Anyway, we got a few good laughs along the way too.

Wait, that’s not the point.

The point is, the dude on the silly video on fb DARED me to turn off the idiot box and read Shakespeare.  Yea, not only to read the bard’s works, but to read them aloud to my children.  (That’s what I heard, but there may have been a boat-load of guilty driving my interpretation thereof.)

Hold on, lemme think, wasn’t I gonna do that anyway?  Isn’t that why I bought my copy of Tales from Shakespeare nearly 20 years ago?  Wasn’t that part of the plan of yore.  I used to do this.  Seriously.  

But now?  We read a chapter of Farmer Boy (nuthin’ wrong with Little House on the Prairie, just happens to be what we are doing right now) and then we pop in a DVD.  Again, nuthin’ wrong with watching an occasional DVD, especially if it’s a well made, classic tale.

Right.

Explosions, hostage negotiations, Marvel comic heroes, futuristic robot take-overs.  That’s what usually plays around here.

*Extreme homeschool guilt happening in my head right now.*

So, to counteract the painful, nauseating guilt I got out my copy of Tales from Shakespeare and read the first chapter to Caleb and Rachel.

Painful.

I could cry.

Seriously.

It hurt my head to read the hard stuff.  And I had to explain so much, so many phrases.  (Glad I still could, bein’ as my mind is mush.)  Troopers that they are, the kids patiently listened and tried to keep track of who was the brother, who was the king, and what the good guy’s name was.  Then, when it was ended, they voluntarily went to clean their rooms.

Seriously.

Totally.

Shut up.

(That last was aimed at the inside of my vacuous vacuum I call my brain.)

So, because I know you’d like to share in my guilt and misery, here’s the video that snapped me back to my senses.

Shakespeare – HA

By the way, you can get Tales from Shakespeare for free for your Kindle (or Kindle for PC) here and lots of regular Shakespeare for the Kindle (most of it free) here.  Regular Shakespeare, <snort>, I mean sonnets and plays and so forth.

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I forgot how worldly the… um… world is.

I’m sure that lots of the books in the children’s section would be fun to read.  That is, if you don’t mind your kids being inundated with VERY WORLDLY THEMES.  Such as government school stuff, feminism, rebellion-as-a-normal-way-of-life, evolution, I could go on and on and on.  I’m sure I’m just the very most naive person on the planet to think that there was anything in that store for my littles.

I did find a nice field guide that we needed.  And Joe found some books he’d been needing.  So the outing wasn’t a complete wash.  But I’d like to remember the lesson I learned about going to actual book stores.  It’s a far, far better thing I do to click on amazon.com.

Also, we had a yummy burger at Wendy’s.

And, in looking around the books on the shelves there in the book store I was reminded of all the many wonderful books we already have on our shelves here.

• Ballantyne
• Henty
• Tolkien
• C.S.Lewis
• Brian Jacques

Again, I could go on and on.

I need to remember all the (free) classics I have on my Kindle.

It’s just not worth the effort to go into a book store anymore.  (Hello Borders.) I guess it’s the end of an era.

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Desire:  It is my hearts desire, and that of my husband, that we both set a better example of right living by spending far more hours reading than we spend gazing into the idiot box.

I got a Kindle for my birthday this year.  It’s a wonder.  I love it.  (Deep breath.) However, it seems more natural to me to have an actual book in my actual hands.  I suspect that I just need to play around with the Kindle more and get more comfortable with some of it’s  features, like highlighting and bookmarking and so forth.  Anyhoo…

Book reading, that’s the topic.  I know some of you (Frankie) use software to keep track of what books you own and enjoy, and what your favorites are.

What I’m wondering is, well, it’s actually twofold.

