6th grade going on college

It's amazing what a little hair wave will do. Looking so mature in this school picture for 6th grade.

Let's get this party started

We got pretty well behind in several subjects last year due to Sofia's marching by the beat of her own drum. So, we worked hard through the summer to finish up math, writing, and we're still working on chemistry. We're almost to the 5th grade finish line, though we've already started 6th. Hooray for homeschool flexibility. And, Sofia loves chemistry.

School Begins: 5th Grade

Homeschooling

Source: TopMastersInEducation.com

4th Grade

Sofia begins fourth grade this school year with My Tech High again and the Provo eSchool.  We continue with our classical curriculum for language arts, Writing With Ease 4 and First Language Lessons 4, All About Spelling levels 5-6, Right Start Math level E, Story of the World Vol 2, RSO Science Earth & Space, as well as some extras we will throw in as time allows such as Meet The Masters for art, Song School Spanish, Song School Latin, a bit of US Geography, a tiny bit of World Geography, Typing, and also her tech class, Cartoon Animation.

Admittedly, this could be the year that breaks the camels back. (Yes, I'm the camel). Sofia marches to the beat of her own drum which doesn't jive so well when it comes down to efficiently getting stuff done in the realm of school work. (It would be no different in public school).  When I first started homeschooling her, fourth grade is as far as I could possibly see going with it into the future. I think that was probably more of a reflection on my own confidence with homeschooling. Now, I feel pretty well prepared to continue into higher grades, but I'm not so sure I have the stamina to do so --growing pains I'm hoping to get through this year. Never the less, the overall picture of her school performance is good and I don't feel there is a better educational alternative for her at this point, where we live.

Her interest in reading has recently been re-ignited after a long hiatus which is a really positive thing. Her weakest subject continues to be writing and expression, though last year's end-of-year test scores through me for a loop with high scores in L.A. and lower than expected scores in math. But her level of success on formal tests usually is a result of how well she can manage to hone her attention on the task at hand. This, of course, is at the center of the conundrum which is Sofia's ADHD story.

So this year, I'm struggling a little between different methodologies, the innate drive to militantly place the core subjects at the top of the priority list and getting stuff done efficiently, and the wiser, more zen desire to prioritize by interest level and energy level. Should we do more "fun" things and ignore the drilling?  Will I be OK if she can't budget her money, or write a three cohesive sentences together (something I still struggle to do even now), as long a she's happily coloring and making pictures with glitter glue?  I don't know.  I would love to think she will learn and teach herself in an interest-lead manner, and everything will magically come out splendidly. But, my type A personality doesn't think so.  So I try to go both ways, which is really neither way, but somehow, I'm trying to find a balance.

3rd Grade Graduation

We completed our schooling efforts about three weeks ago.  There wasn't much of a to do about it so I decided to throw Sofia and Marcelo a quick graduation ceremony complete with confetti and diplomas.

The graduation presents, kids kayaks. How fun. We have a tandem adult kayak but someone it seems it would be funner to be a kid with a kid kayak.

I'm so glad I caught these two moments on film digital.  

Between all the aggravation and darkness that children can cause [me], there are these moments of light and hope.

Sofia's reaction as I inform her of our summer homeschool plans.  Yes, learning is year round.  One of her summer school subjects, the 50 States using Little Passports USA Edition and selected books.

Regard her focus and careful deliberation as she reads the intro page.

And then ...

[High five to myself]

Christmas Around the World

Field trip with My Tech High to BYU's cultural dances around the world.  Front row seats on the stage floor! Nice. Perks of homeschooling. AND you get to bring your Abuela along without riding on one of those buses back there. Awesome.

Beijing Dance Academy

First field trip with the Provo eSchool.  Purchased discounted tickets via e-mail.  Allowed to bring extra family members.  Showed up, got checked off list, sat down where we wanted.  Enjoyed the show.  Left in our own car: no long stinky bus ride. Awesome.

