Homeschool experiment: fail.

Dear Person Who Keeps Leaving the Basement Light On:

You are skewing the results of our data.

Love,

Adrienne

Because that’s the kind of guy he is.

I have a tree.

 

I’ve had a Ficus tree since college. The thing is kind of old. It needed to be repotted, pruned… it’s looking pretty sad right now. Blaine and I looked at pots, but none caught my eye. I clicked over page after page on Amazon. (Thanks to a Amazon Prime membership, compliments of my sister-in-law, 20 gallon pots ship two-day free. Who would have thought?!)

Nothing. Then Blaine found one locally, bought it for me, and brought it home. He even got me purple. And then the (in)famous words were spoken.

“It’s not self watering. But I’ve been looking online, and I think I can make something.”

I nodded, smiled, and I’m sure my eyes got a little bit glazed over. Couldn’t we just put rocks at the bottom like my mother always did?

Oh, no. Certainly not. Yesterday morning I was called into the garage to see the product of all the bumping and scraping and drilling I’d heard.




I’m quite certain I did not make over the invention nearly so much as he desired. It’s a former goat-watering tub, my friends. Re-purposed. I cannot smell the buck’s eu de billy, so all’s good. But is this really necessary?




It’s a pot. With a pipe sticking out of it. That’s where the water goes, I’m told. He even put a stick in the corner of the bedroom so that I can check the water like I check he checks the oil.



I’ll be the first to admit. It' looks lovely. Ten times better. I still think the rocks at the bottom trick would have worked and been far less work. But then I wouldn't have been able to write this post, and all of you wouldn't understand, on a really small scale, the kind of guy I married.

Who am I kidding? I’m not sure I understand either. We’re opposites, that’s all I know. That, and he makes me look really, really lazy when he does something like this.

Review: Apologia Exploring Creation with Anatomy and Human Physiology

As part of the Old Schoolhouse Review Crew, Liberty and I have been using Apologia Educational Ministries’ Exploring Creation with Anatomy and Human Physiology for many weeks now. Liberty has been journaling in the Notebooking Journal and we’re been using the Anatomy and Human Physiology MP3 Audio CD as well.



I was thrilled to be chosen for this review. I’d long heard good things about Apologia and wondered if it was true. Could kids really be so excited to do school that they are asking for more?

Umm, yes. I've been asked every day since we started if we can do science. We've done an experiment “mummifying” an apple and saw the differences between the one submerged in salt and baking soda and the one left open to the elements. We've studied bones and discussed them at length. We've made a Jell-O “cell” with candy components.



You know what the coolest thing was? We went on our own little field trip to the Discovery Center and the kids got to do a science experiment. They got to scrape their own mouths to look at their own cells! After studying this the week prior, there was Liberty, naming all the parts of her own cells, remembering what she’d learned and being able to apply it. That was pretty awesome!

I tend to be pretty bare bones in the classroom. I’m so busy with all of them, if they can work alone, all the better. If I have to get too involved, I’m pretty unlikely to choose that curriculum again. This one, I wouldn’t have had to be involved too much. She could listen to the CD, read the book on her own, and I could provide the materials to experiment with and she would have needed little instruction.

But this has never happened before: I wanted to be there. I wanted to learn this stuff too! It was really easy to use, and before shopping, I just flipped ahead to see what we might need. Most of it was pretty basic and we had it on hand, but the Jell-O cell required a few extra things. I’d do it again in a heartbeat though. Liberty had so much fun and learned enough to be able to name cell components again the following week!

I plan to use these materials for science for all four of my older kids, who will be 5, 6, 8, and 10 in the fall. I’m sure the older students will get more out of it, but judging from the little chins I had to tell to back up for those Jell-O photos, they will still be interested and learn a great deal. Even I’ve learned a bunch! I have to admit, I love this stuff. That CD got less use than it would have in any other subject – I wanted to read it! On the busy days, it’s a great idea, but I really enjoyed reading this aloud on the days when I could make time.

The Anatomy and Human Physiology textbook is hardcover and is $39.00 on Apologia’s website. It is recommended for elementary ages and beyond, depending on each student. I think it could easily be done for all elementary ages - but the little ones won't get as much out of it. The notebooking journal is spiral bound softcover and lists for $24.00. It is for students with upper elementary writing skills, and they offer a Junior Notebooking Journal for those with limited writing skills. The MP3 CD is $29. If your budget is tight, I’d suggest getting just the text and you could use your own notebook and, with a bit more work, make a pretty good notebooking journal of your own. If you have the extra funds to be able to swing the notebooking journal, I’d highly recommend it. It makes remembering the information studied that much easier. The MP3 CD is a great add-on, especially if you have a student who struggles with reading and learns verbally better.

