Week 4 of the "School" Year: Nature and Lessons Abound

Oh dear, where to begin?  We had a LOT of nature this week and frankly I am feeling every one of my forty-two years.  Chasing after little boys and trying to weave educational opportunities into our every day lives can be a bit tiring.  But I am NOT complaining!  This week has been a whole lot of awesome.

We packed a lot of learning in on Monday because we had a big Geocache Expedition on Tuesday with our Gifted Kids Meetup friends at the Botanic Garden on Tuesday.  It was hot.  It was a trek.  But we finally won our little (nano) prize on our third cache attempt at the garden.  Viola!  A nano log!  Woot!  I think we hooked our friends on this fun little hobby.

Wednesday we packed the car and the pup and headed to the San Bernardino Mountains to Aunt Mimi's Family Cabin.  It's a hidden little valley owned by a small group of people for about a hundred years with a wonderful history attached to it.  It is cluster of cabins nestled between two streams and separated by fields of apple trees.  It is my version of Heaven.  I had visited the cabin when I was my kid's ages and this orchard contains some of my fondest childhood memories.  Now my children are very privileged to get to experience it too. 

We arrived, unpacked our cooler and headed directly to the stream to play.  The weather was perfect, around 78 degrees and the fresh stream water chilled our feet.  Of course the boys have to go neck deep whenever possible.

My original plan was to build rafts and huts for GI Joe, to test speed and flotation, to make bows and arrows and test speed via bow tension... Lots of plans for these trips to the river.  You know what they say about Best Laid Plans?  Yup...the kids had their own plans, which included doing what they do best: playing.  And who am I to try to force them to do this stuff anyway?  Ha ha, jokes on me, Teacher Mom.

There was lots of learning happening anyway.  Aunt Mimi surprised the boys with Golf Cart driving lessons, which must have turned out to be pretty funny but I missed the lesson and that's probably a good thing for the state of my heart health.  Apparently T Man nearly rammed them into an apple tree!  He got better on the next lesson :) 

We gave Aunt Mimi a lesson in Geocaching and we were all happily surprised to find an awesome cache within a mile of the cabin. It was an old ammunition case filled with lots of toys.

On the way back to the cabin, we got one of our greatest lessons of the week: finding a baby bird that fell out of its nest.  T was vehemently against taking the baby home and thought we should leave it flailing in the dead grass next to the road.  Mimi and I were all for attempting to save its life.  We put him in a shoe box and immediately queried our Facebook Friends to see if they could help identify it so we could feed it.  Duckling?  Heron?  We were given a number to a volunteer organization that works to save wild birds and got some very valuable advice on finding baby birds like this:  Put it back in the tree it fell out of, watch for an hour and hope and pray mama bird finds it.  Essentially my little T was right.  We shouldn't have messed with it.  I found this out too late.  By the next morning the baby couldn't peep anymore and was quickly on his way to birdy heaven. I feel awful about it, but isn't that how we learn lessons?  Today Mimi said her son thought he was a Vulture.  I'm pretty sure that is correct.  (sigh)

Near the end of the day, it was clear that the golf cart was the boon of the visit.  They boys obsessed on it.  T pointed right at Mimi and said "You need to take us out in the golf cart."  This got an eyebrow raising!  Mimi explained that she is a Communication Expert and that she's pretty sure that this is not the way to convince someone to do something for you.  She coached him on how to properly ask someone for something.  This was an invaluable lesson and I am so grateful to have her do this because it doesn't matter how much mama harps on her kids for their behavior, coming from Mom it sounds like a regular nag session.  Coming from Mimi, however, makes all the difference in the world. 

I am, for the most part, solely responsible for the complete education of my children. Not just reading, writing and arithmetic, but life skills, communication, social skills, manners, self-care, reproduction, respect, love, logic and common sense, caring, you name it.  It is a daunting task that I often try not to think about, but live in the moment and make every situation count to the education of these boys.  It is a wonderful gift to be given when someone steps up and helps in this journey.

