Mockingjay

I'm going to hand my eldest son, 11, at the moment, The Hunger Games book when he's 12. After all, that's the age at which children begin to be included in the reaping for The Hunger Games.

Mockingjay Part I is coming out on the 21st! I'm excited, and want to watch it with someone who has read the books and cares about the characters. Here's the trailer - I can already envision discussions about these books when son is a teenager.

Tweaked School Schedule - 2014-2015

Our school days started again back in September. We had returned from a whole week at Disney World, spent, but with big grins on our faces. The hub and I felt like children again ourselves. Our children - 11, 7, and 3 - all had a blast and could enjoy something different.

Then Monday hit. Like a wall that pops up in front of you when you are cruising happily on a bike, it hit me. It hit us. We are definitely going to need some down time after a holiday like that. I expected whiny children. What I didn't see coming were the changes in the schedules and the cranky, griping teacher. It was back to the drawing board when it came to the schedule, which was way, way too long. We were doing school from 9 in the morning until 4 or 5. With my new schedule, which we tested out the following week, we could be by 2 if we started at 9. Since we like to stay up later and sleep in, we tend begin at 10 and end at around 3, depending on how many snacks we've had.

At my house it's all about the food. Something about mental effort makes my children extra hungry. That could explain why my youngest -who's not technically homeschooled yet in the traditional sense- is not on the hunger craves bandwagon, but my oldest two are. Oldest is in sixth grade and middle is in second. They are at different levels, but our schedule is so smooth now that everything has its own place.

Here's the basic idea why our schedule works. I'm sharing this in hopes this can help someone who's tackling their school schedule.

Group work:

Calendar, Poetry, and Geography on M, Tu, and Wed
Calendar, Poetry, Art Appreciation on Thu
Calendar, Poetry, Music Appreciation and Nature Study on Fri

Oldest: Independent Work
Middle: One-on-one work with Mama (about 1 1/2 hours to 2 hours)

Exercise break and piano practice for both (youngest joins in exercise activities)

Oldest: One-on-one work with Mama

Middle: Play with younger sister - also read to her

My youngest, who's three, also participates in table work by working on her Kumon tracing and mazes workbooks.

My Husband's Space Octopus

Space Octopus by artist William de Paula

My husband designed this rad T-shirt for a contest at Threadless - check it out and vote! You can also get it and wear it. If he wins, he'll get $20,000! That's a lot of money for homeschool books - hehe..