Seven Quick Takes on The Maze Runner, CM Conferences, Chore Mix-Ups, and More!

:: 1 ::

Last Saturday night, we watched The Maze Runner. I hadn’t heard of it before, but it was one of those movies I ordered because Netflix said that if I liked other movies {basically YA dystopian novels on screen}, I’d like this movie, too. Was it my favorite movie ever? No. But I liked it, and I plan to watch the next one when it comes out. It was interesting, and I’m into the mystery enough to want to watch the next one to find out what the answers are to all the questions the first movie raises. Be prepared to not have a satisfying ending if you watch it, too. The whole thing basically sets you up for future movies. There is a resolution, yes, but not without created more need for more resolution as well.

Good marketing tactic, I suppose. 😉

 

:: 2 ::

Have you heard about the AmblesideOnline summer conference? This is an unprecedented conference! Ten years ago, all of the Advisory got together and held a conference. The Auxiliary Board didn’t even exist at that point. Now, all the Advisory and Auxiliary {except me … wah} are getting together in Indiana for an enriching weekend together in July. If you are able to go, I can tell you that it’s going to be great!

 

 

:: 3 ::

In this same vein, all of you Left Coasters can join me at the Northwest Charlotte Mason Educator’s Conference outside Seattle in late September! I am looking forward to a nature walk with Naomi. I have wanted to do this for years, and what better place than somewhere beautiful …with no drought? 😉

 

:: 4 ::

This Week’s Links Collection:

• Early Academic Training Produces Long-Term Harm from Psychology Today
  • This reminded me of my comments on kindergarten in last week’s 7QT post.
• Sexuality as Transcendence: An Interview with Fabrice Hadjadj from Ethika Politika
  • This is a long and difficult read, but it was amazing. I’m not Catholic, which means that theologically, I don’t agree with absolutely everything he said, but — oh my word — this was some of the best philosophical reasoning about sexuality I’ve read in a long time.
• The Death of Christianity from Adam 4D
  • Yep.
• In Irish Catholicism, it seems, God can be outvoted from The Spectator
  • An interesting critique of the church from a gay atheist — the subtitle says it all: What’s the point of a religious tradition unless you believe that the majority can be wrong?

 

:: 5 ::

We just finished the 2015 Ultimate Chore Mix Up. It’s our beginning-of-summer tradition. We still have lessons next week, but we decided to get a jump on it this year since I procrastinated last year, to the great irritation of the children {ahem}. I write a list of all the chores anyone is responsible for. I cross off anything that doesn’t need to be done anymore {like milking goats … since I sold my herd last weekend} and add anything that does need to be done {like mowing the back lawn … since said goats won’t be cropping it for us anymore}. The next thing I do is write everyone’s names {including mine} across a sheet of paper. I assign anything that needs to be done by a specific person {for example, only my oldest can mow the lawn and only I dust ceiling fans}. Everything else goes into a pool, and the children take turns choosing the jobs they want, until there is nothing left to choose from. I make sure that all of it seems “fair” — basically that no one person is carrying more than his share of the burden — and we’re set. These lists are what we work from until the next summer, when we mix it up again.

A-Age-10 is very excited not to have to do dishes with O-Age-Six anymore.

And that’s all I’ll say about that.

 

:: 6 ::

This month in 2008:

It’s interesting looking this far back. I was about to begin Year One with Son E., and I was pregnant with Son O. James Taylor had taught me so much already!

 

:: 7 ::

Answering Your Questions:

• Question: I have chosen to homeschool my son {6} using AmblesideOnline. I reviewed the book list for the next 12 years of my son’s education and realized I have not read ANY of those books as a child. Nor have any of the books been read to me. I have never done a nature, composer, or artist study. It was how I was raised. I suppose without class or culture. Reading the FAQs on AO website I can say that I can do this. Teach my son the CM way. But I know there is SO much more. Right now I really feel inadequate. Is there hope for me?
  • Answer: Yes! You can do this! There is hope for you. So many of us simply learn alongside our children. We read the books aloud to them, and when they are older and reading for themselves, we read the books on our own {we call it pre-reading} so that we can have good discussions. You can start over the summer, if you like, on educating yourself. Or you can just get a big stack of great children’s books from the library and read them aloud to your child. There is nothing shameful about starting at the very beginning, even for yourself. I learned a lot from reading good picture books to my children. You might feel like you are alone, but many of us were unfamiliar with some or all of the booklists. The wonderful thing about AO is that we are enriched right along with our students. 🙂