Tag Archives: homeschool

Toddlers and TV

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011113_9170 blog

First he played nicely with his toys…apollo toys

His little animals chatting about light sabers and coffee…011113_9176 blogThen he got busy moving each and every toy off the shelf…011113_9178 bw blogUntil he realized his ultimate goal: conquering the shelf itself.

I received an interesting question from a blog reader a while back. She asked if Apollo, because he’s  the youngest of fourteen, watches more TV and movies than the other children did at this age. The question (while innocent enough) made me chuckle. The truth is, the other kids watch more movies because of Apollo. Let me explain.

Back when Apollo had his first heart surgery he was 20 months old. Recovery was rough. We were sent home on day three with just a baby-sized dose Vicoden…and he was in pain all the time. We borrowed a Winnie the Pooh movie from a friend, and that was more or less Apollo’s introduction to movies. He watched that movie two or three times a day in the first weeks post surgery. Chuck or I or one of the older children would sit and rock him in our glider for hours…and during the day I often had to have the younger children watching with me (rather than running around unsupervised upstairs). They didn’t watch every day, but more frequently than I liked.

After the surgery Apollo still couldn’t eat well, he was in pain and barely sleeping. Six weeks later he was back in the hospital and one week after that he had his g-tube placed. In the beginning it took an hour per feeding four times a day. He was in constant pain for three weeks after that surgery (and still recovering from the heart surgery). After a few weeks with the g-tube Chuck and I bought a portable DVD player for Apollo so he could watch movies on the couch (in our main living area) while he was fed.  We were horrified by our own actions. It went so against our parenting style. But we had a sick child with a heart defect and he was recovering from major surgery and had to sit still for an hour four times a day. We were just surviving.

Summer came and his health was declining…he had very little stamina and would just sit…we limited movies to feeding time but if we went for a walk or to a park or swimming, he would be wiped out for the rest of the day and just lie on the couch. He just didn’t have enough energy to be active. This is when I began questioning his cardiologist and trying to get to the bottom of his continued health issues.

Apollo had his second  heart surgery in Houston Texas October 30, 2012. Recovery involved, naturally, plenty of movies. We had gotten his feeding time down to approximately 15 minutes prior to this (imagine a toddler drinking sippy cup or bottle of formula). After his surgery he developed chylothorax and couldn’t  tolerate the special milk based formula. When we were discharged from the hospital we were back to hour-long feedings, this time with stomach cramping and vomiting. His ability to sit and watch a movie was a real blessing.

As soon as we were home (with permission from his doctor and under the direction of a dietician) we began blending food adding in the fats and oil he could tolerate along with vitamins, brewer’s yeast and probiotics. We put this through his tube instead of the special chylothorax formula and his vomiting stopped immediately.  Six weeks after surgery we began the process of adding normal fats back in. Apollo is now taking his soy based formula through his g-tube 2-3 times per day (down from four!) and it is back to only taking about 15 minutes per feeding. Once he started getting high fat formula again we noticed him perking up and feeling better. Now that he getting a large percentage of his calories though his high fat formula he is feeling better than he ever has. I think the soy formula has  much more staying power that the foods we were blending.

Now, two and a half months after his second heart surgery, he often goes days without asking to watch a movie. All on his own he has lost interest. He is feeling so good that he would rather be active and play then parked on the couch. And this change thrills me! I hated his daily movie watching. I do believe it is detrimental to a toddler’s brain development. But his heart defect was detrimental to his overall physical develpment. Nothing was ideal.

So there you have it. My children logged far more hours watching movies in 2012 than I would care to admit. But Apollo is now healthier than he’s ever been and he is becoming a much more typical active two-year old. I expect this trend to continue as long as his heath holds out. And I pray it holds out forever…

 

 

Marie’s Words (Product Review)

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{Timberdoodle provided me with Marie’s Words in exchange for giving an honest review. All of the opinions here are mine (and my children’s. And Devon’s)}121312_8202 blogAccording to the back of the box:

“Marie’s Words is the work of a high school junior who was preparing for the SAT. Its original illustrations convey the meanings of these 550 words used in literature and on standardized tests. In addition, Marie’s Words provides the correct pronunciations, definitions, synonyms and antonyms, and sentences structured to SAT standards.”121312_8203 blog But is it fun? Interesting? Engaging?

