Tomorrow morning I will wake up the mom of a 15 year old. 15! Where has the time gone? Since I am only 27 myself it is quite the miracle that my first born is going to be so old.
As I was mildly freaking out over the fact that my baby boy will be 15 tomorrow I also realized that the school year is more over then beginning. More panic! I have not done all I wanted to do. I won't get done all I want to do. What am I doing?
We have been spending some extra time on linear equations this week. Mister B is having some difficulty with converting slope intercept to standard line and vice versa. I can honestly say I had absolutely no idea how to do this. Algebra was really not my forte. My algebra teacher was The Dean of Detention, an Ex-Marine, and coach of the wrestling team and he gave the impression that if you were not on his team or really smart he wanted nothing to do with you. He was scary and when you told him you didn't understand he would come over to your desk. Point at your paper and say "You do this, this, and this. Understand?" "Yeah, sure" you would say even though you had no clue. Lets just say I had a lot of math tutors in my day and I still only squeaked by with barely passing grades. But now, thanks to the internet and www.kahnacademy.org, and some other math resources I found online I have mastered this skill. And more importantly, Mister B has started mastering this skill.
Little Miss M has quickly mastered median, mean, and mode and is now starting a unit on probability.
In Biology we took a step back and now Mister B has a better grasp on the material. Little Miss M is working on a sky journal and is learning about the stars.
History and English are moving along nicely as is Spanish for Mister B.
I can not wait to see what tomorrow brings....
Thursday, March 14, 2013
Tuesday, February 26, 2013
I am mom to a Letterman!
Here he is, Mister B with his First Varsity Letter. So proud of him. After the hoops I jumped through to get my homeschooler on the high school team I feel pretty darn good. All his hard work swimming for two teams has certainly paid off. Freshman and a Letterman, so very cool!
Friday, February 15, 2013
Musings
Just the other day I got to take advantage of one of the many educational homeschooling perks. Mister B was struggling with the lesson we were on in Biology so I decided we should go back a few chapters and start over. Perk. In school if you are lost it is more of a too bad try to keep up come in for tutoring kind of thing. In going back those few chapters we discovered there was a whole section we skipped in one of the chapters. Ooops. Guess what was covered in that chapter-the stuff he was having a difficult time with. Needless to say, it is all making a bit more sense now.
High School swimming is over for the season. Almost undefeated. They lost to the last team they swam against. So close. But overall it was a great season. The club team they both swim on had its second undefeated season. I don't know how the kids who swim for their high schools and a club team manage to fit school and homework into their day. I found the experience extremely challenging and was exhausted.
Little Miss and I have taken to working out together before school starts. It has been a couple of weeks now and I have to admit (as much as I hate to admit it) but I really do have more energy and a lot more patience then usual. Who knew (ok, everyone knew, but I didn't want to believe it).
I am beginning to think that this half of the year is going to go better then the first half in terms of finding our groove. For certain I feel like a finally have a handle on the high school scheduling of work. Little Miss is so going to benefit from it when she gets to high school. Poor Mister B has been my experiment.
High School swimming is over for the season. Almost undefeated. They lost to the last team they swam against. So close. But overall it was a great season. The club team they both swim on had its second undefeated season. I don't know how the kids who swim for their high schools and a club team manage to fit school and homework into their day. I found the experience extremely challenging and was exhausted.
Little Miss and I have taken to working out together before school starts. It has been a couple of weeks now and I have to admit (as much as I hate to admit it) but I really do have more energy and a lot more patience then usual. Who knew (ok, everyone knew, but I didn't want to believe it).
I am beginning to think that this half of the year is going to go better then the first half in terms of finding our groove. For certain I feel like a finally have a handle on the high school scheduling of work. Little Miss is so going to benefit from it when she gets to high school. Poor Mister B has been my experiment.
