30 November 2011

Grendel Goes to Wal-Mart

(By Emperor.  Based on his modern interpretation of the Beowulf character. Reprinted with permission.)

One day, in a bog, Grendel ate his breakfast. Later he said to his dad, "I'm tired of cooked mortal meat EVERY day! We should get some raw!"

Then his dad said, "Fine, then we go shopping!" So they left Grendel's mom home and went on foot to Wal-Mart. Grendel asked his dad if he could eat a customer while his dad shopped. Dad thought and said, "If the manager is not watching and only one." He also warned Grendel to wash his hands after he ate because Mom doesn't like blood on her carpet.

Well, something came on the news at Grendel's home while they were out. The news reporters were speaking of a missing customer. They talked about some bones on the floor and they say it may be some evidence for us wise reporters and detectives.

Grendel's mom panicked. "My poor innocent Grendel is at that store!"

She drove like a speeder to the Wal-Mart parking lot. In her hurry, she forgot to dress up and she only had her underwear on. When she got out of the car, some customers just ignored her thinking that she was a crazy person.

She ran into the store and took a look at the evidence. She saw no claws, so she reasoned that Grendel just ate another customer. She went looking for Grendel and his dad. She eventually found Grendel's dad alone with a worried look on his face. She yelled, "What's going on?!"

"Grendel is on an Easter hunt," he said. "He is hoping to get a big chocolate bunny for dessert."

"Ok, let's get out of here, then," she said. They found Grendel eating the bunny without checking it out. They put the bunny back on the shelf half-eaten. Then they got a new one and checked out.

29 November 2011

Out and About With Emperor

We've finished our testing with the school district for Emperor!  I have only to turn some paperwork in and wait.  That's good to get all that out of the way before the snowy season.  I quizzed him about his latest speech test on the way to the grocery store.  "They asked about sayings and things like that," he told me.  "One was, 'All that glitters is not gold.'"

Ok, so what did you tell her it meant?  "I told her that it meant you had to get one of those people who knows whether things are gold or not to look at it because looks can be deceiving," he said.  (I'm wondering if he got credit for "knowing" this one.  Half-credit, maybe?)

So, what did she say? I asked him.  "She said, 'OK.'  Whether I get something right or wrong or even just don't know it she says, 'OK.' just like that."

Other sayings?  "Even the largest tree bends with the wind.  And I told her it meant it didn't matter how old you were, you would get in trouble sooner or later if your mom finds out."  (??)

"The only other one I remember was, 'What does grass and a blanket have in common?'  And I told her that they are both water-absorbent."  Here he paused.  "Although then I said it depended on the cloth.  Some material doesn't absorb water so well.  I'm not sure exactly why she asked that one."

That.  Is hilarious.  I'm thinking she meant they are both coverings, Emperor.  The grass covers the ground and a blanket covers a bed.  Emperor thought that was a very unique answer to the question and I informed him that actually? That was the answer they were looking for.  Probably.  (I start to doubt myself sometimes.) Emperor is not really sure about that, though it is a very clever answer that he never thought of. 

On to shopping, because there is no soy milk in the house.

"Just how many reindeer DOES Santa have?" asked Emperor incredulously as we were listening to "Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer" on the loudspeaker. "And how did everybody find out their names?  Don't say wikipedia."

Emperor and I picked out some fruit and some soy milk and browsed around for milk-free snacks.  It's not our usual store so we got lost a fair bit and heard ohh... at least three songs.  One was "Let it Snow."  Emperor was a bit miffed that the singer thinks he is "letting" it snow at all.  Even if he didn't want it to snow, you can't stop God from snowing on everything.  That's just... why is he singing about that?

"Is it just bad theology?" I asked him.  It's just bad logic, really... he told me.  He shook his head sadly at the silliness of it all and said,  "Well, that's music these days, I guess."

28 November 2011

All About Alice

(Note: not a sponsored post.  Or I would never be saying these things.)

Ever order on Alice?  I think I am sucked in to the evil.

I started using the Alice website because they sell Van Holten's pickles in bulk.  Instead of paying $2 per pickle, I'm paying just over half that.  D loves them, so I bought several boxes for his birthday.  Today, though, I popped on to find if they sold Lemonheads, D's other favourite food, so I could secretly order it for Christmas. Of course he caught me browsing on Alice and said if I am not ordering pickles, it must be Lemonheads, right?  That was just devastating.  I've NEVER been able to surprise him with anything good, that he actually likes, for any holiday at any time, ever ever... Oh well, they don't sell them and the actual company that does make them sells them in 25-pound packs for $60.  I just went ahead and asked (might as well). D said noo to that one.

And he made it clear he doesn't want pickles for Christmas.  I'm pretty stuck for right now because he's very picky about what he should get.  I was thinking about toothpaste.  Find the right toothpaste, the one that we haven't seen for 13 years or so, and that would be a great Christmas gift fer reallio.

Doggone it, I can't find the really old Aim kind.  The blue stuff that is NOT minty.  Remember that?

Well, anyway.  Since they give free shipping on Alice, I put lots of stuff into my cart.  Why didn't I leave when they didn't have what I wanted?  Because it's free shipping.  And they gave me online "coupons" dagnabbit.  And really, their service is excellent and I have the happy-memory thing going in my head.  Then I see my total price.  I take stuff out of my cart.  Then I see more stuff I want.  Into the cart it goes.

I HAD TO BUY pickle-flavoured lip balm.  I guess it's supposed to smell like the Big Papa pickle from Van Holtens (they are the best pickles, btw, and need I remind you that this is not a sponsored post).  The whole idea of pickle-flavoured lip balm is so cool I also had to put EXTRA ones into my cart for just in case.  I dunno, maybe I need to give one away on my blog later.  Everyone I think will need this product, once they know it exists.

