Retrospective of School Year 2017-18

Our academic year has sometimes skidded slowly to a stop, with tumbles and bumbles, and the kids haven't really known when the official year ended and the summer began. Other years--like this one!--end with formality, a planned date, a party, and certificates.

We started our seventh year of homeschooling on August 28, 2017, with our sixth baby only 17 days old, and we finished on May 30, 2018!

Homeschooling is more than School at Home . . . I love that it's impossible to untangle where school ends and family life begins, so I list below the fun-and-educational activities our family did this last year.

Fun Events

• John and Mary spent all summer 2017 practicing for the musical "Esther," which the homeschoolers performed in last August.
• Over the course of the year, we attended three plays downtown as well: "Mary Poppins," "It's a Wonderful Life," and "Balloonacy"
• Attended a talk by Fr. Cassian Folsom of the Monastery of St. Benedict in Norsia
• Attended a Mother-Daughter Garden High Tea hosted by the Daughters of the Virgin Mother
• Viewed the total solar eclipse
• Attended an Independence Day party
• Enjoyed a visit from the Texas cousins
• Visit to James K. Polk's historical home
• Parish Carnival
• Our Lady of Fatima procession
• Cupcake rosary with homeschoolers
• All Saints party with homeschoolers
• Bishop Athanasius Schneider visited our parish; our family attended a special dinner with him
• Pumpkin patch
• MiraVia fundraising banquet (oldest 2 kids)
• Led praying for souls at the cemetery during the Octave of All Souls
• Day trip to visit a working dairy farm
• Warbirds Over Monroe air show
• The children organized our own Family Olympics Day
• Visited the Georgia Aquarium in Atlanta and the Sea Life Aquarium in Charlotte
• Mother-Daughters Christmas tea at The Ballantyne Hotel
• Celebrated Feast of St. Nicholas at home and at church
• Kannapolis Christmas lights display
• Feast of St. Lucy
• Epiphany parties at church and a friend's home
• John went shooting at ranges several times
• Lazy-5 Ranch
• Gingerbread Lane at The Ballantyne Hotel
• Enjoyed a week of "the big snow"
• Attended a talk by Ryan Grant, Mediatrix Press, on the Reformation
• Attended outdoor Stations of the Cross and play date with homeschoolers during Lent
• Day trip to Dan Nicholas amusement park
• Fishing several times
• Took a tour of Reed Gold Mine
• May Crowning at church, Margaret got to do the crowning this year
• End-of-School-Year park playdate and picnic for homeschoolers

Travel

• Greenville, SC, numerous times to meet up with grandparents, and once visited the Greenville Zoo
• Atlanta, GA--grandparents--Thanksgiving weekend
• Chris and John to Ohio for furniture auction
• Day trip to the Biltmore in Asheville, NC (got iced in to a hotel) and again for the spring bloom
• Chris and John to Nebraska for ordinations of 10 priests of the Priestly Fraternity of St. Peter
• Upcoming this summer . . . Pennsylvania, Virginia, and maybe more!

Music . . . is a significant part of our homeschool

The oldest four children took piano, violin, and theory lessons all year.

They participated in several recitals hosted by our music studio and our family hosted a Christmas music party.

Competitions: Federation, NCMTA, Forum, Royalty, Guild, Steinway

We attended The Five Browns in concert, a Rachmaninoff concert performed by two friends of ours, and the Broadway Revue performed by teenage homeschoolers.

Literature

I love to read aloud and I lament that my time to do so is increasingly brief. Whereas I used to sit down my children for formal read-alouds two and three times daily, I now manage only three or four nights weekly. But I encourage families that it all adds up beautifully, so just keep reading! Here I include some of the books I read aloud this year, and below are listed some books individual children read.