According to my test panel (Tilly, Judah, Enoch and Devon), YES. The described the play as being a bit like Balderdash. One person reads a sentence out loud, and the other players try to copy it down exactly. The first person then collects the cards, reads all of the sentences out loud and the other players try to guess which was the original sentence. I heard a whole lot of laughter coming from across the room as I watched my children play this. 121312_8204 blog 122712_8694 blog  The front of each card has a picture illustrating the word. For a visual learner like me, this is perfection. For non-visual learners, the back has the word and definition in a clean, organized manner.122712_8695 blog As I mom, I plan to use these as basic vocabulary cards- even a young child can learn from the pictures and remember them. There is a reason standardized tests focus so much on vocabulary. We all communicate with words. The more words you know, the better you can express yourself. It helps with writing and it certainly helps with reading. I have always been one to “push” my children a bit with words. Always reading  a book just a bit above their level. Never backing down from using large, complicated words.  When my children have done their yearly testing here in Washington, they had done fantastic on the vocabulary sections. Most of my children achieving perfect scores in that section.

In my opinion, well worth the $22.50 price tag, and a must for homeschool families with older children.

Marie’s Words is something I plan to use with my own children as flashcards,  from seven-year-old Avi and Tucker up to my high schoolers.

Ben and Aaron Wrap Up

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Well, our time with Ben and Aaron, our favorite New Zealanders, is over. We had a blast while they were here. Hiking, extreme trampolining, hot air ballooning (just Ben and Adalia), swimming, the beach, ice skating, tie dying, a bonfire…it was pretty much non-stop fun.

As I mentioned before, Ben and Adalia met last summer on their missions trip to Honduras. They have spent the last year corresponding by mail, email, facebook, skype and phone. They have clearly formed quite an attachment with each other. It was so nice to meet  Ben and see that he is indeed just as nice in person as Adalia described.

And now life shall return to the mundane…you know, just average life with eleven kids at home, homeschooling, a photography business, a teen at the community college,  a tube-fed toddler with a rare heart defect facing repeat heart surgery, five kids in elementary school, two with special needs…Hopefully I’ll be around here blogging a bit more now. I’ve missed you all.

Welcome to Crazy Week

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Enoch, age 12

This is one of those weeks when everything seems to be happening at once.

After much thought and consideration, we decided to keep Hezekiah and Tucker in the Cub Scout pack we’ve been in since 2007. A big part of sending them to school this year was to maintain some normalcy for them, no matter what is going on with Apollo. They have been attending pack meetings with their brothers since they were toddlers and are familiar with most of the people.  The only downside of that decision, is their pack, being made up of primarily homeschoolers, meets during the day. It is only once a month, but requires that I pick them up from school early that one day a month.

So, today, I’ll pick Hezekiah and Tucker up from school at 12, feed them lunch in the van, drop off at Tami’s at 12:30 so  Carolynn pick them up and transport them to Scouts. Then I head to the dentist with Judah, who has an appointment at 1:00.  When we’re done, I’ll head back to Tami’s to pick up the boys to take Hezekiah to his eye doctor appointment at 4:00. Then finally home to fix dinner.

Tomorrow is our day at Seattle Children’s Hospital. Apollo has a neck ultrasound at 12:30, we see his cardiologist at 1:00. He goes to the PASS clinic as 2:15 (to make sure he is healthy enough for his procedure on the 17th) and sees his pulmonologist at 3:00. Now pause for a moment, and imagine that schedule with a two-year old. Nap? What nap? Apollo did so much crying at our last visit to Children’s that we decided to take Enoch and Tilly along this time. The visit with the cardiologist is just for me and Chuck, Apollo doesn’t need to be there, so Enoch and Tilly can take him to the playroom while we meet with the doctor.

Wednesday Adalia  takes her driving test at 8:30 and have an appointment with my naturopathic doctor at 12.

Thursday I have a family/newborn session in the morning.

Then I have Friday  through  Sunday to gear up for Apollo’s mic-key placement and  our guests.

