What is hapening now?

Our daughter on her first day of "school" in over 2 years. Heading for 2nd grade, in January 2010

We have not been up to much. Scary but true.

As our daughter took up my offer to see what our local school was like this semester, we are "taking it easy".
Don't get me wrong, we are all learning a lot about each other, our goals and the people around us. She is experiencing the cons and pros of compulsory school. She still wants to learn and is eager to do well. So she wants out. She just told me she wants to homeschool third grade. Unfortunately the school could not accommodate our request to place her in the 2/3 combo class and now she just wants to get the heck out of there. We asked them to do this as she entered so that she could be challenged and engaged as we wanted this to be a positive experience for her. Instead we got placed in the most challenging 2nd grade class with a (wonderful) teacher who is absolutely stretched to the max and cannot spare much time to help the high performers in the class work at their full potential; even less, make the learning experience out of the ordinary. She has to bring the rest of the class up to standard. My daughter shares her attention with 25 others; some of them much younger by their behavior. We have just been told of a $10 million budget cut in our school district and increase of class size for next year. In the meantime my daughter clocks in everyday and completes endless worksheets that repeat facts known to her for over a year and believe me, she is not a "gifted" child. She is just were she needs to be right now. She wanted to test out of her grade but was not allowed to do so and so she's "stuck" there. At least for now. No wonder she wants out.

Above all I must say that I am very grateful for the opportunity to check out the school and verify our methods even more. Yes, the people are wonderful. The parents, the principal, the teachers. But I can't help to notice how they are all trying to do their best while having to settle for whatever the system dishes out. The parents voice their concerns and rally in demonstrations in front of city hall; the teachers do their best, the principal listens patiently and provides as many opportunities as she is allowed to make the school above average. Yet they are not getting anything but average resources at best and now with these additional cuts everyone's standard will have to be lowered even more.
Today I explained to my daughter that her teacher might have not feeling well because she just got fired from her job. That is why she's having a substitute so often. I explained the budget cuts, the rallies and how the student/teacher ratio will be increasing systematically in the next few years in order to work with the state budget and our governor's decisions. The governor who can afford to send his children to private school. Her first reaction was to consider herself lucky for having been a part of her teacher's class and having met her. Then she moved on to reiterate the fact that she did not want to be there next year, with even more unruly children around her hindering her learning experience. This is a decision made while thinking of her current reality. But what really caught me by surprise was her analogy of them, the children and teachers, to slaves stuck in an overcrowded, sweltering belly of a slave ship while "others" make decisions for them. She felt powerless, violated, angry and sad from the news I was giving her. Although it sounds like a far fetch idea, I see her point.

The people in our schools are admirable individuals, I know. Unselfish, living in a democratic society and exercising their citizenship in an exemplary way.
Be it for better or worse (although I am benefiting from their company), I am not one of them. I am not settling for the average offered to me at this time and I (like my daughter) am ready to jump ship. We've been there, done that, don't need to hang around anymore... we are moving on.
When I talk to the school moms about our choices they say "oh, no, not me, I can never be that brave" or "not me, I have things I want to do". Then I think... Well, I do too but I'm just not settling for the status quota. Why should I? Brave? me? not half as much as you, giving up your child's life to be the product of a faulty system that chews up and spits out everybody who tries to help. Well, at least that is what it seems like to me.
I know if anything goes "wrong" I'll have no one else to blame but myself. Then again... how bad can things turn out for a child who is allowed to grow at her own speed, work at her full potential and be inspired by the real world around her to make the changes it needs? How bad can it be for a child to be around loving adults who respect her, don't steal her erasers, don't call her a lair, scream at her (or others in front of 20+ people) out of frustration and take the time to have a meaningful conversation with her? We'll take our chances and find out.
Back in January we consented to her attending school because I was truly stressed. I kept wondering if I was doing things right, if she was getting "enough" of one thing or another. I over scheduled our days and could not sleep at night wallowing in my own fears. By the second day of school I knew that my fears were completely unfounded and that compulsory school for a regular eight year old is nothing more than a safe form of childcare provided by the state so both parents can work relatively worry free. I guess I'll have to learn to work with her around.

