Category Archives: unschooling

unschooling

Thursday

We visited the International Peace Gardens today, wandered around, admiring architecture, the Jordan river, bridges, monuments and playing some more Ingress while we were there.

The kids did a lot of running and were story telling as they explored, imagining themselves as Nausicaa from Miyazaki’s Nausicaa and Kai from the Ninjago series.  It’s been good to get outside more, especially in the sunshine.

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Gavin and I played Chess and this time he captured the first piece. I probably was more excited about that than he was!

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We had lunch and then headed to the Museum of Natural Curiosity for climbing, running, zip-lining, spinning and more zip-lining.

The moon was coming up as we were leaving; a few drops shy of full.  It was beautiful, even with fences and parking lots in view.

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After dinner we listened to some more Ella Fitzgerald, Louis Armstrong collaborations and then headed out for some more holiday light seeing and Ingress playing.  We still haven’t made it to the candy window displays at Macy’s used to be ZCMI.  Maybe tomorrow…

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unschooling

Wednesday

Lilah rediscovered a Winnie the Pooh lamp that I had in my room when I was a kid and was looking at how it’s put together this morning.

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After some lego play and pop bead story telling, the kids and I spent a lot of time playing Ingress.

It’s a brand new game to us, where you walk and capture portals which are located in specific places so you have to move to them in the real world.  We did a mission which was walking along the trail to Ensign Peak.  It was fun and good to be out, even though it was chilly, especially up on the very top of Ensign Peak!

We enjoyed seeing the city from way up high and reading about early settlers in the valley.  Unfortunately you can’t see our house from the top because we’re right below a hill that juts above but we spotted the University and the temple and the Capitol building.

At home, we played Hedbanz, a game where you have to guess what you are without asking “What am I”?  Instead you ask things like, “Am I an animal”?  “What letter do I start with”?  We laughed quite a bit.  The kids got better at their question strategies. Gavin’s first card to figure out was purse and Lilah’s was key.

We read some more of Julie of the Wolves by Jean Craighead George.  Gavin is enjoying that and Lilah is getting bits and pieces here and there.  They are both intrigued by the idea of communicating with animals, as I am.  They have been talking about that idea together more since we’ve been reading this, though they both have always loved animals.

We did some more rhyming with Hickory Dickory Dock.

After we’d spent much of our energy walking around, we watched a documentary called CaveDigger by Jeffrey Karoff about Ra Paulette’s life digging and carving caves solo in New Mexico.

 

It was fascinating, though some of the interpersonal dynamics included weren’t as interesting as the story of how and why he digs.  The website for the film is: http://cavediggerdocumentary.com/index.html.

Later on we adventured up to the Capitol grounds with Dad for a bit more Ingress.

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unschooling

Tuesday

The kids got out the pop beads and made characters out of those.  Then they asked each other, “What could we build them houses with”? They tossed a few ideas around and settled on the K’nex so they got those out and began building and story telling.

Each of them vacuumed a room of the houses.  We have a chore list up that they can choose to help with or not.  Each chore has a value in money and they are in charge of both choosing what to do and keeping track of what they’ve done.  When it comes time to get their pay, they get to add the amounts together and figure out what we owe them.  It’s a great system for us because I don’t feel the need to nag and they feel ownership of their help around the house.

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Lilah and I did some Spanish practicing.

We wrote alternate rhymes to Hickory Dickory Dock and pointed out the rhyme pattern.

The kids adore Ella Fitzgerald.  We have an album called Miss Ella’s Playhouse which is a collection of Ella’s songs for kids that we listen to all the time.  So I asked the kids if they’d like to learn more about the kind of music that Ella sings.  They said yes so I asked Chris for some suggestions.  He’s studied music copiously and it’s one of his favorite subjects to explore.

So, we listened to Miss Ella’s Playhouse.  Then I briefly explained the history of Jazz.  We listened to Scott Joplin’s The Entertainer to get a taste of Ragtime.  Then we listened to Louis Armstrong sing It’s a Wonderful World, Ella and Louis sing Dream a Little Dream of Me, Miles Davis play from his Kind Of Blue album and Thelonious Monk and John Coltrane play Ruby My Dear.  We talked about syncopation, the different parts that voices and instruments take, and how improvisation is a big part of what makes Jazz special.  The kids got out our drum and did a little drumming.  I think we’ll explore more soon!

Gavin built another really nice lego spaceship.  His designs get more and more nuanced.

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Lilah and I drove over to pick up her friend from school and then the three kids played with pop beads and K’nex for the rest of the afternoon.

