Self Study Update IV

The only area of my self schooling goals that I seem able to devote consistent daily time to of late is piano. Which is ok with me. Baby steps!

I have been trying to practice at least 30 minutes each day and to do more than just play through the hymn book or a Broadway book. I'm still working on the Debussy arabesque but I have added in a Clementi sonatina that I had been working on during my last round of formal lessons. I'm making myself focus on all that tedious stuff like phrasing and dynamics... I probably really do need a teacher again to hold me to this.

And all this daily practice has made a big improvment on my multi-octave scales. I can finally play both hands, 2 octaves, quickly with the correct fingering! Boring? Very much so but so satisfying to finally be getting better even just a teeny tiny bit.

Another thing that has helped is carrying my  music with me to school on days I have to stay late. I've been able to practice (and relax) a bit after the kids leave and before I head to my meetings.

In French news, I have a new goal. I'm trying to read the Louis Segond translation of the Bible. It is slow going but so interesting. I'm in Genesis (and probably will be for quite a while) but it is fascinating to go back and forth between the French and the KJV. I found this free audio online as well but the reader goes really fast for me. Parts of this feel like a tongue twister to me- bone of my bone en francais is beyond my pronunciation abilities at this point!

Genèse 2:23

Et l`homme dit: Voici cette fois celle qui est os de mes os et chair de ma chair! on l`appellera femme, parce qu`elle a été prise de l`homme.

I'm still working away at my Debussy piece which is making me happy because I'm starting to be able to play it at the appropriate tempo (at least in some parts). But then I pulled out my Sonata book from my last round of formal piano lessons which was about a year ago at this point. I am so irritated with myself because I can see exactly where I left off when I stopped working with my teacher and it's hard not to focus on the progress I could have made. I keep thinking someday I'll figure out the secret to getting myself on the piano bench everyday for an hour but that day has yet to come!

I am trying to be more focused in my practice this week. I've been reading a lot about keeping a practice journal as well as having goals, even simple ones, for each practice session. So I'm going to try that out and see what happens. I'm also going to add in some scales (which I've been skipping out on) and also actually work on (as opposed to glossing over the hard parts) of a piano arrangement of Blessed Assurance that I've been messing around with for the past month or so.

And here is why I love wasting time on youtube:
Debussy's Arabesque 1 on harp:


Which leads me down the path of wishing I could play the harp and all these lovely videos :)

Another Reason to Homeschool

I am not one of those homeschooling advocates who thinks that all public schools are beyond hope or that all families should homeschool. Far from it.

My school is small, family oriented, and academically strong. I don't know how I got so lucky to land here after college because I hear teacher friends in other school districts talk about their days and it leaves me in  state of shock and horror about what they have to deal with. I find the easiest way to describe my school is to say that I teach at the school Beaver Cleaver went to in the 50's somehow trapped in a time warp here in 2010.

That's not to say we don't have problems but for the most part our families are strong & intact, teachers are respected, classes are small, and there is a strong emphasis on basic academics enriched by the arts. We also have long standing traditions of boy and girl scouting at our school. I think the main reason my school has remained a place that Beaver would find familiar is our small, isolated community whose members donate an obscene amount of money to keep our programs afloat. In a way we're like a private/public school hybrid. The "suggested" donation at my school per child is $1,000 and that is not including "fees" for art supplies, field trips, class parties, assemblies, classroom supplies, book orders, book fairs, etc, etc, etc. So much for free public education, right?

That is me being wordy to say these families are paying out of pocket a ridiculous amount of money to have their kids in a sweltering, decrepit, classroom everyday with a teacher who is focused on the most unruly students and those who are struggling with serious learning issues. That is the harsh reality.

I try my best to support all my students but in the end I am just one person. No matter how much I try, how much I give, how much I pour myself into my classroom & my students if one of my 6 year olds decides to throw a grand, screaming tantrum (which happened today) or one decides to attack another (which also happened today), or someone throws up in the classroom (thankfully only a false alarm today), that is who my attention is going to turn to out of necessity and practicality. So much for that enriching lesson for my higher readers or the new math game I was going to introduce or honestly even just the extra, fun things I do with my kids (goodbye apple pies we had planned to bake). It all goes out the window in those moments.

If these children were in a homeschool environment each would receive the focused, attention he or she needs in a much more time efficient way. So much of the school day is learning procedures that don't matter for your academic outcomes later in life (lining up, assemblies, waiting for everyone else to quiet down, waiting while your teacher has to deal with another child's special circumstance, etc).

