On Falling Behind, Letting Go, and Origami Yoda

The Boy and his origami Star Wars family

It happens every year. Always a different reason, but every year: I am behind. Incredible mountains of snow that needed shoveling. Chickens and bees had to be dug out. Frozen waterers exchanged two and three times a day. Ill parents to care for. Orthodontist and doctor appointments. So many outside commitments to attend. It doesn't matter; I am behind.

I get overwhelmed thinking about all I need to do: how many blocks I'm behind in school, the seeds I haven't started, the eggs I haven't hatched. I haven't even purchased some of the supplies I need to teach some of our scheduled subjects, or ordered seeds for this year's garden. Or bought chick feed for chicks that I will eventually hatch. Or scheduled our state required portfolio review. Or finished my portfolio! (Because we haven't covered all of our subjects!)

Then i take a breath and ask myself what it means to be "behind." Behind what? And, does it actually matter?

And to that question, I say yes, and no. 

I've read lots of homeschooling advice regarding the pressure we put on ourselves. "Relax; don't get so uptight; let it go." Which, in some cases is great... Sometimes you do have to let it slide. Who wants to sit over a math book when your nose is running all over your face? Or run chemistry equations with an overflowing basement? Not me, nope. When there are emergencies, let it go. Forgive yourself. Have a cup of tea, read a good story aloud, go for a nature walk. After wiping your nose and bailing the basement.

But, y'know, if you let it slide all of the time... gotta take the dog to the vet, need to buy groceries, let's have a play date....well, maybe it's time to rethink priorities. I am in charge of my child's education. I have to hold myself accountable. And having two adult children who constantly remind me of this, I can't always just let it go. We have to do school.*

Yep, I said it. Throwing of cabbages may commence.

But really, sometimes we need to pressure ourselves. Or maybe I just need to pressure my self because those are the things that throw me off track. Dentist appointment in the morning? Forget ever getting back to school work afterwards.

Some days I just need to tell myself: fetch that second (or third) cup of coffee, light the darn candle, and get the day started. Even if it is noon. No one made a rule that lessons have to begin at 8 am. (Made myself laugh at that one, 8 am? Who am I kidding?)

But back to whether it matters or not:

On days I get thrown off track, we will find ourselves immersed in some type of learning. The Boy has great interest in origami right now (especially Star Wars origami). So he folds about a million Yodas (and all the other major players) a day, experimenting with different folds, creating his own versions. He has been writing creative pieces like mad. I couldn't get him to write a paragraph last year and now he's writing all kinds of short stories. He reads any book I pick up for him, so I throw him piles of historical fiction. Fill that in with a library trip, gym class, piano lesson, theater practice, and Latin classes and we still had a full week even if I didn't break out the Algebra book.

This year has been especially tough on our rhythm, but I've learned to throw in one or two "learning activities" on the days I get thrown off track. I give him a book I had tucked away, or we go on a walk and talk about some historical event. And I plan for the next day, and make an attempt to get everything I wanted to accomplish done by week's end.

Let it go?  Sometimes. But sometimes I just need to kick myself in the rear and get going. Never by 8 am, but usually by that third cup of coffee.

Origami Yoda, based off the books by Tom Angleberger

* Doing school is a loosely based term in our house. We do not "school at home," which is obvious from any of my previous posts.

Sixth Grade Waldorf: Geology

Geology was a fun subject to explore! I thought it would be a snooze fest, but like most subjects, if you can discover some interesting bits and find a way to bring them to your child....well, that's the Waldorf way isn't it?

Sometimes I read through subject matter and think, "How in the world will I ever bring this to the Boy in an interesting manner?" Actually, I think that when preparing for most subjects— but some are more difficult in teasing out those interesting, important bits.

In preparation for this block, we visited Fairy Stone State Park in southern Virginia. "Fairy stones are staurolite, a combination of silica, iron and aluminum. Together, these minerals crystallize in twin form, accounting for the cross-like structure. Found only in rocks that have been subjected to great heat and pressure, the stones are most commonly shaped like St. Andrew's and Roman crosses."

We started the block off with learning some basics about the earth: various names the earth has been given (Mother Earth, Gaia, and the like; it's structure; continental shifts and drift; earthquakes and volcanoes.)

