Saturday, December 17, 2011

And the countdown has begun!

Before I share about our week this week, I want to direct people to an article. Let me preface this by saying I'm not shoving this down the throat of any public schoolers. I have, nor will I ever, bash or judge those that send their children to public school. I don't think those people are weird, or cult-like, or that they don't want the same things for their children that I do. We just go about things a little differently.

I found this article on a friend's Facebook page and had to share it. I hate standardized tests. I would go so far to say that I abhore them. I don't believe those test results can tell you anything about a child, other than whether or not a child can test well under pressure. I can't even limit my blanket dislike to just standardized tests. It's all tests. I want my children to study to learn. To remember what they read about and worked on. To enjoy the learning process. I don't want them to study to test, then forget half of what they learned once the test was over.

Ok, back to that article. Here it is: When an adult took standardized tests forced on kids

With homeschool statistics showing us that more and more families are making the decision to homeschool, and more and more colleges and universities are accepting homeschoolers (even from those states where testing is not required by homeschool laws), I'm exceedingly happy that I don't have to put so much emphasis on testing around here.

Alrighty then. Just wanted to throw that out there. Now back to our regularly scheduled program. :D

This past week was good for us. I finished my Christmas cards AND got them in the mail in an appropriate time frame. We took the boys to see Arthur Christmas and really enjoyed it. They did their Toys for Tots shopping, and thanks to a GREAT Nerf sale at Target, we dropped $100 worth of Nerf toys, and two board games, in the local TfT box. The best, BEST part of that whole experience was walking out of Target and both of the boys telling us that they loved the feeling they had inside, knowing that they bought so much cool stuff for kids they didn't even know. I was so proud of them!

Other than that, the boys have been liking their "sloth days." All is well...

This coming week starts the countdown to Christmas. No, not so much emphasis on the gifts as just the pure craziness that is our life at Christmas, lol. We have four separate occasions to gather and celebrate. It's nice, but time consuming and very filling, lol, as we eat with everyone we see.

This week we are going Christmas caroling twice; with the Scouts and with our homeschool group. We are so looking forward to that! We are also doing some holiday baking for the first time. The boys decided that they wanted to make cookies for everyone this year. So we are going to attempt to make a gazillion dozen cookies. No, not really that many. At least I hope not. But I'm sure it's going to feel like that, lol...remember I don't spend a lot of time in the kitchen. :/

This week the boys won't really have a lot of time to do much, but they expressed an interest in Hanukkah, so we are going to try and learn something new about the Jewish holiday on each of the eight days. So instead of eight days of gifts, they will get eight days of holiday facts. :) The site we use for our homeschool spelling curriculum (yep..shameless plug, lol) has some Hanukkah word lists. I probably won't make them test on the words, but they can use the lists for game play.

Today we are finishing the last of our shopping. The boys wanted to make their two new cousins a Build-A-Bear as a gift (it's a tradition for new wee additions to the family that started when we made Bailey - now 12 - his first one when he was born!) so we are taking care of that. And then grocery shopping. Blech.

Tomorrow the boys are in a Christmas parade with the Scouts. We finally got our new camera so hopefully I will have photos to post! I can't describe this parade. Honestly. No words. So you guys will have to see the photos to understand why, lol. It's a country parade. Everything from high class floats to decorated lawn mowers and tractors (nope, not kidding) are in the parade. AND...people actually travel from out of state to see this. It's in the middle of nowhere! Not even a gas station. Nothing.  And yet it's the most anticipated holiday event of the season for some. So freaking weird.

Ok. That was long. Too long. Hope some of you actually made it to the end. ;) I hope everyone has a splendid week!

And in case I don't get to say before next weekend, we wish you all a VERY MERRY CHRISTMAS!




4 comments:

Kerry said...

I made it!!! What do I win??!! ;) (I know, I know...the smartass award, right??)

jeanette woods said...

I loved , loved, loved this post! I am so tired of people asking me what grade are your kids in? What did they score on their test? Blah, blah, blah.....you summed it up perfectly. In my perfect world there would be NO grades, and NO standardized testing, as it is really NO one else's business, but really what do those things tell anyone anyway? Okay. I'm off my soapbox, now.....love your blog! Thanks for sharing and letting us get a glimpse of your life! :)

Unknown said...

Topsy...yep, uh huh. That's the award. :P

Jeanette...thanks so much for visiting and taking the time to reply! :)

Michele said...

Great post. I hate tests because I memorize the material for the test and then dump it so I can fill my head for the next test. Studying for a test is not a productive use of time in my opinion. They should spend that time showing kids real world applications for what they learned.