WEEK AHEAD reminders

CONCEPT INTRODUCED: Responsibility

WORDS:
Manners
Order
Clean
Neat
Hygeine
Treble
Staff

PEN PAL - for writing practice

SCIENCE: Leaves - crafts

MUSIC: Note Reading FACE EGBDF

SPANISH, ASL, JAPANESE

Settle in more fully - release extraneous "stuffs", Allow for quieter weekends, settling in
RHYTHM: Exercise, Movement Circle -Weekend Journal - Focused Learning - Music Practice - Reading Aloud Practice (Second McGuffey) -Lunch - Quiet Rest Time - Practice time - Afternoon Adventure - nature walk, library, play date, cooking, baking, wood work, hand work, painting, bees wax, class

Children's Book Fair

Saturday we attended a Children's Book Fair put on by the Multnomah County Library. They made book marks, journals, name bracelets, button, wire art and corn husk dolls. This earned them a free book each. Dax chose a Joke book and Ryder chose a squishy comic.

Ryder attends Master Class with Akira Sensei

Ryder has been attending Aikido since he was 6. He is committed and focused. We take classes at least 1 time a week with Sensei George but this week we had some special classes.

Akira Sensei is a kind, compassionate and fun Master and we are grateful to have him as our head master of Yoshokai Aikido.

Nature Table and New Story from Dax - Autumn Begins

Corn husk dolls made, Nature Journals, gorgeous leaves turning

Dax tells his Autumn Harvest Story

Dax has taken to Enki Kindergarten with zeal. I was a tad concerned but wow, he is thriving with the rhythm, stories and structure we have implemented to carry out Kindy and Second Grade.

MOVEMENT SUPPORTS LEARNING

This is a great example of vestibular and proprioceptive movements

In Enki Education, Beth Sutton has placed movement as one of the utmost important pieces in education of the individual.

I was a personal trainer and always loved movement - in the form of dance, martial arts, gardening, walking besides structured fitness classes. I loved to move and did so without thinking the consequence or result of the movement being supportive to my brain or not. I just knew I felt better.

When we chose to home school I looked at all the typical curriculum and had started out with a fact feeding, worksheet based concept that fell flat for me as well as my son. I knew there had to be a better way when I found Enki Education.

The fundamental concepts surrounding movement fed my mind, soul and body and provided me with the tools and understanding of how brains actually develop within the frame work of the body.

With this understanding we have the gift to support our children and see areas that cause so much suffering for children when they get labeled.

When we begin our days with exercise - to open our hearts and breath, movement in our circle and regular expansion/contraction balancing activities through out the day I see an enormous growth, strong interest in learning and open intake of new material. The opposite being true if we do not begin with our movement and exercise.

Crossing Mid-line - this alone has shown a reduction in dyslexia patterns

Pen Pals

Here's what is going in the box to the boys' pen pals in Sarasota, FL

We are so blessed to have a vibrant and creative community with Enki Education. Pen Pals and Nature Exchanges bring a flavor to our lives we might not otherwise be able to enjoy.

For example, our pen pal in Sarasota, FL has a climate totally different than what we experience. When we gather and send the beautiful fall leaves and items from our local area we also learn more about them ourselves as we describe them. We might have otherwise taken this for granted.

So as we enter into a real Autumn in the NW we are enjoying the change in leaves, the rain and cooler weather.

Emergency Services Event

For a time there Dax wanted to be a police officer. He would talk about how he wanted to capture the thieves and take them to jail and so he would be a policeman. It crossed my mind that he might be serious. It is always a possibility for a profession. I'm not against it but... from a mom's perspective it can be a little worrisome.

I knew when I saw this event coming up I had to make sure we attended. It turned out to be so much more than I expected and our entire family enjoyed the day.

We learned a lot about our city and the Emergency Services Departments of our home town. I feel safer already.

K-9 Demonstration

Yes, big and fierce when on duty.

This is Dash's last command

Learning how to stake out

Water patrol

Landing on a mini air craft carrier

Bomb Defusing Robot! Really.

Harvest Moon Celebration at Gregory Heights Library

We celebrated the Harvest Moon (a tad early) with our Vietnamese community at our local library.

