ever want to see everything there, we need to go when the zoo first opens and spend the whole day!

We saw quite a bit of "real life" at the zoo as well. The mongooses (mongeese?) and zebras were especially, um, active. It was funny listening to the comments adults would make when they saw what was going on. The boys thought the animals were fighting. :o) The funniest thing was when the monorail guide was telling about the zebras we would be seeing next. As we rounded the corner, they were being rather "frisky" and the guide got tickled. She continued on with her speech, but she was having a hard time keeping her voice normal. I looked at the other adults in the cars past us and saw that all of us were laughing.

I can't wait for the new zoo exhibit to open at the end of May! Giants of the Savannah is an 11-acre habitat that will house seven or eight elephants, 14 giraffes (that can be fed by zoo visitors!), a pride of lions, some cheetahs, and other animals. There will be a restaurant overlooking the big cat area. The zoo currently has two elephants and three giraffes, kept in small neighboring enclosures. The lone lion died of cancer a few years ago. The three cheetahs are on "The Hill", which is not so fun to walk to (which is why we often skip it). The grand opening is set for Memorial Day weekend; the boys and I will go the week after so we can avoid the sure-to-be-massive crowd.

The Fort Worth Zoo recently had a grand opening for its new Museum of Living Art (MOLA) - a new herpetarium. When we visited the zoo with a home school group last fall, the new one was under construction but the old one had already closed. While I'm not a fan of reptiles and amphibians, they do make great photographic subjects. I can't wait to visit it soon!

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I've heard many people make comments about how "bad" the Dallas Zoo is. I think it's great! Maybe it's not up to the same quality as other major zoos or even the Fort Worth Zoo, but it's improving. It's improved quite a bit in the 5 years that we've been going to it. The Dallas Zoo is better than the zoo I grew up visiting, which is better than no zoo at all. I've been a member of the zoo for 4 years now, and I plan to continue my membership indefinitely. Even when the boys think they've "outgrown" the zoo, I know I never will. I love zoos!

To Bee or Not to Bee

Caleb is supposed to participate in the Kaufman County Spelling Bee tomorrow afternoon. He's been working hard since October learning to spell a list of 250 words that range from jet, can, and wig to latitudinarian, horripilation, and fluoroscope.

The big question is this: If it snows tonight and tomorrow as forecast, will they reschedule the bee?

In a way, it would be beneficial to have a postponement. Caleb has several words he's been having trouble with, and that would give him a little more time to study them.

On the other hand, he's ready to get this done. He's waffled at times on wanting to drop out of the bee because he's gotten frustrated with missing the harder words. Then he'll be successful at spelling even more difficult words and his feelings toward it will change.

Tired of his fits and complaining about the words being hard, I gave him an ultimatum last week. I told him he needed to decide once and for all if he's going to participate, to think seriously about whether he wanted to do this or not. If he did, we'd continue working on the word list and he wouldn't complain about it. If he didn't, I'd let the bee coordinator know and that would be the end of things - and I wouldn't allow him to participate the following year. Even though he decided to continue on this year, he's not sure if he wants to try next year. I guess that will be determined by how he does in the actual bee, not our practicing for it.

An Experiment of Sorts

Every school day, the boys have to write an entry in their journal. They each have two topics to choose from. Since Jacob is a first-grader, he's only required to write one sentence or a short list of items. Caleb has to do more, but it's a struggle to get him to write much at all.

I think I read in a magazine once about letting kids have their own blog pages where they can write whatever they want, and they can share it with extended family members. I remembered it the other day and started toying with the idea of letting the boys do it. When I mentioned it to them yesterday during school, they were both excited about it.

Today we set up their blog pages and they've each posted one entry. It's a private blog, invitation only. Currently the invitations are just to grandparents and aunts, but we might branch out a little later on and include a few of the boys friends' families.