Lego Robotics

The distance learning program with Sofia's charter school lasted just long enough for us to borrow a laptop, use it for two days and then take it back. Come to find out, there was another distance learning program available also through Quail Run and an online school, My Tech High, which would provide us with similar benefits, field trips and testing through Quail Run, but the added bonus of financial reimbursements for curriculum. So we switched to the new program. Sofia got to go on one field trip with Quail Run before Quail Run backed out of this agreement with My Tech High. Figures. So, now we are homeschooling with My Tech High whose sponsor school is the Provo eSchool. Yes, many switcheroos. We were sad that Sofia would no longer have any contact with her beloved third grade teacher and wouldn't be able to meet up with her old school friends occasionally, but the freedom from Quail Run's administrative headaches is a welcome relief.

As part of the enrollment with My Tech High, Sofia is required to take a minimum of one online, technical course. Her tech class is Lego WEDO, and here she is building one of her first projects. When she's done, she will connect it to the laptop where she will utilized the included software to design a robotic program. Pretty darn cool!

Self portrait

For the first day of school, we started off with a drawing project, a self portrait.  Sofia and Marcelo really enjoyed being "class mates".  Immediately, I can see a bit of competitiveness ignite in Sofia's eyes, but mostly I think she will enjoy, showing her little brother the ropes.  Homeschool is so tough.

Thoughts on school

Well, we barely made it through the whole year at Quail Run. Despite that three weeks into the school year, I decided to only send her in the afternoons and continue to homeschool in the morning for all the core subjects (it was week three and still there had been no reading at school), we almost didn't make it. I should say, I almost didn't make it. Sofia enjoyed going to school for the most part. Once, in a while she would have preferred to stay home. If she did happen to attend a whole day, she would come home very exhausted and cranky. And it wasn't from the demanding schoolwork she'd been doing.

Sadly, none of the wonderful ideas the school sold itself with ever materialized and I have nothing but bad things to say about the school. Sofia learned many, many things, most of which where bad: attitude, bad words, how to flip people off, how to talk rudely to your parents, how to write like a crazy person, how to deface your own work and body with markers, how to not do any work, how to not be expected to excel, how to not be expected to do anything, how to watch a lot of cartoons and movies in EVERY subject including P.E. On the more positive side, she learned: how to get your lunch stolen, how to deal with bullies, how to be overly affectionate with boy friends, how to almost get run over by cars crossing the street, and on and on.

Since this is a paperless school, I never saw any papers come home. The last week, a few things started trickling in. Here is her art portfolio from the art class she had two times a week. 

Nice title - NOT.

One sticker in her Great Job Chart.  Impressive.  I wonder how many the other kids got.
I like the creativeness expressed in the crayon scribbling all over the bottom and back of the folder - NOT.

Contents of portfolio: one ripped up paper with scribbles, one genuine piece of artwork,
that without explanation, lacks merit from my assessment.

Here is something Sofia created at home[school] for the charter schools' Inspirations Art Contest using a technique and idea from a previous art lesson, of which we've done on average maybe once a month.

Placed 1st at the school level.  2nd place at the county level.

I could write volumes and make many, even more poignant comparisons across other, even "more important" subjects, but why bother.  I've already spent so much time pursuing a good education and experience at this school, making dinners for the teachers, paying for school supplies she never used, going out of my way to attend parent teacher conferences to sit there for five minutes so the teacher could have absolutely nothing to say or show, volunteering for field trips, trying to find out what the hell they were doing all day other than watching movies, that I don't want to waste any more of my time on that endeavour.

So we continue to homeschool.  It's working.  She's learning.  I can manage it much better, than sitting back and watching her sinking in the public school system.  Not sure if she'll attend the same school next year or not.  Not sure if I want to spend any more time looking at other schools.  We'll see.