Examples of Read-Alouds

• "The Odyssey for Boys and Girls" (Church)
• "Heidi"
• Poetry of A.A. Milne
• "Mr. Popper's Penguins"
• "Horatius at the Bridge"
• "Tanglewood Tales" (Hawthorne)
• "Mr. Midshipman Easy"
• "Read-Aloud Book of Bible Stories" (2012)
• "Old Yeller"
• "David Copperfield" (Charles Dickens)--started in winter and still going strong in May

Physical Education

• Track and General P.E. classes at YMCA for fall quarter
• Scottish Country Dance classes weekly from September through May; Reel Scottish weekend; special dance workshop in February, recital in May
• Tennis classes weekly from February through June
• Lots of plain ol' walking and biking through our neighborhood
• Swimming over last summer and planned for this summer

JOHN

. . . Completed fifth grade and turned 11 this year!

Academics

Math: Completed one level of Teaching Textbooks

Spelling: Completed nearly two levels of All About Spelling

Grammar: Completed Junior Analytical Grammar

Latin: Completed Latina Christiana

History: Studied the Ancient cycle year of Connecting with History

Science: Completed Apologia Chemistry/Physics, Seton Health 5, and read books on microscopic studies and the weather. 

Religion: Completed Faith and Life 5, studied the Baltimore Catechism all year, and read at least a half dozen biographies of saints. 

Others: Studied geography and practiced penmanship and typing. 

For his CCE Elementary Program, he wrote and gave 12 presentations and earned one certificate for memory work.

John attended a week-long Catholic boys' camp (Montfort) in New Hampshire last summer, with his dad there as a chaperone-volunteer. He participated in hiking, fishing, boating, marksmanship, exercise, tug-of-war, relay races, talent show, daily Mass and prayers. Everything since that was dated pre- or post-Montfort, and he probably talked about camp almost daily all year.

Starting with goldfish at the parish carnival, John began to keep pet fish, and increased from a one-gallon tank to five to ten. He has learned so much about maintaining a fish tank. He also began fishing as a sport last summer at Montfort, came home and bought his own gear and tackle, and began fishing locally.

John became a postulant altar server at church, attending bi-monthly server trainings all year. He attended all four evenings of the parish Lenten mission talks.

He began attending Fraternus weekly. He also began joining his dad and other men at Liturgy and Fraternity dinners once monthly, and he participated in a men's movie night watching a war movie.

John participated in a season of Math Olympiad (5 team meetings over the winter/spring).

He attended a week of STARBASE (rocket day camp) hosted by the Department of Defense at the local Air Force Base.

John has become quite entrepreneurial, working for neighbors mowing their lawns and bringing in their mail, working for the landscaping crew spreading pine straw, and working at Ryan Grant's talk selling books.

Examples of some books John read this year:

• 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea
• Fishing Basics
• The Young Citizen’s Reader (Reinsch)
• Whatever Happened to Penny Candy? (Maybury)
• Adventures with a Microscope (Headstrom)
• The World Wars (Usbourne)
• Herodotus and the Road to History
• Archimedes and the Door of Science
• What’s Pearl Harbor?
• Air Raid Pearl Harbor!
• The Young Carthaginian (Henty)
• The entire Alvin Fernald collection
• Rascal (North)
• Boyhood

MARY

. . . Completed third grade and turned 9 this year!

Academics

Math: Completed one level of Teaching Textbook

Spelling: Completed nearly two levels of All About Spelling

Grammar: Almost completed grammar workbook

Latin: Completed Prima Latina

History: Studied the Ancient cycle year of Connecting with History

Science: Read various science-themed books, including Seton Health 3. 

Religion: Completed Faith and Life 3, studied the Baltimore Catechism all year, and read at least a half dozen biographies of saints. 

Others: Studied geography and practiced penmanship and typing. 

For her CCE Elementary Program, she wrote and gave 12 presentations and earned  certificates for memory work.

Mary learned how to crochet at a series of social visits over the course of last summer and honed her drawing skills over the year. She enjoyed sewing an entire suite of doll clothes for her sister.

She attended all four evenings of the Lenten mission talks. 

Mary blossomed this year with her creative writing, producing lengthy stories in her free time (aided by the fact that she loves to type, and transcribes lectures she listens to, or types up favorite poems in her free time). She also taught herself Microsoft Office and Paint till she was proficient in both.

Mary was at the top of her age bracket in most music competitions this year, so this was a very strong year for her, with her winning on three occasions.

