Planning Ahead

Calder has a sabbatical for the spring semester of 2011, and we're going to the United Kingdom from January through May.  I have to think a lot more about public vs. private and the future of the blog -- given the kids' age(s?) in particular -- before I say too much more than that.  We are very excited.

Meanwhile, Sumer Is Icumen In (almost) and we are about as booked as ever.  We're very lucky to be able to afford all the traveling it takes to visit grandparents.

Even though we don't leave for Minnesota until the end of June, I''m already designing my own road-trip related word games and exploring audio books on iTunes.  I'm ignoring the fact that we're perfectly happy to let the kids  load up the portable DVD player as soon as we reach the highway each morning, and not turn it off until we drive into the hotel parking lot each night.

In summer learning-loss news, I am once again That Mother, the one who bought workbooks for the children.  To avoid being too screechy about it, however, I will bribe the children shamelessly to do the work.  They'll earn a quarter for two pages of cursive practice and another quarter for four pages of multiplication and division practice.  The cursive is a pet peeve of mine, and the math is sheer necessity.  These kids would forget every multiplication fact they ever learned, if left to their own devices all summer.

Oh, also I've downloaded the book-reading forms from Borders and from Barnes & Noble.  If history is any guide, Elba and Gemma will be ready to redeem their forms by the middle of June, and Wilder will decide that all of the free books are boring and never get around to writing anything down, even though he'll have read just as many books as they have.

I'm vowing to take the kids to some baseball this summer, starting this weekend.  Did you know we can get minor-league tickets for $8?  It would cost us seven times that much to buy similar seats in the new Twins ballpark.

Your plans?

Comments

[chichimama]

London, fun! I thought for a minute that you were doing the Amazing Race Family when you mentioned passports :-). And I was going to be both jealous and annoyed because one of these days I think you and I should do it (Knitting Blogging Buddies, we would make great TV as we knit our way through the world ;-)).

Similar summer plans: multiplication facts on the iphone (it's a game! It's a learning tool! It's fun (maybe)! B&N, Borders, and library book club, road trip to Maine, and minor league baseball (I discovered that one last summer, this year we are springing for the $10 stat book to make the game as least as interesting as the hot dogs and popcorn (I hope)).

Oh, yeah, and trying to train the dog who refuses to learn his name...

When are your kids out for the year?

[Luo Lin]

We are planning (but not actually planning, if you know what I mean) a combined grad school-town nostalgia visit and visit to my mother. I'm hoping to get away for a few days in-state as well.

If I stop reading blogs and get some writing done...

[magpie]

I have ideas, but no plans. I'm tickled that you're bribing them to do summer homework.

[Jody]

It's not London, chichimama, which is part of the blog-conundrum. It's a much smaller place, which means (a) I'd love to blog about it, but (b) blogging would probably "out" me really fast.

[Jamie]

Cool, the UK! Would love to hear more if you're able to tell.

[mommymel]

have you considered the Flashmaster for math practice? It's available through amazon and it was well worth the 50 bucks. And the company's customer service is great. Mine had issues and they helped me fix it AND sent me a replacement.

[Jennifer]

That's very exciting. It's coming into winter here, so our winter plans are to try and make sure we go to all the great Sydney events that happen this time of year. We use mathletics (www.mathletics.com) which is an Australian program, but I think it has adapted to the US syllabus, in which progress gives you more currency to buy accessories for your avatar. The boys are well aware it is homework (and groan accordingly) but it does work well to keep them current. It's not free, though (we get it through school, but it could be expensive independently).

[Jenny]

Conor's family ended up in Canada on a sabbatical. So exciting. My FIL still takes his. Last year he spend alot of time in Ireland.

It will be awesome. I really really wish Conor would get a job in Europe and we could go for a year (since he has that Irish passport he would be golden) but sadly real life happens and it doesn't look like we will ever be ex-pats. Are you going to homeschool the kids?

[Jennifer (ponderosa)]

This sounds exciting! I'm working through the summer so all our trips will be local. We plan a lot of camping.

[Courtney in Crete]

Whee! Sabbatical! If we ever finish the postdoc slog, hopefully one day we'll be able to return abroad through sabbaticals. I'd love to go to the UK.

Well, my 2 1/2 year old isn't ready for worksheets, so our summer goal is for him to be able to use the potty BY HIMSELF before #2 arrives in September. We leave for two months in the US this Thursday. I suppose I should start packing, or at the very least, make some lists. Or I should say - more lists. I've already got a long US shopping list.

[Sheila]

Thanks for the update--I followed your lead on handwriting practice. We use Everyday Math at school and I'm never sure what to do about workbook practice exercises. We are looking into a math tutor for one of our three this summer. Otherwise, we have very similar plans to try to avoid summer learning loss and work in some time for fun!

[bj]

I'm forcing my kid to learn to type during the summer. She'll need to learn in school next year, and already has decent handwriting, and she likes to write a lot. I don't want to key in her books any more.

My other kid likes to do math worksheets, so I'm printing them out for him for breakfast. I don't make him do them, though.

I like http://www.mathsisfun.com/numbers/math-trainer-multiply.html for practicing math facts. I use http://www.mathfactcafe.com/ to generate the worksheets for the kid who likes them.

The sabbatical is so very exciting. I've always wanted to live abroad and am sorry that it's unlikely to happen. But, we do plan on traveling to London at the end of the summer. We'll have to get our fix through travel and not sabbaticals.

[Lilian]

Because of the move and everything I was unable to comment earlier. You've probably seen my post about the possible job for K and my dream of a future sabbatical. Ahhh... too bad my kids will be around 15 by then. :-(

Anyway... hmmm... I hear you on the identity outing thing. Maybe you could have some password protected posts? if you were comfortable with sharing a password with some people... I hope you don't completely shut down the blog because of this trip! ;-) Although with all the privacy issues and kids I know this is something that might happen in the future -- hopefully not such near future.