Education at Disneyland

Tom used the bike lock with combo to lock up the stroller at ESPN Zone. He takes this part of our journey very seriously. I walk and they ride in the big bike stroller so that I can actually get some exercise and they aren't exhausted by the time we get to the park. Then we lock up the stroller (I call it a cart) and walk the rest of the time we are there. Usually we take the Monorail in but it is closed for "refurbishment at this time".

Jake fell on the way into the gate and scratched his arm. He wanted me to take a picture of it, so here it is.

                       

 Tom wanted to try to get on the Pirate's (we have been to the park several times since it reopened but haven't been able to get on it yet). He asked for a map and used it to find where we were and then where we needed to get off the train and get to the ride. It was closed when we got there, again! So we went on Haunted Mansion and Splash Mountain.

 

Tom was laughing about how Jake must be an alien because he likes these rides and isn't scared at all and he is younger than him. Jake rides up front by himself, doesn't even flinch a bit. Tom rides next to me in the back with his fingers in his ears cowering behind me most of the time. But he does want to go on the ride!

Then we had lunch. We talked about the food groups again and identified them in our lunch and made some good choices like water and carrots instead of soda and french fries. I told Tom that they should say that their kids meals came with duck food (aka french fries) We saw the ships sailing by on the Rivers of America while we ate. We talked about the American flag on the Columbia, why it had a circle of 13 stars and when and where ships like that were used. We saw the Mark Twain and decided to go on that later.

We went on Winnie the Pooh. We walked over and Pirate's was still closed. We went over to the Mark Twain just in time and asked to ride in the wheel house. The boys drove the ship and pulled the whistles. We talked about paddle boats and how they run and when, why they blow the whistles. 

 

    

On the way to the next ride we stopped to watch the fiddle player. Then we went on Thunder Mountain. Waiting in line talked about the gold rush. How many people in your group turned into a discussion about how many people could sit the seat.

Then we walked out toward Main Street. The fireman's band started playing while we were there, so we stopped to watch, talked about brass bands, why they call it that, and what kind of music they play. Walked out of the park to Jamba Juice and got a smoothie for the walk home.

I would call it a good day and a wonderful use of our annual passes. I'm tired though and I don't think I have the energy to make dinner. But I did get some much needed exercise!

Irvine Regional Park

One of our favorite places to go it Irvine Park in Orange. We got married there and I bring the boys all the time especially in the winter when it is cooler. I feel like it is an oasis. You can't see anything outside the park and I feel like I am in the wilderness just a little bit. I've learned (the hard way) to always feed these two boys before we do any kind of adventuring at all. So we had McDonald's for lunch today in front of the little zoo. The only animals we could see besides the turkey vultures were these goats. It was pretty hot today and we did get there late in the day. Jake and Tom love to feed the goats. This one really liked Jake! Not much of the river this time of year! I told the boys we should come back each month and take another picture from that same spot and see the changes. In the spring time this place is filled with water! Tom and Jake pretending to be scared in the wild. They are so crazy. Actually, this is the first time we have went for a walk on the wilder side of the park without both of them begging to go back every few minutes. It was a pretty good adventure. We saw ravens, woodpeckers, squirrels, rabbits, huge ants, peacocks, lizards, and ducks. And THAT was outside the zoo. At the zoo we talked about the birds we saw and how they all eat. There were owls, hawks, vultures, and a bald eagle. See the theme here? Well, they were the only beasts we could see today darn it! They all eat meat and were pretty happy to show the boys their hooked bills. Then when we saw the crows and woodpeckers they could really tell the difference. Those birds were not meat eaters. Ahh, science!

Nikki's Latest Work

Inspired by her brother's, Nikki's latest masterpiece.

Enjoy!

Chapter One

Once there was a berry. He was about your age. His name was Uncleberry. Uncleberry lived in a garden. He had lots of berry friends to play with. One day, Uncleberry found some chalk! He wanted to play with the chalk. So he walked over to his friends, Boysenberry, Girlsenberry, and Raspberry. He was sure they would like to play with it too.

