Leigh Bortins is coming to Connecticut!

Founder of the Classical Conversations curriculum, Leigh Bortins, will be visiting the New England area with a stop in Hamden CT.

It’s a Celebration Tour with Classical Conversations!

Join Leigh Bortins, Classical Conversations founder, as she delivers a message designed to encourage parents to embrace classical education and restore the pleasure of learning for a lifetime. Come hear Leigh as she shares teaching methods that will allow parents to relax as they enjoy the academic advancement of their children. Anyone interested in homeschooling is welcome to attend this time of winter refreshment!

Tell all your friends and join us in celebrating the joy of teaching our children “to know God and to make Him known”.

Westminster Orthodox Presbyterian Church
565 Shepard Avenue, Hamden, Connecticut 06514
Saturday, March 27, 2010
10:00 a.m. – 12:00 p.m.

Young At Art, Mystic Arts Center

Today I received an email from another homeschooling mom who I can always count on to be in-the-know of all the local educational and enrichment happenings. Her email informed us of an upcoming exhibit, Young At Art, held by the Mystic Arts Center. They were currently seeking art by students in the elementary through high school grades, to be featured in the museum from March 6 through April 3, 2010.

Young At Art 2010: The mission of the Young At Art exhibition is to showcase the creativity of children by giving them the opportunity to hang their works in a professional gallery setting and view the work of their contemporaries. Our goal is to broaden students’ perspectives on the creative process and inform the community about how teachers use art to advance learning. The YAA Exhibition supports the Mystic Arts Center’s commitment to education and to the enrichment of children’s lives. Young At Art is open to all young people 18 and under who reside or attend school in New London County or Westerly, Rhode Island.

With that, Rilla and Max went to work on their pieces. We did 2 special crafts to submit for the exhibition. The first was a creative pizza craft made of corrugated cardboard (for crust), red paint and glue mix (for sauce), with toppings of yellow yarn (cheese), chopped green felt (peppers), red glossy circles (pepperoni), crumpled construction paper (meatballs), colored punchouts (spices). The next craft was a construction paper mosaic using black paper and punchouts in various shades of red, blue, green, yellow, and gray. Rilla was inspired to make a pony with sky and mountain background, on grass with a sun and rock.

Afterschool Snacks @ Bill Memorial Library

Rilla is really enjoying the weekly Afterschool Snacks program at our local Bill Memorial Library. It runs for 1 hour and involves story time, game/craft/activity, and of course, a snack. Ms. Mary Jane teaches the program and does a great job of engaging the students in fun and creative ways. It also gives me some one-on-one time with Max as we read or do activities. Max and I have averaged reading together about 5 books in the hour!

Also, we’ve met another homeschooling family whose son (9 year old boy) is in the program with Rilla. He has a sibiling who was homeschooled all through elementary and middle school age, is currently attending our public highschool, and is doing very well. It’s always encouraging to meet these families and hear their success stories.

A Reason for Handwriting

I spent some time reorganizing our resource shelf to re-discover (this is what happens when you have a lot stuff to work with) “A Reason for Handwriting”, published by The Concerned Group, Inc. When this was gifted to me last year, I thought nothing of it. I mean, how difficult could it be to teach the alphabet and penmanship?

Now that I am dictating to Rilla (and she is trying to spell and write her own words), I’m finding improvement is needed in her penmanship. There is mix of use between uppercase and lowercase letters. There are inconsistencies in the sizes of her lowercase letters. I found that she was not “drawing” the letters in the ”correct” fashion. I found myself explaining over and over in frustration.

Enter this curriculum… it ”renames” the top, middle, and bottom lines of the paper using a treehouse visual. They are now the roofline, ceiling, floor, and ground – where the tails of g’s p’s j’s, for instance, hang. It’s so clever and intuitive! The letters are grouped according to the styles: downstrokes, slant strokes, and forward curves. Each letter is matched with a large line drawing for a coloring activity.

There is one teacher Guidebook that covers all of the levels. The levels are named Kindergarten, Level A, Level B, Transition (to cursive) and Levels A-F. Eventually, short passages from scripture are introduced (with focus on one or more letters) for each lesson.

As our main curriculum is Classical Conversations, I’m finding A Reason for Handwriting to be a fun and thoughtful companion.

