Tuesday, October 13, 2009


Our Lady of Fatima. Today. I have our Geography book on the dining table..set at Portugal, of course!

And I am responsible for posting a novena to the Unschooling Catholics list, a novena for families, to St John Bosco, starting today.

Good luck! I am often remiss at posting. Even here at logging what we do.

Why? I used to document faithfully but , now, well, I know the State requres it, but I just see kids learning, sometimes a lot, sometimes, a little and the need..urge..desire ...to document... just isn't there!

What have we been up to ?

Well, Anthony just asked Greg - Is talking of God here, in the accusative case? He is reading his birthday book, a primer on the ancient language Akkadian.

So, Akkadian is on the list of educational things we do...Thomas is studying Chinese through Open University..Alexander and I just completed a unit on Christian prayer for certificate courses in Religion. Starting units on The Creed and on The Sacraments.

Thomas and Anthony continue Kumon Maths study; Religion reading has been about the Cure of Ars; from Fr Laux's book Mass and the Sacraments; living - discussing - celebrating - reading about the liturgical year; I have Mere Christianity by C. S. Lewis out for Thomas to read this week.

We've done Latin, mostly translating hymns and prayers, using Lingua Angelica and listening to the oh-so-calming CD.

French class. Cooking. Volunteer work at the parish ( Gardening! Chickens! Woo hoo!).

Anthony has started his beach biology project - wave diagrams, ocean zonation, why waves break what causes waves of different sizes et al; will start a labelled shell collection after our trip to Wollongong.

Writing. Music Piano. Games. Work at Kumon and Salmat. Lots of reading, including Dracula and War and Peace. Lost of movies. Time with friends. A Singstar party. Role playing games. Visitors.

Blogging. Internet research. Questions. discussion, follow up, talking about books and movies...Current events...Facebook ( is that educational??).

Education must no longer be regarded only as a matter of teaching children, but as a social question of the highest importance, because it is the one question that concerns all mankind. The many other social questions have to do with one group or another of adults, with relatively small numbers of human beings; the social question of the child, however, has to do with all men everywhere Maria Montessori

4 comments:

molly said...

WOW, you are amazing! Sounds like a rich environment for kids to grow in. What are you doing with gardening? Chickens?

Leonie said...

Gardening - weeding at the parish - although remember that lemon and mandarin tree Anthony and I planted. In tubs? They have blossoms! Chickens.. looking after the friars' chickens - locking em up, feeding, watering....when we remember! oops!

Hopewell said...

Where is ancient language Akkadian from?? Never heard of it. I totally LOVE the Lingua Angelica cd. It's my favorite for stressed times in the car.

Leonie said...

Not sure how Anthony got nto Akkadian - maybe from his interest in ancient history? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Akkadian_Empire