Itinerary: homeschool, nap, pick up groceries
It was 90 degrees today when we went out this afternoon to run errands. I wasn’t necessarily sweating, just covered in a sheen of moisture that doesn’t go away. Otherwise, just a normal, boring day.
Wait, just one side note. I picked up my co-op grocery today from the co-op. Just to give you an idea, 1 basket of fruit and veggies cost us $19 USD. It included 1 batch yam leaves, 1 batch 空心菜, 10 eggs, 3 taro, 3 tomatoes, 2 strange potatoes, 2 火龍果, bag of passion fruit, and 1 huge Asian pear. Is that similar to US prices?
I would show you some pics but as usual I devoured half of the food before I remembered. What I love the best about this CSA is that I would actually eat everything in the box, unlike the US ones, with often had things I didn’t know how to cook.
So rather than talk about our boring day, I thought I’d meander on the topic of our world schooling so far.
Schooling
First, just forget about schooling when you’re not slow traveling. We tried, but failed miserably, in doing “school”. Now, some people may say that kids learn a lot while traveling. As in, sightseeing. They do, especially practical life, culture, science and history. But they’re not learning multiplication and division.
Those topics I find, need a bit more deliberate practice and we just didn’t have time on the road. I had a whole suitcase of materials that was just dead weight. Most of the time I carried 3 items in my backpack: iPad for math apps, Kindle for English/Chinese reading, and Boogie Board for drawing.
For Astroboy, I bought a bunch of Montessori apps from Edoki that were appropriate for his level. My favorite is the Add and Subtract Large Numbers app. Combined with the Reflex Math, it’s how he basically learned how to add and subtract 4 digit numbers, without me. (We did have concrete material practice with golden beads of course and the other Montessori math presentations before this.)
The app basically has the Stamp Game, Small Bead Frame, and paper. Because it’s a fun enough game, it keeps Astroboy coming back. Astroboy was stuck at dynamic subtraction when we did it on paper. So I was surprised at how fast he got the concept when I whipped out the app.
One thing to note though, the child really should have their addition/subtraction memorization down if they want to move into the abstraction (paper) level. Otherwise it just frustrates them to no end, dealing with the memorization aspect of 4 digit operations.
I also just let Astroboy play with the other apps without teaching him. He loves the Sight Words app and likes well enough the Geometry app.
For Thumper, she was happy once she discovered Harry Potter on the Kindle. Otherwise I had subscribed to Explode the Code online version. We tried to do those whenever we found time and had Internet. But honestly, if you don’t do those daily, it’s hard to build on the concepts.
Amazingly, we did not listen to as many audio books or watch as many videos as I thought we would in Japan though I’d prepped a bunch of those on my iPad. This was probably because the children had first their aunt and uncle, then their friends, to entertain them on long train rides.
Speaking of train rides, that’s when we would try to fit in some schooling. But I felt guilty because really they could have spent it looking at the view outside the window. What’s the point of traveling if you’re always staring at a screen?
Playing
An important lesson I learned the last time we traveled for 3 months is the importance of building in playground time. Alas, the children did not get much of those while in Japan. Because we couldn’t find any in Tokyo and Kyoto! Finally in Kyushu and Seoul did the kids get some playground time.
Thankfully, in Tokyo we went bike riding one day and many of the activities the children and I did were not of the sightseeing variety, but more experiences, like bike riding, cooking monjayaki, wax dying, etc. We only saw 2-3 temples max.
The other thing I’m thankful for is that the children were trained to be good eaters by my mom. So when we can’t play, I can often entice them with the promise of delicious food.
Settling in
We’ve had no issues just reverting to our US routine once we arrived in Taiwan. Heck, the kids only school 3 hours a day. As I previously mentioned, I realized that a super strong daily routine gives me sanity so I’m not short tempered with the children.
I’m glad that I really worked on those Practical Life routines last year. It makes solo parenting easier when the children know to get ready for school daily by themselves, can set and clear the tables without too much prompting and in general, can feed themselves if I’m napping.
The only problem is our new home isn’t set up for them yet. Everything is out of reach. Every time I travel, I realize how much our home environment gives the children an independence in self-care. And how painful it is for me without it.
Traveling with a Buddy
I’m so very happy that I’m traveling with Fleur. Everyone should travel with Fleur! Right now, we’re sitting in front of the TV watching W-Two Worlds while each working on our own laptop. I don’t have to talk to her.
Okay that sounds bad. Just that I don’t feel obligated to talk to her. A must if I have to live with someone for 3 months. I knew that I need my downtime daily to recharge and I’m glad we went on a camping trip together and hung out a bunch with the kids in tow to get a feel of what we’d need to do when we are roommates.
Since Fleur is so easy going, we don’t duplicate tasks often. I mean, for example, I tend to cook and feed the kids but she will cut up the fruit because I’m too lazy to do that. Or she just washes the dishes after dinner when I leave it in the sink. Isn’t that a perfect roommate?
Now that we’ve got food in the fridge, next week I will focus my attention on signing the children up for classes. We’ve already signed them up for a 8 week homeschooler science nature class. More on the Taiwanese homeschooling scene some other time!
