Hey, Caine’s Arcade: Do you need a vending machine?

June 14, 2012

Most mornings, the kids wake up and get some time in front of some sort of screen. (Please don’t get too judge-y here: I work from home and am training for a 10K, so mornings are pretty much my only time to get stuff done.)

But one morning, the kids were especially cranky about shutting things down for breakfast, so I snapped, “No Screens Tomorrow!”

Oh, joy: The punishment that gets me too.

So, when D came stumbling down the stairs the next morning at 7am and asked me for the iPad, I reminded him of the “no screens” day. I then said, “But you can do any craft you want“.

He said, “I want to paint.” At 7am. Le sigh.

So, I pulled out the paints, got him into a smock, and let him go at it. His sisters came down a while later and started thinking bigger.

“Do we have a big box, Mom?“, Belly asked.

There was much running up and down the stairs to the basement, but they were all quiet and intent on their work. I had no idea what they were doing, but at their age, they can be trusted to not paint the furniture.

When they finished, they called me into the living room. And what they had created that morning was pretty cool.

Behold, a homemade vending machine:

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close up of fruits for “sale”

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close up of key pad (on right)

Yes, it works, as long as D is behind the machine. Put the money in, push the “button” for the number snack you want, and using little plastic pegs (that normally hold their Slip N’ Slide onto the lawn), a fruit gets knocked down below where it can be collected. Here’s a video of it being used. (Forgive my terrible camera person skills. All my videos look like this because I cannot hold still for 2 seconds.)

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the back of the machine

 

No, we haven’t given out television away and filled the house with cardboard boxes. But, you can bet we’ll spend a few more mornings than normal with the paints out, the screens off, and the kids’ imaginations intact.

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Though they’ve made many creative things before, this vending machine was, no doubt, inspired by Caine’s Arcade. If you haven’t seen this video yet, drop everything and watch it. It’s the best feel-good story out there, and it makes me so happy that kids like Caine are out there.

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Filed Under: Fairly Odd Kids, Homeschooling, The Outside World, Uncategorized 4 Comments

Grade level ain’t nothin’ but a number

May 9, 2012

“What grade are you in?”

When this question is posed to one of my kids, they often glance up at me for guidance. And then I stand there and think for a moment, which must look really ridiculous—Who can’t remember what grade their kid is in, especially when that person is their teacher?

The curriculum we use is no help. All three kids are following a middle-school life sciences program, and our history program is written for middle schoolers too. My 1st grade son is doing second-grade math, but also plays math games in a weekly class with kindergarten kids. My oldest is in a writing program with kids from about three different grades.

But, that doesn’t mean they are all “beyond” their grade. My oldest, a fifth grader, is finishing last year’s math program, which is technically a fourth-grade book. Same with grammar. But, when we started this year, rather than close the books we had been doing in June, I chose to roll them over and actually finish them, even if it took all year to do it. But, that doesn’t mean it was an easy choice.

I worry that by “falling behind” a year, she will be at a disadvantage when she hits the high school years. Then again, isn’t it more important that she master the basic skills before she moves forward? I think most teachers would understand the value of  the latter even if the school system pushes the former—we found this out when we joined MAVA, our state’s virtual public school, for 8 weeks this past year. Their insistence that we keep “moving forward” even when the girls got stuck on a concept was one of the main reasons we quit.

But while I’ve heard many, many families talk about how their third graders are doing “fourth grade math” or kindergartners are reading “third grade books”, I don’t hear as many admitting that their children are below grade level in any subject.  Are we embarrassed? Afraid we’ll be judged as bad “teachers”?

What about you? If you homeschool, do you use grade level as a basis for the curriculum you purchase? Will you move on to the “next grade” in September, even if you didn’t finish this year’s books?

Are you quicker to offer that your child is “above grade level” in certain subjects than below?  I sure am. But I wish I didn’t care.

 

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Filed Under: Fairly Odd Kids, Fairly Odd Me, Homeschooling, MAVA, Uncategorized 10 Comments

Fun (and history) with Peeps

March 29, 2012



After seeing the Peeps dioramas in the Washington Post, the kids were dying to make their own crafty-sweet versions. I agreed to let them go wild, under one condition: They had to make a scene depicting something we’d covered so far this year in history. And we got their two friends who do history with them involved too. 


I think what they came up with is pretty great. . .


Columbus sailing to the New World by my son, age 7:

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Here are the native people waiting for his arrival:

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Poor Verrazano meeting an unfortunate end with a bunch of hungry cannibals, by my friend’s son, age 8 (I love him in the pot over the fire!):

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Pocahontas saving John Smith, by my friend’s daughter, age 11:

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Pilgrims working hard on their new land, by Jilly, age 9:

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And, finally, the Salem Witch Trials, by Belly, age 11:

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(look at the poor googly-eyed “witch”!)



And, yes, many Peeps were harmed in the making of these scenes. (burp)


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Filed Under: Fairly Odd Kids, Homeschooling 8 Comments
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