VIDEO: Good Morning Middle Earth #1

News Reporter: Emily Weinlick

Mr. Butterburr: Riley Adesheim Marshal

Script written by: Aurora Pass

Videographer: Ethan Lehman

Inspired by the The Lord of the Rings as Literature taught by Elise Duval Werger

Meet PHS teacher Jeanne Bain

By Emily Weinlick

PHS staff member

Planet Homeschool (PHS) teacher Jeanne Bain enjoys teaching lots of things at PHS: Creative Writing, Speak Up, Impromptu, Philosophy. Next spring she will be teaching a Fan Fiction class. Jeanne says she likes to teach classes that get young people “talking to each other about issues and experiences." In Jeanne’s mind the most wonderful gift in the world is to be a part of a teenager’s life. She says that there is so much to learn from them.

Jeanne started teaching in her basement. Jeanne pointed out, “School was my favorite thing to play yet my least favorite to attend.” She started her more advanced teaching around 8 years old by holding a summer camp in her backyard. When she grew into an adult she started coaching speech and teaching theatre classes, after she had left the world of professional theatre. When she was in her twenties she really realized where her heart was… it was with teaching. She likes to make all her classes engaging and energizing because otherwise she and her students will get bored. Jeanne says, “The students at PHS teach other so much, it is through exploration and experience that learning happens so I’m lucky to just stand back and hold space while it unfolds!”

Jeanne started teaching at PHS because Kate Searls asked her if she would be interested in teaching a Creative Writing class. Her son Sam was an amazing writer and had many creative, and intelligent friends that wanted a writing class. They preferred a low-pressure class that focused on the creative process instead of creative product. This was definitely her sort of class! At the time Jeanne was also an instructor at The Loft Literary Center’s summer youth program, so to her teaching writing during a school year sounded terrific!

Jeanne says, “Sadly, I wasn’t homeschooled myself. I went to a traditional school.” Jeanne didn’t even know any homeschoolers while growing up in a small town in southern Minnesota. Jeanne said she had a lot of amazing teachers in her school experience. She had a teacher named Dennis Kalow who taught a class named “What’s Art All About” that made Jeanne the teacher who she is today. And then in her college she had a professor named Philip Morseberger who really made her think about art and life and made a huge impact on her.

Jeanne has two kids. Aidan is a freshman at the University of Minnesota Twin Cities campus. Jeanne homeschooled Aidan for 2 years. Alas, he hated it. Jeanne homeschooled Finn for 1 year. Finn is now in 4th grade at the Cyber Village Academy.

What does she enjoy most about PHS? She said, “How willing the kids and teens are to take risks, jump in and have fun. They aren’t afraid of doing things wrong.”

And finally some personal info on Jeanne! Jeanne became a Doctor Who fan at the urging of Victoria Signorellli and Kathleen Willard. She enjoys sewing yet admits that she isn’t that great at it. She likes cleaning and organizing her house, yet this will make a laugh because her students think that she is the most disorganized teacher that PHS has ever had, she thinks. She owns a three-wheel bike and occasionally rides it. She enjoys family time like most people and going to the Minneapolis Institute of Arts on her own to work on her novel. And to wrap this up, Jeanne’s favorite time of year is Fall. She loves the slow descent into the season of hibernation.

PHS student travels to Tanzania Africa

By Ava Holsather
PHS Press staff member

Emily Weinlick, an 11-year-old Planet Homeschool student, recently went on a trip to Tanzania Africa on August 23rd through September 7th to help teach at Living Water Children Center, play with the kids and cook Ugali (African cake), cabbage and tomato soup.

While she was there she read to the children, let them braid her hair and helped them prepare the food from their harvest.

"There were so many amazing parts of my trip, but I have to say that my favorite part was when I went on a mini safari along a lake shore," said Weinlick.

Emily Weinlick has actually taken two trips to Africa, the first with her mom, but the second time she went alone as an "unaccompanied minor." She says it gave her a chance to be really independent.