Now it’s 5:30 am and I’m off to get as much  work as possible done before my children wake up.

 

School Update {September}

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I’ve had several people ask about how the kids are doing in school, but I wanted to give it a few days before I wrote anything.

The short answer: all five love it and are having the time of their lives.

Tucker told me they didn’t do any school work in his class. “Yeah, we just have a snack, and story time and math and recess…” Apparently math isn’t schoolwork to him.

All five have talked about the friends they are making.  They are excited about music and PE and the school library. Apparently when Tucker’s class (first grade) got to tour the library the teacher said, “Those are the chapter books, so you won’t need to go there this year”. Tucker spoke up to inform her that he already reads chapter books. I’m not sure how the academics will go. Tucker brought home a little workbook he had made where they were “learning” the sight words: we and will. Hopefully this is just “busy work” until they get the classes and reading groups sorted out…

Another highlight? School lunches. A reader asked about it and I said that should probably be post of its own. Basically, we had trouble all last year with Mordecai’s lunch. He carried a packed lunch from home. He had two lunch boxes and a shelf where we kept all of his lunch foods (granola bars, applesauce, etc). And we had constant trouble. We had to inspect his lunch every morning because he would pack the most bizarre items in the most bizarre ways. For instance, making a PBJ sandwich, folding it in half and stuffing it, unwrapped into his lunch box. Or hacking off piece of cheese and just tossing it (no bag) into a dirty lunch box. Or an apple and an unwrapped graham cracker shoved into a little side pocket together, getting crushed. Or half a hamburger bun.  Once he packed two fruit cups…but he opened the lids on both and drank the juice out first so he had two opened fruit cups and no spoon. This despite having all of his supplies out and showing him how to do it. I worried that someone as school would notice his lunch and think we didn’t have enough food in the house. We often packed his lunch for him, but liked to pack his own and often did before we managed to get it packed.

Our school, amazingly, offers fruit and/or veggies at every meal. The juice they serve is 100% fruit. They have “baked french fries” on the menu once for the whole month. No tater tots or chips. It is a far cry from what school lunches were when I was a kid. I feel blessed that our school is actually serving decent food. If you read my blog regularly, you know how much my kids love fruits and veggies- they are thrilled to have them as a choice. Jubilee told me, “I ate my broccoli first because I didn’t want to miss out on that“. Naturally.  So to save everyone stress (and that is why they’re in school this year, after all) they get school lunches. I have been making sure there is a nutritious snack for them on the table every afternoon when they get home.

This morning Jubilee said to me, “The only thing I don’t like is we can’t just do our math.  The teacher has to read it out loud. Then she says, ‘okay, you can read it now’ and it takes forever before we can just do it.”

She also said during reading the teacher reads the book out loud (Because of Winn-Dixie) and they follow along in their books. She doesn’t like it because the teacher reads too slowly. Oh, how I remember those days from my school years. Jubilee has read Because of Winn-Dixie herself several times. It was also one of the first read-alouds we did when our Liberian children came home.

She also said during “reading” time she sits with a partner and they take turns reading a paragraph out loud.

Quite an adjustment for my former (and hopefully future) homeschoolers. No doing your work then running off to play…

Judah and Tilly are enjoying Switched On Schoolhouse and so am I. I was able to type in our custom school calendar, starting early and taking off the two weeks we will have company from New Zealand. The computer then arranges the schedule for me. It tells Judah and Tilly when their assignments are due. They read their text and listen to the lectures right on their laptops. The computer grades most of the work and I go to check the essay questions and written work. Their Science classes includes plenty of hands-on experiments. I was able to order the supply kits from Home Training Tools.

Enoch and Kalina are moving along at a steady pace with their Lifepacs. Their Science also includes plenty of experiments. Yesterday morning I headed to the dentist and left Kalina in the waiting room doing her schoolwork She did fine and even asked the receptionist for help when she got stuck! The other four stayed home with Apollo.

I really like that Mordecai and Jubilee’s teachers are coordinating their work. They agreed together on no formal homework. Both teachers are using Because of Winn-Dixie as read-alouds. It makes things really nice for this mom who has a student in both fourth grade classes.

So far, so good.

As always, I’ll keep you posted on our year of learning.