Wednesday, January 27, 2010

The Murky Quagmire of Mathematics


All right. I confess. Math -- not my thing.

I have been told for the last 30 years of my life that I have the right kind of brain for math, that mathematics and music require the same mental muscles, even that advanced music theory is so close to math that I might as well have swapped in grad school. I don't believe a word of it. In fact, without the motivational factor of homeschooling I may have happily lived my life without glancing more closely at mathematics than my computer's calculator function.

All that being said, I do not want my children to share this prejudice.

There are a lot of math curricula out there. I have spent too much of my life reviewing textbooks and trying to figure out which method will best serve my family. The best answer I can come up with, appropriately, comes from a musical: "Then from out of the blue, and without any guide, you know what your decision is -- which is not to decide." (Sondheim -- "Into the Woods")

My daughters struggle with making mathematical concepts "stick." My son tends to get it the first time and usually figures out how to do the next thing without being shown. To accommodate them all, I flit from method to method in a conscientious attempt to help them see math from every angle, without getting bored or frustrated with one method. This is what I have found.

Public school materials, at least the ones used in our California school district, tend to be tedious in the early grades. Necessary, but tedious. My son gets frustrated with the sequential approach and likes to skip to the end of the chapter to find out "how you really do it." My daughter in sixth grade has had a different experience. The pages are so terribly full of information that she either is overwhelmed by it and shuts off or she tries to digest it all at once and cannot. We use these books, and use them regularly, especially since they will have to take the tests that they teach toward at the end of the year, but they aren't anyone's favorite.

Miquon Math is my third grade son's favorite by far. It encourages creative thinking in math and recognition of patterns. It often takes a concept farther than other methods would but since the student is learning how the concept works it happens in a natural way that feels "easy." Miquon transitions into the Key-to series where it continues to work sequentially with patterns to learn fractions, decimals, percents, and algebra. The Key-to series has been excellent for my oldest daughter because there are not very many concepts per page. The clean presentation helps her to remain focused, and the creative thinking appeals to my more math-oriented son.

Singapore Math emphasizes mental math and problem solving. It is worth noting that the grade levels in Singapore Math are not at all comparable with U.S. equivalents. Singapore Math was made available worldwide after students in Singapore were found to be in first place in mathematics in the TIMSS -- Trends in Math and Science Study -- in each of the first four-year cycles. It is very quickly paced and uses different and interesting ways of thinking about and visualizing math problems. All of my kids think it's "fun."

Saxon, Horizons, and Abeka Math are homeschooling standards. They are "spiral-based" programs, unlike Singapore and Miquon which are "mastery based." This means that where Miquon and Singapore might have reviews every so often for groups of concepts, in Saxon, Horizons, and Abeka review forms the majority of each lesson with only one new concept being introduced each time. Being told that these curricula were very user-friendly for homeschool moms that weren't so keen on math, I have given Saxon and Horizons a try -- in complete truth, we were all bored to tears. I do, however, use the Saxon skill review worksheets for drills -- the pace is so much slower than the public school standards that both my 6th and 3rd grader currently use drills from the 7/8 skills book.

Switched on Schoolhouse is a computer based program. The isolation was not appealing to my children, even though they all enjoy using computers. The version we tried out got a little bit bogged down in the steps the student needed to take to do simple things like borrowing which are so easy with pen and paper but required several mouse clicks to do in the program. However, this was in 2007 and more modern versions may be easier to use. It, like the other homeschool standards, is spiral-based and does not focus on mental math or creative problem solving.

Speaking of computer programs... wouldn't it be nice if we could point and click our way to mathematical perfection??? I haven't found a way to do that yet, however, there are some programs that my family has enjoyed and that have proven valuable.