Examples of some books Mary read this year:

• Little Women and Jo's Boys
• An Encyclopedia of the Violin (Bachmann)
• Much Shakespeare--plays and sonnets
• The Story of the Treasure Seekers (Nesbit)
• Swallows and Amazons
• Redwall
• Pollyanna
• Grimmes' Fairy Tales (the whole thing!)
• Andrew Lang Fairy Tale Treasury (the whole thing!)
• Bronze Bow
• Emily of New Moon, Jane of Lantern Hill, and Pat of Silver Bush
• Smoky (Will James)
• The Young Carthaginian (Henty)
• The entire Betsy-Tacy series

MARGARET

.  . . Completed first grade and turned 7 this year!

Academics

Math: Completed a level and a half of math

Spelling: Completed nearly two levels of All About Spelling

Grammar: Almost completed grammar workbook

History: Studied the Ancient cycle year of Connecting with History

Science: Read various science-themed books, including Seton Science 1. 

Religion: Completed Faith and Life 1, Guidebook for Confession for Children, The New St. Joseph First Holy Communion Catechism, and The Mass by Maria Montessori, studied the Baltimore Catechism all year, and read at least a half dozen biographies of saints. 

Others: Studied geography and practiced penmanship and typing. 

Margaret taught herself crochet, cross-stitching, and knitting in the absence of her mother having time to teach her. She also taught herself cursive. A theme for Margaret this year was "teaching herself": she was independent with about half of her schoolwork, and will be independent with most next year.

This is late-breaking news, but Margaret seems to be transitioning from piano to violin as her instrument, and it is exciting to watch her passion for violin grow.

Margaret had her First Confession and her First Holy Communion this year--both sacraments that are very meaningful to her. Margaret's first-ever drop-off event was her First Holy Communion half-day retreat . . . and her second was a birthday party!

Speaking of birthdays, we took Margaret horseback-riding for her 7th birthday, which was loads of fun for all of our children.

Examples of some books Margaret read this year:

• Jungle Book (original)
• Biographies of Helen Keller and of Louis Braille
• Pinocchio (Carlo Collodi)
• Delightful Stories for Children (Neumann Press)
• Rabbit Hill
• Sarah Plain and Tall (and four sequels)
• Most of the Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle series
• James and the Giant Peach (Dahl)
• Fantastic Mr. Fox (Dahl)
• Clare’s Costly Cookie
• Amelia Bedelia
• Old Yeller
• Heidi

JOSEPH

. . . turned 5 this year!

Joseph's preschool year sure looked different than did that of my firstborn, who received direct, planned, formal instruction from me every morning. In contrast, Joseph learned the skill of "going off to play" and can play quite independently with his little brother.

In my stead, Joseph's big sisters created "Preschool Scouts" for Joseph, in which they taught him out of "Kiendul Ken Four" and "Autaum Quin Six" preschool workbooks that they created. 

His year wasn't entirely without structure, as he joined the Pre-K classroom at CCE. He also started piano lessons last fall. Joseph helps his mama with his regular chores around the house every day.

THOMAS

. . . is almost turning three!

Thomas started the school year as newly two, and will turn three soon. Over the year, he potty trained and now dresses himself too. Thomas eagerly empties the clean dishwasher for me daily. He was delayed in speech, and saying only about five words (nouns) when he turned two years old, but caught up greatly this year. Now he can tell all kinds of stories and I have no more worries about his language catching up. He is such a mischief-maker but he is so cute that we dote on him anyway!

DAVID

Our baby mascot!

David was a mere 17 days old when we began the school year, and is finishing it at 9-1/2 months old. He was born with a tongue tie and had a surgical revision just like his brothers, and he had to learn how to nurse while I exclusively pumped to bottle for a couple of months. He is having difficulty learning to eat any solids--with his six teeth so far!--but we're working on that. Now, he crawls everywhere speedily, including up stairs. He pulls up on furniture and cruises about. He can empty a bookshelf of books like nobody's business! Most of all, he keeps all of us--his adoring fans--entertained with his smiles and laughs.

Annual End-of-Year Park Play Date and Picnic

Swim dresses from Dressing For His Glory

Splash pad fun

At home, speeches were given for each child and certificates of completion granted.

Example of certificates for each child