School on Sila

On Sila, it would make no sense to have school for seven hours each day. And besides that, the point of going on this expedition is to have time to see the world and create valuable experiences for ourselves, not sit around each day. Our system of homeschool suits Porter and me perfectly. It gives us a good education and time to enjoy where we are.

Every day, we do around two to three hours of school work. The good thing is we can do school when we want. There is no set time of when we do it. It benefits us to get the work done in the morning when we are fresh and sharp. Then after that, we have the rest of the day open. I like this system because we get to do what we want, and when we want. It gives us more flexibility to schedule our work around the opportunities of the day.

The second piece of our system is the school calendar. For each day, there are assigned classes written on the calendar. There are three to four each day. Every day we have math and writing. Then we have one or two more classes.

We approach each subject in a different way. For math, we work thirty minutes a day through a set of books, Daddy helping us when we need it. Currently, Porter and I are one grade ahead of where we would be if we had stayed in the Leadville schools. It helps to be working at your own pace. Writing is another subject we do every day. Porter and I write or type at least one page a day. We write poems, prose about where we are, blog posts, or Mama gives us a typical essay topic. Grammar is one where we work through a large book with Mama, learning about all the parts of a sentence. During science, we read some pages in a science book then talk about what we learned with Daddy. For history, we read a chapter of the book and a couple pages in the history encyclopedia, then outline what we learned. We are learning Spanish by using a computer program called Rosetta Stone, which does not need wifi. We are also working through some spelling and vocabulary books.

 This is science class in the cockpit

Here you can see Porter and me doing math while our friend, Flor, works on his blog post

That was our every day formal school, but the most important education I have not even mentioned: these experiences. We do only two hours of classes a day, but overall, we are learning a lot more than two lonely hours. When we go to a museum, we learn about the culture and history of where we are. Whenever we sail, I still continue to build up my understanding of the way Sila works. The hours and hours of sitting around on passage, gets you to think about yourself and I am slowly working through my understanding of me. It is like an enormous jigsaw puzzle. Each piece of information opens the possibility of attaching three other pieces of information to my understanding. 

 In Scotland, we went to a museum and visitor center where we learned about Harris Tweed and how it is made on looms like this one.

Also in Scotland, we saw these standing stones and learned about their history.

Even more than going to museums and being taught how to sail the boat, just being here is helping to educate me. I have learned many things. For example, I now know how to walk up and talk to somebody. I have also learned first hand about different cultures, specifically things that I would not have found out about in a text book. I have seen beautiful places and have done so much more than most people, which makes me feel really lucky. The school on the school calendar represents only a fraction of what we are learning over all.

 Cooking is a regular part of school now in that Porter and I each have to cook dinner one night each week. In this picture, you can see the special 4th of July dessert we made.

The hole in the mountain Torgottan has a legend which I never would have learned had I not been there.

 In the BVI, we met a Swiss family who came to visit and sail with us in Norway. During their visit, we learned how to make Zopf, a typical Swiss Sunday morning bread.

 For Porter, learning how to fillet a fish is an important skill on Sila and a fun part of school.

In this photo, we are painting pine tar on a 100 year old wooden boat that belongs to a friend of Daddy's in Norway. It was fun to learn more about wooden boats and to help with the care and upkeep.

I like our school system of formal school, but I also have gratitude to Mama and Daddy for taking me on this adventure, thus setting me up to learn a lot more. Just writing posts for the blog makes me think about and remember my experiences in a more reflective way. In this way, the blog serves as a journal for us and as another teacher that gets us to think about our experiences. It suits us well on this long adventure. -Jack Rabbit