Making Connections: Establishing Community

Think of a childhood memory that depicted community, belonging, and learning. Now that you have the memory, lets explore it in a new way, be reflecting on these thoughts:

•  What were the key elements of your memory? 
• Are they attached to people who hold meaning in your life? 
• Have you visited your experience in adulthood? 
• Do you continue to live out your memory with your own children?

 When I reflect on my memory, I think of my trips to the downtown Oakland library with my sisters. Key elements of my library memory were the trip, time spent, and the bounty of books we left with at each trip. We always made it an adventure and stretched out our visit. We would leave home on the AC transit bus, from our neighborhood on 12th avenue, take the 15 bus downtown library, just past Lake Merritt, and it dropped us off in front. My joy was climbing the steps to the main library floor, and taking the elevator to the left, down to the children's section. That was really just to get my sisters settled, so that I could head back upstairs to the card catalogs massive displays, to browse and look for titles of books of interest. At this point, this had been our ritual for years, and now I was graduating to more distinct books and choices in the main floor collection. This library experience is directly attached to my sisters, and our relationship with each other, and with every librarian we encountered.

 As an adult, I revisit my time at the library with my sons, on a monthly basis.  Each son, was introduced to the library at age 2.  They received their library cards and learn to browse, choose books, videos, and the rules of the library.  We visit the downtown library near our home, and the librarian   knows us by name.   This simple connection in our community provides a plethora of resource for each stage of development of my boys.  At absolutely, no cost to the patron, we are given rich literary experiences and open doors to knowledge all over the world.

So revisit the questions above, and rediscover your community by extending a childhood experience into your daily life.  Share your discoveries in the comments below, we would love to hear your story.

Kelly Ramsey

Our most important: WORK

Children are amazing creatures. They are always trying to make sense of their world by emulating the sights and sounds around them. As parents,we are constantly being observed and watched by little eyes that make sense of their world through us. A typicial evening in our home is usually filled with lots of routines, homework time, bathtime, dinnertime, reading time, and relaxation. In the hustle and bustle of just a few hours in the evening we are trying to get things done from the time we get home, until we usually crash on the couch or in bed reading a book or watching television. How do we make use of the time we have to capture moments of childhood and still get through our routines? Here are a few tips to help parents who balance work and life, and the desire to spend meaningful time with their children. 1. Plan ahead When we plan for our meals, and making lunches ahead of time, we create more time in the evening to spend with our children. If you children are older, task them with making their own lunch, and create meals that can be reheated easily. 2. Forgive yourself often. The ideal time and moment is non-existent. We can spend our time beating ourselves up or we can let it go and accept our today. Forgive yourself often. If you really think about it, we are usually our worse critics and everyone else has already moved on. 3. Take 5 minute pauses. Even as I'm writing this entry, I paused for my youngest son, to give me a hug, climb in my lamp and talk to me about why he needed to sit on my lap even though I'm typing. His words, "I like stories. Me: You do, what kind? Him: Football. He's still sitting on my lap. When I said, well can I get back to typing, he said, Yes, you can use one hand, and type type type, and I can still sit on your lap. Make the time, for these moments because they pass all too quicklly. Good evening, and enjoy your parenting journey!

Growing Tall...Growng Stong!

Who would have imagined that in a short time we would be parents of two little boys with strong personalities and energy to boot! Welcome to the next phase of parenting. In April, I conducted my first research study with my colleague Jennifer Lewis Johnson on the intermingling of parenting stages and stages of child development. The research was my story of how becoming a parent of a school-aged child changed and influenced my parenting and response to every stage of development in my son's life. Feel free to take our survey and help us to gather more information on parenting at different stages. You can find it here. From 6 weeks old he was nurtured and cared for by his caregiver in a family childcare home called Honeygram's Childcare. She nurtured him and extended our parenting beliefs and values to grow him into a young man that was caring, eager to help others, and with lots of conversations and stories about everything. His little brother, began to grow right along with him, and then he launched to elementary school. On our last entry we talked about kindergarten ending, and now here we are at the end of the first quarter of 1st grade. What a difference a year makes! In 1st grade, children begin to develop a culture of how to get along with others, work as a group, and follow the guidelines. Today, I observed the little kindergarteners from last year, grown up and assuming roles to maintain the classroom environment. Giving commands, and providing guidance to each other to help the class run smoothly. It's as if, they discovered the secret rule, " Do unto others as you would have them do unto you." My most enjoyable moment as a parent is listening in on conversations without the boys knowing it. Today, the youngest was demanding that it's his turn to talk. In month's past brother would just ramble on as he did, without being interrupted by little brothers need for conversation. Now that he's two days away from turning four, there's an urgency to get his turn, and share his story. I can't wait to see who they become, and how they continue to grown in their own way to become mighty men of valor and movers and shakers in the earth. Let's wait and see!

