Bamboo Sprouts

 

Happy New Year!

Bella in her dance costume.

Sophie’s dance costume.  The skirt is magical…wait til you see! 

Her striped skirt turns into this big red circle skirt!  The red part is stuffed into the striped part in the above pic and during the dance, they magically pop it out into this big skirt.

So the dance starts out like this.  (sophie is standing in the middle of the photo, bun smack on top of her head and yes this is a hairdo change from the side pony tail posted above…)

And then turns into this.

It made for a pretty cool effect on stage.

Bella on stage.  (2nd from right side)

All three have attended Chinese school since they were two and three years old.  They only go once a week so it won’t be enough to make them fluent in Mandarin, but it has been a start and mostly we appreciate the influence of the teachers in our lives and the friendships that are formed there and the bits of cultural information that we get.  Sometimes there are boys in the dance classes (although I think there were not any this year) so a couple years ago, I asked about putting Levi in a dance class.  The director of the program told me that would not be culturally correct.  I appreciated her honesty about it and maybe they are telling more people that now instead of going ahead and allowing them to allow the boys to enroll.  I don’t know for sure about all that, but that is why Levi is not in dance as well.  Part of the reason we attend Chinese school is to learn what is culturally correct so we try to follow what they suggest when possible.  At the end, the whole school goes on stage and sings but Levi opted out this year so he just sat back and enjoyed the show. 

They brought in some great dragon dancers for the big show!

And a professional dancer from Beijing, who is also one of the dance teachers this year.

All the kiddos from all the classes.  Well except Levi.    Anyhow, I thought the show, celebrating the year of the dragon, was extra great this year. 

Happy New Year! 

A couple weeks ago we did a big switcharoo.  Seems like we JUST did this!  But last time we moved Levi down to his “man-cave” and really, it was just weird.  We have three bedrooms upstairs (one being the master), a fourth on the main level, and another one on the lower level and that move just put him too far from the rest of us.  Plus he was totally sure a fox was going to get into the dog run and come through the very tiny doggie door in the playroom and eat him.  Ha.  Anyhow, I finally worked up the energy and got him moved back up but this meant that the girls had to move back in together.  They are fine with this because they were always sneaking in to be together, but squishing two girly peeps into one pretty small room (and one closet!) was tricky.  And A LOT of work. 

So yeah, cozy but it is working.

And this used to be Bella’s purple palace but with some paint and Star Wars prints, it is now perfect for Levi.  And I think he is sleeping better without all that worrying about foxes.  Unfortunately, our guests will now be subjected to that problem. 

Actually just about everything.    Homeschooling is going better than ever…much to my relief!  We have made a couple of changes and now that we are a couple weeks into it, I can say, so far so good.

Our schedule.  I had this up on our pantry door when we homeschooled previously as well…but we didn’t really follow it.  Guess what!  Following a schedule works!    This is probably the biggest change.  Well not just following a schedule, but embracing a schedule.  Previously, I would just know what we needed to cover each day and to be honest, we sort of rushed through our work and finished as soon as possible.  I decided that this time around we would fill the time up.  We plan for 45 minutes of math a day so we work on math for 45 minutes a day.  Actually, sometimes we work into our free time because we are on such a roll!  Maybe history is a better example because we CAN do history in a few minutes some days…or we can take over an hour.  Just deciding to take at least an hour has allowed us to relax and really study the subjects better.  If we run out of planned work, I find more.  We read more, look up more info on the computer, find a coloring page and print them up…whatever.  I LOVE it.  I feel like we are learning so much more now AND enjoying it more.  It is taking way more time but we are so productive that it is totally worth it.

As for the schedule, the times are lightly penciled in because I wanted to be able to alter them as needed so you can’t clearly see them but here is the run down.  We spend (at least) 45 minutes on math and then take a 45 minute “break”.  This is like a morning recess.  If their chores and math are done, they can have computer time (we just added a nice bunch of educational “games”), play, read, etc.  Otherwise they use the time to catch up.  Then we do at least an hour and a half of language arts which includes our spelling, grammar, Latin and writing skills.  Then we have a lunch break for an hour.  We have our lunch, maybe do a bit more chores like switch the laundry around and clean up from lunch and if they are caught up, they can have free time.  After lunch we do history or science (or both if needed but generally history is 3 days a week and science is 2 days a week) for an hour and a half.  We LOVE history.    This week in history, lots of peeps got their heads cut off!  What is more exciting than that?  They couldn’t believe it.  Ha.  (we are in the mid 1600′s)  R and R is reading and rest time.  Everyone spends 1.5-2 hours a day in their rooms so we can all have some peace and quiet.  They read, play quietly and often take a little snooze during this time.  At 4 we are all back up and ready to start the evening.  School work is done and we are a no homework school.    Actually, that is up to them but so far they choose to get it all done during school hours even if that means working during some free times. 

It doesn’t look how I wanted it to look, but I moved this shelf into our school area (breakfast nook which has literally no wall space except this tiny 2 foot space) and it holds all the supplies we use daily.  The fact that it doesn’t look how I want it to look is part of embracing this decision fully and actually, I kind of like seeing the school clutter and am glad it has one place to be now.  I won’t complain if something better comes my way, but for now, this is good. 

The things we don’t use daily are stored in this cabinet.

Ok so this might be…over the top a bit…but I created these shirts on CafePr*ss and ordered them up and they are a huge hit.  So far they wear them at least a couple times a week and it makes me smile. 

And yes, the MaMa-Teacher has one too. 

The other good change I made is about me.  I have always showered and got myself ready for the day each morning, but sometimes I put it off an hour or two instead of just doing it as soon as I got up.  While they were in school, I had to be up and ready and have them ready every day by 7:20 so I decided to make a rule for myself that I would be ready for the day by 8am (which is when I wake them up).  This makes such a difference in how our day goes!  This way we are very ready to start our school day by 9am.

We are even finding some time for the extras that we hoped to get to.  Sophie and I made this stuffed kitty for her cousin’s birthday.  So far I have her doing the hand sewing but she is anxious to try the machine soon.  For this project she cut out the pattern, layed it out on the fabric and pinned it and cut that out, sewed the felt pieces on the face, stuffed the whole thing and hand sewed up some of  the pieces (I machine sewed the big body parts).

So yep, lots of things are working around here! 

One of the perks of homeschooling…you can go right ahead and wear the kooky and very tall animal hat you made during free time when it is time to return to the kitchen table for class.  No problem.  It isn’t even a distraction for the rest of us because we all know that is just who Bella Boo is.  :)

 

Turkey lives to see Christmas by Bella

Danger on Christmas by Bella

Bathing birds by Sophie

I thought her bathing birds were a masterpiece but they were made of plain ole playdough and in the end she told me to snap a picture so she could squish it back into the can to use again next time.