We got a little sit-down work done during our full day at the cabin...the kids use dice to do addition (PJ) and multiplication (T) and they wrote on their Favorite Thing about the Mountain Cabin.  (the golf cart, of course)  We started reading Life of Fred Butterflies and it covered the life cycle of the butterfly, and moved onto Astronomy and the Orion constellation, specifically Betelgeuse, the super-sized star that makes up Orion's left shoulder.  Apparently this star is the size of a football field compared to our Sun, if you can imagine our Sun as the size of an orange.  Crazy Big. 

One of the awesome things about getting to visit the apple orchard in September is that it's Harvest Time!  Mimi took us into a separate orchard where we got to bag up all kinds of apples.  And of course, in the Harvest tradition, we had to bake a pie.  By this point in the day, around 4:00, the kids were pooped out, so they watched TV and I poured a glass of wine and started to peel apples.  I'm proud to say, it turned out to be one FINE apple pie :)

 

On our way out of the mountains on Friday, the kids were able to jump out of the car and play in a real, honest to God, mountain waterfall.  What a way to end an amazing few days in nature.   

Home Sweet Home brings us pictures of the Shuttle Endeavor flying piggy back on a 747 on it's way to LAX and its final resting place, the California Science Center.  We are looking forward to visiting it when it opens.  During the week without the crowds, of course, because we have that freedom now that we homeschool.  Just like the freedom to explore nature whenever we are invited to the Heaven that is the Mountain Cabin.  And the availability to spend these precious times with Aunt Mimi and learn from her too.

Week 3 and Off Track...or are we?

 This week we tackled Daddy's Birthday.  I give that a huge font and emphasis because this is Daddy's Special Day and we must make it super specials for him.  If he had his druthers he'd get the entire Month of September to celebrate, but since he's in Crunch Mode, had to settle for his Special Day as 24 hours.  To add insult to injury, his Special Day is September 11.
So we do our best to make it Big and Important regardless of that sad fact.  I gave the boys some butcher paper and asked them to make some wrapping paper for presents.  As you can see by this picture, it evolved into something much bigger and important:  a Happy Birthday Banner.  Minecraft-style.  Daddy was pretty darned impressed!

On a trip to our favorite store, Barnes & Noble, to find a treat for dad, the kids each wanted to pick out a book for themselves.  I think we already own Splat the Cat, so I asked PJ to read this one at the store, out loud to me.  This is PJ's reaction.  LMAO

Monday we did our usual studies and then spent the afternoon at the park with a lovely homeschooling family of 3 little boys.  The older boys tromped around the park in full discovery-mode, into the nooks and crannys of a dried "creek" and up to it's pond.  I looked at my fellow mama and told her I gave the TMan 10 minutes before he was up to his knees in that murky water.  20 minutes later he approached in sloshing tennis shoes.  Haha.  It's what boys do. Snakes and Snails and Puppy Dog Tails! 

After removing the offending pond fifth, the boys went after some climbing trees and and found a huge patch of mushrooms.  T explained the "gills" of the mushroom and disected it and named it's type.  (I still need to go look it up, but I'm looking forward to getting an iphone just for an app I heard about that does object recognition) I can't locate anything about it on the Web except back to 2009.  But gosh, I need it so I can take a picture of something and give it a name. 

Speaking of apps, look at this one!  It's Geocache Navigator and it's directly linked to the Geocaching.com website.  It's amaaahzing and I can't wait to use it.  
Wednesday we met up with our GHF friends, Amy, Liam and Sutton for a geocaching expedition at the South Coast Botanic Garden.  Mission: FAIL.  All 4 of the boys were either hot, bored or obsessing about Minecraft.  I stupidly left my phone (with previously mentioned awesome app) at home.  We are going try that again next Tuesday.  We went home and let the boys have some quiet play time.  Much more relaxing.. 

I had a wonderful Aha moment this week with little PJ.  He has been practicing writing the alphabet in a little Lakeshore Learning writing book.  For some reason, he wants to always start at the bottom of the line and move upwards, so I have sat down and review each letter, explaining to start at the top line and moved downwards, then add the other features of the letters.  While at the park the other day, he got too hot and decided to rest across my lap.  So I began to trace letters on his back.  He guessed every single letter correctly!  I am thinking this whole teaching thing might just be working out.

