Tag Archives: friends

unschooling

Thursday

They started on with some Pokemon and some My Little Pony watching.

There was lego creating.  Gavin built robots and Lilah discussed primary colors she was choosing to build with.

We baked oatmeal cranberry chocolate chip muffins.  They turned on the oven, read the recipe, measured, stirred, set up the pan and even tried our mortar and pestle to grind up some cardamom seeds!

Then there was more lego imaginative play.  “There was a black-out!”  “He bumped into her house and crashed into the window.”  (Indescribable sound effects here.)  “And then Nya came out to help.”  “Yeah…”

I invited the kids to join me in making a color wheel out of legos.   We dug out lots of colored blocks and tried to place them according to where they belong between the primary colors.  Gavin chose to make a white/light grey/dark grey/black gradient to accompany our color wheel.

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Lilah made a hammock out of a scarf tied to the table and rolled a ball inside and then gave her bear a nice place to swing and nap.

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Then Gavin and I picked up his friend from school and came home to play “LEGOS!”  They got out our lego board game Heroica sets and put them all together.  Chips and salsa were eaten as bosses were defeated and weapons were earned.  Then there was a Magic The Gathering game, followed by an epic tale of stuffed animal surprise attacks and spying.

After playtime with Gavin’s friend, we ate and ended our evening with Dad reading some Ranger’s Apprentice by John Flanagan before bed.  We’re in the middle of the fourth book now.

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unschooling

Wednesday

There was ninja character play with legos.  “Wheeeeoooooo, wheeeeeoooooo, ninja alarm!”  “And then Kai sat here to control his spaceship.”  “But he can’t see if he sits there!”  “Well, but it’s much easier to control it if he’s sitting here.”  “Mmmhmm.”

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We spent some more time on the puppy puzzle.  Then we played a game where I draw something and make a speech bubble with an unfinished statement and the kids fill it in.  Today it was a sasquatch speaking to us.  The kids like it plus I get to draw!

Then the kids built with legos while I read a few chapters of Juniper.

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Lilah looked through a National Geographic magazine, pored over the pictures.

Lilah and I played a round of Rat-A-Tat Cat and then all three of us played the next one.

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Next we were off to get a few new fall clothes for the kids and made a nice long stop to play in the fountains.

We came home and ate and then headed off to a co-ed whole family Spiral Scouts meeting to see what that’s like and if we’d like to join.  It was fun and good to be around a bunch of kids of varied ages including a few friends we know from school last year.  We enjoyed it and we’ll definitely be going again.

 

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Uncategorized, unschooling

Monday

Gavin started off with some Chima online while Lilah slept in a bit.

Then they watched They Might Be Giants Here Come the ABCs together.

There was lego play and organizing and other building toys.

We puzzled.

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After eating lunch, I read the last three chapters of Pippi Longstocking to the kids.  Gavin remarked at then end that he does not want to be a pirate when he grows up.  I’m a little concerned.  Wink.

Then it was time to go pick up Lilah’s friend from school.  They played a bit on the playground and then we came home and played school.  We walked to our neighborhood park and played there.  There was tag and swings and toss the stuffed dog while swinging.

We came home and built with magnetic toys and played hide and seek with stuffies.

After we said goodbye to friends, we went out in the garden and picked cherry tomatoes and tomatillos and checked progress of our pumpkins, and fleet of butternut squash.  They are huge plants!  I’d never grown them before and they are taking over our garden plot!

We walked to the local elementary after dinner to play soccer and enjoy the playground before bed.

 

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unschooling

Wednesday

They started off playing coolmathgames.com (Duck Life, for those of you in the know).  Then we watched Pokemon and Pingu.

Then there was lego play and organizing, and a letter to grandparents written.

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We pulled out the marimba, steel drum and our other drum and played scales, Oh Suzannah and experimented.  “What does it sound like when you drop a lego person in the drum?”  “…on the marimba?”  “He’s playing music!”  “I like to just try different things!”

There was puzzling on the puppy puzzle we’re in the middle of.

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We watched John Oliver And Cookie monster, On The News Beat

and checked out An Icy Solution To The Mystery Of The Slithering Stones, an article about the moving boulders in “The Racetrack” which I visited as a kid.

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There was some balance beam play.

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They played a game of Magic The Gathering;  a practice round, because Lilah is still learning how to play on her own.

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Lilah and I went to pick up a friend from school and played on the playground together.  We came home and read Elephant and Piggie books and played with legos and hexbugs and stuffed animals with Lilah’s friend.  Oh, and there was some hula hooping.

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All of it was wonderful.

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interviews, unschooling

Interviews

I thought an interview with the kids about how they feel and what they are thinking about would help us begin our unschooling journey.

