A Tale of the Fort

"He who fears the LORD has a secure fortress, and for his children it will be a refuge." ~ Proverbs 14:26

Back when there were two children living in our home who loved to make forts in the woods, my husband decided to build a *real* fort for them. So there began the tale of THE FORT back in the mid 80's. With scrap lumber it was started and continued a step at a time. And literally, there were steps put into it as a second floor was developed. Before too long, posts were added to the second floor and eventually a roof with some minor railings along the edges was built. Plans were made for shingles on the roof and a stronger railing on the second level, but our family grew as well as my husband's business so that part never happened due to time disappearing in our days. But that didn't stop the children from playing there all the time. And any time our children's friends came over, the fort was the *in* place to play. It was a joyful place filled with childhood adventure!

Until this summer. Although bits and pieces had been replaced through the years, the fort was becoming more and more unsafe with rotting lumber. Plus a big old tree right next to it had died and my husband was concerned about it coming down on the fort on a windy day. Verdict - NO OCCUPANCY! KEEP OUT! And plans were made to take the fort down which didn't happen for quite awhile.....


Until this winter. On a cold winter day my husband took his equipment up to the fort to begin the removal. I posted pictures on our family blog site of the day long project from start to finish and it truly was a sad event for my older ones. Their beloved fort. GONE!

Wait a minute! It wasn't gone at all! Suddenly memories came alive for each one of my children as they shared their stories and with it came the realization for me that the fort wasn't all about play, but about creative learning! YAY! One son recalled his sister making him play "Blaze and Billy" stories (written by C.W. Anderson). Or what about when the fort was a castle and they were knights? Or a drive-through restaurant? Or the time they each had to come up with games so they could have their own carnival with prizes? Or who could forget the *interior design* work that was done with things like discarded curtains from the neighbors, carpet scraps from home, in addition to any odds and ends mom didn't need? Or the tasty lunches prepared with small fingers and carried in backpacks to the fort kitchen? Or learning about the ground wasps that stung them on the path to the fort? Or attempting to transplant trees and plant seeds after their oldest brother had them endlessly raking and digging? Or sitting out there on a dark summer's night listening to crickets? YES, the fort was an active place of learning through playing outside in God's beautiful creation.


Although the old fort may be just a pile of ashes now, plans are being made for a new fort. One for the younger siblings. One which the grandchildren can enjoy, too. It may be in a new location. It may look differently than the old one. But there is excitement about this new project as each one shares their thoughts and ideas. I smile to myself as I see that the tale of the fort lives on and even now continues to be a way of creative learning for my children. It is evident that each one of my children has captured the gift of learning from the God of creation. And isn't that really the heart of the matter?

Heart of the Matter Online Meme

Today, our meme will be based on what your thoughts are on the following quote:

"Education is not the filling of a pail, but the lighting of a fire."
- William Butler Yeats

Post your thoughts on your blog and then please come back here and link directly to your Heart of the Matter Online meme post. Failure to leave a direct link could result in the removal of your name from Mr. Linky.

The schedule for the theme of the homeschool meme is located in the right column under "Blog With Us". Please check it out to view upcoming themes.

Math Mammoth Mulitplication - Giveaway!

We are giving away 3 copies Math Mammoth Multiplication 1! For your chance to win you must guess how many candies are in the jar....

Math Mammoth Multiplication 1 is a self-teaching worktext to learn multiplication concept and the times tables.

Multiplication 1: Master the Times Tables. lets children first learn
well the multiplication concept itself, tying it in with number lines, rows and columns, multiplying by zero, some word problems, and order of operations.

Then the second part practices all the the times tables - and yes, it does involve memorization (which is not bad in itself). BUT when you do the tables in a certain order - easiest ones first - and use a 12x12 grid, the task becomes less daunting.

In each lesson student fills the 12 x 12 grid up to those facts that are already memorized and can clearly see the progress and how little is still left.

