Call me an unschooling drop-out!

Interestingly, Sharon Astyk blogged about unschooling this week.  She does touch on some of the things that were troubling me. I still like many of the ideas about unschooling, but it just doesn’t ‘feel’ right in our home school. Maybe it’s about me and my control issues and maybe that’s not a bad thing. I [...]

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In the home stretch

It’s hard to believe that I’m now planning the final ‘year’ of school for my oldest.  Time sure has flown since that day way back when he cried for hours because he thought we were ruining his life. Amazingly, it’s been a much more difficult task to plan for a high school senior.  The school [...]

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Visiting Russia Today…

We are cooking Russian today!  Sometimes I jokingly refer to Sonlight’s Core 5 – Eastern Hemisphere Explorer as ‘Cooking Around the World’. On the menu? Russian Egg Soup (Flower Child is obsesses with Egg Drop Soup.  She tries to find a recipe from every country we visit.) Apple Pie – This is more like a [...]

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Wanted: Motivation

I woke up this morning ready to tackle school the teens monthly school schedules for the next couple of months.  Somewhere along the way that motivation fizzled and I ended up cruising the blogs of old friends.   While I didn’t get the schedules done, it was a nice trip down memory lane. Schedules?  Yes, I’m [...]

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Letting Go – Week #6

We’re still hanging on.  It feels strange and completely foreign to me and it’s easy to see why some families give up early on in the game.  It’s unsettling!  Especially after homeschooling for nine years with Sonlight only – there hasn’t been any deviation. I’m sure the added stress of our Holiday – Thanksgiving, Christmas, [...]

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Letting Go – Week #3

I’m not going to pretend that *poof* overnight our house has become some hotbed of creativity and work.  Honestly, not much has changed in our day-t0-day lives except for the absence of pressure to get everything done.   At first Princess was entirely against the idea and even made a sad-face-smilie on my FB wall [...]

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Age segregation interferes with children's natural means of learning.

Why We Should Stop Segregating Children by Age: Part I–The Value of Play in the Zone of Proximal Development When you are little and just with kids your own age, the range of possible activities is restricted by the knowledge and abilities of those in your age group; but in collaboration with older kids there [...]

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Homeschool that girl!

Or…  How Mama yelled at the tee-VEE and got kicked out of the room. We all sat down and watched No Reservations on Encore the night the electricity came back on. The movie is about a New York City executive chef (Kate) who must take in her niece (Zoe) after her sister’s untimely death in [...]

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Inspiration for a Sonlight Mom

The School Boy by William Blake I love to rise in a summer morn, When the birds sing on every tree; The distant huntsman winds his horn, And the skylark sings with me: O what sweet company! But to go to school in a summer morn, – O it drives all joy away! Under a [...]

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And the Skylark Sings With Me!

Some students are self-motivated, understand that sometimes school work just has to be done to get it done.  Back in time someone, somewhere decided the exactly combination of high school subjects a student must complete in order to be Graduated.  And these self-motivated sorts just go along with it without really contemplating the importance of [...]

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