My main goal in this is to get the boys to write more, but I have more specific goals in mind for each of them. I'd like Jacob to improve his basic skills: spelling, capitalization, and punctuation. Caleb has the basics down. I'd like him to branch out more in what he writes - to improve his sentence structure and express more creativity. I hope this works!

I Love Mrs. Baird's... Bakery

Earlier this month, our homeschool group took a field trip to Mrs. Baird's Bakery in Fort Worth.

After we were ushered into the classroom, our tour guide told us we were in for a real treat. The smaller bakery that offers tours was closed that day for unscheduled maintenance, so instead of rescheduling us, she decided to take us across the parking lot to the larger bakery. Score!

We watched a cartoon video about the history of Mrs. Baird's Bread and how the bread is made, then we put on hair nets and hard hats with earphones and walked next door.

The factory was loud, as was to be expected. We saw not only bread being made, baked, and cooled, but we also got to see icing being spread on top of cinnamon rolls and mini donuts traveling on conveyor belts, on their way to be smothered in powdered sugar or bathed in chocolate. We saw where their delicious honey buns are made, but they were finished with that for the day. We also got to see where the bread is sliced and packaged, but that was also temporarily shut down.

On our way out of the factory area, each of us was given a package of mini chocolate donuts and a honey bun.

Our next stop was a replica of Mrs. Baird's original kitchen, where she baked 4 loaves of bread at a time. For more information on Mrs. Baird's history, check out "Meet Mrs. Baird" on the company's website.

After our tour was over, we went back into the classroom and sampled some fresh, warm bread and butter. Mmmmm...

Down the street, there was a Mrs. Baird's Bakery Outlet where you can buy day old bread at half-price as well as other things made in the bakery. There's also an outlet near our library, so I think we'll go from time to time.

Unfortunately the Mrs. Baird's bread we've bought at local grocery stores gets hard after just a day or two. The boys eat sandwiches for lunch almost daily, so hard bread doesn't go over well. For Billy and the boys, I buy Sunbeam bread, which I've noticed stays soft for about a week. For myself, I do buy Mrs. Baird's Bread - the Honey 7 Grain variety, which has sunflower seeds and other goodies baked into it. One loaf will last me two weeks, though, since I only eat a half a sandwich for lunch almost daily. Yes, the bread gets a little dry after a while, but it doesn't seem to get as hard as the white bread. I'm happy with it.

We enjoyed the bakery tour and the boys have already said they're ready to go back. If you're interested in going, it's a great experience, but you have to request a reservation up to two weeks in advance. Small groups and families can probably get in easier than larger groups like ours. To schedule a tour, visit their website.

A few things we learned...

*The main ingredients in Mrs. Baird's Bread are flour, yeast, water, and milk.

*The factories run 24/7, with two days off each year - Thanksgiving and Christmas.

*Mrs. Baird's Bread can be found in TX and neighboring states, as well as MO.

*Wendy's restaurants are the largest local (DFW) consumer of Mrs. Baird's hamburger buns.

*The factory can bake 2,000 loaves of bread at once. The bread takes 20 minutes to bake and 2 hours to cool (if I remember correctly). We saw 20,000 loaves cooling on a rotating rack when we visited.

Like a Steel Trap

Jacob can do really well in school when he wants to. He has totally amazed me lately with his ability to remember things. I knew Caleb has a great memory, but Jacob always plays around and seems not to listen. Surprise! He does hear!

Since Awana has started back up for the school year, we've incorporated it into our school studies again. First thing each morning, the boys sit at the table with their Awana books and look over their verses. Caleb reads well, so I don't have to be right on top of his work, but I do work with him on everything. Jacob is learning to read, so I have to read each story to him and go over each verse word for word.