The ebook also includes a guide for effective oral drilling. The best way to memorize the tables is NOT to start down the line: 1 x 7 = 7, 2 x 7 =14, etc. Always start by memorizing the skip-counting pattern 7, 14, 21, 28, etc. first. Then work on memorizing which fact is associated with which answer.

This way your child not only knows what is 8 x 7 but also knows all of it 'backwards' - that 56 is in tables of 8 and 7. That is an enormous help later, when studying division, factorizing, finding LCM's or GCF's.

The three guesses that come closest to the actual number without going over will win! To enter, simply leave your guess in a comment on this post. Make sure that there is a way for us to communicate with you in case you win. The contest will end on Saturday, January 26 at Midnight and the winner will be announced on Sunday, January 27th. Good luck!

Top 100 and Blog Roll

Heart of the Matter Online has a new Top 100!
Go check it out and be sure to sign up!

Also, due to major problems with the use of RingSurf, we have decided to simply use a Blog Roll. It is located on the right column. Everyone from the blog ring was transferred to the blog roll so there is no need to make a request. Please visit this link for full instructions on how to join the blogroll and install the new code.

We are very, very sorry for all of the confusion.

Finding Great Books

Literature is a major aspect of our homeschool. We easily spend 2 or more hours a day snuggled up on the couch reading. I have had a few friends inquire as to how I am able to find such wonderful literature to read with my son. So here is my advice on how to find the best literature and picture books available.

• Use your local library. Most libraries have online catalogs and take book reservations. Most librarians also love homeschoolers, so make friends with your librarians.
• Take advantage of the lists and suggestions on Amazon.com. Anyone can create their own list on any topic imaginable. You can simply browse the hundreds of 1000's of children's books by clicking on the links in the left sidebar of this link. Enter a search item into Listmania. Here is a list of one parent's favorite classic children's stories. You can find helpful lists of great children's books about Africa, Science picture books, or Cooking with kids favorite characters, and much much more. Next week we will study Ancient China with The Story of the World. So I entered "Ancient China" into the search bar, clicked on If I Were a Kid in Ancient China, and it led me to a dozen other books under the section "Customers Who Bought This Item Also Bought..."
  

• Reading Rainbow is the #1 most watched PBS program in school classrooms. It has won most than 250 awards. Request or download a Reading Rainbow catalog. With 150 TV show episodes, you are sure to find something to supplement whatever topic you are studying.
• Two other catalogs that I love to peruse for great book ideas are Sonlight and Veritas Press. Both of those links will take you to the request a catalog page.
• A Book in Time has lists of quality books for American and World History.
• This Classical Christian website has amazing resources including a "1000 Good Books" list organized by reading level, then by subject.
• The American Librarian Association (ALA) has a directory for all the outstanding children's books that have won national awards.
• Last but certainly not least is the amazing Ambleside Online, a free curriculum guide and booklist designed to follow Charlotte Mason's method of homeschooling.

Great is Thy Faithfulness

As I sat down this morning with a cup of my favorite peppermint mocha coffee & a pen in my hand, I began reflecting upon all of the feelings that flooded my soul regarding the decision to start home-schooling or not. Fear, uncertainty, being unqualified, confused, overwhelmed... I had two precious lives given to me by God with instructions to help mold and shape them into wonderful Godly princesses. WoW! What a huge responsibility! WoW! What a life-altering decision!

What I failed to comprehend was that my God is a God who never changes, who's compassion is unending, who created the universe and is overflowing with mercy and love. He not only has covered my sins, but is waiting to shower me with His perfect peace. He's my guider, protector, provider and cheerleader! He has blessings in abundance waiting for ME! He has promised strength for today and has guaranteed me hope for tomorrow. Indeed, He is ever so faithful...

"Great is thy faithfulness, O God my father,
There is no shadow of turning with thee:
Thou changest not, thy compassions, they fail not;
As thou hast been thou for ever wilt be.

