Homeschool Senior Stuff

Jocelyn is a homeschooled senior and a lovely young lady, and she has a blog called A Pondering Heart.

Jocelyn also started a blog just for homeschoolers who are graduating in 2009, and I thought I had blogged about it before. However, if I did, I can’t find the post. So here it is.

And she’s featuring a shirt giveaway courtesy of The Homeschool Boutique. Isn’t it lovely? Click on the image to see more homeschool merchandise at the Homeschool Boutique.

And if you’re a senior who’s homeschooled, or if you are the parent of a homeschooled senior, you will want to check our the blog for Homeschool Seniors 2009. What a wonderful idea!

Homeschool Seniors of the World Unite!

Children’s Fiction of 2008: Bird Lake Moon by Kevin Henkes

Oct11

In the author note in the back of this book, a NYT critic is quoted as saying, “It should be said: Kevin Henkes is a genius.” The critic was referring to Henkes’ work in picture books, which includes the Caldecott Award winning Kitten’s First Full Moon and the popular Lily’s Purple Plastic Purse. If we’re talking picture books, I might have to agree with the NYT critic.

However, I found the middle grade fiction title Bird Lake Moon to be slow-moving, like wading through molasses, and rather odd. Told in alternating points of view, by Mitch, whose parents are planning a divorce, and Spencer, whose parents are trying to decide whether eight years have healed their grief enough for them to return to the summer home where their oldest son drowned, the book tries to picture the potentially disastrous consequences of lying and deceiving a friend and at the same time the bittersweet, grown-up feeling of harboring secret knowledge that even the adults don’t have.

So strike one, it’s a Divorce Book. I know Divorce Books are necessary, but I don’t usually like them very much. Strike Two, it’s a guy book in which nothing much really happens. Guys tend to like action. Strike Three, well, I don’t really have a strike three, but what does happen in the book is fairly realistic, but not very novelistic, if you know what I mean. If not, chalk it up to the influence of this strangely out-of-sync novella.

The novel was odd, as I said, and it gave me a creepy feeling while I was reading it. If some kids, or adults, like it and get something out of it that I didn’t, more power to them. I’m just not thinking it lives up to the genius billing.

Poetry and Fine Art Friday: 1492

Oct10

Johnny’s Hist’ry Lesson by Nixon Waterman

I think, of all the things at school
A boy has got to do,
That studyin’ hist’ry, as a rule,
Is worst of all, don’t you?
Of dates there are an awful sight,
An’ though I study day an’ night,
There’s only one I’ve got just right –
That’s fourteen ninety-two.

Columbus crossed the Delaware
In fourteen ninety-two;
We whipped the British, fair an’ square,
In fourteen ninety-two.
At Concord an’ at Lexington.
We kept the redcoats on the run,
While the band played “Johnny Get Your Gun,”
In fourteen ninety-two.

Pat Henry, with his dyin’ breath –
In fourteen ninety-two –
Said, “Gimme liberty or death!”
In fourteen ninety-two.
An’ Barbara Frietchie, so ’tis said,
Cried, “Shoot if you must this old, gray head,
But I’d rather ‘twould be your own instead!”
In fourteen ninety-two.

The Pilgrims came to Plymouth Rock
In fourteen ninety-two,
An’ the Indians standin’ on the dock
Asked, “What are you goin’ to do?”
An’ they said, “We seek your harbor drear
That our children’s children’s children dear
May boast that their forefathers landed here
In fourteen ninety-two.”

Miss Pocahontas saved the life –
In fourteen ninety-two –
Of John Smith, an’ became his wife
In fourteen ninety-two.
An’ the Smith tribe started then an’ there,
An’ now there are John Smiths ev’rywhere,
But they didn’t have any Smiths to spare
In fourteen ninety-two.

Kentucky was settled by Daniel Boone
In fourteen ninety-two,
An’ I think the cow jumped over the moon
In fourteen ninety-two.
Ben Franklin flew his kite so high
He drew the lightnin’ from the sky,
An’ Washington couldn’t tell a lie,
In fourteen ninety-two.

