What mom hasn’t heard a million questions by now from their kiddos, no matter who teaches them academics? I know I have! As a home learning family, it fuels our curriculum. We found out about an unschooling, delight directed, philosophy that justified how we learned, or gave a little credence to it least ways. So far, pursuing the answers to their ongoing questions has left little to no time for Science, History, Geography or Social Studies packaged curriculum.  People  (curriculum in a box or public/private/tutor driven families) that we’d run out of things to study, and the kids would end up doing nothing all day. I admit, in the beginning, I thought we’d do a delight directed approach while they were young and full of curiosity, but when it waned, we would go to see what the books thought we should be learning.  Six or Seven years later – and we haven’t run out of questions!

So – Today’s QOTD - 

Driving out of our yard on the way to errands we spot 10-20 tiny tiny little birds in the bushes in the side yard.  “Wow those are tiny birds mom. I think those are the smallest in the world!”, says Nate. Hmmmm. Thats a good question. “Nate – I think you should look up what is actually the smallest and see if it lives in our yard!”, I encourage.

So today he gets on the computer and types in the search words, quickly finding the answer to be the Bee or Bumblebee Hummingbird.  “Write that down so you remember for dad”, I urge. Which, admittedly to my surprise, he did. I have a nice little report of how much the little guy weighs and measures, and what colors he can be found in. The only thing that didn’t hold his interest is the question of where we could find one.  “They are all over mom”, was his answer. 

You can click on the pic of the little guy to find out more.

We were set up to play the game, Ten Days in the USAA game we love from Timberdoodle.  You have to plan a trip around  the USA with a few rules, but the states are color coordinated by shape, so even for the emergent reader, or non reader as a team mate, the whole family can play. We had played Yatzee and Skippo after Jonathan,  our 9 year old made Scrambled eggs for the family, so we skipped Math in the workbooks this afternoon. We also addressed 26 cards to my husband’s employees, and over 30 to friends in between Skippo hands. The boys have been squabbling lately. Too much for my liking – I prayed of what to do.  Went to check on my Google Reader, Gmail and Facebook updates and read a few inspiring stories of what some of my virtual and in real life friends are going through.  We have an IRL friend who has found a hole through her sinus cavity to her brain, it is pushing through the hole, she contracted bacterial meningitis, and will have surgery tomorrow, fix it, remove part of the brain. She has peace with the Lord, and is ready for the weeks to come. She wants us to feel at peace with it.  She is about 13 years old.  And the boys can not handle whose cold toes touches whose warm legs.  Ya. That’s traumatic. We sit and talk about how, when facing huge things in our lives, we pull together. Yet, on an every day level, the slightest thing, who is sitting where, touching whom, having the longest turn on the laptop – throws us over the edge. Its a good talk, and has calmed everyone. Our new question to quiet the little ones might be – but ya, do you have a hole that your brain is poking through in your nose? Ya.  Top that for legitimate hysterics!

So we move on with our day, settled in, bracing against the high winds outside (gusts of up to 60 mpg, 25mph sustained) and figure out what we will do as a family for the evening.

I hear, and took in the comments of well meaning friends and family, that we, as homeschoolers will run out of things to learn without the authorities dictating our next move, but we just really don’t have time to read the books and fill out the little worksheets that are so important to them.