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unschooling

Monday

The kids set up a lego restaurant with dishes, tables, customers and a menu.

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We watched a crew clean our street and then cover the cracks with tar.  I asked the kids why they thought they cleaned the street first.  Lilah said, “To get rid of the dirt”. Gavin added, “Because it wouldn’t stick with the dirt on it”.  Then we talked about what happens if water from snow gets in cracks in the road and then freezes (and expands).

We worked on some Makit plate designs for holiday gifts.  They will make plates with the designs the kids draw and color.  The ones from years past are some of our favorite plates to use around here!  Gavin drew an owl with wind, tornado, crown and jewels.  Lilah drew several cats.  They both have a particular interest in those animals right now, which is fun.

Gavin and I solved a sudoku puzzle with his Chocolate Fixx set while Lilah was still working on her drawings.

When she finished we played a game of Magic The Gathering.  It’s a very complicated game and not really something Lilah can grasp fully, or even Gavin for that matter, but they enjoy playing it at the stage they are at now and it has so much to think about: math, strategy, order of phases in your turn, lots of new vocabulary, art on the cards.

Lilah and I drove over to her gymnastics class

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while Gavin stayed home and built a lego spaceship and watched an episode of Cosmos: A Spacetime Odyssey.

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unschooling

Friday

Computer play time was followed by lego play time in the morning.

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While I cleaned up in the kitchen they used the magnetic poetry words, letter magnets and various other magnets on the fridge to tell some stories together.

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In the afternoon, we went out to our garden to get it ready for winter.  I asked the kids to help since I have a sore tailbone and it’s really too much for me to do the repetitive bending that’s needed to pull out the dead plants and cages and markers.  I was surprised by how willing they were (after I explained I needed help) and though they did things in their own way instead the way I would have done it, they did what was needed and enjoyed it.  I am very grateful they are willing and able helpers and I am glad to give them opportunities to help with important tasks in our lives.

After that was done we pulled up our crop of carrots together.  They loved seeing all the different sizes and shapes and we’ll have some yummy carrots and carrot greens to eat.

We cleaned ourselves and the carrots up and then we did some Spanish together, lessons and then games.

Lilah and I went outside to try the helicopter seeds from pinecones in the breeze.  She tossed them up in handfuls and watched them fly.  It was beautiful fun!

Chris showed the kids a short film he made in college and then they talked about how he made it and what goes into making a movie.   There was a lot of excitement about the idea of making our own movies, writing scripts, filming…  Sounds like a great project for us!

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unschooling

Wednesday

There was lots of play with hexbugs this morning as well as quite a few conflicts between the kids.  Both kids wanted to play with the same bug.  Both kids wanted to use the same track piece for different things.  I had to step in and ask them to resolve things when it got too heated.  I reminded them that words are our best tools for resolving differences and that unless they resolve things not only can they not continue their game but also they would both continue to feel badly.  I asked them to help solve things.  Eventually they came up with a lovely compromise and proceeded with their game happily.

They have been more conflicts lately and  I think the cold weather keeping us indoors has been hard on all of us.

We read some library books together and played Chess and Rat-A-Tat-Cat.  Gavin read some Brambly Hedge stories to himself.

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A friend came over to play with Lilah and Gavin went to his friends house to play.  It was wonderful here and from what Gavin’s told me, wonderful there too.  There was playground building, singing, stuffed animal playing, math fact sharing, a walk to the park and swinging here. Then Gavin was dropped off, Lilah’s friend was picked up and it was just the three of us at the park enjoying swinging, hula hooping, hoop rolling and the sunshine.

When we got home we made some pumpkin pies together for Thanksgiving tomorrow.

While the pies baked, we watched Nausicaa of the Valley of the Wind together, a Hiyao Miyazaki animated film with a beautiful story about peace being stronger than force. It features a princess who I can actually say I adore because she works harder than anyone in her village, she advocates for others, she is not invested in her appearance, there is not one mention of her marrying in the entire film nor is she ever in need of rescuing, in fact, she is often rescuing others.  Hurrah!  Both kids really enjoyed it and Gavin proclaimed it one of his favorites even though it features a female main character.

It was a cozy evening before the holiday.

