Homeschool Happenings v. 3

I haven't posted several things this past week because I have been getting ready for today. It's the first day of school for us. We are going with a 6 weeks on 2 weeks off system this year. I am kind of excited. Here is a run down of the stuff we are using.

Phonics/Spelling The Writing Road to Reading
I would not necessarily recommend this to everyone, but my son really struggled to get a handle on sight words in kindergarten so we went to this system where there are extremely few sight words (like the word one) and you learn many word teams and all of their sounds.

Math Right Start Math Levels B and C
Both of my kids are in the middle of a level so we are starting out where we left off in June. I highly recommend this for anyone. The lessons use lots of games. Almost all of the stuff comes with the kits. The lessons are varied so its not 50 lessons in a row on one thing, but all of the things are covered and reviewed.

Writing Handwriting Without Tears
Both of my kids have a problem with handwriting. (One because he wants to write with his hand upside down and the other because she doesn't have the fine motor coordination yet.) I got the workbooks and the chalkboard (helps with the fine motor stuff), but not the whole shebang. We will see how it works.

Grammar Daily Language Review
I wanted something fast and simple that would reinforce grammar for my son in 2nd. I got the first grade one because I wasn't sure if it meant a review of what was learned in 1st grade or a book for first grade reviewing what you learned in kindergarten. Each day has a little exercise that he can do himself, so we'll see how it goes.

Bible My Father's World and a Bible reader of my own design
You have to call MFW if you want to order individual things instead of the whole curriculum. The reader is good (the illustrations could stand to be better). I got it for the ease of reading. I also got the workbook where the student draws a picture about what he/she read and writes a sentence. I got a little journal type thing with a space to write and a space for pictures at Wal-mart. For my daughter I am writing short (about 6 sentences) Bible stories and letting her draw the picture.

Science How to Teach Science, DK First Human Body Encyclopedia, Apologia astronomy
We are doing an element a week somewhat following the How to Teach Science e-mails. We doing one human anatomy lesson a week starting with the skeleton. My kids love bones and such. I borrowed the Apologia astronomy from a friend to do bits of because my in-laws generously gave us a telescope. We will also be attending star parties with the Fort Worth Astronomical Society. We will also be doing little weekly science experiments.

Texas Geography Lessons made by me.
This year we are learning about the various regions of Texas as described by the Texas State Parks people. Texas is such a huge state we are taking the whole year on it. We will also be playing Great States Jr. to gear up for next year's America geography.

Weekly Wisdom Lessons by me
I am doing a "wise trait" each week. This week is discipline.
Getting a better mind, body, and soul takes training.
Listen
Practice
Keep moving forward.
"Anyone who loves to be trained loves knowledge. Anyone who hates to be corrected is stupid." Proverbs 12:1 (NIrV)

Big Fat Lies Lessons by me
We are also discussing some of the Big FAT lies Satan has saturated our culture with. The first is that the earth is billions of years old.

Art Lessons by me
We are going to have one lesson a week on observing and then drawing. For example, look at a person. Do the arms come out of the head? We will also have one creative art lesson a week.

Quilting Lessons by me
The kids wanted to learn about quilting. So I found an "easy" pattern that I think I could do and my mother-in-law said we could have one of her sewing machines. We are starting with a lap size quilt so we (read me) aren't too overwhelmed. Maybe I will post some pictures of our progress.

I think that about covers it. I am excited about this six weeks.

Great Visuals About Why the Obama Health Care Plan Stinks

Needs to Be Said pointed me in the direction of these two videos. I thought they were great at explaining in simple terms why the single payer health care idea STINKS.


Those numbers are almost mind numbing.


This makes me glad that I don't live in MA.

UN Me

I have said that I wish the US would get out of the UN. I am interested to watch this expose movie about them. I think that they do more harm than good.

Happy 4th!

Happy July 4th everyone! Whether you are enjoying fireworks, BBQ, family, friends, or none of the above, remember freedom is bought with blood. The most obvious example of this is Christ dying for our spiritual/eternal freedom. Many have died to protect our right to enjoy physical freedom in our country. May we always remember to be grateful.

Planned Parenthood Closes Doors in El Paso

As of 2 days ago, all 37 Planned Parenthood locations are now closed in El Paso, TX. This thrills my soul. I fully expect more locations to close across the nation. They will claim financial problems, but I think that it is the power of prayer.

An Hour Worth Watching

Ken Ham of Answers in Genesis did a speech a while ago about the state of Christianity in America. It is worth the hour to watch. In it, he shares some of the information from his book Already Gone. The book is titled that because many parents fear that kids will loose their way in college. Yet the statistics show that most kids that leave the Church fell away in middle school and high school. There parents just weren't aware of it until the kid left for college. Some of the most striking statistics are these.

The results are shocking:

• Those who faithfully attend Sunday School are more likely to leave the church than those who do not.
• Those who regularly attend Sunday School are more likely to believe that the Bible is less true.
• Those who regularly attend Sunday School are actually more likely to defend that abortion and gay marriage should be legal.
• Those who regularly attend Sunday School are actually more likely to defend premarital sex.

Mr. Ham states that he feels these things are true because kids go to Sunday School and get entertainment instead of answers. They aren't told how the Bible relates to real life. If they ask a question about evolution (for example), they are told something ambiguous. The focus is on trusting Jesus, but how can you trust Jesus if you can't trust the whole book that points to him? All of this makes them more sour on religion than those who were not involved in religion much.

I feel the online video is worth the hour it takes to watch it. I have ordered the book, but haven't gotten it yet. If it is good, maybe I will give one away.

Abusive

Apparently I would make a terrible judge in child abuse cases.

Let's take case number one.
Woman caught breastfeeding baby while drinking alcohol. I would have said this was unwise behavior. I might have the woman sign up with AA or rehab. But I wouldn't likely remove her child from her or charge her with a felony or send her to jail for 5 years.

Let's look at situation number two.
Parents raise child as genderless. They never tell the child whether he/she is a boy or girl. They never tell anyone else. The child is supposed to "decide". I would say that this is abuse because the few previous cases that exist where kids have been raised in whacky gender experiments messed the person up for life. Take the boy raised as a girl for example. I do think that the kid is likely to "figure it out" correctly if he/she goes to public school. Other kids are blunt enough to say show me your parts and I'll tell you. Though I doubt the parents would accept that decision based on what they would see as flimsy evidence. Good grief.

This is where parental rights get tricky. What is damaging or dangerous? And who gets to decide? I think even in this case I wouldn't take the kid away from the parents. I would just order them to tell the physical gender of the kid.