Quote #10.

Wow. Already ten weeks into 2011? Here's this week's quote:

Take chances. Make mistakes. Get messy. – Ms. Frizzle in The Magic School Bus series

As is usual, I’ve been thinking about homeschooling a lot lately…tweaking our plans and approaches. I’m very much looking forward to continuing down this path we’re on. This quote will help me. You see, on the whole, I’m a rather low risk sort of person…I prefer to stick to things I know and keep my feet on the ground…to *know* and not guess…to keep things orderly. In this, at least one of my boys is just like me. At least one is, um, not. I’d be lying if I said there aren’t times when this poses quite a challenge for me. I’ve struggled with it. Plenty. Trying to figure out how to think differently, how to be okay with getting things wrong, how to embrace exuberance. 

What I’ve found is that it works out much better for me when I choose to look at this difference in approach as an opportunity to learn rather than as a challenge to be overcome. (Incidentally, over the weekend, I came across this blog post that says it so perfectly.) So. While I love tidiness and security, I know now that I want to encourage my boys to take more chances…to make their own mistakes…and to (occasionally) get messy. I want to arm them with the courage to think outside the box and try new ways of thinking…to grow. To do that, I have to do it also. Here goes…

Ditto.

Just a few homeschool blogging posts I've seen lately that I wanted to share. They said it so well, I figured I'd just direct you to their posts. ;)

Think before you buy. I totally wish I'd have read something like this back when we started homeschooling. ;) I've gotten better, but still feel drawn to shop first and examine later, lol. Plus, I'm a collector. Things sold in sets just scream my name. You have no idea how hard it is for me to resist just buying an entire set of something...or three entire sets. ;)

The Public School Parents' Guide to Homeschool Parents. I just liked this one. Very well said and so true.

Keeping Up With the Joneses. I know I still struggle with this from time to time, especially when I read homeschooling blog posts online, LOL. But. I also know that I'm doing better now than I was back when we started. That helps. 

That was all. Just stuff that I've been thinking about. ;)

Full Splits Club.

I've been meaning to take a picture for months. I finally got one after the karate tournament last weekend. ;) Months ago, Asher became an "official" member of the Full Splits Club at his karate school. You can see why:

Yeah. The kid's incredibly flexible. He can do the splits the other direction, too. After this obviousness in class, his instructors informed him that he could try for this "club" and earn a patch for his uniform. He, um, did. :)

Ameritowne.

So, Noah takes this class at Options called AmeriTowne. This is the second year he's taken it. He LOVES it. To read more about this fabulous program, check out this link. (Seriously. Go check it out and then come back. They explain it better than I could. Cool, eh?)

Yesterday (Wednesday), they had their Towne Day. It was awesome. :) (To be clear, his own class that he goes to every Monday does not have this many kids. This year's Towne Day brought together a number of Options sites and their AmeriTowne classes to create this entire town and learn about working together.)

I was fortunate enough to attend as a parent volunteer this year. They have an entire little town created and the kids are in charge:

To outline the details a bit more:

1. Noah's job this year (they have to interview for positions prior to Towne Day) was as accountant for the medical center. There are about 17 different shops.
2. As accountant, he paid all the salaries at the medical center (to himself, the manager, a couple doctors and a couple health technicians, I think). Each shop had a manager/president/editor, an accountant and miscellaneous staff people depending on the shop needs. Managers and accountants made $30 for the day and everyone else made $25. (This is all in AmeriTowne money, not true US currency obviously.) Oh, and prior to Towne Day, they elected a mayor and a judge as well. They worked in Towne Hall and were paid the same as managers/accountants. They oversaw the police officers and community relations person.
3. He also paid all the bills to the other businesses (for things like advertising and delivery services and training). (The parent volunteers primarily help the accountants in each shop during the day as they have a lot of paperwork. I helped in the newspaper this year.)
4. During his breaks (every kid got two breaks--one before lunch and one after), he was told to go and spend all his money (having been paid at the start of the day and then depositing that money into his checking account) to help stimulate the Towne economy.
5. On those breaks, the kids could use cash, check or debit card and were encouraged to use all three and keep their registers up to date. The goal of the day is to end with zero in this case. Anything left at the end of the day could be donated to real organizations (the Young Americans program turns those donations into real money!). 
6. Each shop sold different items. The medical center's income derived from selling squishy eyeballs and from co-pays (students are randomly brought to the medical center with a variety of illnesses and injuries and required to pay a co-pay before they can return to work). Other shops sold snacks, candy, drinks, ice cream, newspapers, picture ID cards, trinkets and more.
7. At the end of the day, shops hopefully brought in enough money to cover their bank loans that were made at the start of the day (with 10% interest). Knowing this, students were able to raise or lower prices as they deemed fit (within a few guidelines).
8. They concluded the day by evaluating their shops, awarding employee of the day certificates for each shop and looking at their bank statements to determine if they'd made a profit or not. 

I feel so fortunate to have experienced this program and am so very glad it exists. They have summer camps and Saturday classes in addition to other programs, so check them out if you live around here, okay?

3rd Annual Science Fair.

We had our third annual homeschool group science fair on Sunday. (You can read about the second annual fair and the first science fair in these other posts (scroll down on that second link).) It was fabulous as usual. I love seeing all the projects the kids come up with! Here's what it looked like:

We ended up with about 44 projects (and more kids than that). We have the kids set up and then each table has a little notebook that gets filled with positive feedback as we walk around. Fun times!

Because we didn't manage to get pictures of the boys or their projects actually at the fair, though, we staged them again at home the next day. Here's Noah:

He tested the reactions between various acids and bases and then presented his findings, while also talking about chemical reactions in general. The molecules on the table represent some of the acids and bases he used.

Asher's project was entitled "If We Had No Moon." He listed various things that would happen "if we never had a moon" and also "if tomorrow the Death Star blew up the moon"...

...and on the table he put together models to show how the moon was formed in the first place:

Micah's project this year was about planetary orbits. He talked about the difference between a year and a day (for each planet) and then made a model, noting that nothing was to scale. ;)

After he'd done all this, he decided his project board was too plain, so drew all the planets to decorate it. I particularly liked some of his additions, like the "flying saucer" just off of Earth...

And, to wrap up this long post, here are all three with their hard-earned science fair participation medals:

 
Each participant received a medal and certificate (along with their notebook full of feedback) and went home happy. Yay!

(And, yes, they've already started brainstorming for next year. ;) So glad they love this!)