I really enjoy my job and find it fulfilling (most of the time) but I cannot imagine seeing my own future children in a classroom setting like the one I spend my days in. Some of my co-workers are admirable, caring teachers. Honestly, I know many of them do a better job than I do and I still wouldn't want my children in their classrooms. It doesn't matter to me how loving and talented the teacher is, the setting is still all wrong. Spending my days teaching in a classroom, it's funny to me that I still feel this way but if anything being a classroom teacher has just made my desire to homeschool even stronger than before I taught.

I think this is all coming out in my end of the day, end of the week stream of consciousness because we had such a rough week at school. I have never had so many children with serious behavioral issues (not to mention learning issues) in one class and as a result we are still focusing on learning routines & appropriate ways to act at school here at week 6.

I'm exhausted everyday. I have a headache everyday. My throat hurts everyday. My face hurts from trying to keep smiling. And I just feel sad for the 5 kids in my class who are ready to learn, who have lovely manners, and who spend a big part of their day at school waiting for their classmates to listen. It should not have to be that way.

And all I can think is that if they were at home things would be so different.

Self Study Update III

What a stressful week this has been! My root canal tooth has been acting up and I succumbed to my first illness of the school year. Sadly it didn't take too long for that to happen this time. I have high hopes for a completely healthy year someday. I guess I need more  vitamins and hand sanitizer! Because of all this I have made less progress this week than I had hoped for:

French:
I started the next chapter in my book when I realized that it begins with the irregular verbs that I know well (avoir, etre, aller) but I am still hoping to really improve my -ir verbs with the spelling changes.  I need to clear some space on my hard drive so I can download the verb drills I found last week.

Poetry:
What can I say, it's still in my pocket! ;)

Piano:
I've been playing this a lot lately, albeit much more slowly than in this video.



Nora and I went to a book signing a few weeks ago with a bunch of teen authors which was really fun. Someone asked the panel for writing advice and one bit has stuck with me. Margaret Stohl said that she works on the bic principle (butt in chair) and that a big part of writing is just forcing yourself to start and do it even if it is just for 15 minutes.

I'm trying to apply that to a lot of my endeavors as I feel myself getting stressed & tired from work every day. It is hard not to just collapse onto the sofa some days and rendezvous with my good friend JB Fletcher

I am telling myself I can play the piano for just 15 minutes or conjugate French verbs for 15 minutes or read a little bit of Who Killed Homer and I find once I start it's easier to go longer than the original 15 minutes.It's the getting started that is the biggest challenge for me.

Somehow giving myself permission to quit after 15 minutes is making a difference in my attitude. And I really do quit after 15 minutes sometimes. But I'm also trying to keep in mind some advice from Eat Pray Love: "you must be very polite with yourself when you are learning something new."

Self Study Update II

Last night was Back to School Night for the parents in my class which is always a huge production with so many things to get ready. Things went smoothly but I am relieved it is over! At this point the school year starts to flow a little bit smoother and I go back to feeling like I have some sort of a life outside of school. 

French:
I finished up the first chapter in my French verb book on schedule and realized that I am very rusty on anything but present tense regular -er verbs. I am not going to start the second chapter until I practice and review the other regular verb conjugations and get more comfortable with them. I started googling and found some great resources to focus on verbs:

I like this powerpoint about "boot verbs" a lot and plan to print it out to cut up as flash cards. But I am most excited about this website I found, frenchtoday.com . I want to order the French Verb Drills I and French Greetings & Politeness. I love that I could practice while I drive to work and I like that the instructor has placed the emphasis on pronunciation. Everything offered on her site looks like something I would like to try out.

More French Links:
Francais interactif

The French Workshop
This site made me so nostalgic for Madame Pantzer, my high school French teacher. I loved all the posters of Paris she had on her classroom walls and I used to think I would be a French teacher like her (that pesky issue of fluency pretty much stopped that plan!) and be decorating a French classroom someday. I do think some of these books would be helpful to me because they are so simple.

French Flash Cards

Poetry:
I haven't done much with my chosen poem other than carry it around all week in my own personal poem in your pocket celebration. But I know it's there and I'm taking baby steps. I have been pulling it out and reading it a few times throughout the day.

Back to School Update

It is week 3 of first grade with my new class and thankfully we are all starting to settle in. I knew I was winning them over when I heard one little boy whisper to another, "she is just so funny" (in a complimentary seven year old boy way, I promise!) and that has kept me going on the long, hot days. But I have to say, the temperature in my non air conditioned school is yet another reason to homeschool! My poor students have been so uncomfortably hot and sweaty. It is really challenging for them (and me) to want to keep working & learning when we're so miserable.

