Week 4, Tuesday

It was another rainy day.  We don't get many rainy days in Spain.  We do get some terrific thunder storms though.  I don't know why, but the thunder seems way louder here than it was in Canada.  Sometimes it sounds like a bomb is exploding right on top of you.

There was rain today, but no thunder storm.  All day I was anticipating my meeting with the director and elementary school principle to discuss what Ciara's new schedule will look like.  The meeting was at 3pm and so all day Ciara was a little on edge.  We had to move around our schedule, so she was having a hard time focusing during her Discovery session this afternoon.

I thought the meeting went well, they proposed a good schedule that would have Ciara attending classes after lunch every day with the 5th grade class.   There were a few classes that probably wouldn't make much sense for her to attend on Monday and Tuesday, so I proposed that she come to school Wednesday through Friday afternoons.  The Director wasn't sure if this was enough to qualify as attending school at ASB.   He is going to check with the school lawyers and will get back to us on Friday.

So it's more waiting and wondering.  4 weeks of researching, inquiring, pleading, negotiating and stressing, just to get a document that says Ciara is registered in school, so that we can renew our residency cards.  Bob's company is pressuring us to get the documents  ready to be submitted as it could take months to complete the process.

I am just going to try to do the best I can until we know for sure what Ciara will be doing for the rest of the school year.  I hate having this unsettling feeling: the fact that we can't comply with the law and we can't not comply with the law.

Week 4, Monday

Wow! We already made it to week 4 and we are still going strong.  Today Ciara finished an entire unit of math in less than 30min.  It was on number lines, and all 5 lessons were very short and easy.  So we moved onto our units 1-4 review and Ciara did quite well remembering what we had studied during our very first math unit (mega numbers and place value).

After Spanish, we decided to work on a board game that Ciara had invented a few months ago.  It was called the "Minty Game" (Ciara loves mints).  It was a pretty cute game, but needed to be reworked a little.  During our lunch hour, we took out some clay and made new game pieces.  Then Ciara rewrote all the instructions to the game and we started designing the game board.  It is really fun to work on this board game together and Ciara is learning a lot too: how to write instructions, how to design and sculpt, how to draw, how to measure, how to calculate the number of spaces between obstacles so that the game is not too easy or too hard.  Once the game is done, I'll post another picture.

Clay pieces drying and instructions

Quick Link

I started following a couple of homeschool blogs to get some new ideas.  I came across this blog by a mother of 10 children who homeschools in the US, her name is Montserrat Wadsworth.  I will admit that I was only intrigued by her blog because her first name is Montserrat.  Montserrat is the name of a very famous mountain near Barcelona that has special religious significance, especially here in Catalunya.  I was kind of hoping that she would have some connection with Spain, but as it turns out, she has never lived outside of the US.  Still I really enjoy reading her blog from time to time and I came across this post the other day, and I wanted to post it on my blog so that I remember it.

http://www.cranialhiccups.com/2014/09/simplify-outside-activities.html

Week 3, Friday

Forgot to post last night, but I did post to Nathan and Rylan's Lego Blog.  Nathan and Rylan's Lego blog has been around since 2010 and gets 10 times more traffic than my homeschool blog.  It's true that their content is much more entertaining :)

Yesterday, was a pretty good day.  Ciara did a lot of writing, and as an incentive if she held her pencil correctly, I told her we could do our cooking class before math.  This worked, and she decided that she would make the same cake as we did last week, but this time, she wanted to do it all on her own.  Bonus free time for me!  I helped Ciara put the cake into the oven, but otherwise she did everything else on her own and the cake turned out great.

For social studies we are still working on Ancient Greece.  This time I thought it would be good to review some of the geography and political system.  We have a map of the world in the front hallway that we bought off of Amazon for $4.00 and quite often we run over to the map so that Ciara can see how close we are to many of the Ancient Greek settlements.

