RICH ACADEMY IN FULL SWING: SEPTEMBER 2013

RICH ACADEMY IN FULL SWING

SEPTEMBER 2013

I have always loved homeschool and I am loving it now though it is crazy busy as we work to get a schedule and flow in place and get the kids all trained on their routine.  This is our first full year with everyone home with a new curriculum and there is transition and training that must take place.  I know it will come -- we just must progress in baby steps!!!

One of our first activities was putting our new knowledge from education week to the test. The girls and I attended a class by "Chef Brad" (chefbrad.com) and learned about using grains and eating more healthy.  We are trying out using Agave Nectar, coconut oil and a bigger variety of grains in addition to our whole wheat flour. We tested this out on a batch of peanut butter chocolate chip cookies.  The ones on the left are the regular recipe with whole wheat flour.  They are pretty!!! The ones on the right are with whole wheat flour, agave nectar, and applesauce. They aren't as pretty, but they taste great and are much healthier!

Here are 2 pumpkins from our garden, our cookies and a large jar that has a LARGE cocoon in it!!!

Bethany helps Mason do some math!

 Rachel's art project

M&M MATH

We needed a powerful example of how important it is to estimate correctly!

You could lose a lot of M&M's if you don't estimate correctly!

WE LOVE SWIMMING FOR P.E.!!

Mason loves this floating alligator -- he says:

"THIS IS THE LIFE!" 

SCHOOL AT THE ISLAND!

BACK TO SCHOOL: AUGUST 26, 2013

BACK TO SCHOOL

AUGUST 26, 2013

Though we technically started school on August 6th, we haven't all had our books and electronic devices and schedule in place.  It has been a work in process.  We finally all have our books, except for Rebecca, and are going full steam with our K12 school program with ARVA (Arkansas Virtual Academy) which is a charter school through the state of Arkansas but is taught at home by me, mom, the learning coach.   Here is our school room!

We turned the office into our school room and we have set up 6 stations for the 6 youngest kiddos.  Joseph and Benjamin do the bulk of their school day up at the university in a computer lab near his office.  It helps them stay focused and  helps us stay focused at home.  We put up a cute pirate display with everyone's name in our school that we call "Rich Academy!"  We have a calendar and cute stuff for Mason -- it is required to have lots of cute and fun stuff for kindergarten!!!

SOLE: A NEW TEACHING APPROACH

SOLE:  A NEW TEACHING APPROACH

STUDENT ORGANIZED LEARNING ENVIRONMENT

Today my handsome prince sent me a video link that he had watched and encouraged me to watch.  I was so inspired by this that I am jumping in with a trail run tomorrow in our home school!

We have such a variety of levels and personalities in our 8 home schoolers with a wide range of ages -- 4 1/2 to 17 1/2!!

It will be interesting to see how this goes!

I had all ready planned to do an activity to go along with our brief study of Robert Fulton, so it will be fairly easy to adapt this lesson to follow the 

guidelines of the SOLE approach.

Watch the video, look at the packet, and check back to see what happens tomorrow!  Wish me luck!!

School in the Cloud 

SOLE Tool Kit

With our variety of kiddos, some unfortunately with some baggage from their past in Russian orphanages, I think that this "group" work and the guidelines presented could be some really good learning experiences.  It could also end up being chaos -- but we are going to try.

As I have summarized this in my mind: we will do a 1 - 1 1/2  hour session learning about submarines, they will gather information, create a poster and make a submarine out of supplies that I provide.  I have the supplies to create pop bottle submarines but I think I will give them a little start and then NOT provide any instructions.  I will see how far they can get with just an occasional question from me to encourage them.

A KEY COMPONENT in all of this approach is the "GRANDMOTHER ROLE."  That is defined as having someone complimenting their efforts and telling them how clever and smart they are for figuring out what they do!!

My role tomorrow during this activity will be to present a short youtube video linked here:

US SUBMARINES

and get them excited about how cool subs are!

Then set them loose to figure out how they work, where they came from 

and with the assignment to build one!

As they work and progress, I will help with behavior, be a sounding board that doesn't give answers, encourage problem solving and mostly tell them how great they are doing!!!

I am excited to see what happens!!!

I am pretty sure I will have one son who will get mad and will end up with everyone leaving his group -- there is always the option of changing groups at any time in this philosophy!!!

There will be some good social experiences and learning how to get along and to behave in a way so that people want to work with you.

It will be interesting!!!

I wonder if we will end up with 2 groups or 7 by the end of the activity!!! :)