Jacob learned his first verse (John 3:16) in two days. We practiced it all last week to be sure he wouldn't forget it when he had book time at church. As it turned out, the Sparks didn't work on verses much last week. I think they were getting into their groups for the year and learning what to do. When I asked him if he said his verse, he told me, "No, Crazy Kevin said we didn't have to say them." (Crazy Kevin is the Sparks director.) Instead of just working on the same verse all week, I decided we'd go ahead and start working through his book. He could recite his next verse (1 John 4:14) after I had read it to him only 2 times! When we went over both verses today, he could say them both with no help. So we went on to his next verse, Psalm 147:5. I figured he might need to hear it several time and practice saying it with me, but he went right on after just two readings and said it all word for word. We reviewed his other two verses, which he said without any help, then repeated the new verse again. No problems whatsoever! Wow! If he continues on at this rate, he'll finish the book in no time!

Caleb is doing really well with his verses, too. I gave him (well, both of them) a card file box and a stack of index cards. I'll write their new verses on the card, with the references on the backs, so they can recite them and check to see if they're right. They file the card away by book (J for Jeremiah, John, and 1 John, etc.). Later when it's time to review, they know right where to find them. In the past I would write Caleb's verses out on large index cards with different colored markers. Then I'd cut the verses into phrases of 3 or 4 words for him to put in order. After a day or so, I'd cut them into smaller sections, until by Friday they'd be down to individual words. By then he can put the whole verse together. He loves puzzles, so that method really works for him. I'm not sure if I'll need to do that with Jacob, though. He seems to get things quickly by just hearing them. Caleb is more of a visual/kinesthetic learner like I am.

Freebies!

Several weeks ago - in fact, I think it was early June - a friend of mine emailed a group of us a notice about free tickets to the Texas State Fair for homeschoolers. The deadline was only 2 days away, so I got right on it and mailed off my request. I had completely forgotten about it and was talking with a friend of mine Monday about finding some tickets so we could go. (We've never been in the 5 years we've lived here, and I know the boys would love it.)

Another friend had emailed me about the Pizza Hut Book-It! program for kindergartners through sixth graders. I'll need to look over the program more closely, but participants can earn coupons for a free one-topping personal pan pizza for each of the next six months - October through March.

Last week I signed Caleb up for the Braum's Book Buddies program. For every 6 books he reads, he'll get a coupon for a free ice cream treat - a sundae, a single dip cone, or a frozen yogurt cone. He's participated in that the last two years and has really enjoyed it. Unfortunately it's only open to first- through sixth- graders, so Jacob has to wait another year.

Wednesday, after my workout, we ventured out to a nearby Dallas Rec Center in hopes of getting some free passes to the Dallas Arboretum. Score! They still had some, so I got four. Now we're just waiting for cooler weather...

Today's mail brought some nice surprises! Our state fair tickets and our pizza coupons arrived! I'll get the ice cream coupons later this month. Now I need to see what other freebies I can get my hands on!

Providence

There's a large number of homeschooling families in the Dallas area, and several are seminary families as well. That's how I got to know the majority of my homeschooling cohorts.

Last fall, I got connected with Stacy, who was a homeschool mom in South Carolina on her way to Dallas. We hit it off, emailing frequently and commenting on each others' blogs. (They finally got here in May!) She was frustrated about not being able to connect with different homeschool groups in the area, and I want to do some other field trips in addition to what my homeschool association plans. We put our keyboards together - we chat regularly through Facebook - and decided to do something about it.

We planned an outing at a local park where the kids could play and fish and the moms could talk about activities we'd like to do together and places we'd like to visit. Last month I hosted a gathering for a group of homeschool moms so we could look over each other's curricula, ask and answer questions, etc., so we started with that basic group and added others to our list as we thought of them.

The big question was not what or when, but where. If you take the two families in our group who live the farthest apart, it's probably an hour difference! Stacy and I threw around a few names of area parks, then I asked Kim about Samuell Farm here in Mesquite. She said it's her boys' favorite park. There are ponds for fishing, a playground, picnic tables scattered here and there under trees, old tractors the kids can climb on, etc. And it's free. We decided to meet there.

