Saturday, June 9, 2012

our new backyard

exploring along the Charles
 This is where we have been spending much time lately as Daddy is taking sailing lessons 2-3 days a week.  It was a gift for him, and it has been a gift for us as well.  While dad's learning about jibs, leeward winds, and other cool boating stuff, we have been lounging in what feels like our new backyard.  We have found our own special spots and developed a bit of a routine that includes picnicking, watercolor painting, "fishing" along the shore of the river, riding bikes, and just generally exploring.  We've been out in the rain, sun, in the morning, afternoon, and dusk.  I know I've developed more of an appreciation for how accessible this wonderful spot is to us, and I'm really enjoying watching my kids grow familiar and comfortable here.  It really does feel like it's ours, and that is a neat aspect of city life--sharing spots like this with a million strangers, yet each of us feeling ownership and personal connections to the space.
searching for river monsters with some geese friends

an exciting find--dead blue gill

Thursday, June 7, 2012

lesson for the teacher

Homeschool  requires quite a bit of risk-taking and learning on my part--more than I could have imagined!  As nature class at the Sanctuary drew to a close, there was a defining moment for me--canoe class.  I knew it was coming, and although I love canoeing, I have always been more of a passenger with an able adult on board to "lead".  Somehow, I imagined canoeing with the nature class meant a trained adult would accompany Seven and I, as clearly, I was an adult, but far from able.  THIS was not the case though, and I was sweating as the group leader gave instruction, distributed PFDs, and the city girl in me stood in fear that they were actually going to hand me paddles and set me afloat on the water with my son ALONE!  As I formulated a thousand different ways to say, simply, "I can't do this", I saw how eager and excited Seven was--oblivious to my quiet nervous breakdown--and realized this was a great opportunity to do what I ask him to do almost every day as a learner--try something new, something I was not sure how to do, take a risk.

So I sucked it up, grabbed my paddles and we headed out on the Ipswich River.  Lo and behold, canoeing is not that hard, and aside from a few crashes into the reeds (mostly when I tried to take pictures!), we did pretty well!  Most importantly, Seven was beaming and had a great time.  He was so empowered (as I was!) after the trip that he was begging to do it again as soon as possible.  On the way home, I confessed how nervous I was and that I really just wanted to tell them I couldn't do it, but I decided to try it anyways--and I was SO glad I did--because it was awesome!  And mostly, I loved just sharing the quiet time on the river with my boy--searching for birds and "what lurked beneath the surface."--his words.:)  I asked him if he could tell I was nervous, and he said he had no idea.  Then I asked him if he thought I did the right thing, and he rolled his eyes and said, "Of course, mama."

Always good to experience the vulnerability of learning as a teacher--probably one of the most powerful reminders of how learning can feel at times.  And looking back, how silly I was to be that nervous, and now, please, hand me the PFD!  Can't wait to do it again!

old man and the canoe


passing by a beaver lodge spotted by Seven--then we crashed

why do we have to stop?

I've been working on writing a narrative assessment of our homeschool year, which I anticipated to be about 2-3 pages long, and actually had to stop myself after 6 pages.  So much to write!!!!  It brought me right back to writing narratives for my students in school, only then, the writing was so general, with room only for a line or two about the specific child.  No tiny little boxes on a report card to hold me back this time, though, and really an amazing experience to reflect on just Seven (Five's is still to come).  Just his growth, progress, interests, activities, and skills to ponder--and while I am his mother and of course, he is "perfect" in my eyes, I feel my years as a teacher allowed me to reflect in an objective way.  We have all grown so much this year!

As I was looking at the calendar recently, I casually asked Seven when we should stop homeschool for the year.  His response? With a shocked expression: "Why do we have to stop?"

For me, that's all the evidence I need that homeschool was the right choice for us.  When learning has engaged the learner to the point that finding a stopping point sounds ludicrous, you know you've done something right!

So we will continue on with our lessons and learning adventures--maybe in a little more relaxed way--trading nature & swim & ballet classes for trips to the beach and vacationing in Maine--provided the sun does return and summer will (please oh please) feel like summer!

Five's friend at the zoo--the jaguar

Noisy seals at the Aquarium

the ballerina


Five's first dance recital--ah, so girly!  She LOVED performing on stage, and the lights and crowd just fueled her fire!  She danced to Teddy Bear's Picnic with 4 other little girls, and it was sweet and oh-so-cute!  Her adoring fan club attended both nights--yes--2 nights of recitals!  I was proud to say I managed to plaster her hair into as a straight a part down the middle as I could, and cried when she skipped out on stage first.  So grown up, so lovely.  And now, so glad to sleep in a bit on Saturday mornings in lieu of dance class! :)

one minute four, now five

It feels like only a minute ago, my little baby girl entered our lives.  Sweet, snuggly, loud baby girl with no hair.  And in an instant, she is this powerful little ray of sunshine--even louder than before!  I'm sad that the baby/toddler years are over.  Truth be told, time & finances permitting, I'd have two more...but even then, the day would come when diapers, strollers, bibs, and what I miss most--the sling--would eventually leave our lives.  I loved it all--the baby years--and I can say that now that the years of sleep deprivation and diaper changes have passed.  Now, it's on to new adventures!