1. Can y’all hook me up with the different sites for cataloging my massive collection.  (Really need to un-clutter the shelves before that big event.)  I want to organize my stuff, but I also want to be able to see what is in your collection.  Is that the way those things work?  Or am I just dreaming?
2. Those of you who don’t have it all categorized and cataloged for me to peruse via internet, could you leave a list of your favorites in the comments here?  I know there are only seven of you out there reading this, but, you know, y’all are who I am meaning to ask.  I value your opinions.  Leave this info on any category of book you care too.  My favorite categories include, but are in no way limited to:

• Cookbooks
• How to:

1. Build stuff
2. Teach stuff
3. Improve myself
4. Survive T.E.O.T.W.A.W.K.I. (The End of the World as we Know It)

• Historical Fiction
• SciFi (mild, not horrific)
• Classics
• Poetry
• Kids books – Starting with easy chapter books and on all the way up.
• Biographies

Seriously, I could go on and on, but there is a Baconator with my name on it somewhere in town.  I have to go google Wendy’s locations and get out of here.

Why are we going to town again so soon?  Not just for the Baconator, although, if you’ve ever had one you know that it could warrant the trip all on it’s own.  No, the Baconator is just a perk.  We’re heading to the book store, and the thrift store (book section).

I made the mistake of going into Books-a-Million yesterday.  I steeled my resolve not to buy a book yesterday, and I didn’t, but those kind of pacts only last till sunset.  Beyond that I became vulnerable.  Vulnerable to recalling the aroma of new books. Vulnerable to dreams of cracking a brand new spine.  Vulnerable to the craving to meet new characters.   And the desire is overwhelming.

Must buy books.

If I’m smart I’ll stick to useful stuff for the kids, who do I think I’m kidding here?  I know this urge is going to compel my feet to carry me into the sci-fi section, or the survival novels shelves.

So, since we all love books so much we should point each other towards our favorites for consideration, IMHO.  So here is my tidbit for you to mull over.  Alas, Babylon.  Yes, it’s a “survival novel”  but oh my does it have story!  It was originally published in 1959, and that right there is a good recommendation.  And since it is older, the crisis is a different one than we normally think of today.  Ditto the difficulties to overcome.  Fascinating.

***Yeah, I just re’read this post.

***What is the matter with me?  Why do I feel guilty over buying a book and not over eating a Baconator?

***(Deep breath, tiny talk with self, pulling up boot-straps.)

***I’m so over it now.  Ok, book stores.  Look out, here I come!

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Overwhelming?  Just a tad.

I had to sleep on it.

I came up with a S.T.E.L.L.A.R. plan.

Shop right here on my book shelves, choose several books to find unit studies for.

Lemme ‘splain it to ya, Lucy.  I’m talking about lessons for my littles who are 13, 11, and 8.  I need a combo of unit study/lapbook/notebook type stuff.

These are the books I chose off my very own shelves, and each is followed by resource links I think might be useful.

Mountain Born by Elizabeth Yates

• eThemes – Plenty of info, not much for smaller kids.
• Loyal Books Blog – A review of Mountain Born, but no links or lessons.  Interesting blog.
• A New Coat for Anna -A book about wool, from sheep to clothing.
• Pele’s New Suit – Another book about wool, from sheep to clothing.  Alas, this one is a bit too young for my crew.

The Sign of the Beaver – by Elizabeth George Speare

• Homeschool Share has an entire unit study on this book just waiting to be printed off.  It has a fairly loose feel to it.  It’s arranged by chapter instead of day-by-day.  Might just use it all.
• Squidoo has several beaver coloring pages.

By the Great Horn Spoon! – by Sid Fleischman

• This book has it’s own web site. Pretty thorough.  Quizzes, History, Miner info.  Neat stuff.
• My Learning Center has a goldmine (ahem) of info and lessons.  How ’bout some writing advice from Sid Fleischman himself?  It’s here.

The Cricket in Times Square

• Homeschool Share is on the ball again.  And again, it’s all laid out by chapter.  Lots of useful, fun stuff here.  Vocabulary Bingo! I can’t wait!  Seriously folks, click the bingo link.  You can do this, make it yourself or use this grid, and make a list from whatever you are reading to  your kids.  It’s that easy.
• This one is deep, lots of language arts pages here.  I was just wanting a page like this one to re-enforce my recent teaching of contractions.
• Lesson Pathways has a few neat resources linked here.

