Engaging Students in Artist Study

Linda Fay has a new post on Higher Up and Further In about Artist Study and Art Appreciation. It's a simple, interesting way to get your children engaged.

I particularly liked this idea she presents:

At the end of the term, I show my kids some more pictures from the artist we studied that term. These are the ones that we didn't get to but I thought they might like. Together, we download their favorites and put them on a flash disc, take it to Walmart and have each printed for about a quarter each. Then the children get to add them to their personal artist albums.

I can hardly wait to start my own children on their personal artist albums!

By the way, after you've read her post, you might like to click the link she has at the bottom to see her post titled Our Picture Studies. In that post Linda Fay gives a more extensive description of the proccess.

In The News

This from one of our members this afternoon:

Please, if you are able, take a look at an article today's National Post (p. AL8) called Recess to the Rescue which covers all sorts of contemporary research findings about how time spent in nature is as effective or more effective than medication for children with ADHD. It talks about the important role of recess and how walks in natural settings are more effective than those in urban settings on improving concentration and attention. And it talks about the role of play, and playful learning environments. (Maybe the article will be on the web tomorrow, not sure how the National Post does that).

As if that was not enough, the Hamilton Spectator, had a story sub-titled, Intense Cognitive Training may overcome disabilities (p. Go 6), which discusses the Arrowsmith program, which uses the close study of works of art (by students) to improve cognitive abilities and improve attention.

...nature study, picture study...are we on the verge of an appetite for a new paradigm for education?

On Narration

In case you've never visited "Higher Up and Further In", I'd like to point you in that direction. Linda Fay has a terrific blog that covers all sorts of things educational from a CM perspective, as well as branching into other areas of life.

This week she put up a post called "Narration Thoughts from a Highschooler." These are her daughter's responses to questions about narration. It's interesting to read the student's perspective on the value of narration and to see how much she has come to appreciate the discipline of narration.

Why don't you take a moment to visit this post by Linda Fay and then, if you've never been there before, you might want to spend some time browsing. Her sidebar list of "Starting Points" might be where you'd like to begin looking. Or maybe you'll scroll down to "Categories" and pick one of those to dive into. Whichever direction you take, I know that you'll be inspired by her wisdom and enthusiasm.

A Gospel Primer - Received!

I heard Amy recite the Gospel Narrative at the end of January and was so moved by the personal nature of this confession of faith. Hearing the words "My God is immense beyond imagination" to "but this is my salvation, and herein I stand. Thank You, Jesus" spoken so simply and sincerely was beautiful. I think the personal pronouns were what impacted me the most. This was a personal testimony about a personal God, His work for me, His undeserved love for me. I felt like Amy was telling me her own story as the recited, but that her story was my story, too. It was beautiful.

Then I learned that the publishers of A Gospel Primer had given Amy some copies of A Gospel Primer and the pocket version which she was using as a give away on her blog. So I entered. And I was one of the ones chosen to receive the pocket version!

Yesterday I received it in the mail, and I'm so excited. It is as beautiful to read as it is to listen to! I've even had an opportunity to show it to a friend, and she also thinks it's something she'd like to have nearby!

Thank you Amy, for this lovely gift. It will soon become worn!

Welcome Gloria

Sandra Z and her husband Tim are so pleased to have little Gloria Joy Katherine in their arms after months of waiting and questions. While in utero Gloria and Sandra had multiple ultrasounds in order to determine the extent of a structural problem with little Gloria's heart.

Gloria was born by scheduled C-section on Monday morning, February 9. She is strong, but the complications with her heart are what was expected. She has also had a positive test for Down's Syndrome.

Sandra and Tim have begun a blog to track their journey with Gloria, and you are invited to visit there to get a glimpse of their sweet baby as well as to read some of the information about what they are expecting to happen in terms of surgeries, etc. (Prepare yourself: this little girl is too precious for words!)

Welcome, Gloria! Congratulations Sandra and Tim (and Philip, Reuben, and Lydia). We hope to see you at a meeting soon.

::

By the way, if you have an announcement such as a birth, adoption, or other occasion that you'd like to share with the WHHE group, please do! Simply email me (talsma at cyg dot net) and I'll make sure it gets posted.

Flesh and Blood - an article by Art Middlekauff

There is a new post entitled "Flesh and Blood" on the ChildLight USA blog. Art Middlekauff looks at what Charlotte Mason believed about the natural and supernatural process of sanctification. This is something that is foundational to her philosophy of who children are, yet it is often misunderstood because many of us interpret her perspective from her writings about education and not from her writings on the human soul.

My little introduction here is for no other purpose than to encourage you to read Art's post. It is, as is characteristic of Art, thoughtful, respectful, and insightful.

Following a Pattern

Months ago I saw a pattern I liked for an afghan. I looked around for yarn to use for it, but was uninspired, so the pattern sat unused for some time.

After a while, the company that the pattern came from was having a 'free shipping' promotion on online purchases, so I went ahead and bought the yarn that way. When it arrived in the mail, I began to crochet.

That's when things got complicated.

The afghan is made up of 30 units (called 'blocks', which are actually rectangles), using 3 different patterns. That sounds easy enough, and I thought that doing 30 small pieces would be a lot more manageable than doing one huge one.

But I was wrong.

You see, when you do 10 pieces of the same pattern, they should all be the same size. And mine aren't. Some are quite close, others (2 or 3) are almost perfect. But there's a fair bit of variation over the 10 pieces.

AND...

...when you have 3 different patterns to follow, the resulting blocks should be the same size as well. But I've had to do so much fiddling to get my single crochet blocks to be the same as the double crochet blocks, first by making my stitches looser or tighter, then by increasing or decreasing the number of stitches in each row... And still they aren't the same.

It makes me very nervous to try the third pattern which is more complicated, because changing the number of stitches in a row will change the pattern and it'll require a fair bit of figuring to determine what will work. And because I also know that, no matter how perfectly my adjustments work out on paper, when I actually crochet them, they'll be no more consistent than my first two styles have been.

Sigh.

But I'm still trying. I'm crocheting piece after piece. I'm pulling out rows, sometimes too many to count, sometimes a whole block's worth (I'm sure I've actually crocheted enough blocks to make the afghan, even though I only have 12 pieces sitting in front of me now).

These blocks have taken on a life of their own for me. I want each of them to be perfect, to match the others in size and shape and texture, but they all come out differently. Some are nice, others are filled with flaws. Some I have to pull out and start over.

In the end, though, once each block is pieced together with all the others, the result will have its own beauty, will look like no one else's, and will be completely mine.

Sounds a bit like the days my Lord has given me.