Learning French

I've been thinking over what we are going to do about language study in our homeschool.
Teaching our kids the French language is very important to my husband, as he sees the bilingual way in which our New Brunswick economy functions, and also the workplace restrictions that being unilingual place on a person. And so, it has become important to me, too.
Loving the Charlotte Mason method as I do, my first thought was to find out what she would recommend. This is not as easy as it sounds, because there is no universally recognized and loved French curriculum among CM educators.
I did find some recommendations for the Pimsleur method, which looks really good to me.  This method teaches you a phrase (audio, so there is no confusion about pronunciation), and then another phrase, with review along the way. It felt very good to me; so good, in fact, that I looked up the price. *cough* I think it is more suited for older children. Older, rich children.
I kept on looking, and then found Speaking French with Miss Mason and Francois. This method seems to be very close to what CM recommends (this link goes to a blogger who has read CM, since I haven't, yet!).  I will be taking a closer look at this, even though it isn't free (I'm trying to homeschool for free this year, but that's another post).
A few things that I think are the important aspects of language learning for my girls at this point:
1. Correct pronunciation

"The child speaks with a good accent, pronounces correctly, when his nurse or his mother speaks with a good accent and pronounces correctly. Where, indeed, can he acquire a bad accent if he never hears any other than a good accent: How should he be likely to pronounce badly when he has never heard anything pronounced other than well?" (136)

Similarly, he claims, an improper accent may "falsify pronunciation" for good. (58)  As Miss Mason would say, a word spelled incorrectly creates an incorrect visual image in the mind that may never be undone. Better for a child to listen, listen, listen until he is ready to speak correctly:

"Talk yourself, talk continually. At the commencement let the pupil speak as little as possible; it is in his ear and not on his tongue that it is important to fix the word or the phrase. When the spring is abundant it will flow of itself, and the liquid supplied by it will have the advantage of being pure. Let us not forget that the little child listens for two years before constructing a phrase, and that he has possession of both the sound and its idea, that is, the spoken word, long before attempting to produce it himself." (140)

(Quote from  the 'CM recommends' link above)

This is easy for me, because I hope to have a native French-speaker teaching the initial lessons, with my role being review at home. That is, if she is on board with this method and book, because otherwise, I'll have to adjust to suit us both!

2. Being able to talk in French first. Learning to write in French is something for a few years down the road.

3. Learning sentences that have meaning to the child (sentences that speak about daily life, like "I love my daddy.") rather than learning random words (you know, like those books you get at Costco. Dog picture. "Chien." Cat picture. "Chat." "Yes! I am speaking French!!"  Euh, non. )
I realized, incidentally, that I know a lot of random French words, probably from that high school French course, as well as living in a partially French province. What I do not know is how to put everything together.

Looking at all the blog posts, sorting through the information, trying to find out what method is most effective for learning French, but also for keeping things simple and blending language study into daily life, I find myself really excited about this. I think I might learn to speak French, too. Just as a matter of course.  Awesome.

Better Than Before

I've been reading Better Than Before; Mastering the habits of our everyday lives, by Gretchen Rubin. This about sums up goal of the book, which is also my goal as I build habits a la Charlotte Mason:

"As I reflected on the changes I'd seen in my habits and in other people's habits, it struck me that only rarely do we achieve a dramatic, picture-perfect before and after. Sometimes we do make a complete transformation; it's not an utter fantasy. But usually we end up in a place that's better than before. And that's enough."

on (not) sleeping through the night.

I'm tired today. As I was yesterday. And the day before that. You see, I'm trying to teach O to sleep through the night. He's almost 1, and it's about time.
I remember doing this much earlier with my girls; there's something about having a third child makes me delay tackling the issues. I'll have to be careful to be aware of his character training. Sleeping through the night is not a big deal, but it would be terrible to delay tackling, say, an unkindness problem he could have.
Charlotte Mason managed character training with whole schools of children. I wonder... I expect she was just very organized.

I'm praying that he'll stay asleep (and not need rocking) soon!

Days

We are a couple of weeks into this school year. I hadn't meant to keep track; I thought it would be inconsistent of me, since my philosophy is 'education is a life.' However, school start times, subjects, and finished accomplishments are so important to Kevin that I find myself noticing the days.
It's okay; they've been good days.

We practice reading, which is, at this juncture, practicing letter sounds. We try to put them together, but K just can't, yet. It will come.
Piano lessons are not going very well. Part of the problem is K's age, I suspect. The other part is K's mom. She hasn't figured out how to mix having authority and being exciting as she teaches. K is going to have to learn how to sit and work at it for at least 10 minutes, and how will she learn if I don't teach that? I've been focused on keeping her attention and enjoying the process, but am going to have to insist on obedience. K does like the music, and being able to play, but doesn't like the work it takes to get there.
We started our sketch books last week. I'm so pumped about those! I have to admit, this is more about me than the girls. Though, I think Charlotte Mason would approve of the drawing, because she's all about appreciating beauty, and drawing helps draw the attention to the beautiful.
I've been worrying myself about nature study, since I didn't have anything planned other than lots of time outside. However, I had a nice talk with Nelleke, who pointed out that K is only 4, after all, and perhaps, being outside is enough. She suggested starting with what I know myself (the plant and bird names, etc). Later on, I can add to that. It makes sense. And it's easy, which is what I need right now.
Why? Because Nanny is coming home today.

On not 'doing school'

I just realized that this is the year that K will be 5. And, while that doesn't matter a bit to me, it matters tremendously to Kevin. He's a first generation homeschool dad, you see, and, while he is always respectful, he does worry that we 'won't cover all the bases' with our kids as we homeschool.
That just makes me grin.

Which doesn't help.

I've almost decided that it is all a matter of presentation. I could say, for example, that we are doing 'music appreciation', when what I really think we are doing is listening to classical music. If the kids ask about it, I'll tell them who wrote it and what it's called. But is it 'doing school?'
Or I could say we're doing 'language arts', when what I really think we're doing is writing cards for people we love. Once again, I wouldn't think of it as 'schooling,' but I could present it that way.

The only area in which I really suspect that we will need to 'do school' would be math. I can see myself buying workbooks, and sitting down to supervise. Perhaps I should do that part of life when Kevin is around to observe and be reassured.

I have Charlotte Mason leanings, you see. And, while I don't even know all that will entail, I do know that I want to see my kids learn most or all of their history lessons from interesting books, rather than workbook-style compendiums of facts. I want their nature study to be done outside; their social and economic ideas to be informed by the bible, newspaper, history, and daddy; and their language arts to be the furthest thing from lists of prepositions ever.

I may someday turn to textbooks (rather than what C Mason calls 'living books')  in order to 'fit in' in a school setting. I can see this being useful as my kids prepare for university, or if one of them wants to teach for a living or a mission.
I may also use them as supplements, if I notice a gap in someone's knowledge of writing, say, or for phonics.

Well, there it is. The beginning. My thoughts on what we will be.
Writing it out here is a sort of insurance for me; it will help me resist the keeping-up-with-the-Joneses thoughts that I know will come. The Joneses toddlers have art appreciation mixed into their spelling workbooks, you know. It's hard to keep myself from feeling that I'm withholding something the kids really need.
I'll have to read lots of Mason, to be continually inspired and challenged in the right direction; away from busywork, towards a life that helps us all develop in healthy ways, mentally, physically, and spiritually.
Ultimately, I want my kids to enjoy learning and ideas, but not to just stop there... I want their ideas and increasing knowledge to expand their capacity to glorify God and enjoy Him forever.

I expect to change.  Let's see what happens!