Timez Attack is a multiplication tables drill that looks a lot like a video game. Need I say more?
Rainbow Rock, Vroot and Vroom, and Wiggle Woods are corny names for the CD ROMS that go with Singapore math. My kids loved the first two and I need to invest in the third as soon as possible.
Mathletics was recommended to me recently by another homeschool mom. She says it is fabulous and has watched her daughters' skills improve through its use. I plan to try it out soon, too!

Friday, January 22, 2010

Middle Ages and Renaissance Reading Lists



These are the rest of our books for this school year. I have divided them into Middle Ages, Renaissance, and a few "Just for Fun."

Middle Ages

Flame Over Tara (Polland)
Beowulf -- A New Telling (Nye)
The Apple and the Arrow (Buff)
Tam Lin (Yolen)
Inferno (Dante -- Pinsky verse translation + Italian)
Otto of the Silver Hand (Pyle)
The Beduins' Gazelle (Temple)
A Proud Taste for Scarlet and Miniver (Konigsburg)
The Canterbury Tales (Chaucer)
Adam of the Road (Gray)
Catherin, Called Birdy (Cushman)
The Door in the Wall (de Angeli)
Sir Gawain and the Green Knight (Tolkien)
The Once and Future King (White)
Matilda Bone (Cushman)
Joan of Arc (Stanley)
Saint George and the Dragon (McCaughrean)


Renaissance

Michelangelo (Stanley)
Leonardo Da Vinci (Stanley)
Treasure Chests: Da Vinci
Luther (Nohl)
Master Cornhill (McGraw)
I, Juan de Pareja (de Trevino)
The Prince and the Pauper (Twain)
The Shakespeare Stealer (Blackwood)
Shakespeare Stories (Garfield)
A Midsummer Night's Dream (Shakespeare)
Sonnets (Shakespeare)

"Just for Fun"

Mountain Born (Yates)
The Wheel on the School (DeJong)
The Phantom Tollbooth (Juster)
A Little Princess (Burnett)
The Hobbit (Tolkien)

Tuesday, January 19, 2010

Ancient History Reading List


As we aim for a literature-rich program that enlivens the history and cultures we're studying, "The Reading List" is the most time consuming and intense item in our preparation for the school year. I draw from Sonlight Curriculum, The Well Trained Mind lists, public school recommendations, and various websites that may have suggestions for certain periods or cultures. Of course this number of books gets very expensive -- the library hasn't worked well for us because these books become like old friends my children want to return to time and again. They fight over who gets to take which books when they move away! I highly recommend half.com, the used bookstore to the world -- I get beat up discarded library copies that have super tough bindings!
This year our history takes us from Ancient times through the Reformation. The following reading list is our complete literature for the Ancient World -- some are read aloud by me, some are read by the third grader, some by the sixth grader and some by both.
As a basis, the sixth grader has worked through the public school text book for sixth grade history, Ancient Civilizations, published by Pearson/Prentice Hall. There are extensive writing assignments throughout. The third grader has read through A Child's History of the World (Hillyer). We have listened to Margaret Wise Bauer's The Story of the World (volume I, Ancient Times) on CD all together, so the kindergartner who isn't yet a fluent reader got her first taste of the ancient world as well.

General

Usborne Time Traveler
Historical Atlas of the Ancient World (Hays)
The Encyclopedia of the Ancient World (Hurdman)
Learning About Ancient Civilizations Through Art (Chertok)
Ancient Civilizations (Hart)
A Child's History of the World (Hillyer)
The Story of the World (Bauer)


Prehistoric Times

Boy of the Painted Cave (Denzel)

Ancient Egypt

Hieroglyphs from A to Z (Der Manuelian)
History Detectives -- Ancient Egypt
Kids' Discover Magazine -- Mummies
Tut's Mummy -- Lost and Found (Donnelly/Watling)
Mara, Daughter of the Nile (McGraw)


Ancient Middle East

Kids' Discover Magazine -- Ancient Persia
Hittite Warrior (Williamson)
The Golden Goblet (McGraw)
The Bronze Bow (Speare)
Beyond the Desert Gate (Ray)


