Inspire AND Require?

I have read several things lately about Inspire, not Require. Some people feel their kids won't do anything without requiring them. Some feel that not requiring is more unschooling and they are not comfortable with that. I have found that each child is different and is inspired under different conditions.

Marly (15) - Project Scholar
Marly is intrinsically inspired to learn. She devours books, reading hours and hours every day without me saying anything about learning. She finds so much to learn about that her day is full of learning experiences. My job as a mentor is EASY with her. She can find things to occupy her time without me and is a self-learner through and through. I find her writings have depth I didn't know she had in her. Inspiring her to learn about new topics or go into depth in other areas is as easy as getting the books from the library and putting them on the shelves. She peruses the books and eventually picks up most of the books I bring home.

Chris (13) - Transitioning to Scholar
Chris is a hands-on, I-need-to-experience-it-myself type of learner. Inspiring him is much harder in that he does not value stories very much. He values things that are "real"...really happened...or things he can do. I did finally find some books he likes, Robinson Crusoe being his all-time favorite so far. We also stumbled upon the fact that he likes Louis L'Amour books and is enjoying the Sackett series. Mentoring this child is HARD. It takes a lot of experimenting to find what inspires him, and even then it doesn't seem to inspire him long.

Did you notice I used the words "stumble upon" and "experimenting". This is what mentoring my son is to me. I have to work harder at it and search high and low, rejoicing in the once-in-a-while golden find that leads to an inspiring moment.

Inspire and Require?
During our Return and Report meetings, my son has expressed that he would rather I require something of him because he needs the direction.....hhmmm. After delving into this further, we came up with the idea that he needs a little bit of require in order to feel motivated (yes, I know this means he needs more core work). In the mean time, he very much wants an education and flounders a bit in finding things that interest him. We found that for Chris, he needs a basic outline of subjects that he should be doing each day - reading, writing, and math - and a list subjects he can touch on weekly - history, science, government, and grammar. He can choose what he does for those subjects, but he is required to work on each subject every day/week.

We have been doing this for a couple months now. Yesterday, I spoke with Chris about how this was working for him. I talked about taking away the require portion and he said, "But I need you to require me to do these subjects each day." OK, well I guess that answers my question.

Remember, YOU are the expert on your family.

Transcripts and Diplomas

I attended a homeschool conference where I attended a class with a lot of emphasis placed on record keeping for the state. The HSLDA attorney who spoke says they are greatly concerned that families in states that are not required to routinely show their records are not keeping records. Missouri requires families to keep records in case they are investigated, but we are not required to file them or show them on a regular basis. Almost every mom I talked to said they do not keep records...hhmmm. This is not compliance with the law and I want to be a law abiding citizen.

With Obama's new "National Curriculum" that he is proposing, HSLDA is concerned they will come after homeschoolers as well. They want everyone to keep good records so that there would be a strong showing of true education going on in families around the country. So, how does a TJED family keep records? Each child will have a different "plan" with different "records" at different "ages/grades". How does this translate into the kind of thing the conveyor-belt system is used to seeing/requiring?

Interestingly enough, the idea of transcripts and diplomas have been plaguing my mind even before I attended this conference. My father-in-law has asked me several times how I'm going to graduate my children. His comments come out of concern and love for my children, so I have given them great thought. In Missouri, there is no recognized "homeschool graduation" and they say homeschoolers need to take the GED for a diploma. Many homeschoolers are against this because they feel this makes their children look like high school drop-outs.

While spending some time pondering this, I ran across an article about transcripts by subject (I wish I could find the source). The mother developed a detailed transcript of each subject and gave it to the colleges her child was applying for. The list by subject included textbooks and other books used and an explanation of what they did for each subject. HSLDA has a sample transcript by subject here. The one I read about was more detailed by far (7 pages long).

I decided that I want a transcript and diploma in case we are ever questioned and to give my children a sense of accomplishment that what they are doing is going to be transferable to the world. I took books from the TJED Books for Youth and the TJED for Teens lists and made a book list for each subject. As my children read/study these books we check them off. Once an area of study has been completed during their Scholar Phase they have completed the "course". How is that different from some of my high school courses? It's not. I took Children's Literature and Mythology, which had a book list that we read and studied together, I wrote a couple of papers and then I got a grade.