 

 

With Gavin:

1. What do you and I do together?

Ummm.  Play games.  Make puzzles.  Watch movies.  Play soccer sometimes.  Play Magic The Gathering.  Cuddle time and choose one song for you to sing.  Sometimes play frisbee. We adventure in Yellowstone and we saw geysers.  Like, Goblin Valley and California.

2. What do you like most about your life?

Everything.  Games.  Legos.

3. What things would you change in your life?

Sometimes you guys shouting at me.*  Being not cold in the winter.

4. Are there things you’d like to do more of?

Play Magic The Gathering.  Umm.  I want to play more games.  I want to do more biking.  Watch more movies.

5. Are there things in our life you really dislike?

When things are unexpected.  Like sometimes there’s certain games I want to play on certain days and you play different games and I don’t like that.

6. What would you like to know more about?

Science.  More science.  How to make games on the computer.

7. What are you really good at?  

Math.  Adventures.  Playing games that are older than eight.  Magic.

8. What are you not as good at?

Aiming at targets.  Nothing else.

9. What do you like most about your family?

Because they play games.  I like birthdays because I can invite friends.  We get to read books together.

10. What do you like least about your family?

I don’t know.

11. How is your life different from other kids your age?

Because other kids like different things.  People do different things at different speeds like S last year gets to do three math strips.  I’m not in school.  I’m homeschooling.  I get to do stuff at home and do other things at other places.

12. If you had more love in your life what would that look like?

I don’t know.  More time with friends.

 

With Lilah:

1. What do you and I do together?

Hmmm.  We play games.  And we read books together.  And we’re still working on a puzzle.  Sometimes we fly kites.  Sometimes we play soccer together.

2. What do you like most about your life?

I like it because I have lots of stuffed animals to sleep with and we get to play lots of games.  And sometimes I get to play all day.

3. What things would you change in your life?

I don’t know.  When people hurt me; I don’t like that.

4. Are there things you’d like to do more of?

I’d like to read more books and play more games.  And I also wanted to sew a lot.

5. Are there things in our life you really dislike?

Sometimes when someone yells at me.*  I don’t like that at all.

6. What would you like to know more about?

I wanna learn more cooking and also I would like to learn more about art and I also would like to learn more about birds and animals.

7. What are you good at?

I’m very good at reading.  I’m sometimes good at baking and cooking.  And I’m very good at hiding presents.

8. What are you not as good at?

Creating things and planting plants ’cause sometimes they don’t grow.

9. What do you like most about your family?

I love Mama.  And Daddy.   And I also like about my family that they like me too.  And I also love Gavin.

10. What do you like least about your family?

I don’t know.

11. How is your life different from other kids your age?

Cause sometimes (a friend) is not nice to me.

12. If you had more love in your life what would that look like?

I don’t know what it would look like.  Maybe like a hundred times more than the universe.

 

*It hurts to hear the kids say this, and it hurts to admit that I do shout and speak in anger and frustration sometimes.  Shouting and speaking unkindly is something I am working so hard to end right now.  I am making progress but I have a way to go.  Obviously this is incredibly important to everyone in our house!

 

With Mama:

1. What do you and I do together?

Hmm.  We read books and we draw and we cuddle.  Sometimes we do yoga and dance.  I like hula hooping with you.  And I like to laugh with you.

2. What do you like most about your life?

I like being able to spend time with my family and enjoying one another and the world.

3. What things would you change in your life?

I wouldn’t change much.   We might have decided to invite you home for school earlier so we could have more time together and less stress in our lives.

4. Are there things you’d like to do more of?

Yes!  I’d like to do more yoga, more hiking, more reading, more drawing, more painting, more camping!  I’d like to tickle you more.

5. Are there things in our life you really dislike?

Yes.  I really don’t like speaking unkindly to you or anyone.  I want to do better at always, always using non-violent communication.  I wish I could spend more time with my sister.

6. What would you like to know more about?

Lots of things!  Like, how to identify the squash in our garden before they have squash, what kinds of mushrooms are edible, anything about animals, how brains develop, constellation names and positions, new words.

7. What are you really good at?  

I think I’m pretty good at reading, drawing, having fun, hiking, gluten free & vegan baking, being a mom.

8. What are you not as good at?

Keeping all the dishes clean all the time, memorizing dates, talking to people I don’t know, being on time.

9. What do you like most about your family?

That we like to be together and do fun things together.

10. What do you like least about your family?

I’m not sure.

11. How is your life different from other kids your age?

I don’t have to earn a living right now so I have the luxury of spending time with my kids and looking for opportunities for us.  We don’t follow a rigid schedule like most people who have to be at school and work at specific times.  I have so much less stress without the outside schedule worries.

12. If you had more love in your life what would that look like?

More love for myself (my inner voice) and my body the way it is today.  I would feel lighter, be more readily able to happily connect with others without the dark shadow of worry about myself that occasionally affects my interactions now.  I would be more confident.  The love I have from others is already full to the brim!

 

 

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