One of my best days yet!

Today was a special day for me. I've been ill with the flu and had to find a substitute for my classes.  How excited it was to turn to my own daughter, Shelly, who has a Master's Degree in English, to take over my classes!

So, she did what she does best - she taught them a bit about Shakespeare. Next, she had them act out a portion of Star Wars in Shakespearean English. Finally, she had them write Get Well notes for me using what they learned. How much fun I had reading these notes! Here's two samples (some of them were pages long!):

"Hello thither, Mrs. Downes, I hearth thou hath fallen ill. Thou not weepeth, Maddam, for we be not shrewd in your absence. Thy daughter hath best us to learn greatly. Hark, we hath, and fain too. Cowish we hath obeyed thy spawn beautifully. I hopeth thou lurch over your illness and thou returneth soon. Alex"

"Harken unto me thither instructor. Word through the grapevine is that thou hast been bent by a cowish disease. Fie! To this abomination! Castest it out and returneth post haste. Joshiah"

Shelly had to give me a Shakespeare dictionary so I could interpret the letters! I sure am proud today of both my daughter for taking on all six of my classes and doing such a good job, and also of my students for being the best students in the state of Oklahoma! 

My Newest Article: Chisholm Trail Heritage Center

Oklahoma Living Magazine just published my article on Chisholm Trail Heritage Center. You can read the article on their website (pg. 14-15).

Published Dec. 2013

More Adventures in Tutoring

TUTORING! 

I've been so busy tutoring that I haven't kept up with my blogs and websites. This past month, I've learned more about Biology than I ever did in school. I'm using Apologia's high school biology with a class of 9-12th graders. There are 12 students in the class - all fabulous kids, by the way! We've examined fungus, grown micro-organisms in pond water, and learned a bit of chemistry. This week, we're going to do the edible cell project just for fun!

I have 19 students in Beginning Composition and 12 students in Intermediate Composition. Again, all fabulous students! There are some excellent writers in the class, and it will be fun watching them get even better. I expect a few of them will be authors one day!

The other two classes I have are younger students. The first semester, I taught a Kids Can Write class for 3rd-6th graders. We've had fun scrapbooking and writing. We've learned about alliteration, metaphors, similes, and personification. This week, we will be writing letters and then scrapbooking Christmas cards and envelopes to send them in. The second half of the year will be Oklahoma History.

The other class is a CSI class for 3-6th. Besides having a Broken Arrow CSI come to the class and tell them that I was telling them all the wrong stuff, it's been fun! We've learned about fingerprinting, blood spatters, blood typing, forensic anthropology, bite marks, and handwriting analysis. This week, we're going to study evidence in soil. The second half of this class will be in electronics.

I never thought that after I graduated my own two kids from homeschool, I would be teaching others. But, I am so enjoying it. The kids keep me young and ON MY TOES!

Going Back to School

My article, Going Back to School With My Kids, was featured in the Old Schoolhouse Magazine this month. You can read it for free online.

This is the last article I have written for this magazine. I have one more article coming out in December for another magazine; then I am taking a writing break. With some much of my time devoted to teaching at Cornerstone, I just can't find the time to write. Once I get my curriculum "perfected," I'll start writing for publication again.

Latest Article - Three Ways to Mentor an Entrepreneur

If you have kids who are interested in starting a business, you won't want to miss the September-October issue of Old Schoolhouse Magazine. It's filled with helpful  information AND I have an article in there! I hope you will check it out.

Another Article Published-Girl Power

My article, Power and Wisdom, was published in the August issue of Oklahoma Living Magazine.

For this article, I traveled down to Chandler, OK, where they held the Girl Power/Wise Guys Conference, a one-day workshop for 5th graders in Lincoln County. It was a lot of fun watching the kids learn about all types of occupations as well as getting tips on safety.

You can read the whole story on page 20 of the August 2013 issue.

Update on School

I just found out I have 53 signups for classes this year! This is going to be a very busy year! I start teaching next week, so I'm working hard to get ahead a bit so it won't be so bad. Keeping ahead will be a must! I ended my summer tutoring two weeks ago to give myself some time to prepare for fall.

One of the things I'm doing this year for my elementary students is having them do some scrap-lap booking. They will create notebooks using some elementary scrapbooking techniques. I hope they enjoy it. I had a hard time find clip art to use for my CSI class but I finally found a scrapbooking company that sold a police set. It worked perfectly!

I also have 29 composition students, so there will be a lot of reading and grading papers this year! I'm not complaining. I love these teens and enjoy helping them learn to write.