19 September 2023

Closing This Blog Down During 2023

I really think I have come to the end of the line with my home educating blog, so I'm giving an update now for anyone that may want to archive any of our free downloads or activity pages before the securing/payment on our domain name needs renewing sometime in 2024; and, 
I will begin removing access to free downloads and activity pages in my dropbox midway through October 2023   
(which may affect opening the  links even through the Wayback machine ).

Life has taken so many twists and turns since my last post on this blog in 2019. 
-  chronic illness, surgeries, moving home, having a house being built that unexpectedly became a self-build (still is),  both children completing highschool studies,  Covid-19 and all it's rules had us reinventing our worker day lives, coping with deaths of loved ones; and, both Jay and Daisy graduating from their higher level studies (so thankful to God, and humbled, and proud of all they have achieved!).  
Jay completed his studies in Finance, and, Economics, and Daisy in Business, and, Art studies - and they are both working in their fields of interest.  It's a little hard to share a photo of Jay's work life achievements - so many - but nothing that is photographable (one of the myriad of things he does in his after work hours life, is run an online Lego brick store).  
I can show a visual of one of Daisy's glass stained pieces (she purchased and now runs a business that has been in operation for over 25 years in New Zealand) and she continues to create art pieces (a few commissioned) and lovely journaling notebooks each year
A snapshot of one of Daisy's finished pieces, being boxed up ready to freight.
 
Our home educating things were packed into boxes during 2019;
and, I'm just sorting through them now in September 2023.

As my journey back to full health has progressed where I want to, and how I want to, spend my time has shifted too.  
I entertained the thought of blogging about life post home educating, yet I seem to be lacking in "wanting to" and take my time from other things, to give to blogging here. 

For those who may be interested in where I've been spending much of my time: 
  • being more intentional about spending time quietly in nature, and, with God (so necessary for continued healing and peace) and journaling,
  • working alongside my husband in our business, and, on our self-build
Yes, we do still live in a self-build :)
yet try to create spaces of visual interest 
and peace we can sit in amongst all our industry
  • I'm actively involved with my family in our church's ministry,
  • being a mum to two, working, adult children (laughing a little here, as I thought the pre-schooling years were busy),
  • investing in friends and family members, 
  • and, continuing to read (audiobooks count too) as much as I can.

As I close off with my last post,

May grace and peace be yours in abundance.

Chelle



14 February 2019

Our Month Ahead ~ February and A Brand New Learning Year

February:  This is our first month back to academic learning and a very busy month for family celebrations -  three family birthdays and one wedding anniversary, all within the same week.
One of Daisy's favourite, shady, reading spots in summer
In previous years we preferred to ramp the subjects back up slowly but have found that is not really possible with Te Kura, so we try to make as many adjustments as we can: no extracurricular courses or activities in the first term and only sign up to start three subjects with Tekura, then once we have those up and running we reevaluate in March to see if the children have the space and energy to add on more which is usually something like a Barista course, Red Shirts with the Warehouse, First Aid  Course, etc...

This week Daisy is spending time setting up her initial course selections and getting started.  She'll be working through Maths, English, and, Digital Studies courses with Te Kura this year; we've bulked up the English course to include components we are wanting to Daisy to have had exposure to, which will include lots of reading, discussion, and complementary lectures.

Here's a rough outline of what our first week back looks like...

Morning Book Basket  (yes, we still start our learning day this way and share the reading load between us)
Bible:
Poetry: 
  • A Child's Anthology of Poetry ~ Edited by Elizabeth Hauge Sword      Reading from:    I Saw a Man Pursuing the Horizon ~ Stephen Crane p.58,     to:   Souvenir of the Ancient World by Carlos Drummond De Andrade p.65  (this book is purely for read-aloud enjoyment, and a gentle re-entry into this year's, potential, poetry study)
Other:
English 
  • Poetry and Film, intro unit  NCEA 
Math
  • awaiting contact from Te Kura teacher   (tap, tap ... anyone out there)
Digital Students
  • Started .... but I can't remember what Daisy said she was working on 
Delight Led Courses/Hobbies This Year
  • Photoshop (select areas)
  • Art
  • Card crafting
  • Life Skills   (which also still includes raising and selling livestock.  She has three miniature Angus this year, a first ... photos will follow in another post sometime.)
  • Learning to Drive    (I've been out of action for a while with less-than-health and surgery, so this didn't even 'get started' last year.  Daisy's quite happy as she's in no hurry to learn to drive.)
  • Piano and guitar
Free Reading

04 February 2019

Proposed Highschool Literature, Reading List, NCEA English for 2019

As this is a possibilities/planning post,  I'll be back to change, delete, and update as we go along.
Beneath are some of the items Daisy (17) may, or may not, read this year.  This is her last full year of highschool courses. 
LoriD on TWTM forums would probably label this as a kitchen sink selection: where we pull any items we like together and even if it doesn't look like a cohesive reading list, we're calling it one.