Wednesday, January 30, 2013
Another Day Completed
Sometimes it just feels good to have completed a day without steam pouring from ears and flames shooting from eyes. These past couple of days have actually gone fairly smoothly (as smooth as a day with a teenager and soon to be teenager can go)
Today they had discussion group and it was our turn to lead. We did The Secret Life of Walter Mitty by James Thurber. I have always liked that story and now seemed a good time to follow up the last meetings satire discussion. Who knew there were so many themes to discuss (http://www.shmoop.com/walter-mitty/table-of-contents.html). It was quite eye opening to see how they view *cough* middle aged to old people (it seems there is a point where you can no longer change your life) and marriage. They all thought it was funny that if the wife was wearing the pants the husband was wearing the skirt (side bar-kilts). A nice discussion on what it means to be a man and not letting those around you define who you are. And, disappearing into a fantasy world is probably not the best way to deal with your life. People will think you are nuts.
Today they had discussion group and it was our turn to lead. We did The Secret Life of Walter Mitty by James Thurber. I have always liked that story and now seemed a good time to follow up the last meetings satire discussion. Who knew there were so many themes to discuss (http://www.shmoop.com/walter-mitty/table-of-contents.html). It was quite eye opening to see how they view *cough* middle aged to old people (it seems there is a point where you can no longer change your life) and marriage. They all thought it was funny that if the wife was wearing the pants the husband was wearing the skirt (side bar-kilts). A nice discussion on what it means to be a man and not letting those around you define who you are. And, disappearing into a fantasy world is probably not the best way to deal with your life. People will think you are nuts.
Wednesday, January 23, 2013
This High School Thing
High School is a lot more time consuming then the younger years. I find myself with little time for blogging and that makes me sad. I like going back and reading about the things we have done and seeing pictures of the places we have gone. Between course work and swim team it seems we have little time for all the fun things we used to do. Come the spring I want to figure out a way to get some of that back in to our days.
In the mean time, Mister B has gone to his first high school dance. Swimming for the high school swim team allowed him to attend the freshman dance. He went with some friends and had a great time. My little man is growing up so fast. Not so little anymore (he has got me by a good few inches in height but he is still my baby boy).
Little Miss is writing a short paper on Galileo. I took her to the library to use the encyclopedia. Lets call it retro day. Sure she could have used the internet but there is something soothing (quiet) about working at the library. I think there is value in knowing how to research something without electronics. Sometimes you just don't have access.
The Good Things jar is filling with good things. Although I seem to be the only one putting anything into it. I remain hopeful that the rest of the family will catch on.
In the mean time, Mister B has gone to his first high school dance. Swimming for the high school swim team allowed him to attend the freshman dance. He went with some friends and had a great time. My little man is growing up so fast. Not so little anymore (he has got me by a good few inches in height but he is still my baby boy).
Little Miss is writing a short paper on Galileo. I took her to the library to use the encyclopedia. Lets call it retro day. Sure she could have used the internet but there is something soothing (quiet) about working at the library. I think there is value in knowing how to research something without electronics. Sometimes you just don't have access.
The Good Things jar is filling with good things. Although I seem to be the only one putting anything into it. I remain hopeful that the rest of the family will catch on.
Friday, January 11, 2013
The New Year is off and running
We are grooving along in the New Year. We have some slips of paper in or Good Things Jar. I am hoping we can keep it going all year.
Mister B and Little Miss are chugging away at their lessons and making progress. Mr. B has been reviewing Commutative and Associative Properties along with finding the Lowest Common Multiple. Little Miss is dividing with decimals and a review of adding and subtracting fractions.
In English Little Miss has been reading Lyddie and learning about life as a servant back in the day. Mister B is working on Run On sentences and will soon be starting Animal Farm (one of my favorites- 4 legs good-2 legs bad).
In History Little Miss has started to learn a bit about the Age of Enlightenment and will be writing a report on Galileo (good news-she remembers getting to look through his telescope at The Franklin Institute a few years ago). Mister B has been studying about State origins. I was unaware that we have North and South Carolina because farmers did not want the North. The South had a better climate for growing sugar cane.
