"Heresy is from the Greek word meaning 'choice'.... But we are not permitted to believe whatever we choose, nor to choose whatever someone else has believed. We have the Apostles of God as authorities, who did not...choose what they would believe but faithfully transmitted the teachings of Christ. So, even if an angel from heaven should preach otherwise, he shall be called anathema."-Saint Isidore of Seville
After rearranging the playroom, rearranging all the upstairs bookcases, gathering up all our resources (I still need to do a bit more of that) and writing up the schedules, we finally had our first day back to school yesterday. Overall, it went well!
I always find the first day of homeschooling difficult. I just never seem to have things organized right until I actually start doing what I need to do. This year went fairly well.
Math took up a lot of time, mostly because I was not as prepared as I should have been. I am still getting used to MEP and getting a better feel for how it is organized. I also decided to use the laptop for the lesson plans instead of printing them all out. I need more play dollars, dimes, and pennies to demonstrate regrouping...
So far the boys all worked well. With computer programs and "toys" restricted to certain options during school time, they found many educational ways to fill their time while I was busy working with one or another of them.
Ds#3 was the most excited of the three, always eager to be doing things.
Ds#1 is focusing on learning about fractions this year, besides reviewing basic arithmetic operations. I've got quite a few resources gathered to make things interesting:
I also have dice, counters, Math U See Epsilon DVD and fraction overlays that I picked up at a used curriculum sale last month. It looks like a lot of fun to dig in to!
Friday we went to the Eric Carle Museum of Picture Book Art. It is a small, lovely museum that my rambunctious boys could tolerate for about two hours this time around.
In the theater we saw Sylvester and the Magic Pebble.
In the art studio the kids explored Thick and Thin (my kids' favorite spot.)
In the library, with the hundreds of hardcover picture books for all to read, we listened to two books during story hour.
The art galleries have one room dedicated to Eric Carle with a fun picture scavanger hunt fot the kids. The second room featured the Golden Age of Children's Illistration: Kate Greenway, Jessie Wilcox Smith, Ernest H. Shepard, and more. I even picked up a Kate Greenway poetry book at a used bookstore on the way home.
I once heard William Bennett tell about the hiring of a conservative theology professor. One of the comments by a liberal on the review committee was something like, "We can't hire this guy, he actually believes this stuff!"
The University of San Diego decided to rescind the Monsignor John R. Portman Chair in Roman Catholic Theology being held by radical feminist Rosemary Radford Ruether. She promotes the Big Three: women's ordination, gay marriage, and abortion--all against the teachings of Jesus Christ and thus also the Catholic Church.
Liberal activists immediately initiated a petition to have her reinstated and collected 4,000 signatures.
Ora et Labora is trying to top that number by September 3rd with a petition in support of USD's decision. You can join me in signing it here.
"Not 100 in the United States hate the Roman Catholic Church, but millions hate what they mistakenly think the Roman Catholic Church is." --Bishop Fulton J. Sheen.
She is abusing St. Augustine's late 4th century writings about when a fetus receives a soul.
First, St. Augustine urged that we follow the science regarding this issue. We've learned a few things about embryology in the last 1600 years.
Second, SINCE THE FIRST CENTURY THE CATHOLIC CHURCH HAS CONDEMNED ABORTION including St. Augustine. This is long-standing Catholic Sacred Tradition.
Hours after Speaker Pelosi's comments, Denver Archbishop Charles J. Chaput posed a question in his homily:
"If you're Catholic and you disagree with your Church, what do you do?"
His response?
"You change your mind."
Amen!
Also according to Pelosi catholicism, she wants to reduce the number of abortions. The Roman Catholic Church wants to eliminate all abortions.
I find it hard to believe that an ardent practicing Catholic misunderstood those positions. I pray for Speaker Pelosi that she may better understand her faith.
With summer fast coming to an end, our family has been enjoying the glorious weather. Our homeschooling friends live on a hill perfect for kite flying.
It's the first time, really, my kids have done this--they thoroughly enjoyed themselves! The moms had to spend some time untangling strings with so many kites going. (It's actually somewhat therapeutic and rewarding, LOL.)
While looking for used Vision books at abebooks, I noticed one bookseller that had a lot of them, Cox & Cox. As it turns out, they are located here in MA. This being our tax-free weekend, I made an appointment and took a ride out to see the collection to save myself shipping charges since I wanted to buy a good many of them.
Roger Cox has a wonderful collection of Catholic and secular books that he has bought from closing Catholic schools. Most of the time these books would have ended up in the trash if not for him offering to buy them.
Not only does he have a lot of books for sale, he of course has read many of them. He is better than most Children's Librarians I have spoken to in what he knows.
He explained something interesting to me: Publishing companies generally kept books in print even when the demand was low; that was until the tax laws changed in 1970. Today publishers must pay taxes on their inventory, so if a book does not sell well, publishers take them out of print rather than pay taxes on the stock. This is why all these really great books from the 1950s and 1960s are no longer available.
The many written accounts of the Assumption date back initially to the 4th century, and it is a long held belief of both the Roman and Eastern Rites. Because of the long-standing belief of this event did Pope Pius XII declare this definitive dogma of the Roman Catholic Church in 1950.
This is a wonderful example of how the Pope and Magisterium do not create new dogma, but rather continually deepen our understanding. Through the Holy Spirit they study and contemplate the Word to understand and teach the will of the Father, just as Christ had designed when He created His Church.