But Uncleberry’s friends looked sad. When he asked them why, Boysenberry said, “YOU are DIFFERENT, Uncleberry! I mean, nobody’s ever heard of a berry called Uncleberry!” Puzzled, poor Uncleberry turned to Raspberry. “That’s because you are a FREAK!” Raspberry yelled. “You don’t belong here, and you never will until you can prove you’re normal!” Now Uncleberry wasn’t confused anymore. Uncleberry was mad. Uncleberry was very mad.

Have you ever seen a berry get mad? Well let me tell you: it is NOT a pretty sight. First the berry heats up until it’s burning hot. Then it starts screaming, and then spinning around in circles very, very fast, like a figure skater on a sugar rush. And then, if the berry is hopelessly angry, it steams up and-here’s the awful part-it turns into a FRUIT SMOOTHIE! Fruit smoothies, as you probably know, are horrifying concoctions made up of the flesh of innocent fruits whose only crime was getting too angry. And Uncleberry was VERY angry.

But luckily for Uncleberry, Uncleberry had always been told by his elder berries that he should always control his emotions, and never get very angry. So Uncleberry took a deep breath and ran away as fast as he could. He ran and he ran, until he realized that since he was a berry with absolutely no arms or legs whatsoever he in fact couldn’t run, and it would defy logic to do so. “I can’t defy logic,” Uncleberry said to himself. “Only a truly twisted and evil berry would ever do that!” So he stopped.

Suddenly, he noticed another berry running. He realized it was Girlsenberry, his only friend who hadn’t yelled at him in the past 5 minutes. So he called out, “Hey, that’s defying logic, you know that right?” Girlsenberry, was a little irritated (“I was hopping, not running, there is a difference!”) but nonetheless she stopped right next to Uncleberry.

“Listen,” she panted,” You…are...destined…for…great…things!” Uncleberry was confused. Now that Girlsenberry had caught her breath, she began to explain more clearly. “Uncleberry, there is a prophecy: once every thousand years, someone is born-or grown-who is destined to save the galaxy from the evil Sith! And that someone is you!” 

 

Now Uncleberry was even more confused. “Wait, Girlsenberry, who’s the Sith? And why do you think that I’m the one to stop them?” Girlsenberry almost smiled, until she realized that berries couldn’t smile any more than they could run, and that she was probably really irritating whoever made that stupid rule about not defying logic, and then she quit smiling. “I don’t think; I know. Haven’t you ever noticed how, you know, different you are from other berries? And, haven’t you noticed how strange things happen to you sometimes? When you’re scared, maybe? Or angry?” 

 

“You’re crazy,” Uncleberry retorted, but Girlsenberry was quick to back up her theory. “Remember that one time, when you were being chased by the bully berries at the park?” 

 

“Yeah, but what does that have to do with”

“And you jumped so high that you landed in the top of a tree?”

“Well, I don’t know about”

“And how about 5 minutes ago, when you ran away from Raspberry and Boysenberry? Doesn’t that defy logic? And we all know that nobody can defy logic, so”

“But weren’t you doing the same thing?”

Girlsenberry was exasperated. “I was hopping, which berries can do without defying logic, not running! I already told you that!” Then she noticed that she was starting to heat up, and, not wanting to become a fiber-rich cold beverage, started to slow down. “Listen, Uncleberry,” she began. “Within you, you have the power of the Force. You have to get a starship flight to Coruscant, and ask the Jedi Council to teach you the ways of the Force so you can become a Jedi. Then you will go on a mission to stop the Sith from taking over the galaxy.” Uncleberry was stunned. “But-but-how do I get a starship flight to Coruscant?” Uncleberry stammered. “And, come to think of it, how do you even know all this stuff?” 

 

Girlsenberry stood erect. “The flight will come later,” Girlsenberry said in a grand, yet brisk sort of way that Uncleberry hadn’t heard before. “As for your next question, well, my name is not really Girlsenberry.” Uncleberry stared, then flinched, then stared at her some more. “My name,” Girlsenberry said slowly, “is Jedi Master Girlsenberry.”