In Science Mister B is learning about bacteria and Little Miss is working on volume and mass.
Mister B is making progress in Spanish. He knows his seasons, how to count to 100, how to tell time, and the months and the days of the week.
And swimming, lots of swimming.
And the countdown to Little Miss' Bat Mitzvah. I can not believe it is a few months away. It seems like just yesterday that Mister B became a Bar Mitzvah. No more babies. Just teenagers. 2 teenagers. 2 teenagers who are taller than me.
Mister B and Little Miss are chugging away at their lessons and making progress. Mr. B has been reviewing Commutative and Associative Properties along with finding the Lowest Common Multiple. Little Miss is dividing with decimals and a review of adding and subtracting fractions.
In English Little Miss has been reading Lyddie and learning about life as a servant back in the day. Mister B is working on Run On sentences and will soon be starting Animal Farm (one of my favorites- 4 legs good-2 legs bad).
In History Little Miss has started to learn a bit about the Age of Enlightenment and will be writing a report on Galileo (good news-she remembers getting to look through his telescope at The Franklin Institute a few years ago). Mister B has been studying about State origins. I was unaware that we have North and South Carolina because farmers did not want the North. The South had a better climate for growing sugar cane.
In Science Mister B is learning about bacteria and Little Miss is working on volume and mass.
Mister B is making progress in Spanish. He knows his seasons, how to count to 100, how to tell time, and the months and the days of the week.
And swimming, lots of swimming.
And the countdown to Little Miss' Bat Mitzvah. I can not believe it is a few months away. It seems like just yesterday that Mister B became a Bar Mitzvah. No more babies. Just teenagers. 2 teenagers. 2 teenagers who are taller than me.
Wednesday, January 2, 2013
January 2, 2013
The holidays are over. We are all rested and recovered from our New Years Eve celebrating and today we jumped back into school. With my resolve strengthened from our school break I am making an effort not to raise my voice (yell) so much.
Me, yell? How can that be? Don't my blog posts practically shimmer with the joy and rainbows that is homeschooling? A little secret...It is not all unicorns and cupcakes. Some days I want to load them into the car and drop them off at the local school and let someone else deal with them. I may have mentioned that before but I have been feeling it with greater intensity lately. Hormones. Theirs not mine. Well, sometimes mine.
Today started off decently. After the initial raising my voice moment I sat down with them and reminded Mister B and Little Miss M that I need their help in achieving that goal.
They both got back into the swing (for the most part). I think today had the crowning achievement of Little Miss writing 2 Haiku.
Flowers grow in dirt
They need water and sunshine
or they will not grow
Family is good
They are very important
You need them always
Also for 2013, in an effort to focus on the positives in our lives we have started a good things jar. (Right now it is a ziploc bag but it will be a jar). When something good happens you write it on a scrap a paper and put it in the jar. At the end of the year we will read all the good things that happened.
Me, yell? How can that be? Don't my blog posts practically shimmer with the joy and rainbows that is homeschooling? A little secret...It is not all unicorns and cupcakes. Some days I want to load them into the car and drop them off at the local school and let someone else deal with them. I may have mentioned that before but I have been feeling it with greater intensity lately. Hormones. Theirs not mine. Well, sometimes mine.
Today started off decently. After the initial raising my voice moment I sat down with them and reminded Mister B and Little Miss M that I need their help in achieving that goal.
They both got back into the swing (for the most part). I think today had the crowning achievement of Little Miss writing 2 Haiku.
Flowers grow in dirt
They need water and sunshine
or they will not grow
Family is good
They are very important
You need them always
Also for 2013, in an effort to focus on the positives in our lives we have started a good things jar. (Right now it is a ziploc bag but it will be a jar). When something good happens you write it on a scrap a paper and put it in the jar. At the end of the year we will read all the good things that happened.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
