This year Elijah's main focus was on Linguistics. He spent the vast majority of the year immersed in the world of languages, writing systems, and phonetics.
Language Arts:
Elijah reads on a regular basis for information and pleasure. He enjoys writing comics, emails, grocery lists, table top game instructions, and notes and plans for game designs. He is adept at finding information via online wikis, Internet and Google searches, encyclopedias, and the library catalogue. He knows how to use a dictionary and thesaurus. This year Elijah focused on linguistics, constructed languages, writing systems, and foreign languages. He was mentored by both armchair and professional linguists via online conversations on the web forum Reddit. Elijah also recently started using Duolingo to learn so German.
An excerpt from email Elijah sent discussing pragmatism in the Chinese languages
Elijah plays Scrabble & Words With Friends solo and with others.
Mathematics:
Elijah continued to practice and gain skills in addition, subtraction, multiplication, division, fractions, decimals, and measurements by exploring calculator and number tricks, calculating area for building Minecraft creations, assisting with creating grocery lists and budgets, figuring maths problems in his head, working maths and logic puzzles, and following recipes. Elijah and his family play table top games involving maths and strategy and web series videos by Khan Academy and Vi Hart are utilised frequently.
Elijah playing Carcassonne (tile based strategy game)
Science and Technology:
Elijah enjoys Science Fridays on NPR, as well as other science related web series/podcasts. He also really enjoys hands on science projects with immediate results such as, Snap Circuits, working with magnets, and bases/acids forming reactions. Elijah is quite competent in computer literacy. He is able to navigate the Internet, social media, conduct online research, use a word processor, and navigate Apple iOS, Android OS, Ubuntu Linux, and Mac OS X enough to satisfy his computing needs.
Elijah playing Magic The Gathering at Elks #339 Game Night
Geography:
Elijah and his family travelled to Boston, MA for the Northeast Unschooling Conference this school year. Elijah looked over maps to help plot our course. Elijah has also been familiarising himself with Google Maps and GPS on our cell phones, helping with directions around town and when travelling. Elijah has become more familiar with global geography in general while learning about which languages are spoken in which countries.
Different routes to Northeast Unschooling Conference and our hotel in Boston
Social Studies:
As a family we continue to have discussions about current events in politics such as, equal rights for the Queer community, feminism, and racial politics concerning institutional racism. We also discussed democracy, anarchism, and other forms of government, the Civil Rights movements, civil disobedience, and the importance of voting in local and national elections. We always listen to NPR in the car and discuss the current topics in science and politics while commuting. Elijah has been exposed to general world history while learning about the history and evolution of different languages and writing systems in various countries.
We visited the house where Gertrude Stein was born. It's just a 5 minute drive from our house!
Health and Safety:
We covered fire safety for our home, especially concerning the pilot lights on our older gas range. Elijah knows how to exit the house and use his cellphone to call 911, his parents, and his parents' friends in the event of a fire or other emergency. We also revisited safely navigating the Internet and social media. We continue to keep an open, healthy, and honest dialogue with Elijah concerning drugs, alcohol, general hygiene, personal care, sexuality, and sex. Elijah has also learned a fair amount about human development and childcare while helping to care for his toddler sibling.
These two are always up to shenanigans
Physical Education:
Elijah walks, dances, engages in unstructured play outdoors, and enjoys swimming whenever he can.
Elijah playing badminton with friends
Elijah getting a score while playing badminton
Fine Arts:
Elijah enjoys making and trading Artist Trading Cards. Elijah enjoys listening to a variety of music via YouTube, the radio, and our personal family collection, including the music that his father writes and produces. Elijah utilises computer software, iOS applications, and gaming software to create music for his video game designs and for pleasure.
While Elijah has not decided whether or not he wants to go to college, it seemed like a good idea to go ahead and make one for them as it can still be useful for employment. I know from the experience that many colleges and even some employers like to have course descriptions for the credits given to unschooled/homeschooled students and a portfolio to get a better idea of what they have learned and the kind of adventures they have lived. Here is Elijah's high school transcript. When it came time to write course names it was not too difficult since Elijah mainly had wanted to engage with some more traditional subjects, but it is not too difficult to take a survey of what a homeschooler has been doing and translate it into a more traditional subject/course for the purpose of creating a transcript. When I began thinking about course descriptions, I talked to several people who had already graduated unschoolers are the best advice I kept hearing was to not reinvent the wheel. The numb...
This year Elijah's main focus again was on Linguistics. He spent the vast majority of the year immersed in the world of languages, writing systems, and phonetics. Language Arts: Elijah reads online articles on a regular basis for information and pleasure. He enjoys writing emails, grocery lists, and determining phonologies and pronominal morphologies using Lexilogos.com. He is adept at finding information via online wikis, Internet and Google searches, encyclopedias, and the library catalogue. This year Elijah continue to focus on linguistics, constructed languages, writing systems, and foreign languages. He was mentored by both armchair and professional linguists via online conversations on the web forum Reddit. E reading to his sibling. E reading to his sibling. E reviewing commas and "its" vs "it's" Mathematics: Elijah continued to practice and gain skills in addition, subtraction, multiplication, division, fractions, decimals, ...
So, it might seem as though we have dropped off the face of the Earth or that we "took a Summer Break", but neither is the case. Before I go any farther, I never intended for this blog to be editorial or contemplative, just archival, but I feel like I want, nay, need to say some things. One of my friends, a mother of a toddler, who is considering home/unschooling her child and who was homeschooled herself, asked me the other day, "So, do you, like, give E a break during the Summer or is it just all the time?" I believe I've quoted her fairly well (or at least the general idea of what she said). I know (and some of you know) that people who ask questions like this have not really grasped the concept of unschooling, but that's okay: I love my friend. I just said, "No, we just do our thing, living life, all of the time." What I *do* mind isn't innocent questions from friends, but keeping track of what we do. It's no secret that I abhor a...
