Teachable Moments Caught on Film

Here’s the crazy way I teach sometimes.

His Octopus Walks from Penney Douglas on Vimeo.

Everybody gets into the act!

Patrick Teaches the Twins to Read from Penney Douglas on Vimeo.

I teach multiple concepts with one lesson, such as phonics, earning and saving money, responsibility, and whatever else comes to mind at the time. The Spirit leads me to bring in character lessons and spiritual lessons during times of interacting with each other or reading stories to the children, too.

Eating Green Eggs and Ham from Penney Douglas on Vimeo.

For St. Patrick’s Day, we always talk about the miracles St. Patrick did. And we eat green eggs and ham. This year while we ate, we tried to come up with rhyming words like the ones in the story about where we would eat green eggs and ham. We watched the video online of the story Green Eggs and Ham.

Even the older kids will watch a show with the younger ones when it’s well done. They appreciate fine animation, vocal talent and music.

Patrick as Saint Patrick from Penney Douglas on Vimeo.

Patrick extemporaneously acted out the life of St. Patrick with a little help from the twins. He converted some chieftains, taught them about the Trinity using a “shamrock” and baptized thousands in this little improvised skit.

Sullivan and the Giant Squid

 

Sullivan and the Giant Squid

A Science story by Anna Margaret Douglas

Sperm whale with mouth open

Sullivan was a normal sperm whale. Being born 14 and a half feet long, he was now 60 feet long and an adult. Sullivan had not yet found a bachelor pod to travel with and had decided he was rather hungry. He took a fancy to the idea of getting himself a giant squid for lunch. He planned out where he should dive, for he wanted to get as close to the ocean floor as possible. This would be as easy as taking a step is for a human. If only the giant squid lived on the continental slope or rise (where he spent most of his time) he’d have light to see in the twilight zone.

Sullivan swam to what he thought was the best spot to dive into the abyss, lobtailed to give him more speed and shot, at an angle, downward. It got darker the farther down he went. He heard the warning call of a fellow whale – a humpback – not a good sign. He stopped before all light completely disappeared. Sullivan scanned the waters around him. Nothing. He swam forward, staying completely alert. He was confident, for he was quite big for a toothed whale… But just the same, there’s always a bigger fish. Especially down here.

Suddenly he saw something move past very quickly. Something with a ghostly glow. He caught only a glimpse of what looked like many arms. Could this be it? He swam very slowly now. There it was again! Sullivan readied himself. The third time the giant tangle of arms swam past, he caught the cephalopod by one of its largest arms. The giant squid was quick to react, it grabbed Sullivan with the other feeding arm and pulled itself onto him.

The whale hadn’t really planned this far, he struggled to free himself unsuccessfully. It was quite cold down this deep, where the sun doesn’t reach, and Sullivan wasn’t used to these temperatures, he could feel himself slowing. It was becoming harder to move. He had to get to the surface, and quick, or he was going to die to this beast. The sperm whale struggled, determined not to let himself be dragged into the black. He saw a huge eye staring hate at him. Ow, she began squeezing tighter and pecking him, yes pecking mercilessly, leaving scars all over.

He pushed upward. It was very difficult with something half his own size squeezing him to death. Slowly the battling two floated upward, toward light and warmth. Sullivan bit off one of the monster’s arms and heard a kind of screeching of pain come from her. The huge suckers felt weird in his mouth, and he almost gagged on the arm.

As the whale felt the squid weakening, he too, felt too tired to fight. He had made it so far, how could he give up now? But the enormous eye no longer looked angry and hateful. Sullivan was a whale. He was used to the rule of the ocean – kill or be killed. There was something strange about this case, though. He had a feeling, no, he somehow knew that this was a mother, strange as it was that she was alone and not in a shoal… maybe it was different with giant squids.

In any case, he could not end this creature’s existence. The effort would probably end his own life, as exhausted as he was. The eye looked as though this seemingly emotionless creature were begging for mercy. She let go of him! He stopped fighting and left her be. She, now having only 9 arms, looked at him, then up, as if thanking the Giver of Life for saving hers to care for that of her eggs, slowly swam back into the dark, cold waters of the abyssal plain.

Fin

Author’s Note:

Sullivan did not, indeed, become a vegetarian, but stayed in his rightful parts of the ocean, finding himself a bachelor pod to swim with and living quite a satisfactory life – never again to go looking in the cold and dark to find bigger prey.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Anna wrote this as an assignment from her Apologia Science Swimming Creatures of the Fifth Day.

Favor, Favor

I had two miscarriages in 2002. The second one was at 19 weeks. I was halfway through that pregnancy! I was devastated. I’m crying even as I type this.

