First Day of School: 2021/2022

Happy first day of school! We extend a warm welcome to our new faces and a ‘virtual’ hug to all of our returning families. This year, along with our study of the Ancients, our theme as a school is “All Aboard” with our community moving towards …the pursuit of the good, the true and the beautiful.

All little bit about us here at the Down Home blog:

SLO Classical Academy exists to educate for life: the education we provide is life-enriching, life-preparing and life-giving; we understand that education is not a means to an end, but a worthy end in and of itself.

The Blog’s Purpose:

Our school blog is called Down Home because we know that much of the work and wonder that goes along with educating for life, takes place in the home. We want you to feel supported and encouraged by what we share. Down Home’s intention is to inspire, nurture, and educate us on the home-front as we cultivate and learn alongside our children. We hope to be a useful resource that will strengthen your role as an involved parent in your child’s classical education.

The Blog’s Aspiration:

We believe that there is nothing better than face-to-face connection and conversation. However, with the ongoing COVID-related changes, face-to-face connection within our SLOCA community is going to be limited. Despite the changes, we can still find connection and community. As we were reminded at the Parent Orientation meeting with our theme “All Aboard”, we are all on the same train together and this year Down Home aspires to be a place that encourages our families to support each other on our homeschool journey.

How To Join In:

• Subscribe — The easiest way to keep current with the blog is to subscribe. Follow the link and enter your email in the subscribe box. You’ll receive a message in your inbox each time there is new content.
• Comment — Feeling connected this year is going to require some extra effort and creativity. Don’t be shy. If a post inspires you, sparks a question, or you have something additional to share — leave a comment! It is super easy, just type in your name and email address (your email will not be shown with the comment) and share your thoughts with our SLOCA community.
• Contribute — We love when our SLOCA community contribute ideas for posts, helpful websites, notices about student events, photos, and more. Send in your contributions to [email protected].

The Blog Curator:

My name is Wei Waterman and our family has been at SLOCA since 2016 when my oldest started in Kindergarten. This year we will have a 5th grader and a 2nd grader and I am wondering where the years have gone! Below is a photo of the two of them on their first day for 2021. If you haven’t taken a photo under the balloons yet I encourage you to do so! In the rush of the morning we did not get a family photo, but I hope to fully introduce our family soon in a following post.

What to Expect:

New content will be posted on Sundays/Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays.

Here is what you can expect for each day:

• Sundays/Mondays | This year our Monday Mix-ins are going to be heavily influenced by our History Experience extraordinaire Sarah Shotwell. All enrichment resources will be posted on Sundays to help you prepare for the week. I hope that it will also help you remember that interesting note you wrote down during the History Experience evening but couldn’t decipher 6 weeks later!
• Wednesdays | Will feature series like our ever popular A Day in the Life, our Character Traits and Latin meanings as well as other posts on classical education, homeschool help, and more.
• Fridays | We will start off the year with the ever-popular, Friday Faces; get to know the staff of SLOCA through these fun posts. You’ll also find Fill-me-in-Fridays, What’s up Weekend, recipes ideas, etc.

Here’s to a fantastic first day of school! Don’t forget to subscribe to the blog.

Finally, a quote from our Executive and Visionary Director Susie Theule on our community’s vision this year. We hope you will come alongside Down Home on our journey!

“Our aim in education is to give a full life. We owe it to them to initiate an immense number of interests. Life should be all living, and not merely a tedious passing of time; not all doing or all feeling or all thinking – the strain would be too great – but, all living;

~ Charlotte Mason