"And the angel being come in, said unto her: Hail, full of grace, the Lord is with thee: blessed art thou among women." St. Luke 1:28
Mary is the Immaculate Conception since she was born and is forever without sin (full of grace.) Who else could be the Mother of Our Lord? Sinless, she did not experience death; rather, she was assumed into Heaven.
"Because he hath regarded the humility of his handmaid; for behold from henceforth all generations shall call me blessed." St. Luke 1:48
The Bible instructs us to venerate the Blessed Virgin, and so we do.
Assumption of the Virgin by Carracci
"And a great sign appeared in heaven: A woman clothed with the sun, and the moon under her feet, and on her head a crown of twelve stars: And being with child, she cried travailing in birth, and was in pain to be delivered. And there was seen another sign in heaven: and behold a great red dragon, having seven heads, and ten horns: and on his head seven diadems: And his tail drew the third part of the stars of heaven, and cast them to the earth: and the dragon stood before the woman who was ready to be delivered; that, when she should be delivered, he might devour her son. And she brought forth a man child, who was to rule all nations with an iron rod: and her son was taken up to God, and to his throne." Revelation 12:1-6
The woman is the Church, though allusion to the physical birth by Our Lady is evident. Hail, Holy Queen.
Though I am using Primary and Intermediate Language Lessons with ds#2 and ds#1 respectively, I have gathered several other resources to use during out Math/LA block to enhance what we have done in Language Lessons, or if we want to take a break from it.
I've ordered The Great Word Race. I also have Spelling Beez, which is a bit slow, and of course we have Scrabble, too.
I picked up the Magnetic Sight Words and Sentences board for 50 cents at a library book sale, though it had no words. I was able to pick up the sight word set from Christian Book Distributor
I also have The Writing Menu by Melissa Forney for writing ideas to get ds#1 more interested in writing. He writes in fits and starts. When it is an "assignment" his writing is very minimal and without creativity, yet when he has that spark he has the start of some pretty decent writing. Hopefully this will help us make those sparks!
Wordplay Cafe is a fun book using lots of puns, which ds#1 likes to think up. It would be something for just him and I to do together.
Hmmm, there must be some decent grammar game books out there...
Web sites
My kids have educational computer time scheduled during the day. Some of these sites we will sit and do together during block time while others they can use independently.
I found a lot of sites by going to Delicious and seeing what sites are bookmarked using search word "grammar."
Academic Skills Builders has several free math and word games with nice animation and interaction.
Here's one for diagramming sentences and has exercises using history and literature.
You can even download free sentence diagramming software from the University of Central Florida! You can then use any of your other books for practice, much like copywork or dictation. For the grammar geek in us!
Here's a Montessori page with word activities, including using colored shapes for beginning sentence diagramming. This makes a nice visual demonstration of basic sentence structure. In fact, I have to get to work getting these printed and ready. Maybe with magnetic tape to make this more interesting!
Ds#1 going to use Rosetta Stone Italian while ds#2 will use Italian for Children
This doesn't include our nature walks, working on our commonplace books, learning Latin phrases, or even our Country Club (studying a country a month with 3 other families.)
Last year I had every subject, every day scheduled and I would drive myself and my kids mad trying to stick to it. This year I have scheduled subjects or programs but not daily content. Also I used to schedule 36 weeks; this year will be 33 weeks since my kids have done at least 3 solid weeks of school activities over the summer.
I put some subjects into blocks. During these blocks we will do a variety of things depending on how the day or week is going. We may spend the whole time working on a project or we may do some reading, activities, and games during it. We may even spend time getting caught up in our commonplace book for that subject.
My next step is to create a list of books, activities, and games to choose from to fill those blocks. I will create a blog entry for each subject with the resources that I gather for others looking for new resources (since I benefit so much from other blogs in this way!)
For me, the key is to not feel the need to cover a certain amount of material before a deadline.
I rely heavily on Mater Amabilis and For the Love of Literature to create my book lists. For activities I get ideas from books, blogs, and web sites. I also have a lot of games, especially for math and history, but some for science and language arts, too.
This type of schedule allows for a bad day, a sick day, an opportunity, or a surprise without the dread of feeling you are falling behind. We all know Life happens, so we pray and trust in Him to have it all turn out just as He intends.
-----Avatar is "Muse" by Henri Martin-----
Muse...1: to become absorbed in thought; especially: to turn something over in the mind meditatively and often inconclusively
2. archaic: WONDER, MARVEL. Transitive senses: to think or say reflectively.
Our Patron SaintSt. Isidore of Seville
Doctor of the Church
Patron Saint of
Computers and the Internet
Schoolchildren and Students
Feastday: April 4th
St. Isidore pray for us!
After rearranging the playroom, rearranging all the upstairs bookcases, gathering up all our resources (I still need to do a bit more of that) and writing up the schedules, we finally had our first day back to school yesterday. Overall, it went well!
While looking for used Vision books at abebooks, I noticed one bookseller that had a lot of them, Cox & Cox. As it turns out, they are located here in MA. This being our tax-free weekend, I made an appointment and took a ride out to see the collection to save myself shipping charges since I wanted to buy a good many of them.
I've ordered The Great Word Race. I also have Spelling Beez, which is a bit slow, and of course we have Scrabble, too.
Here is the general schedule that is intended 
to guide us for the entire year.