She had lots of fun but when it was time to leave the second time, Weinlick was sad to say good-bye to the kids.

FICTION: Mindy and the wish for a beautiful thing

by Emily Weinlick
PHS Press staff member

Once upon a time, there was a little girl named Mindy. She had light blonde hair and chestnut brown eyes. Her favorite color was mint blue, and she was a very sickly child. She could never leave her house in Candetville for she was too weak. All Mindy ever wanted was something… beautiful.

On Christmas Eve, Mindy looked out her bedroom window that was covered in frost, and saw three girls with blonde hair like Mindy’s, but brilliant blue eyes. Mindy opened her window slightly and listened in on their conversation. The three girls were talking about the new porcelain dolls with blonde hair and blue eyes at Mrs. Marge’s Toy Shop. Oh, how Mindy wanted one of these! These porcelain dolls sounded so… beautiful.

Mindy called her parents to her bedroom and asked them if she may have a beautiful porcelain doll like all the other girls. When her parents asked her why she wanted one she said that she had never felt that way about anything and knew she must have something beautiful forever. Alas, her parents said they couldn’t afford anything at Mrs. Marge’s Toy Shop, for they were very poor. Mindy was devastated when she heard she couldn’t have a porcelain doll, her parents then left the room silently to let her rest.

Mindy lay back down on her bed, shivering slightly. She slowly cried herself to sleep, but then she had an idea. Santa Claus! She could write a letter to Santa Claus! Slowly, she got out of bed and put on her robe. She walked over to her desk and sat down. She lit the gas lamp and started to write a letter.

Dear Santa Claus,

I know it may be a bit late, probably just 12:00 but I would like to ask for a porcelain doll. Not just any porcelain doll, I would like one with blonde hair and blue eyes. If you can’t manage this I understand. Oh, and don’t forget Mother’s ever so good ginger banana cookies, and my goat Katie’s warm milk.

Love,

Mindy

She folded the letter and creeped downstairs to the fireplace. Mindy placed the letter on the fireplace along with some extra cookies and milk and went back to bed. “Hope Mindy, just hope.” she told herself. The next day Mindy’s parents helped her out of bed and down to the kitchen table. While walking past the fireplace she saw some gifts under the tree but none that seemed to be a porcelain doll. Her parents seated her in her chair and set out breakfast. Cranberry sauce and pumpkin bread with a glass of warm goat milk, this was one of the most special meals they ever got.

When they were done Mindy got up and walked over to the Christmas tree. She sat down and waited for her parents to hand her a gift. Suddenly there was a loud knock on the door. Her mother ran to it and opened it quickly. “Mrs. Marge! How nice to see you! Come in now before you catch your death of cold.” Mindy’s mother said. Mrs. Marge entered with a small package, neatly wrapped in light blue paper and topped with a chestnut bow. Mrs. Marge sat down on the sofa and welcomed a warm cup of goat milk.

Slowly more guests arrived: Mr. Gandy from next door, Mrs. and Mr. Casterben, Louise and Malory the twins from down the street, and Mindy’s best friend Badger Ives. Once everyone had goat milk and blankets the present opening began. Mindy’s father was given a new plaid shirt from Mrs. Casterben, Mindy’s mother was given a beautiful new shawl from Malory, and it went back and forth until it came to Mindy’s gifts. Mindy got a pair if mittens from Badger, blue and red hair ties from Mr. Gandy, and finally the gift from Mrs. Marge.

Mindy carefully untied the bow and unwrapped the paper. Inside was a beautiful black box about the size of her hand. She opened it and inside found a bar of chocolate. Mindy thanked everyone for her gifts graciously while hiding her sadness. When all the guests had left and said goodbye, and all the goat milk drunk Mindy sat by the fire thinking. Then she spotted something in the corner of her eye.

A red box with a blue bow propped behind the sofa, she crawled over to it and lifted the tag. 

