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Things you might want to know about us:
Our music:
Our family sings together in 5-part harmony. We live in South Austin Tx. Mostly what we do is vocal, but our musical interests reach far beyond that. Martin (the father), Mary K. (the mother) and Kathleen (the oldest kid) play the guitar and Mary K. and Kathleen play recorders occasionally. We sing mostly in churches, but we have also performed at the Old Settlers Music Festival, and other such places
Our acting:
Our family has been involved in many different student productions, specifically at Zachary Scott Theatre. Kathleen started out our interest in the homeschool Zach Scott productions by signing up for the class that would put together a cut version of Romeo & Juliet. The next semester (the Spring of 2003), we were completely enthused about the idea of the classes and Kathleen was in King Lear, Will was in The Three Musketeers and Mignon was in You're a Good Man Charlie Brown. The semester after that, Will was in Robin Hood, Kathleen was in Hamlet and A Winter's Tale, Mignon was in She Stoops to Conquer and Mary K. joined the class-going clan by signing up for A Winter's Tale with Kathleen (those were very lively rehearsals). This semester, Kathleen is in Antigone, Mignon is in Newsies and The Spoon River Anthology, Will is in Newsies and The Spoon River Anthology, Forrest is in Newsies and Mary K. is teaching Newsies! We are keeping very busy! We have made many friends throughout our many plays and by now the theatre seems like it's our part-time home!
Our school:
Our family has always prided being weird. When Kathleen was in Kindergarten, she was going to the Waldorf School. She loved it there. She had friends (whom she taught song on the playground), she loved the crafts and she'll always remember the wonderful puppet shows. About that time, she wa ready to learn to read. When Martin or Mary K. would read to her, she would follow where they were on the line, so she was already learning. When her teachers at the Waldorf School realized what was happening, they called her Prematurly Intellectually Developed! They said that while she was still at school she must wait to learn to read until 3rd grade. Martin and Mary K. decided that if she did as they were asking her to, it would make her time spent at home hard, but if she learned to read, she would have a hard time at school, so they decided to let her continue learning to read and not have any trouble at home. Because of the new arrangement, home would be school! Since then, none of the kids has ever gone to school. Some people ask if they would go back if they could. Their immediate answer is "no. We could go if we wanted to, but we don't. We love learning at our own pace with the people we love." We've been asked often how we do our homeschooling, if there is a specific format that we follow. Our answer is usually that we don't have our days planned out, we just learn when we want to learn, and what. "We usually go through phases" Kathleen explained to one of our adult friends. "One of us gets interested in something and the others follow. With all of us working together to find new stuff about the thing we're trying to find out about, we learn probably a few years worth of material about that subject. We just soak it all up. When we come out of the phase, we still have all the knowledge, even if we don't have the driving passion to learn about it."
Our COOP:
We go to a homeschooling COOP that meets every Friday morning. The kids take classes from the parents and the parents who don't teach are on clean-up! Currently, Kathleen and Mignon are teaching a class together at COOP about beginning acting for kids 4-7 years old (click here to read some skits that Mignon wrote for the class)!
Our Church:
At different points in our lives, each one of the people in our family has been extremely involved in one church or another. Mary K. was at one point the Director of Religious Education at Live Oak UU, Martin and Mary K. are both founding members of Wildflower UU, Mary K. and Martin were both active members of First UU of Austin, and all of us have participated multiple times at church services all over the US.
Campfire:
The kids in our family are members of Campfire USA. In Campfire, we learn outdoor skills,
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