Brave Writer Weekly Digest Vol. 2

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Hello Dear Friends!

Welcome to the second edition of my Brave Writers Weekly Digest. (Read Vol. 1 here.) Each week I plan on sharing how we're feathering in the Brave Writer Lifestyle as I read from one chapter per week from The Writers Jungle, as well as using The Arrow for our Language Arts program. I'll share my personal thoughts on what worked and what didn't.

I've signed up for the Brave Writers Mom Yahoo Group where I receive weekly emails on how to incorporate the elements of Brave Writer at home. I also purchased the Brave Writer Lifestyle Winter Planner from Homeschool Planet. This is the Holy Grail I've been looking for! Everyday is mapped out for me and because I'm a type-A mama, I get to check off little boxes when I'm done, giving me a small sense of accomplishment. What I'm sharing in these weekly digests are either from the emails, the planner, or The Writer's Jungle. Fair warning, I have several links in this post.

Reading will be the foundation of our Language Arts. That's the beauty of Brave Writer, and here's why:

Reading aloud is the chief way in the homeschool you show who you are to your children—and they show themselves to you. It’s the core of education. I can’t think of any more important practice in the homeschool than the sacred read aloud time.~
Why reading aloud matters

Now for our first week with Brave Writer :)

Monday I blogged about my melt down epiphany and how we're going to implement the Brave Writer Lifestyle in our homeschool.

Tuesday we ventured to the library and picked up a huge load of books for the week. It was just enough to get us through the snow storm and kick off the Read Aloud Revival 31 Day Challenge. My 9 year old, Charlotte has really enjoyed the challenge the most! With each book, she gains a little more confidence. It's been fabulous watching her read out loud to her sisters, every day sometimes for nearly an hour.

Tuesday was also a movie day and we watched one of my favorites, Fiddler on the Roof! When the movie began, I wondered what in the world I could ask my girls about this movie to spark some Big Juicy Conversations. (Really just my eleven year old since the others barley made it through intermission.) I scrambled on my phone and came across Teach with Movies. Thankfully they had a fantastic list of discussion questions for Fiddler on the Roof. Google for the win!

Wednesday: One thing I've learned from Brave Writer, is that when I begin to feel overwhelmed, it's best to do just one thing. We pretty much have copy work down, so I decided to take on Dictation from the Writers Jungle, as suggested in chapter one. I chose a paragraph, which after we completed the assignment learned was too much. At least to begin with. I wrote the paragraph on our white board, omitting three words and instructed the girls to fill in what was missing. When they were done, Anabelle said, "That was like a giant spelling test! But it was ok." I haven't perfected dictation. In fact, I'm a little intimidated so I'll challenge myself to spend more time on practicing it with the girls this week.

For enjoying art together, I printed out a few pieces of art and the girls created their own sculptures with play-dough. Super simple, yet effective.

Thursday we enjoyed Poetry Tea Time. I read from The Missing Piece, and Pug, And Other Animal Poems while the girls sipped their cinnamon tea and munched on cookies.

I'm not too big on Handicrafts. I want to be, but it's one of those subjects that gets tossed aside. I took Julie's advice however, and had the girls finger knit while I read.

For copy work, the girls selected pieces from a few of our read alouds such as Owl Moon, Winter Bees, and The Big Snow.

Friday I was asked to introduce Literary Elements, such as onomatopoeia, alliteration, or rhyme.
Uh, deer in the headlights! I had no clue what these were, let alone how to discuss them, but it's all explained in the first chapter of The Writers Jungle. "Onomatopoeia" is also introduced in the fourth week of  The Arrow for "Bud, Not Buddy" so we'll get to it later in the reading. (Phew!)

One of the emails suggested that I have one on one time with the children. As much as I love this, it simply wasn't possible at the time. Because we're a bigger family, I actually schedule "Mommy Dates" with my girls every other week. I'll take just one of them to a thrift store to buy some treasures, or we'll get an ice cream and just talk. It's so important. We both feel valued and heard when we spend this time together, and I love that I'm creating individual memories with each of my girls.

Game Day! My oldest daughter Anabelle has been begging me to play a board game with her, so she was delighted when I finally said yes to Othello! Not a language game, but still enjoyable!

Side note; have you heard about the Gameschool Challenge? What a fantastic idea!

Language Arts:
In my last post, I shared how we're purchasing The Arrow and were beginning with The Green Ember. After much thought, Anabelle decided she didn't want to start over with The Green Ember, {sigh} and in an effort to include the children more in what they will be learning about, I allowed her choose a Single Issue from the Arrow. She chose Bud, Not Buddy, commencing our daily chapter book read aloud using our new LA program. Our lesson was to simply review a typical paragraph, routine punctuation and structure. A perfectly gentle way to begin. Easy breezy.

Reflections from the week: I don't talk enough with my girls. Not enough questions were asked with our lessons that are free thought, heart feeling type of questions from other curriculum we've previously used. Reading about a topic then asking the scripted questions to see what they know from a teachers manual is easy. Narration is easy. Asking questions to awaken their own souls about a given topic are totally foreign to me. When we watched our movie, one of the discussion questions was why was Tevye unsure about dancing with the Russians? That led to what others may think about you and your community, and Communism. "And why were the Jewish people forced to leave?" and many other curious inquiries. 

Our own hearts began to ache when we started Bud, Not Buddy. I can't remember ever  talking with the girls about Foster Care, let alone child abuse. It's outside of our bubble. I know it's out there, but why haven't we talked about it before? We've yet to study modern history so we discussed briefly what the Depression was...More big juicy conversations. 

At first this made me feel terrible. Like I don't know my girls past their favorite color. But it's good that I'm discovering this for myself. The greatest lesson learned this week for me is that I must be intentional and purposeful in teaching, while asking and listening.

None of what we accomplished this week felt like "school." In fact, one of my girls asked me midweek, "When are we starting school again?" If I could, I would have done a thousand cartwheels! Talk about success!

Because isn't the whole point of doing school at home is to not do school at home? For our children to learn without "lessons" and there's no pain involved? No tears, just love and beauty in what they are learning?

At least for me it is. I want our homeschool to be like a secret covert-op-schooling. Funschooling. Braveschooling. Unschooling.

Brave Writer week one gets an A++ and gold stars all around!

For a review, this is what we covered:
Read alouds
Copy work
Big Juicy Conversations, aka narration
Dictation
Poetry Tea Time
Games & Handicrafts
Art Study

Later this week I'll share a post on the brilliance of the Homeschool Planner using Brave Writer so stay tuned.

How about you? Share some of your successes from last week. I'd love to hear all about it!

Until next week, enjoy this Gracious Space chat on Less is More.

oxox

ps. here's Vol.3