How many historical errors, aside from the obvious dating errors, can your children find in Johnny’s poem? I find at least six, maybe ten, depending on what you count as mistakes. It’s a good exercise in spotting historical inaccuracies. I’ll start you out:

1. Columbus never even saw the Delaware River.

Children’s Fiction of 2008: The Floating Circus by Tracie Vaughn Zimmer

Oct10

Twelve year old Owen Burke just fell out of a tree, and now his arm won’t move at all. But since Owen’s an orphan and destitute, there’s no doctor for him, just a few days in bed to recover and then a sling for the now-useless arm. Owen and his younger brother Zach are set to go on the next Orphan Train and find a new family out west, but when Owen decides that Zach will be better off and find a family more easily without a crippled brother to hold him back, Owen makes the sacrifice and goes off on his own.

And where Owen lands is the most unlikely place you could imagine, a floating circus traveling down the Mississippi River. Owen finds a new sort of family in Solomon, the freed slave who works as stable hand and all-round janitor on the circus barge called The River Palace. And Owen becomes attached to the animals, especially the elephants, Tippo and her calf, Little Bet.

The Floating Circus, a straight prose work of historical fiction, doesn’t have much in common with Ms. Zimmer’s 2007 verse novel for children, Reaching for Sun (Semicolon review here), except maybe a certain empathy for the disabled and a talented story-telling ability on the part of the author. I think The Floating Circus will reach a wider audience since it’s appropriate for reading aloud in conjunction with a history unit (pre-Civil War, 1850’s) or for suggesting to children who are interested in reading fiction about circuses or the Mississippi River or slavery.

The story moves along at a good pace, and the book is not too long, only about 200 pages. There is some violence portrayed in relation to both animals and people. Although it’s not graphic or gratuitous, if your child is especially sensitive to reading about the mistreatment of animals or of people, you might want to take a look at the book before handing it over. Otherwise, it’s highly recommended.

Tracie Zimmer’s blog.

How Do I Get It All Done? Guest Post by Melissa V.

Oct9

This guest post is taken from our homeschool co-op newsletter. You might find this article especially helpful if you are homeschooling and using the services of other teachers from outside the home. The author, who is also co-director of the co-op, has four daughters ages thirteen, ten, eight, and six. I thought the ideas in the article were so helpful that I asked Melissa if I could reprint portions of her thoughts here at Semicolon.

How Do I Get It All Done?

Well, first of all, I don’t (my house is rarely clean and picked up at the same time, I don’t cook as often as I should, and my husband does the laundry and ironing—gasp!), but our schooling takes priority and that (usually) gets done by God’s grace. Having four students this year, I hope that I can share some ideas with those of you who have multiple children in multiple grades, classes, workbooks, activities, etc. that help me get MOST of it done. So I thought I would give you a glimpse into a day in the life at the V— homeschool.

First, let’s just make sure everyone understands that my children aren’t perfect. They don’t always do exactly what I tell them or when I tell them; they aren’t the greatest geniuses; and the biggest weakness in our homeschool is probably their primary teacher. Let’s just be honest, there are always so many things that could use or need my attention: the laundry, the sick widow from church, the neighbor who needs childcare for a day, the list can go on and on.

Each of my children has different needs and works differently. One is pretty independent at this point (praise the Lord!). And as great as she does about getting her work done for her co-op or other outside class teachers, it just doesn’t translate equally for the math that she does for me. YOu’d think I was asking her to do what no other child has ever done —finish one math lesson per day. So I must stay on top of that. I don’t usually adapt any lessons from other teachers. She is now learning how to complete work on her own, without constant parental supervision and how to work with teachers of different styles, personalities, and requirements.

Then I have one that needs me to sit right next to her, walk her through every step of every subject, except math. So we make some modifications for some of her homework. For example, she’s having a difficult time in language arts class. I read the story to her, and she answers the comprehension questions as we read. I have her read other books that relate to the geography we are studying which aren’t quite as difficult for her, and she isn’t looking for answers to specific questions. She does complete the daily work for the spelling and vocabulary, but I don’t test her on it. And sometimes I find that I just have to give her the answer to a particular question. I find that sometimes it goes more smoothly if I write the words in the blanks for her as she calls out or points to the right word. It seems any amount of writing can be a lot for this particular child.

Another of my children completes her language arts material on Monday afternoon when we get home form co-op and announces that she’s done for the week. I use other spelling words for her, so I pretty much consider her done at this point. By the way, she’s not that independent on anything else though.

