TEACHING A WIDE AGE-RANGE WITH LITERATURE…

Hi Cindy,

I just finished listening to Notebooking Part II on audio and  I got so much out of it!  My favorite, and most-needed, part was the little “sidebar” that you added on how you scheduled your school days.  I have SO much I want to teach the children, and have so many great books on my shelves; I’ve just had such a hard time implementing it!  A regular hourly schedule will NOT work for us, with all the variables we have (4 diff. ages, Tim’s unpredictable work/sleep schedule, and a Mama who will go out to “just to check on the goats” and then not reappear in 2 hours because something interesting was out
there – and the children always follow!).

I really like your “schedule” and the flexibility it includes!  I’m thinking that it would work perfectly for us! I’m wondering 2 things about it:

1.) When you had family read aloud time, did you read a book for Elizabeth or for Matthew? Or did you just not worry about their age differences?  I have ages 3-11!  I don’t want the little ones to miss out on Charlotte’s Web, for example, but Brenden (11) isn’t interested in hearing it again.  He’d rather have King Arthur or Tom Sawyer.

2.)     Did you have the children read classics alone, as part of “school”?  If so, when did you fit that in?
Send me the handout from your mom to mom chat on notebooking (that you mentioned on your audio), please!

Thank you so much for what you do!  I’m off to finish supper!

Love ya, Lori

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FROM CINDY…
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Hey sweet gal!

Thanks for your feedback! I LOVE feedback! It makes it more of a dialogue. 🙂

I found the same thing with my schedule. I guess you picked up on that, huh? No two days were the same. When we began that schedule, it was during a time that Harold worked various shifts. It was never the same. We desperately needed a sense of routine and discipline. This was our answer!  It not only worked for the struggle with Harold’s work schedule, but also it worked when we began to travel with the businesses.

And…it still works today with a homeschooled graduate, high schooler, and three big family businesses vying for our time each day. I hope that it will help you with your family.

For those that have NO idea what I am talking about, you can listen in to our podcast for a description of our “typical day” and how I set up a schedule that had a FLOW to the day, rather than a strict hourly schedule (that I could NEVER keep and be NICE! ha!)…here is the link to that show:

http://momtomomradioshow.com/lets-try-notebooking-with-cindy-rushton-part-one/
http://momtomomradioshow.com/lets-try-notebooking-with-cindy-rushton/

Back to Lori’s questions…

Your first question…

I usually read to the oldest child. What I mean by that is to his level of understanding. In doing this, I found that actually if it is a great book, all ages of the family will enjoy it. C.S. Lewis best expressed this, “No book is really worth reading at the age of ten which is not equally (and often far more) worth reading at the age of fifty and beyond.”

Of course, I would add in that if we will find great books for all ages, then we will truly find the best that are out there. That is what I look for–the best out there.  Yes, some will appeal more to our daughters than our sons…or to our sons than our daughters…or to the older children than the younger children…or to the younger children than the older children.

Now in saying that, I have to admit that I enjoy books like WINNIE THE POOH or CURIOUS GEORGE in a way that I did not enjoy them when I was a child–I still have sweet memories of the books from my childhood. I think they are completely HILARIOUS now. The writing is simply exceptional! Great writing is like that. Not always deep, just always exceptional! 🙂 Great writing can reach the younger children while humoring or challenging the older children. Hunt for those books!

When my children were little, I took turns with books that were geared more to a boy then books that were geared more to a girl. One thing that you may want to do with Brenden is have HIM read to the little ones-a great way for him to minister to their hearts and a great way for him to make memories with them and be included in their education.

I have sweet memories of Matthew reading aloud to Elisabeth when she was a little girl. He would read with many of the funny expressions that the children LOVED about my reading aloud–funny laughs…whiny expressions…excitement. It was neat to see him “get into” her little story books and read aloud like I would. Makes me excited about the days to come when he has his own children! 🙂 Sweet, sweet memories!

SECOND QUESTION….

2.) Did you have the children read classics alone, as part of “school”?  If so, when did you fit that in?

Great questions! 🙂

We read most of the classics that we read right before bedtime during our read-aloud time. Of course, as they got older and older I looked less for the classics and more for life-changing literature. I wanted books that could influence them toward godliness. We loved biographies…books with moral lessons…etc. Those literally shaped our lives for the better. Much of who we are today is because of what we have read over the years. God always seemed to send the right book for the moment. We now have years of fun experiences with characters and real people we “lived” with during great books!

I mentioned that over time I began to look less for “classics”  and more for life-changing literature. There was a big reason. I felt that many classics were undermining our values that we wanted to instill upon our children. We read a large number, but there were some that we chose to avoid. I am very glad that we did now. This is where we go a different path than some of the CM gals. We did not read everything that “everyone” else chose to read. God just always gave us the RIGHT book for us at the time. I still have several books that are “good” books on my shelves…yet, we chose books that were AMAZING instead of them. They made us into even better people for spending time with them.

To do it again, I think I would go back down that same path again. My only regret that I have is not scrapping more of the unessentials and having MORE time in books.  Of course, all of it made the perfect education for our children. 🙂

BACK TO YOUR NOTE…

Here are the links to the Notebooking Handouts:

http://www.cindyrushton.com/Ebooks/LetsTryNotebooking!.pdf
http://www.cindyrushton.com/Ebooks/SamplesofStudentNotebooks.pdf

Hope you enjoy!

AND…thanks for your feedback and for taking time to ask such great questions. Hope this helps! 🙂

Love ya tons!
Cindy