Archive for May, 2009
Gallery of Great Works
At our house, picture study looks like this.
- I pick an artist and find a nice large book containing his/her paintings from the library.
- Each week, for six weeks, we look at one piece of art from the book. I keep it displayed prominently in our family room, so that as we pass by it seeps into our memory.
- Sometime during the week, I take the book down and we look at the painting together. We spend five minutes trying to remember as many things as we can about the painting and then I close the book. Everyone takes turn sharing what they remember. We open the book and see how we did and add elements we might have forgotten.
- Like the click of camera, now we have added the painting to the gallery in our mind.
- If I find interesting books or videos about the artist, we add those as well.
- Every 6 weeks, we start a new artist.
This takes us up about 10 to 15 minutes in our whole week, and already we have begun building a gallery of great works.
This week, I felt inspired by another element of picture study added by this family.
I confess, I was nervous about M and J’s reactions. ”I can’t draw that, ” seemed the least of the worries. Falling to the floor and giving up completely because they couldn’t BE the artist was more of my concern.
So last night I showed the girls samples from the blog above and we talked about how we weren’t trying for perfect and all of our sketches would look different.
Today we tried it and it went great! I know that having this positive experience is going to make the next time that much more fun and enthusiastic. Here are the girl’s work side by side with our artist’s painting of the week, A Midsummer Night’s Dream by Marc Chagall.
Life is Learning
In my secret heart of hearts, I’m an “unschooler”. For those of you who may not know that term, it’s describes a philosophy behind homeschooling that means learning by what the day brings and where your children’s interests take you rather than with a stack of school books and a lesson plan.
We move in and out of various philosophies. This year, as I saw pregnancy and baby ahead, I leaned much more toward lists and plans and official curriculum to make sure school was happening even on the low days. Last year, we had many fancy free days of learning through trips to the zoo and hands on projects. The unschooling approach I usually save for the days when all plans escape us due to sickness, exhaustion, or undeniably great weather, it’s when I look back at the day and see their make-believe games and the cooking we did together,wipe my brow and say, “See, the were still learning”.
There are major influences that build up my fear of unschooling more of our days. Expectations from family and non-homeschooling friends, the comparative standards of our school system, the neighbors who might report me for neglecting my children’s “proper” education, and then my own etched memories of conventional school all group together to form a strong voice. Despite that, a deeper voice tells me there is a better way to learn than at a table.
This past week we came to a day that I lacked good judgement and scheduled dentist appointments(for 3 children), swim lessons(for 3 children) and an night excursion for myself. School, as the mainstream think of it, just couldn’t happen for this mom to stay sane. So between getting teeth cleaned and putting on bathing suits the children went outside in a perfectly breezy spring day for four and half hours.
Then spent most of those hours drawing.
With an enthusiasm far beyond their regular art lessons(even though we all like those too) they drew still life, self-portraits, and one another. Later, as we traveled in the car we listened to the story of Hudson Taylor, the missionary to china. We didn’t have to call it history or Bible Time to be just that.
That day was a day their minds were wide open. Joyful. Learning without calling it “school” and all the better for it.
I’m a thief
I’m grabbing my moment.
If I keep my eyes on the screen, my only goal to compose thoughts into words, I can pretend that this is all I should be doing.
Outside of this screen there are the other things calling. The right things. The responsible things. The things that, even if I were to devote my day to them will still be waiting for me in a few minutes, tomorrow, and next week.
Beyond the screen bits of our life lay ground into the carpet, waiting to be vacuumed. No, I won’t look.
Around the corner awaits the school room where our learning has spread across the surfaces. Steady now.
See how easy it is to wander back to those other things? Shouldn’t I be doing them instead of stealing this moment away to sit with my new macbook and write?
Maybe not. The Lord had called me to be a wife. A mother. A teacher. A good steward of our finances. It ’s my job to keep a warm hand on our home to provide a (relatively)clean and pleasant place to live. That’s enough to fill up 48 hours in a day, so how could I possibly believe that He’s also called me to give into these creative longings and write? After years of worrying about balance and how to look like every other mom, I’m giving myself a hearty yes.
Will I ever be the writer with luxury to stumble out of bed, grab coffee, and spend hours lingering over words? Or the late night writer determined to get ideas to page? Right now I value sleep too much. I really don’t know the answer past today. Today, in this moment, my moment, I’ve got my blank page(well, not so blank now) and my thoughts and until the time that baby girl wakes up, or the boys get back or the girls arrive home, I’ll have my moment.
Maybe it’s not a stolen moment. Maybe, it’s a gift.
2 commentsNow We are Six
The number 4 doesn’t seem like something to faint at, in my opinion.
Until Trader Joe’s. When two weary parents who had been up during the night with their 3 month old and already attended church (making it to sunday school and a service for the first time in months), decided it would be a good idea to take the 4 kids (3 of whom had colds of varying stages) to Trader Joes.
Because it sounded like fun.
On this outing though, we felt like that family. You know that family. The one you watch with waryness, keeping a distance of several cart lengths. You try to stay on a different aisle, and you have no problem doing that because you can hear what aisle that family is on. On this day when we were that family, we even armed our 4 year old (the sickest one who hadn’t had a nap) with his own child-size shopping cart. As we made our way through the store (note: nothing about TJ’s is large) we moved like a wave crashing against the shore, taking out all of the shells and sweet little crabs in it’s path.
The aforementioned cart had a large pole attached to it (for what purpose other than people bowling, I don’t know) and on the other side a boy who didn’t want any help steering. Next to him was his 6 year old sister with arms crossed and lips out because she wanted to be the one with cart. And then there was the normally content baby discontent in her sling. What about the 4th you ask? Luckily she knows how to spy out these situations (when mommy and daddy’s color is changing to pink) and walk the straight and narrow while her parents flounder about behind her.
After 10 minutes of this, I couldn’t think of single snack that would make this trip worth it.
My husband has more stamina (which means he can block out noise and activity longer than I can) so his curiosity led us around the store for about 20 minutes past the time we should have left the store.
Later, as we sat there emotionally drained from the venture, I leaned back on the couch and said to Matt, “I feel like a family of 6.”
He started laughing, “That’s exactly what I was thinking.”
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