Thanksgiving has come and gone, with all of the accessory intensity that holidays and get-togethers always have. The Sunchild's Nanny & Gramps (my mom, and my grandfather) came to celebrate the holiday with us. The Sunchild's uncle also came to the festivities, accompanied by his roommate. We had a wonderful, though brief visit, and a good time was had by all.

The Sunchild and his uncle spent a couple of hours playing with the Magic, the Gathering decks that I have had kicking around. They were given to me by a friend of mine, back when I lived in Santa Fe, upon my admission that I had indeed often spent long evenings playing Magic in my past. It took until Steve's visit, though, for them to find their way into willing hands. Now the Sunchild is very excited to play, and I am hoping that I remember how!

We had the truck yesterday, and so went out & about on various adventures. We had a nice lengthy library visit, and restocked our media supplies with new material. The Sunchild asked the librarian if she had any Lego books, and she came up with The Ultimate Lego Book, which is really quite amazing. There are pictures and descriptions of the models made for the LegoLand themeparks, including a reproduction of Mt. Rushmore, the Empire State Building, and Grand Central Station.

This has inspired us to go to Cap Toys, in Chesterland, and see the models there. We also learned that this little store, run by a toy train hobbiest, is a great place to buy individual pieces. We went in order to see if they had Lego separator tools (they did), and left with Buckbeak, and a bagful of scorpions. Today, we re-sorted his collection once more, so that he can move on to more ambitious projects.

"I took something from Nature. Now I want to give something back to Nature." - the Sunchild, gathering seeds together.

The Sunchild gets in touch with both his Viking & his Pirate roots.



Isn't he fierce? 

I was at work all day today, while the guys whiled away the day working wood and whatnot. They took another trip to Western Reserve Hardwoods, and picked up some wood for Papa's guitar. The Sunchild is working on a wooden robot, for which the first part he has crafted is a battle-ax. He is hoping to get more wood for his project soon. It is fun to watch the two of them crafting away on the kitchen table. Who knew apartment living could be so much fun?

After a while, the glue was deemed to be dry, and his clamps were removed. All seemed well & sturdy, and so the Sunchild put his new creation through it's paces.

"It's easy to complicate things, but not easy to do something that is complicated." an observation by the Sunchild...

I asked the Sunchild if he would read me "If You Give a Pig a Pancake" this morning, and he was more than happy to oblige. I read about every third page, and he read me the rest. It is neat to see his reading skills getting better all the time.

Shortly afterwards, we made a trip to the toy store. He had decided to spend some of his allowance on some new Bionicle Rahaga. We also revamped the play area in the last few days, and he has a large number of Lego projects on display. He wants to take some pictures of his best ones, so that we can post them at Lego Club, and perhaps even enter a contest.

We finished the first Bionicle book today. I like having a better understanding of this gameworld that he is hanging out in. It reminds me of my role-playing days, back in my 20s, when my friends and I would spend hours creating fantastic, mythological, multi-author realms, and having adventures within. It is also a good focus in our current unschooling adventure. I know he is learning all sorts of interesting things about engineering: levers, pulleys, gears & gear-ratios, articulations (yes, he is the son of an anatomy geek), structural stability, and so on. He loves when I read the books to him, adding a literacy element as well.

Meanwhile, I print things out from the Net that I feel he might enjoy, and sometimes he does, and sometimes he doesn't. Sometimes, it takes a while, and he finds interest in something from a ways back.

I have to keep in mind the dimensions of this learning, and that there is plenty of time to cover things like timelines, and science experiments, and whatnot. These days, the kitchen is our laboratory, we get history and culture through stories. He loves number play, and we engage in it spontaneously throughout the day. We read a whole lot, and he is starting to be part of those who read aloud. I think he was inspired by his friend Daniel the other day, who read him 2 Dr. Suess books during their playdate. He picks up the pen when he has something to write. He practices woodwork with his Papa.

There is a whole lotta learning going on.

We have discovered Sudoku in our home. I went to my friend's house last night (the one who got me hooked!) and she showed me some ways to make the solving of the puzzle more orderly. I have been playing the computer version for the last few days, and am beginning to get the hang of it. Today, I printed out a few, and did them on paper with the Sunchild. He really enjoyed the process of elimination, and applying logic to the puzzle. He is currently designing his own Sudoku puzzle- he thought it would be neat to make one which has colors instead of numbers as the pattern element.

We finished Goblet of Fire this evening. We jammed through the last few chapters in the rush to learn all of the things that were being revealed. The excitement is mounting for the release of the movie.

And I am glad I can read something else for a change of pace :)

The Sunchild & I had a fun morning yesterday. We snuggled & cuddled & hung out in his top bunk, playing with his stuffed animals, and just having a grand silly giggly time. He even decided on a name for a boy doll (Harry) that I found for him ages & ages ago, which at the time, he insisted that he would never, ever play with.

Unfortunately, I couldn't leave well enough alone. Somewhere along the line, I started feeling anxious about our lack of 'real' work. My mother is coming to visit soon, and once again, I am feeling a bit of internal pressure to prove that this homeschool adventure is the best way for the Sunchild to learn. Lately, we have done very little of the kind of work which leaves a paper trail. I know that Kindergarteners countrywide are bringing home masses of papers each week, proving just how much they are learning. Of course, I know that it is quality, not quantity, that counts. Yet, in the process of daily living, it can be hard to hold on to that idea.

