Here is your workshop leader, five minutes before class starts, having a serious bout of imposter syndrome. I have been under the impression that I had just started liking MY kids more the closer they got to puberty. Turns out, I think I love this age group. We had a diverse group of 10-13-year olds…
Category: language arts
finishing up “treasure island”, hopefully with a bang
We have tickets to the musical version this Friday! I never thought I’d see either of them read such a book out loud. When we began, they didn’t even try to take turns with it, and left it to Tuck. Now they both read. “Treasure Island” has been going slowly and concurrently with “Robin Hood”,…
studying for the national mythology exam
“Persephone had to live in the Underworld for half the year and during that time Demeter stopped plants from growing but taught the farmers how to grow crops on their own.” “The souls of the dead are lifeless creatures that live in Hades’ realm.” “Hermes guided the souls of the dead down to…
internship
We’ve been working for months now to find out ways that the kids can help out — during school hours — at various Mighty Writers locations in Philly, whether in reading to toddler-aged children, helping to design, print and distribute flyers, or — as they did today — transcribe workshop writing assignments to computer from…
reviving the art of the christmas eve ghost story
This was the second year that Claudia participated in “The Dark is Rising” readalong beginning on Midwinter’s Eve. Both kids also caught (out of the corner of one eye) a few episodes from my BBC “Ghost Stories for Christmas Eve” DVD box set. A lot of steps to string together, but each of the kids…
ImprovEd Shakespeare’s “Global Hamlet”
(There MIGHT be a third video being added to this post — I’m not sure. But I couldn’t hold back from putting this up any longer.) The new Agile Learning Center had put a message up on one of the local homeschool groups about the ImprovEd Shakespeare Company breezing through to produce a little bit…
NIGRUM NOCTUA: THE HONEY OF DEATH
On the very VERY first day of “back to homeschool” in September of 2017, I told the kids that one of our MAJOR goals was to attend PhilaMOCA’s “Tokusatsu Tuesday” program every month, and to begin filming our own episodic toku program. Even if we only got one done! “Even if we only got…
latin? check. fire safety? check .
Most people know we are the “Parade of Spirits” family (or, going back far enough, the “Krampuslauf Family”). Costuming, folklore, festal culture… soldering battery packs for LED lanterns… using big X-acto blades for cutting foam props… all part of our homeschooling experience. Claudia appeared this year as an amethyst geode — a costuming departure, to…
RITUAL
Months and months ago, we saw this call for single-sheet zines on the topic of “ritual”. The solicitation included a pattern for folding a single-sheet zine and this is, actually, what we used for the kids first zines — the “Six Simple Machines of Physics” and “Do Crystals Have Minds?” zines. But I really wanted…
a year ago tonight
Was the last night of my life as a parent whose kids went to school. They came home on the afternoon of November 30th and Claudia asked me, “Can I say ‘damn’?” I said she could. “I’m never going back to that damned place,” she said. And Béla nodded. So that was it. Whatever I…
TED-Ed Talk at Indy Hall: Why Can’t International Adoptees Run For President?
After taking a Sunday class for a few months, sponsored by TED-Ed, the kids were invited to Indy Hall to present what is essentially their “elevator speech” about… well, they make it clear enough. (For someone who likes to do a lot of dramatic filming, Béla is definitely more held back on serious topics, but…
philly ‘zine fest!
Up until yesterday the kids thought ‘zines were just fine — they knew what their own looked like, and they knew what a shelf-full at Fantom Comics in D.C. looked like. But yesterday was the Philly ‘Zine Fest, and boy did that change things! WHAT an avalanche of fun. The kids brought the printouts they…
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