So here we go again, trying to make it all work. Optimistic about our future and knowing that we don't have to be anyone's pawns to get what we want.
Our daughter is committed to finishing the semester where she is. "It's only 6 weeks, how bad can it be?", she says. They are doing the standardized testing this week. I guess we'll take it one day at a time and enjoy it for what it is. I wonder if she would be asking to homeschool next year if she had been given the chance to be inspired, challenged and engaged by her peers and her environment in whatever she does with them for 6 hours per day. We might try it again down the road, when we have more options available and the scales are not so tipped out of balance.

When I mention that she will have to go back to having less children around (she's an only child) and missing her friends she accepts her reality calmly. I'm surprised to see her admitting at such an early age the fact that she much rather have a stimulating learning experience over friends. According to her, these are friends that she can hardly enjoy because of the short time they have to play at school. As I said, we are all learning a lot.
I can't help but think of what my scout leader's training book recommends: "Always leave smiling!".

What have we been up to?

Work work Work FUN! or Fun fun fun WORK!
We have been busy this semester with great opportunities for learning. Laura is now 7 years old and is still enrolled in Sky Mountain Charter school, currently doing second grade. We meet with her teacher once a month and let him know our progress. She took her state mandated language arts and math assessment pre-tests and demonstrated to be a grade above average. We are very proud of her.
This summer we started reading the Harry Potter series and she took off with it! She is now in the seventh book and has become a complete fanatic of it.

This Year's Curriculum
PE: She started western riding classes (partially funded by the school), has taken a basketball class and participated in the local AYSO league this fall.
MUSIC & Arts: She has continued with her piano lessons and is becoming more proficient at reading musical notation. She loves to compose her own music and enjoys her weekly choir practice. She just performed during the thanksgiving service and has another performance scheduled for December, as well as her first piano recital.
This semester she's had the opportunity to attend a ballet based on her Wizard of Oz reading and a musical of Mary Poppins. What fun way to bring literature to life!
Her art classes were taught by myself while attending a local homeschooling co-op school. I used the Art adventures at home curriculum. I have volunteered there for the last year and have had a great time teaching art and Spanish.
SCIENCE:Besides from regular hikes and readings we have done our science curriculum at home thus far this year. We get messy, experiment and record all our findings. We are using the Real Science curriculum and has proved to work very well for us. Flexible and fun. She has also taken advantage of Burbank's science classes for homeschoolers which use the Stough Canyon Nature center and hikes around it as a classroom.



SOCIAL STUDIES: In social studies we have concentrated in early and classical Greek culture, begun reading the Odessy, have learned about Alexander the great and are now moving into Ancient China. We are following Level I of History Odessy. I like this program a lot because it still uses Story of the world and also utilizes other resources and point of view that I find very valuable.
LANGUAGE ARTS: Besides from allowing her to read voraciously, we do the following:
Spelling: Sequential spelling. I find this to be a nice strong program. We do it 4 times p/week and occasionally do "Spelling workout"
Grammar: "First Language Lessons for the Well Trained Mind", year 2. After considering changing for a while, I decided to continue with it. I like the poetry memorization and its gentle and fun approach to grammar. Yes, the lessons are repetitive but I find that to be an advantage and makes sense to me. Laura does very well with it too.
Writing: "Writing with ease". We incorporate our writing work with our social studies and science.
She also attends our Homeschool group's reading club monthly and participates in the book readings, discussions and activities.
Literature: Besides from her "personal" reading selection (basically whichever Harry Potter she's working on) we try to cover one classic p/ month (excluding "The Odessy" of course). We sometimes download classics from Librivox.org and listen to them as we craft or do a more tranquil activity. This is personally, one of my favorite times.

Math: Still love "Right Start Math"! she's doing level C. We love the games, approach and everything about this program.

We supplement her "standards" education with occasional workbook sheets, computer based instruction,games and her girl scout activities.

Over all this has been a very busy and engaging semester. I am currently looking for employment and desperately trying to hold on to our homeschooling ideas.
And since a picture (or two or more) are worth a thousand words, feel free to look at our "Homeschooling in Action" albums on the side bar to see what we've been up to this semester.
Thanks for visiting today!

Year recap- just the tip of the iceberg, really

Hello friends and family,
I have been really silent and busy lately, so I just wanted to give you a quick recap of our going ons.

This summer we are planning on taking a road trip to see daddy in Seattle while he is there. We will be driving up thru Whisky Town National Recreation area and Lake Shasta (and see the caverns)in California. Then we will go up to Crater Lake in Oregon and end visiting Mt. St. Helens in Washington. On the way back down we will be also make a cannot-miss-for-anything-in-the-world stop in San Francisco and visit the King Tut show. DD studied Egypt's old, middle and new kingdoms along with other ancient cultures this year so we are really looking forward to it. We are following Susan Wise Bauer's "Story of the World" curriculum for social studies.

