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reading for fun and by force - dissection lab and eyeballs!!!
By Rebecca in Learning in Freedom
April 30, 2008

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The weather was so nice today that we all did school either outside on the picnic table or in the swing.  My daughter and I sat together on the swing and read our books that we picked up from Hastings yesterday.  She’s a reluctant reader and I am hooked on Ken Follett.  We’ve read books together (back and forth to each other) but she really doesn’t like to read on her own, for fun.  I was like that too when I was her age, in fact, I didn’t read unless forced until a few months ago.  At her age (11 or so) we would both rather draw or paint or create something out of paper, fabric, or anything we could find.  But, now that I am spending time reading in the comfort of my swing I want her to join me with a book of her own.  It could be bonding (AND SCHOOL) time.

I remember thinking that I didn’t like to read because I didn’t enjoy it, because I couldn’t focus, so I concluded that I wasn't good at it.  You know we don't like to do things that we aren't good at.  Maybe it was a maturity thing?  The hormonies?  (My Big Fat Greek Wedding reference there.)  It’s funny how if you don’t read often you aren’t as good at it as you could be.  You don’t even notice until after you get addicted to a book and spend several hours a day with it.  After a few days you realize that you are reading much faster and comprehending much more than you did when you first started.  I am now able to focus better.  I now can say that when I read I am more likely to have ONE movie rolling in my mind rather than two.  The second is MIND WANDERING and it’s IMAX compared to the B rated movie that was directed by the book.  

And I just realized today that two out of the three Ken Follett books that I have read have started out with one of the main characters puking.  Hmmmmm

My six year old is reading three and four letter words so I wrote a few sentences on a dry erase board and let him read them to me.  He then dictated several sentences to me and read them out loud.  We did this for awhile.  When we do this at the dry erase board I just ignore the phonics lessons for that day.  It’s the same thing that the book would have him do only it’s more fun because he is reading sentences that HE created.  He also quizzed me, as usual.  I guess he thinks that if I can ask HIM questions that he can ask ME questions.  He can play teacher too.  He drew a big sun and a tiny star on the dry erase board and asked, “Which one is bigger?  The sun or the star?” I picked the sun because he had drawn it bigger and I was WRONG.  I got the little ditty about how the sun may appear larger but that’s only because it is so close to us compared to the stars which are much bigger…  

We also dissected four of our specimens outside on the picnic table.  Thank God, because I was sick of the rubber gloves being used as balloons and the critters and tools taking up space in my home. 

My daughter was horrified at the idea so I let her stand a few feet back.  My teen said that this was his fourth time he had dissected critters and he was tired of it and bored.  He had dissected a frog in public school and this would be his third time as a homeschooler.  Homeschoolers like to participate in each other’s attempts at dissections.  You spend so much money on the little critters that you almost want to show them off – invite your friends over.  “Hey, come on by today we are going to operate on Kermit!” 

My six year old was very excited and even shed crocodile tears when he wasn’t the one chosen to wield the scalpel.  But, by the time we got to the perch, I let him have at it.  He was not as interested in the innards but instead took a quick fascination to the eye balls.  Those were easy to identify and had a glass-like ball on the inside…..  what is that???  (I remember seeing somewhere that you could order a cow eyeball to dissect, maybe that would explain it all.)

We dissected a big earthworm, a crayfish, a frog and a perch.  I’m glad we didn’t buy the pig.  That would have been a mess!  Plus, what would the trash-men think if when they went to empty out the trash they discovered a mutated frog and pig…and a fish with no eyes?

My teen was slightly angry that I took time out of his life for these dissections.  He said that he had cleaned enough fish to count it as a lab for biology.  :/