Here are some examples:

Shakespeare (All Plays are read) - 1 English Credit

• The Tempest - Watched movie
• Julius Ceasar
• All's Well That End's Well - watched movie and wrote a paper
• A Midsummer Night's Dream
• Hamlet - attended a performance
• Othello - Wrote a paper
• Romeo and Juliet

Government (all are read) - .5 Government Credit

• The Constitution of the United States - Wrote a paper
• The Declaration of Independence - Watched a documentary on the signing
• The 5,000 Year Leap - Discussed each Principle
• The Federalist Papers

American History (all are read and some are watched/listened to) - 1 History/Social Studies Credit

• "I Have a Dream"
• "Give Me Liberty of Give Me Death"
• "The Gettysburg Address"
• "Battle Hymn of the Republic"
• "Let America Be America Again"
• The Last of the Mohicans
• The Making of America
• The Real Thomas Jefferson
• The Real George Washington
• The Real Benjamin Franklin
• Field trips to civil war sites and attended a reenactment

 I firmly believe that A Thomas Jefferson Education is transferable to the world and we can show people how successful it can be while still giving them something understandable in their terms.

Missionary Work vs. Homeschool

I've received a lot of comments lately about my plan to homeschool through high school. There is an argument where we live about the fact that the local high school has not one LDS student. The idea is that we should all send our LDS children to the local high school in order to be missionaries. The youth that have left the high school explain that they are ostracized, picked-on, and left out of everything including sports. Out of the 11 students old enough to take Seminary in our town, only 3 go. Our town has a Home Study Seminary where they meet once a week instead of an Early Morning Seminary like most areas. Just North of us in the next town there is a swelling number of LDS students, which is why we have over 60 youth in our ward.

My feeling is that my children can be missionaries to our neighbors and community without going to the high school. We have been homeschooling for over 5 years now and we love it! Why should we change a good fit for our family? Do I sacrifice my child's education so that she can be a missionary at the school? Heavenly Father entrusted these children to Mike and I. We'll go with what He has directed us to do and that is to continue our home education plan.

Constituting America

I support organizations that teach Americans about America. I have read The Constitution of the United States a few times, but I heard about this undertaking by Constituting America to read the Constitution and the Federalist Papers in 90 days. I decided to take this challenge and hope that you all will too!

I'm a little behind in posting this, but I hope you'll do it with us!

Reading Schedule (Article are the Articles of the Constitution):

• Tuesday, April 20 – Read Article I
• Day 1 – Wednesday, April 21 – Blog on Article I; Read Article II
• Day 2 – Thursday, April 22 – Blog on Article II; Read Article III
• Day 3 – Friday, April 23 – Blog on Article III; Read remaining Articles (IV, V, VI, and VII) of the United States Constitution
• Day 4 – Monday, April 26 – Blog on Articles IV, V, VI and VII of the United States Constitution; Read the Amendments 1-10, Amendments 11-27
• Day 5 – Tuesday, April 27 – Blog on the Amendments to the United States Constitution; Read Federalist Paper # 1

Week in Review - 16

I have gotten away from posting what we do on a weekly basis. We are settled into our new home and routine. Some great things happened this week, so here is a Week in Review.

:: Daily Lessons ::

• Devotional: "Preach My Gospel" - Finished Lesson 5 and started Lesson 6 - a section a day.
• Read A-Loud Book:  "The Little Town on the Prairie" - book #7 of "Little House" series. We started the Doctrine and Covenants for family scriptures.
• Math: Chris - Finished Math-U-See: Delta a couple weeks ago. Whoo hoo! Math-U-See: Epsilon He has worked through lesson 10 - Marly - Math-U-See: Zeta - She is up to lesson 14 - Celeste - Math-U-See: Algebra (review for mom...again!) I have not been working on my Algebra lately and I getting back to it.
• Exercise - We are using the Wii Fit Plus, walking the dog, and going on nature hikes.
• Writing - Chris - daily journal entries. Marly - writing her own book and daily journal entries.
• New Era and Ensign Reading, Scripture Reading, and Individual Reading - See each person below for their readings.
  

:: Weekly Lessons ::

• Monday: Weekly Library Trip, Grammar Lesson - Chris "Winston Grammar".
• Tuesday: Nature Center Fieldtrip, Government Lesson - "The 5,000 Year Leap" - Principle 18
• Wednesday: History Lesson - Chris: "Story of the World", Vol. 2, Chapter 11 - Marly: "Story of the World", Vol. 3, Chapter 8.
• Thursday: Spent time in Urgent Care with Chris. 
• Friday: I attend the local SHEM homeschool conference, Science Lessons - "Concepts and Challenges of Physical Science" - Chapter 6.8 - NEW -"150 Captivating Chemistry Experiments" - Gases, Liquids, and Solids - Exp. #2

:: Individual Readings ::

• Chris (Practice Scholar) - "Sackett", Scriptures, and New Era magazine.
• Marly (Project Scholar) - Re-reading "Harry Potter" series, "Jane Eyre", Scriptures - "Book of Mormon", and New Era magazine.
• Celeste (Mentored Scholar - back to looking for a mentor) - "Villette", "Ann of Avonlea", The Constitution of the United States, Ensign and New Era magazines, and Scriptures.

