Mariposa Academy Homeschool

poem: Halloween, by Richard Anderson
Spanish word: la calabaza, pumpkin.
root word: noct-, night (Latin)
artwork: The Bath, by Mary Cassatt

The past week or two has been very unschooly. I’ve been slacking on planning, but the kids have been learning through their own activities. Last night I finally got around to writing down our plan for this week. Of course, I just had to do a Halloween theme! We are going to focus on pumpkins and bats. I printed out a bunch of stuff from Enchanted Learning. They have a fantastic illustrated printout of the life cycle of a pumpkin. I’ll have the kids color that, and we’ll talk about the pumpkin life cycle. I saved some pumpkin seeds last night when we were carving our pumpkin. Some were sprouting inside the pumpkin, and one was even taking root in there. How cool! We’re going to take the sprouting seeds apart to examine them, and we’ll plant some seeds. obviously we’re not going to grow a pumpkin vine from a pot on our balcony, but we’ll see what happens.

We’re going to learn some Spanish Halloween words. The kids have Halloween-themed writing projects where they draw a Halloween picture (Llani’s is her favorite costume, and Zeke’s is a scary monster) and write a few sentences about it. Of course, Zeke will dictate to me and I will write down what he says. Llani has a Halloween word search, Zeke has a bat counting sheet, and they both have jack-o-lantern mazes.

We are going to read Stellaluna and Bat Jamboree. I printed out an information sheet about bats with five comprehension questions at the end for Llani to answer. For social studies we’ll talk about the history of Halloween, and maybe touch upon Dia de los Muertos, too. Math is the only subject I haven’t worked into the theme. I could have printed out some word problems with bats and pumpkins, but it seemed a bit contrived, and Llani is doing so well with the Miquon book I figured why bother.

The other day, when talking with some dinner guests, I found out that an acquaintance of mine has started spanking her two-year-old. She is someone I never would have expected to spank. She is smart, educated, well-traveled, and generally pretty AP. I’m surprised and saddened.

Upon hearing the news, one of my guests commented that spanking doesn’t work for her child (also two years old). They tried it but it didn’t work. The little girl was spanked twice by her father, and once she “really deserved” it. I was wondering what heinous act a two-year-old could possibly commit that would deserve violence. Her crime? She wrote on the carpeting and new TV set.

I just don’t get it. Are material goods that important that they warrant violent retaliation when someone damages them? Is that a lesson one would want to teach a young child? Did she damage those things maliciously? Did she understand what she was doing? She’s two, for Maude’s sake! She drew on them because she wanted to draw and didn’t realize how valuable those things were and didn’t have the impulse control to stop herself. How does spanking teach her impulse control (which is mostly age-related, anyway) or respect of property? Wouldn’t a better response be to make her help clean up, to make amends for her actions? Tell her that crayons are for paper, and that if she draws on other things the crayons will be taken away?

I think a lot of times when people say that their child really deserved a spanking, what they really mean is that the parent was really, really angry.

Anyway, after relating that story, my guest talked about how punishment worked best, and she and another guest talked about the different punishments they used, such as not letting the child watch TV, or taking away a favorite toy and placing it where the child can see it, but not get to it. Letting the child see it is key, because then the child feels bad.

I try not to be judgmental, because I realize that punitive discipline is the only thing most people know, and it’s a leap to start thinking of discipline in an entirely different way. And of course, when I am stressed or tired or frustrated, I do slip back into punitive mode. But it is so hard for me, so painful, to sit there listening to parents talk about the creative ways they devise to make their kids feel bad in order to change their behavior.

I think part of what makes it so difficult for me is that, often, the reasons for punishment aren’t really misbehavior– they’re just things that the parent finds annoying or inconvenient. The kids are punished for having a hard time going to sleep, for crying at bedtime and saying, “I want to sleep with you, Mommy!” They’re punished for crying when they are upset, for stamping their feet and whining when they are angry. What does it teach children when their emotions are considered punishable offenses? When expressing their feelings in the only way they can is labeled “bad”? And if they are expressing their emotions in an inappropriate way (for example, throwing things or hitting when they are angry), how does punishment teach them better ways? I’ve seen kids punished for potty accidents. How does punishing a child for mistakes help the learning process?

Like I said, I try not to judge. There are so many worse things a parent can do than giving a child a time-out or taking away a toy. And I don’t want to sound like I think I’m a perfect mom, because I’m far from it. I do yell sometimes, as much as I try not to. I do punish from time to time in the heat of anger. I probably spend way too much time on the computer and not enough time playing with the kids. But it is becoming harder and harder to listen to parents talk about punishing their kids, or to see the punishment in action.