Two of my girls are in zoology, and they haven’t learned to pull definitions from the paragraphs yet. So the night before they will work on it, I write out all the vocabulary words and their defiitions on the white board. Then all they have to do is copy it. They read the book themselves, taking turns reading aloud. This gives me time to work with my youngest who is still learning to read and needs lots of individual attention when it comes to her schoolwork. I do have to work through the questions at the end of the zoology sections with them. They haven’t yet learned how to find the answers in their reading if they don’t just remember them.

As for the geography, we do it first thing and all together. It’s the only subject that all four of my girls are doing. We do all the reading aloud together, except for the seventh and eighth grade bookswhich my oldest reads on her own. I find that with me guidig all of them, we can complete the assignments quicker. Even with the read alouds, geography never takes more than an hour and usually only takes 20-40 minutes if I’m prepared before we start and don’t have to go looking for a particular book we need.

I hope you see that I adapt things for my children that fits my family and that it will still work with co-op. You may have your children find the definitions on their own in zoology; you may need to fill in the blanks or write what your child dictates on some of the language arts assignment. Maybe you need to eliminate an assignment from a class. All of this is okay. My point is that you are the primary teacher, and you adapt each class to fit your child’s needs.

Oh, and about all those other things that I think need my attention —sometimes I must remember that I am not the only one capable of meeting those needs. I need to let others receive the blessing of serving as well. Other things get done, but maybe not when I’d like or to the standard I prefer. I am learning that God has given me these four wonderful blessings, and they and my husband are my priority for now. There has been time in the past and will be in the future where my services can be made more readily available to others. We should not forget that or a season, service to our families is what God desires from us. Through prayer God will lead us through all the distractions and opportunities that come our way.

YA Fiction of 2008: Slipping by Cathleen Davitt Bell

Oct9

How is it possible to write an entire book about the boundary between life and death, about what happens to people after death and never once mention God?

When his grandfather dies, Michael begins “slipping” between his own identity and someplace “between life and death” in his grandfather’s memories and in his grandfather’s ghostly mind. It’s a sort of “mysterious river between the living and the dead” where Michael must figure what it is that will satisfy his grandfather and help him rest in peace and at the same time keep himself from being sucked into the river forever.

The story draws on a lot of psychic mumbo-jumbo and at the same time derives some of its philosophical underpinnings form the realm of psychology. So there’s lots of father/son relationship stuff and talk of repressed emotions as well as the idea that the dead may not be able to rest in peace, may become rather annoyingly insistent ghosts, if they have unfinished business in this world. The young people in the book even go to visit a psychic, Charlisse Hillel-Broughton, who talks to them about Plato and the river of the dead and finally tells them they’ll have to figure it all out themselves because “there is little I can do.” Typical psychic.

Oh, and video games are an important element of the story. Michael sort of thinks in video game terms, a thought frame that might appeal to the gamer mentality, but doesn’t do much for me. Slipping was a good story, but the worldview upon which it hangs its plot and themes is not one I can get particularly excited about.

Other opinions:

B Is for Books: “From the very first page I was hooked. What was happening to Michael was totally freaky but cool at the same time. Being able to [experience] his grandfather’s memories and everything was so awesome.”

YA Fiction of 2008: Love Me Tender by Audrey Couloumbis

Oct7

What would it feel like to have a father who was a landscape gardener by day and by night (and on long weekends) was an Elvis impersonator? And what if he and your pregnant mom had an argument, and Dad-channeling-Elvis went off to Vegas to try to revive his stalled career in Elvis impersonation? And what if, just as he left, he said, “I’m relying on you, Elvira. Don’t let things fall apart once I’m gone.”

This book was hilarious. Elvira’s mom is a character, just the type to be able to be married to an Elvis impersonator and still remain halfway sane. She threatens her kids, “I’ll snatch you baldheaded if you do that!” Or “if you throw yourself on the floor again, I am going to put you up for adoption.” If you think either of those statements is a terrible thing to say to your seven year old or thirteen year old daughter, then you won’t like this book.