Kindergarten Complete

Well the last we wrote, we were beginning our journey in kindergarten, and now we have completed the first year of kindergarten.  Immediately my favorite book as a teacher comes to mind, All I ever knew I learned from kindergarten by Robert Fulghum.  Here's what he says, 

"All I Really Need To Know I Learned In Kindergarten"

by Robert Fulghum

Most of what I really need
To know about how to live
And what to do and how to be
I learned in kindergarten.
Wisdom was not at the top
Of the graduate school mountain,
But there in the sand pile at Sunday school.

These are the things I learned:

Share everything.
Play fair.
Don't hit people.
Put things back where you found them.
Clean up your own mess.
Don't take things that aren't yours.
Say you're sorry when you hurt somebody.
Wash your hands before you eat.
Flush.
Warm cookies and cold milk are good for you.
Live a balanced life -
Learn some and think some
And draw and paint and sing and dance
And play and work everyday some.
Take a nap every afternoon.
When you go out into the world,
Watch out for traffic,
Hold hands and stick together.
Be aware of wonder.

Well I'm glad to tell you that our son learned all these lessons, and it was clear that he payed attention to every detail.  It amazed me that in the first two weeks he learned what it takes to please the teachers and the adults who care for him.  I watched as each night, he gave me a running report of his day, always prefaced with the sentence, "I didn't get any tallies today".  As the year progressed, he learned that not all tallies are created equal.  By listening for our response as parents, he began to understand what was important to us, Take care of your things, Take care of people, and Take care of yourself.  That's what it all boils down to isn't it.  Sounds a little like, "Do unto others as you would have them do unto you".  

The other thing that amazed me was seeing our deposit as parents grow up before our eyes.  Jason chose to protect a teacher and child's relationship instead of protecting himself first.  He as more concerned with marring the representation of the child that was bothering him, than keeping himself safe.  He was courteous, had lots of stories and a huge imagination.  At the end of the year, we lost our teacher due to a family move out of town, so Jason won't get to see her next year, but he's in Summer School now, upstairs in the elementary classrooms, and we've picked our teacher, now to wait for school to begin in August, and 1st grade here we come.  

P.S.  The goal of Mrs' Lerch was to teach her kindergartner's to read, and guess what... he can.  Thanks Mrs. Lerch we'll miss you.  The Ramsey's 

Redefining homeschooling: kindergarten begins

Our last visit was to share the options for my firstborns schooling experience.  The path definitely changed, but the goals are the same.  My husband and I are committed to raising children who will fulfill the destiny of God in their own "bent".

Our son is now a full-time student DCS, in K-5.  As an experienced ECE professionals, there are aspects of developmentally appropriate classroom experience that are not present, I admit that.  The greater focus is hat through the nurturing environments of home, church, and family childcare he was ready to enter the world of school.

We understand that children pick up the messages that are spoken the loudest, and that message at DCS is obey the rules or face the consequences.  Our home rules are the same, yet spoken by parents whose main goal is to nurture understanding and provide hands on guidance to the goal.

The second message is that Christ is center to all we do.  The same is our message at home.

The last focus is the method.  We are a teaching house, a house of exploration, discovery and wonder.  That's where our homeschooling comes into redefinition.  While I believe that we are the source of educating our children, we choose to partner with the school for formal education.  Moral development is up to us.  We educate our sons to be a light of Christ in the world and to change the systems they are in by the instruction we provide.  So, we change the blogs focus to Bringing Up Boys:  Our  Journey - Gods Way.  Stay tuned!