Hideyo came over in the afternoon.  She is really helping Ciara to gain confidence in her own abilities.  Hideyo is very encouraging and gets Ciara excited about accomplishing difficult tasks.

I have noticed that since Ciara has been homeschooled, she really enjoys playing with her brothers.  It used to be that after school and on weekends, she would lock herself in her room and not want to come out.  The boys would often want to go play at the park, but she would rarely want to go with them.  Sometimes she would even hide hoping that we would leave her alone.  Now, she is out playing with the boys every day and even initiates the outings.

The map is in the front hallway.  You can see our front door and where we put our shoes.  You can probably tell from the picture, that we don't have a lot of space in our house here.  This is why the map is right by the front door :)

Just a little further down the hallway is our chalkboard right beside the entrance to the kitchen and the living room. 

Week 3, Thursday

Today was kind of a difficult day.  Ciara took an extra long time to do her Discovery homework this morning.  We are really working with her to correct her pencil grip.  We have been working on it for over 2 years now, but she staunchly refuses to grip the pencil properly.  Most of the time I just let it be, as long as she is doing her work, but since we are doing Discovery I know that Verina will insist that she grip the pencil properly.  I think that it improves her muscle control in her hand and will hopefully help her to write more neatly.

When it came time for math, Ciara was unresponsive.  The exercise was changing mixed numbers into improper fractions and vice-versa.  We have been working on this for about a week now, but this morning she just couldn't do it.  We took a break and had a long discussion about her responsibilities when it comes to homeschooling.  I told her that if this arrangement was going work, she needed to put in a little more effort.  She agreed to not get frustrated and give up so easily.

She was kind of luke warm during her Discovery session with Verina in the afternoon.  Verina thought that maybe Ciara was getting distracted by the fact that she may be going back to school (at least part-time) very soon.  It could be.  Not knowing the fate of our homeschooling these past few weeks has really been a distraction for me.

In any case, after the boys came home from school, Ciara went swimming with them for about 30min.  We came back to the math that we hadn't finished this morning.  This time, she was completely willing to do the work and even wanted to do it independently.  Sometimes with Ciara, it's all a question of timing.  We all need structure and schedules in our lives, but learning happens when the child is feeling good about themselves.   

I am learning that my most important job is to help Ciara gain self-confidence.  She needs to know that she can learn and accomplish difficult things.  I used to think that Ciara just had an aversion towards doing work.  Now I think that it's more of a fear of not being able to understand, of not being able to succeed and of being ridiculed.   It was this fear that made it impossible for her to participate in school and the more anxiety she felt, the less she learned and the farther behind she fell.   Homeschooling this year is all about taking the fear out of education.  Of course, this has to start with me working through my fears :)

Week 3, Wednesday

No school today because it is La Mercè, the festa major de Barcelona.  The kids have been in school for less than 3 weeks, and they have already had two holidays.  We didn't do much today as the weather was iffy, and Bob had to work as usual because his office is outside of Barcelona in Rubi.

We did watch the fireworks and huge audio-visual presentation highlighting some of the important event in the past 300 years since Catalunya became a part of Spain.

Since we didn't venture into Barcelona this year, here are some photos from last year's La Mercè when we did go downtown and witnessed first hand how crazy busy it was.

Video presentation in Plaça Sant Jaume

Watching the dragon procession

One of the many dragons that danced down La Rambla

It was also a free museum day, so we went to Cosmo Caixa - science museum

The sunken rainforest was amazing

The kids also decided to play in the water 

Week 3, Tuesday

This morning, at 9am we had a meeting with the director of the American School of Barcelona to talk about how we could get Ciara registered in school and still homeschool at the same time.  The meeting went pretty well.  The director is supportive, but will not sign a document saying that Ciara is attending school this year, when she really isn't.  So he came up with a compromise:  we register Ciara and she attends school part-time and then I homeschool part-time.  We agreed that this could work for us.  How exactly it will work, we won't know until the director meets with the elementary principle.  Since grade 6 is pretty full, she might have to work with the grade 5s.

