AHASRADA
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Posts posted by AHASRADA
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So very thrilled for you! Just a question: you said most of your extended family lives in Canada. Are you by any chance a Canadian citizen? If so, you could start the paperwork for your daughter to become a citizen, she could live with a relative in Ontario for 6 months to establish residency when the time comes, and save even more on tuition. I've heard Ontario has generous interest-free college loans for residents. Just a thought.
Either way, it sounds like an excellent plan!
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I don't think I would send food with him. That's a problem if he still has it when he enters the U.S. P.O.E. (Port of Entry). They have dogs to sniff for food and if we were going to the states and brought one bag of Colombian coffee, we would need to declare that and probably be delayed in a different line.
Just as a clarification, yes, he definitely shouldn't bring any fruit, veggies, meat or dairy products that may come off the plane with him, as these will hold him up at customs (which I'm sure you're aware of as a very seasoned traveler, but I'm mentioning this for other readers). However, snack food should be no problem (crackers, chips, popcorn, granola bars, etc.).
Just a funny anecdote: One year when traveling overseas to visit the ILs, we would be stuck at the airport waiting to board at dinner time. Not wanting to subject ourselves to the ridiculously expensive and not that great airport food, we brought our dinner with us: several different kinds of salad in plastic tubs, sandwiches and a whole roasted chicken. We had no problem going through security with our food, and ate near the boarding gate. Unfortunately, our eyes were bigger than our stomachs, and we couldn't finish it all; we didn't even touch the chicken. We boarded with the chicken still packed in a plastic grocery bag. When we arrived, MIL reheated it in the oven for lunch! Fortunately our family has iron stomachs and our destination was a developing country that doesn't concern itself with food imports :)
I'm sure your son will be just fine and have a great time!
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My latest squash dish success: mac & cheese! Make a 1/2 batch of cheese sauce. Separately, boil butternut squash, peeled and cubed, in a quart of chicken broth. When tender, add broth and cooked squash to cheese sauce, puree with hand blender, season to taste.
This is a rich, delicious cheese sauce, but with only half the cheese, butter and milk, plus the goodness of squash! Kid approved :)
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I haven't actually tried SW, although I have looked through many copies. My dd has used several levels of Megawords. SW is a very ps traditional approach, with a weekly word list and various activities using the words (copying, fill in the blank, etc.). For those who can learn spelling simply by seeing and writing the word multiple times, it would probably be sufficient.
I prefer MW, especially for those who aren't natural spellers. It groups words by phonograms and syllabication rules, giving students more tools to figure out the spelling and put some sense behind it. It also requires very little parent involvement (a short dictation a couple times per week). Just keep in mind that MW teaches multi-syllable words. The student should have a strong foundation in spelling single - syllable words first.
If you don't mind teacher-led programs, and especially if you have a struggling speller, you might want to check out All About Spelling.
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I voted yes, but only for Sheep Daddy. I bought him two long john/union suit type of underwear for Christmas. He was threatening to buy himself footed jammies and I put my foot down. The long johns are the closest thing I will allow him to get to footie pajamas.
I bought this cozy alternative to footed pjs for ds18. He absolutely loves it!
https://www.fleececorner.com/product.php?productid=17565&cat=257&page=1
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We have never been in a position to save for college. We made a conscious choice to relocate to an area with extremely affordable higher education well in advance of our children's college years. It also happens to be a homeschool-unfriendly area, there has been a lot of hoop-jumping and other logistics that have made life more challenging than if we had stayed home. But, in-state state school tuition back home is $16k per year. In our current province, it's $1500. No comparison.
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We were awoken a few times in the wee hours by a car alarm. I came to enough around 5:30am to ask dh if he thought it could be ours. I heard him answer with a confident "No," so I put it out of my mind. It must be out of town visitors. I was feeling sorry for those preparing to celebrate with family and friends (we don't), that they were having their sleep disturbed by this alarm.
Dd and I were getting breakfast around 9am, and the alarm started in again, so I told her the whole story. Next thing I know, dh is downstairs with his coat on, heading out the door. Apparently it was ours :( When I asked him about it in the night, he claims his response was "I don't know," rather than, "No." If I had realized that, I would have gone out to check myself.
Sorry neighbors!
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I just came across this podcast called "Bilingual Kids Rock". It has interviews with authors, parents and professionals about raising bilingual kids. I found it interesting and full of helpful tips.
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I don't celebrate anything this time of year, but certainly am not offended by greetings from random strangers, store clerks, etc. I know it is a festive time for the majority of people, and always reply, "thanks, you too," to whatever greeting is offered.