We explored crystals and crystalline shapes. On the first day of crystals I spread some salt crystals on black paper and we looked at each under a magnifying glass.  What a thrill when he discovered that table salt crystals are cubes!  We compared them to rock salt, sea salt, sugar and sand.

We then made crystals from super-saturated sugar water.

Salt Crystals

Sugar crystals....rock candy!

We followed crystals with Minerals and Elements and the combinations that make.....rocks! In this section we pretty much went by the Waldorf proverbial "book." We studied igneous rocks, namely granite, then sedimentary – limestone, and metamorphic – slate, marble, and quartzite. We spent a little extra time on quartz and quartzite as the Boy has always had a "thing" about quartz.

We finished by following up with caves, fossil fuels, and metals.

I know this isn't really descriptive of all we did, and so may not be really helpful. I used various resources to get through this block, mostly from my local library. I am not typically fond of DK books, but found, for this particular subject, they worked really well. Lots of pix of different types of rocks with short descriptions. I also downloaded some science articles from the Waldorf online library. I followed the Waldorf outline of which elements, rocks, etc. to highlight, but found my own resources to explore.

The one main item I purchased was a set of sample rocks from another home school family. Towards the end of the block, after we had delved into properties and "met" many of the rocks in their natural surroundings, I opened the samples and arranged them on our dining room table/school space as a centerpiece that the Boy could play with anytime.

We took a family trip to Massachusetts during this block and took advantage of a nearby geological wonder: Purgatory Chasm State Reservation, a massive exposed vein of granite. The area also produces quite a bit of the gem, beryl, of which we found a piece.

The Boy at Purgatory Chasm outside of Boston, Massachusetts

  I had meant to visit a local limestone quarry during this block, but the winter weather caught up with us making our autumn shorter than usual.

Sixth Grade Waldorf: Astronomy

Tides and the moon, chalk pastel

We had so much fun with this block; we could've just kept going, I think. Just sitting outside staring up at the stars—wondering and imagining—made for a refreshing, creative block. It was fun, incorporating Greek/Roman myths (constellations), explorers (navigation), and just plain old observation, watching the sky spin 'round the earth. (Yes, I know it's the earth that spins, but it seems the other way around. No wonder early philosophers thought everything revolved around Earth.)

The main resource I used was Kovac's "Geology and Astronomy," supplemented with appropriate library books to expand on the chapter topics:
    Stars, Seymour Simon
    Find the Constellations, H. A. Rey
    The Moon Book, Gail Gibbons
    Sky Phenomena,  Norman Davidson

 Following are some of our Astronomical studies and activities:

The making of Stickhenge.
At noon on the December solstice, we ventured outside to a small clearing to hammer a garden post into the ground. We then marked where the shadow of the post fell, inserting a stick at the topmost point of the stake's shadow. That evening we returned and using the post as a visual reference point, we marked the direction in which the sun set, again inserting a stick into the ground in the line of sight from the stake to the point on the horizon in which the sun set. And then we did it all over again. A lot.

This was a long term project, being updated weekly from winter to summer solstice. Eventually we pulled out all of the markers except the ones marking the two solstices and spring equinox. (Some weeks there seemed to be no movement, others the shadows would just "jump") In this way we "illustrated" the movement of the sun through the months. If I were a morning person, we would have marked the sunrises as well, creating a more circular pattern, like Stonehenge. But I am not a morning person, and neither is the Boy. So we opted for 1/2 of Stickhenge. Good enough.

Movement of the sun from southwest to northwest over a six month period.

Lengthening of shadows over a six month period.

Planetarium visit:
The York County Astronomical Society operates a planetarium out of an old high school,  offering shows once a month. We observed a show about the winter solstice, including some of the history of solstice celebrations, and a show regarding what we should be seeing in our local winter sky.

We also visited our middle son at school during a parent's weekend, where they had a planetarium show about constellations, and tricks on how to find them.

Observation:
My favorite part! We have a fire circle in a small clearing in our back acre. (An acre that we've been naturalizing over the past 10 years). It is the perfect place to light a toasty fire and just gaze up at the stars. That college planetarium show (above) proved very helpful as we looked for the M-shape of Andromeda, the rectangle of Gemini, the belt of Orion, and others. Finding the North Star is a breeze, if you can find the dippers!