I put in about a zoodle things that I kept MEANING to buy at the store but never got round to.  It's been so hard to shop of late, between being sick, more sick, getting strep throat on Thanksgiving (fun!) and also not being able to get out much/pick things up well.  Little things.  Detangler, shampoo, celery flavoured potato chips (whoops), some sort of interesting-looking coffee to mix with my Folgers, a box of garlic pickles for ME and um... $30-something worth of cheesy potato fries.

Welllll... I don't really need the potato fries.  Even though there are 90 packs of them in a box and the children would really really like them for school.  Out of the cart it goes.  Browse around some more.  Go back to look at the cheesy potato fries. Welllll they're baked.  And that's really good.  And um, they're different from the little chip bags the children have brought to school for years.  That's also good.  You know it's bad when the free lunch kids make fun of your kids because they pack the same thing every day.

Back into the cart.  Look at all my numbers at checkout time.  Out of the cart.  Fish around for passwords, reset passwords, start to check out my stuff.  La la la.  I'm almost done...

"Do you want one of these last-minute deals?" the computer asks me.  AND THERE ARE THOSE BLASTED CHEESY FRIES!!

Into the cart they go, doggone it.  God wants me to have the cheesy fries.  Ok.  (Patrick says that the Alice people track me and see how indecisive I am, but we all know better.) 

Welp, I hope the children like them.  All 90 of them.  Why did I do that?  I still don't get it.  I'm almost never an impulse buyer.

27 November 2011

Crazy Comment Monday!

"Unlike formal instruction in school, baby reading doesn't begin with learning the alphabet; it begins with recognizing words. Flash techniques and multisensory approaches are time-tested for babies and toddlers. A baby-sensitive curriculum makes it easy to slowly move from words, to couplets, to phrases, to sentences, to easy and happy picture books. Enthusiasm, attention, imitation, and fun drive the curriculum--no testing! The five-minute process is engaging for the child and easy for the parent."

Go ahead and read Early Homeschooling Can Save American Schools and tell me if you get some of the same feelings I did:

1.  Uiiuugghh.  "Baby-sensitive curriculum?" Really? I think the Baby Einstein stuff is cute, and I have some LeapFrog items at home, but bleh.  "Baby-sensitive curriculum" sounds so... like the crap I vomited out to impress my professors when I was in college.  Now that I've been out for a while, I can't keep a straight face when I hear such things.

2.  People should HOMESCHOOL so that the SCHOOLS ARE BETTER?  Who on earth is gonna homeschool so schools are better?  People homeschool because they think the schools suck.  I have never, never, never, NEVER met anyone who even remotely thought that they were homeschooling with an aim to make the schools better.  Have you?

Perhaps the author doesn't know what homeschooling is... or maybe he doesn't really mean it when he says people should "homeschool."  If he did, why would he be concerned about saving American schools?  Surely he doesn't mean that parents should only "homeschool" until children are "school-age?"  That... would be so backward and oddly-reasoned that I don't even know what to say about it.

3.  How can there possibly be an ACHIEVEMENT GAP when someone is ENTERING school?  They haven't been taught anything formally yet, so that means something besides "achievement" is being measured.  And saying that schools are an unequal playing field "littered" with black and Hispanic children is... wow.  "Littered?"

4.  I refuse to believe the outlandish stories in the comments about families who have NO books at home except for what is provided by the school. I think this is a made-up story, sort of the opposite of the "my cousin homeschooled her kids and they can't read so homeschooling should be outlawed" type comments we see in other places.

Christmas Shopping

I know the economy is crappy and I don't fault anyone a single second for doing whatever it takes to get a good bargain.  It's pretty sad, though, to hear about people getting pepper-sprayed and trampled or dying people being ignored because the good deals won't stay on the shelf for the people who aren't the quickest.  "Whatever it takes" should have some limits sometimes, or we'll live in anarchy.  I do fault the people who are violent or mean or whatever.

But honestly.  I fault the stores for setting up these sorts of madhouses.  Set up an insane level of competition between people, and no one should be surprised when it turns nasty.   How about a ticket system or say that at random times during the day, three of x product will be available at a secret/random location in the store?  Spread the crowd out a little.  THINK about what other people will do.  As parents of toddlers, we've had to do this forever... consider the grumpy/tired kid and YEAH, set some limits, have some laws.  But structure your environment, too.  Wal-Mart and friends need to think about that.  Mobs are strange sorts of things and it takes just one nut in the bunch to set things off.

I'm not hearing much about people cutting back this year.  People have already cut back for a couple years running, most of them, so I think we're at a new normal now.  Some families I know are really hurting, charities are tapped out and their children will get no Christmas.  Go ahead and tell me Christmas is supposed to be about God coming to the earth, salvation, love, and all those things.  I will agree with you. But parents have to cut toys and Christmas items out before rent, you see.  People are still losing jobs.  I'm worried about some of my friends, how about you?

23 November 2011

Homeschool House Tour!


Do you know how long it took me to get everyone reasonably quiet, shoot 5 minutes' worth of video, and upload it to youtube?  A fair while, I'll tell you that!  I hope you enjoy it.  I wasn't as brave as Blondee, posting a vlog about myself, but this is more interesting anyway.

22 November 2011

Are Science and Social Studies Unimportant?

What's important is the TAKS test if you live in Texas.  That means only reading and math are important when teaching third graders. 

The school systems take the TAKS seriously.  One Dallas school was able to pull off some "stellar" reading and math scores on the third grade test because reading and math was ALL they really taught.  Teachers just gave fake grades for the other classes that the students never really received.  I suppose the attitude there was that schools teach to the test anyway, so reading and math it is.

No-one sounds particularly shocked or upset, really.  As one homeschooling forum poster noted recently, "social studies in our public school contains almost no real history, geography, government, civics, or economics, but it is primarily the vehicle they use to promote the PC agenda, including teaching about things like Kwanzaa and their definition of a 'family.'" 