Sarah, Plain and Tall – by Patricia MacLachlan

• Homeschool Share – my new best friend.  :D
• Vocabulary, questions, activities.
• Easy Fun School has a mini-unit study.  Just right for this tiny book.

Some of these books don’t have much available to use with them online so I’ll be:

• making my own vocabulary lists and playing Vocabulary Bingo.
• creating my own “Unscramble the Words” pages.
• copying some of the artwork right out of the book to use as coloring pages for Rachel.
• using the illustrations in the books as inspiration for art lessons.
• flying by the seat of my pants, as it were.

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Nope.  All I’m showing you today is how I assemble the book, and giving you a few links so you can come up with a system that works for your family.

For our weekly chores I use one form, the same one I’ve used from the beginning.  No, wait, I just had a flash-back to the days b.p. (before printer).  I used notebook paper and a ruler and drew the vertical lines on there.  Ugh!  Anyway, back to what I’m saying.  The forms at Chart Jungle are a little more kid-pleasing than the plain-jane look of the ones at Donna Young.

Once upon a time I bought The Christian family’s complete household organizer by Gregg and Sono Harris.  Doesn’t that title inspire AWE!  I mean, it sounds like the answer to all my problems, homeschooling, organization, household, and all others!  That’s why I bought it (at a bookswap of course, you don’t think I’d pay full price for something that expensive, do you? It was $35 new, I paid $7-woohoo!) Oddly enough, Sono Harris did not show up at my house and teach my children how to parse sentences or run into my kitchen and whip up a gourmet meal.  Had to learn to do all that on my own, but the book helped me learn to plan, schedule, keep track, and generally be much more up-tight (in a good way) than I ever had in life.  And when you have a ship full of little pirates and you’re trying to teach them to grow up respectable a little up-tight is in order.  And I’ve since learned that it’s hard to be outta-sight if you ain’t up-tight to start with.  Me and Stevie – we’re like this.

The PROBLEM

This stuff will help.

Pay no attention to the MONTHLY CHECKLIST – that’s not what we’re talking about today.

Buy the write-on tabs.  Every time you use them think -RIGHT ON!

RUH-ROH!  Binder integrity has been breached!  Sound the alarm!

Brand-spankin’ new and perty!

A little guilt-trip, uh, I mean INSPIRATION for the Pirates.

Just as an aside, I’ve had a little fever as I was writing this post and now you’re probably thinking one of two things.

1. Wow, she should get sick more often, this was a hoot!
2. Uh huh, so when she says “fever” she means “hittin’ the sauce”, we are not amused.

Whatever.

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I had read it to the olders years ago.  I’m sorry to tell you this, because I know that I’m violating some un-spoken homeschooler code, but I just don’t enjoy The Chronicles of Narnia.

<cue crickets>

• Are you still there?
• Do you still like me?

Anyway, I ran hot and cold in my attempt to finish it up.  Part of the time I would read like a mad-woman, chapter after chapter…

“Forget math, we have to finish The Silver Chair!”

…trying to get through as quickly as I could.  Other times not reading anything at all because I couldn’t face another snooze session with the current Narnia we were in, and it would be wrong (on some level) to spend any read-aloud effort on some non-Narnia book because that would certainly not get us any closer to the ultimate goal of FINISHING-UP-NARNIA.

See the problem?  I forgot all about the goal of providing my children with a pleasurable listening experience and an enjoyable education.

Ooops!

Anyroad, we FINALLY finished our journey further up and further in than I ever cared to venture.  But I still didn’t have my head on straight again about the read-aloud.  I needed a break.

Don’t get me wrong, we’ve been reading.  We’ve been enjoying some fine books.  Just ever so much slower than our (used to be) “normal” rate.