Ancient Far East (This isn't much -- we studied non-Western cultures last year)

The Great Wall of China (Fisher)
The Samurai's Tale (Haugaard)
I Rode a Horse of Milk White Jade (Wilson)
A Single Shard (Park)


Ancient Greece

The Greek News (Powell, Steel)
D'Aulaire's Book of Greek Myths
Usborne Greek Myths
The Iliad and The Odyssey (Homer)
The Trojan War (Coolidge)
The Aesop for Children (Ill. Winter)
Pandora of Athens (Denenberg)
Theras and His Town (Snedeker)
Archimedes and the Door of Science (Bendick)


Ancient Rome

Detectives in Togas (Winterfeld)
Mystery of the Roman Ransom (Winterfeld)
The Ides of April (Ray)
The Lantern Bearers (Sutcliff)
The Eagle of the Ninth (Sutcliff)


Byzantine Empire

Anna of Byzantium (Barrett)

Coming up... Dark Ages through the Reformation!

Monday, January 18, 2010

Homeschooling for a Global Future


How can homeschooling today give children an advantage as they emerge into a world that is more connected, more culturally globalized, and more conflicted than the one their parents emerged into?

To address this question, first I need to express that my philosophies differ greatly from many -- not all, thankfully -- homeschooling families I am in contact with or know of. My general philosophy is one of MORE. More cultural connections, more history, more scientific knowledge, more language, more understanding of the world. We are dedicated Christians, but unlike many families, this was not a factor in our homeschooling decision.

The public schools in our community tend to fall flat in three areas. History, arts, and foreign languages. Above all, if our children will be able to exist and thrive in a global culture, these studies should instead be paramount. How will they understand a person from another culture if they are unaware what shaped that culture? The history, the religion, the triumphs and the tragedies of that part of the world? The language, also, helps to shape how people think.

Our curriculum starts with history. We build literature, art, and music studies around the culture and era that we are studying. I find that this approach works extremely well when combining ages -- the sixth grader has been through Ancient History before, for example, and is taking from this year a far deeper understanding than the kindergartner who is seeing the sights for the first time, but they both enjoy the trip.

Science, of course, has its own timeline, however studying the inventors, scientists, and philosophers of the historical eras helps to understand the current science we study as well.

Foreign Language. Currently my family seriously studies two: Spanish because we live in a part of California that was recently Mexico, and it seems only fair to study the language. Mandarin because it is the major commerce and scientific language of the Eastern world, as English is in the west. I am operating on the idea that whatever field they choose, knowing English and Mandarin will serve as life insurance.

It is well documented that music study, particularly piano, makes connections in the brain that are a significant help to math, science, and language skills. Add to the the tremendous enrichment and enjoyment that the arts bring to both cultural and individual life and the need for arts education becomes apparent. We study classical piano and singing, and other forms of art in connection with history.

Will all this enable them to function in a global culture? I hope so. At least they will grow up with a profound respect not only for other cultures but for their own. That respect could lead to greater understanding and a greater chance for a peaceful world for their children to emerge into. That's all I can hope for.

Sunday, January 17, 2010

Why Homeschool?



Homeschooling was something that our family fell into very easily.

I was already for the most part a "stay at home mom," teaching piano and voice lessons during after-school hours to supplement our income.

When our oldest daughter was the right age to enter kindergarten, several factors affected our decision to keep her home. We had just moved to a new job/city/and state, and the move had affected our daughter more than we expected. She was depressed. She didn't eat well, she cried a lot. We were expecting another sibling in December. For some kids, the entry into school and the possibility of meeting new friends would have been a positive change, but though she made friends easily and wasn't at all shy, she was not able to sit still for any amount of time and we knew that the stress level she was just beginning to come out of made transitions extremely difficult.

