May 31 2016

HOLA! Let’s Learn Spanish Review

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I have always loved languages and Spanish is a good one to learn if you are living in the US. Even though my focus is on English, Romanian and French with the children, I like to throw in a little Spanish now and then.

HOLA! Let's Learn Spanish

When the author of HOLA! Let’s Learn Spanish contacted me about a book review, I was glad. This is no ordinary book on learning Spanish. Even if you don’t speak Spanish, you will be able to introduce your children to the proper pronunciation because it even has an audio version. It takes commitment and your time, but I know homeschooling parents are made of commitment and time dedicated to the development of their children.  Continue reading »

May 31 2016

Tuesday Tome Week 22 – The Thing Around Your Neck

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The Thing Around Your Neck by Chimamanda Ngozie Adichie has taken me on an emotional journey to Africa and back to the US through several stories, all represented in the book as Chapter 1. These are short stories and they could all be the beginning chapters of stand-alone novels. Different characters – mostly women – are portrayed in a slice-of-life setting with their painful, emotional situation, and how they get out of it. Or not.

The Thing Around Your Neck

As such, it was difficult at first to get into each story. Each story had different protagonists and their African names did not make it easy for me to keep them straight. Adichie’s writing makes these people so real, so believable, you feel like you know who they are after the first few paragraph which describe something they did or felt. And yet, this bursting into their life from paragraph one felt like a movie with lots of close-ups. You did not get an overall picture of any landscape. It wasn’t a bad thing. Just a different way of immersing yourself into a book. And I relish literary challenges.

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May 31 2016

Our New Daily Schedule

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As children grow, schedules change. This is our new daily schedule, revised for one child in first grade and the other in third grade, after careful deliberations with an experienced homeschooling mom and my husband.

We work simultaneously on most subjects, but in skill subjects one would have to wait a couple of minutes until I explain a new concept to the other child. Ours is a multi-level classroom – they have been around for centuries and they have worked beautifully.

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Hanging on our fridge, our new daily schedule – even I need to refer to it several times a day

8:00-8:30 Breakfast in pajamas (Romanian and/or French lesson or video)
8:30-9:00 Getting dressed, personal hygiene, making beds
9:00-9:30 Family devotions and mommy reading aloud a chapter from a book
9:30-10:15 Math
10:15-11:00 Language Arts  Continue reading »

May 27 2016

Sparkle and Shine Brightly Review

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Recently, I became aware of two magazines from Christian girls. Sparkle targets readership in the grades K-4, and Shine Brightly is geared towards upper elementary grades, so 5-8. This post is a review of the sample copies I received from Gems Girls’ Clubs, the owner of these two publications.

Girl with Sparkle magazine

She enjoyed these magazines.

Sparkle is published monthly October through March, so six issues total per year, for an annual subscription price of $10.70. It is a 16-page, full-color magazine, mostly glossy.  Continue reading »

May 24 2016

Tuesday Tome Week 21- The Return of the Native

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The Return of the Native (or How Not to Choose A Spouse) by Thomas Hardy is one of the 32 novels included in The Well-Educated Mind by Susan Wise Bauer – the most influential novels in the history of Western literature, according to Dr. Bauer. The link provided above, by the way, is to the free Kindle version of the book.

The Return of the Native

I was familiar with other writings by Hardy, like Tess of the d’Urbervilles. Unlike any other novel before this one on Dr. Bauer’s list, I had no idea what to expect. It was an interesting place to be. I realized that when I don’t know the plot or have expectations about the characters, I am a bit insecure inside a novel. It’s a good thing to experience now and then. It keeps everything fresh.  Continue reading »

May 22 2016

How to Deal With Symptoms of Stress in Your Child

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As children are constantly growing and learning, we get used to them going through different stages and fussy phases. One day they’ll relish your pot pie and ask for more; the next time you serve it they’ll refuse to take a bite. While these behaviors are typical in growing kids (and sent to make us stronger), if you notice that your child is consistently acting out, is unusually aggressive or irritable, distant, or not sleeping well, they could be experiencing symptoms of stress, rather than a passing phase.