I do like my job a lot but I always forget how exhausting the start of a new school year is with getting to know all the new families and learning everybody's routine. Because of that, I am scaling back my self-study plans a bit for the fall which I am hoping will make them a bit more realistic and attainable for me.

French:
 My goal is to work through one chapter a week in Barron's French Verb Workbook. I'm also going to keep up my hodge podge Francophone music/magazine/movie intake as much as I can. I've been listening to Feist sing en francais a lot during my commute:




 Poetry/Memory Work:
I have very little experience memorizing poetry so I'm not sure how this will actually play out. But I think this is an appropriate selection given my recent pledge to stop buying books (at least until I make a significant dent in those I already own). And I have always loved Wordsworth so I'm going to give it a go.

"THE WORLD IS TOO MUCH WITH US; LATE AND SOON"

THE world is too much with us; late and soon,
          Getting and spending, we lay waste our powers:
          Little we see in Nature that is ours;
          We have given our hearts away, a sordid boon!
          The Sea that bares her bosom to the moon;
          The winds that will be howling at all hours,
          And are up-gathered now like sleeping flowers;
          For this, for everything, we are out of tune;
          It moves us not.--Great God! I'd rather be
          A Pagan suckled in a creed outworn;                         10
          So might I, standing on this pleasant lea,
          Have glimpses that would make me less forlorn;
          Have sight of Proteus rising from the sea;
          Or hear old Triton blow his wreathed horn.
                                                              1806.

One of my favorite moments at the end of last school year was when one of our volunteers, a retired teacher in her eighties recited "Daffodils" for the first graders, who were, surprisingly, quite a polite audience. And I've thought that would be another good poem to try to memorize. Maybe later this year. But I'm also being tempted to try to memorize this one which always makes me think of Bridget Jones in her boat with Daniel Cleaver!

Other than my French and poem memorization I'm going to keep myself free and see what happens as the fall unfolds. I've got Latin, Welsh, some math review, grammar, piano (mostly trying to be consistent with Hanon and scales amidst playing for fun in my living room cabaret act) and of course the books I'm in the middle of reading to pull from as well. I love making lists (for me, the fun seems to be in the list making not so much the checking off of items) so my original plans had formal goals for each area which just isn't realistic for my schedule right now.

It will be interesting to see if I actually stick to any of this!

Latin

There are way too many Latin programs out there for me to decide which is best. I only have personal experience with Wheelock and it was not a successful or happy experience. I have looked at Latina Christiana, Henle, Cambridge, Oxford, Latin is Fun, & Latin via Ovid. Tonight in my browsing I found some more:

Beginner's Latin from the National Archives
This free tutorial focuses on 1086-1773.

Latinum podcasts
I like that these videos focus on listening to Latin and on pronunciation. That was always something that confused me in the Latin class I took years ago at college. Well, actually quite a bit frustrated in that class frustrated me but that is probably best saved for another post.

http://www.linneyslatinclass.com/
I love that this site is specifically geared to homeschoolers and self-studiers (is that even a word?) I loved this even more when I saw a comment on amazon mentioning that the text used is available on google books. That sent me off to check it out immediately and now I have my own free and legal copy! I am excited to be able to start using this without having to order anything new.

Birds

I am in love with this post at Satori Smiles about bird watching with young children. So in love that I have forced my family to go to two different bird stores in the area during the past week or so. I have to confess that my main motivation in going to the stores was looking for these awesome stuffed birds with bird calls. I want them all!

I am going to use the information on that post to teach my first graders about birds this year and I am so excited to get started. I am planning to read one chapter from the Burgess Bird Book to my kids each week. I'm still playing around with different ideas: having the kids create bird journals, learning to draw birds, bird art, all the fun picture books that I clearly "need" to get the classroom library now. Especially this one:

I love the cover art! I think I got into this because of how well organized this post was and by realizing how many free resources there are out there that I could easily incorporate into my classroom. I also have a really cute tree that I am going to add each week's bird to as a display in the room. I have a lot more to think about and learn about on this topic. For now I'm getting myself organized by printing out the chapters of the Burgess book to put into a binder I can keep at school (I just love how my school blocks pretty much the entire internet so I'll have to print it at home) and deciding which books and other important resources (like adorable stuffed birds!) I need to buy.