Today around noon, nine minivans and a car pulled into the parking lot. We trooped out onto the grounds and searched out a place in the shade to eat lunch. I don't think we had been there 5 minutes when a man with a video camera came walking up to the group, asking if we minded him filming us for a news story. The local CBS affiliate was doing a story on the park because it's part of Dallas Parks and Recreation and is in danger of being shut down. It just so happened that we were there at the same time.

As we were checking with all the moms to make sure there were no objections to filming, a reporter walked out and began asking us why we were out that day and who had been there before. None of us had! Since I was answering most of his questions, he asked if he could interview me for a news segment.

He asked me preview questions, then moved me to a shady spot and had a microphone put on my collar. The cameraman began filming and I answered the reporter's questions. Then he cut the video but kept recording audio while he asked a few more questions. He was fishing for a history angle since the park is part of an old now-non-working farm, so I gave him my best "we love learning about local history" answer. I hope he got a decent sound bite. I'm sure the video will be horrible - me all red-faced and sweating, trying to hide a half-eaten carrot stick in my hand. (Well, he was there during our lunch...)

We only decided to go to Samuell Farm on Tuesday, and I'm pretty certain none of the moms in our group would've alerted the local media for something as simple as what we were doing. Certainly no news station would've sent out a crew to film and interview a bunch of homeschool moms and their kids. It was just providence for the reporter - and the farm's owner - that we just happened to show up there today.

It'll be interesting to see what becomes of Samuell Park, if what we did on a whim will have any influence on the final outcome. In the meantime, you can see me and the rest of our homeschool group on the CBS 11 news.

Update: They didn't use the interview in the story because it didn't fit with the angle they decided to go with - upkeep on the out-of-the-way farm versus the beautiful Samuell Grand Park in the Dallas city limits. They did show footage of our group, though, as background to the main story. Jacob can be seen briefly walking between the swings. His back is to the camera, but he's in a blue shirt. Caleb can be seen even more briefly as he swings past the lens in his bright green shirt. It's easy to miss him, it's so fast. Stacy's boys are the ones fishing. You can see it here.

February Field Trips

This is our second year to be involved with our local homeschool association. Last school year, we only participated in soccer, t-ball, and the spelling bee. When I renewed our membership for this school year, I decided I wanted to be more involved. Boy, have we!

The boys were involved in soccer again last fall, and Caleb participated in the spelling bee again this year. There were other opportunities for field trips, but we didn't participate for various reasons. Then came February!

One of the first events we signed up for back in August was for the association's World's Fair. Each family would choose a country and work on a project to share with everyone at the main event on February 5. Since Billy has been to Greece a few times and has several pictures and other things he's brought back with him, we chose that country. (Countries could only be represented once.) I thought about the project off and on, but never really did much with it. Then it came down to the wire. (I've always been quite the procrastinator...) The week before the fair, I purchased the project board. That Saturday, I put the title on it. Monday, the day before the fair, I got busy deciding what to put on it and getting started. The day of the fair, I spent all morning and a good part of the afternoon finishing up. After Billy got home, we loaded up everything we were going to put on the table and headed out.

This was our display.
The fair was really interesting. Twelve families ended up participating, representing a total of 13 countries. They were chosen for various reasons. Some had served as missionaries in another country. Others had ancestral roots they wanted to share. One family chose Iraq because the husband/father is there right now. All the tables were decorated nicely, and there was all sorts of food to sample. (I thought about taking some, too, but in all my procrastinating, I forgot that detail...) The students were given "passports" to carry with them as they visited the different countries. At each table, they would get a sticker or stamp representing that country. The girl at the table for Japan drew a Japanese symbol in each passport; Billy wrote "Greece" in English and Greek. Several families who didn't make a project for the fair came out to tour it all. I think close to 150 people showed up in all.

Two days later, we went on a field trip to Cici's Pizza. About 40 of us attended. Everyone got to choose which kind of pizza they wanted to make from cheese, Alfredo cheese, pepperoni, ham, or sausage. They took the kids back in groups of five, plus whatever adults needed to supervise them. Caleb, Jacob, and I wanted different kinds of pizza, so I went with their groups, then went back and made my own later.