We studied the moon phases, tides, equinoxes and solstices, the zodiac (from an astronomical view, not astrological, although some may want to incorporate that), comets and asteroids, position of the planets, and a bit about navigating with stars.

Here are some excerpt from the Boy's main lesson book:

The Moon, colored pencil

Hercules, metallic sharpie

Rotation around the north star

The Solar System, chalk pastel

Atmosphere

Shooting Stars, chalk pastel

The zodiac

Equinox

Ancient Civilizations: Greece Part II History

The year has gotten away from me. It's time to wrap up final plans for seventh grade, and I realized I've not yet documented all of sixth grade. I will do my best to show what we covered in during our second semester, beginning with history.

Greek History. Hmmmm, what fun! Most of our stories came from Kovac's Ancient Greece . Each day I would deliver a story. Using the 3 day rhythm, we would review on day 2 and develop the ideas through artwork on day 3. But this semester, instead of focusing on painting or drawing, I had the boy write, write, write.

I realized about mid-way through the year that I had been rather lax on the writing skills. My goal was to get the child to write at least one paragraph, coherently and completely on his own. I started with having him write his ideas down. Then he formed them into complete sentences, then arranged them into a paragraph. Sounds simple, but for a boy that doesn't care for writing (Can't we just draw this story?") it was fairly exhausting!

 The "big" project was to write a comparison essay, using narrative. He chose to compare Sparta to Athens using the stories of two characters from the Kovac's book to illustrate the differences. (Solon and Lycurgas). The major struggle during this project was the Boy wanting to do it his way, rather than following my directions.

Doesn't look so intimidating, but this was a two week process!

 At one point he made two lists of characteristics, one for each city, handed it to me and said, "I've finished comparing." My response, "Hmm, yes, you did compare the two cities, but I would like you to put these characteristics in story form. Not list form." And his, "Well, I like my way better. "  This is when I had to put on my teacher face and get firm about completing the assignment, not changing the assignment to suit his wants. This time, anyway. It took two weeks of writing and rewriting, working through the draft process, but he finally completed it.  And was so proud of his accomplishment when he had.

During his free time, the Boy read some library books about Ancient Greece, including Black Ships Before Troy, Rosemary Sutcliff. One we thoroughly enjoyed was Wise Guy:The Life and Philosophy of Socrates. The Boy spent the next few weeks tossing out Socratic quotes. (Where were those nosy homeschool quizzers that week? No....they only quiz on stuff we haven't covered yet!) 

We transitioned into our studies of Rome by reading aloud the Aenid, closing our books on the study of Ancient Greece.

Ancient Civilizations: Greece Part I, Mythology

One of the things I love about homeschooling is the ability to tailor my son's education to his needs, and a close second is the ability to flex around the needs of the family.

While grade specific course objectives may state that your child needs to know x subject matter in a particular grade or age we, as educators, can determine if the child we teach is emotionally, physically, and spiritually ready to meet the subject matter. And, as parents, we sometimes have to bend a little in our expectations of running a perfect household (Ha!) whilst giving our child the most fabulous and thorough of educations.

Characters of the Iliad

Where am I going with this? An admission that we did not get to Greece in 5th grade, as is prescribed in almost all Waldorf curricula. Yes, we tried, but we were running out of school year and it was not a subject I wanted to rush. Plus, as we worked our way through India, Mesopotamia, and Egypt I could tell that the Boy was not quite ready to make the jump from 'story' to' history.'

Fifth grade is typically where Waldorf teachers make that all important leap with their classes—history told as a story to history told through fact. The children have reached that developmental milestone of being aware of the world around them. They thrive on physical challenges like the contests of the Greek Olympics. They are less dreamy and more of the world.

But my Boy was not completely there at the end of last school year. So we entered the world of Greek mythology this past fall. We told tales of the triumphs an tragedies of the Greek heroes and the meddlesome habits of the gods. We drew, painted, and modeled our way through the ancient myths.

12 Labors of Heracles

12 Labors of Heracles, Illustrated

Waldorf Sixth Grade Geometry

From "Compass Drawings"

I know I say this about every block we study, but we have loved geometry. The Waldorf approach is so appealing, and gentle. The Boy and I both have benefited from the lovely way geometry is taught in the Waldorf curriculum.  We both gained a little confidence and were able to immerse ourselves in creating beautiful, orderly, shapes.