There are many ways that stress can manifest in your kids, but generally, a parent knows when their child is simply not being themselves. They may lose their appetite, throw sudden tantrums, or begin to grind their teeth. Teeth grinding (or bruxism) is actually fairly common in children, with as many as 3 in 10 suffering from it at some point. If your child starts complaining of earache, or pain in the jaw area, then you should check if a dental night guard would ease their discomfort until they outgrow the condition.  Continue reading »

May 17 2016

Tuesday Tome Week 20- Down and Out

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Down and Out in Paris and London by George Orwell was the book I had to read for the May meeting of my reading group. I did not enjoy it. It describes poverty in Paris and then in London. I don’t like reading about poor people, especially when they spend most of their earnings on alcohol.

Down and Out in Paris and London

While reading the book, I did have all sorts of thoughts about Protestant countries (like England) versus Catholic countries (like France). Have you noticed that Protestant countries tend to do better economically? That they have a bigger middle class than Catholic countries? That the contrast between the very rich and the very poor is not as striking?

Religion has a lot to do with life – more so than we realize. Religion influences one’s take on work, for instance. There was an atheist in the book who hated the bourgeoisie and stole from every employer he ever had simply because he hated anybody with a business. Of course, he was also a Communist.  Continue reading »

May 10 2016

Tuesday Tome Week 19- Traveling Mercies

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Traveling Mercies by Anne Lamott is a funny book if you can put up with some language and an enormous amount of liberal concepts. If you can get past that and focus on the Christian experience the author shares, along with good writing and great humor, then you will enjoy this book.

traveling mercies

A single mom and a recovering alcoholic, Lamott makes a living as a writer of mostly nonfiction, memoiristic books. The introductory chapter to this book will give you her conversion story which can be summed up in the following: she was an alcoholic and a drug user, then she met Jesus, and then she quit. But see, I just made it boring. She makes it fun over several pages and you get to sense the heart of God through this process, the incredible love of the Creator for Anne Lamott, working her over and over until she finally surrendered.  Continue reading »

May 6 2016

Essentials Curriculum Review

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For the past four months, I have been teaching spelling from a curriculum from Logic of English, called Essentials. My children are in second grade and kindergarten respectively and we started LOE Essentials in January, in the second semester. I geared this curriculum mainly towards the oldest, but the little one could benefit from it too. She is learning how to read and spelling is reading in reverse. So I have included her in our lessons, especially in the beginning, during the Pre-Lessons.

Teacher's Manual and Student Workbook

Teacher’s Manual and Student Workbook

I decided we needed the Pre-Lessons after administering the Placement Test very informally, over breakfast. Even though my son can write in cursive (we did not do manuscript at all), spelling has come difficult for him. We have tried four other curricula and I have no seen great results. He does the work, remembers the spelling for a few days, then he does not.  Continue reading »

May 3 2016

Tuesday Tome Week 18 – Madame Bovary

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I read Madame Bovary painstakingly. It took me longer than a week because I had to put it down over and over again. I was not sure I could finish it. It pains me to see characters – especially women – making foolish mistakes again and again. When I finally came to about 80% of the book, – yes, I read it on my Kindle – I started enjoying it. Why? Because Emma Bovary was finally hitting rock bottom.

Madame Bovary

I don’t like reckless behavior, whether in real life or in literary fiction. I understand why Susan Wise Bauer included this novel in her list of 32 best novels to read from Western literature. It is the first novel chronologically which puts an end to Romanticism and starts Realism as a current in literature.

Gustave Flaubert shocked many people with the realistic depictions of every day life and the adultery Madame Bovary engaged in while married to Charles Bovary, a country doctor in Yonville, France. Flaubert even got sued over the book, which shocked the sensibilities of many in the 19th century.

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