School break

It is officially Christmas break from school. Cheng is home, Austin is home and Connor is home. Oh boy. Luckily, Cheng has basketball games all week, Austin has indoor track, and Connor has Tae Kwon do. For Christmas Connor received $67.00 cash, and today he wants me to take him to the bookstore to spend it all. Yes, Connor wants to buy $67.00 worth of books!! That, to him, is pure joy. In the meantime, I have received two phone calls from Connor's friends' moms, wanting to know if Connor can play. If you read the previous post, you know that I like it when Connor has friends, but I also feel like we wasted school time when I let them come over to play. Since it's school break, I suppose I will have to arrange at least one play day for Connor. Today is not going to be the day though. I have to take Cheng to basketball and then pick up Austin in Rochester, then take Connor to Tae Kwon do, then pick up Cheng again. Too much running around today. I also want to return a few Christmas mistakes and go to the bookstore. So, to answer the question, does Connor follow the school calendar. Sort of. Right now he is practicing guitar and he'll read at least half the day. I just try to unschool during school breaks. That means that Connor is still learning, just not with my direction.

Being Flexible

I've said it before, and I'm sure I'll say it again; I'm not quick to cede control. I am flexible and rather spontaneous when I decide to change plans last minute, but I don't like it when my plans go awry because someone else puts a kink in my day. Yesterday, I received a call from the mother of Connor's friend. She wanted to know if Ezra could come over to play. On the one hand, I like Ezra, he's a great kid, and I want Connor to have a social life. On the other hand, I had a list of tasks that I felt Connor needed to accomplish. I said ok to having Ezra come over at 11a. What that meant was that Connor had to try to finish all his schoolwork in a short amount of time. He didn't finish his Chinese and had to work on it for an hour while Ezra was here. That, of course, frustrated us all. I often wonder why I don't feel I can just shelve the work and put it off until tomorrow? Lord knows the school does that all the time. In fact, the public had two snow days last week, and I'm certain the work was just put-off until the next school day. Instead, I feel as if somehow Connor will "lose" a day if a friend comes over to play. Our goal is to complete (each week) a unit in Chinese, a unit in Math, a unit vocabulary, a unit in Social Studies etc. etc. I know that we complete at least twice as much work as public-school children, yet I still hate to "waste" a day by giving Connor a snow day. He deserves days off too, I'm sure. In the end, Connor did manage to finish his work, and he got to play outside with Ezra for several hours too. It guess it's all about keeping a balance and being flexible. Easier said than done!

Fruitful day

Today was another busy, but fruitful, day. Connor's new Biology and Math tutor came this morning at 9am. She will be coming Mon. Wed. and Fridays from 9-10am, now that Connor is finished with his computer programming class. His new tutor seems enthusiastic, and at least Connor will have someone working with him so that I can go to the gym without guilt. At 10:15, when I arrived home, Connor was studying his vocabulary flashcards by the fireplace. He was all cozy and focused. After vocabulary, it was time to work on his Chinese homework. His Chinese tutor (who came yesterday) gave him homework to complete before his next lesson,and he was able to do the work independently. At 11:30, I explained to Connor his English essay assignment for the day. For an hour, he diligently typed up an essay on the short story, "The Necklace." Unfortunately, he once again wrote a summary, not a thesis driven essay. He was totally bummed when I told him that he would have to rewrite the essay after Tae Kwon Do class. Off we went to Tae Kwon Do for an hour. After Tae Kwon Do, Connor decided to practice guitar for 30 minutes before attempting the rewrite. I was lucky today; it is Friday and Connor was invited to stay overnight at his friend's house. I used the invitation as a prize, or maybe just a threat. "If you want to stay overnight at Joe's tonight, you need to have a cohesive, thesis-driven essay before 5pm." What a difference it made. Actually, it also helped that I forced Connor to sit down and plan his essay in graphic organizer format. Connor wants to just write; he assumes that the words will just come and all will be great. That works for poetry and creative writing pieces, but an essay needs to have a thesis, structure and organization. Writing essays can be tough for a creative writer such as Connor. Anyway, he did complete a pretty good essay in the end. His thesis was that although some people might argue that Mathilde was a victim of fate, he believes that her free-will (and subsequent bad choices) were her ultimate undoing. Hmmm. Not bad. So that was our day today.

Learning and teaching

Yesterday, I asked the guitar teacher, via email, if Connor was showing any improvement lately. He sent me such an articulate reply that I decided to share it on this blog.

As a Matter of fact he has improved very much. He has retained the major and the minor pentatonic scales. His articulation is getting better too. His fingers stumble a bit but that is due to how fast his mind is traveling 10 to the 10th and beyond and his fingers and hands can't keep up. I have to make him slow down and play slowly and he really sounds good when he does that.

Yesterday we played Beck's Bolero ( that lick he probably plays a million times and drives you crazy) He not only played it to the chords in time but remembered where everything fit just right. We were having too much fun, like that can happen. I also showed him a simple solo to play over three chords and I plan to build on that concept until he gets the idea and can create his own solos from the ideas he has. He even took the Bolero piece and used the chords in a different progression to make up a new song. We jammed on that for a while until it sounded pretty good.

