Unschooling Recordkeeping, Week 1

After going to the Expo, I had the inspiration to see what our life really looks like and how that fits into unschooling. Do we do “enough?” Am I a sort of unschooler? Are the kids really learning all the time? Should I practice keeping records in light of the fragile state of homeschooling in California?

By the way, our rights have been upheld for now, as of last Friday. Hooray! Support local homeschooling organizations to keep this an option for all families. Think twice before you withhold support: I was totally against homeschooling before and have had a complete turnaround, so I highly recommend learning all about it before forming an opinion.

First, here is one of my favorite YouTube videos ever, which has nothing and yet everything to do with homeschooling and childrearing:

Anyhoo, I downloaded this unschooling record keeper from The Home School Mom. I filled it out for a week and this is what it looked like:

Books I read aloud or with DD5:
M: A few chapters of The Wonderful Wizard of Oz by L. Frank Baum
T: A few chapters of The Magician’s Nephew (book 1 of the Chronicles of Narnia by C.S. Lewis)
Th: A few more chapters of The Wonderful Wizard of Oz and a few chapters of Peter Pan.
Th through Su: Finished the Magician’s Nephew.

Audiobooks we listened to this week (all read by Jim Weiss ):
Stone Soup
Puss in Books
Rapunzel
The Brenen Town Musicians (Grimm)
Rumpelstiltskin (Grimm)
Things Could Always be Worse (Jewish folktale)
The Shoemaker and the Elves

Movies/Videos/TV watched:
M: Dragontales (PBS)
T: Maggie and the Ferocious Beast (Noggin)
W: Sesame Street (PBS)
F: Maggie and the Ferocious Beast, Franklin (Noggin)
S: Miss Spider’s Sunny Patch (Noggin)
Su: Miss Spider’s Sunny Patch (Noggin)

Classes/lessons attended:
Sa: Time-4-learning lessons (she volunteers to go do these and picks what she wants)
1.Background: It's Puzzling! Sound (Language Arts Extensions)
2. Story: Pasquale Goes to Market Read Along (Language Arts Extensions)
3. Story: Pasquale Goes to Market Read to Me (Language Arts Extensions)
4. Background: It's Puzzling! Consumers and Producers (Language Arts Extensions)
5. Phonics: Review ed (Language Arts)
6. Phonics: Review long o (Language Arts)
Su: Home cooking class (vegan agave apple pie with whole wheat crust) with discussions about nutrition, fractions and measuring.

Miscellaneous academia:
T: 1 hour French Lyric lessons in car
W: Verbal Math lesson 1
Th: Ocean ecology and marine biology at beach; 15 minutes French Lyric lessons
Sa: Human anatomy from “Looking into my Body” book and daddy’s spine model
Daily: Counting to 100 dance

Projects:
M: Painting and art at the Boone Children’s Gallery
T: Painting
W: Play-doh and Floam free sculpting. (If you haven't played with Floam, you must, even if you aren't a kid. Also, try Moon Sand. Buy it or, for even more fun, make your own.) Planted a thyme plant and forget-me-not flowers.
Sa: Creating cards and drawings for upcoming birthday invitations at Libby Lu, which my daughter loves, although it might just be the future shallow anorexia victim training unit.

Field Trips:
M: Boone Children’s Gallery and the Broad Contemporary Art Museum at LACMA
T: Kidspace Children’s Museum free family night
Th: Beach (marine biology and ocean ecology talks; sandcastles; swimming)
Sa: Grocery store (budget help; discussed different stores, picking fruits and veggies); took dogs to dog park.
Su: Courtyards Children’s Play Group. Brought felt solar system and taught the adults all about the planets. (FYI, not one adult there could name the planets in order from the sun, although most knew Pluto is a moon).

Discussions:
Helping out. DD5 would like to have "jobs" around the house, like clearing the table, vacuuming and feeding our lovely dog.
She really wants to master reading so she can read the big books (like the Narnia books) by herself.
She really likes verbal math, but doesn’t like worksheets.

Skills observed:
Many, many, but my favorite thing was when DD5 made up a story called “The Owl Who Was Not Nocturnal and His Friend the Bat.” It was deep.

Side note: As we all know, relationships and life in general become complex when we go against the norm. What a struggle for the owl and the bat! We decided we're going to co-author a children’s story and her Grandma Teri will illustrate it.

Physical Activity:
Lots of running, dancing, swimming, biking.
Th, F, Sa, Su: Pool
Th: Beach

Sa: Long bike ride

Okay, that’s what I recorded. Of course, there was much more to the week with lots of amazing, imaginative play and bonding with our friends who were in town.

Really, how could school ever beat such a rich and full week? The best part is that EVERY week is this great.

Here's my gratitude journal for the day:
1. I'm still feeling grateful that my mom is recovering from an infection and not another bout of breast cancer.
2. I'm grateful for the brain surgeon and how he always manages to give so much of himself to us, even though he gives and gives and gives at work all day long.
3. I'm grateful for my terrific friends.
4. I'm grateful for my children and the wonderful family members that surround them.
5. I'm grateful for FlyLady, because I've finally listened to her about the laundry and I'm loving it!

That line about the laundry is kinda pathetic, huh?

Toodles!