In any case, I am kind of relieved that we at least have a solution in the works that will allow me to continue homeschooling while also allowing us to comply with Spanish laws.  Ciara may benefit from attending school part-time as well.  It will mean that I will have to redo our awesome homeschool schedule, but at least I wrote it all in pencil.

Today we continued to work on improper fractions, this time the questions were word problems.  Word problems are a difficult for all of my kids.  Nathan, who works so hard in math, just can't seem to figure them out.  When Rylan and Ciara encounter a word problem they just look like deer caught in the headlights.  The word problems we did today, were pretty difficult.  Ciara has the skills to solve them, she just has a hard time determining which equations to use.  We did all of our math work on the chalkboard so that we could draw pictures and break down the problem into small steps.

For social studies, we are still looking at Greek mythology.  Ciara is fascinated with the stories about the Greek Gods.  Today she learned about Pandora's box.  Ciara was so excited about Pandora, that she had to recount the whole story to Verina when they began their Skype session.

Tonight, I took Ciara to her judo class again.  She was a bit apprehensive as we entered the gym.  I think that she always feels a wave of anxiety whenever she enters a crowded place.  Since she liked her first class, we signed her up and bought her a judo-gi.  She felt good about wearing her new judo-gi and when I picked her up after class, she said that she had a good time.  I was so relieved.  Nathan also decided to try a judo class and he liked it too.  So we will probably have two kids in judo.  I also signed Cole and Rylan up for swimming lessons at the local rec. center.  I feel like we are really broadening our horizons.  This is the first time any of my kids have attended extra-curricular classes outside of the school.

Week 3, Monday

Wow, it's Monday again already.  The boys are becoming more independent as they get used to their new school routines.  Nathan takes Cole to school and picks him up after school, which saves me a good 15 to 20 min each morning and afternoon.   Really all he has to do is walk him across the street, but in any case, this is a big help to me.

Ciara is now working on adding, subtracting and multiplying fractions and mixed numbers.  I think that this has been our most challenging lesson to date.  I can see how difficult it is for her to remember all the steps she needs to follow.  I am glad that we can take our time and I can explain things over again if needed.   So after lunch, we skipped gym class so that we could go back and work on math some more. One thing I loved to see was how Ciara remembered a reference she read in a book during the summer about fractions.  We had read the book together, but I had completely forgotten that in one part of the book, the protagonist is trying to do his math homework and remembers that when you see 2/3 of 5/9, 'of' means multiply.

Ciara and I started reading together before bed last year.  Ciara was having a difficult time at school and she didn't seem to have the desire or energy to read anymore.  I also felt that I needed to spend more one on one time with her.  So reading a book together was a good way to solve both problems.  I am also really enjoying the books that we read together.  I am starting to gain an appreciation for pre-teen lit.

For our science period we continued learning about levers.  I didn't know that there are 3 types of levers.  During the lesson, we stopped a lot to draw pictures of ways that we use levers and also to find actual levers that we use around the house, such as scissors, a tennis racket, even a door.

As for our struggle to continue homeschooling here, we still have no solution.  I am starting to really worry that we will have to send Ciara back to school.  I have called or e-mailed about a dozen international schools in Barcelona and Spain and still have not been able to find a school that will support us.  Tomorrow we meet with the Director of the American School, I think this may be our last hope.

Week 2, Friday

It's already Friday again.  The week went by so quickly.  This morning started out simple enough: rhythmic writing and Spanish homework and then math.  We are still working on the improper fractions unit.  We started doing a worksheet converting mixed numbers into improper fractions.  I asked Ciara a question, and she just refused to answer or even try.  I tried to break the question down, but she hit a mental wall and could not get past it.  She was getting frustrated and I was getting frustrated.  Since we were getting nowhere, I told her to take a break.

