Sympathize, sympathize when kids don't comply.

In the picture- my 2yr old fully enjoying her Nutella toast.

Believe me, I used to be a really, really sweet-voiced mom, back when I only had one child. My father used to admire how patient and sweet I was teaching E, unlike many demanding Chinese mothers(or using currently the most fashionable word: tiger mom) in Taiwan.

It took me two miscarriages to have the second child-L. So E and I had 5 and a half high quality time together. Everything seems so easy since she was such an observant and attentive learner and such a sponge for anything I showed her. Yet when the second one came along, everything changed! I found my voice getting tighter and louder each day trying to make E comply. Especially after the second one turned two(you know what I mean!).

I need to remember to slow down or cut short when E is introduced a new element-I would say the biggest learning struggle of this year is piano, then occasionally math. Until this year, it's always been math.
E tended to "block out" when she had to practice new piano pieces. She usually waited until I the last drop of patience perspired to tell me:"It's too difficult." And I always regretted that I failed to detect the trace of her frustration beforehand. It usually helps her learning spirit when I break down a new math concept or make her practice pacing shorter on piano.

Both children get jealous with each other, and I need to learn with it- 
E, although is almost 8 and is the best older sister I can imagine. Inevitably,  she gets jealous. Especially when she has work to learn, piano pieces to practice, and I am giggling and playing with the second one(although that's how a two-yr-old learns).
Two-yr-old L gets jealous when I practice cello or piano with E and immediately wants to nurse.

That's just the way it is.

some good days of learning

Homeschooling is life, there are some good days and some bad ones. Following are two good day schedules.

2-16-2011 Wednesday
1. Memorization-the Daffodils by William Wordsworth
2. piano
3. Chinese classical poem 春曉-孟浩然
4. Coffee shop math- carry over and borrowing
lunch
5. cello- review book 1 and Judas Maccabeus
6. Saxon math 2 in the car
7. Acting
8. Saxon in the car
9. Read-Aloud: The Iliad
Euna's internet game time- American Girl
10. Auralia
Chinese Dance

2-17-2011 Thursday
1. Lydie-identify bopomofo game
2. Euna eats breakfast and reads Mathematicians are People, too.
3. Copy work of Chinese poem-春曉-孟浩然
4. Euna got out of her Chinese writing book and did some drills spontaneously
5. Chinese dictionary, look up the character 花, 花色，花招
6. Piano
7. Cello in the kitchen while I prepare lunch
Lunch
8. Piano review(since tomorrow is piano lesson day)
9. Coffee shop math
10. English grammar(tutor's assignment)

Looking back the first year of homeschooling in 2008

It has been almost 3 years since DH and I made the decision to homeschool. I still remember in June, 2008, my head was buried by several how-to homeschool books. Among all, I was mostly impressed by the Well-Trained Mind and Core Knowledge. These two books are still our main reference for Euna's HS learning content.

Back then Lydie was still in my tummy. The first 6 months of learning how to homeschool was so much fun and exhilarating. Euna was already fluent and was reading some Chinese books and magazine, but just started phonic books(I delayed her English reading deliberately). So the first thing to HS was to teach Euna phonics. I used Phonic Pathway. Half way through she was reading reader 2 and quickly level 3 books. Long before I realized, she clearly did not need any more phonic drilling and was able to sail along on her own with real books(skipping Bob books and other phonic easy readers I bought for her). Spelling did not seem to be an issue for her. Until now she rarely gets confused with spelling rules except for words of other language origins.

Learning to teach Euna math was stressful for me since I never liked math(my music boarding school math teachers told me that I had no hope for it). But I had time and joyful energy to learn along with Euna rapid progress. That first year we chose to use Saxon 1. With its incremental sequence of progress, it was an easy start for me but occasionally boring for Euna.

That year I completely stopped teaching Euna cello. I just did not know how to deal with power struggling. She was still attending a piano group class with an old French teacher and she liked it very much.

Now that first year seems so easy, fun and merry. That was a never to return period of peaceful time before the chaos of juggling with two kids, homeschooling, and teaching cello part time at home.