We decided to keep her home, allow for a little bit more maturity to set in before we entered her into a classroom situation. We didn't want her to be labeled as a "bad kid" when we knew she was bright and had every reason to be successful in school.

It was a great year. Lots of reading out loud, which the two year old loved as well, and the beginning of creating an environment where learning was the focus not just of school time but play time as well. It was fun!

But all too soon it was time for first grade. When the offices opened for registration, I called our local public school and the two private schools in our area. "My daughter is entering first grade, she's a fluent reader and she has finished the first grade math book -- what will you do with her?"

The answer was universal -- nothing. Megan would be expected to sit down, shut up, and pretend to learn phonics and adding. "Bad kid" label? I might as well have sent an engraved invitation.

I had an infant and a toddler at home, my after-school studio was thriving, and homeschooling had suited our schedule of evening rehearsals and performances, so my husband and I talked it over and decided to go for another year. "As long as she's ahead, we might as well keep it up."

She stayed ahead. My son completed his two years of preschool and it was time to make the decision again. Cameron was different. His preschool teachers loved him, and he adjusted well to classroom life. He followed directions. His attention span was great, and he met every expectation.

That's what made me wonder. He was smart, too -- just not as obviously as his sister, because he wasn't talkative. But he met whatever expectation was given to him. What if the expectations didn't meet his abilities? We experimented over the summer. We expected him to read. He learned to read. We expected him to match his second grade sister in Rosetta Stone Mandarin and in math games. Okay, if that's what I need to do...

Cameron stayed home, and we raised his bar. He's still the same, rising to every expectation.

So this past fall, we finally had the conundrum. Our youngest thrived in her preschool classrooms, was very social, and was driven to always do more than was asked. Our entire lives revolved around homeschool, and now we had the child perfectly suited to a classroom.

Our compromise -- charter school. Megan and Cameron attended last year and Erin could hardly wait to join them. They have interaction with a wide variety of kids from different school backgrounds. Some have been educated at home for their entire school careers, some failed in the public school system and are trying to catch up. The teachers are great, encouraging and compassionate for the wide variety of kids represented in their school of 130 some students. The kids attended "elective" classes every friday -- algebra, math and science labs, computers -- and meet with a teacher who is responsible for overseeing their progress once every two weeks. The kids take the star tests at the end of the year so I have a piece of paper that says they have at least mastered skills expected by their age. It's good.

However, now that all three are old enough to be successful in a public school classroom and here are no more small ones coming, I have to ask again, why?

At this moment I feel that education at home is the best option for my family and will help my children emerge into a world that looks drastically different from the one I graduated from high school into.

Why? Well, that's the next post... Homeschooling for a Global Future... :)

New Year's Resolution


It is difficult to begin this.

There is tremendous pressure to begin a project like this with something profound or thought provoking, or at least with a hook that will encourage the reader to continue.

I am a mom of three trying to navigate the dangerous waters of education in the home. It is terrifying, electrifying, frustrating and exciting. It is a constant roller coaster of successes and defeats, dramas and breakthroughs, despair and elation. I wouldn't trade the experience for anything in the world.

We work in connection with a charter school, though it is an extremely flexible one and I am blessed with the opportunity to create my own curriculum that suits me and my children. Before the winter break, the teacher there that we work with said "you need to write a book about homeschooling."

Wow. I took it as a great complement, and to some degree, took it seriously. I consider myself a writer, and I have a small stack of novels already that need to be sent out to collect rejection slips. But those have... well, a plot. Characters. A reason to turn the page. How to even start a book on homeschooling?

So I made a very specific and detailed New-Year's goal. "Start thinking about outlining a book about homeschooling."

And to make things worse, an old and respected friend threatened to post this (along with a few other resolutions) on his google docs so he could help nag me over it. Really?

So this is my "beginning to think about it." A concrete way and place to collect thoughts and maybe start a few ideas rolling and begin a few conversations.

Coming next... why we began to homeschool... why we still do...