Study Guides and Personal Growth Books for 2019
  • NCEA English ( writing, and, literature studies)
  • Greenleaf Guide (selections from various books listed in literature beneath)
  • Invitation to the Classics ~ Cowan  (Selections)
  • KJV Life Application Bible (selections)    
  • How to Read Slowly ~ James W. Shire
  • Poetry for Dummies with a selection of poems (Selections)
  • Ourselves ~ Charlotte Mason   (1905)    hmmm, which box did I pack this in? 
  • On Stories ~ C.S.  Lewis (1914-1963)
  • Outliers: The Story of Success ~ Malcolm Gladwell 


Biographies/Memoirs
  • The Hiding Place ~ Corrie Ten Boom   (1971)
  • Gifted Hands ~ Ben Carson   (1990)
  • The Zookeeper’s Wife ~ Diane Ackerman   (2007)
  • Have a Little Faith ~ Mitch Albom   (2009)   


Play/ Dramas/ Short Stories
  • Sophocles Plays   (c. 440 BC)    audible drama (mum to preview first)
  • The Winslow Boy  play (1946) and film (1999)   
  • The Penguin Book of English Short Stories ~ Edited by Christopher Dolley (pub 1983)


Literature
  • Epic of Gilgamesh   (c. 2500 BC)    abridged & selections 
  • The Odyssey ~ Homer   (c. 850 BC)
  • Till We Have Faces ~ C.S. Lewis   (1956)    Angelina Stanford webinar on Cupid & Psyche (this is an online class I purchased last year through Circe Institute and I hope we, at least I, get to go through)
  • The Aeneid ~ Virgil   (c. 30 BC) abridged & audio   
  • The Inferno ~ Dante   (1320)
  • Gawain and the Green Knight   (c. 1400) selections   
  • Rob Roy ~ Sir Walter Scott   (1817)
  • The Legend of Sleepy Hollow ~ Washington Irving (1820)
  • North and South ~ Elizabeth Gaskell   (1855)   
  • The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde ~ Stevenson   (1886)  
  • Night ~ Elie Wiesel   (1982)   


Free Reading Options
  • D'Aulaires Book of Greek Myths  ~  (audiobook)
  • The Three Musketeers ~ Alexandre Dumas   (1844)
  • Just William ~ Richmal Crompton  (1921 – 1970)
  • Georgette Heyer (to be selected)  (1921 – 1974) Discuss later. Compare and contrast the characters from a Heyer book and an Austen one.  How are clerical men, families, portrayed in each.
  • Winter and Rough Weather ~ D.E. Stevenson  (1951) (Daisy is not a fan of this author)
  • Thrush Green ~ Miss Read   (1959)
  • The Year at Thrush Green ~ Miss Read   (1996)
  • A Beautiful Blue Death Bk1 ~ Charles Finch   (2007)
  • Charles Todd  (Bess Crawford series)  (2009 – 2018)
  • Return to Me:  Restoration Chronicles Bk1 ~ Lynn Austin   (2013)
  • The Girl Who Drank the Moon ~ Kelly Barnhill   (2016)
  • The Love That I Have ~ James Moloney   (2018)  (need to purchase or loan from the library)


Audio
  • The Three Musketeers ~ Alexandre Dumas   (1844)
  • Cranford ~ Elizabeth Gaskell  (1853)
  • The Woman in White ~ Wilkie Collins  (1860)
  • The Moonstone ~ Wilkie Collins, narrated by Peter Jeffery  (originally pub 1868)
  • Georgette Heyer (to be selected 1921 – 1974)
  • Ngaio Marsh  (to be selected  1934 -1947)
  • Thank You, Jeeves: Jeeves  Bk5 ~ P.G. Wodehouse (1934) humour
  • Sarah Morris Remembers ~ D. E. Stevenson  (1967)
  • The Silmarillion ~ J.R.R. Tolkien   (Originally pub 1977)  Classic   Audio   Others may also like a heads up about content in chapt 19, which we skip (incestuous brother/sister relationship)
  • Salt to the Sea ~ Ruta Sepetys  (2016)
  • The Last Moriarty:  Sherlock Holmes and Lucy James Bk1 ~ Charles Veley and Anna Elliott narrated by  Edward Petherbridge  (2016)
  • The Wilhelm Conspiracy:  Sherlock Holmes and Lucy James Bk2 ~ Charles Veley and Anna Elliott narrated by  Edward Petherbridge  (2016)
  • The Jubilee Problem: Sherlock Holmes and Lucy James Bk5 ~  Charles Veley and Anna Elliott  narrated by Simon Prebble and Wendy Tremont King   (2017)  (audible)
  • The Traitor’s Game ~ Jennifer Nielsen   (2018) 

03 August 2018

Learning to Read Craft ~ Letter a Week Crafts

When the children were young we used to focus on a letter each week, complete with a craft, books, and our LeapPad Phonics tool on the fridge: the children loved it, learnt the shape and sounds of letters; and it made me feel I was achieving something pre-schoolish with my two.




I had a folder filled with options for crafts that Daisy would love, colouring or paint, cutting and glueing  - which a kindergarten teacher purchased off me years later in a box of pre-school 'teaching' tools - I guess I could have saved myself the hours of fun compiling those pages if  All About Learning  to Read's ABC craft pages  had been available back then.

29 July 2018

Picture Post, and a book review ~ July 2018

The Ranchsliders are finally in and glazed
One of the engagement cards Daisy crafted
The first wedding card Daisy's ever made, she really struggled with it.
Leroy LOVES to be in on piano practice
Daisy's current read. I edited the profanity out first.
Adding a review of a 'highschool' audiobook I've just listened to: 
This was a recommended homeschool history book (Sonlight Core 300) that we never  read with the children - we have heard some first-hand accounts from Cambodian friends who were young teens in Cambodia during the late 1970's.
This a sober, harrowing, and gritty listen. The love, care and respect this family have for one is heartening – along with their deeply held Buddhist faith – those traits seem to undergird the incredible resilience Teeda's family required to endure each next heartache and hardship.  The fact that all, bar one member of their family group make it through that holocaust seems miraculous.  Although the writing may not rank as the very best in literary terms, I felt compelled to keep reading.  This is a story that stays with you, long after the last word is read.  
    
(Extra: while the author/s detail the atrocities of a despotic, genocidal, regime it is done in a more sobering, factual tone without “glorifying” the very real horror or the gore of the events taking place.  Beheadings, mass murders, the horrors of slavery, an account of gang rape, the desperation and vulnerability of fleeing refugees.)