Homeschooling: Creating an Environment for Learning Exploration

Well here it is, A simple weekly outline to enhance your child's learning and create lots of learning activities for the home.  Here's our weekly plan for supporitng learning in the home : 

Monday - Friday :  Family Childcare

Evenings/Weekends
Tuesday - Cooking Project
Wednesday - 9 - 12 Childcare/ 1 - 4 Learning Activities at Home / 4-5 Dinner Preparation (Math) 5 - 7pm Tutoring at GECDC/ 7 - 8pm Bible Lesson at GAPRT.
Thursday - Childcare 9 - 4 / 5 - 7pm Library Day
Friday - Childcare
Saturday - Outing/ Service Learning
Sunday - Family Day

Our learning week has interactive play experiences at Childcare, one-on-one learning time at home including bible devotional, helping with chores, helping with meal preparation and character building activities. 


This year will give us a start at developing a learning atmosphere, identifying learning styles, and creating a curriculum plan for learning. 

Well the plan is changing and taking shape.  As an advocate for home learning environments, I have come to a point where working outside of the home full-time is a priority.  In this journey, I discovered alot about my self and how important proper education is to me and my family. 

Our home has a plethora of activities to enrichment our children's learning, no matter what setting they are in.  This year we will be enrolling our  oldest son in a private Christian school that supports our values and beliefs.  While this school was not my first choice, I've decided that it is the best choice for my boys.  The tenets of faith and the commitment to quality education is at the core of their mission.  Some of the methods for teaching differ from my belief on what is optimal for young children, although both methods warrant the same result, a child excited about learning and grasping the concepts needed for advancement to the next grade level. 

So for those following me on my journey stay tuned.  We will still be talking about the homeschooling aspect, and how to partner with your child's school to support the child's development.  Stay tuned, as we create a specific space in the home for homework  materials, reading enrichment, and math manipulatives for active boys, two years old and five years old.  The materials will support lessons taught at school, and cause the boys to experience success no matter what the school setting.  Happy Homeschooling! 

Plan B It is!

In our last post we were looking at our plans for homeschooling, well we have determined that it is: 

Plan B:  Begin homeschooling mornings twice a week, and continue to attend our wonderful Family Childcare Program to supplement our work schedule

As a beginning, we will start with just a basic schedule that allows for one-on-one time and some exploration of new interest.  This will give me a feel for how Jason truly learns best, and what interest we want to focus on.  Our goal is to support his learning in the most optimal setting, and to create a foundation for learning that last a lifetime. 

What will our schedule look like?
That's still to be determined.  I would like to see a morning schedule from 9 - 12pm, twice a week.  One day we will focus on specific learning skill-building exercises and the other day will be outings, errands, and experiences that include practical hands-on application.  For instance, As we cut coupons, and make a grocery list, we will talk about budgets and take a shopping trip to the store, to match our coupons to the items on the shelf.  Come home, store our groceries, plan our menus, and prepare our meals.  All of those are learning experiences, that deal with math, counting, sorting, classification, and understanding volume.  I haven't seen that experience in the classroom, have you. 

I can't help but think about how families existed before organized schools and systems.  How lessons were taught, character, integrity.  All of those lessons were taught in the home, and that's what homeschooling for me is really all about. 

When I create the homeshcooling space, I want it to be uncluttered, and clearly labeled, so that Jason can begin to take ownership of his learning environment.  I can see a year from now, him being able to go in and get started on his lessons on his own, as I accliment Jeremiah to his homeschool schedule in the next two years.  So this first year September 2011 - May 2012, we will set the environment, identifying learning styles, and interest and then build the foundation for next year.  September 2012 - May 2013 will be a little more structured, move into a 5 day a week plan and create a full year of experience for Jason by himself.  September 2013 - May 2014 will be Jeremiah's launching year, starting with two day's a week like Jason did, and then moving into a full year plan. 

The other element that we want to add this year, is identifying two families with children around the same age, to join us in our journey.  Launching slowly, and then developing our full program by next year. 

So this month, is research month, planning and organizing our work and schedules.  Getting a feel for what our daily life will evolve into, and how to keep everything on a consistent basis.    Next step, decluttering our spaces so we can actually get it all done.

Happy Homeshcooling!

It's Official......

Well, I did go and visit my first school in our road to finding a quality education setting for the boys, that matches our values and beliefs about education.  Well they are definitely not a match!!  As I sat in the chair for my interview (actually it wasn't an interview, just an orientation to the schools philosophy and beliefs) I was dismayed at the time spend explaining the disciplinary policy, before even finding out about our family, the boys, and our desires for their education. 