Caleb made an Alfredo cheese pizza. I didn't realize how simple they are: just Alfredo sauce and cheese. I'm not a fan of Alfredo sauce, but I might break down and buy a jar of it next time we make pizzas so Caleb can help make his own small pizza. (The boys each have a small pizza stone now for making their own pizzas.) Jacob made a pepperoni pizza, and I made a ham one.

As the pizzas finished baking, they were cut and put on the buffet. Everyone got to eat some of their own pizza and sample some of the others. By the time the regular lunch crowd came in, the buffet was nearly overflowing with all the pizzas we had made (and were still making).

It was a great experience for all the kids to see all the processes to get to the point of making the actual pizzas, to take part in making their own, and to see other customers eating the pizzas they had made. It was pretty fun for all the adults, too!

This morning we went on our third and final field trip of the month. I had signed us up back in September to attend Slim Goodbody's "Bodyology" show. (I remember watching Slim Goodbody on TV way back when I was a kid! For some reason, I want to associate him with being on Captain Kangaroo, but I think it was the other way around - Bob Keeshan made special guest appearances in Slim Goodbody's show. Either way...) We all loved the show! The music was catchy, and he taught the audience a few of the songs. There was a lot of audience participation, both verbal and physical. He also had some of the children come on stage to help him with a few things. One of the girls from our group got to go up when he called for a few children who could do "something amazing" using their bones and muscles. A few kids did cartwheels and bridges (cheater back bends). One boy did a little breakdancing; another one did the worm. But 8-year-old Jade got the biggest applause for her double front handspring. Very impressive!

Apparently the "Bodyology" show comes through here every year or so. We'll have to be sure we go again next year. It'll be pretty much the same thing, but the boys loved it so much, I know they'd love to go back. If you ever get a chance to go with your kids or grandkids, I highly recommend it.

F-I-R-S-T

Caleb won the 2nd grade spelling bee this morning!

The next to last contestant misspelled "blue", which Caleb spelled correctly. His next word was "chew".

The 2nd grade list had several homonyms on it, and the caller had said before the bee began that it was up to the contestants to ask for definitions or sentences if they needed them. I think that's what threw the little girl off. Caleb realized it earlier in the bee when asked to spell "toe".

My friend Jenny's daughter Abigail won the 1st grade bee. We left right after the 3rd grade bee because Caleb and Jacob were both antsy and bored. It was good for us to stick around for that bee, though, because Caleb had a chance to hear the words on the 3rd grade list. They're quite a bit harder than the 2nd grade list, so we'll need to get an early start on them next school year.

Another friend of mine had a son participating in the 5th grade bee. I'm not sure how the bees for 4th grade and up work, but I think each grade participates separately, with the winner from each participating in an overall bee. The winner from it will represent the homeschool association in the county bee next month. The winner of the county bee will then either participate in a regional bee or go on to the Scripps National Spelling Bee in Washington, DC.

Many years ago when I taught middle school, I worked with preparing my students for that bee. The word list is actually a book of several lists that follow different topics. The words range from very easy to exceptionally hard. I remember the first year we participated in it. I was trying to encourage my students to get involved, and they wanted me to give them examples of the words they'd have to spell. I started reading from one of the lists and several students decided they didn't want any part of it. A few of my gifted students wanted me to tell them some of the harder words, so I challenged them to spell "otorhinolaryngology". I read the definition to them (the study of the ear, nose, and throat) and showed them how to figure out the word one part at a time. By the end of the day, many of them could spell the word. I had several students participate in the bee that year. Only a handful participated the next year, and no one did the year after that.

I don't remember ever participating in anything other than class spelling bees when I was in school. I would've loved to work toward the Scripps National Spelling Bee. In fact, I may get out those three lists/books from my teaching days just for fun. Yeah, I'm a nerd.

Friday Fourteen

Wow! It's been a while!

There's not a Friday Fourteen that I know of, but I missed yesterday's Thursday Thirteen and I have had so much going on lately that I can fill you in on 14 things.

