His first REPORT

Today several homeschooling families that we know went to our local zoo. We were later than the set meeting time, but we happened to find some of them anyway. After we got home, I asked DS1 to write a report (or story) about our trip. This was his first ever report. He dictated it to me, and I typed it in Word. It was difficult for me to not correct some grammer and sentence structure, but I didn't. The parenthesis are all at his direction, and most of the sentence ending/beginning places are also. I tried to make paragraphs as he was dictating, but he didn't like that. He said I could change it when we were finished, but by then I had decided to leave it as one. Names have been changed because it was just to awkward to use initials or something else as a privacy measure.

The Things We Saw At the Zoo

By Jack Smith
November 12, 2008

We saw some of our homeschool friends, Laura, Vic, Donna, Doug, and Lisa. We saw them on the bridge to the Children’s Farm. We went to the penguins. Brad was a teeny bit taller than the King penguin. I was taller than the King penguin but shorter than the Emperor penguin. After the penguins we went to the Reptiles and Amphibians (it was really Amphibians and Reptiles). I saw green A’s (with a frog hole in it) and red R’s (with another strange hole that I can’t remember). We found buttons that made mini movies and sounds. We saw some flaps to see what was different and the same about humans and reptiles. Mindy and Brad went outside before me and the others did. Brad got to climb and play on the Komodo Dragon statue while me and the others looked around a little more. We stopped by some things that we have already seen before. A little while later we finally went out and found Brad on the Komodo Dragon statue. Then me and the others got on (not the grownups, though, they were too big anyway). There was no room for Brad once all of the other kids got on. Mindy suggested he could sit next to me on the tail, but he didn’t want to. It looked like there was no room on the tail anyway. Next we went to the jungle building it was right next door to the reptiles and amphibians (just like the reptiles and amphibians was next door to the penguins). We saw a giant hole in the ceiling with water coming out of it like it was raining (the hole was not the whole ceiling). Under the hole there was a rock. There was the most water falling in the middle. When Brad went through the exit he went straight to the entrance without waiting for Mindy to come and him telling her. Me and Mindy went looking for him. I ran and he started to walk so I caught up to him and held his hand so when he got to the exit he wouldn’t go through again. I tried to make him sit on the bench after I let go of his hand, but he ran too fast and almost went outside, but one of the other moms caught him. A little while later Mindy came through the exit of the jungle (that was not the exit of the whole building). After the jungle we went to North America (it was not far but not next door). We saw the grizzly bear statue. I almost climbed onto the head but the back was too slippery and I couldn’t reach its ears to help me. Next we found ourselves at the boat dock. Vic and Laura had a snack. I thought we could feed the ducks and fish. Mindy didn’t have a quarter; Donna had a quarter but only one and she used it on the box on the left bridge. We walked past the giraffes. The others went through the Australia and South America exhibit while we headed toward the playground. Mindy and Brad looked at the hippos while I looked at the map. After a little while I stopped to see the hippos. Mindy told me that Brad had seen the hippos over the water and under the water two times. Then we started to go to the playground again. We saw that there was a dead end. When we came back we saw the elephants just coming out of their indoor home. The others were probably at the lions (because Laura wanted to see them). Mindy didn’t want to go to the lions but we went to the orangutans and chimpanzees anyway. After that we went to the exit (or you could call it a gift shop). We looked for a get well gift for Grandpa. We found some grabbers but Mindy suggested we better get one next time we go to the zoo.

Records

It's a good thing that we live in a state with few homeschooling requirements. If I had to document everything (like the box-checker side of me wishes I did), then we'd be in trouble. I have 4 places that I sometimes use to describe school: here, my Sonlight Instructor's Guide, Home School Tracker + software, and our A Record of the Learning Lifestyle book. My last post here, on 10/23, was the most recent documentation that I have done. But never fear, we have been doing some awesome learning! Life has been interesting, exciting, and yes, sometimes even boring, but a day hasn't gone by where at least one of us, if not all 5 of us, haven't learned something.

In no particular order, here are some recent activities and topics of conversation:

• Homeschoolopoly - money counting, financing (borrowing & interest), percentage
• vocabulary - often from listening to books on tape such as Geronimo Stilton and Magic Tree House
• a 1880's county fair
• science (particularly physics) on a playground (several times)
• reading (them, not just me)
• School House Rock Jr live performance
• Tiger Cub Scouts
• "What's a coffin?" which led to quite a discussion about death, the body and soul/spirit, and heaven
• "Is heaven in outer space?"
• dancing
• a Halloween party
• making music with various household items not originally intended to be musical instruments
• watching plowing and planting
• watching houses being built
• meeting and welcoming new neighbors
• creating a maze
• trip to a pumpkin patch with a corn maze and a milo maze
• decorating pumpkins for Halloween
• coming up with a "not scary" costume
• trick-or-treating
• helping Grandpa with his wheelchair and walker regularly at his weekly outpatient appointment and at the dentist
• standing in line for 20 minutes (and staying fairly calm and well behaved!)
• recycling
• calling a friend on the telephone
• memorization
• discussing even and odd numbers
• building levels in a computer game
• taking photos
• having our portraits taken
• eating out at a fancy restaurant
• measuring and pouring ingredients for lunch
• discovering a new channel on TV (Discovery Kids)
• helping at a book fair
• staying in church instead of going to the nursery
• Wednesday night Kid Zone (without a parent anywhere near)
• jigsaw puzzles
• printing
• I Spy books and computer game
• creating elaborate train track layouts
• loading and unloading the dishwasher
• setting and clearing the table
• putting away clean clothes
• finding a lost remote control
• playing well with kids they'd never met before
• Speed Stacks (stacking cups)
• negotiating with each other (to avoid Mom taking the toy, TV, etc. away)
• picnic on the trampoline in the basement
• movie night
• spelling
• creating a Game Club (with rules and signs)
• teaching an uncle how to play Sorry!
• inviting people to eat with us
• P.E. class
• video games
• wishing on the first star of the night
• dismantling the bedroom furniture (We're still working on putting it back together and making the bed!)
• Giving Mom the best hard job in the whole world!