About 15 minutes later, I went up to speak with her and encourage her to continue the lesson.  She had calmed down, and was willing to come down and try the problems again.   I told her that I would show her how to do the questions and she could just watch.  We went to the chalkboard and I wrote down the mixed number.  Then I explained step by step how to convert the mixed number into an improper fraction.  After the first question, she was able to do all the rest with very little prompting.  We both felt like we had accomplished something.

This is one of the advantages of homeschooling for Ciara.  When she is frustrated or angry, she just shuts down.  The only thing to do at that point is take a break from the situation and then come back a little later.  This is possible at home, but not so much at school.  If she is feeling stressed or frustrated during a class, she cannot ask for a 15 break.

Friday during lunch period is going to be our cooking class.  This time, Ciara wanted to make rainbow cupcakes.  She went on the Internet and found this video tutorial.  Here is what ours look like:

Not exactly like the video, but they still tasted fine.  Ciara was very excited to have Hideyo try one of the cupcakes.  Hideyo came over in the afternoon to work with Ciara.  Here is a picture of Hideyo timing Ciara as she practices doing mental addition as quickly as possible.

Hideyo is working with Ciara to try and help her to process and respond to information faster.  A lot of the activities they do together also help Ciara to develop a better working memory.  I am very happy that Ciara really wants to do her best when she is with Hideyo.  

Week 2, Thursday

Today I let Ciara choose the next unit to study in math.  She chose improper fractions, which I think was a good way to review the unit on multiples and factors.  Because Ciara is receiving one on one instruction, she is able to ask more questions and I am able to see if she really understands a concept.  As a result, we are really covering a lot of ground.  We have finished over 3 math units in less than two weeks.

Today for our science period, we decided to work on simple machines.  Ciara had an idea to build a machine that can paint.  I told her to sketch it out for me on the chalkboard and tell me how it would work.  It was basically a lever, with paintbrushes at one end.  It was time to discuss how levers work.  We did a simple experiment that we found on the Chicago Museum of Science and Industry website.

Here's what our lever looked like:

I mentioned in a previous post that Ciara is much happier this year.  Last year she had a mostly negative attitude towards living in Spain.  Her overall negativity made it difficult for her to make and keep friends.  She didn't really like being around anyone, not even her family.  Now her attitude is starting to change.  Today I dropped her off at a friend's house and her son was home from school sick.  I was kind of worried, because last year, she couldn't stand to be around this boy.  She went out of her way to avoid him or was extremely unpleasant when he was around.  When I picked her up from his place this afternoon, Ciara was all smiles.  She told me that she had a great time playing with this boy.  What a difference!!  Honestly, I think that not having the stress of constant social interaction at school has made a huge impact on Ciara's ability to socialize.

Another evidence of change came this evening when I dropped her off at her very first judo class.  Just a few weeks ago, she told me that she would not do any after-school activities.  Then, this week she changed her mind, and was all of a sudden really excited to do judo.  I have found over the last couple of weeks since we started homeschooling that she is more willing to take initiatives and she is more willing to talk to people.  It reminds me of the way Ciara was before she started grade 1.  Interesting.

Week 2, Wednesday

Today we did our Wednesday schedule, but during our lunch hour we visited our favourite Peruvian couple, Socorro and Amerigo.  I have been meeting with them weekly for about 8 months now.  It is an opportunity for me to speak Spanish (they are in their seventies and speak no English) and Socorro always prepares a little lesson for me based on what we are studying in Sunday school.

Now that Ciara is home with me, she came along and coloured mandalas and did origami with Amerigo.  It's great that Ciara gets to socialize with people of all ages during the week.  We live so far from our extended family, Socorro and Amerigo are like our Spanish grandparents.

Week 2, Tuesday

Well, things are still going well on the homeschooling front.  Ciara is much more relaxed, adventurous, caring and happy.  Her self-confidence is almost back to where it was before we came to Spain.  I'm sad to say that we are having difficulties finding a way to keep homeschooling.  We need to renew our NIEs (numéro de identidad de extranjero) very soon in order to remain in the country legally.  But to do so, we have to show that each one of our children is enrolled in school here.  We are looking at several options right now.  Hopefully we will find a solution in time.

