Thanks for stopping by! I'm Magi, a scratch cooking, homeschooling mama, learning to raise good kids, good food, and good fun on our teeny-tiny little farm!
When each of my first two babies (not babies anymore, but my babies still) was new, in those sleepless, bleary-eyed first months I would lay awake at night, listening to my husband snore, and eyeing the baby monitor, suspicious of it’s silence. Exhausted, barely managing […]
This is less a blog post than a list I’m keeping for my own information. But it may be useful as encouragement for those of you who either want to homeschool and think it will be too expensive, or are homeschooling and wondering where all […]
Can you believe it’s already July? I can. I’m about done with Summer to be honest.
We finished our 16/17 school year way back in May, and the lack of structure is starting to get to me. Thank goodness I plan to start us back to school August 1.
I originally intended to do a modified year-round schedule wherein we would school six weeks on/one week off and take the entire month of July as well as six-ish weeks off from Thanksgiving to the New Year. But since the girls were itching to start school early last year, and then we also forgot to take a couple of our scheduled weeks off (which I think speaks volumes about this lifestyle…we forgot to take a break from school…more than once…chew on that a minute) we finished early this spring, which led to us having extra weeks off in early summer. (Although we’re still doing reading and Math…shhh, don’t tell the kids it counts as school…suckers!) It hasn’t been as structured as I need for my sanity though, so I think it’s time to ease us back into a Charlotte Mason Summer schedule, and then start back to AO in full force August 1.
That means it’s time for Mama to start planning and get some ducks in a row.
The first thing I do is set the dates for our school year. I like printing free year at a glance calendars from Anny Studio for this. I start at Thanksgiving and count back six weeks, then cross the 7th week off for a scheduled break. Then I count back another six, cross one off and so on until I get to August 1. Then I go to the New Year and count forward six weeks, cross one off etc. until I get to July. Sometimes it works out to not quite six week intervals, but that’s okay as long as you get your 36 weeks in all. (Or however many your state requires–find out here.) We ended up with 37 scheduled last year, which gave us plenty of wiggle room. Joy of homeschool in Washington State–we don’t have to report our schedule, so as long as it works out in the end I don’t worry too much about shifting dates, or taking time off as needed.
We follow Ambleside Online for our spine curriculum, so my next step is to print the book list and 36 week schedule for the year. AO years don’t necessarily correlate with public school grades, so at this point I’ve chosen to keep my girls in the same year. They still do Math and Language Arts at their own level. More about that later.
Next I go over the book list and see what I need to buy. Ambleside uses public domain books as much as possible. Many are available free for Kindle, or as e-texts from Project Gutenberg, or audio books at Librivox. They also provide alternative suggestions for the books that must be purchased. Between what we already had on hand, and what I was able to get for Kindle, I will only need to purchase three books for the upcoming year! I do prefer “real” books over ebooks, so I am always keeping my eyes open for quality hard copies of the Kindle books.
At this time I also take a look at Ambleside’s composer, hymns, folksongs, and artist studies for the upcoming year, so I can have prints made (public domain images can be printed on card stock by Walgreen’s or Office Depot very inexpensively) and create or find youtube and prime music playlists, and decide if I want to sub anything out. I make note of these right on my 36 week schedule so that I don’t have to keep looking up what I’m supposed to be singing/looking at each term.
I feel like we floundered a bit with Math last year, mainly because I couldn’t decide on a curriculum. I wanted something not too teacher intensive, like Teaching Textbooks, but the cheapo in me couldn’t spend the money for it. We tried, Moby, and Kahn Academy (both free) but I didn’t feel like either of those was linear enough. The girls would do their work each day, but the progress graph never seemed to change, so I was never sure if they were making any progress. With a workbook, they bring it to me, we go over whatever might be incorrect and I can physically see where they are. But I keep hearing such wonderful things about Khan Academy that I am giving it another trial for summer, just to rule out the possibility that the problem with it wasn’t my own lack of understanding on how it is set up. This year I will likely get them some basic grade level workbooks and also use Khan Academy as a supplement/evaluation tool.
I’m also considering pre-planning this year’s copy work (This is the beginning of language arts in a Charlotte Mason style education) and scripture memorization, so that I don’t have to come up with those as we’re going along. Last year we did it off the cuff, choosing whatever we liked best from what we were reading, or looking up inspirational quotes and scriptures.
Finally I plug everything into a Course of Study, to be sure I’ve got all my bases covered. This wouldn’t really be necessary if one were to purchase a complete open and go curriculum, but since I’m pulling resources from several places, I like to lay it all out in one place so I can see how I’m meeting each of my states eleven required subjects.
Now all that’s left is daily and weekly planning. For this I simply take 5 minutes each Sunday to look at the week ahead’s scheduled readings, as well as a look at any appointments etc. I put a M, T, W, TH next to each reading selection, two or three each day. Again, I just scribble right on the 36 week schedule. For Math we just do the next thing, so I don’t pre-plan that with the exception of giving errand days lighter workloads. I leave Friday open for catch up, field trips, Nature walks etc. This works well because the kids feel like we don’t have school on Friday, but I know that what we’re doing “counts”. Once that’s done I just sit down each evening and write out a checklist including the next day’s chores, reading, math and copy work for each kid in her spiral notebook. I leave these on the kitchen table with sharp pencils so they are ready to go first thing in the morning. I really liked having most of the written work all in one place last year. Minimal paper-clutter that way. The notebook checklist also allows the kids to be largely self-directed in case I need to be out of the house or otherwise busy. I wrote about our average day here.
That’s it!