“Dear Mindy,

Merry Christmas! May you have the beautiful thing you wished for…”

Sincerely,

Mommy and Daddy

Mindy eagerly opened the package. Once the paper was of there was a box coated with leather. Labeled on it was: Mrs. Marge’s Toy Shop. Now Mindy was very excited, with her fingers crossed she opened the box and found a gorgeous porcelain doll with blonde hair and… brown eyes? Brown, why brown? Mindy’s parents walked into the room at that time. “Why chestnut eyes mommy and daddy? Why not blue?” Mindy asked.

“Mindy, your brown eyes make you more beautiful that we could imagine. This doll doesn’t need blue eyes to be beautiful and neither do you. You’re perfect they way you are and we love you.” Mindy’s father replied. This brought tears to Mindy’s eyes. She was beautiful. She hugged her doll tightly and said silently and happily.

“Thank you, mommy and daddy.”

THE END

The best sandbox you will ever have

By Emily Weinlick

PHS staff member

Minecraft is an amazing way for people to let their imagination run wild! It’s creative, engaging, challenging, and super fun! Minecraft is a sandbox independent video game originally created by the Swedish programmer Marcus “Notch” Persson and later developed and published by the Swedish company Mojang since 2009. The creative building aspects allow players to build constructions out of textured cubes in a 3D procedurally generated world. Other activities in the game include exploration, gathering resources, crafting, and combat. There a multiple ways to play, including survival mode where the player must collect resources to build the world and maintain their health, creative mode where layers have unlimited resources to build and the ability to fly, and adventure mode where players can play custom game worlds built by other players.

“Minecraft is an amazing game, I love to invent, build, and explore so this was the perfect game for me,” said Charlie Weinlick.

Minecraft received five awards during the 2011 Game Developers Conference. It won the Innovation Award, Best Downloadable Game Award, Best Debut Game Award, Audience Award, and the Seamas McNally Grand Prize. As of June 25^th, 2014, over 12 million copies of the game on Xbox 360 and 15 million copies on PC have been sold; nearly 54 million copies have been sold across all platforms, making it one of the best-selling video games of all time.

Minecraft is an open world game that has no precise goals for the player to accomplish, allowing the players a large amount of freedom in choosing how to play the game. At the beginning of the game the player is placed on the face of a procedurally generated and virtually infinite game world. The world is divided into an endless amount of biomes ranging from deserts, to plains and swamps, to jungles and snowfields.

Throughout the course of the game, players encounter many non-player characters also known as mobs, including animals, villagers, and hostile creatures. Non-hostile animals-such as cows, pigs, chickens, and sheep-spawn during the daytime.

 The player may hunt them for food and crafting materials. By contrast, hostile mobs-such as large spiders, skeletons, and zombies-spawn during the night or in dark places, such as caves. Some unique creatures have been noted by reviewers, such as the Creeper, an exploding mob that sneaks up on the player; and the Enderman, a mob with the ability to teleport and pick up blocks.

“Minecraft is incredible, the creativity that I have drawn out of myself and the way people keep trying to make it better blows me away,” said Rebecca Foxercy, a homeschooler.

Ava Holsather inspired to play guitar by her dad

by Emily Weinlick
PHS Press staff member

Ava Holsather (Photo by Paavo Downing)

Planet Homeschool student Ava Holsather’s hobby is playing her guitar. She plays a ¾ size left-handed Taylor acoustic guitar and ¾ size left-handed Ibanez electric guitar.

She takes guitar lessons at the Linden Hills House of Music and plays at recitals on the Famous Daves stage. Her last performance she had a very special opportunity to play with a drummer and another guitarist. “It was so fun to play with other people who loved music just as much as I do!” Ava said.

Her dream is to play in a band and go on tour. She thinks that it would be such an enjoyable time to go around the world to different places and performing all kinds of different music. She wants to be part of a band because she loves collaborating with different instruments and song writers to make a performance seem more professional.

Ava’s dad loves to play guitar, as well. Ava enjoys playing with her dad, because they are able to share new songs they know or wrote with each other. Ava was motivated to play the guitar because of her dad. Ava’s dad is not in a band himself, he just enjoys to play for his family.

