If You Want Something Done Right...

If you want something done right, do it yourself; and by all means, don’t let your ex get his hands on it. As you may have read, our first week of lessons went swimmingly, and our second week happened to be the week their dad was planning to be in town. Now, after a week away from home, we’re starting over on things I thought we had figured out.

We’ve had to put lessons on hold so I can put my full attention and (limited) energy toward reteaching the household rules as well as personal responsibility and hygiene. The attitudes around here have become resistant and defiant enough that it has been difficult even to convince myself to TRY structured lessons. Not to mention, I certainly don’t want to further distract them from their potty responsibilities, since their attention to their bodily needs has become... lax.

It has only been one week since they returned from their visit, at this point. We have already made huge improvements. It was just very upsetting to me and to our routine to be put in this situation.

Additionally, the home school planner came back to me reflecting only two, half-hour lessons for each of my daughters for the entire week that they were away. While I recognize that their dad would probably like for his visits to be like vacations, I did inform him in advance that it wouldn’t be possible, considering the hours we need to squeeze in. It’s also not terribly difficult to teach them because they think it’s fun.

On the upside, I got divorce paperwork filled out, reviewed by a lawyer, printed, signed and notarized last week. Now I’m just waiting for a copy of our marriage license to be returned to me in the mail so I can file. Unfortunately, divorce only solves some of our problems. I’m also going to need to learn to make demands and get him to give our kids what they need (and I’m not even talking about college funds or cars).

This Book Doesn’t Work

Last November, I did my first black Friday, doorbusters shopping spree. I managed to avoid it, despite having children, for years and I was curious what all of those other people were raving (or ranting) about. I only went to Target. They had a great deal on a huge, flat-screen TV that I successfully bought for my partner.

I also bought Leapfrog toys. Specifically, I picked up two Tag pens and a Tag Junior pen and a few books to go with them. My mom also bought some books to go along with the bundle when she found out.

I loved the idea of my kids being able to explore stories with a pen to help them sound out the words. I imagined them learning to love the colorful and interesting stories written on pages, and I thought it might be a helpful back up for ultimately teaching them to read. But that’s not what happened.

Now, when people started complaining that Baby Einstein was failing to turn out smarter kids, I was one of the first to raise my hand and say, “maybe you’re doing it wrong.” After all, it seems ridiculous and counterproductive to me to sit your kid down with a DVD and expect great things to happen. Maybe it would work, mixed in with active parenting. I don’t know, though. I’ve never tried Baby Einstein with my kids and I certainly don’t know what all of the Baby Einstein parents were doing.

But I did buy this Leapfrog stuff, and now I’m thinking about taking it all away.

I’ve been turning the idea over in my head for a couple of months. Then, this week, my five-year-old came to me with a board book that was not compatible with the Tag system, “brown bear brown bear what do you see” and said, “this book doesn’t work.” That really made me think about what’s happening.

We read them a story almost every night (unless it’s especially late and they need to get to sleep asap), and sometimes in the middle of the day. We have classroom learning books called “Bob Books” that we help them read on their own. And, many times, when they want to know what something says, we help them sound it out instead of just telling them. But, recently, I’ve noticed that my strongest reader gives up when I say, “let’s find out”. She doesn’t want to know what that word says if it’s not going to be handed to her. And they certainly aren’t going to try to read a boring book if they can have one read to them.

I don’t like this attitude at all. My kids shouldn’t think that a book is broken because it doesn’t read itself. I know that parents want to get the new, popular toys for their kids, especially if it seems educational, but this one is unconvincing for me. Maybe I’m not doing it right.

When it comes to educational programming, we have DVDs of Signing Time and Sid the Science Kid. We watch Wild Kratts, and Nova. But it’s easy for me to watch with them (or watch over the bar while I’m cooking) at least enough to be able to talk about it and make sure they’re learning something. Maybe that’s the key for these reading pens, too. Maybe they need assistance and supervision and I shouldn’t have just given them the books and the pens to play with at their own leisure. But I did, and now I’m thinking I need to pack them up and remind my kids that books that don’t read themselves to you are wonderful.

Dinosaurs - Week 1

Our first week of homeschooling was a success. The girls are very interested in their lessons, and always asking to do a worksheet from their folders. As a pleasant addition, I’m finding that spending constructive time with them on lessons is making all of us more agreeable, and keeping track of their work and time spent learning has made me feel much more productive at home.

