Rain!

It has finally rained over here! After all the time of waiting and sitting around sitting on my thumbs it has finally come! Even now I can look outside and see it. There is no feeling any greater then to see all of that beautiful rain outside and the pitter patter of the rain drops. Mainly because of all of the evil and terrifying summer weather.

Secondly we ran into one more problem. I mean really, another one? This one was so simple it really made me wonder if everything in this house was as all fun and games as I thought it was. The problem was just the fact the remote for the VCR wasn't working. The only reason why this was a problem is that I needed to watch a movie in french but of course I can't select the french option if I can't select it with the remote.

Today had some upsides including the fact that my work today was pretty easy. It mainly consisted of french. In fact work today consisted of 8 essay questions a bunch of reducing fractions and finally some reading. Really not much to today at all. While I was doing all of my work I had gotten my computer hunting viruses which ironically didn't have as much as I thought I had. Meaning my computer is faster and ready for all of  the work waiting ahead for me (also its ready for my gaming).

First Time For Everything

Yep today was certainly that first time thing that people always talk about. For example I was brought along by Kristi to help with Made to Serve. For the people who don't know what this is, it is a group dedicated to handing out food to the people that need it. For example the homeless downtown. This is what we did. Including stopping by a place to help with dialysis. They really needed food as most of them didn't have good health insurance. So pretty much they get one thing off their mind.

On the other hand we finally got the crossword puzzles working. In fact I have my first one right here at my desk. Despite the problems last night on my computer and dads utter hating on my computer it worked just fine on his. I mean seriously dad I made the exact same puzzle on the exact same website and got the paper out of the printer. Maybe you just didn't realize that my computer just doesn't like you.

Well not much else has been going on lately considering that because of my recent trip with Kristi. But the good news is that I may be getting access to my first free day. Mainly because I am very close to being 20 hours ahead of schedule. This isn't as amazing as it might sound to some of you considering I had the 6 extra hours of make up work on Monday earlier this week. Which to this day I do not regret considering tomorrow I might get off of school early because I would have completed all of my work. Don't forget there may not be a post Monday as it is a holiday and there won't be much to post.

Tae Kwon Do and feeling good

The title is accurate to an extent. First of all I am feeling really good about how well I did today for only my second day. On the other hand I'm not feeling so good about the fact that I am in excruciating pain and there is a subtle annoyance about some of the exercises I had to do. Including the dreaded middle stance. I would rather be doing some splits any day then to sit in the middle stance for more then a minute. I came home still in pain and am surprised to say I can still walk. Though I think that may be temporary.

We have discussed more in depth what I should do with my catapult plans! We first are going to build it. The type is most likely going to be a Roman catapult. Then I am going to study it in length. To be more exact I am going to study how far it can shoot, the maneuverability, and finnaly the all together extents of this catapult. Then I am going to present my actual catapult. I am still debating who might be willing to listen to this terribly boring lecture on catapults but I think I will find someone.

We are also having a bit more trouble with my all to simple curriculum. Or so we thought that it would be simple. For starters all we were trying to do was to get me some crossword puzzles printed off using my altogether flash cards. Well since we were using the almighty internet and as a whole the computer, it was not that easy. Earlier on dad had gone over my computer getting side tracked with all of the different items located on this particular system. But finnaly dad had started working to figure out that my computer is much to stubborn to work his magic on. So he has decided to that I will be able to try all of this again tomorrow. So hears hoping  that everything goes well tomorrow.
We wait and see what happens.

Do you think that the plans with catapult are good?

Growing Pains part 2

Despite this being a different day this post is pretty much going to be a continuance or follow up of yesterdays post "Growing Pains". This includes the weekend of work and fun. Which I still have some mixed feelings about. And some details about my time at the hospital with Kristi. The hospital visit definitely had some up sides and some down sides.

We will start with my weekend. My weekend mainly consisted of camping,eating,working, and playing. The camping part was not exactly fun. This included most of the working aspect of the trip including holding an umbrella over our gas stove to keep the wind and the rain away from our food and fire. This then continued into going to fetch water. Now this wasn't just fetching water from a lake no but a spiggot near some old stables. Now I bet your wondering what the heck I was doing near some old stables if I'm camping right? Well this is what is called SCA camping. So have any one of you reading this been to the Renaissance fair? Well SCA camping is like the Renaissance fair only with camping and one more thing, Boffers! These are weapons for kids made with PVC pipe, foam tube of some sort, and DUCT TAPE. I also have some pictures I will be posting with this as well some cool and some funny. And yes the guy in the uniform is carrying a spoon.