So after lunch, I tried to interest the Sunchild in all sorts of 'educational' activities. We did play with money counting for a while, which he did enjoy. I also brought out a puzzle for us to do. He thought he wanted to do it with me, but after a while, I realized that I was the only one putting the pieces together, and left the project table in a huff. Ironically, he is currently sitting quietly at the table, and finishing it up. It just is another bit of evidence that force doesn't work, and that interest is what catalyzes learning, not pressure.

What he did want to do yesterday, was work with his Legos. His creations are getting more elaborate, and are including more moving parts. We are still working on integrating his need for workspace with my need for order. I think that the art of Compromise will probably be a big part of this lesson for both of us.

This morning, during our daily morning gigglecuddle, we started playing with numbers, and working with addition patterns. I asked him to add various numbers to ten, and surprised him by asking him what 15 and 10 made. He said he didn't know, so I asked him what plus 10 makes 15. He said 5. So I pointed out that the question could be looked at as 10+10+5, which he answered correctly. In fact, he thought it was pretty cool, and kept asking for more & harder questions. We ended up at 110+110, which he worked out, with a bit of prompting... but his tendency is still to think of 2 100s as 102, so we need to work with some manipulatives to concretize the idea. But this time, I am going to work a lot harder to control my impatience, and wait for the moment when his interest is ripe.

He just finished the puzzle, all by himself.

Yesterday was another mad story day. We finally finished The Silver Chair by C.S. Lewis, which was rather enjoyable. I would often stop, and see how the Sunchild's critical thinking skills were processing the story. It was fun to ask him what he thought would happen next, and to see what sort of details he would remember from previous chapters.

He is still very much into the audio-books, as well. We have borrowed several from the library, and the current favorite is one read by Jim Weiss, called Tell Me a Story: A Treasury of Classics. Whenever it is time to work in the kitchen, I can count on the Sunchild to go and find the CD player, and get the stories happening. The added benefit for me is that it is no longer a struggle to get him to take part in cooking & cleaning!

After finishing the Narnia book yesterday, we began Tale of the Toa, which I borrowed from the library. We have only read 4 chapters, but I am convinced that all of the unschoolers that I have been reading are correct. The Sunchild is very interested in Bionicles these days. Some days, I struggle with the commercialism of his chosen fad, but most of the time I can honor his choice.. Since he is so intensely interested in them, I thought that adding a reading dimension to his Bionicle play could be very appropriate. So far, he has been sitting right next to me while I read, and will read words & sentences that I point out to him. His interest is already captured, and he wants to know what the words on the page say.

We have reached Chapter 29 of the Goblet of Fire. Only 9 more chapters to go. The first 2 tasks have been completed, and many things are beginning to come clear.

I am glad that I have read this book before, at I feel rather at ease with the characters, and very much enjoy reading it aloud to my family. The upcoming release of the movie (November 18th, in case you were wondering) gives us a time goal, and I am certain that we will be able to finish the book before the movie comes out. I look forward to seeing it in the theatre with the Sunchild. It will be our first movie out together. I know that it will be pretty intense, and we have been discussing which parts we expect will be the scariest. I don't think that this one will be as frightening as Prisoner of Azkaban was, though. The story line isn't as dark.

The Sunchild and I have really been enjoying our story-based approach to learning, these days. We experience stories (books, audiobooks, movies) and discuss them throughout the day. It is interesting to watch which pieces of what stories come back up for further discussion. Sometimes, I hear him re-telling parts of the stories aloud. Other times, he makes up his own stories, which is something I have not heard him do much before now. It seems as if he is getting a 'feel' for the whole artform of stories, and continuity and rhythm & flow.

We went to the Cleveland Zoo today, with our friends from Chesterland. It was a spur of the moment sort of adventure, and we had a wonderful time.

The Sunchild's favorite exhibit was the Sea Creatures. He liked the sharks a whole lot, because they had the biggest tank. There was one shark who was 'floating and sleeping' and that fascinated him.

He also liked the Giraffes and the Snow Leopard. One of the highlights of the day was using the 'penny-squisher' which had gears and levers and turned pennies into little souveniers. Of course, once he made one, all of the kids wanted to do it. It took some effort, but the gearworks inside were visible, and turning the crank to achieve a result made all of the kids happy.

Inside of the Wolf House, we saw a Bald Eagle and a cutaway view of a pond. The Sunchild also got to operate a remote camera with a TV output, that was controlled by joystick. He never did find the wolves that way, but he had a lot of fun, all the same.

When we told Papa about our adventures, he said that he would like to go. So we hope to return, and see more of the exhibits on our next visit.

We have been busy lately, with a little bit of this and a little bit of that. I found some 100 piece puzzles at Marc's recently, and we have been having fun doing them while listening to Irish folktales. The Sunchild especially enjoys the tale of Finn MacCoul, and how his clever wife Oona helped him to trick the giant Cuculain, and so, avoided a fight. I try very hard to do as little of the puzzles as possible, and watch his thought processes as he searches for the next piece. This is the perfect size for him, and I mostly help with the edge, and then sit back and watch him go to work.

We have been doing quite a bit of baking lately too. He enjoys measuring out the ingredients, and mixing them up. The best part, though, is when you get to play with the dough! We have recently made pesto pizza bread, rice pudding, virginia spoonbread, and homemade biscuits to go with sausage and gravy.

We made an assortment of different paper airplanes yesterday. It was a nice day out, so we took one to the playground to see how it flew in the wind & wide open spaces. Sometimes, we were able to make it do loop-de-loops.

Yesterday evening, and continuing into today, the Sunchild has been especially keen to work the Play-Dough. He is currently working on making 'candy'. It is very interesting to watch how he can be thoroughly bored with something, and then, after it has been hidden away long enough, he is once again able to look at it with fresh eyes.