STOW: Hatshepsut

 For our history studies, Sofia made some Egyptian jewelry and Hatshepsut's beard.  Hatshepsut was the first woman pharoah but she had a hard time being taken seriously so she wore the same fake beard the other pharoahs did.  (Those toilet paper rolls really do come in handy for homeschooling).



Yes, I did this myselft, but only for educational purposes. Dear lord, please tell me she's not going to look like this when she's fourteen.

First Day of Cursive

After diligently practicing her D'Nealian manuscript for the past year and a half, Sofia is finally ready for cursive. Here is her first cursive word. Not bad!  Not bad at all, if I do say so myself.  I can't say I feel too bad about burning through a few reams of paper in the name of homeschooling.

SOTW: Ancient Mesopotamia

Sofia colored the boat for this project so cute that I had to take a picture of her work.

The Story of the World: The Old Kingdom of Egypt

For our ancient history studies, we've begun using The Story of the World (SOTW) Vol.1 Ancient Times.  For the chapter on the Old Kingdom of Egypt, I ordered this little treasure chest which proved to be very exciting.  I had it sitting out on the study room table for Sofia to find when she got home from school.  (Who needs homework when you can do homeschool like this!)  This might be cute or somewhat interesting to a kid with no background on Ancient Egypt but paired with a quick read-aloud on the topic, suddenly it brings everything you've been learning about to light. 

Sofia had a great time exploring all the little things the treasure chest had to offer: an information guide, a board game, hieroglyphics stamps, a sumerian scroll, and a secret drawer with more goodies including a paper temple.

She was very quick to learn some basic hieroglyph letters. I didn't even realize how much she already knew until she immediately started pointing out discrepancies between the symbols in the set, and what she had learned from browsing through some library books we checked out.

Field Trip: "Hoo Ha Barns"

Entering the corn maze.
(Oh, look!  There's one adult not wearing the standard Utah uniform -gym shoes and jeans.  Note the hair.  She's not from here.  You can also tell she's not from here because she's wearing event appropriate shoes AND a wool coat in Winter!  That kind of thing is pure nonsense to a real Utahn).

Sofia's first school field trip was to Hee Haw Farms, or in Sofia-speak, Hoo Ha Barns. I got tired of correcting her. She grew equally weary of correcting me.  I volunteered to go of course, because after being banned from the school's Facebook page for demanding such things as cleanliness and learning in the school environment, I want to show everyone that I am doing my part. And, also because God knows what would happen if I wasn't there to supervise. Right? It was an uncharacteristically cold and crappy day in October. I was really regretting the whole, I-love-to-volunteer facade I was trying to keep up, especially when I found out I would have to ride the bus and have no means of escape for two hours. I forgot to bring an umbrella and I couldn't find my winter gloves. Luckily, I was only assigned three kids to look after and only one of them screamed bloody murder at me when we were told to go to the pumpkin patch and she wanted to go to the slide instead. No wonder people say Sofia is so well behaved. And this whole time, I didn't understand how they were getting that impression. Now, I think she might actually be an angel sent from heaven to grace me with her kindness.

Among the activities we were treated to were a hay ride around the hay where you get to sit on hay; muddy, maneur-y farm animals, a slide, a maneur-y corn kernel pool, a hay stack jumping accident-waiting-to-happen, pedaled vehicles, pumpkins, scary metal playsets, and lots of mud.

Luckily, it didn't rain for the whole two hours we were there. I didn't lose any of my kids like a couple of other really nice looking mom's did, not even the fit-thrower deflected. Sofia still thinks it's neat when I'm with her at school. You never know. She didn't think it was cool when she was three and I went to pick her up from daycare. Her favorite part was getting to ride the bus. My favorite part was that my thermos with hot tea was still waiting for me when we got back in the bus. Thank you thermos for keeping my tea hot, you are more reliable than anyone I know. You made my day.

(It was reported by the boys that there was a dead horse in there.  Luckily, we were too lazy to walk that far and didn't see it).