Got up super-early because today Zekey had his first speech therapy session of the year. He has a new therapist, and she seems really good. Nice, personable, got my shy Zekey to open up, and seems to know her stuff. I’m relieved. Our therapist last year was so fantastic, and I was worried that whoever we got this year would not compare.

Zeke drew a picture during therapy, and apparently his drawing is incredibly advanced for his age. I had no idea. I knew he was good, but I didn’t realize he was that good. I am going to have to look up typical drawings of different ages. The therapist kept saying things like “wow” and “I’m so impressed” and “I can’t believe it,” and shaking her head in amazement. She said that usually at three years old and sometimes even in kindergarten, kids are usually just drawing stick figures, and their circles aren’t very round. Zeke draws whole bodies with hands and feet, different kinds of hair, and quite a bit of detail. Wow, my boy is talented! I’m proud.

Our walk home from speech therapy became a nature walk. The kids collected a ton of leaves, and some acorns and pine cones. We are totally stealing this idea from HSing3kinder. I’m not sure yet what else we’ll do, but some other nature crafts are definitely going to happen.

Right now Llani is reading one of the new books that arrived yesterday, in our first order from Scholastic Book Clubs. I have such fond memories of those book club orders from when I was a kid, and if our first order is any indication, my kids love them just as much as I did.

I am really loving our homeschooling these days. I haven’t been this happy and satisfied in a while. We seem to have struck the perfect balance of routine and freedom, of child-led learning and parent planning.

We’ve been going outside and doing nature study at least once a week, more when we can. It’s really relaxed for now. We walk, we notice things, I remind the kids to use all their senses (except for taste!), and they journal their experiences if they want. So far, their journals are just drawing, but I might work with Llani tonight on listing the different trees we saw today. I pointed out different trees in the park and explained how to identify them. As time goes on, I’m going to introduce different nature projects to do. Someone on one of my homeschooling email lists posted a ton of fall nature projects, and I can’t wait to try some.

We do Miquon Math almost every day. That’s pretty much the only thing I insist upon, and we only do as much as Llani wants. Sometimes she’ll do page after page of work until I worry she’ll get burned out, sometimes just a few pages. I can’t say enough how thrilled I am that my daughter loves math.

Llani has picked up knitting again. I’m sure she’ll drop it and pick it up again several more times, but it’s nice that she’s interested. She’s also been helping me prepare dinner, which she loves.

We are keeping busy, while at the same time not running ourselves ragged. We have fun each day, and at the end of the week I am amazed at how much learning was accomplished.

Oh gosh. Fourmother tagged me for a meme. I am supposed to choose 5 posts which show the evolution of my blog, and then tag 5 other people to do the same. Really, though, I don’t know that this blog shows much evolution. Sad, I know.

What I’m going to do is choose five entries that show different aspects of my blog. I will have to copy some in their entirety because when I switched blog software, I had to turn a bunch of old posts into one big post. Here goes:

1: My first Mariposa Academy blog entry:

2006-06-09
Yay! We have a blog!

Things are going along swimmingly here at Mariposa Academy. I’ve been learning more about classical homeschooling, and while I am not going to become a classical homeschooler, there are certain aspects of it that really appeal to me. So we have started using The Story of the World for history. I’ve been reading it aloud to Llani, and having her narrate a summary of what she’d read back to me, which I write down for her. We’re both enjoying it. At first I was trying to do history three times a week, but sometimes she’d balk at the narration part. It started feeling like I was forcing her. So now, we do it when she wants to do it. I guess I really can’t call us unschoolers anymore. What we are is eclectic. Eclectic and relaxed. We’re pretty unschooly in that I don’t make her do anything, and I let her interests steer us, so to speak, on our homeschooling journey. But I’m not just sitting around doing nothing until she decides, of her own accord, to study a particular topic.

Llani does something “academic” just about every day, just because she feels like it. Some of the things she does are: read an “easy reader” book, read a picture book (which is more difficult for her, but she reads the words she knows and skips the ones she doesn’t); look at a Spanish, French, or Hebrew picture dictionary; write some words down; practice her handwriting by copying or tracing something I’ve written; write a letter to a friend; observe birds, squirrels, and bugs; and look at a history picture book.

Lately she’s taken to teaching Zeke stuff. She shows him the letters of the alphabet, has him repeat after her when she reads aloud, writes dotted letters and numbers for him to trace, and works with him in a workbook. Besides being absolutely adorable to watch, her involvement really is teaching him stuff! And wow, my “little baby” is actually a big boy, and a smart one at that! He is able to trace dotted lines, he can count to two, he understands bigger and smaller, he knows his colors, he knows some of his letters, and he can do simple mazes.