For close friends who know my religious affiliation and vice versa, I tell them, "Enjoy your holiday! "
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The only time I expect to bring my own leftovers home is at a large group function, not in someone's home, where there is no hostess, no one really in charge of the food.
As a guest in someone's home (and the way I host), my friends and I expect the hostess to keep the leftovers. If there are large amounts left, it is divided among everyone's dishes to take home. That way, everyone gets to enjoy a mini smorgasbord when they get home. In my case, dh rarely attends these events with me, so it gives him a chance to have a taste of everything that was served.
If I was handed my own empty, dirty dish, I would assume there weren't enough leftovers to go around so the hostess transferred them to her own tupperware and didn't have a chance to wash everyone's dishes. No biggie.
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I got a 68. I expected to be just above the mid-point, so there you go. I'm sure when I was younger I would have scored much lower. From my college days on, I came to realize I have a lot of interesting perspectives to share and which others appreciate, and have come to thrive on such interaction.
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This is fun!
SOTW
1st Language Lessons
Explode the Code
LLATL
Getty-Dubay Italic Handwriting
Singapore Math
I was pretty much following WTM recommendations, while also researching Charlotte Mason.
Lucky me, I get to repeat those years, with the benefit of experience, with dd4. The only curriculum choice I plan to keep is ETC :)
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Our kids are thinking the same thing. So many trades are in high demand, while a number of college grads are out of work (or underemployed). They want to go to college, but will take a year or so to learn a practical skill and get a bit of a taste of the world, hopefully helping them to narrow their interests and aptitudes into a university major. This absolutely broadens their options.
I would encourage your ds to take the course. He may begin a successful career, or he might realize he doesn't want to do physical labor long-term and go to university after all. Either way, he will learn something about himself, the world of work, and have a marketable skill, even if he only uses it in the summers to earn better pay and experience than his friends who have no training.
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Thanks, exactly what I was looking for, I just didn't know what it was called in Canada. I'm annoyed that the neuropsych never mentioned it, grrr. I'll keep digging for the textbooks. Thanks!
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All this talk about Bookshare and Learning Ally got me thinking. Both services are restricted to print disabled students in the US.
Is there anything similar for students in Canada? I'm thinking there must be audio textbook support available, but I'm only familiar with the US options. My dyslexic dd will be attending college in Canada in a few years, and I'm trying to get an accommodation plan in place.
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Do you honestly think that getting a kid up, dressed, and fed is *that* much of a difficult chore?!?! It's a normal day at our house, even with homeschool, and happens by 7:30-8:00. Hopping into the car (or in our case, a stroller) wasn't that big a production, either. Really.
That's wonderful that you have a morning routine that works and is easy for your family. But, yes, having to get my 4 year old up, dressed and fed to get to preschool at 8:15 would be a deal breaker for me.
We have our own routine that works for us. It involves quiet mommy time in the AM before anyone wakes up for me to exercise and have a peaceful breakfast while reading these boards. It involves leisurely snuggles and cuddles from the whole family when dd4 groggily makes her way down the stairs at 8:30 or 9am, followed by the "Good Morning" song and building with blocks until she feels ready for breakfast.
I have no desire to turn my AM into a frantic rat race in order to conform to someone else's schedule. That's one of the benefits we enjoy by homeschooling. If the cost benefit analysis worked out differently, we would make a different choice. For our family, right now, no, it wouldn't be worth it.
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Yes, we always get calls from long distance phone services in Arabic based on our last name. I hang up on them just like the English speaking ones :)
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I use Tomatoes. It allows for different stores and syncs with my phone and tablet. It doesn't have a huge database, but allows you to add your own items, and you can even add pictures (I had tons of fun adding photos of the actual brands I buy off Google images). There are probably fancier apps, but this one did everything I wanted.
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With the mother's helper you would not necessarily have to do a bunch of planning. Just have the materials available and perhaps a list of acceptable activities. Assume some creativity on the part of the mother's helper. Assume also that the children could learn by making choices of what they want to do.
My dd14 does all of the messy, art type projects with dd4. I gave her lists and books of preschool activities, sometimes she uses them, other times she makes up her own projects. A mother's helper age 12+ should be able to handle this with a little initial guidance.
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Have you read the "Dyslexia Empowerment Plan"? It really opened my eyes to the fact that, while we should do our best to remediate to a point, we should make sure we aren't trying to "fix" our kids. The author suggests tutoring using an OG program for 2 years, then focus on using technology, like the ones recommended. He makes good points that we would never insist a blind person should be able to read print if they just work at it long enough and that somehow using braille is a cop out, or that a paralyzed person just needs to be given more time to be allowed to crawl up the stairs instead of providing a ramp. These analogies really helped me to see that I wasn't a failure if my dd never learned to spell as well as a NT student, and there is no shame in using technology or accommodations to level the playing field.