C is very focused and can work on the same task for half an hour at a time with no trouble (much more if it’s coloring or painting). She shocked me with her vocabulary of sight words on Tuesday, when we read Bob Books before bed.

S is a little more chaotic, though not at all abnormal for her age. She can focus for 10 to 15 minutes at a time on things that frustrate her, like math worksheets. She’s hit or miss as far as whether or not she wants to color for more than 15 minutes at a time, but if I’m verbally explaining something she’s interested in, she’ll listen for almost an hour. She even remembers what I say, in pieces. Her sight words vocabulary is only just beginning, but she can sound out everything with impressive accuracy.

This week, we covered some reading and writing and quite a bit of math. We did some form of art every day, and covered science topics such as how a compass works, how babies are born, and dinosaurs. If you read my previous post, you know we also watched some of President Clinton’s DNC speech and discussed government.

On Saturday, we went to the Denver Museum of Nature and Science and checked out the dinosaurs as a field trip. Sunday, we made “fossils” with clay.

All in all, though, we only averaged a little less than 3 hours of recordable education per day. Colorado requires that we average 4, once we start reporting our progress next year. Does this get easier?

It’s not that educating my kids is hard. I’m really enjoying that, actually. I’m just not sure where I’m going to pull more hours from. Maybe when they say “instructional contact hours”, they mean something less restrictive than I’m assuming. After all, public schools get to include lunch and recess. 

Government Overload

Day 3 of our first year of lessons just happened to be day 2 of the Democratic National Convention. Just to get this out of the way, I wouldn’t say I’m an Obama supporter, but I would say I’m not a Romney supporter. So I was watching a video of President Clinton’s DNC speech on my laptop at the dining room table.

Watching Youtube in my house, by the way, is like emptying a jar of honey a few inches from an ant hill. Even if they have no idea what the video is about; even if the subject is way beyond their understanding, they come running. Only recently did they figure out how to tell the difference, from audio alone, between things I’m watching deliberately, and ads.

This video of President Clinton’s speech was about 50 minutes long. It took us a whole hour to watch the half of the thing (about 26 minutes of video). This is not taking into account breaks for lunch and nap time. I think I spent about as much time pausing and explaining what he was saying as we spent actually watching the video.

There’s only so much I can explain to a five-year-old whose deepest knowledge of the government up to this point was that we have a president. But President Clinton is a good, plain speaker who makes it possible for my kids to understand what he is saying well enough that they can form questions about the material. So, that was a good start.

We talked about elections and reelections, vice presidents and succession if the president dies, and why we don’t just keep one president forever. They asked about taxes and domestic policies and what the health care problem is. There was, finally, a discussion about party politics, in the sense that we have several, but have historically always elected from one of two. I didn’t try to hard to explain the difference between Democrats and Republicans in the grand scheme, only that Obama is a Democrat and his policies are... and Romney is a Republican and his policies are...

They asked, much to my distaste, what the “big mess” was that Obama was trying to fix. We talked about the debt and unemployment, even though it made me uncomfortable because it was hard to sound neutral.

This is not a good election year for me to pretend neutrality, I must say.

There were other, less political questions: Have any girls been president? Could you (referring to me) be president? What would happen to us (referring to themselves) if you were president?

(Not) Back to School

 

It's the beginning of the week, and we're just getting started. I have no idea how this will go or what we'll accomplish this week. I don't even know what to expect or plan.

Labor Day was fun. We had two picnics (one for lunch and one for dinner) at two different parks the girls had never been to. Denver has an incredible number of parks, really. Sunday, they made brownies, with my guidance, and we had those for dessert on Monday. We brought flashlights and stayed out late at the second park. Inexplicably, there were huge fireworks we could see from the park, also. This morning, everyone was still asleep when I opened their door to announce breakfast at 8.

Today, we start lessons, but they’ve been learning every day of their lives. Yesterday, we gave them their first lesson on the cardinal directions and how to use a compass, which I didn’t learn until fifth grade (is that even normal?)

I’ve been telling them, “On Tuesday, we start lessons” or, “next week, we’ll start lessons” because I didn’t want to confuse them with the word “school”. Last night, my partner used the ‘S’ word and got just the response I figured I would get, “AT school?!”

My five-year-olds were excited to go to school. Six months ago I wasn’t planning on homeschooling them, so they’ve always assumed they would go to school with other kids when they were old enough. They only recently learned otherwise, and what homeschooling would mean. Of course, we’re looking into sports teams, community center art classes, and other group activities so they can still get the parent-free, mingle-with-other-kids time they were so thrilled about. Besides, they’re very excited about learning at home.