2nd grade Sep/2010-Sep/2011--Curricula for E(7yr10mos)

I. Chinese:1. Writing, 2. Calligraphy, 3. Sunday Chinese school (it is really below her level, but she wanted to go back for meeting friends and reviews), 4. Read-Aloud: Chinese history, Chinese folklores, legends and stories about Chinese characters. 5. Langauge art I designed for her: Use Chinese dictionary for reference, sentence composing, grammar and idioms. 6. Chinese children's magazine 巧連智

II. English: Lots of readings, Wordly Wise, Spelling Workout, Winston Grammar, and English poetry(tutor),Getty-Dubay Italic Handwriting.

III. Math: Miquon/Saxon2/Singapore2(just finished Singapore 1B in December 2010) and coffee shop math that either E or I be the owner and calculate the bills.

IV. Music: Cello/Piano/Auralia-Musition/our 900 classical/jazz CD colection
Continues both piano and cello. With her maturity increasing, I am gradually adding more practice time on both instruments. E also enjoys studying music theory on Auralia and Musition softwares while I am busy.

V. History: Sonlight core curriculum 1/2 grade compressed is used as a spine, supplemented with Jane Watson's The Iliad and the Odyssey, and D'Aulairs' Book of Greek Myths. Instead of SL worksheets, we use the Calvert's worsheets for A Child's History of the World.

VI. Science: Finishing Sonlight Science 1. I just received my Amazon package of Building Foundations of Scientific Understanding by Dr. Nebel. We will see how this works.

VII. Art: this year E starts her first formal art learning in a studio.
VIII. Acting: E enjoys greatly in her Zachary acting class. This spring she will be working on Treasure Island. She will be Jamie, a girl's version of Jim.

VIV. French: Hardly constructed. She watches T'choupi, a French cartoon we bought in Paris last year with L(2yr5mos). A little bit of Muzzy DVD, Harry Learns French(Barron's) and French for Kids(McCraw Hill).

I know it looks overwhelming, in reality, we try to do the first four subjects everyday. While the rest of subjects are her "electives" which we visit once or twice a week at her own pace. And somedays, when we just don't feel right, watching educational Netlix streaming movies counts for learning for the day. And that's the merit of homeschooling- flexibility.

L- 2yr&5mos

Although Lydie started talking earlier than Euna (around 1yr & 2mos, she could say more than 10 words including: good night, daddy, mommy, grandma), she has never been interested in English until this month.
Before, when I tried to tell her a story in English, she protested in Chinese:"Please speak". In other words, she thinks saying things in English is not speaking words but something else?!

From my observation, most second child in a Chinese-English bilingual household will develop her English skill much earlier than the first child since she or he hears the older sibling's conversation in English more and earlier at home. I have been waiting for the same thing to happen in my house. But thanks to our decision to homeschool, with Euna's daily help, we cultivated an almost full day Mandarin-speaking environment for Lydie. Lydie speaks Mandarin fluently at home with us. In Mandarin, she is already using complete sentences begin with:"because"(因為）, "I feel"（我覺得）, and "but"（可是）.

This month something is changing though. She is using more English, mostly in commands, such as, "it's mine.", "stop!", "OK, OK", "I can share.", all with vivid and IMPATIENT voice. I think it's because she is able to verbalize much more and is spending more time playing with Euna and Euna's homeschool friends on park days and our poetry days.

The funniest incident so far happened two mornings ago when she saw a toothpaste tube laying on the kitchen counter, she pointed to it and told me in Chinese: That is..then switch to English:"brut--your--teese".

L- 2yr&4mos

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Lydie's phrase of the week is when I point to a page in her book that has only one object and if I ask her how many there are, she says: Not Many, in Chinese. So I am teaching her the quality of "only one" this week.

If I ask her something with a "Why", she answers with a "because".

It also happened this week in the van, she would sing the English alphabet song(Twinkle Twinkle melody). And she would stop after singing a couple phrases, in Chinese,"what does that mean?"

3/5/2009

Piano

math-miquon orange book simple multiplication: F-6, F-9,

Chinese- 字卡和造句，巧連智 2002/10月聽CD

French- Muzzy cassette tape 1