To a point, the poster is correct.  The social studies text Elf had for his fifth grade year (all 23 days of it) was a HUGE hardback full of cute anecdote-y stories ("Your mom is going to work and you hope her new boss is fair" - type story introducing ERA, for example). But he WAS at least reading and learning.  And for about a week, he might have recognized the acronym ERA.

Emperor is testing through a local public school to see if he qualifies for special help, so happen to I know one elementary has what I'll just call "COOKIE" time every day for half an hour.  During "COOKIE" time, children who did poorly on the MAP test are drilled, drilled, drilled, drilled, drilled.  Children who did well on the MAP test get "enrichment activities."

I don't know about you, but if I did badly on the MAP test, it would just burn me up that no one felt my enrichment was worth half an hour a day.  Don't kids get enough reading and mathematics during the regular school day?  The poor kids need COOKIE time and homework, too?  For better test scores?  And what about special-needs children who will NEVER do well on the test?  Guess they are never worth it.  They are always behind.  They always need to focus on those weak areas.  Drill, baby, drill.

This makes me sad to think on too deeply.  What kills me is that I have never heard of anyone complain about it. I would.  I don't think it would do any good, though. 

I think that however wrong these teachers were who never taught science or social studies, that maybe they thought they were helping the children by boosting the school scores and giving themselves something to be proud of.  Sometimes I think maybe we get what we ask for when we rely on fill-in the bubble tests instead of a more expensive year-by-year tracking process for each child.  Woodjie has a dandy one, you know, and I support its use for him in the public school setting because it is objective and measureable, so we know when progress is being made/ regression is happening.  It's pretty detailed.  Here is a small subset of the things Woodjie can now do, under the heading of "Reading Skills:"

Receptive letters
Labels letters
Receptive sounds of letters
Labels sounds of letters
Match words to words
Names letters in words reading left to right
Match individual letters to letters on word card

Actually, it's very complicated and each item listed is noted in a graph as a small square and then coloured in bar-graph style (This would all be in his Q graph, and yes, it goes from A to Z, but there are some graphs he is not doing yet).  Different colours are used for different years, so one could literally see Woodjie's academic and social/toileting development from age 3, building upwards.  I'm NOT suggesting every child needs anything nearly so detailed, but it does schools and children a dis-service to let gifted children languish and NOT do a year's worth of academic growth.  Just show some proof of growth.  Same with special-needs kids.  Are the schools doing a good job helping people like Woodjie grow another year academically?  So what if he's still not "proficient."  Maybe he'll never be proficient. Reality sucks.

Dang it, but that preschool has helped make communication books and diapers non-essential parts of this child's life and I wish they got a bonus for that.  I'm a severe critic of schools when they do stupid busy work but this?  Kids learning practical skills so they can talk and use the potty?  There should be bonuses for that.

20 November 2011

Christmas Gifts

The Leapster 2 has an awesome bundle-pack through Amazon.  I practically NEED it for Woodjie and Rose for Christmas.  D isn't quite sold, however.

"How about just rice in an old pop bottle? *shake-a, shake-a* They'll love it," was his Christmas gift suggestion.

Well, I meant a real gift...

"So, you have to spend MONEY to have a REAL gift?" he questioned.  "Can't we just have a real Christmas at home where nobody gets anything and everyone would be disappointed, but then, we wouldn't have spent anything..."

Arg.  And he keeps on and on about it and I think he's for real. 

"Well, I'm tired of all the fights and everybody fighting over stuff," he told me.  "Don't we have enough stuff already?  What about the expensive handheld toy you bought before for Rose and Woodjie?  I haven't seen those in a while..."

Yeah.  A month.  You know.  I haven't dug around in the cabinets since my surgery.  I haven't done much of anything.  (Not that it was that expensive... they were less than $20 each and were probably one of two new toys I got them this year.)

Well, there you go.  Stuff gets stuffed into cabinets, and hundreds and hundreds of dollars just gets all dusty and then you forget it is there.

You know... there is no arguing with logic like this.  He's right (somewhat, but not to that extent).  We will dig the old Nintendo out of a Japanese orange box where it's been stored for about ohh... six years... for the little children's Christmas.  The Nintendo is so old it was new when I was a teen.  No, not Nintendo 64 or anything like that.  The Nintendo that is so old it doesn't have a number or letter designation after it.  The original, first Nintendo system.  With Zelda (tm) cartridge.  And the original cartridge where Mario and Luigi are *enemies.*  It's that old.

The only condition is that all the other children have to be able to play it.  D doesn't want fights over anything!  Sighhh again.  Well.  I just deleted $279 from my Amazon cart, and really... the only person who wanted the little kids to have something new was me.  *shrug*

What are you doing for Christmas for your family?  Have you found ways to save on presents this year?  Has it been hard for you, too?

19 November 2011

I Lived!

Shortly after posting the last entry, of course, I became quite ill.  It was very bad there for a while.  Everyone was sick all at once.  I was in bed most of the time and surprisingly D was able to hold down the whole fort between the throwing up and, um, other stuff that happens during sickness.

Anyway.  I hope you will consider voting for this entry: http://apps.facebook.com/promosapp/181517/entry/215243?=f2i5hk

...in the MathTacular contest.  Just click the link and then click "vote for this entry" underneath.  You could even do this once a day!  Please?  Thanks.

17 November 2011

Big Family Barf Bonanza!

It's a bonanza, I tell you!  Read this post and join the fun.  I considered adding Mr. Linky, but I don't know if I'm up to reading the entries I'd get...

Well, we thought Woodjie just had a little tummy bug or ate the wrong thing yesterday.  Of course little did we know what was coming up next.

Emperor started in on it when I was on the way to see the surgeon for a follow-up.  Here we are in the hospital elevator and RETCH! just like that, chunking it up out of nowhere, there he goes.  We made a beeline for the bathroom when the doors finally opened, and I got a pink kidney-shaped tray from the receptionist after giving her numerous apologies.  Drove him home and back to the appointment I went.  Yes, I had the custodians called.  What can you do.  At least he didn't make it into the waiting room where everyone is getting prepped for surgery.  I would have felt awful if that happened.  I know how nervous I get before surgery about "people with germs."
Appointment souvenir.