We will try and see daddy at least twice some time again before November, when he comes back from his tour. He has been performing Technical Director duties for Disney's promotional tour of their Christmas Carol beginning with the planning stages, back about 8 months or so. Believe me, this is not an easy job!

Here is what DD has been up to lately (well in May).
She performed really well in her end of year test, administered by her school teacher.I present her school teacher (who is a super nice guy) with an academic report every month along with work samples so he knows what we are up to. I like to also point out our state standards met p/subject, since it is a public school. I will try to figure out how to post this document in this blog so you get an idea of what we do.
DD is now seven and will officially start second grade in late August, but we are continuing to work all the same at our own pace during the summer so it's not so horribly hard when we "come back" in the fall. I am trying to keep summer and fall classes to a minimum so we can have the flexibility to travel around to see daddy and go camping! She might just do swimming.

We just finished reading "Harry Potter and the Sorcere's Stone" which she absolutely loved. She loves to listen to "Storynory" podcasts while in the car, which feature a great selection of unique stories. She also enjoys listening to classical, jazz and blue grass music. She currently reads "Magic tree house" books by the handfull and enjoys playing all sorts of games.
Her two favorite books that we read aloud this year were Edward Tulane and "The Adventures of Pinochio".

She just decided to sell a number of her outgrown toys on ebay and purchased her own Nintendo DS, which she is very proud to say, completely belongs to her.
She enjoys playing with and collecting My littlest Pet Shop toys and just finished putting together her first Bionicle, which she loved doing. Her screen time (computer/TV/DS)is still highly controlled by her fanatic mother (who is way too strict about it in her opinion) and does not exceed 3 hours p/ week on average.

DD started taking formal piano lessons last September. She joined The National Fraternity of Student Musicians in January and has been studying under one of their teachers locally since then. Her basic level piano audition will take place at the end of July. She will be judged by a guild teacher on her performance of basic piano skills including sight reading, basic scales and 4 memorized pieces. She will have her recital in late September.


She is ending her second year of Girl Scouts as a Brownie and absolutely loves it. I am her troop leader and I absolutely love it too. She is the only homeschool girl in our troop of 12. All of the girls are wonderfull. She did her first nuts and cookie sales, first encampment, rededication and awards ceremony this year. She also started sewing her own badges on her vest. We had a great year!


She dressed as a headless bride for Hallowwen and looked specially creepy, along with her groom, Timmy. I made their costumes.



This year DD also played the piano at her co-op's talent show, perfomed with her choir and drama class on stage and experienced drumming and percussion clases.



We have enjoyed this, our first full year of homeschooling a great deal. We have been sailing on a ship looking for whales, saw a fish disection and learned about the ocean. We visited san Juan Capistrano Mission and talked about its history. We have been learning track and field sports, gymnastics, learning to play tennis, hiking tall mountains and playing soccer with the AYSO. We learned about transportation at Knott's Berry farm, built a solar powered playcar at Legoland and slep with the manatees at SeaWorld San Diego as part of our school's field trips.
I can tell you that as a very busy mom and almost non-working artist it was amazing to wake up at 5 am to see my daughter's silluette sketching the manatees silently while everyone else slept. She was entranced.
I do count waiting in line at Disneyland as waiting in the cafeteria line ; ) There's no fear there, she's got that one down!



We have been to a number of concerts and school presentations including sounds of Korea, Earthquake county and the Sioux people at CalTech. We have also gotten a chance to visit the Aquarium of the Pacific, the Norton Simon, The Getty Villa and the Natural History museums.





Also, after reading "The Chritsmas Carol" we went to the Dickens fair, which was fantastic fun! We danced, played parlor games, saw characters from Dicken's novels, enjoyed the sounds, sights, smells and people around us and had a ball.
DD has also taken regular hands-on science classes, explored a sheep's heart, learned about the microscope and found many new treasures in it.
Overall, we have been extremely busy!





There have been hard days and great days (I especially enjoy our short winter season homeschooling days), for which we are very gratefull, as they have helped us grow a great deal. I am now more comfortable choosing our curriculum and have a better idea of what works for us; as well as what doesn't. It has been a learning experience alright. So what is the most important thing I learned this year? Don't over schedulle! we can't do it all!