Today, I think we’ll try to get in some math, reading, and writing. Of course, we’ll see what they’re capable of, right out of the gate and I’ll teach them whatever they want to know about. Between me and the oracle of the internet, we know everything.
 

A Day In The Life

We have a schedule... sort of.

If the kids aren’t already up by 7:45, I get them up because they absolutely must file through our single bathroom one-by-one before breakfast, which is at (or near) 8:00. Breakfast is usually just cereal. I’ve tried other things, but 8:00 am is not a good time for me to hear “I don’t like it” after I’ve just made applesauce pancakes, so I stick with what’s safe.

I try to have the dogs fed by 10:00 because I have to have lunch ready by 11:00. A result of feeding them cereal for breakfast: they’re hungry for lunch. The twins usually finish their lunch in 30 minutes or less, while the youngest sometimes takes over an hour. My favorite thing to make for lunch is turkey and cheese wrapped in crescent roll dough. They love it, and it’s fun. And I try to always offer a side of fruit. Of course, they also like corn dogs, mac and cheese, and pizza, but those things make me feel guilty, so I try to limit them.

Nap time is from 1:00 to 3:00, with some flexibility. It is required that they clean their room before they nap, so I assess the damage at around 12:00 to determine if the clean up will be a half or whole hour-long project. I also generally have to spend most of clean-up time in their room with them, keeping them on track and reminding the two-year-old where things go. But I don’t physically help.

The twins will soon be ditching naps, except on days when they've exhausted themselves in the morning. So, we'll probably utilize that time for more lessons.

Between 3:00 and 4:00, I take my dog out.

Lately, my partner has been on the “late” shift. He works for the school district, though, so that amounts to 8:00am to 4:00pm. The office is downtown, so he gets home between 4:30 and 4:45.

Dinner is as close to 6:00 as possible, and limited to 45 minutes. Our current favorite dinner food is tortilla soup.

After dinner, we fit in a bath, a second clean-up session, brushing teeth, and a story.

Bedtime is at 9:00.

It looks like this:

Click image to see larger version

I’m so glad that it counts as education when my kids ask me questions over dinner, or when they ask me to explain what something is during story time. Additionally, we manage to fit in math practice after dinner, to earn gummy bears or jelly beans for dessert. Still, sometimes I have to interrupt their play time to work with them on something. Otherwise, I’m not sure how I’d fit the required 4 hours (on average) into each day.

This post linked to iHomeschool's  *Not* back to homeschool blog hop

Planners

I mentioned in my previous blog that I printed a planner. I spent one whole day on the process, which involved finding forms that worked for me, printing, copying, and filling out the pages, and putting the planner together. Granted, this would not have have taken nearly so long if I didn’t have many other obligations, but we’re working with whatever free time we can find, here.

To me, it’s a masterpiece. To anyone else, it’s a pinkish-purple binder full of paper. And, really, who uses binders? But I keep looking at it and thumbing through it with pride.

You can buy lesson planners. Book stores have them, or you can buy them online. There are lots of options on Amazon. That might work for you if you are a flexible person who doesn’t mind having to bend a bit to conform to the styling set out in a pre-printed book. Also, if you can make the time to review a few different versions and find the right one for you. I make that sound bad, but that’s only because I’m not that person.

If you’re not at all flexible, you can make your own. If you know how to use Excel (or something similar) or tables in Word, or any of a number of Adobe programs (I bet InDesign would be fun for this), you could organize and style your own planners from scratch. That, though, requires some time.

For those of us in between, there are great resources online. I want to be able to pick what kind of pages I include in my planner, how many, and how I organize them in my binder. I have most of a design degree, so I do know how to do this on my own, but I don’t really have time. So I’ll sacrifice a little personalization for the sake of being able to put it together in one day and no longer having to think about it.

I got my planner pages at http://donnayoung.org/forms/. This site has a short list of different sets available. Then, if you click on a set you like, then click “homeschool”, you can see the different pages available for that set. For instance, in the set I chose (Colonial, because I’m a sucker for script), you can choose from 9 different layouts for your planner, depending on what works for you.