Go ahead and try different spelling programs, spend a few minutes a day on them (my dd is still working through Megawords). But, the greatest preparation you can give him for high school and college is figuring out what technologies work best for him, implementing them, and creating a paper trail of both his diagnosis and accommodations used so he will be allowed to continue to use them when he enters higher education.
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Only if your kids are in HS and taking distance courses with deadlines (ask me how I know). In that case, it is worth it to stay on track and not have to cram in the spring or work into the summer. Otherwise, bah, take the break and enjoy. Those holiday memories are much more important than anything you could be covering in a week of grade school work.
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Deanna makes excellent points. It is perfectly normal and natural for a child to want to speak the language of the larger culture once he has become fluent, especially if it is necessary to communicate with teachers and friends. If you want the child to be bilingual, you absolutely must enforce that at home. A child doesn't forget his native language overnight. He may resist speaking at first, but if his parent speaks only Spanish to him, he will not forget. If the parent insists he reply in Spanish, he will not forget. I'm not sure how to backtrack with him now, although 3 months of immersion certainly should have helped. Moving to a Spanish speaking neighborhood should certainly help. I would definitely teach Spanish skills alongside English.
As for the younger child, stay vigilant. Speak ONLY Spanish with her, period. It will be tougher, because your older child will try to speak English with her, but don't back down. Mommy = Spanish 100%, that's it. And the older one will learn from listening to you speak slowly and simply to the little one.
I think you underestimated the power of the societal language (English) to overpower and replace the native language, since he was already fluent in Spanish as a young child. Living in a Spanish speaking area should absolutely help, but the most important thing you can do is to make your home a completely Spanish environment. No matter how old they are, once you become lax about speaking Spanish at home, their language skills will suffer. Bilingualism is truly a life's work.
Good luck!
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As we dig out from under multiple layers of ice and snow, only to be repeated ad nauseum over the next 4 months, I appreciate the reminder that it could always be worse. I've been known to say I'd rather deal with the annual ice and sniw snow than hurricanes, tsunamis, tornadoes, earthquakes and poisonous creatures :)
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It sounds like in this case, the parents' financial responsibility had already been established in the divorce decree. Still, I wish people would just do the right thing (in general) so laws about family responsibility wouldn't be necessary.
I understand the frustration at the differing levels of legal adult independence. At the same time, the idea of a young person having no rights, no freedoms, and no responsibility suddenly becoming a full-fledged adult overnight is equally ridiculous. It makes sense to be given adult privileges and responsibilities in stages. Ideally, this would happen within families based on the maturity, development and background of each individual.
I chose to marry at 18, during my 1st semester of college. My parents calmly and logically tried to talk me out of it, but I was blinded by love :) They could have said, "Yoy made your bed, lie in it," and let dh and I scrape by on minimum wage jobs, likely drop out of school, etc. Instead, they realized that, while I was legally old enough to marry, I still needed their support and guidance to establish my adult life successfully. They paid for my college (as planned) and let dh and I live with them until we graduated. I worked a few hours a week to pay for car insurance and gas, etc., but school was considered my job. Marrying the man I did when I did was a determining factor in having a successful, happy life and family, but my parents' wisdom in giving me the freedom I needed while providing the safety net necessary to get my feet on the ground was at least as influential.
My ds turned 18 last week. He is still my dependant child, nothing has changed. We will support and guide him through all the bumps in the road to adulthood until he is capable of making it on his own. Especially in the current economic climate, there is no arbitrary age for that.
Which phonics program will give the kids the most bang for their buck
in K-8 Curriculum Board
Posted
I 2nd Phonics Pathways. It's inexpensive, simple to use and very adaptable. I use it to tutor ESL students in grades 1-6. Of course, since you already have OPGTR you could probably adapt that to work (since the print is smaller and includes a lot of scripting, you would need to copy words onto the board or type up your own handouts with the info you want the students to see). Also, I believe Blend Phonics is free, so that might be a good choice too.
LOE Essentials would be excellent, but likely too expensive and intense for this short of a session. Of course, if you only bought the Teacher’s guide it would be more affordable, but possibly still out of your price range.
I would highly recommend that you read "Uncovering the Logic of English" yourself. That will give you an excellent crash course in phonics, and all of the rules are neatly lined up for you there. That could help you create a scope and sequence, and use another resource you already have for word lists, etc.
HTH!