From "Compass Drawings"

Last year we spent time exploring geometry through form drawings, practicing various patterns of lines, circles, and squares, but all free hand. This year we broke out the compasses, rulers, and protractors to make our shapes more mathematically accurate.

Main Lesson Book Polygons, Circles

We learned how to measure radius, circumference, diameter, perimeter, and area. We learned how to divide a circle in halves, quarters, and in sixths, eighths, twelfths on up to 24ths. We created spirals, hexagons, octagons, squares, and stars. We learned about angles, intersecting lines, parallels, and perpendiculars. And the Boy spent quite a bit of time just experimenting with the compass and ruler. He would often ask if he could make up his own designs. I was happy to oblige, it's not often that I see such enthusiasm for "work" from him.

From "Making Math Meaningful"

 The main resources I used were "String, Straightedge, And Shadow, The Story of Geometry" by Julia Diggins, "Making Math Meaningful," Jamie York Press, and "Compass Drawings," Enasco.

I also picked up a few workbooks from a yard sale to use for concept practice (measuring area, perimeter, and determining radius, diameter, and circumference, etc) We don't typically use worksheets, so they're kind of a treat for the Boy. Yes, he likes worksheets!

Besides using our compasses and rulers, we also crocheted shapes. I found a great book, "Beyond the Square Crochet Motifs" at our local library. Choosing a pattern, I would begin, then would give verbal instruction to the Boy.(Single chain x amount,etc.) After a few rounds, he would begin to notice a pattern. We continued our crocheting until he would eventually start to verbalize the steps to the pattern. Then I knew he "got it." Not only in his head, but in his hands as well.

Patterns From "Beyond the Square"

We used paints, colored pencil, and chalk pastel to color our work. And we enjoyed it so much that the Boy has asked if we could continue with our compass drawings. 

We are moving on to our next block, Greek History, but I'll still throw in a compass drawing now and then.

Waldorf Geometry: Struggles of an Artistically Challenged Mom

I love, love, love perusing Waldorfy websites and books, just poring over samples of the beautiful artwork. But, as an artistically challenged person, I sometimes get rather discouraged with my own abilities. If only I could create such dreamy paintings, vibrant pastel drawings, and accurate real life sketches. And the fabulous chalkboard drawings! What is an artistically challenged mama supposed to do?

Practice.

I recently read an article in which the author compared art to physical fitness.The idea was basically that you might not be able to do 10 pushups now, but if you exercise your muscles, eventually you will. Likewise, if you practice your art "muscles" you will improve.

With that in mind, I have decided not to beat myself up over my inabilities and just do my best, exactly what I expect of the Boy. (I never, ever disparage my work in front of him; I want him to joyfully create for creation's sake.)

Geometry has given us much practice work. And I have found I absolutely love coloring in our figures. It is so relaxing!

Before each lesson, I practice whichever figure we'll be doing the following day. On day 2 we practice it together on scrap sheets. And finally it goes in the main lesson book. While he's doing his mlb version I usually spend my time coloring my practice sheets.

My practice sheet

The Boy's practice sheet

And, just as I work my physical muscles, I will also continue to practice, stretching my artistic muscles. And yes, I can now do 10 pushups.

Note: For inspiration, I like waldorftoday

I also started building a pinterest board, pinning all kinds of images and tutorials.

And this year i purchased a book by Thomas Wildgruber, with lessons for improvement.

The Nature Table

Fall nature table

Creating a nature table is a natural extension of our time spent out doors. Each treasure we find reminds us of the remarkable beauty in nature: the forms, colors, smells, and tastes. When a fascinating specimen is found, we gently carry it to the house to place reverently on our nature table.

We've had a nature table in some form since the Boy was born. Originally, it was a little plate on the center of our dining table, where he would put little stones or flowers. As we spent more time in nature, among the amazing flowers and trees, splashing in the creeks and puddles, clambering over rocky trails, that plate soon proved to be way too small.

The Boy loves to collect rocks and feathers, seeds and twigs, pine cones and bird's nests. And now they all make their way to our designated nature table. (Much better than in his pocketses.)