More bird stuff:

 http://satorismiles.com/2010/03/17/birds-birds-birds/

http://satorismiles.com/2010/03/09/bird-journal/ 

 http://mentalmultivitamin.blogspot.com/2008/02/valentines.html
 I really like this valentine idea and am thinking of doing something similar for my students.

http://www.spoolsewing.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2008/06/birdpattern1-1.pdf
I just think this is cute... I want to have a flock like this mobile:

 

adorable photo (and link to bird pattern) from decor8blog.com

http://decor8blog.com/2009/05/15/a-delightful-swedish-home/

More French Resources

I love this site about French phonics. I don't know why it has never dawned on me that focusing on phonics would be helpful in my quest for fluency. You would think it would have since I spend so much time immersed in English phonics with my students at school. So I am interested to see if this helps me.

And then I looked up Jennie at ielanguages.com and found her post about French summer school materials which looks really helpful as well. I don't often look at Jennie's site but she is one of those people on the interent who I feel like I know just by virtue of how long I've been reading their blogs. Back when I used to daydream about teaching English in France she was my go to girl for practical information. And I need to find a daydream about getting to France for a longer season now that I'm too old to daydream about that program!

{photos credit to the internet at large.... i saved these so long ago that i don't know where i found them! let me know if they belong to you and i will credit or remove... they are just so pretty!}

Family Inspiration

I love how the internet gives you a little peek into other people's live that you wouldn't otherwise have. Simply Radiant is a blog I found awhile ago when I was googling something to do with children's literature and I was so impressed by the many fun ideas for family activities and traditions shared there. Here are a few of my favorites:

Valentine Exchange Party~
I love the idea of hosting an exchange and I really love all the cute valentines shown- so many would be great gift ideas for my fellow teachers. I'm horrible at throwing stuff like that together so I love seeing photos of so many fun ideas.

 And I love all these posts, "I want to be the kind of mother who...", there are so many great ideas collected there. I would add I want to be the kind of mother who takes cute pictures of her baby each month with the same stuffed toy to show growth.

I love finding blogs like this one: positive and inspiring!

French

This clip from Paris, Je t'aime always makes me feel a little sad. 16 years ago I took my first French class (that makes me feel so very aged!) and ever since then I have wanted, at times desperately, to visit Paris. I took French classes throughout middle school, high school, and college followed by brief attempts at adult education courses in the evenings more recently.

In the past year I've worked my way through half of this:

But I want to organize a more formal plan for my French studies and then, of course, actually follow through with it. In terms of travel, I seem to be stuck in an endless pattern of "maybe next year" but maybe I'll mean it this time.

Here are some other resources I'm thinking about working with:
More Grammar Review Books~
I bought both of these books in the last few months:

French in Action~

Thanks to my lovely sister we have all of the episodes & I do love watching Robert :)

Online listening & grammar programs/resources~

Listen to French
Carnegie Mellon OLI French courses

Watching more French films~

I need to get more of these into my netflix queue:

And I really want to buy these two:

French Newspapers, TV news, magazines~

I was sick of paying for and not reading the magazines I subscribed to, Point de Vue & Marie Claire Idees, but I have tons of back issues I could start reading. And I used to pick news articles to print out and read from Le Figaro and Le Monde as well. France 24 looks good for listening as well.

French books/audiotapes~

I ordered the first Claudine story in print and audio book from chapters in Canada last fall as well as Twilight in print & audio. I'm mixing my high brow and low brow here. And I wish I could find more French music that I like enough to play frequently.

Alliance Francaise or Community College~

I started taking a night conversation class a year ago but then got pneumonia and dropped out. See why being a public school teacher is a dangerous job? I need to try again. And I need to get brave enough to venture to the Alliance Francaise as well.

Subscribe to Champs-Elyssees~

I'e always been curious about this program but never curious enough to pay for it.

At some point (realistically when school is out in June) I want to make a cohesive plan and hopefully start making more progress.

Piano

Young member of the Larsson household does her piano practice while papa paints her, Carl Larsson

During the past few months my school has held rehearsals for a musical play in the music studio afterschool, pushing the piano teacher to my classroom to borrow my old spinet for her lessons. It has been an eye opener for me to eavesdrop on these first and second graders at their first piano lessons while I work in my classroom.  I've been hearing a lot of Beethoven's Ode to Joy done with 5 fingers, lots of C Major scales in 1 octave, and lots of "I promise I'll practice more next week". 

As a child, I loved taking piano lessons for about the first two years then I remember, not hating them, but not caring enough to practice either. Then there would be the stressful 5 minute drive to the piano teacher's house with a horribly guilty stomachache and my own fruitless promises to practice more. A year or so later the piano teacher moved away and my siblings and I wore my mom down with whining for no more piano.