I'm fine, by the way.  No lifting ever, ever again, but I am fine.  I was worried about maybe having popped another hernia (there was much crying last night) but it turns out this is just weird scar tissue.  Another appointment in a couple of weeks.  Well, that does it for all the school testing Emperor was going to do this afternoon.  He doesn't even GO to school and I had to call him in sick.  :)  He has literally been in and out of the bathroom/bed until five minutes ago. 

As I was washing Rose's hands after dinner, she told me her tummy hurt.  Ten minutes later, it was chicken salad container time for her.  Then Patrick was down.  D is informing me that he feels ill as well.  Just as a conversation piece, it is called the "Flyin' Hawaiian" when you get sick on both ends as you switch from squatting facing one way and the other way, like those surfers hopping about.  Picturesque, is it not?

Elf and I sat together alone and watched a movie together.  It was nice to be away from all those horrid germs.  After the movie, I said good night to Elf, gave him hugs and snuzzles and he went upstairs.

And vomited.

Oh yay, what a night!

Do you want to know what Emperor did when he finally got out of bed?  Oh yeah, brought down all his blankets, came up RIGHT NEXT TO ME, and told me that he didn't want to catch everybody's germs.

15 November 2011

Proud Mommy Presents...

Emperor "A-Gust-of-Wind" plays chess expert David Petty in this video.  If you're not a chesskid.com member, it's only about 3 1/2 minutes long.  The extended version for paying members is about 16 minutes long and Emperor veryy nearly won. 

Emperor is missing nationals this week.  I'm sad for him but I'm glad he has over 100 chesskid.com friends and is going to be playing his little heart out online during his extended vacation from chess club.  :)

Carnival of Homeschooling!

This one's pretty unique.  It is a standard homeschooling carnival, complete with elephant.  (You can't have a carnival without an elephant.)  But it also is the first carnival I've seen that's also been entirely tweeted.  Check it out and have fun browsing!

14 November 2011

Tales for Young Men

"Grendel's plan, I think, will be
What it has been before, to invade this hall
And gorge his belly with our bodies.  If he can,
If he can.  And I think, if my time will have come,
There'll be nothing to mourn over, no corpse to
    prepare
For its grave:  Grendel will carry our bloody
Flesh to the moors, crunch on our bones
And smear torn scraps of our skin on the walls
Of his den.  No, I expect no Danes
Will fret about sewing our shrouds, if he wins. 
And if death does take me, send the hammered
Mail of my armor to Higlac, return
The inheritance I had from Hrethel, and he
From Wayland.  Fate will unwind as it must!"

(Beowulf, lines 442-455, translated by Burton Raffel, Signet Classic edition)

Emperor seems to read well enough.  It is not his favourite subject, but he likes Beowulf a lot.  "It's very pretty," he tells me. "I like writing that is beautiful and has a lot of adjectives in it.  This lets me know what is really going on." 

Yep.  There's really no mistake about what's happening in literature like this, and the character motivation doesn't seem to be so deep or introspective as many tales marketed to children seem to be.  It's understandable to Emperor in a way standard "kid" literature is NOT. He has a lot of trouble with your usual kid-fiction. 

Emperor is currently being tested by our school district to see if he needs any sort of special services.  Lately the tests they have been giving him are reported to be boring.  Emperor tells me they had him read and answer stories about some child and a dragon.  "But, the story had no taste to it."

No taste?  Surely my kid isn't getting all highbrow and pining for classic literature only?  I asked him a few questions about the readings he was supposed to do.  One is about a dragon and a small town, he told me, rolling his eyes.  Well what about it?  "Four letters," he said.  "L-A-M-E."

Stories about odd creatures such as dragons and Grendel and Orcs and what-have-you are usually very exciting! 

Ughhh... Emperor explained that this one is about a dragon that steals people away from the town.  Everyone was scared and didn't know what to do until some little kid went off to find out what the problem was.  "And ALL SHE NEEDED TO DEAL WITH THE DRAGON WAS A MAP AND SOME FOOD."

As if this weren't insulting enough to the reader's intelligence, Emperor reports that the kid brought along as her companion some fluffy thing called MISTER FEATHERS.  Here I got another good eyeroll from him at the stupidity of the story. 

"Mister Feathers and the girl find the dragon and then they just TALK with the dragon.  The dragon tells them he is picking up all the people to save them from the avalanche that will be destroying the town soon." He shook his head and put his hand up to his brow as though the whole ordeal were painful to recount.

"THE END."

"The story just sucked, Mom."

Well, maybe it did.  I don't fault the school for having sucky stories during the testing process because I'm thinking that it might be a test to see if the child is able to remain calm and polite under duress or something.  (I dunno.)  Usually these "tests" have a hidden objective and the thing you think you're getting tested on isn't the thing they're really measuring. 

But on the whole, I hear boys are "behind" on reading.  I wonder at us as parents for not having better literature choices than the Junie B. Jones series in our personal family libraries.  Sorry, I hate those.  They are just WRONG. 

Am I the only one with reading pet peeves?  Looks like I passed mine onto my children somehow.

12 November 2011

Autism and Empathy

Maybe you've never met Woodjie.  Most people just love him because he's so friendly and extroverted.  Fancy that, an autistic extrovert.  Seriously, he IS.  He also has a lot of empathy for people when they are sad or hurt, or when things aren't going well.  Mind you, he is definitely a little behind-hand on the talking and the understanding thing, and he doesn't understand a lot of the "why" in social situations, "why" someone is sad or feelings are hurt.  And unless something is pretty obvious, he's not going to respond to your feelings or tone.

That doesn't mean he doesn't care!  Once he figures out someone needs something, he's actually MORE likely to respond with kindness and concern than your average person.

