Saturday funnies

I suspect my crew will open a bakery together someday.  The boys have talked about it, and the more we bake, the more convinced I am that their passion will endure.

They received spring cookie cutters in their Easter baskets, which we finally got around to using today.  Our recipe called for using powered sugar to help with the rolling, rather than flour.  Of course they all had to taste it.

Paul announced, "This is the best tasting sugar on the planet!  That's what they say!"

They do?

I caught her "reading" Scripture while enjoying a snack.  She's heard enough Psalms to come up with some Biblical-sounding language, courtesy of King David.  "Oh, my God!  Help me!   I love you Lord!"

That's my mantra often:  "Oh, my God!  Help me!"

You know your life might be getting a little easier when you send your 6- and 8-year-old boys to look up and print a recipe for buttercream frosting....and five minutes later, they hand it over.

"This one is uncomplicated, Mommy."

He's paranoid about raw egg germs, so he carefully chose an eggless recipe.

Kids!  What a blessing!  But the back-breaking cleaning involved in their endeavors?

So not fun.

Here, you'll find a funnier baking story.

The other day I sat down for five minutes to read a quick blog.  I noticed on my sidebar that a favorite blogger just posted five minutes before, but it was a post I had already read, posted on the previous day.  It was then I realized that every time I get back into a post to make corrections, it must show up on someone's sidebar as a new post.  Is that true?  I frequently find errors and make corrections after a post is in published form--I just find more errors and awkward sentences that way.

So anyway, if this blog is on your sidebar, pardon the constant reposting.  I think?

This is grace

This is grace.  Beautiful short video--just over a minute.  I watched it from the John Piper Desiring God blog.  Click on the green sentence.

writing process samples

Peter completes two writing-process pieces a week, both of which start with a planning web and a topic sentence.  The following needs some revisions and some more details, but my husband and I were so proud of it!

Peter, I thought this one was so endearing!  Your siblings will enjoy it!

I have 3 siblings.  Ferst I will tell you about Beth.  She is curious and active.  Next I will tell you about Paul.  He really likes math.  He is really exuberant.  Finally I will tell you about Mary.  She is very sweet and loving.  


I love all my siblings.


Here is another writing sample:

I went on a hike at AWANA.  I saw plants.  I saw pinecones and flowers.  I saw grass and rocks.  The rocks were red and gray.  The flowers had bulbs.  The rocks were in dirt and the pinecones were under a tree.  I really like nature hikes.


New writers tend to use bare-bones language.  We scream at them, details, details, details!  Be descriptive!  What kind of car?  What kind of tree?  What words describe your sister?  What else can you add?

Adult writers, in contrast, must learn to cut extraneous words and details--essentially unlearning some lessons from elementary school.  Solid, professional writing emerges only after years of practice.  Even with 28 months of frequent practice under my belt, I still struggle with passive voice and other bad habits.

I want my children to leave high school capable of beautiful, precise prose.  Daily practice is the key, along with the reading of good literature to build vocabulary and enhance sentence structure and style.

unschooling part 2

In reference to my last post:  I just saw the GMA segment--maybe the second segment, the longer one--on radical unschooling.  I am not interested in the no-rules, no-discipline approach, nor in allowing a donut for breakfast, or TV time during school.  But, I do think kids will learn quite well if they read about, write about, do research on, do experiments regarding, whatever topic they are interested in, whether it be photography or insects.  The parent has to be very involved though, to ensure that they're learning effective communication skills (reading, speaking, writing composition, listening), which will later allow them to do well in college and in the workforce.  As well, I think it would be beneficial to have the children choose from interests in a variety of areas, so that no discipline is entirely neglected.

This uproar reminds me of an educational debate that existed right about the time I became a public school teacher.  Back then, it was about the "whole language" approach to reading.  It was misunderstood.  Some thought it meant not teaching phonics at all, and just reading lots and lots of books to children, who would eventually pick up reading by osmosis.  That is true for some kids, by the way.

What it really entailed, when done correctly, was to introduce phonics in the context of a whole piece of text, rather than through an isolated worksheet.  When this was done, the child could clearly see how phonics related to reading and writing.  They learned that it was a means to an end, rather than an end in itself.

It is really through writing that kids learn the most about phonics, which is why the "write to read" approach is so effective.  Lots of reading is important in the process, too; it allows them to practice and apply what they've learned through the composing process.

Anyhow, the family GMA chose seems to definitely fall into the most radical segment of the unschooling population.  If given more opportunity to show what their kids could do, I'm sure the family would have come out in a better light.  I think it would have been better to have chosen a less radical family, if the purpose was to highlight the unschooling trend.  Definitely, the mother in the segment saying that her kids "might watch TV, or play computer games", was not the best thing to say, IMHO.

unschooling on GMA

I learned from The Homeschool Adventure blog that Good Morning America did a very negative segment on unschooling.  There was such an outcry (positive and negative) that they brought the featured family back the next day.  Read about it here.

Without cable TV, I'm out of the loop.  If you see any more segments can ya'll let me know?  I am interested in unschooling, but not until the kids are all out of diapers and sleeping through the night.

Thank you!