Would you like to know what got me straightened out?

It’s a cute little paragraph from the book The Unschooling Handbook by Mary Griffith.  It’s in the chapter named Reading and Writing.

Whatever other tools you may introduce, the first requirement is one exemplified  by this five-step reading program that occasionally appears on homeschooling lists on the Internet:

Read to them.

Read to them.


Read to them.


Read to them.


Read to them.

Now, I have personally never seen this on the internet, however I learned it early on and always subscribed to this philosophy for successfully educating a child.

When the boys were tots I spent hours on end with them piled on me in my arm chair reading Treasure Island and The Adventures of Robin Hood and whatever else I thought was worth while and interesting.  And I would always read several picture books during the course of the day, everyday.  That’s most of what’s been missing around here.  And not all of the blame can go to Narnia.  Some of the problem is that Rachel, my youngest, is such a good listener.

Just bear with me, it’ll make sense in a minute.

She can sit and listen to whatever is being read and for however long it’s being read.  And see, she’s the baby.  Everybody else can do it too because they’re big kids.  But even though she’s only 8 years old, I have been abusing her maturity and not reading ANY picture books.

Sad, I know.  Let’s keep moving before I dwell on it and cry over that spilt milk, ok?

So, here’s the list of books that Rachel and I have enjoyed over the past couple of days.  I hesitate to say I read them all to her because some of them are wordless books (which I love because I love making it up fresh each time thru) and because some of them she read to me!

• Anno’s USA
• Princess & the Kiss
• Oscar, Cat-About-Town
• My Grandma Lived in Gooligulch
• Make Way for Ducklings (Rachel’s favorite)
• Andy and the Lion
• The Story of Ferdinand (my favorite)
• JUST IN CASE YOU EVER WONDER
• Raccoon On His Own
• Blueberries for Sal
• Five o’clock Charlie
• Chanticleer and the Fox (John’s favorite)
• Anno’s Counting Book
• Millions of Cats
• They Were Strong and Good
• Anno’s Magic Seeds
• Chickens Aren’t the Only Ones
• Verdi

These are only the ones that I have left in my stack, she carried some to her room to read at lights out.  It always tickles me when I’m sending kids to bed and they ask, “May I read a book?”

I’m always itching to find new story books.  What are your favorite books to read to your kids?

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The photos are some that Jacob took of my 9 month old Pomeranian puppy, Blaze.  She has hardly anything to do with Mary Poppins, except that her nickname is “The Perfect Puppy” because she’s so… um… perfect!  She’s a sweetie and she thinks I hung the moon.

The Perfect Puppy pretending to be Alice in Wonderland.

Linked to regular Wordless Wednesday and GooberGrape&MonkeyMan’s Wordless Wednesday.

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Not too long ago I ordered it’s companion book Miserly Meals and have found fresh inspiration.

Other books I’ve found to be fundamental in learning to be frugally creative, or creatively frugal are The Tightwad Gazette, The Tightwad Gazette II, The Tightwad Gazette III.  Of course, if you don’t mind holding a huge book, then it can be had in one volume, The Complete Tightwad Gazette.

On Mondays you can find me at Frugal Hacks doing a link round up of exciting frugal online resources.

The worth of a book is to be measured by what you can carry away from it.  ~James Bryce

Books are the quietest and most constant of friends; they are the most accessible and wisest of counselors, and the most patient of teachers.  ~Charles W. Eliot

Outside of a dog, a book is man’s best friend.  Inside of a dog it’s too dark to read.  ~Groucho Marx

The man who does not read good books has no advantage over the man who can’t read them.  ~Mark Twain, attributed

Books can be dangerous.  The best ones should be labeled “This could change your life.”  ~Helen Exley

Some books are to be tasted, others to be swallowed, and some few to be chewed and digested.  ~Francis Bacon

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No Sir!

How’s THIRTEEN?

Who knew!  Thirteen comments on one  post!  Most Triumphant!