We had a playdate on Friday and got to go to their pool.  Many thanks to them, as it was 104 degrees in the harbor area of Los Angeles.  Holy Cow.  It must have been a record.  Before we could go outside, however, the boys had to be shown their friend's latest interest: www.coolmath-games.com  There are some excellent brain games on this website, perfect for 5-7 year olds.  PJ is positively obsessed now and has been playing since we got home yesterday.

With this summer heat, we are getting lots of bugs.  We had to pick bees and termites out of the pool yesterday.  We also got a strange little visitor that we couldn't identify.  I called over to T to have him check it out and see if he knew the name.  "Ah! It's a Weevil!" he exclaimed.  Having never seen a weevil in my life, I just didn't believe him and pulled up the trusty browser on my phone.  WHY did I question this kid?  It was a weevil.  When I asked him how he knew this, he credited "Ugly Bugs" one of the Horrible Science books.  Ah, it really IS working!

So I am okay today with a morning of cartoons and relaxation.  It's gonna be another hot one!  Next week we get to visit the San Bernardino Mountains with my sister.  We have planned some community gardening and a little history of the area.  Should be lots of fun.  And Educational.

Socialization: Age Peers and Intellectual Peers

This is an iffy topic for me.  I could really come off like a snob, but those of you who know me, realize that I really am earnest in these thoughts. 



Tulip fields with BFF Ally - 2009

I've always had good friends, but finding friends hasn't been all that easy. I'm considered outgoing and friendly and I have had many many acquaintances in my life.  Facebook reports 189 Friends on my Profile, the list including friends from grade school, junior high, high school, work friends, relatives and lots of mommy-club friends. There are a couple handfuls of "friends" that I have met only once, but have formed an intellectual connection with: those I admire for thier thoughts, activism or ideals.  I don't mind sharing my intimate thoughts with these people because I feel like they get me.

It took this past year of research and discovery, a journey of diagnoses and pain, to realize that there really is something to this concept of "gifted" and there are neurological differences that effect social and emotional development, that these differences must be recognized and handled in a different way.

Looking back, I realize that I spent most of my working career surrounded by smart people.  I worked for lawyers and then moved into information technology and capped off my professional career working for a billionaire genius who, of course, surrounded himself with smart people.  I took all that for granted.

I have come to appreciate the concept of Intellectual Peers and Age Peers.  While my T-Man is only 8.5, he is intellectually more of a 12 year old, his interests and humor and thoughts on the world are all more mature than a typical kid of his age.  I remember when he was 4 he wanted to hang out with the 8 and 10 year olds in the neighborhood.  In public school he had to deal with age peers that one day he would be "best friends" and the next day they aren't friends anymore. For my emotionally intense sensitive boy, this was devastating.  He just didn't understand them.

Now that we are on the Great Homeschool Adventure, socialization is almost totally within our control.  It's like when you have a toddler and find a playgroup or schedule playdates and you get to choose the kind of kids your kids (and you!) do well around.  It's not completely in control - you still have typical interactions with the public and new people.  It's almost like an office social environment: the usual players, understanding what your co-workers are like, who you can depend on for what you need, etc.  And for a gifted kid who likes routine and predictability, it is ideal.  Now the challenge is to find other kids near his age that have similar interests and intellect.

BFFs Tylan & Brayden - 2009

I think it's important to actively seek out intellectual peers and to put energy into the care and feeding of relationships that have potential for such a deep connection and understanding.  I hadn't realized how good I had it up in Seattle with all my smarty mommies and co-workers until I moved to Los Angeles and had such difficulty establishing friendships in its massive and diverse socio-economic landscape.  Nearly three years later, T and PJ have only a couple of friends that they connect with on a deeper level and that are available to be with us on a regular basis. 

