in pursuit of wild things

I have a new obsession…Periscope.

I learned about Periscope from the Brave Writer Blog.  The amazing woman behind Brave Writer is Julie Bogart. I’m a total homeschool fangirl for Julie!!! Total fangirl!! I admit it, I own it. Not ashamed of it! (Full Disclosure: I am a total homeschool fangirl for Rea Berg of Beautiful Feet Books and Dr. J Wile’s science).

Julie and her entire approach to homeschooling has changed my life. She’s changed how I see homeschooling and more importantly my relationship with each of my children. Over the past six months I have slowly blended Brave Writer techniques into our homeschool. We adapt just one practice at a time. We’ve added Arrows to our read-aloud time together. This coming week we will add Friday Freewrites. We’ve talked about Poetry Tea-time and have poetry books chosen to share together. After Christmas our Poetry Tea-time will morph into Tea with Shakespeare. My kids are excited about writing, literature, poetry, Shakespeare and being together.

We just moved into a beautiful new home. The move was tough on the kids and us parents. This move and the reasons we moved cut and exposed our vulnerable souls. For the kids and I homeschooling became a peaceful oasis for us to escape the turmoil. The kids always asked for their Brave Writer Arrow first. We were reading the book Ginger Pye by Eleanor Estes and working through the accompanying Arrow from Brave Writer. We chose spelling words, worked on French Dictation, cursive copywork and learned all about personification. We all cried over this book and fell deeper in love with homeschooling. Many times the only schooling we managed to fit in to our hectic days was our Arrow and Oldest’s book Robin Hood from Beautiful Feet Books Intermediate Medieval study. When the day comes that I no longer homeschool because my children are grown and gone…I will never be able to part with Ginger Pye and Robin Hood (worst ending ever!!!). Never ever. Those two books represent a terrible and beautiful time of growth and homeschooling maturity for me. I found my confidence and the courage to tell anyone where to go and what to kiss if they do not like the way I homeschool…the way I live…my family’s chosen lifestyle.

My newest obsession is Periscope. Several times a week I can listen to a few broadcasts and feel encouraged and equipped to live my enchanted homeschooling experience. Julie Bogart often broadcasts at 4:00 pm Eastern time. This is the time I begin cooking dinner. So I just prop my phone up on the stove and listen to her while I cook. I love that time. I love the feeling of connection with the rest of the homeschooling community. Sometimes I need to re-listen to the scopes later in the evening so I can write a few notes. All of the broadcasts can be found on Katch!

Here are the links to a few of my favorites:

Julie Bogart All of her scopes are worth the time!! My faves: You Are the Sky, Unschool Undefined and Party Like a Homeschooler

Life on PEI She does not have very many up yet but I like them all

Amongst Lovely Things Isn’t she just cute!!! I could listen to her all day. Love the Nitty Gritty on Spiral Notebooks

Do you know of a great Periscope to listen to? Please share!!!