'Great is thy faithfulness! Great is thy faithfulness!'
Morning by morning new mercies I see:
All I have needed thy hand hath provided—
'Great is thy faithfulness,' Lord unto me!

Summer and winter, and springtime and harvest,
Sun, moon and stars in their courses above,
Join with all nature in manifold witness
To thy great faithfulness, mercy and love.

Pardon for sin and a peace that endureth,
Thine own dear presence to cheer and to guide;
Strength for today and bright hope for tomorrow,
Blessings all mine, with ten thousand beside."
—Thomas O. Chisholm

"Make me understand your ways, O Lord! Teach me your paths! Guide me into your truth and teach me. For you are the God who delivers me; on you I rely all day long." Psalms 25:4-5 NET

"And we know that all things work together for good for those who love God, who are called according to his purpose..." Romans 8:28 NET

In Him;

Field Trip Tuesday

If you have read my personal blog for any length of time, you will already know that I am a field trip mom. I thrive on fun field trips and love to go and see/do things with the kids. We are also a family that struggles to survive on one income and are excited to find a free or inexpensive field trip in an area that isn't too far to drive to. Over the last six or so years that we have been homeschooling (and even before then), we have gone to many places as a family and I have tried to keep a record on my blog of most of our adventures. My series is called "Field Trip Foto Friday ©"... but for Heart of the Matter, we're giving it a new day of the week and allowing YOU to participate!

While you might have seen some of these field trips before if you are a long-time Sprittibee reader, I'm certain that there are a great many of homeschool moms out there who haven't. So please allow me to bring you some memorable re-runs of the amazing field trips we have taken. As a homeschooler, a camera-nut, a mother, and a Texan (we Texans aren't afraid to travel long distances in the car truck)... I LOVE ME SOME FIELD TRIP.

I hope you will share some great links to the field trips that have enriched your homeschooling journey in the Mr. Linky below. I'm always looking for another great educational quest to set out on!

* * * * * * *
The Houston Zoo
By Sprittibee ~ Jan 20, 2006

I'm checking through some of the field trips we took the first year of homeschooling to see if I still have pictures from them on my computer. I haven't gotten the photo CDs down yet, so there may be more there as well. This is the first 'Field Trip Foto Friday' in the series, so please, come back next week for another peek at what us homeschoolers do for fun. Field-tripping is our favorite way to learn, even though we usually limit our outings to once a week or once every two weeks except on rare occasions when there is too much to do in a week to pass up multiple day trips.

The Houston Zoo is a nice place with lots of great scenery and fun animals. Those little kids in the picture are mine... and they grow up so fast, don't they? Enjoy your field trips while you can. This is one of my favorite spots in the Houston Zoo to stop and rest. Wish I had a yard with a pond (and huge old trees) just like this!

* * * * * * *

That was my very first field trip for my series. Don't you just want to jump into that photo and go check out the fish in that pond? Join me as we walk down memory lane and allow me to share my favorite field trip 'fotos' with you. Hopefully you'll be inspired to get out and enjoy the world around you with your younguns. Be sure to share the link to your own field trip posts here at Heart of the Matter! We want to peek in on your outings.

From my Heart to Yours,

This Is All I Know

I don't have a clue about what I'm doing. No, really, I don't. I know people who have their whole homeschooling careers mapped out from before their child is born. They know the method they'll use. They have a plan for whatever learning styles their children turn out to have. They have their curriculum ordered, their school year lesson plans written or if they've chosen unschooling, they are completely confident and prepared for the life of learning they'll unravel. Me? I have no idea.

A year and a half into this thing I don't know what I'm doing. Nope, truly. How many days a year? Nope. Start in September? Start in January? Nope. Use a full curriculum set? Unschool? Eclectic? No idea. I don't even know if my oldest is really in kindergarten or 1st grade. I told you I didn't know what I was doing. Before they were preschool age I thought maybe I'd homeschool. I knew I had the ability. I wasn't worried about socializing. I knew there were lots of great curricula out there. And then my oldest made lots of friends and there was such a to-do about registering for school and I caved. Against my husband's better judgement.