Somewhere along the way as I got older I started to love to play the piano on my own. It was fun and relaxing. I loved to choose my own music. A lot of times that music was this:

Or this:

finished off with some of this:

By the time I was a teenager I was regretting ever giving up formal lessons because I had no knowledge of theory or ability to play more difficult pieces. Ever since then I have taken lessons here and there for a year or so at a time, always tapering off when life gets too busy. Which brings me to this:

Should you force your child to practice? I'm kind of inclined to say yes within certain boundaries. I've read a lot of advice on kids and piano (Munchkins & Music, Parents Magazine, and the Piano World message boards to name a few) and I'm leaning more towards the compulsory side. Obviously this would be taking into account an individual child's temperament and abilities but a lot of early music instruction really is boring, it is repetitive & tedious, it's the drudge work that isn't very fun. You can't play songs that sound like very much and nearly everyone would rather be outside playing.

Honestly, that's not so different than parts of learning to read or to do math... but hopefully your parents and teachers don't let you quit because it isn't fun 100% of the time. I think for me I would approach piano as another academic subject with certain expectations. I wouldn't want my kids to hate it (or to hate me!) but at the same time I've known people who were forced until a certain age (usually about 12 or 13) and by that point they didn't want to quit and it became their own choice. Part of the reason they kept with it is that after 6 or 7 years of lessons and diligent practice they could play interesting pieces that they truly enjoyed. And by "forced" I don't mean chained to the piano legs.

And of course there are ways to try to make practicing fun. I really liked the idea of a Family Concert Night with all family member performing what they had been working on throughout the week. Somewhere else I read about having your child record themselves playing to have a tangible way for them to hear the improvement. Practicing a certain element of a piece instead of practicing for a set amount of time seems like another good idea.

The big one for me is having kids realize that music isn't just about advancing to the next level or playing a more difficult piece. Playing the piano has brought me relaxation, peace, & enjoyment but it is also something that I use in my career (it definitely gave me an edge when I interviewed for teaching positions) and in my church life (as much as I get nervous it does feel good to be able to step in at the last moment to play the accompaniment for the hymns in church meetings).

But then I read this article and blog post and I have a whole new set of issues to stew about. That will have to be for another day because I am off to enjoy school teacher freedom (aka spring break!).

The Brain Drain in American Schools

I really liked reading this article "Creativity in Crisis: the 'Brain Drain' in American Schools". It's something I struggle with in my classroom. To be successful in a group setting my students have to learn to follow directions which leads to a lot of these types of projects which might make people cringe but I can tell you the kids really enjoy doing. I have found that my students like making something and seeing it "turn out" and actually look like something real. The problem is that when they start seeing projects like this they are less interested in doing their own art and are consistently wanting me to give them the "step by step". I like how this quote sums things up:

"Most adults, with our increasingly hectic schedules, assume that at least creativity is alive in our children when we send them off to drawing class or bassoon lessons. Yet most children’s time in the arts is spent either appreciating someone else’s art or learning the skill required to make the art, so that perhaps in the future one could be creative. This training sometimes leads to amazing technical skill. I have met more than a few children who can perfectly recreate a Dragonball-Z character or still-life bowl of fruit, but who struggle so to create an original character, story, technique, or idea."

And here is where homeschooling comes in the winner. If you didn't need to have a themed art project up in the hallways to make the principal and parents feel that things are on track you could absolutely let the children take the lead. That just isn't practical in a public school classroom setting. In my experience, teachers don't have the freedom to follow plans like the article outlines.

That being said even in a homeschool environment I do think there is a time and a place for children to have formal instruction in the arts as well. I just think that for young children their own artistic ideas should be at the forefront. In my classroom I try to strike a balance of both types of activities but I know it is not ideal. I loved this post from Wee Wonderfuls, showing the "dot a dots" her son made in school that she converted into a purse. That is awesome!

"Creativity requires teachers and students to put aside the textbooks and prescribed curricula and authentically engage children in learning." 

Sir Ken Robinson on creativity

About Me

I am a first grade teacher at a great public school in California. I've been interested in homeschooling since 1999 when I first heard about The Well Trained Mind. I am a life long lover of books and of foreign languages so Susan Wise Bauer's ideas struck a chord with me.

I attended public school experiencing the best (my excellent high school French teacher), the average (elementary school), and the worst (living out this book while struggling through new math, no science or art, and pathetic attempts at history and literature) of what they have to offer.

I hope to homeschool my own children someday and in the mean time I feel like I'm playing catch up homeschooling myself. This blog is where I gather resources, ideas, and my thoughts on teaching,learning, and families.