Elvira has a mouth, and she gets it from her mom Mel, short for Melisande. Elvira’s little sister, Kerrie, is cute, whiny, and somewhat manipulative. Dad is having a mid-life crisis, with his desire to be like Elvis and win Elvis competitions. And when the three girls in the family go to Memphis to visit Mel’s mom, the grandma that Elvira hasn’t ever even met, well, let’s just say that the smart mouth and the over-the-top rhetoric runs in the family.

There are some great scenes in this book: when Elvira convinces Kerrie that the police are after her for murder, when Kerrie gets a pair of fake eyelashes stuck to her eyes and has to go to the emergency room to have them removed, when Grandma burns a great big hole in the “warshing room”, when Elvira decides to get her ear (one ear) pierced in three places by someone named Pandora . . . It’s really just one laugh-out-loud episode after another. And the dialog is full of humor, too, if you like your humor Southern, sarcastic, and exaggerated.

It kind of reminds me of the old TV show Roseanne. If you liked that, you might like Love Me Tender. However, I didn’t much care for Roseanne, and I don’t usually like mouthy kids, in books or movies or in real life. But I loved this book. So go figure.

Other reviews:

Becky’s Book Reviews: “Honestly, I thought this one was a bit disappointing. When I see the name Coulombis, I expect better things, greater things. Not that this one was bad, it just wasn’t as magical as I expected. The premise, the author, the cover, I expected to be wowed a bit more than I was.”

Look Books: “The book was fast-paced, and easy to read. It needed a more decisive end, especially after so many memorable events. I feel like the end was sort of pre-conceived before the book was written. Too perfect.”

The Goddess of YA LIterature: “The characters are nicely drawn; the dialogue snappy and sharp tongued. THIS is a family story about real family members. You can’t pick your family members, but you can decide how to live with and among them. Important lessons for us all, folks.”

Children’s Fiction of 2008: Shooting the Moon by Frances O’Roark Dowell

Oct7

Well, maybe I’m just in a sourish mood. Lots of people seemed to be quite taken with Ms. Dowell’s Vietnam-war-from-the-homefront novel, Shooting the Moon. I thought it was O.K.

The best part of the novel is the main character, twelve year old Jamie. Jamie’s brother, T.J., has just left for Vietnam, and Jamie is higher than a kite. Finally one of them will get to experience what a real war is like, experience all the games Jamie and T.J. played growing up on an army base, and T. J. has promised to write and tell Jamie all about it. Jamie only wishes she could enlist and go with him.

Jamie, a self-described “Army brat” who admires her father The Colonel to the point of hero-worship, is an ebullient, indomitable, ball of fire, and she kept me reading just to see what she would do next. The plot and character development are predictable; as Jamie grows up she learns that war is not all fun and games. T.J., instead of sending Jamie letters, sends her rolls of film, pictures that he has taken in Vietnam for her to develop and print. For some reason, many of his pictures are photos of the moon, hence the title. I’ll probably beat myself when I figure it out, but I didn’t really get the significance of the moon pics. Maybe it’s something about the same moon shines over in Vietnam that shines over Fort Hood where Jamie is?

I also enjoyed one of the minor characters, Cindy Lorenzo, a learning disabled friend of Jamie’s who “hit and bit” and “whose brain was still on the first grade level.” Everyone knows a Cindy, and Ms. Dowell presents her sympathetically but realistically. I never really understood why T.J. joined the Army in the first place, and I didn’t get why Jamie’s other friend, Private Hollister, did what he did in the course of the story either.

Anyhoo, if you’re a fan of war/anti-war Vietnam novels, this one fits that description. Or if you like girls that win at gin rummy . . .

Other, uniformly laudatory, opinions (what do I know?):

Becky’s Book Reviews: “Full of depth and true meaning-of-life “stuff,” Shooting the Moon is one of 2008’s must read books.”

Megan at Read, Read, Read: “This book would really be a great starting board for talking about some of the harsh realities behind war. Frances O’Roark Dowell is very careful not to be too preachy about war or even too supportive of war. The novel had the perfect balance for me.”

Fuse 8: “This book is amazing. Top notch, wonderful, humorous, meaningful, with a pull and a hit in the gut that’ll knock a readers’ socks off. What we’ve got here is a title that has an excellent chance of engaging every reader that comes across it. And timely doesn’t even begin to describe it.”