Most exciting, the boy who took so long to speak that I was starting to worry, is now speaking in full sentences and adding at least a word a day. His verbal skills just sort of exploded over the past few weeks. It’s delightful. Adrian and I don’t always understand what he’s saying, but he’s definitely speaking in sentences. Sometimes when I guess at what he’s telling me, he smiles and says, “No, not dat!” It’s very cute. Llani is a great Zekey-to-English translator; I don’t know how she does it. So usually if we can’t figure it out she tells us.

2: I write about child discipline:

08-08
Quite often, I’ll read something on a parenting website or in a magazine that discusses how to stop this or that troublesome behavior. The answer suggested is almost always punishment. Sometimes it’s time-out, sometimes it’s withholding of privileges, but almost without exception it is some way of making the child feel pain or unpleasantness whenever she misbehaves. The unquestioned assumption is that this unpleasantness will “teach the child a lesson” and cause her to change her behavior.

I do not punish my children. I do, however, discipline them. Contrary to popular belief, discipline and punishment are not the same thing. Punishment is one tool of discipline. It’s not one that I use. Instead, I use nonpunitive discipline.

With my children, I try hard to avoid the entire behaviorist paradigm of reward/bribe/punishment/threat. The natural question, I guess, is, “If you don’t punish, then what do you do instead?” I have to preface my answer by saying that, unlike punishment, what I do is not a reaction to misbehavior, a single action taken after the misbehavior has occurred. A lot of it is preventative, and a lot is part of my everyday interaction with my children, so much so that it’s become habit and I barely think of it anymore. Some of the techniques I use are anticipating needs; avoiding boredom, fatigue, and hunger; understanding their temperaments; using natural or logical consequences; connecting with my kids when I talk to them by getting down to their level, making eye contact, and touching them; empathizing with their feelings; giving choices; and “time in”; among others.

I’m not going to write a guide to nonpunitive discipline here; there are many books and websites written about it. Google “positive discipline” or “nonpunitive discipline” and you’ll find lots of information. My two favorite discipline books are Kids, Parents, and Power Struggles by Mary Sheedy Kurcinka, and Kids Are Worth It! by Barbara Coloroso. Another great one (and a quicker read) is How To Talk So Kids Will Listen… And Listen So Kids Will Talk by Adele Faber and Elaine Mazlish.

My children are not wild, undisciplined brats. They’re not perfect angels, either. They certainly have their moments. They’re at their worst when they’re tired, hungry, bored, or any combination thereof. Generally, though, they are well behaved children. I regularly get compliments on how nicely they behave. If you know my kids, you’ve seen how great they are. And none of it is due to punishment.

3: I get on my soapbox about homeschooling regulation.

4: Just so you know it’s not all sunshine and rainbows.

5: I start out crushing on Dan Zanes, and end up pontificating about simplicity and family unity.

There you go, five entries, showing different things I blog about here. Maybe you’ll see some sort of evolution that I don’t. I’m going to follow Holly’s example and not tag anyone, because most of the people I would tag have probably been tagged already. But if you read this and would like to participate, consider yourself tagged by me. You’re it!

Our slightly-more-structured homeschooling is going well. We’ve been doing math every day, using the Miquon orange workbook. Llani understands it well and really enjoys it. I’ve been math-phobic for as long as I can remember, so it’s very gratifying to have a daughter who loves math, looks forward to it, and has no idea that some people hate and fear it.

Llani has started looking at our weekly homeschooling plan and talking about what she wants to do. Hooray for self-direction! Yesterday for art she chose to draw out her plans for Halloween decorations. Apparently we’re going to string ghosts along the mantle, hang a spiderweb like a wreath on our front door, and have two small jack-o-lanterns on the kids’ windowsill. They will decorate those jack-o-lanterns with paint or markers.

She’s done a bit of handwriting practice (tracing letters), but she hates it and says it’s boring. I asked her if it would be more interesting to trace real words instead of just letters, and she said that would be even more boring. So I don’t know what we’re gong to do for handwriting. Maybe some light copywork, maybe just waiting a few months and trying again.

Today we went on a nature walk. We just had a little while, as I wanted to get back inside before it got too hot. Our condo complex is bordered by (sparse, suburban) woods, so we walked along the edge of the woods. We brought nature journals and a ziplock in case we wanted to collect stuff. The one thing we didn’t bring, that I wish I had brought, was a camera. As we were walking, I saw something swoop through the trees, and when it landed, I saw that it was an owl. City grrl that I am, this was my first time seeing an owl outside of a zoo. We were all awed. It sat on a branch for a few minutes, turning its head from side to side, and then flew away. When we got back inside we looked it up in a field guide and determined that it was a barred owl.