1. I went ten days ago to have some dental work done. Thankfully I didn't have to have a root canal! Ten more days until I get my permanent crown.

2. The boys' schooling is going nicely. We've all gotten into a good routine and are usually finished with everything by 12:30 p.m. Jacob is doing well with his reading, too. I made him some flash cards for practice, and I add to them each time he learns a new sound. He's proud of his progress.

3. My friend Kim and I have decided to start meeting each Wednesday morning to work out. This Wednesday was our first day. We walked about 3/4 mile or so on the outdoor track, then went inside to use some of the weight equipment. We finished up with some crunches, then sat and relaxed for a few minutes in the sitting area of the dressing room. I'm very sore today, especially my right arm. At times I can hardly bend it. I think I'll take some pain reliever before going to bed tonight so I can sleep. Last night I had a hard time finding a good position for my arm and woke up several times.

4. Billy and I watched One Flew over the Cuckoo's Nest last weekend. It wasn't great, but it held my attention enough to watch to the end. It was great seeing Christopher Lloyd and Danny DeVito when they were young. DeVito reminded me so much of someone else, but I haven't been able to put my finger on it. I want to read the book now because I didn't understand part of what happened in the movie. One more book to add to my ever-growing list.

5. This weekend I'm hoping to watch The Lake House. Sandra Bullock and Keanu Reeves are in some of my favorite movies. Anyone seen it?

6. Caleb is learning about ancient Greece right now, so we've been reading some Greek myths. He loved the story of Echo and Narcissus. Today we read about King Minos, Theseus, and the Minotaur. He really liked that one, too. He thought the story of Daedalus and Icarus was okay. Next week we'll read about Arachne, Hercules, and Odysseus. I'm really enjoying this part. I remember reading and falling in love with Greek myths when I was in 8th grade.

7. I've been working hard with my SWIM Secretary duties the last few weeks. With the new semester starting up, I've been busy inputting all the new wives' names into our database. Then we decided to clean up our email account. I didn't realize there was a limit on the number of sent emails each day and ended up blocking the account. We decided to get another account elsewhere, so then I was busy researching free email services and determining which one would serve us best. Then I had to get it set up and export our address book - nearly 1,000 email addresses. Now I have to count up the hours I spent doing all that so I can include it in my September monthly report.

8. In other SWIM news, we had our Fall Opening last Saturday. There were about 95 wives present, with about half of them new to the seminary. The program was good and several wives signed up for various programs.

9. Caleb decided he doesn't want to be in the science fair after all. I think he got aggravated because I went from Home Depot to Lowe's to a nursery without finding what I was looking for. I had decided to go back to Lowe's to get what we needed, but he said he didn't want to do it. He just wanted to get the few groceries we needed from Wal-Mart and go home. There's always next year...

10. Tonight is the last night of new Monk and Psych episodes until January. Too bad! But at least Survivor starts back up next week. The week after that is CSI, CSI: New York, and ER.

11. The 51st Annual Greek Food Festival is in two weeks! I can't wait to go back so I can eat some more souvlaki. I might even try some spanikopita (spinach and feta cheese fried in phyllo). They'll also have baklava sundaes there. That sounds good. Really sweet, but good. Oh, and Constantine Maroulis will be there, too. He's supposed to demonstrate a recipe Friday night and play two short concerts on Saturday night and Sunday afternoon. They need to book Yanni.

12. I've got a full month of bookings for October - 4 cooking shows. I'd like to get one more show. I've got another lady who's very interested in the stoneware that's on special next month, but I haven't been able to get in touch with her. Maybe I'll be able to reach her tomorrow...

13. Pampered Chef has some really good-looking recipes out this fall/winter. I can't wait to start trying some. One I'm wanting to make next week is the Mediterranean Hummus Pizza. I'll get Billy to pick up some of the good hummus from Fadi's. I'm also wanting to make some Warm Nutty Caramel Brownies. (I think that's what they're called.) I tried some Truffle Brownie Cups the other night at our PC Cluster meeting. They were sooo good, and they look really easy to make.