Nikki is "homeschooled" during the times she is released from her sentence of 12 long years of public school in Huntington Beach. And, I believe, an incredibly talented writer!

?!What?!

Tom is sitting on the couch reading a book about American symbols. I had planned on reading the book to the boys this week. Each page has a description of a symbol like the Liberty Bell and why it is important to our country. I knew some day I would find my children reading important things all on their own without my prompting but I didn't realize it would be so soon!

Finished reading "Oliver Twist"

I realized, after the first quarter of the book, that I have never seen the movie past that point. For some reason I always get distracted by that point and never get to finish. So the ending was a surprise. Half-way through the book I thought that if one more rotten thing happened to that boy I wasn't going to finish it!

I guess that is all I have to say about it though. I really did love it and spent many late nights reading this week. I just had to get to the next chapter to see what was going to happen.

Today's excitement...or complete lack thereof.

I woke up with a sore throat and a fever this morning! Yuck! So I went back to bed. I did actually get up and shower and go to the grocery store though. I've been lazing around all day.

The boys helped Dad trim back the avocado tree in the back yard. It had overgrown the house again and was in dire need of work. It was funny though to go out there and see Dan up on a ladder trimming branches and Tom and Jake under neath with their helmets on cutting them up to fit in the trash can.

Other than that it has been pretty uneventful. They both have played lots of video games and I have sat around watching them and asking when it was my turn.

A response to...

"I'm not patient enough to homeschool my children."

I really believe that people that say this don't understand homeschooling. They probably think that we re-create school at home complete with a black board and 5 hours a day sitting at a desk "learning". I don't have patience for that either! We don't "do school" at home, we learn in a natural way. The same way an adult would if they wanted to know something or had to have a specific skill to complete a task. Now, mind you, my boys are very young, so they aren't gathering information on a topic on the internet or skimming through reference books at the library. Right now, they are fully engulfed in learning about the world around them. They are just little guys so they are only concerned with their immediate surroundings and the city they live in. Relationships with friends and family are their primary educational experiences right now. They are learning to read, write, and cipher. Other than that, well, we just live. We go to parks with our friends, birthday parties, museums, aquariums, beaches, amusement parks, libraries, shows, concerts, and anything else we can find to do around here. Luckily we live in an area where you can do pretty much anything year around and there are plenty of places to go. I know that I have seen more of Southern California since I had my boys than I have in my whole life! I am learning more too. I'm learning things I didn't have a chance to learn in high school and college; History, Civics, Literature, just to name a few.

To top it all off, I am NOT a patient person. I am a lot more patient with other people's kids than my own. I find myself having a panic attack just trying to get my boys out of the car in the afternoon or trying to get them to brush their teeth in a timely manner! So those are things I am working on as well.

It is ok if they are behind their peers at school. We are on a different schedule and "curriculum". We have different goals that we have set up for ourselves without aid from a "study" or a government agency that knows exactly how children all grow up. We are a family of perpetual learners and thinkers. Some of us are falling into this lifestyle a little late (namely me) and hopefully our boys will have their entire young lives to explore and be ready to be adults when their time comes. I will leave that up to God and his infinite wisdom. I cannot see that far into the future.

Two Things

First of all, my boys are sleeping later! They have always been early birds. I mean they get up never later than 6 AM, usually between 5 and 5:30. That is ridiculous! No matter how late they stayed up, they always woke up that early. Drove me crazy! And now, for the past month or so, they have been sleeping until at least 7:30. It is wonderful and I praise God for it on a daily basis.

Second, we went to the Natural History Museum yesterday. The boys wanted their sister to see The Bog People exhibit before it leaves in September. It was so fun. We walked through the whole thing talking about ancient people and tools and the peat and what it was used for. Nikki was cracking me up because there was one "human remains with wooden stakes". She made up this big long thing about steaks used to be made out of wood and they were hard to eat but then someone learned how to make steaks out of cows and they made him a god. The whole exhibit was now centered on BSE and SE (before the steak era and the steak era). It went on and on. Crazy kids!

