So, I'm thinking that I really should talk about our homeschooling, maybe once a week - as a record for ourselves, perhaps, and also as our duty to be proponents of it.
We have been extremely lucky in that, except for a handful of encounters (probably less than 5 in the past decade), we have received only warm support, some glowing praises, and even some admiring envy when we tell people we're homeschooling. I know people who have horror stories.
Naturally, homeschooling isn't for everyone, and you should always go with what works best for your family and kids. We had our reasons for starting to homeschool (gifted for one, special needs for the other), and it's been a great journey so far.
Anyway, I was thinking I'd post some photos of our homeschooling fun, and since I'm too lazy to scan in photos, and our digital camera-ownership only go back to 2004, I'd start with showing you some photos from that year. Hope I don't bore you too much, but then again, I won't hear you if you fall asleep on the keyboard. =)
We started that year with a trip to Vancouver in January. Here are the kids at the airport, quietly doing activity books.
While in Vancouver, we took them to Science World:
Back home in our old homeschooling space in the kitchen (they've since outgrown that furniture and have moved into our office space).
When not doing academic work, they often read books.
We used to participate in a lot of field trips offered through our homeschool group. Here we are at the local newspaper company, getting a tour.
Our homeschool group also holds a lot of fairs. This is one that ds#1 did on frogs (bet you couldn't guess) for the Science Fair.
One time, the kids decided to build a dummy to warm up their dad's chair until the real dummy (just kidding!) came home.
When the Brood X cicadas hit our town, we went over to our friends' farm to feed cicadas to their chickens. We learned a lot about periodic cicadas that year.
While perusing our wonderful Farmers Market that summer, we discovered that the boys were the cover-kids for the local arts center! We had taken many class there, and they had featured the kids doing ceramics on their summer catalog.
Also that summer, ds#1 tried his hand at photography. He needs a lot more practice, but has taken some rather lovely photos.
More photos next time I post about homeschooling!Ds#1 also took the CAT/5 exam again this past Friday. He'd taken the grade 7 one this past June when he was supposed to have just completed grade 7, but his scores were so off the top of the chart that we really didn't learn anything from it. So, I had him take the grade 10 test this time. Maybe that will show us areas that he could work on in the next few years before university.
"I may not have gone where I intended to go, but I think I have ended up where I needed to be." ~ Douglas Adams