:: Projects ::

• Chris- Chemistry Labs - Programming Palm PDA and Windows PDA, wrote a lesson for Runescape and posted online.
• Marly - Seminary. Latin - Latina Christiana I.
• Celeste - Organizing details for In The TJED Trenches website and design Utopia Carpet Care website.
• Family - Finish unpacking and hanging pictures.

Fieldtrips in the Spring

Spring really is the best time to get out and explore nature. Everything is growing, sprouting, blooming, and just plain beautiful! Here are the last two fieldtrips we've been on in the past few of weeks.

Wilson Creek National Battlefield

Mike went with us on this fieldtrip. We were still staying in a hotel and he had not started work yet. It was a nice break from waiting around to move in to our house. I didn't know this, but the battle at Wilson Creek was the 2nd major battle in the Civil War and that Missouri was greatly divided between feelings for the North and South. In fact, they had troops fighting for BOTH sides. Enjoy some pictures of our visit. We'll have to go back now that the trees have their leaves.

Springfield Conservation Nature Center

A few days ago we decided to go to this free Nature Center. There are several hikes so we can return often and have several different adventures. The best part...it is all free! We saw wild turkeys, squirrels, caterpillars, several types of birds, and some frogs.

This is what the landscape looks like near our home. Many areas have been cleared of trees for farming and pastures for cattle and horses. We live in a pasture area that is now being turned into home sites.

Time to Post Some Pics!

We are getting settled in and finally have a home phone and Internet hooked up. Today I am getting around to downloading the 200+ pictures on my camera and getting a few posted. Finally!

We lived in a couple of different hotels for a week before finding a home. We looked at several homes, but everything had cats (Celeste is allergic) or smokers (Christian's asthma can't take that)...so we went with a brand new duplex home instead. It is a comfortable 1600 sq. ft. Our only complaints are that we share a wall and there is no fenced yard. In the mid-west only a few have fenced yards. The ward is super nice. When I hear about people from "the West" being rude (No offense! I'm one of those rude westerners, too) I now know what they are talking about. I guess you have to have something to compare to understand.

Odd Things

• People drive SUPER fast on skinny little farm roads that have no shoulder. You have the white line and then a grassy ditch. I've had several people fly past me going 70 mph in a no passing zone. Yikes! Marlayna is nervous now about getting her permit after seeing how people drive here. I thought Arizona, California, and Utah had bad drivers...but Missouri drivers take the cake in this area.
• No Mountains. I didn't realize how much I rely on visual clues to know where I am. In the Phoenix area, the valley is surrounded by mountains and you can judge where you are by which set of mountains you are by. In Flagstaff, it is pretty obvious with the large San Fransisco Peaks. Here...no mountains and I'm directionally challenged now! Thank goodness my van has a digital compass or I would be REALLY lost.

So far, we are loving it! Enjoy the slideshow of what we've been up to the past couple of weeks.

Missouri Move

We started our move last Saturday and just might make it into our new home by tomorrow (Saturday). We had an uneventful trip to the midde USA, with great weather and no mechanical problems. Yeah! Once we arived in MO, the time to find a house was short. We had a few choices lined up and chose the one I had a feeling we would pick all along, simply because it is new and has had NO CATS. We saw several homes that were beautiful on the outside and just sickening on the inside. Why are people so dirty? The smell of cat urine would just knock me over. My family really wanted land again like we had in Flagstaff, but it is just not going to happen this time. The house was supposed to be ready on April 1st, but it was not. We moved to a different hotel with bigger beds (the first one had double beds) and I'm standing in the laundry facility doing load after load of laundry in those tiny condo sized stackable washer and dryer sets. Luckily, the laundry facility is free here at this hotel. Score! Not to mention they have computers in here so I can blog, answer email, and check Facebook.

The only down side...it is now raining and we might have to unload our stuff in the rain. And, having the Penske truck another day costs $100 (per day). No, the landlord will not pick up the tab on that one (We already tried.) In all, a very good trip!