All of our summer and early fall treasure, abundantly overflowing their boundaries!

At the beginning of each seasonal change, the table is nice and tidy. We change the cloth, rearrange piles of things we want to keep, create a blank slate. Oh, but by season's end, it is crowded! So many little treasure that need to be moved to some other place.

Some disintegrate, like fern leaves and herbs. Others the kitty knocks to the floor, amusing herself. Those are easy to dispose of...off to the compost pile. Some are too special to just toss back outside. I actually get a little anxious thinking about how I can get rid of these finds without seeming callous. I think we came up with a great solution.

The fairy house.

This morning we decided that with our fall to winter change we'd build a fairy house with our nature treasures. After a full geometry lesson, we packed up the contents of the table and trekked outside to find the perfect place...meaning protected from the puppy and the chickens.

An hour spent in the sunshine and fresh air, building a quaint little cottage scene under a forsythia. Plus cleaning off the nature table in a gentle way.

The late fall/winter table. Look at all the clean space!

Sixth Grade Waldorf: Egypt

Settling into October, we have completed our study of Egypt and are beginning to read the Ancient Greek myths. Before we go into Greece I want to post what accomplished in our Egypt block.

We started by reading "Tales of Egypt" (Roger Lancelyn Green), while on our trip to New Jersey. It was such a sweet time, curled up on our lounge chairs by the pool reading to each other. I could have stayed there much longer, but, Husband's classes being finished, we headed home.

It takes me a few days to return to normal, so while I tried to get us on track with our schooling we continued reading the Tales as our main lesson work. The following Monday we started in with "real" main lesson work, beginning with reading the book of Exodus from our Bible.

Way back in 3rd grade his class learned the Moses story in their Old Testament block. The Boy even had the opportunity to portray Moses in the class play whilst belting out "Let My People Go!" He reminisced about third grade, but this time 'round he really connected with the plague portion of the story. He seemed to get a kick out of the different versions of the plagues when we compared the story across several versions of the Bible. He was so intrigued that he initiated listing them in his MLB and then illustrating each plague.

i've been itching to introduce chalk pastels and thought the Pyramids at Giza made a likely subject. We tried our hand at blending colors, starting with the light colors and progressing to darker. (Ihave decided that I do not like the feel of chalk dust on my hands. Just thinking about it gives me that oogly, shivery feeling.) Overall we did enjoy using the medium, though. Next time maybe mama will need to wear some gloves!.

I won't post his version. After looking at it for a few days, we decided that it looked more like ginormous breasts than the great pyramids.

While reading a few of the myths aloud, the Boy decided to model a sphinx and pyramid, which he placed in front of his Great Boobies of Giza on our school table, making for lively dinnertime conversation.

He started the year with much enthusiasm. I hope he keeps it up!

Chalk pastels of the Pyramids at Giza

For individual reading, the Boy zipped through "The Golden Goblet." (It's a book my older boys read, so I already knew the plot, and therefore saved myself the time of having to read it now.) I'm determined to start him on short essays this year, so had him write a synopsis. Typically I would ask him to narrate a brief version of the story, and would outline it on the board. The next main lesson I would form those bullet points into paragraphs, with his "help." This time I assigned him to write it out in paragraph form on his own, which he balked at, of course. He was panic stricken, actually. Had no idea how to begin. I asked him to recount the story verbally, as we've done in the past. Only this time I didn't write the points on the board. I just concluded with, "That's exactly what you write down." Furrowed brows eased back in place, "Really? That's it?" Meltdown averted!

Main Lesson Book drawing of one of our fave myths.

A few days later he wrote his own essay about Egyptian mummies, drafting it in bullet point style on our white board first.

 Our main lesson book was finished with illustrating one of his favorite myths, the story of Thutmose and the Sphinx.

One of the last things we did was to construct paper pyramids using our new compasses to make them mathematically acuurate. I'll post directions in a day or two for those.

Completed paper pyramid

We finished our block by listening to the "Bartimeus Trilogy," by Jonathan Stroud. It isn't really about Egypt but gives small references to Egyptian artifacts and historical figures. Kind of a stretch, but it served the purpose of car entertainment on a long weekend to North Carolina.