Four to five is a big transition.  Five is the real deal--she's a little kid now, and her personality, interests, habits, memory are all truly forming--and I do love this age so much!  Exploring, discovering, adventuring on a whole new level.  We rolled it in with a smashing Princess Party, which Five loved, loved, loved.  Her face beamed all day.

Yes--I made this spectacular cake--roses, leaves, and all!

Rapunzel's hair hanging from the princess' bedroom window to greet guests
And now on to a glorious new chapter in our lives!

Wednesday, May 16, 2012

mother nature's child

I had a fabulous Mother's Day weekend!  The sun was finally shining and we spent most of the weekend outside.  We enjoyed a lovely dinner on Sat with all the moms (& dads & Auntie M & Uncle J) at the Wayside Inn (favorite restaurant), and after everyone else departed, we rambled down to the meadow to search for bugs and pick wildflowers, and then onto a little brook where Seven went WILD catching crayfish in his dress pants.  What a better way to ruin a pair of pants?!  Of course, after finding ticks all over the place on Monday, I think we may be steering clear of the meadows for awhile!  But boy did we have a blast!  More from Mother's day next post!

bug hunting and flower picking

in the meadow

crayfish

serious crayfish catching

mel and rose

In a neighboring town, (Melrose), there is a lovely swan family we discovered one day.  We saw them early on when it was just Mom & Dad (named Mel & Rose by local residents) sitting on the nest, and on this day we saw 6-maybe 7 newly hatched cygnets!  So fuzzy and cute!


Today we went back to visit (about 3 weeks later from the visit depicted above), and found only the nest, with one lonely unhatched egg.  No family in sight.  So glad we got to see them when we did!

We are rather bird crazy lately--watching the Decorah eagles on line, and our latest homeschool project is creating Life Lists.  A Life List (for the serious birders), is a list of all the birds you see in your life--at least that's my understanding.  I spent weeks trying to figure out how to do a life list with a Seven & Five (yes--no more four, but more on that later!), and finally came up with a plan that seems to be working.  I found this North American birds coloring book on our bookshelf (no one in the family seems to know where it cam from so I'm thinking a little bird fairy left it), and each time we see a bird, I photocopy a page for the kids to color.  We record the date and place we saw it and put it into a 3-ring binder.  Ahh success!  It's working out great, but I am racing to keep up!  I am doing a more grown up life list for myself where I sketch and record in a journal.  It's been amazing to document all the bird sightings that I am sure would otherwise have gone unnoticed.  We saw an oriole this weekend and actually captured a couple good pics:



I have hijacked my husband's Canon Rebel SLR and am trying to learn how to use it in lieu of my point and shoot.  That's my new homeschool project!

Many thanks to our friends in NH, peregrine falcon fans, who I think inspired this bird frenzy!  Happy birding!!!

Saturday, May 5, 2012

springtime explorers

Sometimes I get really frustrated with the limitations of our living situation--no yard, apartment living, the down side of city life.  I believe so strongly in the importance of nature in childhood, and I want my children to grow up marveling at the natural world all around them, and to develop a deep connection to the living world.  They need to spend time outside--playing, exploring, wondering.  And while all this would be easier if we had a yard they had unlimited access to and lived in an area where they saw more trees than buildings, we work hard to accommodate our challenges, and I have to remind myself--I'm doing the best I can.

Looking back at these few snapshots from April remind me of this--and also make me feel like we are doing pretty well!

If I had influence with the good fairy who is supposed to preside over the christening of all children, I should ask that her gift to each child in the world be a sense of wonder so indestructible that it would last throughout life. - Rachel Carson
climbing trees

desperately seeking salamander egg sacs

newt or salamander?  Seven can tell you!

tadpoles and water bugs

creating our own ponds with modeling clay at Garden in the Woods

Wednesday, April 11, 2012

Springing forward!

We experienced some way too early spring weather, which was wonderful at the moment, but as we watched all the spring trees and bushes bloom far too soon, thoughts of climate change really hit home.  Once the temps returned to normal, most of the trees that bloom in April in May started turning brown, and we worry how summer fruit crops will fair this year.   After such a crummy winter, it's so depressing to see so much brown in spring...except for the adorable fuzzy brownness of newborn babies on the farm!

These pics are from a day we spent at a local farm: climbing trees, meeting newborn lambs and goats, and Four getting drenched under the chicken coop as the little snow there was melted on her head.



Tuesday, April 10, 2012

Maple Sugaring


I have always wanted to go maple sugaring, and Seven's nature class allowed us a wonderful opportunity to experience this away from crowds on the weekends, and at our own pace.  Four and I joined the group for this last session of Winter Nature Class at the wildlife sanctuary.  We learned so much about how to identify sugar maples, the process of extracting the sap, interesting facts, necessary weather conditions, and the best part was hanging out in the Sugar Shack!  The smell was so delish you could taste the air and we just wanted to stay there all day.  Seven turned to me and begged, "Can we have pancakes as soon as we get home?"  I could not resist, so after sampling the first batch of syrup for the season, we feasted on stacks of pancakes and REAL maple syrup--no more high fructose corn syrup imitation for us!