And so I come to my tragic tale of what truly happened in the hospital while I was there yesterday.
Well what happened was that my teacher Kristi went over things I could improve on and all of the work. So I really didnt want to go over this subject but as this is a open post blog I had to put this in as this is important to the rest of whats happened. Including if I was actually ready for home school. Yes she was actually considering sending me back to public school if I wasn't ready for home school. That would have ended my blog pretty quickly don't you think. Well things didn't go as bad as I had thought they might end which I thought it would end with shame dissapointment and even worse a very grumpy parent. Not to mention the failure of saying I couldn't really keep in home school for more then two weeks.

Well I have learned quite a few things from all of my working on my subjects. One of my favorites is Freakonomics. It was mainly the first chapter that tweaked my interest. It was talking about cheating in very common areas. Some more common then others. The one that got me was Teachers cheating for benefits. I also had an essay question based off of this one so I only got it finished yesterday with in all of the make up work. It went a little something like this. In relevance to the first chapter of Freakonomics my perspecive has changed drastically. For example if teachers were cheating for incentive in Iowa what does that mean for my own public school district. Even if we can't get held back they still have something to gain. This includes promotion, pay raise, or even recognition among the teachers, staff, and even students. How much of this was truly affecting the way I learned? Could I hve made it into bridges if maybe teachers hadn't done some magic for their students. These are questions that make me struggle to understand my school district and the forces sourrounding the very people around us. Anyway the paper was long and I am actually pretty good at creative writing so this didnt take to long but even now it makes me wonder what could have been different if something like this had happened in my district.

good news

I fixed the problems with people not being able to post. You all can now post without a Google account. If you spam you will be required to register accounts as I will turn off comments again

Growing Pains

Today was probably one of my most interesting days so far. Because today was all catch up work literally! Today started with my first long ride with dad on his scooter. This was amazing except that we were heading for the hospital where Kristi was at because of some terrible blood clots. Well most people dont know this but in my honest opinion hospitals are some of the most evil places ever!
Only because they have the evil looking white walls,ceilings, and floors that never change color under any circumstances what so ever. Then they are always seemingly cold. There is not a warm room in this hospital.

Anyway I went to work on catching up once i got upstairs. I started out with my flashcards. The total amount of flashcards today was 60. Can you believe it? 60 different flashcards spread between french and English from my Troyka book. This was all an extreme pain ut it got worse. I then had to do the actual assignments from my Troyka. this was 14-6 to 14-10. all in all I would say about 30 questions total. Most of it took me all day. There was a prelude in between these things but we'll get to that later. This later included the dreaded Essay Questions. But this time I had a secret weapon! That would be my teacher Kristi. For once in my home school career I finally asked for help. Despite all of the work I needed to do this blog entry is the last I need to do for the day.

I at least need to tell you guys one more thing before I wrap this up. First of all I will need to make a second entry for all of this to get everything in. Secondly I am planning my first project. The project I am planning for is involving a catapult. I really dont know much more detail then this because I still have to decide wether I should make one, teach about one, enter one in a science fair, or just flat out test one and its limits. I'm open to suggestions on that one but if you recommend one please back it up with a why or why not. I am thinking about building one then maybe as a later project test it. Anyway give me some review please.

Day 8

I have spent most of the day doing review work. This includes the essay questions i missed out on during the week. These were a pain as always but I dealt with them as I have done most of the school year so far. Even then it is still hard as nothing has changed from the constant questions that require some outside input for once in my life. As I grew up with filling in a circle or writing a letter to represent my answer never actually giving input.

French lessons are doing well lately. I am currently learning how to say things in relevance of in a restaurant. Including what would you like to drink. These are not extremely hard just time consuming out of my normal day making things a bit hard to work in. My French lesson is 30 minutes every day. It is actually shorter to write this blog then to go through all of my french! I look forward to seeing my improvement in my French and other curriculum.

I am going to go camping with my mom this weekend. This isn't as easy as it sounds as I still have the long drive. We are going all the way up to Nebraska. All in one car with everything we need. I hope I have everything. I have a nasty habit of when I need one object to do something I will forget it for my trip. An example is that I brought my computer to my moms to use because her computer that I use while I'm up there doesn't have the data mine has. Any way I go to hook it up and find that im missing a working keyboard and mouse! This ended in disappointment's as i went back to work on hooking up my moms computer again.

Have you ever forgotten something important?