We also went to McDonalds for lunch and saw the butterfly pavilion. That was the coolest because Nikki was amazed at how many butterflies were in there. She had a million questions about how long they lived and how they got them there. Man, I wish we could homeschool her!

On our way out we checked out the California Coast exhibit. The boys loved that one because they hadn't seen it before. It showed the tetonic plates and how they move. There were dioramas about different sections of the ocean. And Jakes favorite was a giant tuna skeleton!

It was an awesome day. On the way there and back we listened to the story CD about Galileo and the Stargazers. The kids love those CD's and so do I. We learn something we didn't know about AND there is complete silence in the car while they are on. Crazy!

In the background

I thought I would write a little about our day and I hear my sons screaming "Boom! I'm gonna kill you! Bam Bam!", but they are in a cheerful voice and giggling is following the statements, not crying. I'm going to assume this is all some kind of loud game.
 

This morning my friend turned me on to www.postcrossing.com This thing is awesome! You register with them and they send you an address to mail a post card to. You do and when that person gets their card, someone sends you one. I signed us up right away and we got a boy in the Netherlands that loves Disney. So a trip was in order. We walked to Downtown Disney and bought two postcards from the Disney Store. We got lunch while we were there. I had to listen to quite a few complaints about not getting to go into Disneyland. Our passes aren't good again for another week, when summer is over. The we played at the Lego Store for awhile. We walked to the Disneyland Hotel and checked out the waterfalls and koi and mailed the postcards from the hotel lobby. The walk home was excruciating. It was getting really hot and the boys had just about had it with this walking stuff. In all we probably walked 3 miles, which is a LOT for a 4 and 5 year old and their fat mom!

We are home now and they have got their second wind! They are wild and crazy and running around the living room. Now I need to find them something to do. Maybe a little sprinkler action in the backyard will wear them out!

For those of you with weak hearts, the boys just came downstairs dressed in full King Arthur attire and "galloped" out to the back yard for a battle. That must have been what the "I'm going to kill you" was about.

Have a thought to share

Or maybe an announcement? After much debate and careful thought we have decided to go completely independent. What does that mean? Well, we had Tom enrolled to start first grade at California Virtual Academies. Once I got all the boxes of crap (mostly stuff we already have around the house) and looked at the lesson plans online, I started realize that I will be sitting down with my son and making him do assignments I don't whole heartedly agree with for several hours a day all to please a "credentialed" teacher that does not know us from Adam. It was kind of like a training an animal to do specific tricks when we take him to be in the show.

Part of the decision was that we went to a the CHN conference mentioned earlier in my blog. We fell in love with the math and bought the program. We came home to realize that the math they teach at CAVA is exactly the opposite way we wanted to teach this new program. So that wasn't going to work. What were we going to do? Show him the math from the school and teach that and then tell him, "But that isn't really the way you do it." That is what we do with Nikki and the public school she is at now! And it drives everyone crazy!

The other thing is that we have this crazy notion that the federal and state governments really should have no say in how and what I personally want to teach my children. Accepting the governments "help" through a public virtual school was saying one thing and then doing another.

So we thought about it. Our sons both are reading (one more than the other of course), writing, adding, subtracting, and relating just fine with no formal instruction. Why start now?

So I called and backed out of CAVA. And they said, fine, see ya! I can't even believe it.

So I filled out the paper to start our own very private school and in October I will officially file. I have a program that tracks attendance and I write down a log of things we do each day and books we read (much like we have been doing for years). It is good and I feel at peace with what I feel is right. We will not jump through hoops for the government because they say that is what is best for our children.

A Tuesday

It was a big bummer of a day!