I've had several requests to see the "pirates," what he calls the gash from my recent hernia surgery.  I think it's kind of scary to him that Mom got hurt like that.  Mom can't let him on her lap and pick him up for "baby wuv" time.  He has adjusted pretty well after a while.  Now, he will explain, "I huck I tiss you.  Then I play!" instead of automatically climbing onto my lap.  I think I am having a harder time adjusting than he is.  It's just un-natural not to be able to pick small hugging children up.  Just wrong.  Sure, he threw about 1000 temper fits about it all right at first, but now he has adjusted.  I never threw serious screaming temper fits about it... and I have not.  Go figure.

I think right now, he understands is that Mom NEEDS him.   If I throw something into the trash but barely miss I pretty much can't pick it up off the floor.  Woodjie is cute and hard to direct often, and 99% of the time it's just easier to do everything myself.  But right now?  It isn't.  So when I see a friendly fluffy blonde kid bouncing about and declaring, "I hep a YOU, Momma?" I put him to work. 

It's genuinely helpful to have the little guy pick up my trash and throw it out when I miss, or open a cabinet, or get laundry into/out of the dryer.  Oh, I really need help with that.  Basically anything that has to do with squatting or bending down is still hard to do.  The trouble comes when I have no little easy jobs for him to do.  He still wants to help.  I am going to admit to having the kid put washcloths away one at a time so that he will be occupied whilst I fold the other laundry.  Or have him run each item to a different basket instead of throwing it in myself.

This little guy has a lot of empathy.  He's really sweet.  I think sometimes people who don't know many autistic people mistake the disability of understanding when someone needs some empathy with the willingness to give it.  Because Woodjie LOVES to help people out when he sees a need for it.  Everyone who has ever been to a doctor's office at the same time as our family knows how very important it is to Woodjie that you have a magazine to read.  You don't want this magazine?  He'll pick a different one.  And another and another until you declare that WOW, you really like this magazine, thanks!

It's just what you needed.  You just didn't know it when you walked in the door.

11 November 2011

Rose Update


I've hardly seen Rose since she was sick when I got home from my surgery.  But now that I'm able to spend time with her, I'm very sorry to report that amazing and terrible things have been happening since I've been gone.  Today during lunch, she reported that the Pokemon character Rhyhorn used "tail whip" attack and hurt her on several occasions.  It even made her dead!
I'm starting to see where that stereotype about "autistics can't lie" came from.  Hello, they can lie just like anyone else, but they often lack the ability to manipulate people with them.  Most of Rose's lies are very well constructed... just not the Rhyhorn one.  She'll wait until parents are out of the room and, during a disagreement, she will make up stuff that didn't happen.  Woodjie is not that clever socially and if you ask him, "Did you hit your sister?" he'll tell you.  Poor guy is genuinely upset that Rose is saying that he hit her, when SHE just hit HIM. 

Thankfully, Dad is on the case.  But when she is in trouble, Rose has taken to saying, "I not wuff youu," and folding her arms or hiding her head.  Sometimes she will even refuse hugs when the banishment to the chair is over.







09 November 2011

Parenting Classes

I have a friend in Louisiana.  Let's call her Mrs. Friend because I'm creative like that.  Her daughter, despite being dropped off at the entryway at least 20 minutes before the start of school each day, has been marked as tardy four times this school year.

In Mrs. Friend's school district, it's a $50 fine and MANDATORY parenting classes if Little Friend is tardy more than FIVE times in a given school year.  The school year isn't even halfway over yet.  Mrs. Friend is upset and angry. 

I should imagine that if the school building is open that someone should be there to tell Little Friend and others to get to class.  I have a lot of problems with our local elementary, but I will say that at arrival and dismissal times, there is a teacher or aide stationed at about every corner to ensure that children don't get lost and/or to avert whatever potential problems might arise when 600-odd children under 12 might be congregating.  If no one is at least reasonably watching that children are safe and where they need to be, what is happening to them?  How do we know that they are safe after we drop them off?

I'm upset for my friend.  Maybe something should have been done/brought to her attention way before.  Maybe there needs to be a change in dropoff procedures, or bla bla whatever.  But calling a kindergartener HABITUALLY TARDY, and slapping parents with a $50 fine and mandatory parenting classes?  Parenting classes??? Isn't that just going to take valuable class space away from oh, I dunno, people who beat and starve their kids or something?

Am I just hyper-freaking about too much governmental control into parenting and family life because I'm a homeschooler and I can afford to scream about it?  Is this just a normal "natural consequence" of tardiness in your district?  Suspension might be in mine after a point.  But that's usually an upper-grade thing and I've never heard of such a thing at the elementary level. I suppose it's possible; I just have never heard of such a thing before.

Naturally, I side with my friend and think she is being treated unfairly.  But perhaps this is not an unusual circumstance, and I'd like to hear what my blog friends think.

08 November 2011

Math Specialists: Who Needs 'Em?

You've heard of reading specialists before.  Now, the new thing is math specialists. 

We need math specialists, this article strongly suggests, because a great majority of elementary teachers are intimidated by the subject. Apparently attaining certification after years of study does NOT guarantee that a given teacher really knows third grade math, let alone how to teach it. 

"Many teachers-in-training harbor bad math memories, said Jennifer Suh, an assistant professor of math education at George Mason University. Suh begins her classes 'almost like a therapy session,' she said, where she asks the aspiring teachers to talk about their math education. Some recalled suffering through work sheets or getting stuck in lower-level classes."

Let's just take a break from chatting about "math specialists" for just a minute, okayyyy?  Do we want people who got "stuck in lower-level classes" teaching our future mathematicians and scientists?  Nevermind the therapy business a minute, because I'm assuming these teachers are paying for that crap themselves.  Let them discover their inner teacher as much as they'd like on their own dime; but hopefully, my local school district and yours would know better than to hire someone who's plainly incompetent.  Especially in this down economy, where recently there were 75 applications for every teaching job, we can DEMAND better.  Demand better!