It was an evening of open intake of the Vietnamese culture with native speakers sharing a play and songs and stories of the Harvest Moon Festival!

Our librarians as thespians

Finishing our paper lanterns

Preparing for the Lantern Parade

Children gather to show their lanterns

They let me check out all the books so we could read about it at home!

Photos don't do the lanterns justice. But I had to take this to remember how to do these.

It's possible we looked a little out of place but I just couldn't miss this.

 The children all went on a lantern walk as we sang in Vietnamese. It was so interesting and a delightfully fun experience. I think I will join them for the next Vietnamese story time. It's actually a very lovely language and wasn't too difficult to pick up (in chorus at least).

Special thanks to Gregory Heights librarians for all their efforts in making this such a special and memorable experience for our community!

Stalking Wolf - Our first Humanities/Language Arts Block

We are in to week two of our LA/Hum Block with Stalking Wolf.

Our projects are

Carving our own bow drill for friction fire

Making our own moccasins

Medicine/Treasure Bag

Woven reed mats

Petroglyphs

 Stalking, animal tracks

Gourd Bowl and carving of the bowls

Mesquite bean grinding and backing
Apache Sunflower bread.
Pine nuts/pinon nuts


Music - rain dance.

What to do with the anger you feel...

Dax is deeply in touch with his angry side and it expresses very easily as his forefront emotion especially if he doesn't get his way. We've had a bit of a time with it as it often results in throwing punches - to his brother and even to me. He is an intensely emotional child and as a mother and his teacher I respect his individual personality greatly. Albeit choose to assist him in working through his emotions, specifically anger, in a safe and nurturing (to himself and others) way.  Ryder is very compassionate and loving and it takes quite a lot for him to go to anger (like me) so it eases some of the "self blame" I might attribute as the reason for this anger.

I have devised a mini program to work with Dax and am happy to have the assistance of my beloved "Mister Rogers Neighborhood" as the electronic media source (as you know I would be Almost Amish but have extreme disagreement from husband and boys - cringe - can't beat 'em, join 'em but choose wisely).

We use KIND TRUE NECESSARY & GENTLE as code words. I give extra love especially when his response is "I HATE YOU" when he doesn't get his way. Now my pat response "Oh dear, Well, I love you very much" or "I love you enough for both of us". I've said it enough now I truly feel this way and I will embrace him tightly and lovingly and bring him to our Peace chair or a safe spot if not at home. My unending compassion for him as I see him suffer rather than flow through the anger (which I now know is just the closest expression he contacts and he's observed this in daddy as an expression that is easy, and they have that common temperament - fire, pitta, choleric.) has helped me grow as a person and as a mother. For myself I am enjoying reading Pema Chodron's book "Start Where You Are" and "When Things Fall Apart". (I highly recommend these books!) Even Ryder lightens the mood as he looks at me conspiratorially and whispers, wow he's really hot between the ears.

When I move to "Open Intake" an Enki web piece - I can breathe and take in without having to fix first. What is so lovely to see is how Dax wants to get a grip on this anger. When we first read The ANGRY Dragon I could feel his relief as he sees that other little people experience this too.

We paint and do a modified 3 fold process from ENKI. Read the story, sleep/digest, paint and retell, next story. Sometimes we will play out the story at the park or with our puppets. He loves this so very much.

Do I have a goal for this. Only that he knows he is safe, it is safe for him to feel any emotion. That he does have the power to control any action and word and he can choose wisely what those words and actions are. This does take practice as we all know.

The Peace chair is a space I have created with a singing bowl and gems with a comfy sheepskin rug on my yoga bench. I love going there myself. Later when the boys are older I will show them how to create their own space with an alter so that they will always have a place to self soothe. I believe in that greatly.

Modeling behavior is the next and frankly the most important piece I see as needing to be put in place. Without naming names, the modeling of anger in our household has been sub par. Because we are adults we can look at the scenario logically and work through it. What a gift children give us - to mirror what is going on in our own lives. Anyway, for adults in our household we are looking into Non Violent Communication by Marshall Rosenberg.

Imagining is another key piece. I am personally implementing and re-implementing Simplicity Parenting steps to improve and create a more calm and connected environment.

