Lifestyle of Learning Volume 19

Aaahhhh...Sunday has arrived.

So we say farewell to the week that has just ended, this first week of the new academic year, and we recap how it is that we have chosen to live our lives for this week, the week of June1- June 8.

We checked on the goslings that we found at the park a couple of weeks back.

 We found that ours were grown and another little family has some kiddos that are almost there.  They are practically the size of their parents, their markings resemble an adult goose but their feathers lack their shininess of their parents.  They are so sweet.

We enjoyed the natural offerings around us.

We are particularly enjoying the glorious offerings of the magnolia tree down the street.

We are still watching the magnificent show 'North America'

and more MythBusters and FaceOff and so on and so forth.
There has also been reading.  Bishop is making progress on The Brotherband Chronicles and Maceo is working in World War Z.  Maceo also found this cool website that allows him access to movie scripts.  He depleted the ink in the printer by printing the script for Napoleon - a movie written by Kubrick, his favorite director, but never produced.  He has begun reading that as well.

Speaking of Kubrick, Maceo bookended his week with Kubrick movies.

The Moxie is doing a Stanley retrospective during the month of June.  Of course, Maceo is thrilled.  Last week he saw Dr. Strangelove and this week he saw 2001 A Space Odyssey on the big screen.  He even managed to talk some friends in to joining him to view 2001.  He is proud that he was able to introduce his friends to Kubrick.

There is still sketching going on here.

On a whim, I got Bishop the Boys Doodle book thinking that it might provide fodder for his sketching goal.  He really digs it!

I sent the boys on a dudeventure.
(They would hate that I just wrote that.  They scoff at my phrase but I find it much easier to say then guys day out or dude adventure.  Dudeventure is succinct and quirky - it works for me).

I sent them downtown for lunch at a Mexican restaurant and then a quick walk to the larger movie theater for a viewing of Iron Man 3.
They had a blast!

We had other adventures.
We took a day trip...

to the Ralph Foster Museum,

chuckling at first with the claim that it is 'The Smithsonian of the Ozarks"
but coming out a believer.

And we saw the Star School.

And we went in to Branson...

to score some lunch...

and some ice cream.

Another day we managed to celebrate summer at Lamberts.

We enjoyed the weather.  Whatever it chose to bring.  Whether it be fog...

or rain or sun.

And when it was sunny we worked outside building a basketball hoop, planting more flowers and mowing the yard (although that last job never seems to be done when we are getting as much rain as we are).  And when it was rainy we worked indoors rearranging the house.  Maceo now has his own bedroom.

Other business got taken care of as well.

The boys went to the dentist.  Maceo went to the barber.
And the Jeep went to the shop.

 I ended the week helping a friend prepare for her son's Eagle Scout Court of Honor.

Our week will begin with attending this special event.  We are so excited!

What a fantastically full week it has been.  We have accomplished so much and we have enjoyed life so very much.  Now we dive right in to another week of life and all of its grand adventures!

Trip to the Barbershop

In dealing with the hair on my boys heads it is usually cut by Dad if he is around and if he isn't than it has typically been allowed to grow.  The only exception being several months ago when Maceo allowed me to try my hand at cutting his hair.  I didn't do so well.  So for Maceo's most recent haircut, with Dad being unavailable and Mom not being very successful at this gig, we opted to go to the little barbershop on the corner.  This would be the first professional haircut that any of my boys have ever had.

So, this smattering of photos commemorates Maceo's first trip to the barbershop.

Lifestyle of Living Volume 18: An Ending of Sorts

We approach education in a free-flowing kind of way.

We believe that a thorough and satisfying education can be achieved by fully engaging in life and relationships; being curious, pursuing to our hearts content, challenging ourselves.

We tend to view schoolish things such as grade level and scope and sequence as arbitrary and restrictive.  We have sought to slough off those restrictions but those schoolish constructs still enter our lives.  Our state's homeschool laws require that within a school term (12 months or less) 1000 hours of instruction must take place, with 600 of these hours focusing on five core subjects.  This requirement means that we must establish a school term.  We have determined that our school term runs from June 1 of each year through May 31 of the following year.  At the conclusion of May 31 the boys may say that they are now in the next grade - they are always being asked what grade they are in.  We may view grade level as arbitrary and not really revealing much about the individual and what knowledge and skills they have attained but others find it to be very important and many community-based programs are based on grade level so we speak their language and have assigned the boys a grade level.  Today my boys are in a different grade then they were in yesterday despite the fact that their lifestyle of learning looks just the same and different as it did the days before.

Typically each volume of our lifestyle of learning would include the week beginning on Sunday and going through Saturday.  This volume will include Sunday, May 26 through Friday, May 31.
 This volume will share with you the final week of Bishop's sixth grade year and Maceo's seventh grade year.

And so I present the final lifestyle of learning for the academic year 2012-2013...

We began our week with the recognition of U.S. soldiers and their sacrifice for our nation

 and then we moved on to feasting, fun and family fellowship.

Bishop did our Memorial Day grilling

and spent some time in the kitchen making homemade ice cream, berry crumble and chicken marinade.  He is getting more and more comfortable selecting his own recipes and working autonomously in the kitchen.

We enjoyed some of our ripening mulberries in the form of muffins. Yum!

And the first creamsicles of the warmer months.

Bishop spent nearly six hours playing hard with good friends.

Bishop read The Brotherband Chronicles.  Maceo began World War Z and has downloaded the audio version of The Restaurant at the End of the Universe.  And there has been sketching.

We have watched storms roll in

and have survived those storms, a little wet and bedraggled but doing well.

We have toasted the end of a 'school' year and the beginning of another.

And just for the fun of it we take a look at Maceo on the final day of the term a year ago

next to a picture of him at our final day celebratory meal this year.

And do the same for Bishop; him celebrating a year ago...

and this years celebration.

Aaaahhh, good times together!
So, we wrap up another week and, in fact, wrap up another academic year.

And we acknowledge that these times of endings and beginnings, even relatively arbitrary ones, are to be embraced and viewed as beneficial for they allow us a time to reflect on where we have been and what we have done and help us focus on where we hope to go and what we hope to do.
So, now on to a new year of adventures in loving and learning!