I couldn’t believe that God had let that happen to me. I found out later that she had been a little girl and didn’t appear to have anything wrong with her. I named her Cassie Mae.

After that, I felt like a loser. Even though I had six children already, the loss of those two babies made me feel like I had failed at motherhood. Combined with the other stresses we were facing at that time of having no income and totally living by faith with people criticizing us and the state and the law coming after us every time we turned around, I was feeling crushed and beaten down.

We had been attending a house church in a neighboring city for several months. God used many of the people there to help support us through our living by faith period. God would speak to one of them, and he would give Gary a $100 handshake. Those were nice. Sometimes a guy would just stick a $100 bill in his shirt pocket. I would find money in my purse or Bible when we came home from meetings. They did many things like that and helped us to keep on going when it seemed like the rest of the world was against us.

One night at a meeting, my friend came over and told me that she had been praying for me and Gary and this poem kept going over and over in her mind. She said she had never prayed a poem before. She wrote it down in a notebook she found lying close by. It happened to be my notebook! She read it to me. Here’s what she read:

Favor, Favor

Favor, favor
Above and below
Favor, favor
Whatever you do, wherever you go.

Favor, favor
From God to you in your lives show.
Favor, favor
His love forevermore.

I was really surprised. Mostly because it was the opposite of how things felt. It felt like everything we were experiencing was lack of favor. Like everybody hated us and the system was out to get us, because we had dared to step outside of it. It felt like we were attacked and unprotected. It sure didn’t feel like we were experiencing favor.

She had torn the page out of the notebook to write on it. I wish she had just left it in my notebook, but she didn’t know it was mine. But I thanked her and took it and folded it and put it in my notebook and told her I would keep it and ponder on it. It was encouraging, even though it seemed so far-fetched.

About a month later, I started experiencing some familiar symptoms and realized that I was pregnant. I was happy, but at the same time dreading what everybody else was going to think and say. I didn’t tell anybody. I never really did. I didn’t have to. After six babies, I was already showing by the third month or sooner. I never talked about it to anybody. It was just something I kept to myself. I didn’t go many places, so I didn’t have to hear or see what other people thought about it.

I didn’t go to the doctor until halfway through the pregnancy. My last visit to the doctor had been when they couldn’t find a heartbeat, and that memory was too painful for me to even think about going back until I had to. I finally made an appointment and they set me up for an ultrasound because I was already 19 weeks along.

Gary took me for the ultrasound appointment. Gary let me out and then went to find a parking spot. We had Morgan with us who was a baby then. They called me back before Gary came in. I asked them to send Gary back when he came in. The ultrasound tech started the preliminaries and said she would wait for Gary before getting more specific. Suddenly, she said, “Did you wonder why you were so big?” At that moment, I knew. “Do I have twins?” She said, “Look!” I looked at the screen and saw two little heads. She said, “It looks like twins to me.” I couldn’t believe it. I was so excited. I said, “Where’s Gary? Please have someone send him in!” So she called out to the waiting room.

He was just sitting there reading or something. He came rushing back with a worried look on his face. He was remembering my last miscarriage. I had a big smile on my face and the ultrasound tech told him he better sit down. He still looked worried, and I burst out, “We’re having twins!!!!” He looked relieved and shocked at the same time, if that’s possible. Then he said, “Eight? What does eight mean?” We had been thinking of this as Baby number 7, which means “completion, perfection”. Now we would have 8 children, not just 7. So he was wondering what the spiritual significance was. The ultrasound tech didn’t miss a beat. She said, “Eight is enough?” We all started laughing. I just shrugged my shoulders. “I don’t know. Only God does.”

Now I told everybody my news. I called my mom right after I left the clinic. She was very excited! She started telling everybody. They had a big shower for me. I got two of everything. It was so fun and exciting!

The rest is history. I had twins, a boy and a girl. We had thought this baby would be the tie-breaker. But instead we were tied again at 4 boys and 4 girls.

Several months after they were born, I took out the poem prayer that Shari had given me. I looked at the date and started figuring. I realized that she had written that poem the same night or the night before I most likely got pregnant with the twins. Favor, favor! That’s why the word was given twice! The Lord was telling me that He was going to bless me with twins!

Here they are:
Favor and Favor!

I had lost two babies, and now He was blessing me with two babies. At the same time!

I realized that I felt different now. After I lost those two babies, I had started feeling like a loser. That feeling was gone now. I didn’t even realize that I had felt that way until the feeling was gone.

God opens the womb.

Children are a blessing!

He has blessed us with favor, and then some!