Back to the math specialist idea.  It might just be a good one if children who are struggling with mathematics get a little bit of specialized help.  Certainly, if we're going to have a specialist for reading, I don't see why we can't have one for mathematics.  Mathematics is just as important as reading, isn't it? 

Though it does bother me to read that the specialists seem to be hired to take the load off teachers who have no business instructing children in the subject, and aren't by and large there to help the children directly at all.  I googled "math specialists" and found quite a number of articles.  The best I can deduce from my reading is that it is a relatively new speciality and other articles also discuss the lack of competency many general classroom teachers have in the subject.

Perhaps it is wrong of me to get snickety about WHY the math specialists are needed.  It seems a simple fact that they are needed, plain and simple. This post is not meant to be a high-n-mighty, public schools are all bad sort of rant.  I am shocked, though, to read that so many teachers have difficulties this deep.  Presumably *most* teachers in training were once public-schoolers. 

WHAT are we doing to our children that turns them off math so decidedly?  I'm sneering at the very idea of this "math therapy" thing, but maybe (just maybe) there is something deeper at work here.  Demographically, our new teachers are overwhelmingly young ladies.  So, what is going on that our young ladies are so math-aversive?  And why would people who are math-aversive be drawn to teaching, knowing that their least favourite subject would need to be taught on a regular basis?

Just some questions I have...



07 November 2011

The NEW Homeschool Room!

Thank you, D, for all your hard work.
D and I have now been married for 19 1/2 years.  I don't think we've ever had a television much bigger than a laptop screen in all that time.  Until now.  G and D spent the entire weekend making trips to Sam's Club and the hardware store, moving things about and setting the new television up.  D took particular care to have a very heavy un-topplable stand.  It takes two strong men to move and topple, it will not.  The new television is bolted to the back of this.

Nearby are a reproduction of an old family photo and my Egyptian Pharoah.  D likes that he can see the elephant (now partially covered, oh well) and all is cozy.  THIS is the perfect nook for Emperor to watch his Latin lessons and do his schoolwork when he is not working on his mathematics or chess on the computer.  The basket on the VCR is for Emperor to keep homeschool-specific DVDs so that he doesn't have to rummage through the entire collection that will soon fill the shelves. 

(As a quick aside, I want to let you know that Emperor is also reviewing MathTacular and YOU can get a free DVD by entering the video contest the Sonlight company is holding.  Sonlight is a Christian company, but I have found MathTacular to be entirely secular and would recommend it to anyone regardless of their religious affiliation.  I'm NOT being compensated to tell you this; I just genuinely think you would enjoy their product.  We're still finishing our entry.)

See Emperor's notebook on the coffee table?  All of his notebooks have Hello Kitty designs, or are plastered with Hello Kitty stickers.  I got the table for $20 at a garage sale.  I actually probably overspent considering that it is a very 70's looking style and was wearing in some places.  But it has to weigh about 100-odd pounds and is not something I am worried about breaking with every little bump or scratch.  I don't know why but I enjoy it very much.  When the children were smaller they would enjoy crawling through the ends like a tunnel.  Even Rose is a bit big to do this now.

What they are big enough to do is sit reasonably still for about 20 minutes after bathtime while Dad finishes cooking dinner.  What I had always done after catching the bus and giving children baths was to put out sandwiches or Pop-Tarts.  Dad can cook spaghetti or frozen pizza.  D's cleaning standards are not quite the same as mine, but the children are well-fed, the dishes and clothes are washed regularly, and... the plumbing has been fixed.

For those of you who have known our family's struggles with plumbing, you'll know how huge this event really is.  I'm really impressed at how well he has run the house.  He has even rescued the laptop I'm blogging on from "paperweight" status.  Somehow I infected it with a virus.  Sorry about that.

Here I had just been blogging about the perfect homeschool room and I am finding that different rooms seem to be ideal for certain subjects, and I have no one set homeschool room at all.

06 November 2011

My First Homeschool Purchase

Do you remember the very first thing you bought for your homeschool?  What was it?  How did you decide what to buy?  Did you regret your first purchase?

When I first started homeschooling, I just grabbed some worksheets from one of those "Comprehensive Curriculum" workbooks available at Sam's Club.  I think that I bought it because it said "Comprehensive" on it and also? Because it was all in one book and available at Sam's Club.

Looking back on it, those are TERRIBLE criteria for purchasing schoolwork for a kid!  But it turned out *just fine* for teaching Elf as a first grader.  It gave me lots of time to check out what's "out there" in more specialized subjects like cooking or art, and considering that first graders know very little in the way of math or handwriting, just about anything I bought and actually used would have worked for a while.

I've been homeschooling for five years (as of next week).  I'm still discovering new homeschool resources each year that I had no idea were out there before.  I enjoy going to conventions, and (I must be crazy) I enjoy looking at homeschool ads and spending time trolling homeschool curriculum websites to compare their scope and sequence with other brands.  I've found myself changing homeschool brands as 1. I've learnt about new products, 2. my children have grown and changed, and 3. my confidence in my ability to homeschool has increased. 

But I still remember that first purchase.  What was yours?  I'm going to try to do a Mr. Linky thing and see if YOU want to post about this topic as well.  If it doesn't work, leave your link in the comment section!  I'm hoping to try new things and see how they go. :)

05 November 2011

Your Perfect Homeschool House

Your budget is not unlimited, but pretend you have an opportunity to buy a nice-sized house in a good neighbourhood.  What sort of layout or features would make you MOST happy as a homeschool family?

All of us like to dream-shop sometimes.  I googled "homeschool house" and "homeschool house design" and found that most websites say nothing about home design.  Many of them want to "design a homeschool curriculum" or help with organizing a "homeschool room," but only one (that I found!) spoke to the idea of homeschooling as a lifestyle that would be reflected in building design.  I reflected on that a bit and concluded that perhaps this is because so many of us (contrary to popular stereotype) are different and want different things to happen during our homeschool days.  Then, too, is the idea that many homeschool families are large families, and home design must take that into account first and foremost.