My planner includes an attendance calendar, two sets of lesson plan pages (one for each kid, since one will have speech therapy and the other will not), and two reading lists. This year, it’s fairly simple. We’re not grading because I don’t have to report grades to the district yet. However, when that changes, there are grading tables available, too. And if I need more copies of, for instance, the reading list, I can just copy a blank page and not have to fill it out again. This works for me.

I’m pretty sure I’m not being biased at all when I say the planner I created is concise and easy to use. I have a dream in which I imagine family members being able to substitute teach and fill out the planner for me while the kids are on vacation with them. For some, though, that might be unrealistic.

As mentioned in the previous post, I’m currently compiling a list of resources I use for our lessons, as well as free/cheap field trip (or just for fun) destinations for families in Denver. If you have any suggestions for either list, let me know. I can always use more information.

Curriculum

A page from our headstart agenda

I’m noticing the topic of conversation this week among homeschoolers has been curriculum. And since the conventional school year is about to begin (some schools here started this Wednesday), a hot topic is how to save money on your materials. For those of you who don’t homeschool but read this anyway, imagine back-to-school shopping, but include all of the stuff the school provides, too. Keep in mind, the state doesn’t consider us part of its budget, so we have to find our own resources like textbooks and chemistry sets.

My kids are young. We did some head-start work through spring and summer, and we’re starting our first full year of lessons this fall. So, textbooks aren’t a concern yet. Instead, we need workbooks, for which I can mostly find free, printable versions. And there is no strict curriculum, yet. We have lessons, but they’re usually dictated by what my kids are interested in learning that day, and are generally kept pretty short, so they don’t lose focus.

This year, I plan to cover the following topics:

Reading: We started on this in our head-start period. We will spend more time working on it this year, and we’ll probably be spending an increasing amount of time at the library. We have a lot of books, here. Really, I barely have space for them all. But I think exposure to the library is positive.

Writing: We also worked on this in the last several months, as you may have gathered from my last blog. They’re getting fairly good at it, but still require reference sheets to get each letter right and need practice. I also thing reading and writing go hand-in-hand and I would like for them to start writing words by the end of the term.

Basic Math: Some work has been done on this already. They’ve established the method of double-digit counting, and know the concepts of addition, subtraction, and multiplication. But, here again, practice. We use Khan Academy quite a bit, and I’m thinking about incorporating “bedtime math” to see if I can foster more interest. 
http://khanacademy.org
http://bedtimemathproblem.org/

Science: We will mostly be focusing on the visible, physical world. There are a lot of great resources for this, which is good because my kids’ interests are varied. I’m thinking we’ll have one structured and pre-planned science lesson per week, and anything else they feel like bringing up will be taken seriously and explored. This is a category we never seem to have a shortage of inspiration for. http://scienceforpreschoolers.com/

Culture: This year, I want to start talking about religion. We are not a religious family, but I want the kids to understand and appreciate religion, and be able to make their own (educated) decisions about it in the future. I’d also like to talk about the role of girls (since I have all daughters) throughout the world. And, since we’re here in America, we’ll talk about the history of our country and how it came to have the culture it does.

Sign Language: This one has been running its course for years, now. I started teaching them their alphabet with sign language so they could break up the “LMNOP” segment, visually. We’ve been using Signing Time, and I want to expand on this by taking some courses, myself. If I manage to go back to school part-time this year, it will probably be for this. http://www.signingtime.com/

Art: I’m not sure if this one counts. I don’t so much “teach” it. Mostly, I let them draw and color because, even if they don’t end up caring at all about art, and even if they can never draw anything more exciting than stick figures, it’s great practice for motor skills and not structured like writing practice. I consider it part of the curriculum because it needs devoted time, because it’s important. http://www.kiwicrates.com

Speech Therapy: One of the twins has a bit of a speech problem. I believe it's a tongue thrust problem, but we'll have to have it assessed. Then, I plan to work speech therapy into our structured time at home.

An important note: My homeschoolers are five-years-old. According to the state of Colorado, it is not required for them to enrolled in school at all for one more year. This means I don’t have to subject them to standardized testing yet. I also don’t have to take attendance, tabulate grades, or submit an official curriculum to a district school. http://www.cde.state.co.us/choice/homeschool_law.asp

However, since this is the year leading up to their official homeschooling, I’m trying to simulate (at least for myself) what this undertaking will eventually involve. I have a planner I printed and arranged for the coming months, that includes reading lists for each kid. I also have an attendance chart to keep track of our days and hours.