Week 2 - Monday

I never really look forward to Mondays, but now I no longer have to dread them.  One of the many perks about homeschooling Ciara, is now I only have to worry about 3 lunches in the morning!  I hated making 4 lunches every morning, especially because each one of my children usually wanted something different (not that they got what they wanted).  Ciara was the worst though, she is extremely picky about her food: taste, texture, temperature etc... Everything has to be just the right way.  Now that she is home, we plan lunch together so that we both eat a balanced meal.  This, in and of itself, makes a huge difference in her productivity and overall well-being.

I figured that the boys would start complaining about going to school, since Ciara got to stay home.  But, none of them said anything during the first week.  This morning on the way to school, Cole (grade 1) finally complained "Why does Ciara get to stay home?  I want to stay home too!" I told Cole that Ciara needs to be homeschooled right now, but he does not.  Because of everything that we went through with Ciara last year, the boys understand that she has different needs.  I am pretty sure that Cole likes school anyways.  He is very social, and thrives on attention from others.  So school meets his needs better than homeschooling right now.

After Ciara did her rhythmic writing, we finished the math unit on factors and multiples.  I like how I can take time during a lesson to review a concept that she needs to work on. One of the reasons Ciara struggled so much in math at school was because she has a very poor working memory.  When she learns a new concept, quite often it is forgotten by the next day, unless it is reenforced again.  In school, you have to move on to the next concept even if you didn't quite get the concept before.  The teachers have so much to cover, in so little time.

After math, Arantxa came for her Spanish lesson.  I am still amazed at how much Ciara says when she is in her Spanish class.  Arantxa is doing a great job.  She has planned out Ciara's classes all the way until the end of December.  In each class they cover a different topic, do reading, writing, have conversations, and play a game or other activity.

During our lunch period we had our second sewing class.  Today, Ciara sewed a small pillow on the sewing machine.  We are working up towards making a plush two-headed dragon.

In science, we finished the unit on the classification of living things.  It was kind of a dry unit, but I wanted to follow the Link on Learning curriculum somewhat.  Fortunately, we don't have to dwell on these subjects too much.

We had a gym period and Ciara decided that we should go out and roller-blade.  Another benefit of homeschooling is that we can go out when all the other kids are still in school.  The skate park, which is usually packed with kids, was completely empty, so Ciara got to skate at her own pace and try some tricks that she would have never have tried if there were other kids there.

Last period was library, so I let her pick out some online books to read.  Today, she used Tumblebooks, but sometimes she goes on Reading Eggs or gets books from our bookshelf.   I'm looking forward to when the new school library will be open so that we can check out what they have.

Day 4

This morning Nathan left for Madrid at 7am to go on his very first temple trip.  Luckily Bob had the day off work, so he was able to take him to the bus. After dropping off the boys at school I asked around to see if anyone had information on how to homeschool and comply with Spanish laws.  Really I would like to talk to someone who has dealt with the same problem as us.  So far we haven't found anyone.

Today I contacted Clonlara, a school based in the United States with an office in Spain, that might be able to help us.  Bob also contacted the Canadian Embassy in Madrid to see if they could give us some guidance.  They are prepared to support us in any way, which is something.

Today we continued with our regular classes, Discovery homework, math, writing, social studies, typing and then a special class with Hideyo Roberts.  Hideyo also has kids at the American school, she is Japanese American and a life coach.  For Ciara and I, it is important that we share the joy of homeschooling with other educators.  It allows Ciara to interact with other people and gives us a bit of a break from each other.  Ciara really enjoyed her time with Hideyo.  As this was their first time working together, they played some games and got to know each other.  I feel very fortunate to have great team of teachers to help me with Ciara's studies.