I have been spending time seeking out friends for us. I've spent many hours on the GHF yahoo group and found a couple of matches.  I've even created a Meetup group in an attempt to draw out more families like us.  (If you aren't careful with "The G Word" you may get the hairy eyeball, but that's a risk I'm willing to take.)  It feels like a constant effort that is well worth it when you see the smiles on your child's face, when you get to have stimulating mommy conversation and enjoy full belly laughs, with people who get it.

2nd Week of "School"

First of all, why the heck am I calling this "school"?  I am beginning to realize that it's a bad word around here, a bad word I'm telling my kids to use.  Silly mom.

We started our week off on Labor Day Monday.  Dad had to work (no irony there) and so we decided to be couch potatoes.  Mr. T parked himself on the coach with my laptop and proceeded to spend the day studying his favorite topic:  Minecraft.  He had discovered a nice guy named Paul Soares, Jr., a dad of boys who is quite funny and clearly gifted, and who does some very nice tutorials on youtube aimed at the child audience.  Am I a big fan of the game?  Not so much.  But since my son is studying it with the voraciousness of a groupie to a rock band, who am I to complain?  The fact that my son was finding an actual goal within the game helps me to cope with it.

In the meantime, I discovered that Rovio, famed game designers of Angry Birds, has a new release called "Amazing Alex" a ""whiz kid who turns everything into adventure. From cleaning his room to battling cardboard robots in his backyard.  Alex creates amazing chain reactions..." another awesome physics game to challenge my little PJ's puzzle brain.  This gave me time to look at our Moving Beyond the Page and make a strategy, as well as investigate some new history books to order.  T Man loves his history.

Tuesday started off with nightmare battles trying for some cooperation to do some school work.  (There's that WORD AGAIN, Mom!)  After the usual threat of zero gaming, things turned around.  T wrote out our grocery list, emptied the dishwasher and offered to join PJ for a game of Scrabble.  PJ and I had worked our way through the day with Life of Fred, Boggle, Dreambox and were just pulling down the box for Scrabble.  I decided to give them each 10 tiles and we actually finished a game, the boys nearly the same score of 140 and 144.  PJ beat his big brother.  I, of course, found the word FOUNDER on my tile holder and was able to play FLOUNDER for a 50 point bonus, but they didn't seem to mind ;-)

Wednesday was much nicer and we moved through our day with wonderful cooperation, working on our Map of the Community, doing some Ooka Island and reading Horrible Histories.  At one point the house was too quiet and I found these two taking over Life of Fred and finishing the first book.  I'm feeling a little bit of a loss over that; I wanted to see how it ended!  :)

Liam and T tutor each other on Minecraft

Thursday featured a playdate and nature hike to Temescal Canyon with our gifted homeschooling friends.  It's always such a treat to be with this crew because they are as funny, interesting and quirky as us.  We hung out at their house on the Westside for a bit and the little ones played board games and the big ones played Lego Hero Factory and then tutored each other on Minecraft.

Our trip to the Canyon was a lot of fun.  The weather couldn't get any more beautiful and the kids couldn't be a better match.  The boys separated off in their little teams and explored the creek and ravines. 

We moms watched, amused to see how well the kids got along.  Little Sutton just turned 4 but is a great intellectual peer for little PJ, almost 6.  That is one of those funky "gifted" things that people have a hard time understanding.  T could go play Scrabble with a couple of college students, but don't put him in a classroom with twenty average 8-year-olds, because he just can't relate.  

On the other hand, put this kid in a giant play structure with a bunch of 4 and 5 year-olds during the week and he's having an absolute blast. Go figure. 

Friday we met up with another gifted friend just to let the boys run and play.  Kid's Concepts in Torrance isn't cheap, but it was just the kind of physical outlet these boys needed.

It's now Friday at the end of the day and T is waiting for the use of the laptop.  While he's waiting, he's sprawled out on my bed reading the 8th book in the Life of Fred series.  The kid just slurped up the other 7 books since Tuesday.  Sheesh, I really need to pay my library fines and get back over there... ;-) 

If you want to read more about our friends Liam and Sutton, you can find them on Amy's blog, A Voracious Mind.