Sir Ryan’s Quest by Jason Deeble

Just a quick note about a thoughtfully written and artful book, “Sir Ryan’s Quest”, written by Southeastern CT’s very own Jason Deeble. It’s about an imaginative boy whose quest begins one morning in the kitchen. He is set forth on a journey by the King of Pots and Pans. He is given a piece of armor with best wishes for safe travel. From there he ventures through jungle, by guards, and in a cave (various parts of his home) where Sir Ryan meets his “foes” with bravery. He is granted “tokens” of passage and successfully completes his journey with a satisfying reward.

It’s a great book for curious and imaginative little minds. 4 year old Max enjoyed the story and was engaged by the colorful illustrations… a great read for your little adventurer

American Landmarks series by Jason Cooper

Weeks #15 and #16 in our Classical Conversations curriculum covers America’s independence from Great Britain. To supplement this timeframe, I found an easy-to-follow book on Valley Forge and the winter spent there by George Washington and his Continental Army. What I liked about this book were the occasional highlighted key words (Continental Army, Tories, Baron Von Steuben, etc) and the photography (soldiers in period uniform, landmarks, memorials, and landscapes), and its size was easy to carry size (about 8″x8″ square). Come to find out, this book is actually one of a series of books called ”American Landmarks” published by Jason Cooper. We’ve also read the “American Landscapes: Gettysburg” and “American Landmarks: Mount Vernon”. The complete series is: Gettysburg, Historic Boston, Mount Vernon, U.S. Treasury, Valley Forge, and Vietnam Veterans Memorial. It’s an engaging read for the younger ones, say 4-8 years old.

CT Co-op of Home Educators East of the River, CT-CHEER

We just joined CT-CHEER, a wonderful, informative, and welcoming group of homeschoolers. The primary mission “… is to focus on disseminating homeschool information and support to current and prospective homeschool families that reside east of the CT river. We provide the opportunity to bring people together to expand our families’ horizons, in a collaborative, informal manner. We are a group of people with diverse homeschool philosophies & experience, but with a common vision: volunteers who are supporting one another, sharing information, and reaching out to new homeschoolers as a labor of love and understanding of a new homeschooler’s process.”

With our membership, comes an official CT-CHEER membership card good for “proving” that you’re an official homeschooler which affords some perks and discounts at retail and educational establishments. We’re also in the know of local events tailor made for homeschoolers and programs that we as a homeschooling family are able to participate in because we have organized with CT-CHEER, including the Six Flags Reading program.

This is in thanks to Diane Connors who founded and continues to moderate the group. It is certainly a busy bunch of families with events all the year through: “Support & Info Nights, Parents’ Night Out, Park Days, Beach Days, Book Swaps & Sales, Family Business Ads, Scouting, Parks & Recreation, Library Events, Science Fairs, Geography Fairs, Valentine’s Potluck Party, Pinewood Derby, 4-H Clubs, rollerskating, swimming, ice skating, Game Days, Craft Days, Skiing, gymnastics, Book Discussion Groups, Gym Days, lots of field trips, classes and workshops, and more.”

Furthermore, “The *myth* of homeschoolers being unsocialized is laughable to us; as we’re an extremely social, active bunch who enjoy the planet as our playground while we’re learning !!” Well said, CT-CHEER!

American Heritage Girls – CT Troop 001

With our participation in the Classical Kids Co-op every Friday, came another discovery of our local (and CT’s only) American Heritage Girl Troop 0001. “AHG is a nonprofit organization dedicated to the mission of building women of integrity through service to God, family, community, and country”. The program emphasizes life-skill building (through the completion of badges), leadership (there are opportunities at all levels), teamwork and confidence building (outdoor activities), character development (community service and citizenship), social development (special troop events), spiritual development (religious awards programs).

Think Girl Scouts, but Christian-based and conservative in values. And certainly, there’s no selling of overpriced cookies whose minimal proceeds hardly help with troop fundraising. Expect crafting events whose products are donated to local shelters, bake-offs that serve as Community Service Projects, cook-offs and fundraising dinners whose proceeds benefit a local hero, as well as Mother and Daughter events to reconnect with each other – not to mention the earning of badges where life skills are learned.

We attended our first meeting this evening and Rilla met several similarly aged girls, some who are also homeschooled. I especially appreciated their routine circle-time prayer and a call for the girls to reflect on how they could serve God in the coming week as the meeting came to a close.

Rilla is excited for the next meeting and I’m thankful that we were led to participate in this worthwhile group