I can't tell you how much I look forward to his session each week. He is a wonderful person and though he is learning I think he is teaching me more.

Energy and Time invested

I was reading a posting on one of my home-schooling lists and it prompted me to blog about the energy it takes to home-school. One of the posters remarked that home-schooling has literally taken over her life and, although she knows it the best thing for her children, she is exhausted from the effort. I remember when we first began home-schooling. I spent hours and hours and hours creating curriculum, tests, essay questions and field trips. I drove Connor to one activity or another (usually in Rochester) practically every day. Yes, I pretty much devoted my entire day to teaching Connor. Now, I find, Connor does most of the work himself. We have a list of subjects that must be covered, and how exactly we meet those standards is flexible. For instance, take Science. We settled on Biology this year. Some days Connor decides to "play games" on Biology4kids website, other days he looks at cells in the microscope, and yesterday his new tutor came over to work with him. I do not have to dictate the when/where and the how of Science. If Science is on the daily list, then Connor figures out a way to fit in a Biology type activity. I expend much less effort now than I did the first year, and I think it helps Connor to be an independent learner. Only once in awhile do I have to sit down and do a mini-lesson on a particular subject. Most of the time, I'm doing my own thing, while Connor is doing his own thing. Yes, I still drive him around to various lessons (guitar, horse-back riding, Tae Kwon do, and Chess), but it just seems more manageable now.

Standardized tests

Since I have to administer standardized tests to Connor each year (per NYS dept. of Ed.) I decided to give him a practice SAT exam, just for yucks. Actually, I happened to be dropping off Xiao's letter of recommendation for college and saw the practice SAT packets there. I grabbed one on a whim, and since it was a snowy cold day decided to administer the practice test. I did administer it over two days because I have a hard time justifying 4 solid hours to one exam. The results were rather interesting. First of all, Connor was stunned to find out how many questions he got wrong. I've said it before, and I'll say it again; Connor needs to learn that there is a whole lot that he DOESN'T know. He often gets cocky and needs to be reminded that he's only ten. That said, however, when I actually went through all the steps to compute his grade (and it's a complicated formula, outlined like a 1040 tax form) we found out that he scored a 950 combined Math and Reading grade. That is as high as Austin scored last year (in 7th grade) and higher than what Katelyn scored as a senior. The writing section he scored a 470 (out of 800), but that section still isn't nationally normed yet and many colleges do not accept that score. Overall, it was a productive experiment. We are going to go through the booklet next week, and revisit all the questions that he got wrong. I feel that the test is pointless unless we actually use it to improve our teaching and learning. Onward we march. Next year, when I have to submit the end of the year test score, we might actually have him sit for the SAT exam, along with Austin. Austin is taking it for the second time this year, just for the practice. The grades are purged at the end of the year for younger students. Again, it's to get the kids comfortable with the exam.

Wow!

Wow! I can't believe that I haven't blogged in over a month! Time sure does fly when you're home-schooling. It's actually one of the biggest challenges, I find. We have so many things we want to do, and so much to learn, but the days are only 12 hours long. We "school" for triple the amount of time the state requires, yet we feel as if we barely scratch the surface sometimes. For example, after church today Connor wanted to create another web page, using the knowledge he gained from the Computer Programming class at John Hopkins. It wasn't on my "to do" list today, but when Connor is all excited about a learning activity I find that he does his best work. So this morning I let him program in HTML for 90 minutes. That is a long time for an "extra" activity, although not long for a computer programmer I'm guessing. I spent the rest of the day trying to recapture that 90 minutes. It's difficult for me to stay on schedule AND let Connor lead the learning. I wish I could totally let go of my idea of a curriculum and just "unschool." I'm certain Connor would learn just as much overall. It's not my personality though. I frequently look at the SAT test and gear my instruction towards what he is going to need to get a high SAT score. Sad, but true. On another note, we have started a new phase of our curriculum. Now that Connor finished his computer programming class and his typing program, we have time to devote to other things (theoretically). And with the semester finishing up, both of Connor's tutors have told me that they won't be available to tutor Connor after this week. So, I posted on State University of Geneseo's website for two new tutors. This time I am seeking a biology/math tutor and a Chinese tutor. I don't think I spend nearly enough time teaching Math and Science to Connor. Of course, I devote more time to English ( because of my English teacher background) and a whole lot of time to just reading. Abraham Lincoln was self-taught, as was Malcolm X, and all they did was read all day. Connor would love it if I let him just read all day! I do insist on other subjects too though. This time when I interview the candidates I'm going to request that they bring a lesson plan and teach Connor for thirty minutes. I want the tutor to be prepared to keep Connor on task and I also don't want him/her to just wing his lessons. If they take tutoring seriously, then Connor will take the tutor seriously. He often gets the unprepared teacher off-topic and off-task. Clever little guy--