As far as I am concerned, well... you have just read what I have been up to. Just view it from a "planner's" point of view. That's me. I am currently trying to make a dog cart out of a discarted baby jogger (they collapse nicely, are strong and light) for our dog to use in our road trip. We'll be camping most of the way and hey... someone's got to carry the fire wood. Might as well have the big girl earn her kibble right?



As many others, we are struggling thru difficult financial times, but we are well, healthy and trying to take it one day at a time. Hopefully we can continue growing the same way next year as well.

First grade has been great fun! I highly recommend homeschooling in southern California if you can do it!

A "New Citizen"

My oath ceremony was quite extraordinary for me. I was sworn to citizenship along with six thousand other individuals at the Staples center that day. After getting over the shock of paying $20 for parking I remembered that as anything else in life, it is what you make of it. At times I felt as if we were cattle, being herded from one room to another, one line to another and basically being kept busy for 5 hours so we could be grateful when it was all done. Honestly, I was hoping for something much more personal than that.
Then I realized the magnitude of the event I was part of and of coming together with all these people who I will never see again. Although a bit restless at times, Laura stood by me the whole time. She saw all these eager individuals waiting just like me, saw their faces and heard their native languages. She saw her mom cry with mixed emotions of sadness and relieve when she was told to give up her mother country of Colombia, heard six thousand voices pledge allegiance to the flag of her country and joined in the happiness when it was all done.
So now that I am an "American" I see that I could have never gotten to be one with out being Colombian first. Without my parent's values, my grandparent's love or the principles instilled in me since childhood. That is the road that brought me to this point of my life and the road that I hope my daughter never forgets, no matter where on earth she ends up when she is my age.

What? My voice counts too?

Never had I been so involved or interested in the presidential election as today. Here I am in bed recuperating from a back injury, devouring information on all things having to do with the upcoming presidential election. This maybe an everyday ritual for some, or a nuisance for others. To me it is an incredible new world: voting and having my voice heard.
You see, I have just been appointed to take my citizenship oath on October 9th. Suddenly a new conscience has emerged. MY rights, MY voice, MY choice. They never counted before at this time. What I thought about one candidate or the other, the media or the laws being passed never made a difference to anyone but me up to now.
I have lived in this country for 24 years, paid taxes, gone to college and paid my loans, married, give birth and have turn 40 years old since that faithful night of July 1st, 1984, when I first set foot in American soil. Here I am about to vote for the first time in my life. I don't take this privilege lightly and take great pride in it.
I share this pride with my daughter and explain to her what makes this event so special in my life. We have talked about Washington, Lincoln, the revolutionary war,the flag of our country, the suffrage movement, Martin Luther King, September 11 and Iraq. After our conversations I have often asked myself: Is this appropriate school curriculum for a first grader? Does it meet "academic state standards in social studies? Is it too much information for a 6.5 year old? Then I remind myself that we are not homeschooling to meet state standards mandated by people who can afford to send their children to Princeton or Harvard. We are in it to create a conscientious citizen who stands for her believes with dignity and passion. I conclude that these conversations certainly meet OUR standards.

Considering the choices that the media makes most readily available to the public, I find myself in quiet desperation for everyone who holds the precious right to vote. I firmly believe that no one has the right to tell me what to believe, what to think or who I should vote for. I find the lack of responsible media coverage of ALL the candidates for presidency a crime against all Americans.
I urge you to become informed of all your options. Don't settle for the "lesser" of two evils.
Please register, get out there and VOTE!
Citizenship starts and ends at home.

Sanity prevails!

From CHN’s website:

August 8: This morning the Cailfornia Court of Appeal, Second Appellate District, Division Three issued its ruling in the In re Rachel L. case. In Feburary 2008 this same court issued an opinion that held that California parents can homeschool their children only if they hold a valid teaching credential. The court vacated its February 2008 decision by agreeing to rehear the case. In addition to hearing from the parties on rehearing, the court also invited numerous friends-of-the-court, known as “amicus curiae” to provide legal argument. The court heard argument from the parties and the amicus curiae on June 2, 2008 for more than 2 hours. Today’s court ruling held that (1) California statutes permit home schooling as a species of private school education; and (2) the statutory permission to home school may constitutionally be overridden in order to protect the safety of a child who has been declared a dependent. Homeschooling, therefore, remains a legal educational option in California.

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Smiles,
Stella