Shoulda been a sign.

And then my husband took a job in a different city 3 weeks before school was to start. And we didn't find a place to live (leaving him commuting more than an hour each way) until 3 days before the first day of school.

Shoulda been a sign.

I was in the first trimester of my 4th pregnancy. Every morning I got 3 small children dressed and fed and drove 20 minutes (to the best school in the district - refused to put my 4 year old on a bus) and dropped my crying, hysterical child off with strangers who could care less. That's how kindergarten goes.

"They have to grow up," they said.
"They'll eventually stop crying," they said.
"He'll love it," they said.
"It'll be great for your other children," they said.
"You deserve it," they said.
"He'll listen better to someone other than his mother," they said.
"You're coddling him," they said.
"You'll ruin him," they said.
"He needs to toughen up," they said.

He cried and I cried. Then, my other 2 children stood by the door all day asking about their brother and when I picked him up from school he was hungry; and tired; and overwhelmed; and in trouble - Everyday. So, I scheduled appointments with the teacher and I was informed that she had "only a minute to talk" because her son had a football game to get to so I couldn't glean from her if it was typical kindergarten adjustments or if it was him. Next, I signed up to volunteer and was told that I should allow the professionals to do their jobs because they've been trained and know best. I attended the PTA meetings and was treated like a first-timer that needed to wise up; get seasoned.

I brought my son home each afternoon with new papers declaring things like "name moved from good guys to bad guys" with no specifics of what to actually address. I went to meet him for lunch on his 5th birthday and realized they had 20 minutes to retrieve their tray, eat, and dump their trash. So, when he needed to potty, he didn't get to finish eating. When we told him to put his chicken nuggets in his pocket so that he could eat them on the playground immediately following lunch he said, "Oh, no, I would get in a bunch of trouble for sneaking food." He got in trouble at rest time for holding the 2 inch square of cloth that I had sprayed with my perfume to comfort him. In the mornings he begged me to not drop him off before the morning bell. They were to go out to the playground with all 6 of the other grades to play with 2 on-duty teachers. When we got home we did homework, reviewed his disciplinary action for the day, fed him, bathed him, and sent him to bed. We awoke the next morning to do it all again.

Shoulda been a sign.

At 8 weeks we finally prayed about what we were doing. And we brought him home - with no plan; no curriculum; no ammunition in our arsenal. We were armed only with our love for our son. Our feeling of what we were doing was finally right and we had the confidence that we know what's best. I still don't have a plan. I have hand-me-down curriculum. I have the internet. I have the Discovery Channel. I have ideas about someday ordering cool sets. I don't know. Most days I question if I'm doing enough. Other days I question if I'm pushing too hard. I don't know much about what I'm doing. But what I do know, we'll go where the wind blows. I know that I love my children. I know that I don't need a special degree to do that. I know that they've come so far in such a short time and I know that they astonish me constantly with what they've learned. I know that I love being with them. I know that they love being with each other. I don't know how to do what I'm doing, but I know that what I'm doing is right. And I know that at the end of the day I love what I'm doing.

Homeschooler of the Week: Carrie

This week's Homeschooler of the Week honor goes to Carrie: the official Gremlin Wrangler!










So, Carrie, tell us a little about yourself.
I'm in my early thirties, been married for 11 years, have 4 gremlins, a dog posing as a hyena, and a cat posing as a jerk. I'm one of those creative people who can't make up her mind what creative outlet to focus on the most, so most people think I'm really cool to have sooo much talent, but really it's evidence of my schizophrenic mind. Currently my ADD is getting the better of me and I have so many creative tentacles out online just waiting for something to happen so I can quit my part time job and do something else for money and stay home all the time again.