La Diada

Today is a holiday in Catalunya.  On Sept. 11th the Catalans commemorate the day they were defeated in the Spanish War of Succession and therefore lost their independence and became part of Spain.  It is actually quite amazing that the independence movement is able to gather so much support.  When we came home we saw some of the pictures on the news.  This year is actually the 300 year anniversary of the fall of Catalunya in 1714 so it was supposed to be an extra special protest.  Thousands of people lined Diagonal and Gran Via dressed in red and yellow shirts to form a giant human V.   It think that it is supposed to be a reminder for people to go out and vote for independence.  Here is a link if you would like to see pictures of today's protest:  http://www.lavanguardia.com/politica/20140910/54415849103/imagenes-diada-de-catalunya.html

We did not participate in any of the protests, but instead headed to Sitges with friends and enjoyed a day on the beach.

Last year we actually got stuck on Diagonal (the main street that crosses Barcelona) because of the human chain across Catalunya protest of Sept. 11 2013.  Here are a few pictures we took that day.

Day 3

We are getting into the grove of things now.  Ciara and I always start our first period as soon as the boys go off to school at 9am.  We do rhythmic writing which is an important component of educational therapy.  It consists of drawing motifs on a chalkboard while saying outloud what you are doing. It helps to stimulate the brain, increase hand-eye coordination, directionality, handwriting skills and memory.

We always do math during the second period.  We are following the grade 6 curriculum from the Link on Learning website, but we do a lot of explaining on the chalkboard.  The chalkboard is a great tool.  We use it for every subject and the boys enjoy drawing on it in their spare time.  There is something fun about drawing or writing on a chalkboard.  I don't know why it appeals to the kids so much.  Maybe because all kids like to draw on walls.

After Spanish class, I promised Ciara that we would do a cooking period.  We had a bunch of over-ripe bananas, so we went on the Internet and found a recipe for banana cake.  Following a recipe is a great way to review fractions, so it was a cooking/math class.  It was a really good cake so if you are interested, here is the link to the recipe: http://truebluebaking.com/2013/05/16/best-ever-banana-cake-with-cream-cheese-frosting/

Here is a picture of Ciara with her piece of banana cake getting ready to do Discovery over Skype with Verina.

I had a few distractions today.  The kitchen sink started leaking so we had to turn off the water for the whole house until we could get it fixed.  Also, while we were doing our work, Bob kept calling me from work because we are in the process of renewing our residency visas.  It took over 6 months to get our visas to live in Spain, a lot longer than we expected.  Our visas expire in November, so we have to start the renewal process now.  The problem is that for the kids to get their visas, we need to prove that they are registered in school here in Spain.  As I mentioned before, the Spanish government does not recognize homeschooling as an alternative to formal schooling.  So we really don't know what to do.  I have sent out a few e-mails asking around to see if anyone else has dealt with this issue before.  So far we have no solution. 

I honestly didn't think that we would have this problem.  I mean why would the Spanish government care if a Canadian citizen went to school here or was homeschooled?  I hope that we can resolve this issue without having to seek legal advice.   

Day 2

I didn't think that I would be blogging every day, but I have to admit that it's kind of addicting.  I haven't kept a journal for several years, and I kind of feel bad about it, so this blogging kind of fill that void.

I can't believe how fast the time goes between the time when the boys leave for school and when they come home.  I think that we are doing pretty good sticking to our schedule, but there is always that nagging feeling like I should be doing more.  The problem is I love reading information online especially from other homeschool blogs and it's kind of overwhelming.  It's great seeing what other families are doing, but I have to remember that I can't incorporate everyone's good ideas into my own homeschool all at once.  It will take some time before I really feel organized.

Today, Ciara had her first educational therapy session (Discovery) over Skype.  It was a 45 minute session with Verina Goobie, who lives in Brampton, Ontario, Canada.  She worked with Ciara for the first year after she was diagnosed with a learning disability.  Then we moved to Barcelona and I would have liked to have continued with the Discovery sessions, but with the 6 hour time difference and Ciara's school schedule, it was just impossible to find the time.  Now that Ciara is being homeschooled, we could make the time.