Carnivorous Plants Exploration

For the past few months Ryder has asked for Venus Fly Trap that our local grocer happens to carry. I told him we would need to learn about them first so we would know how to care for them properly.

Our experiential learning opportunity came in the form of an adventure to our local Carnivorous Plant Nursery called Sarracenia Northwest

These are a beautiful species however I forget their name. They are in the picture plant family.

Dax found a carnivorous kitty named Jasper.

These are some of our favorite but not as hardy as the Venus or picture plant. Cobra is the code name.

We came with a Venus, 2 Ophelias and Darling Dalia. We have had quite the experience observing the process of these plants "eating" the bugs. They originated from soil that was very depleted so they adapted to get their nutrients from bugs that would otherwise feast on them. Circle of life in full spectrum.

Bees Wax Modeling is so much fun - just don't leave it in the hot car

 Retelling of Coyotes stories. Coyote and Dove with Ryder.

Very grounding for Dax.

Diary of our "first" official structured learning day.

Cereal for breakfast *(desire to choose better)

We started off our Monday with a new opening blessing but I want to find a better fit

Movement - exercise (running, bike, race, tag) for in and out breath. Balance beam -
SONGS:
Come Follow Me from Enki
Kookabir Song
Grand old Duke of York
 (I'd love to see this become a real circle connected time but right now it's more free)

Weekend Journal - 20 minutes (I saw Dax was feeling left out and I asked him if he'd like to have his own journal - he perked up and so joined in with his own journal drawing pictures from the weekend.

Focused Learning - Language Arts/Hum BLOCK: day 1 is with open intake of stories - Coyote stories from Enki Kindy (Dax yelled and became angry at the repetitive rain rain coyote chant but later in the day repeated it and the story in his own words, hmmm ask Beth about this, is it integration or no?) and Grade 2 story (Ryder asked for another/more stories but I said that was all for today "lesson").
Snack Apple and almond butter
Made Jump rope - 1 long 15' and 2 single for boys (enough extra for me to have one too) We began with learning basics using the snake rhymes 10 minutes, hopping and skipping

Lunch - Spaghetti
Quiet time Ryder held his pokemon cards, Dax played on his own (I bought the doll house as he enjoyed this at Aikido he combines house with castle and many things. Seems grounded and but I need to understand more about the expansive and contractive concepts and how to recognize them in the boys.)

Ryder practiced his numbers and after a full page they were clear and near perfect. He saw the change and was proud of his accomplishment.

Snack. Protein shake (milk, eggs, blueberries)

Aikido class in the afternoon with Japanese song and poem

Ryder reads aloud from his various books he's chosen from the library - mostly comic (sonic and green lantern - I would love to release these back to the library)

We continued with Herb Fairies story 6 on chamomile. The boys are enjoying these and I'd like to give more time to this - a unit study in itself? Not certain.

We are reading the Festival of the Stones by Reg Down for bed time story. Boys settled in quickly and calmly and fell asleep a little after 7:30.

By the end of the day Dax seemed more connected but we did have a major outburst and retelling as if he was in the moment again - with the Aikido instrutor George Sensei. Dax is very very sensitive to anyone who bosses or speaks in a mean manner to him - he goes into a very defensive protest but I see just under the surface emotional pain. I'd love to understand this in terms of NVC - will work on that one. Ryder is jolly as usual and integrating head, heart and hands nicely.

Teacher Health: Feeling anxiety about Kelly and Amsterdam. It would be an amazing opportunity but I feel concern about the homeschooling laws there. It's confusing as to why any country would not support home schooling. If I ever thought my children could get more patience, consistent love and support and unconditional encouragement in who they are as individuals and understand where they are developmentally as an individual person and foster what was in their best interest I would not hesitate to support them in that. It would also be a great loss of what we have created here in our community.

I hate to remove our dairy (especially because it's the highest quality one can buy) but I believe it could be a real allergy for Dax. Ryder doesn't seem to have an issue with it but he doesn't drink as much as Dax. In 2 weeks I will remove dairy as I've just removed spinach, kale and other oxylates he was having daily (high oxylate issues along with salycilyte - see feingold and  - ok I want to see if that helps)

Consult call with Beth Sutton tomorrow. A lot to go over. I know she will shed some light in the right direction.