14. Sundays are now chock-full of activities. After church and lunch, we'll all be home for a couple hours before heading back for the afternoon. I'm attending a Bible study series called "The Truth Project" (by Focus on the Family) for the next 11 weeks. The boys have started AWANA, too. It begins right after the Bible study session is over. I'll be helping some in Cubbies this year. (They've added a new group for 2- and young 3-year-olds called Puggles.) Billy will be using the 4 hours we're gone each Sunday afternoon to work on his online class and other school work.

Now that things are slowing down again (or so it seems), I hope to get back to blogging regularly.

First Day of School

After a few delays, and a much bigger break than I had intended to take, we're officially back to school again. We didn't finish everything last year and, because of our busy summer schedule, we didn't get the chance to pick back up again until now. I had hoped to have a more year-round school year, but we ended up taking a full 3 months off instead.

Caleb woke up early today, shortly after 7:15. He might have been excited, but he wouldn't admit to it. I woke Jacob up shortly after 7:30 and had the boys get dressed for the day and eat breakfast. I wouldn't let them get on the computer until after we had finished with school, which they hated. That's one of the new rules.

As I was getting Caleb's books ready, he told me he wanted to do his math first. That's his favorite subject. He jumped right in, picking up where we left off with very little trouble. He was a little rusty on adding two-digit numbers, but after I worked with him on one or two, he got right to it.

I had planned on history (his least favorite subject) for Mondays and Tuesdays, but Caleb wanted science on those days. He wanted to do plant science again, but I told him we had completed that unit. He has the opportunity to participate in a science fair sponsored by our homeschool association for grades K-8, so he decided to do a project on plant science for that. We reviewed our journal entries from our experiments so we could come up with some ideas. Since he really wants to plant some more seeds, and the ones we planted in small cups this spring quit growing because they ran out of room, we decided to make that the focus of the project. This weekend we'll get seeds, good-quality potting soil, and 5 different sized pots so we can start our project next Monday.

After we planned that out, we got back to our human body science. Today and tomorrow we're studying bones. We actually have a library book called Dem Bones: "The toe bone's connected to the foot bone. The foot bone's connected to the ankle bone..." Next week we'll study muscles. Then we'll move on to the nervous system, the circulatory system, and the respiratory system. Finally we'll be able to get to this year's study on earth and space sciences.

Following a quick snack break, we worked on spelling, English, and writing. Part of our spelling this fall will be working on the 2nd grade spelling bee word list. Caleb participated last year and did really well, especially considering we didn't start working on the word list until only 2 weeks prior to the bee. In English, he learning about the different types of sentences. He's having a lot of fun with that. This year I need to increase the amount of writing he does. I need to be sure he does some copywork each day and gradually work in some writing of the narratives after his science and history lessons.

I also need to get him started early on reviewing his AWANA verses for this year. It starts in two weeks, but since I know the first few verses he'll need to know for this year, he may as well get started. I have also thought of two visitors he can take with him this year, so he'll get that part of the green jewel requirement met. We've struggled with that the last two years.

I set aside 30 minutes this afternoon for him to complete the second side of his math worksheet, then do some silent reading. When his time was up, he said he wanted to read some more, but that only lasted about 5 minutes before he was back to playing with his Hot Wheels.

While Caleb was working on his copywork, I started working with Jacob on learning to read. I'm using a phonics program, Teach Your Child to Read in 100 Easy Lessons by Seigfried Engelmann. I used that with Caleb and he was reading Dr. Seuss books after only 3 months. Jacob did really well with his first lesson today. He surprised me by already knowing the 's' sound without me telling him first. Thankfully the lessons are short - only about 10 minutes each right now. I had trouble keeping him still long enough to complete the first lesson. Maybe he'll adjust as the lessons get longer later on.

I wonder what tomorrow will be like!