Colorado requires at least 172 days, averaging 4 hours of “educational contact” per day. Our current schedule will leave us short at 169 days, if we do nothing educational at all on the weekends. But I suppose you can imagine how likely that is. After all, weekends are our preferred field trip days.

I’m currently compiling a list of resources I use for our lessons, as well as free/cheap field trip (or just for fun) destinations for families in Denver. If you have any suggestions for either list, let me know. I can always use more information.

This post linked to iHomeschool's  *Not* back to homeschool blog hop

Saving Money on Field Trips

I'm back in the blog game, now that the kids are back from vacation and settled in at home again. This week, I've been thinking about saving money. With all of the traveling that has gone on in the last couple of months, we're on a tight budget while we catch up. So I'll share with you how we manage to keep things rolling for the kids while we grown-ups are watching the numbers.

Last weekend, I took my three kids to the zoo. I was not the lone grown-up, of course; I had my partner, David. We all go to the zoo a lot. We've been about five times so far this year, and we've only spent about five and a half months of this year in Colorado.

There are a couple of obvious reasons we like to spend so much time at the zoo:

1. The kids love it. My five-year-olds are very excited about watching animals and asking questions, two things the zoo is perfect for. "Do snakes go fast?" "How long can an elephant stay under water?" And when I can't answer them, I can usually find a keeper who can. Which leads me to... 
2. It's incredibly educational. I can show them videos on the internet of elephants swimming all day, but that doesn't compare to seeing one roll over into the water right in front of them. They really don't seem to completely understand that the videos I show them on my computer are of things that actually happened.

There are other benefits like spending some time in the sun and fresh air, getting some exercise, and wearing them out so they'll fall asleep the moment the bedroom door closes. Last weekend, we even got maps for the five-year-olds and let them show us how to get from one place to another.

Taking your kids to the zoo regularly can be expensive, though. Admission prices, food and drinks alone are enough to make your head spin. The first step to making this work for you is to remember that a lot of what you're spending at the zoo is going toward taking care of the animals and improving the park itself. A lot of the zoo staff are probably volunteers. But that doesn't ease the stress on your wallet. Here's how we do that:

1. We're members of the zoo. That paid for itself the next time we went through the gates. We no longer have to pay admissions, and we get discounts on zoo fare. We get about 10% off on food at the various venues. That's not bad, but the food is still over-priced by the standards of the outside world. This time, we spent $30 (after our discount) on 4 small scoops of ice cream, a large soda (my partner and I shared for the rest of the zoo trip) and a smallish serving of Asian noodles. I say small(ish) because they do not match the size you would expect to get if you ordered "a scoop" of ice cream or "a bowl" of noodles in the city.
2. Also, you can often find coupons online specifically for things to do with your kids. Of course you can sign up for Groupon or other discount-offering services. They often have great deals on the kinds of things you'll probably only be able to do once in a while. For instance, that's how I got my family a huge discount on a trail ride coming up this fall. Otherwise, just try googling "things to do with kids in (your city) coupons" or something similar. Here's the page I check before taking the kids out here in Denver:  http://www.denverkids.com/ 
3.  We bring food and water. I baked croissants and made meat and cheese sandwiches with them before we left. We also bring one reusable water bottle per person, and refill them at water fountains. Thus, we dodge buying bottled water and lunch. That frees up some spending money for that ice cream, later.
   
4. We make a commitment to ignore the gift shop entirely. We go to the zoo a lot. We bought them each a souvenir once. They don't need one every time we go. Besides, you should see how many toys they have already. Also, gift shops are so expensive... and there's nothing in there you need.

An additional idea to save you some cash: don't pay for parking if you can avoid it. The Denver zoo doesn't have paid parking. Even when the free parking immediately in front of the entrance is full, there is free parking available at the science museum which is in the same park.  The Honolulu zoo had paid parking lots nearest the gate, but you could find free street parking a block or two away. As far as I can tell, unless you're in a hurry to get to a specific event, you can probably find free parking you can walk from. After all, you're going to be walking around the zoo all day anyway, what's a little more? And who wants to feed the meter and then spend the whole day concerned about time running out?

Obviously, we aren't cutting all of the corners we could. We did buy ice cream. But two adults and three children spending 5 or 6 hours at the zoo only cost us $40-$50 if you count putting gas in the car right after we left the house. It could have been a lot more.