Anyway, I used my old friend, the Random Number Generator.  I always have fun with that one.  I think I can link to the result page.  (Nope, still randomizing.) I assigned numbers to your comments in the order that they came in, and had to be careful not to count my comment replies.

Details – harumph!

And the number generator gave me “lucky” 13 as the result.  So, Kimarie, come on down!  You’ve won a brand spankin’ new copy of the excellent book The Way Home by Mary Pride!  I can not wait to hear what you think of it!

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This will be incomplete, I can just feel it.  Fair warning.  So, if after reading this you think to yourself, “Wonder if they’re studying ______?”  Then yes we probably are and I just forgot to mention it.  Or maybe we aren’t.  You know, here in Texas, the best state of all where homeschooling laws are concerned (and where everything else is concerned too), the requirements are that we teach the following subjects:

• Reading
• Spelling
• Grammar
• Mathematics
• Good Citizenship

Amazing, isn’t it.  I am always shocked that Science and History did not make the list.  Where is Creative Writing or even Handwriting?  See what I’m saying?  The homeschooling is great here.  Not that we don’t teach those things, but we’re not jumping through governmentally positioned hoops to do it.  We make our own rules – to a certain extent, and we like it that way.

For this post I’ll just focus on how we cover the state requirements.

To teach reading I am using a free book that can be found online.  It’s called Word Mastery.  It’s kinda light weight, so I’m switching to Word Studies, which is also free online.  It’s much more in-depth.

Also, for those that already know how to read, I have them read books.  Simple, eh?  We have ABeka readers, Christian Liberty Press readers, McGuffey readers, Sing Spell Read and Write readers, hundreds of  easy readers, Bob books, and a billion other good books.  I have the kids write their names in the back of the book when they’ve read it, up to about age ten.  They used to get so tired of me going thru a stack of about 350 books asking “Have you read this?  What about this?”

For spelling we are and forever will be using Sequential Spelling.  Nothing succeeds like success, and we’re finally having heaps of success with this program.  And we deserve it.  I’ve been through some very trying times with my dyslexic son, and with this program he is finally learning and remembering how to spell words.

Our favorite grammar books are called Woe is I, and Woe is I, Jr. – These books are so straight forward and easy to understand.  I love them.  Easiest way to teach Grammar I’ve ever seen.

Mathematics – my evil nemesis.  Because I am not a math person and John (who is a super-math-person) doesn’t have time to teach it, I have sought out resources that do the whole job.

For the older kids we’re using the Life of Fred books.  The kids no longer groan and slouch and try to hide when I say “Go do your math” like they used to when we used Saxon.  They actually just do their math, oft-times without being told.

For the middle kids we’re using Teaching Textbooks, which I love so much that I worked the Teaching Textbooks table at our local Homeschool convention last year.  One thing I have learned, since we never get the book out, never, the next time we order we’ll just order the cds and save about $20.

And for Rachel we have used Horizons Math which is very good, but is kinda spendy.  I have ordered J.U.M.P. for her to use this Spring and Summer.  It just came in Friday’s mail, I’ll let you know how we like it.  J.U.M.P. stands for Junior Undiscovered Math Prodigy.  Once she finishes that she’ll start Teaching Textbooks.

Our study of Good Citizenship has been organic and home-grown.  Here is a paragraph from our state homeschool coalition concerning this subject.

What is “a study of good citizenship”?

“Good citizenship” is usually taken to mean civics. Public schools teach one semester of civics, usually in the senior year of high school. Teaching U.S. and Texas history, government (theoretical and practical), the Pledge of Allegiance, and similar activities will also help meet this requirement.

Seems vague to me, so I ordered the Good Citizen Pack from the Texas Homeschool Coalition Association.  That ought to cover it.

That’s not all we do, but this is getting long.  I’ll be back another time to finish telling it all.

Now, don’t forget about the GIVEAWAY!  Go enter!  Now!  Click here!

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