As an educator, I had my list of important questions to ask, here's what it looked like: 

• Philosophy
• Education Model/Theory
• Teacher Qualifications/Training/Professional Development
• Parent Engagement
• Sample Lesson Plan
• Schedule
• Christian/Moral Education

Each of these areas, were never mentioned, unless I asked a specific question about it.  I asked about lesson plans and schedules three times, in three different ways, and finally got a response. 

While I am committed to homeschooling our children, I would like to give them a small experience in a school setting as well.  This year would be optimal, as we transition career and professional settings.  Well, the story will continue as I take a look at a public school this month, and then create the plan for proceeding. 

Plan A:  Enroll in public PreK program with developmentally appropriate curriculum and lots of time and materials for exploration and of course, meeting new friends.

Plan B:  Begin homeschooling mornings twice a week, and continue to attend our wonderful Family Childcare Program to supplement our work schedule

Plan C:  Continue full-time at Family Childcare Program.

We will see......

A Pre-cursor to Homeschooling

Well our journey continues......
My full-time grant funded position will end on September 30th, so my plans for homeschooling will either be in full force, or will wait until next year.  One thing that I've learned is that transitions and change happen to us all, but dealing with multiple transitions at the same time can be insane when you pile them on top of each other. 

So while I transition from full-time employee, to full-time business owner with an office space, we've decided to look at a temporary school for our four year old.  He's ready to be challenged, and needs this year to begin his transition to schooling. 


The appointment is set for Monday to look at the school, measure it's philosophy against our goals for his education, and place my white glove test on the school to see if all of my beliefs about how children learn can be housed in one program. 

The deciding factor, lies in how they view active learning environments, spiritual development in young children, and how many learning centers children get to interact with throughout the school day.  The last factor of course is the teacher's philosophy and background in working with children. 

I'll let you know how it all pans out.  If it works, he'll start in September, if not.....well I'll be balancing the start of my agency in full-force and homeschooling in the same transition span.  Happy Homeschooling!

P. S.
My resources are building momentum as we speak.  I can already see that we will need a homeschooling room, or space outside of the home for our weekly lessons and interactions and a few families to share the journey with us.  I'll keep you posted on this as well.   

@home_education

A Meeting to Share

Today, I had the opportunity to spend time with a friend, and homeschooling mom of 10 years.  She shared her experience with homeschooling her two children and continued to reiterate that homeschooling is a "lifestyle".  As I entered her home, quiet music played, the table was set with goodies and we sat and just talked. 



The gift of hospitality, and friendship reminds me to take time to share in small ways with those who enter my home.  Thank you Jenny for opening your home to me today and sharing your homeshcooling experience with me.

Let the journey begin....

Well this is the beginning of a journey as a homeschooling parent!  I've just spent the last two days attending the OCHEC conference.  Oklahoma City Home Educators Conference at the Cox Convention Center in Oklahoma City.  This is my second year attending.  The first year was when Jason was 6 months old, in 2007, and now four years later, I'm here again ready to begin.

The vendors just laughed at me the first year, as I pushed the stroller with my infant son in tow.  "So how old are your children?  They asked. "  I just have one, he's 6 months old.  I knew at that point that homeschooling was what we wanted to do.  I say, we because both my husband and I are in agreement to homeschool, our boys.  Now two, instead of just one. 

So this year, I was purposeful in looking at materials, discovering what philosophy we wanted to go with, what curriculum if any is needed for the first few years.  I attended two workshops, both six dvds of the sessions I missed but wanted to attend, and now the journey begins. 

Purposeful Planning
I've shared the first days findings with my husband of 11 years, and now we have to sit down and plan out the strategies and how to approach homeschool the boys.  I'm really excited about what will unfold, and how we will be on this journey for the next 18 years.

I heard loud and clear the importance of character development, bible study, devotions, and understanding your child's learning styles throughout the conference.  The other thing that rang clear, was the idea of habit forming.  I like the concept, so now it's off to discover more of how to begin. 

This is the first of many post of our journey, and will create a manual for other homeschooling families just starting the journey.  Come with us as we share, impart, and discover this whole new world.   Kelly

Next blog:  Why homeschooling?