I've been a Christian for a long time, but it didn't really make sense to me until I was 19 and heavily involved in the occult. I went searching for God in all the wrong places, but He is faithful to seek out His own and eventually pulled me out of the pit I had fallen into. Nowadays, I'm lovin' my thirties and have found it to be a swell time of finally being comfortable being my goofy self.

When and where do you blog? And for that matter why?
I blog at The Gremlin Wrangler, almost everyday. That's almost. I just can't contain the madness in my head and must get it out somewhere.

How long have you been homeschooling?
Since 2001. Roughly.

Tell us a little about those children of yours.
There are four of them all together; three boys and a girl.
Chaz is 10, and loves to debate every word that comes out of my mouth. I count that for school, since he's following in the footsteps of Socrates. He's also a budding filmmaker. He specializes in action figure actors.

Zoe is 8. She's a creative genius. Complete with the mood swings that go along with being an arteest. She's so much like me, it's frightening.

Jack is 6 and probably the weirdest kid I've ever met. At any given moment you'll find him dressed as a superhero and in the next moment hear him discussing what it would be like to pop someone's eyeballs out.

Xavier is almost a year old and was a bit of a surprise. He's probably the cutest baby you'll ever meet. And maybe the happiest. God had mercy on me and finally gave me what I think might be the fabled "easy child" that every other family seems to have one of. We shall soon see.

I lovingly refer to my children as gremlins. If you've seen the movie, you'll know exactly what I'm talking about. But I've deemed myself The Gremlin Wrangler and find it a privilege to mold their gremlinhood into fine upstanding citizens of the world. You just can't do that in public school, right?

Where do you do most of your homeschooling?
The floor, the couch, the table, the trampoline. We have a school room, but it's mostly for the books. Although lately we've started using it since certain people can't read with any noise going on. Poor baby. Someday he'll understand my whole life.

Tell us about your typical day.
The gremlins whine a little, then they get their work done as fast as they can, while I spin around in a blur trying to be five people at once. If there's anything typical about our day, it's that we always, always get done by lunch time. I keep a very flexible schedule so that I'm never pressured to overwork everyone in order to catch up. I like my afternoons free and I feel the gremlins need that time to let some of that gremlin juice seep out for awhile without me judging them.

What is the hardest thing about homeschooling?
Dealing with bad attitudes. My gremlins have never particularly claimed to enjoy school, and before you start questioning my methods, you should know I've tried just about everything short of feeding them grapes and fanning them like royalty. They are all very strong willed, but I've found it's the bookwork they protest. So we keep that short and then they have time for their creative pursuits. Which is also school, but not in their opinion.

And, of course, conversely, what do you love most about homeschooling?
That I can see some very strong strengths in them as far as future opportunities that I'm sure they wouldn't be able to pursue properly in a different school setting. And I love seeing their gremliny faces everyday.

What is the strangest or funniest thing someone has said to you about homeschooling?
"You mean your kids are with you all day long? How can you stand it?"

Where do you usually buy your curriculum and other items?
I beg, borrow and steal. Just kidding. If I can find used items on Amazon, I'll do that. Lately I've been frequenting Blue Thistle Books. They have a lot of really swell "living books." We are a low income family, so there's only one time a year (tax return time) that I can afford my books. Otherwise I use library materials and free resources from the internet.

And, ma'am, can you leave us with a little advice for new homeschoolers?
Don't give up . By all outward accounts, well meaning people have thought it best that I get a break and put my gremlins into public school. But I have great faith, that my efforts will be worth it. I get very discouraged by the attitude issues, but every once in awhile I see a glimpse of greatness. And don't compare your gremlins with other homeschooling gremlins! Simple learning is the best kind of learning and if you only get the basics done don't beat yourself up!

Carrie can also be found sketching some amazing portraits at her etsy shop Wandering Ink Portraits.