This article about homeschool real estate is five years old, but the seller wants you to know about the unfinished basement for roller skating and painting projects, the open floor plan, the separate dining room for schoolwork, and the home office. 

"I keep thinking that it would be nice if a homeschooling family moved in here after us, even though the chances of that are probably pretty slim, statistically," author Barbara Frank wrote. "But when I think of all the changes we made here, it seems a shame to waste them on people who are going to park their 1.7 kids in daycare while they go to work each day. This house is meant for a family with kids who have interests, make projects, spend time together, and occasionally need time away from each other."

My perfect house would have a kitchen with a large pantry, because I'm tired of having much of our food kept in the basement or stacked on the buffet in the living room.  It just looks messy, not to mention the inconvenience.  I'd want the clothes in a central location for laundry purposes, probably in a common area near the bathroom.  We select clothes before we bathe for the most part, so it makes sense.  The new house would also have a layout that is more conducive to Woodjie being more independent and not having to be watched QUITE so closely.  Imagine your inquisitive year-old baby in a five-year-old's body.  How quick he is, how he can open doors, stand on chairs to find things or discover the magic of flushing things down the toilet... and then imagine designing a house for him that would minimize discipline and yelling while keeping him occupied and safe.

I'd like a room specially set aside for homeschooling, but it isn't the highest on my priority list.  I don't know if I'm alone in feeling that way, so I'll open the comment section up and see. 

So how about it?  What are the features of your perfect homeschool house?


04 November 2011

No Baby Wuvs.

Woodjie was upset.  He frequently wants his "baby wuvs," and Mom refuses to sit on the couch and let him sit on her lap with a blanket for wuvs time.  Maybe he just didn't ask persistently enough.  He needs A BABY WUVS, YOU, WUVS? 

Nope.  Mommy has owies.  She can't give baby loves right now.  Want to see?  (Yes, see a owies).

"OH!!" he yelped after seeing my gash. "A PIRATES! Ee hurt you! Pirates!"

"No," Rose corrected him.  "A doctor hurt a Mom with owies."

"A pirate!  I see a hurt you??" Sigh.  He has to see where the pirates cut me open a few more times.  I'm thinking that's a way more interesting story than this "hernia" thing.

03 November 2011

Advice From My Dreams.

*Do your eyes itch?  Put down the X-acto knife before you rub them.

* Do not use age-progression software on the Disney Princesses to see what they will look like in 50 years.  Whoa.  Snow White still dyes her hair black, but is very wrinkly and wears a bathrobe.  The Prince in the movie has these huge ears and says "What the hell, I try anything once" and winks all the time.  Which I guess makes sense considering the fact that he was willing to kiss a total stranger while she was asleep... and let bunches of dwarves watch... ok that's weird...

* Bikes.  Roller coaster tracks.  Don't mix these!  That was scary!  I woke up before I died, thankfully.  I've heard that if you die in your dream, you die in real life.  Then I wonder how anyone would possibly know this to be a fact.

* I do NOT know why the US Army is accepting a 41-year-old woman who is 80 pounds overweight, had several abdominal surgeries, and sure can't lift 40 pounds, into the service.  Nor do I understand why they want her to jump out of an airplane without teaching her what to do or how to put the special backpack on.  Do not dream this dream again; what did I eat that night??

* I know it is a down economy, so I'd like to know how I landed that job as a reviewer of restaurant kitchens.  That's right!  I don't even eat in the restaurant; I spot-review restaurant KITCHENS and take pictures.  If I'm refused access, that's a bad write-up.  If the place lets me in, whoo, do I take good pictures AND I have a special sidebar "smell of the kitchen" review in which I rate whether the kitchen smells like a good place to eat. One local steak place got a bad mark because its kitchen smelled like a refrigerator.  Two stars and a baking soda box recommendation.

* Any ideas what it all MEANS?  Been having odd dreams lately.



Science: Is it Important?

Do your elementary-schoolers get enough instruction in science?  Research conducted by the University of California indicates that if your children are publicly-educated in the state of California, they likely do not.  Get this: about 40% of California students are receiving one hour or less of science instruction per week.  Some of the reasons cited for the overall lack of strong science programs at the elementary level (with my helpful analysis) include:

1. Teachers.  They don't have strong science backgrounds, and therefore feel ill-prepared to teach science to little kids.  Oh, come on.  We're talking GENERAL concepts like why the moon looks different at various times of the month.  The water cycle.  The solar system.  The difference betwen bugs and spiders.  Gimme a break.  This excuse did not hold water with me; how about you?

2.  Instructional materials and facilities.  Yeah.  I'd like a big science budget, too, so I could demonstrate the properties of platinum to all my students.  But seriously.  Materials at the elementary school level do NOT have to be expensive.  Have you guys not done the cardboard and half-full glass trick to show air pressure?  Played with magnets?  Used a lever or screwdriver and hammer to show "simple tools?"  Grown a seed in a clear plastic cup?  Are you SERIOUSLY gonna give the "instructional materials and facilities" copout at the elementary level because your kids are at the poverty level? Are you saying you can't afford to walk outside and look at bugs and trees?  Oh, good grief.

3.  Assessing student progress.  It's a big problem.  We won't know if the kids learn anything if we don't have a standardized test for it!  Wow.  So, when children refuse to learn stuff or pay attention in class when something isn't going to be on the test, we'll know where they got that attitude from.  I know no teacher can do it all, but how much money does it cost to put out a clearly-marked bowl with 300 ml of water on a Monday with the words, "Process of Evaporation" on a paper nearby.  Hm.  On Friday, what changed?  Log that down. What is this "process of evaporation" and how long does it take? Do something small each month to help these children learn more about how the world works.