I don't know what your zoo's policies on outside food or membership discounts are. You might benefit more or less from the things we do. Either way, you benifit from knowing, so ask. You can call, stop by, or go to your zoo's website. They seem to all have publicly available information about these things.

If you're homeschooling, you want to have as many resources in your back pocket as you can, and finding money saving opportunities is key. These tips don't just apply to the zoo. Check out botanical gardens, museums, butterfly houses, and whatever else your city has to offer. If you manage to save enough money to go out just one extra time this year, you win.

Beautiful Butterflies

It is technically my twins' first year of school. I've started semi-structured lessons, but they don't have to be registered with the state as home schoolers until august of next year. My (very loosely) categorized, dry-erase chart of lessons lists math, reading, writing, science, sign language, art, and culture. I also have a weekly planner in which I make notes of the specific topics we cover. 

Last week, we did 12 lessons. Some of them were fairly pedestrian, like reading practice, addition and subtraction, and writing letters and numbers. But in other cases, they certainly blazed their own trail. We talked about reflexes and the difference between voluntary and involuntary movements, then had a breakfast lesson about the causes, physiology, and symptoms of cerebral palsy. They were curious.

This week, they asked me about where butterflies come from. We discussed the butterfly life cycle, cocoons and chrysalises, and watched a video of a caterpillar exposing its chrysalis. Then, this weekend, we took a field trip to the butterfly pavilion and they got to see what many different butterfly chrysalises look like, and saw butterflies coming out of them. They remembered so many facts about it, and even learned a bit more about how butterflies eat. 

This, to me, is one of the beautiful things about homeschooling. They learn such a wide variety of new things because they're curious. I could dictate their education by scheduling what we will practice or discuss and when, but when they ask me questions and I answer, they're far more likely to remember what they learned. And I can offer them an incredible array of relevant field trips to help solidify the lessons.

My Homeschooling Training Wheels

Before I begin, this isn't about convincing everyone to choose to educate their children at home. It's about sharing my story, which might be your story, too. And it might just help you make the right decision for you and your family.


I really fought the idea of homeschooling my kids. I thought a lot of pretty typical things like, "public school was good enough for me." and "I don't know everything, how can I teach them all they need to know?" and "I don't want to deprive them of the social aspect of public school." Then there's the one most parents won't admit, publicly: "I can't wait to have that eight hours to myself!"


Now, my twins are five-years-old and I'm homeschooling them through their first year of "structured" learning. What happened?


Now that my first born kids are old enough to start school, I had to reevaluate those things I told myself, and it was scary. 


Was public school really good enough for me? Is it good enough for anyone anymore? Maybe it is, for some people. But it wasn't for me. And it's not a matter of smarter or better behaved or otherwise better prepared kids doing better (or worse) in public schools. Kids, and really all people, have different methods of learning, not all of which are met when a teacher has to constantly tend to 15 or 20 students. 


I got an education, and I graduated on time, and I was told how smart I was, but I wasn't interested in my lessons, I did as little as I could to get by, and the few things I was deeply interested in learning weren't offered at my school. Now that I'm openly talking with other adults, post-high school, I'm learning that I'm not nearly the only one who has these complaints. 


No, I DON'T know everything. That much is absolutely true. What I know is pretty limited. Of course I know a lot about what I care about. I try to keep up with psychology, and I can impress you with all of my knowledge if you take me to the zoo (I loved zoology and botany in school). But I'm only average at best in the field of math and when it comes to history, thank goodness for Wikipedia. 


Which brings me to my epiphany: I don't KNOW everything, but I have access to it. I have the internet and the library and my college text books. I also have the willingness to answer my kids' questions with, "I don't know, but let's find out!"


The most bizarre realization was that I do, in fact, want to deprive my kids of the social aspect of public school. I don't want to deny them the ability to make and spend time with friends. But that should not get in the way of a good education, and, in my experience, social issues destroy the educational scene in public schools for almost every student at one point or another (or many points). Honestly, the twins already have each other for distractions, and that's difficult enough.


As far as wanting that eight hours to myself... I can't answer for that. I still want that, and I know I won't get it this way. But nothing good in life is free. We barter our time for money at our jobs, and our money for food at the store, and as our Dalai Lama said, you should, “Judge your success by what you had to give up in order to get it.” I'm not going to get everything I want. My children's education is more important to me than eight free hours a day to take more college classes, get a new job, or just bake a lot. My prerogative is to produce adults who are prepared for the world and ready to start a life and be successful, by their own definitions.


Here we go!