A special treat was seeing a Bluebird--they are so beautiful and look like tropical birds!--as we were walking about searching for sugar maples in the woods.  Wonderful day!

and experiments!

One of my favorite aspects of the Polar Study has been the variety of cool experiments we have conducted and recorded in our Polar Journals.  Antarctica is exclusively inhabited by scientists, so we have spent much time discussing what scientists do, how they do it, and why.  I love that Four and Seven are so curious and willing to participate in our science experiments--it has always been one of my favorite aspects of teaching--"playing scientist".  We have studied why salt water doesn't freeze, how to make frost, density and buoyancy, and ice--we have really studied ice, and it's been so fun!  I think whatever we study next, we will make a point of including an experimentation component!

Arctic Studies continued...

In a previous post, I wrote about our Arctic studies--including both polar regions.  W completed our Arctic mural by painting the Aurora Borealis and creating a numbered guide to all the animals and plants we included.  Our Polar Regions dictionary and the ample supply of reference books on both the Arctic circle and Antarctica provided great sources of info, and we were careful to only include region-appropriate life.  Since more animals live in the Arctic, Seven and Four agreed on that region for the mural as they were both most excited about making as many animals as they could.  You need to use your imagination a bit when viewing the animals, so the guide is very helpful!




Now that we are wrapping up our Polar studies, we are investigating other places in the world we'd like to know more about.  Looks like Beanie's vote is for Greenland!  

February Adventures

February's mild weather allowed us to get out and about quite a bit, which was loads of fun, but we were wishing for snow the whole time!  By Valentine's Day, we were ready to bag winter and say hello to spring!  Here are some highlights:

Chatting with the harbor seals at the aquarium

Four's best friend at the zoo...her jaguar

Seven scootering at the park

Valentine making at home

Happy Year of the Dragon 2012

I am quite fortunate to have had several students over the years who celebrated Chinese New Year, and shared their family's traditions with our class.  It's really an interesting celebration--the dragons, the fireworks, the costumes, music, and dances.  I was really excited to break out the old Chinese New Year box for our home school celebration of Year of the Dragon.




We spent the day cleaning the house, making decorations, and preparing a Chinese New Year feast with symbolic food and everything!  We even surprised Daddy with "fireworks" (flashlights and streamers) when he got home from work.  Good fortune for the year to come!

Wednesday, January 25, 2012

winter weather--finally!

We LOVE winter!!!!  And we have had our hot chocolate, marshmallows, and new popcorn maker ready to go, along with several "snow day only" special activities waiting, and it's been so warm, so rainy, so NOT winter-y!  But last weekend brought us enough of the white stuff to get out and shovel and wonder at the beauty of winter.

ghung-ghung was cold and forgot her parka (a clothing item modeled after animal blubber--a little Arctic info we learned!), so she snuggled safe and snug in Four's hood:)
             We filled our beach buckets with snow and created winter wonderlands in our jammies in the  
               living room.
It was interesting to see the differences in the ways Four played with the snow vs Seven's preferences.  Four needed her own space--her own bucket for her own "guys", which included moose, fairies, a gnome, bears, zebras, and a unicorn.  She carefully made blue footprints in the snow by dipping the animals' feet in food colored water and they walked around the snow.  Even though her bucket was MUCH smaller than Seven's, it was all hers, and that was more important.

I had set up a big, wide bucket with snow, ice cubes, and water made blue with food coloring, with the intention Four & Seven would share the space, but that didn't work out.  Seven was willing to share, but Four needed space.  Seven's play really reflected him--no nonsense, "real" inhabitants, non-fiction, serious business.





This polar play, with real snow, ice, and water is just so cool!  Seven played with this for ONE HOUR straight when we came in from shoveling. Four stopped for hot chocolate & popcorn after about 30 minutes, but returned to this play several times before bed.  And yes, you will often find odd things like a couple of huge buckets of snow and ice on any random day of the week, but, this is us. :)  And we have a lot of fun!

doing the work of scientists

Let the experimenting begin!  We are conducting a series of experiments over the next few weeks and recording them all in our Polar Journals.  Today we made frost.

Step 1: crush the ice

even Snow White joined in

Step 2: wet a piece of paper, place the can of crushed ice on top, and add salt

Step 3: mix and wait

While we waited for our frost to form, we worked on an Arctic habitat mural.  We've been reading a lot about both the arctic and antarctica and the different animals that inhabit both areas.  Seven and Four agreed they wanted to make the arctic because more animals live there.  We used some materials we got at a local recycle shop, foil, cotton balls, felt, etc to create an Arctic mural.  I'll post pics of the finished piece soon!

even Beanie helped!

about 20 minutes later.....FROST!!!!!!  very cool!