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unschooling

Tuesday

We did some reading about and then had quite a bit of conversation about Michael Brown, the young African American man who was shot and killed by a Caucasian police officer and the lack of indictment decision yesterday.  I shared what I could find about facts as well as that there are multiple different stories.  It’s such a crucial concept to grasp that there are sides and different perspectives and more often than not they can all be “right” or “real” or “accurate”.  We talked about cultural privilege, who has it, what it means and the responsibility of caring for others.  I hope that talking about these things when they’re young means they’ll be more attuned to how they fit into the cultural world we all create together when they grow.

We finished reading Matilda!

Lilah and I met her friend at school and then we came home to play.  While we were gone Gavin worked on computer coding.

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Gavin and I looked at pictures from Rosetta and Philae of the comet 67P/Churyumov–Gerasimenko while the two girls did yoga together.

All three played together, dressing up and making up a story with queens, ninjas, frogs, cats and countless other elements.  After they exhausted that play they got out the hexbugs and made tracks for them to climb and race and scurry around on.  Almost all of our bugs were out of batteries so I used up the last six of our batteries and they scurried around like mad with full batteries.

Lilah’s friend brought some of her hexbug pieces over to play and Gavin accidentally broke one as they are really tough to get together and apart the more you use them.  For me as a parent it was one of those awkward situations where I felt badly about it but didn’t want to make it into a bigger deal than the kids made it.  So later after talking with Chris we decided to offer to replace it, if that friend and her parents decided they’d like that.  We’ve often had our kids toys broken or messed up by friends and we figure that’s part of playing and learning how to share and it’s never been an issue but we wanted to make sure we cover our friendship bases, but not in an overly formal way that makes us less valuable friends (who can break each other’s things and go with the flow).

After Lilah’s friend went home, we noticed the pine cones we’d collected last week had opened and the seeds inside shake out.  The kids call them helicopter seeds because they twirl as they fall.

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There is something so satisfying about being able to explore things over time, to notice changes, to come back and see what you saw last time and notice things that were there before but you didn’t see them.

 

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unschooling

Monday

Gavin watched Pokemon and played on coolmathgames.com this morning.  When Lilah got up she played a game on cool math games and Gavin helped her.

We went to the library to return some books and find new ones to borrow.  They each picked a few and I picked a few and they sat down to read while I finished.  Then we stopped to pick up a few things at the grocery store before coming home.

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I read some more of Matilda to the kids while Lilah cuddled with me and Gavin built with legos.

Lilah and I played several games of Rat-A-Tat-Cat and she won every time including one time when she managed to get only zeros (the best possible card)!  Gavin read some magazines while she and I played.

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After that Gavin and I played Chess together.

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We worked on a puzzle with barns, carriages and hot air balloons.

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Lilah made a few things out of our tangram blocks.

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Gavin rested (he’s not feeling so great today) while Lilah and I did some Bollywood dancing (dance moves inspired by Bollywood films of India) before dinner was ready.

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unschooling

Friday

They built with the marble run pieces and sorted the marbles and found new ways of fitting things together.

The Hobbit lego game was played.

They finished up some perler bead creations they began yesterday.

We went up to the State Capitol Building with some other unschoolers for a tour and explore.

My favorite part was the beautiful matchbook marble walls, where they cut the marble from the same point in both directions and arrange it so it is symmetrical from a center point in all four directions.   Gavin’s favorite part was the dome in the middle where it arches up, up to a painting of blue sky and seagulls on the inside and has intriguing areas with balconies all around from the outside, and the elevator.

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Lilah’s favorite part was looking at the marble.

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Afterward we played in the gardens with some new friends for a while before heading down to Memory Grove and checking out the ice partially covering the pond and admired the dry grasses on the path up and down from the Capitol.  We admired the view of the city, even with the inversion.  They rolled down some hills on the way.  We even spotted a family of quail!

When we got home it was time for a trip to get groceries with Dad and then dinner, clean up, reading Matilda, cuddles, songs, sleep.

 

 

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unschooling

Thursday

There was more perler bead making, this time they began making pieces to be made into a garland later.

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I printed out a few math worksheets for both kids and left them on the table, telling them they could work on them if they wanted to, if it sounded fun.  They both did some during lunch time and then Gavin helped Lilah with hers a bit later on as well.  She would be in first grade this year but is more at a second grade level in math and it makes me happy to be able to meet her where she is with material and interests.

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We went roller skating at the other place with the slippery floor and ramps!

When we got home it was time to pick Gavin’s friend up for play time.  They played Connect 4, Chess, The Hobbit lego game, and they built a marble maze.

Gavin was thrilled to see his friend who was over today as it’s been a while since they last played and they have been friends since they were five.  It’s always great to get the two together as they have a long history of fun.

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