Day 7

This is the official first week. Although this is not considered a school week it is still something to celebrate over because I have made it through the first full week without getting in trouble! No I'm not a trouble maker. Anyone from my family could tell you that one. Even my little sister Zoe who   is young is smart, kind, but a nuisance at times can tell you how quiet I am.

Another thing is for once I actually completed all of my work for the day which is fantastic. I didn't have any math because I finished my first subject so dad and Kristi decided to give me a break from math until Monday. I also finally got something arranged for my essay problems! We are planning on keeping essay questions because they will help with me with my future profession that I wish to have but we plan on lowering the amount of essay questions because I have never really had to work with more then about 2 a day in public school.

Truly this has been an amazing experience for me and my teachers. There was talk between adults that I shouldn't go into home school because they wanted me to continually wanted to meet people my age. Honestly I was never a really social person but even then this made me think if I should disappoint these people who have helped me so much. These people were my grandma Kathy and my mom. Both of these people have been there when times were rough for me. I don't truly know how many people were against my homeschooling but it ended well so far and I still wish to continue.

How was your first week of school. How well did it end. Did it seem to easy. Do you wish you could've changed your first week.

Day 6

End for today and still more work on my plate piling up. Including more and more essay questions. This is going to be a pain on Friday but there is still an upside to Friday. I am going to be going camping with my mom over the weekend. Even if this was short notice I am extremely excited and can not wait to go with everyone. Only 2 more days and counting.

The work i did accomplish was reading my pages of Adrian Mole and then Mathematics. I believe that I finished it with flying colors. My grandma checked the work today and she only checked the ones she could do in her head. That's actually pretty good considering that you can do most of it in your head making it an extremely easy test. Though it sounds to easy to be a test it is and it still benefited me quite a bit.

Now the reason why I didn't actually finish all of my work is so I could help out my grandma. My grandma had to bring my older brother, Nate to a Dentist appointment. I helped by reading the instructions i printed off the computer from Google maps and continued to help even after we had made it there. Including helping navigate our way back home and keeping grandmas eyes on the road instead of on the instructions.

Have any of you passed a test your were confident in? Was it an extremely easy test or a devastatingly hard test? Were you correct in what you thought you got on the test and did you enjoy the subject? 

Day 5

Well here we are again although this day was not like the others. For the first time this year I did not finish all of my work in one day. This really is quite a shock for me and I don't know how i got over the shock so quickly. some how I did manage to get over the shock and was not mentally scarred for the rest of my life. Although this is a sad day for my work completion ranking there is an explanation that is actually quite simple. It is because I went with Kristi to her meeting for Made to Serve. While i was there I was side tracked a couple times in a good way. Like making cupcakes as one can see to the side.

While i was there i did more then just frost cupcakes I also managed to do all of my reading for the day. Which is a great start but then i had to do all of the essay questions. This is the hard part as I mentioned time and time again. This included essay questions for "Freakonomics" Which while I was at it I managed to find videos on Khan Academy to help me with my first essay question "describe economics in your own words 3-5 sentences". I found a video labeled cupcake economics which although sounding strange pulled me in and I found out a lot about economics from the 3, 12-13 minute videos.

While I didn't manage to complete any of the essay questions completely  I did manage to complete my very first test! Even if it was a pre-test it still counts towards my grades unlike Public School. I was very pleased with my work and although i feel confident in my ability in fractions i still cannot say what I actually got on the test. I wish for a bit of luck to get at least 95% or higher so i can get a definite A and some benefits. Benefits include a free day in math which I can turn in a slip and go back do math another day.

After my first 5 days of Home school I realize all of the differences there are between public school and home school. Despite one seeming to be better and more convenient then the other I believe that home school is better in several ways that are unmistakable. First of all home school shows a much needed freedom for the student and the teacher. For example instead of paying for an entire class to go to the science museum or worlds of fun for some reason, you only have to pay for only the amount of people going. nd there is so much more as this is one example of many

So here is my question to the audience. What would you change about public school. Why would you do this. How do you believe this would help things out around the school. Respond openly!
so heres my question

Day 4

Day 4

Things are getting harder but more interesting. I started out my morning with continuing "The Secret Diary of Adrian Mole" and found out that not only did i have to continue but i also had to answer questions based on yesterdays reading. Now despite how annoyed i was i stuck it through and did all of my essay questions for Adrian Mole. I then had to continue on the Hunger Games to find out that i had even more essay questions. I thought that the essay questions would never end but despite all of the odds they did.

