Everyone is sick with a cold here. Gloria and Bede were the worst hit today, feverish and wan on the couch. Faith was very bad off yesterday but is much improved. So far I have not succumbed; I hope for the best.
It brought homeschool to a halt though. I did nothing today. Faith is reading Beorn the Proud and Abby is reading How to Train Your Dragon, and they both spent an hour or so reading, so i guess that’s countable.
We have the movie for How to Train Your Dragon but neither I nor the older girls and G-Lo have seen it. We would have watched it with everyone else but instead we went to a homeschool event on Saturday. It was a discussion followed by a hands-on demonstration of solar panels and wind generators – but we didn’t watch that part. The kids were far more interested in the dozen-plus homeschooled kids on the playground, so I wandered thataway instead. I talked with a charming homeschooled teenager named Chris and another homeschooling mom named Kara. Kara also has six kids, the oldest aged ten and a girl – who was playing with Faith and Abby as we spoke.
I was yet again struck by the ease and grace the multi-aged children exhibited in their social actions. I so rarely see that in groups of institutionally schooled children. Within minutes these kids, most of whom had never seen each other before, were playing with abandon. The younger kids were included and tended to if they got knocked down or squished. The difference between this Saturday and the last event we attended with institutionally schooled kids was very plain. Not to say that nonhomeschooled kids are mean, but they are stiffer socially across age groups, and slower to socialize. Maybe because they have been rebuffed in the past, whereas homeschooled kids generally have more positive experiences? Who can say.
It’s ironic that homeschoolers are badgered about “socialization”!
Also noteworthy was a visit from our friends the Roykas. Yall need to come more!
