Watercolors

After our exciting water balloon fight today, I got out the paint supplies and let the kids create some masterpieces.

Schooling.. or lack thereof

"It is a miracle that curiousity survives formal education."
-Albert Einstein

So, after much back and forth (of which there will probably be more), I've decided (again) to homeschool... well, unschool. For the past couple of months, I've been struggling with the idea of sending Sophia to public school... something I never wanted to do. I've be procrastinating with getting her Vaccine Exemption forms, I haven't even enrolled her yet... so, I'm making an executive decision... I'm just not going to.

For being such a laid-back person, the thought of homeschooling frightens me. Not because I'm scared of it, or because I think I can't do it... I was homeschooled some myself... It's those little things like, "How do I measure how much you've learned?". "What are you supposed to learn this year?" For me to have also picked a more "unschooling" approach positively baffles me... but then again, I also had no idea why I seemingly at random chose to have an un-medicated birth, and within the week, also decided to have a home birth. I guess I'm just unconventional in a mildly self-destructive, yet positive way. More to the point... my first reaction upon making this "schooling" decision was to google "how to unschool".... makes so much sense, right? Google provided me with this lovely link...

http://sandradodd.com/howto/precisely


I'm in heaven.

So, then I turned to Sophie and asked her how she felt about not going to school in August, and just staying home with me, and learning here. She of course said "Yes!", then she asked what we would be doing. "We'd being going places and learning things you want to learn about." She liked that. The little spark of interest that flicked on in her eyes the moment it was out of my mouth made the decision worth it.

So, here's to seeing how it goes... later. :)

Math Lesson of the Day

Scene 1
Early Morning, Breakfast Table

After placing 3 pineapple slices on Cole's plate....

MOM: Sophie, how many pineapple slices do you want?

SOPHIA: (THINKING, THINKING) Um, 4.

MOM: 4? Then I'll only get 2!

SOPHIA: So?

MOM places 4 slices on her plate.


END SCENE.


Scene 2
A few minutes later, Breakfast Table


SOPHIA: Mom, if you would have given Cole 4 slices, and me 4 slices, you would have only gotten 1.



My child is a subtraction genius.