I then started on a new book that i've had but haven't used yet. It is called "Freakonomics". This book is an interesting look on economics that you wouldn't usually think of. For example The first chapter though weird explains how a teacher is like a sumo wrestler. Even if they seem to have nothing in common they actually both can cheat at their jobs especially when their jobs are at stake. Including pay raise and the ladder of where they stand in the job world.

This Sunday I managed to do a activity hosted by people in the Free Skool group. The activity they hosted was a card game based on using facts presented by the cards against the other person. This game despite being somewhat a role-playing game was extremely fun because it consisted of attacking and countering the person using only information that you had from the character card and the area card or "scenario card". There was also interesting advantage cards like "Your opponent is drunk" and then they would have to account that they are drunk as well as the current situation.

Don't forget to post everybody.

Day 3

The end of the day has come and its time to write my blog. This day had a lot more work then the other 2 days. Including 108 problems, all of them were converting fractions and decimals. I then worked on some flashcards from my troika book.This took a little bit as i had to do my exercises as well which was sorting through sentences and finding adjectives and adverbs.

I also for my English work i had to take sentences from the Hunger Games and find adjectives and adverbs like my exercise earlier for English. I also continued on both of my books. "The Secret Diary of Adrian Mole" seems to get better and better. Hunger games on the other hand doesn't seem to get better only because I've read it before. I mean if you can read a book a second time, more power to you but i really can't do it without getting bored sometimes.

All though this day sounds a bit worse then the rest the weekends here and it feels relaxing. Even if I do have a lot time on my hands it feels good to have free time that i can fill in with some actual entertainment. When i was in public school i grabbed one of the three different books i always kept on me. Now that I'm at home it feels different. Almost as if i don't really want to read at my own house. Which is pretty accurate but its pretty much restricting me from doing much with all of this free time but some more work around the house. Lately I have not a had mess to really bother me during my time to do chores unlike usual.

Have a good day and remember to post!

Day 2

Alright second day and just as amazing as yesterday. Although this day mainly consisted of essay questions it still had its upside. Well it started out like yesterday. All up and ready to go as fast as i can through all with this with careful readiness. It didn't go as well as i wished when i remembered the essay questions for "The Secret Diary of Adrian Mole". They stumped me for 2 hours straight!
once i got through that though i was ready to go.

Unlike yesterday i managed to do all of my math with no problem using my math video source, Khan Academy which is an astounding source of math. After watching my assigned video i jumped into my 2 pages of comparing fractions. Though this sounds to be a tedious task it was amazingly easy. I then continued in my french work which is really a listen and repeat session but it actually helps.

 We finally have my first field trip planned which is going to be astounding. It is going to be a lecture from to amazing people. One of them is a scientist for NASA whose name is Kobie Boykins. The other one is a National Geographic channel main photographer named Brian Skerry. This ought to be an amazing trip to never forget

first day

Day 1


First day of my home schooling and doing good. My home school career started off with a surprise breakfast at Corner Cafe which made me ready for anything they could throw at me including my already organized curriculum, binder, flashcard container for every subject, and the lack of a proper work area though the one i had did pretty well as well. now all of this is good and all but the curriculum is the most important subject of school and that's what I'm going to share with you mostly

Well i started my actual school day with some reading starting out with "The Secret Diary of Adrian Mole" which was humorous and fun while still helping me learn to read more fluently due to the English dialect and any other interesting words . with all of this i also have to fill out some essay questions. Though i wasn't required to do so yet i wrote down things while i was reading that chapter currently. i then inched into the popular book the hunger games which is an alright book and hoping it can help me with any extra reading talents that i didn't pick up on during the public school years.

well i then inched my way into my somewhat new troika book which i only say some what because Kristi (my main teacher) had gone through all of my books before i did which is a relief that someones doing it cause i certainly cant and it lets me know its not them just throwing out random work out of nowhere. well this led into pretty basic curriculum i still hadn't gotten down yet like nouns, pronouns and other things which though saddening is true. well after this i decided to go downstairs and start doing all my computer curriculum. this includes my math (for now),french, and my blog so that anyone can follow along and give me feed back as far as what i have done this year. well math didn't start so well but we finally figured it out. all it was is that  i had gotten about four pages labeled all under one day. in total it was 108 problems that they were wanting me to do in one day. well after working that out i did one page and went on to pimsleur or my French course which was basic like do you understand english and so on and so forth.

and so i wrap up my first day with an open mind to new ideas.

P.S. don't forget to comment