Reading back through all that it sure seems like it would be easier to open a box and do the next page of the workbook, but that’s just not my style! If I wanted to follow someone else’s plan to a T they’d be in public school. 😉
Are you doing any planning, dreaming or scheming for the upcoming school year?
Homeschooling isn’t really a new sensational thing anymore. It’s almost mainstream. Everyone knows someone who homeschools. Look, you don’t need me to tell you about all the wonderful benefits of individualized education, more family time, or marching to your own drum. You need me to […]
Finding Time How about writing the final post in my Mother Culture Monday Series a week late at 7:40 pm? Sounds like someone has her act together, huh? Honestly, that is exactly the point. It’s EASY to let little demands and big demands, (even joyful […]
Can I be honest for a minute? I’m having a hard time replacing “time wasting” with Mother Culture. But that is exactly WHY I need to be more deliberate. The nature of my time wasting habits (internet/facebook) is definitely making my brain dull. I don’t want a dull brain. Today I took the proactive step of removing email and facebook from my tablet, so that when I’m using it for a legitimate reason (homeschool math, reading kindle books to the kids, playing music) I don’t get distracted by the time-wasters. This way I’m not bringing the distractions with me when I step away from my desk, and into my role as a human and mother.
Now, onto our final definition for (Mother) culture from Merriam-Webster.
5
a : the integrated pattern of human knowledge, belief, and behavior that depends upon the capacity for learning and transmitting knowledge to succeeding generations
b : the customary beliefs, social forms, and material traits of a racial, religious, or social group; also : the characteristic features of everyday existence (as diversions or a way of life} shared by people in a place or time popular culture
c : the set of shared attitudes, values, goals, and practices that characterizes an institution or organization
d : the set of values, conventions, or social practices associated with a particular field, activity, or societal characteristic
That is a lot to chew on. There are so many ways to be a mother, and more yet, to be a “good” mother. I suppose for the purpose of our discussion we can default to those things which all mothers have in common; The Culture of Motherhood.
Get a group of mothers together, no matter what religion, socioeconomic status, or nationality and you’ll find that we all desire that our children be healthy, well adjusted, and smart. We all hope our children know how much we love them. We all hope our children will grow into respectable adults. We are all trying hard, and we all worry we’re falling short.
We may speak different languages but we’re saying the same things:
Quit pulling your sister’s hair!
Brush your teeth!
Eat your veggies!
I love you!
Isn’t that idea kind of edifying? You are not alone, and that “pinterest perfect” mom at story hour, is probably just as tired and insecure as you are. Perhaps you could strike up a conversation.
Having a good group of Mothers to fellowship with does MUCH for the mother’s soul. Whether its your own mother, your sisters or a local mom’s group, I can’t say enough good things for spending time with other mothers, hearing their stories and sharing yours. I know that I always walk away from visits with other mothers with a full cup. I hope that I can fill theirs in return.
The one caveat to all this motherly fellowship is that you need to be sure not to compare, and critique yourself too harshly against mothers who appear to be doing it better. In truth they may be have it all together today, but maybe yesterday their kids had frosting sandwiches for lunch, (points to self). Do borrow the good ideas other moms share with you, but don’t use another mother’s public persona as a checklist for your failings.
You are the mother your children need.
Well, I’m all out of Mother Culture definitions for you, and I think by now we’ve all had a good chance to mull over what it means and how it can help in each of our homes. Next week I’ll move on to some nuts and bolts of how I get a few minutes to grow myself each day, even with a busy toddler in the house.
Welcome to Mother Culture Monday #3 How did you do carving out a few minutes for yourself this past week? I did some time wasting, but for future reference, I’d like to be more intentional about my “Mother Culture Minute” and do something that really […]
Thanks for coming back for more Mother Culture! Let’s dig right in, and take a closer look at the words Mother and Culture. Click below to find out what Merriam-Webster says: Definition of Mother (alert… one definition is decidedly naughty…I don’t know why they included it) […]
Oh my. We have been on a bit of a wacky cake kick. We love the classic cake, but we’ve been playing with the recipe, and have some variations that are to die for!
Actually “we” is a misnomer. I hardly get involved at all anymore. This cake is so simple that my daughters (8 and 10 yrs) are able to make it with zero help from me.
It’s about a 35 minute process which makes it perfect for short notice company, sudden cravings on a busy weeknight, or when your kid tells you about the bake sale the morning of the bake sale. And it doesn’t need to have any fancy ingredients. You likely have everything you need for the basic recipe in the cupboard right now.
Let’s get started!
Preheat your oven to 350 degrees.
Grab a cake pan. I use 9×13 Pyrex, which yields a thinner slice.
You’re going to mix your dry ingredients right in the pan, no need to grease it first.
In the pan whisk together:
1 1/2 C All Purpose Flour
1/3 C Cocoa Powder (mileage may vary by brand-I use toll house)
1 C sugar
1 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp salt
Make a hole in the middle of the dry ingredients, and add:
1 tsp vinegar (I use ACV)
1 tsp vanilla
5 Tbsp vegetable oil
1 C water
Mix wet and dry ingredients well and spread evenly in the pan.
Bake until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean, about 25 minutes.
Variations:
Substitute melted coconut oil for the vegetable oil, and add 1 C shredded coconut for a tropical twist.
Substitute orange extract in place of vanilla for orange truffle cake.
Substitute cold coffee in place of the water for a mocha cake.
Use your imagination.
YUMMY!
So, today I was feeding my sourdough starter, and I made a seriously Charlotte Mason quality connection. Mother Culture; you have to feed it, or you run out. If you’re not a hardcore CMer you’re probably wondering what on earth I’m talking about and how […]