I love this curriculum. I’ll definitely continue this one and pursue their other sciences in the future. Any textbook that has them begging for more is worth a second look!

Click to read more reviews from the Schoolhouse Review Crew.

Disclaimer: I received a free copy of these materials through the Schoolhouse Review Crew in exchange for my honest review. I was not required to write a positive review nor was I compensated in any other way. All opinions expressed in this review are mine and my family’s. I am disclosing this in accordance with FTC regulations.

It’s going to be a doozy of a week.

I’m two for two this week, my friends. I’m afraid to touch anything at this point.

On Friday I took my sewing machine to the repair shop. It’s been having issues for some time, and that was the last straw. I walked in with it, and within 38 seconds the lady told me I was using the wrong size bobbin. This may have – and likely has – caused all of the problems I’ve been having with it. I left it anyhow, since it’s 15 years old and has yet to have any repairs to it.

Friday night, we realized the new fridge in the garage was not cooling properly. I researched, tried a million things, took the back panel off and cleaned the coils, and nothing helped. I left the panel off and gave up. Yesterday the appliance repair guy came and couldn’t find anything wrong with it, except that it cannot run properly with the back panel off. He put it back on and it is working fine.

Turns out, one of my million repair tries actually worked. (I do know which one. It resulted from someone pushing buttons on the fridge. No child is fessing up. The child lock is now engaged. Grr.) And then I took the back panel off. I paid the guy $79.95 to put six screws into the back of my refrigerator.

Two for two. Ouch.

What a way to wake up.

I woke up with a start in the dark of night. The coin cup we use for math – a metal cup full of likely 500 coins – had crashed to the ground. It wouldn’t have fallen off the shelf by itself, so I was a little disturbed. Who on earth?! I crept to the doorway and peeked around, wondering what on earth I would find (and what was I going to do about it?! I didn’t even put my glasses on. I wouldn’t have been able to see anything anyhow!) and there were my daughters, attempting to do schoolwork by the yardlight beam coming through the window.

Today is Eden’s birthday, and they’d decided to get up early and do their schoolwork so they could have a fun day. I asked them what time it was. They didn’t know. It was 4:09 a.m.

I shook my head, sent them to work in the kitchen where the light could be on without shining into the bedrooms, and went back to bed. I’m not sure why, since the adrenalin rush from thinking we had an intruder in the house left me shaking and unable to sleep.

Eden finished her schoolwork at 5:09 a.m. (She’d started the night before. After a day that made me shake my head and wonder if those big yellow school buses that take them away are such a bad idea after all, I made her quit because I didn’t want to do school after 5 p.m)

Liberty finished everything but her spelling at 6 a.m.

On the agenda for today: naps, all around.

Poor, poor monkey.

Poor monkey. It’s like Pierce knows I made it. And when I make him mad and put him down for a nap when he doesn’t want one…

poor, poor monkey. Momma made Pierce mad. Again.

Pictures: what our homeschool looks like.

Every homeschool blog I look at looks idyllic. Orderly, labeled, color-coded shelves of perfectly graded schoolbooks, desks free of pencil marks (and dust), and charts on the walls to tell each perfectly groomed student which minute of which hour they should be doing their 3rd grade Geometry.

Oh, to be so organized. But I’m not. So, without further ado about what I don’t have, a look at a day in the life of our homeschool:

Sometimes, they sit where they are supposed to: at the little table, in front of our less-than-organized children’s reading bookshelf. (Do I get points that the kids’ books have their own shelf, and 95% of them are on the shelf or on top of the book on the shelf? Please?)

Or they work in the middle of the room, on their laps. Because that’s super comfy. (?!)

Younger siblings sit and soak up the instruction as well. The way I figure, they’ll know half of what they need to know before the age of five at this rate.

The floor is a popular place to be.

But it has it’s risks.

And in the end, it usually works something like this.

I attempt to keep children on task and distractions to a minimum. But it doesn’t always usually work.

Our school shelf screams for someone, anyone, to do something. It started out the year organized, and each child’s books were together, youngest to oldest, left to right. Now, they are all on the shelf, and when room runs out, they are on the books on the shelf. It’s success so long as it’s on the shelf, I’m afraid. As long as the encyclopedia set is in alphabetical order, I tell myself there’s hope.

When a dear child fails to maintain their proper schedule on time, penance must be paid. It’s rough.

But they are learning. And one day, when they are older, they will thank me for their ability to concentrate despite extreme circumstances.

At least, that’s what I tell myself.

**Just for the record, Pierce was napping during our photo session this school day. If he hadn’t been, the camera shake would have been considerable and the learning level greatly diminished.