Verina and I were both pleasantly surprised with the Skype Discovery session.  The connection was pretty clear and Ciara remembered a lot of things from when she did Discovery over a year ago back in Canada.  I even think that it was easier for her to focus because she had to look at her teacher through the computer screen and did not get distracted by anything else around her.  The wonder's of technology!

First Day of School

First day back at school for the boys, and Ciara's first day doing school at home.  We got off to a pretty chaotic start, as it took longer than normal to drop off the boys.  Ciara and I made this awesome schedule last week, and although we started 30min late, we managed to complete most everything we wanted to do (mas o menos).

The day went really quickly, but I am already starting to see how homeschooling can be a more effective use of time.  When the boys got home from school and I asked each one what they did on their first day, the common answer was 'not much.' One of my pet peeves about the school is how much time is wasted each day doing 'not much.'  

In any case, I shouldn't complain, because I'm glad that the boys are going to school.  It gives me the opportunity to spend more one on one time with Ciara.  I am not against formal schooling, but it just doesn't work for everyone. 

The highlight of the day, was Ciara's Spanish class.  Arantxa Leon, who is an English and Spanish teacher and also goes to our church, came over to give Ciara a private class.  I was amazed at how much Ciara spoke.  In fact, I have never heard her speak so fluently before.   Ciara does have a gift for languages, she just needs the right opportunity and right person to bring it out. 

So my observation from our first day of formal and homeschooling is that you can accomplish a lot during the day, but there is always more stuff that needs to be done.  I realize that I didn't do the laundry that is overflowing the laundry baskets.  I didn't do any cleaning.  The boys need a few things for school tomorrow and I didn't get them.  We didn't eat dinner until 9pm, which is not really that late for Spain, but I like to have the kids ready for bed by 9:30pm, so of course they weren't.   I am really wishing that there was a 24hour Walmart around here, but for some reason, Spanish stores do not like to stay open past 8pm.  Well, we'll see what we can get done tomorrow.

School Starts Tomorrow

Tomorrow is a big day, the boys will start school back at the American School of Barcelona: Nathan in grade 8, Rylan in grade 4 and Cole in grade 1.  Ciara and I will start homeschooling.  We have been busy over the last few months, getting everything ready. I decided to go with www.linkonlearning.com to help me cover all of the essentials of the grade 6 curriculum.  It's a virtual school program, not unlike many others out there.  There were so many to choose from, but I chose linkonlearning because they offered some Canadian content.  Since we will likely be returning to Ontario after 2 more years here in Spain,  I thought that it might be good for Ciara to get a little bit of Canadian history and geography.

To supplement the online curriculum we have organized two session of educational therapy per week with the same therapist that we worked with in Canada.  She and Ciara will do their sessions via Skype.  We will see how this works.  I hope that the connection will be strong enough so that they can see and hear each other clearly.

As well, Ciara will get two Spanish lessons a week with a private tutor.  The Spanish teacher is a friend of the family and knows Ciara well.  They will focus on conversation, more than grammar.  We would like Ciara to feel more comfortable speaking with the children and adults she meets here.

The next step is to find extra-curricular activities for Ciara and her brothers.  Ciara is not too keen on doing any extra-curricular activities as she kind of worries about what other kids will think about her.  1) she is quite introverted and 2) she is being homeschooled.  It's very rare to be homeschooled in Spain.  Most Spanish people would probably think that it was strange.

We are going to check out a few activities this week.  We'll see what we decide on.

Why are you Homeschooling?

I think this is the first question I would ask anyone who is currently homeschooling.  I am always interested to know why a parent would take on this challenge and what brought them to this decision.

For me, ever since my daughter Ciara started grade 1, I considered homeschooling her.  We knew that she was a bright girl, but at school she refused to participate.  She also made a fuss about going to school almost every morning. Her teacher was confounded by her lack of desire to do any work, when most kids that age are very eager to learn.  This was back in Canada.  She was in French Immersion, and picked up French faster than any of our other kids.  By the end of grade 1, Ciara could converse in French like it was her first language.