A Wrunge Sponge: “This is a really wonderful middle grade novel, highly recommended for boys and girls alike. You could use it as a discussion starter around the topics of family, war, and changing perspectives, an example of memoir writing and excellent dialog that moves the story along and reveals character traits, or to introduce comparisons of writing and the visual arts (photography).”

Franki at A Year of Reading: “This is a powerful story. A story of how war affects a family and how a family deals with a child that is sent to war. It is the story of a young girl growing up and finding herself. And there is amazing thread of photography throughout the book.”

Young Adult Fiction of 2008: The Redheaded Princess by Ann Rinaldi

Oct6

Maybe I’ve read too many books and seen too many movies about the Tudors. We’re big Ann Rinaldi fans around here, and I’m fascinated by the Tudor kings and queens of England, but Ms. Rinaldi’s latest about Princess Elizabeth Tudor, the red-haired daughter of Henry VIII and Anne Boleyn, was just O.K. Nothing to write home about.

I didn’t get any new perspective on Elizabeth the princess or Elizabeth the queen. I didn’t find myself attracted to her character, and indeed I thought Ms. Rinaldi’s Elizabeth was a lot too ambitious and self-serving for me to want to be anywhere near her. I suppose most absolute monarchs, or those who think they might become absolute monarchs, tend to be all about power and self-preservation. It just wasn’t very attractive to read about.

I felt as if the author wanted to make Elizabeth likable, but was constrained by the facts of history. Every time I started to like her, Elizabeth would do something that she really did do, and the only motivation that Ms. Rinaldi’s book could find was a rather ugly one. Elizabeth’s servants are arrested, and although she’s terribly upset about it all, Elizabeth doesn’t even write a letter in their behalf. Her good friend Robin Dudley is in the Tower, accused of treason, and Elizabeth wonders if she’ll ever see him again. But she doesn’t bother to write him either, maybe because she thinks it would be too dangerous for her. She’s jealous of Lady Jane Grey and only mildly sad when Miss Jane is put to death.

I probably wouldn’t have enjoyed being friends with the real Elizabeth, but the person portrayed in this book is just petty and not very pleasant. Red-headed, rich, intelligent, and popular, none are a guarantee of either virtue or amiability.

I would recommend any of Ms. Rinaldi’s American historical novels or her book, Mutiny’s Daughter, about the supposed daughter of HMS Bounty mutineer Fletcher Christian, over this fictionalized biography of Elizabeth I. Read it if you’re a collector and fan of any and all books about Elizabeth. If not, it’s skippable.

Sunday Salon: Random Thoughts in the Midst of a Financial and Moral Crisis

Oct5

Our nation is not only in a financial mess; we’re in a moral crisis. Just as we believe we can have our financial and materialistic cake and eat it, too, we act as if we can live any way we want to today, no matter who gets hurt, and work it all out and make it all right someday when we get old and gray. It doesn’t work that way: words have meaning, and actions have consequences. ForgivenessÂ is available through Christ, but it doesn’t remove the consequences in this life.

It’s time to pay the piper. And God have mercy on us all.

/sermon

I’ve started my Cybils reading: middle grade fiction that’s nominated for the Children’s and Young Adult Bloggers’ Literary Awards. So far, of the books nominated in my category, over fifty, I’ve read six. I hope to read all of the nominated books I can get into my hot little reading hands. I’m thankful for libraries.

Several people “heart” my blog, and for that I am truly thankful. I enjoy blogging for my own purposes and to record my own memories, and the fact that other people enjoy reading what I have written and participating in the Saturday Review and Author Celebrations is just icing on the cake. Thanks to all of you who like my blog well enough to come and read and comment. And special thanks to those who favored me with a mention:

American Bibliophile

The Tome Traveller

Jew Wishes

Wonderful bookish blogs with good taste in blog-love.

Beautiful and talented Eldest Daughter, who resides in Nashville these days, has written an autumn poem and posted it at her Xanga. I think that some of you poetry-lovers and lovers of autumn would enjoy her poetic endeavors almost as much as her most partial critic, Mom. So here’s a link.

Enjoy the season, crisis or no, and keep it real. (Wow, blogging really does help me to get get from Point A to Point B, emotionally speaking. I started out with a rather admonishing sermon and ended with a “sense of hope.” Not bad for a Sunday.)