  

Back to School Angst and a Food Revolution

Okay, I admit it: I have a little of that Back To School Angst everyone on the Gifted Homeschoolers Forum is talking about.  It was about a week ago; a very, very long thread dedicated to feeling kind of sad, kind of like you are missing out on something now that school has started.  At the time, I mostly shook my head because I was happy to not be returning to LAUSD on August 14th and as I heard the local school bell ring from my desk, I was relieved to know my kids wouldn’t be going back to that.  I mean, WHY would you miss something that was so terrible for your kids?

Today all my Seattle and Torrance friends started back to school, 1200 miles apart, but sharing the same experience.  Facebook is filled with darling photos with smiling children and notes of what grade they are beginning, I’ve watched them grow taller over the years.  There would be no “back to school” photo with backpack in our photo albums, no formal class picture, no spring picture to compare to the fall.  We are no longer part of that community.  Today I felt the loss.

Today was also my presentation for the local MOMS Club Chapter about bagged lunches versus school lunches.  My goal was to tell them about my experience with school lunches and to try to inspire them to pack a healthy option for the little ones entering elementary school.



I was brought back to three years ago, where T was dropped off at the local school for his first public school experience.  It took me a couple of months to get situated, to get into a preschool program for PJ and then be able to volunteer in his class.  On my big volunteer day sometime in January, I walked with the kids out to the “cafeteria” to find a service window with a lunch lady handing out plastic wrapped lunches in brown paper baskets.  All the food was brown.  Brown potato “smiles,” brown breaded chicken breast on a whole wheat bun and a brown ice-cream looking thing called “Chocolate Launch! Frozen Whey Protein.”  No fruit, no veggies.  I later discovered that “ketchup” and the potatoes covered that food group.


LAUSD 2011 lunch of "Sweet & Sour"

 Along with this discovery was the milk choice.  Strawberry, Chocolate or plain in a “bladder” bag (not pictured here) the Kindergartners were required to puncture with a straw in order to drink.  The strawberry milk covered the chicken sandwich of T’s classmate, who shrugged helplessly, probably grateful to get that free meal.

I. Was. Mortified.  All the literature from “Café LA” and their website advertised “healthy meals” for our children.  I bought it hook line and sinker.  These meals were positively disgusting and I had trusted that the second largest school district in the country had my back, my kid's best interest in mind.  Grrr.

I packed lunches after that.  I did "bento" style using Laptop Lunches.  I became an expert and an activist.

 

In Spring of last year I was contacted by Jamie Oliver's people about the Food Revolution coming to LA.  I had signed up as an activist on his website after watching the 2010 television series where 1st graders couldn't identify the name for a tomato.  I began to work with the grassroots team to tell LAUSD that this kind of meal is unacceptable.  Flavored milk was unnecessary.  I attended a rally to ban flavored milk, attended the filming of a demonstration of how much sugar the kids in LA drink in a week of flavored milk, met with Jamie and his team, interviewed for magazines and the nightly news, met with the food services director and the deputy-whats-his-name right hand guy to the Superintendent. It amazed me that we could affect change so quickly, but then that's what you get when you have a celebrity backing the effort.  Thanks Jamie!  We got the flavored milk removed.  The menu was changed as planned.  John Deasy promised late night entertainer Jimmy Kimmel he promised to see this through. 

 

The bigger fish to fry is really the USDA who thinks it's okay to call "ketchup" a tomato, but these things are coming clearer every day.

But the point is, it was a fight.  Everything within a school district is a bureaucracy and even a simple thing like getting a healthy square meal for a kid is a freaking fight.  Can you see where these thoughts were headed?
 
And so, my successful talk concluded, I headed home to my boys who were hanging with their favorite sitter.  I was greeted with relaxed smiles and they reported they did some math and played Uno.  Happy Kids. 

I found this magnet on my refrigerator last week.  It's the 1st Grade School Picture for the Fall of 2010.  This is my little T Man and it was very clear that he wasn't happy.

So angst-schmangst.  I know it's all good.  Even if I need to sit here and spill the beans to you to make myself feel justified.  I know you know, and I know you support me.  I'm feeling pretty grateful.  Thanks for that.