All that doesn't cost anything... or very little... it just takes a minute of your time.  After reading this report, I was very concerned that this isn't just a "California thing," or if it is, it won't be for long.  I've homeschooled for about five years now and I'm sooo tired of the stereotypical "Christian homeschoolers don't learn science like we do" business.  Maybe that's a good thing!  Why fight over Christians not teaching evolution to their kiddies if you hardly teach ANYTHING at all?

I guess all I can say is that at least my children learn in their elementary years about the solar system.  They know about various sorts of birds and where they live.  They've looked at trees and can identify some.  They know a little about the weather and how weather can change, about the various cloud formations and a bit about the different types of rocks in the world.  Insect and plant life cycles.

I'm not bragging.  I don't even pretend to have a 'world class' (or whatever the current buzzword is) science education going on here.  But SOMETHING is going on here. (At least, when I'm not doped up right after a surgery it is.)

I just found this report to be the biggest, lamest bunch of excuses ever.  I'd actually be ok with the entire state of California saying, "You know what? Science isn't really that important, and so we don't feel like teaching it."  That would be fine because then, I could just figure that I have a polite difference of opinion with the state.  But it chaps my hide to see all this stuff about how vital it is, but they can't dig up a few earthworms for some third graders and talk about soil aeration.  Or get a basketball, a tennis ball and a flashlight and talk about the moon and the seasons.

Maybe I'm just a big meanie beanie because I don't know what it's like to teach an entire classroom full of children.  And I don't know what it's like to be under the constraints of testing and bell schedules.  I admit that.

But less than an hour a week in science?  If you were a parent of a child in elementary school, would that be OK with you?





02 November 2011

Was the Principal Wrong?

The story goes like this:  a group of girls went across campus and used the bathroom.  Maybe they were talking or dallying or whatever... who knows?  What's not disputed is that they were late to class.

These girls, who have already obviously hit puberty from the looks of the video, got spanked by the principal in public.  This happened despite their parents signing forms stating they did NOT want this disciplinary option used on their children.   School staff did not call the homes or use other means of discipline (detention, written warning).  And to many of the commenters on the story, that's absolutely acceptable.

Katherine Roy of Lafayette, Louisiana, thinks this is really blown out of proportion.  "oh get over it," she wrote.  "those kids will be fine."

Michelle Sittig and several others agreed.  "if it were my child, I would not be upset at all...nothing like a little good ole fashion discipline."

Still other commenters on the story phrased the problem in terms of who gets to decide when the paddle is used.  If the parents didn't give permission, the school should NOT paddle.  If the school did receive permission, there is nothing wrong with a good paddling and many of the folks writing in want you to know that they turned out OK and it isn't a big deal.

None of the commenters felt that paddling should be illegal in school or in private homes.  Interesting.  Check out the story and see what you think.

01 November 2011

Bad News.

I've started in on a cough.   Not a big one, but big enough that I was honestly concerned that I would tear. Then I took pain pills until the surgeon's office opened because a side effect of the heavy-duty pain drug I'm on is that it stops people from coughing.  I don't like doing that, using drugs off-label like that without seeing a doctor, but I had to get through the weekend.  The surgeon's office refused to see me for a cold yesterday, I went to our family physician.

He prescribed me still more pain drugs and said what I'd been doing is a good idea.  We sure don't want to upset the surgeon by opening this all up, he told me.  Well, ok then... I just don't want to turn into a junkie.

You won't, he said, because you don't have an "addictive personality" and you are using them for a set purpose and a short period of time.  I would tend to think a few weeks isn't a short period of time but I am not going to argue with him; I agree I can't be coughing with this huuuge opening in my gut just starting to heal.  I just can't.

I also checked in with my surgeon when I saw him today and told him what happened so that he wouldn't think I'm doctor-shopping for drugs.  Hey, but if your front office says I need to go somewhere else then that's what I'm going to do.  It's just odd, though, seeing the regular doctor over a tiny cough when really it's a surgery-related issue.  WHO would care about just going *cough* once or twice an hour otherwise?  Not me.

The surgeon told me to stay on the pain pills for about another week and then see if I still have a cough.  I like having a set time and also like having all the doctors be able to talk with each other.  I don't like not having people know what the other guy is doing and I'm glad there were no professional disagreements.  Just take the drugs, lady.

I was going to post what it looks like without the staples in but the whole thing, this whole gash is open and bloody and has LAYERS to it just like looking at the sides of a half-cooked steak.  It's THICK like a half-cooked steak, too. I mean, horror movie stuff.  I cried when I saw it... I could seriously whip off my shirt in a crowded place and scream that I've been stabbed and people would believe me, that's what it looks like.  Huge six-inch long gash, still bleeding a little actually.  And that is "normal" for what I've just been through.

Right now I'm on a lifting no more than 10 pounds restriction.  But the surgeon said I will never be able to lift more than 40-50 pounds. EVER again.  As in, I will never be able to lift my little children again.  I am so sad. I can't remember which time was the "last time" I got to pick them up, so I won't be able to have a goodbye picking up.  I don't know, that part makes me very sad.  And more than that, how am I going to handle things if I have to move to a new city?  OR even pick heavy stuff up at Sam's Club?  NEVER move over 50 pounds again?  How am I going to live like this?  People will think I think I'm a princess or something, making everyone else do MY work.  But I don't want to be back at the surgeon's place again.  These folks can patch you up, but you are never as good as new.  Each new patch is really not as good as the last one.

I'm not very happy about this at all, especially with the prospect of what if Woodjie runs away?  He doesn't understand about cars.  What if I am going on a trip alone?  I can't lift my own bag.  No fair packing bunches of stuff in different bags; it will still all weigh over 50 pounds.  I guess I'm in shock and have no clue how I will live the rest of my life like this.  I mean, it's not the worst thing that could happen to someone... there are harder things some people handle in this life... but I'm unhappy about it all.  :(

Bringing Garbage Home

Some people up the street were throwing this table away. It was in pretty bad shape and one of the legs was off. I've glued the leg back...