Since she was obviously learning something in school and she had plenty of good friends, we kept her in school for grade 2.  While in grade 2, her teacher tested her reading ability and told me that Ciara was below grade level and needed to be put into the remedial reading program.  But after only a few reading sessions with the volunteer, it was clear to them that she could definitely read at grade level.  The reason she was evaluated so low by the teacher is because Ciara gets nervous when she is being evaluated.

Flash forward to grade 3.  Ciara began to really dislike going to school again, mostly because she didn't like her French teacher.  She also had English and French on alternative days, which made it difficult for her to stay organized. Her English teacher requested a meeting with us and said that she felt that Ciara should be tested for learning disabilities.  We really respected her observations because she knows our family and has lots of experience in special education.   So at the end of grade 3 Ciara went for her psycho-educational evaluation, which required two afternoons over two weeks.  It was a fairly positive experience for Ciara and at the conclusion we found out that she has a processing delay.

This diagnosis answered some questions for us, such as why she hated school so much, even though she was a smart girl and had lots of friends.  With a processing delay, day to day school tasks became overwhelming.  She did not want to participate or speak in class because she often didn't know what was going on.  Next, we had to decide what to do about it.

We have a family friend who is a certified educational therapist through NILD (http://www.nildcanada.org/).  She was able to do personalized sessions with Ciara, to help her overcome some of her learning difficulties.  She started from the basics of reading, writing and math to make sure that Ciara had the skills she needed to learn more difficult concepts.

We also got the news while Ciara was in grade 3, that we were going to be moving to Barcelona.  This was a pretty big shock for the whole family as we had never moved outside of Brampton, Ontario since the kids were born.  For months after my husband accepted the delegation we never quite knew when we were going to move.  At first we thought it might be in July 2012, then Sept 2012, then December 2012, then January 2013, then March 2013.  When it became apparent that we were not going to get our visas until after May 2013, I decided that the kids might as well finish the school year in Canada and we would move in the summer.  Ciara continued to do educational therapy during grade 4 and I took her out of French Immersion to make things a little less complicated for her.  The kids also started to take Spanish lessons after school.

My husband moved to Barcelona in May 2013, but the rest of us didn't come until August 2013.  We decided to put all 4 kids in the American School of Barcelona.  We were not sure if the school would work for Ciara, but as we needed a school that taught in English, we didn't have a lot of options.  At first, Ciara seemed to be doing well.  She was making friends and although she was struggling academically the teachers were very helpful and she received quite a bit of one-on-one instruction.  But as the October became November, things were starting to get worse.  Ciara didn't want to go to school and resented the fact that we had brought her to Spain.  She was negative all the time, didn't want to go anywhere, didn't want to eat and would spend hours in her room alone.  I began to worry that she was becoming depressed.

December 2013 was a low point for Ciara.  It was around this time that I decided that Ciara needed to be homeschooled.  My husband was not so sure that I would be able to do it and urged me to really consider all of our options and do a lot of research.  I think that he was most apprehensive because I don't really have the personality of a nurturing homeschooling parent.  Ciara and I have quite a contentious relationship because I like doing things MY way and so does she.  But I figured that if we were going to survive another year in Barcelona we would have to try something new.  We decided that we would let Ciara finish the school year and I would take the next few months to really get prepared to homeschool.

In May 2013 we officially told the school that Ciara would not be returning the next year.  It was a very exciting day.  Now it was no longer a big secret, her teacher and principle were aware, Ciara could talk about it with her friends and I started looking for other homeschooling families in Barcelona.  I soon discovered that we were pretty much on our own.

I am surprised at how much I wrote today.  I have talked with others about why we are homeschooling Ciara, but this is the first time that I have written it all down.  I'm sure my subsequent post will be a lot shorter.