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Ladies,

I must admit that I was not really looking forward to doing the Socratic Discussions in MTMM. As the guides are getting harder and the workload increasing, many assignments just seem so much more serious! I know that they need to be, but sometimes I long for the easier more light-hearted days of elementary school.

With this in mind, I am surprised at how much my son and I are enjoying the Socratic Discussions in MTMM. It has truly been eye-opening to discuss deeply about various issues, viewpoints, and stances, and I can see my son's maturity growing as he shares his own thoughts. I really look forward to this time, and I find that I have some pretty strong opinions during our discussions too!

Anyway, I'd love to hear from the rest of you about one thing that you are surprised to be enjoying in your current HOD guide(s).

Blessings,
Carrie

I have been surprised how much both of us are enjoying the Composer study in Rev to Rev. I really am not a big fan of Classical music, maybe because I am a singer and I like words to sing. I am finding that the stories on the Story of Classical Music are fascinating and I love the little tidbits I am learning about the composers lives. I also discovered I really like the music of Haydn. In fact I asked for a CD of his music for Christmas. My dh was shocked. It is also fun to hear what my ds imagines as he listens to the music and then fills out his music appreciation sheets.

Carrie it is encouraging to read you remarks about the Socratic discussions because when I think about trying to have those types of conversations with my just the facts, don't like to go deep, boy I get almost sick to my stomach. Hopefully I will be pleasantly surprised.

Art I'm really not into kid art and honestly thought these activities looked more like a craft session. I'm making a bigger effort to include the art projects each week and am LOVING the outcome! I haven't blogged about everything, but here are the few projects I have highlighted http://gracefilledhomeschooling.blogspo ... /label/art

Book wise its the history... History was never this interesting in school.
Art wise... The painting. I'm so in love with your watercolor instructions! I'm so happy with the effort my kids are putting into it.

What surprised me personally was the Edward Eggleston history books in Bigger Hearts.
What surprised us both was how well my 8yo took to Science.

Mikki

I have really enjoyed listening to the What in the World History CD's and reading the Beautiful Girlhood Book (especially the discussion that follows). Speaking of Socratic discussion, I am really hoping a Logics course is planned for early High School years. I LOVED learning about this as a teen (slippery slopes here we come! ).

I have to agree with Mikki. The Edward Eggleston books in Bigger have been good. I never liked history when I was in school, but I find it so interesting now. We are from PA and are in the middle of reading about William Penn. I don't think I even knew a whole lot about him, so that has been interesting. After the first day of reading about William Penn, Angie was even saying 'More! More!' When I was in school, I probably enjoyed math and english the most, although I was basically an average student. So, I wasn't into the science much either. I must say that I am enjoying the science as well.

Reddy Fox.

My youngest is using LHFHG. I honestly was not expecting her to be ready for the guide yet. She has SPD and some auditory processing issues, so I was thinking we'd be running the guides later with her because of all the listening involved. She is such a visual learner. Silly me. We tried a week on a whim, and she LOVED it. She is doing beautifully.

And she is in love with the story of Reddy Fox. She begs me to read it every day. She can skip phonics and not be the slightest bit upset, but try and skip Reddy and she is not at all pleased. What's really funny about this is that neither of her brothers was all that crazy about the story back when they were using the guide as their own, but they both rush to where we are so they can sit in and hear what happens next now.

We are not very far along yet (Bigger), but I have to admit there isn't anything I thought for one second I wouldn't enjoy and I have been right so far. I think my biggest discovery/surprise has been the Rod and Staff English. Afterall, English is just English is it not? I am just so pleased with what they have done in their English texts. What a joy to have wholesome, solid, quality texts in subjects like English.

I think this year in CTC, I am most surprised about the geography. I thought, geography, ho-hum, but we are really enjoying the geography book, and the lands we are studying are coming to life for us. We all want to take a trip to the middle east now so we can visit all these places in person.

Overall, in all of the guides, I am amazed how much I have been enjoying poetry. It really isn't my thing, but each year I have enjoyed the selections, and all we've learned with them.

I must admit that I was not really looking forward to doing the Socratic Discussions in MTMM. As the guides are getting harder and the workload increasing, many assignments just seem so much more serious! I know that they need to be, but sometimes I long for the easier more light-hearted days of elementary school.

I was so surprised to read this Carrie. I thought for sure since you planned the guides, you would be looking forward to it all. That was naive of me. I guess we often do what we know we need to do even if it isn't our most favorite. I appreciate hearing that you feel this way at times also. There are times that I long for the simpler fun days of early elementary school too, and I don't have any younger ones to school so those days are gone. As I am looking ahead, I see middle school and high school looming and know the days are going to be filled with much more serious study. I do appreciate that you still have fun scheduled in with the serious and even the serious will be enjoyable. Thanks!

I am surprised at how much we all enjoy the Rhymes in Motion in LHFHG. While I thought they were a good idea, I was anticipating a struggle in getting my ds to participate. However, he and dd LOVE them and even the 2 year old can join in, so it is a fun time all around .

bethelmommy wrote:I am surprised at how much we all enjoy the Rhymes in Motion in LHFHG. While I thought they were a good idea, I was anticipating a struggle in getting my ds to participate. However, he and dd LOVE them and even the 2 year old can join in, so it is a fun time all around .

Yes! My girls just LOVES these and her younger sister (3) is usually all over it! My older two also jump in with the letter rhymes and finger play in LHTH

Homeschooling!

But seriously, we enjoy so many things, my only real struggle(s) in homeschooling at the moment are how to get my housework done and I wish I actually had more time to linger over some of the projects and subjects with my oldest, but life with 4 kids just doesn't usually allow it. On those days where the baby is taking a good nap and the other 2 kids are outside entertaining themselves nicely (those days are soon to be over sadly) we just have such a great time together!

Art is the one subject I never got much into in school and I feel like I don't know much about it, so how can I teach it? The projects in the guides have always been easy to do and well explained, and my DD loves art and seems to be good at it as far as I can tell. So, I am enjoying teaching her art even though its not something I would've thought I could teach.

I would have to say the thing that has surprised me the most is how much I love history!! It was my least favorite in school but how I love snuggling on the couch with my kiddos and reading the living history books. HOD does such a fantastic job of revealing God's hand throughout history, it's fascinating to me now!

Another thing would be that it is possible to teach two different guides, even with a very active one year old. I love the independence my older two are gaining this year in Preparing (my favorite guide yet) and after some weeks of tweaking we found a schedule that works really well for us.

I just can't imagine why everyone wouldn't want to use HOD!

Rev2Rev is all great, and I knew we would enjoy the "Who is God?" book, but I didn't realize how much. I love how it really starts some deep discussions about peoples' worldviews and how everyone makes decisions from their own worldview (whether it is Biblical or secular, etc.) It has come up a lot during the election season! We have always discussed things like this, but the book seems to really clarify our thoughts and views in this area and helps us (both!) to articulate them better.