We were all worked up to go see the Bog People at the Natural History Museum. So we hopped in the truck and drove the 45 minutes to Los Angeles and then realized that I had forgotten my wallet, so we had no money at all to park the truck. So we headed back home. We could think of three positive things about it. First, we did get to listen to all of the Myths CD that we had. Second, there was no traffic either way. And third, we hadn't planned on getting gas on the way home like I had originally thought I would do. The kids were so good about it though that I had to treat them to McDonald's lunch and ice cream when we got back home.

On the way there we listened to one of our new story CD's. This one is called She and He: Adventures in Mythology. It has Psyche & Cupid, Pygmalion & Galatea, Echo & Narcissus, Atalanta and the Golden Apples, and Bauci & Philemon on it. All three of the kids were dead silent the entire hour and a half we were in the truck. Jake didn't even fall asleep even though it was the time he usually does.

After McDonald's, a shopping trip to the Disney outlet store, and ice cream at Cold Stone, we came home. Tom wanted to do some school work, so we worked on his Highlights Puzzle book about Texas. Those are super cool!

Nikki is practicing with her guitar. She has gotten into it again. And Jake is playing "The Great Escape" on the XBox...still. Now we are taking a break. And I'm thinking a cup of coffee would be good.

CHN's Expo

I have so much in my head right now that I am afraid to start writing because I don't know where to start.  I guess I should have started earlier!

Dan and I attended the California Homeschool Network's Expo over the weekend. I went last year with my Grandpa and was thoroughly inspired, so this year I really wanted my husband to experience it with me. So he went along. I know he didn't particularly want to go, but he will do things for me when he knows that I have it in my heart to do it. So there we were. Childless for two days at a conference. We went home for the night since the conference was close by so we did have the kids at night. They spent the two days with one Grandma and then the next. Let me tell you how nice it was to hear someone speak on a subject and then have a quiet moment to discuss it over with my husband. We had so much fun. Well, not fun. I don't have the words to describe it, but we are a closer parenting team and couple because of the last two days.

There was one suggestion from my husband. There should be some sort of Dad prize in the goody bag. Coupons and flyers for educational products are great for Mom's but he would have liked to see some sort of toy or candy for him, much like the prize in a happy meal.

Another great thing is that he got me to look deeper into the conference than I would have if I had attended alone. He asked me what I wanted to get from the two days, confirmation that I knew what I was doing or new information or experiences? Either one was good for him, but he suggested that I leave my comfort zone for a bit and check out something new. So we did. And boy what treasures we found!

First of all, Jim Weiss, Professional Storyteller. What an amazing man! We attended a session by him about historical stories and just fell in love. What he does is research these stories and retells them in such a way that you are riveted by stories you may have heard a thousand times. Not just the story either. He explains things during the story and repeats words or phrases in other ways so that you can infer meaning. What was wonderful for us was to find someone else that believed that the stories of our heroes, fictional or otherwise, meant so much to children. They inform, inspire, and teach values. It was wonderful. If you are interested his website is www.greathall.com

And now on to my second treasure, math! Those that know me are taking a second look at that sentence, I know. I am not good at math. Don't get me wrong, I can add subtract, multiply, and divide small numbers. But after that I really use a calculator and higher math, well forget it. Except Trigonometry. I really love that. But I digress.

We were drawn into this speaker because she said she would show us how to teach math to our children using an abacus. My husband had just commented earlier about using an abacus and how ancient people through around those beads like it was some kind of magic. So off we went. I was enlightened. My husband is great at numbers so he wasn't has boggled as I was but he was impressed and really wants to use this system to teach the boys math. I can't explain it but after listening to her speak for about 10 minutes I realized why I hadn't been able to go farther in math. It wasn't that I was "not a math person", it was that I wasn't taught in a way that made any sense. I could go so far with the way I was taught, but after that I was lost. It just got too confused for me. Her website is www.alabacus.com and I strongly suggest you read her work!

I'm about typed out now, so I will end here. Bottom line? We had a great weekend and I'm inspired knowing that I have done right by my children having them home with me since birth. The stories we read and the discussions that we have daily have all led to two amazing little boys. And we plan to continue raising them this way so that they become free, happy, intelligent men that know how to get what they need for themselves.