Wednesday, September 09, 2009

...dear old Golden Rule time...

OK...so...the OU game didn't quite go as planned...oh well, life moves on. I love college football, i'm a big Sooners fan, but my planet doesn't revolve around Memorius Stadia, that crimson beauty that shines so brightly on Fall evenings here in central OK. And hey, in all honesty, the season ain't over in one game...that's an out of conference loss to a currently #9 ranked team. There is no doubt we got stung...hard, but it's not insurmountable. We have a tough row to hoe, but we did before that, it just got that much longer...and hotter. Now we have to win out. Which means going to Miami who just beat Florida St. in the Seminoles yard (and they owe us a favor), to big D again next month to trade licks with the Horns, at Kansas, at Nebraska (who owes us a BIG favor) and then finishing the regular season with currently #5 ranked Little Brother (OSU) in Norman. Now with our all-world TE out for the season, our Heisman trophy winner on the mend, and a defense that looks way to porous than it should...we've got our work cut out.

The real news looks like this...

Started school on Monday, we now officially have a couple 1st graders. I've been working with The Prosecutor for about a month already to get her up to speed with HRH. She finished Kinnygarden last Friday and began 1st grade on Monday...one of the many beauties of homeschooling. The playing field has been evened considerably with HRH being out of school since early June and The Prosecutor getting back into the routine of cognitive exercise for a month already.

We've got a full slate for the morning, poetry, phonics, beginning cursive, math, and reading. The first week is pretty relaxed, almost a snowball poised at the hilltop, the potential energy slowly giving way to kinetic. After this first week, workload begins to pick up speed and increase in magnitude but the hill isn't extremely steep so as not to overwhelm.

Beginning cursive has been fun for all of us. It will be a lesson in rewind for me...i left off cursive around 7th or 8th grade i think, and printed ever since. My cursive just never took very well. They are already cursing as good, if not better, than me...and we've done 'e', 'i', and 'u'.

Math was a subject i had some interest in seeing how the difference of 16 months between the two would pan out. The x-factor is that the curriculum itself is completely new (and very cool). They are picking it up well in the three days we've been at it. I have noticed that HRH seems to be flowing right in, while The Prosecutor is swirling in an eddy or two. For HRH the light is on a potentiometer, it's slowly dialing brighter and brighter.
For The Prosecutor its more like a slightly open circuit in a breeze, there's a flicker of light on occasion and at any point i expect it to burn brightly once the short gap between concept and understanding is federated. This particular curriculum adds another concentric circle to the paradigm of math perception...when the student shows enough understanding of the material, they become the teacher and teach it back to the instructor. The author of the model takes a quote from Confucius and then adds to it, "Tell me and i will forget, show me and i will understand, let me do it and i will remember." To which he adds, "Let me teach it and I will have achieved mastery." And that is what we are striving for here in our little academe'...mastery. Those who achieve mastery in one thing are confident in themselves and their ability to accomplish higher goals.

Monday, after school was over i had flicked on the tube to watch The Open...and Roger Federer was hitting holes in his next victim. Most of The Royals were outside enjoying the sub-90 degree early September afternoon sun. Only The X was inside with me. I was wrapping up some school stuff and preparing for the next day. I heard him jabbering about something and looked up...he was standing on the couch, jumping up and down, clapping his hands and saying "Go! Go! Go!" intently watching the tennis match. I quickly sent a text to a friend who is a huge Federer fan saying "Looks like the X is another Fed fan" to which he sent back "There is hope for the youth of today." I guess Saturday with the Sooners made more of an impression than i thought...its football season X...it only gets better from here.

Here's a recent rite of passage The X recently experienced...the boy he's a'growin'!


6 comments:

man2followJESUS said...

Looks like a great haircut to me! I hope you save a few "locks" for Grammie! You KNOW how she is when it comes to the "First Haircut"!

It's great that the girls are doing so well in their studies. I don't even want to discuss my handwriting! I think I may have ADHD when it comes to writing - either cursive or printing. I think there is some kind of "mis-firing" between my brain & hand.

Its funny you blogged about the home schooling because I've been intending to call you for about the last week or so and ask you questions about that. Since we're getting closer and closer to the adoption, I am seeking information.

Love to all,
Uncle K & Auntie T

Anonymous said...

OMG! His after picture makes him look more like the Prince every day. Too cute!!!!

Auntie DeeDee

Jesse Baggett said...

Ahhh, the X is so handsome! I like hearing about the girl's schooling - it's all about learning how to learn.

Bag Blog said...

Just knowing the differences in your two princesses - their personalities, the way they learn, their maturity, etc, can you imagine how a public school teacher feels with 25-30 different students - trying to meet their needs - trying to teach all of them - it just cannot happen well. Someone is going to get lost or left behind. Homeschooling rocks! You can nourish their individualness and still teach them together.

The haircut was quite handsome on the X-Man.

Buck said...

Nice job on the haircut, Jay!

I admire your patience and dedication when it comes to homeschooling. While I might have had the latter, I'm a lil bit short of the former. :D

Anonymous said...

... bhwahaha.... now THAT is how you give a redhead a haircut, sir!..... I'm getting the exact same styling tomorrow!....

Eric