week #12 -- end of Autumn Semester!

It's hard to believe that our Autumn Semester is over! Time just flew by. I got a lot of my goals for the semester accomplished: I established a formal movement circle and curriculum story time, which we did at least three mornings each week. We established a firm weekly rhythm, including outings and organized classes. There are few things I did not introduce that I thought I would -- weekly crafts being at the top of that list, so that is the first thing I will add to our Winter Curriculum. But the autumn weather was just SO wonderful this year, that it seemed a shame to spend more time indoors than necessary. The world was out there asking for exploration, and we went forth and explored! This photo is from this week's Friday Excursion to our favorite park.

This week began the 4-week homeschool classes Intersession. J is taking chorus (he taught his class our family meal blessing song during this week's class!) and is participating in an African Drum Circle. Here are the boys in the circle, with J's buddy T. sitting between them. Zoo Boy actually participated in the first half of the class, then suddenly burst into tears and said "but I only wanted to watch!" Silly kid! So he came and sat with me for the rest of class. He's been showing a lot of interest in J's classes lately and says that when he's 5, he'll take classes too. We'll see! Right now he'd rather spend his museum time chasing around with his two little buddies, M. and N. I'm guessing once they're old enough for classes, Zoo Boy will want to still be with them, and hence will agree to participate. That's how I got him to agree to watch the Drum Circle -- both of his friends were also in the circle. J really likes the Drum Circle and has been singing the chants all week.

In addition to the homeschool classes, J also took part in a class called "Fantastic Fish" at the museum, where he created a fish print and a magnetic fishing game, in addition to listening to stories about fish and doing some other fishy type activities. There was an opportunity to sample tuna fish also. (Funny aside, before class, the instructor asked all the parents if it was OK if the kids ate tuna. I told her if she managed to get him to eat tuna, I would buy her a really big, expensive Christmas gift!) Later that night, J told me that he did NOT try the tuna. Drats.

At home, the boys spent a lot of their free time setting up elaborate train track configurations and running their trains over them (non-motorized wooden Thomas Trains). It's funny, it's been at least a year since they've shown any real interest in the trains, not sure what motivated them to dig them out and play with them now.

This week's curriculum story was the Korean folk tale about the Tiger and the Persimmon (adapted by Enki Education to better meet the young child's needs). A tiger mistakenly thinks that a baby is more afraid of a dried persimmon (the tiger not knowing was a persimmon was) than a hungry tiger, and a thief mistakenly thinks the tiger is an ox and 'steals' it, making the tiger think it is caught by and will die at the hands of a dried persimmon. VERY funny tale, and it really captivated both of the kids. Our Special Storytime story at the fireside on Friday night was an Enki Education nature story about goose migration, entitled "The Mournful Goodbye". It was a long story, but both kids enjoyed it, particularly J who got quite involved with the story, flapping like a goose where appropriate and pretending he was the various animals that we met along the way. It's the first of two parts -- in this first part, Little Goose migrates south to a new home with her family. The second part is read in the spring, it's about Little Goose's return to her original home. This story was a perfect end to our autumn semester!

This week Zoo Boy surprised us by suddenly showing an interest in artwork! He found this little fuzzy poster and markers set amongst our various art supplies and asked me if he could do it. You betcha, I said! He spent quite a bit of time coloring in the picture and took quite a bit of pride in the work when he was finished (not completed, but a far cry from the quick scribble and "I'm done" that usually ends a foray into art for him). You'll note that his grip on that marker is pretty rudimentary -- this comes from an almost complete lack in any interest in writing or drawing to this point. I have no doubt that with practice this will come along, and I plan to work on some pre-writing/drawing activities with him this winter to strengthen that pencil grip. Also interesting, he's using his left hand here. He switched back and forth between both hands during this project. We've not noticed any sort of handedness preference from him yet, although he definitely has some tasks he prefers to do with one hand over the other (but both hands seem to be used equally). I've read that handedness usually become apparent when a child is around 3 yrs of age, so I'm wondering if Zoo Boy will be ambidextrous like his great-grandfather was. J is pretty capable with his left hand as well, but is dominantly right-handed, which has been obvious for several years.

And this is what greeted us this morning -- snow! For the second time this season, but this time I am officially declaring it Winter! I know, I know, the Winter Solstice isn't for another few weeks. But calendars be hanged, it's only about 10 degrees out there right now, and there's a winter storm warning posted for tomorrow afternoon -- it's WINTER I tell you!

This week's Family Storytime books were a good transition from Autumn to Winter: How Do Bears Sleep, by E.J. Bird; When The Wind Stops, by Charlotte Zolotow, illustrated by Stefano Vitale; and Home at Last -- A Song of Migration, by April Pulley Sayre, illustrated by Alix Berenzy (which probably would have been better to save until Spring, since it's mostly about Spring migration, but it gave me the opportunity to preview the fact that we'll be talking about migration again in the spring, and we were able to discuss where the animals came from -- their winter homes -- and how going to those homes was also migration, so it actually worked out well to use it now, especially in association with our Special Story this week.).