Tomorrow it’s supposed to be hot again, but after that it’s going to cool off. I love fall! I’m planning to spend lots of time outside with the kids, enjoying the weather. Nature walks, playground trips, hopefully some weekend trips to pumpkin patches, apple orchards, state parks, etc. I want to go to Latta Plantation. Maybe I could convince Adrian that we should go to the Folklife Festival there this weekend. On Sunday we went to a birthday party at the Equestrian Center there, and both kids rode horses. They had so much fun. We’re thinking of signing Llani up for riding lessons. She’s really into horses; I know she would love learning to ride. They also teach the kids how to care for the horses, which I think is important.

I’ve been neglecting the board– I haven’t put up new content since before our trip. But now that I am feeling better and we’re getting more organized, I’m going to keep the board up again.

It doesn’t quite feel like fall yet, but maybe a fall-themed poem and work of art will help my favorite season come sooner.

Poem: Autumn Greeting by anonymous
Artwork: Corn by Grandma Moses
Spanish Word: el otoño, autumn
Root Word: man (L), hand

I need energy! can someone give me a big bottle of energy, please? And a big box of cute maternity clothes would be awesome, as well.

So… we have finally chosen names for both sexes, and I might as well just share them now. Probably half my readers will hate them, but that’s life. I like unusual names, so the ones I pick are usually the kind people either love or hate. Ready? If we have a girl, she will be Luz Katharine. If we have a boy, he will be Atticus Francis. It took a long time to choose a boy’s name, and I started to despair of ever finding one, but I am so in love with the name Atticus Francis I almost hope we have a boy. Really, though, I don’t care whether we have a girl or boy.

I am almost into my second trimester, and feeling so much better in terms of nausea and food aversions. Still a bit gaggy in the mornings, but that’s nothing compared to how I was feeling. My tummy is popping out, and I am at that “is she?…. I’d better not ask; maybe she’s just gained weight” point. Yesterday I was at a café where I am friendly with the owner. I could swear she was looking at my tummy and wondering.

I decided (for the 40-billionth time) to get a bit more organized and structured with homeschooling, and wrote out a set of goals for Llani’s year. It’s still very laid-back, but for my own sanity I need to have some sort of path in front of me. For social studies we’re going to study world cultures. I know I saw a book at Joseph-Beth about how kids live in various countries; that will be a great way to start. For math, Miquon seems to be working out great for us. Science is going to be based in a very relaxed observation of the natural world, with nature walks, journaling as she gets more into writing, and fun demonstrations/experiments. Spanish will be learned through reading, conversation, Spanish TV shows and movies, and Rosetta Stone. For language arts, what can I say– this kid will just continue reading like it’s going out of style! Reading, talking about what she’s read, writing more.

What have I not covered? Art, gym, home ec…. these are all done through life. Do I really need a formal program? Even if I wanted to, could I possibly prevent Llani from drawing, dancing, listening to music, running, climbing, or begging to help prepare dinner?

As for Zekey, he knows almost all the letters of the alphabet, and loves to point them out and write them. He draws all the time, does dot-to-dots and mazes, can read most numbers up to 10, can count objects up to at least 7, and loves to be read to. He asks questions all the time. Sounds like we’ve got it covered.

What a disappointing trip that was! I really could not stand Madrid. Other than a couple of highlights (the Palacio Real, kids’ clothes at H&M), it was awful. Castilian food is terrible, and thee is pretty much nothing to eat for vegetarians. Even if we ate meat, we’d get pretty sick of meal after meal consisting of ham, other parts of pig (including ears, snout, and feet), and seafood– most of it deep-fried.

The streets smelled of piss, garlic, wine, beer, and cigarette smoke. Even the people smelled of smoke, booze, and garlic. My first-trimester overactive sense of smell has been lessening, but the smells of Madrid were able to make me gag a few times.

I’ve been to other cities in Europe and was completely enchanted; I’d been expecting the same from Madrid. That sense of enchantment just wasn’t there, though. After a few days, I just couldn’t wait to go home.

Salamanca was a lot better, but the lack of food, the smells, and the surly non-service in restaurants still got to me. Maude, was it pretty, though! It’s an old university city, with winding cobblestone streets and sandstone buildings. We visited the attached Old and New Cathedrals. The “new” section was built in the 15th century, if I recall correctly, and the old section in the 11th century. It was breathtaking to realize we were walking around in a building that was almost a thousand years old.

One thing that was great was seeing family, which was the reason for the trip. We finally got to meet two ten-month-old baby cousins, who were just adorable. Llani was head over heels for them, and they for her. She knows exactly how to talk to babies. I love watching her with them. Zekey holds back a little more; that’s just his nature. But he, too, loved seeing the babies.