The reason Ava got a guitar in the first place is because she liked playing around with her dad’s guitar even though it was to big. Her parents realized that what she needed was a guitar her size and a left-handed styled one too. Ava has been playing guitar ever since June 2011.

(Photo by Paavo Downing)

PHS student uses iMovie to create movie

by Ava Holsather
PHS Press staff member

Last month, Emily Weinlick, an 11-year-old Planet Homeschool student, and her cousins made a movie called "Stupid Agents" using an app called iMovie.

Emily Weinlick (Photo by Paavo Downing)

They got together one day and filmed the preview.

 Next time they got together they started the movie! They got inspiration for this movie
when they saw what looked kind of like a secret agent car and decided they should make a movie about it.

The movie had some sound effects, and costumes! Weinlick says they were "Not that great".

They all had experience with acting, and they talked about what they were going to do before the scene, and if something didn't work out as planned they would make something
up as they were recording.

QUIZ: What Halloween Creature are you?

Quiz by Emily Weinlick
PHS Press staff member

1.    What place(s) appeals to you most?
a.    Dark alleyways and rooftops
b.    Slimy swamps and sewers
c.    Your grandma's dusty catacombs
d.    An old and spooky mansion
e.    A eerie caravan in a thick forest
f.    A foggy cemetery
g.    Other

2.    Which would you rather eat/drink?
a.    Blood or animals
b.    Fish or lizards
c.    Nothing
d.    Anything from an abandoned refrigerator
e.    Children, mushrooms, or potions
f.    Brains or anything fleshy
g.    Other

3.    What would you rather wear?
a.    A tux and long flowing cape or a shredded plaid shirt and jeans
b.    Slime
c.    Dirty strips of paper
d.    Nothing, it would just go right through you!
e.    A simple black dress with a pointy hat to top it off
f.    Ragged clothes of any kind
g.    Other

4.    What would you do to spend your free time?
a.    Cower in a dark place and wait for an unlucky victim to terrorize
b.    Make your own slip n' slide out of slime!
c.    Sleep, sleep, sleep…
d.    Stroll through the hallways of your haunting home
e.    Boil a love potion to use on your next door neighbor
f.    Roam around moaning about nothing
g.    Other

5.    Which pet would you rather have?
a.    A bat or wolf
b.    A frog
c.    A mouse
d.    None, you don't really like animals anyway
e.    A cat, raven, or rat
f.    A skeletal puppy
g.    Other

Congrats on completing the quiz! If you answered mostly A's then you are a terrifying vampire or werewolf, if you answered mostly B's you are a humble swamp monster who keeps to themselves, if you answered mostly C's you are a lazy mummy, if you answered mostly D's you are a ghost or ghoul, if you answered E's you are a tricky witch, if you answered mostly F's you are a zombie, and if you answered mainly G's I seriously don't know whether this quiz was any use to you. Happy Halloween!

POEM: ∫• A Halloween Poem •∫

By Emily Weinlick

PHS Press staff member

Leaving the house on Friday night, going out for quite a big fright…

 candy corn, pumpkin pies, and popcorn balls soon all the dead will rise…

Lurking black cats and frightening rats, be sure to check under all mats…

Mummies, goblins, vamps, and wolfmen soon you will be crying for your mommy…

ghostly chills and terrifying creams, lucky dads at home paying bills…

ghosts haunting every hallway, you just wish it would become Saturday…

What’s that sound? A howl? A scream? You’ll experience all this on Halloween…

a cackling clown and howling wolves, a dead king still wears his crown…

And the Bogey Man howls…

“Happy Halloween!”

Aurora Pass is on a Swim Team

By Willow Skidmore

PHS Press staff member

           

Aurora Pass (Photo by Emily Weinlick)

Aurora Pass (age 12) taught herself to swim. She started swimming because she loves to be in the water. She started competitive swimming because she watched the Summer Olympics and wanted to be like the swimmers that she saw.

Aurora started swimming with the Otters team last year. Her swim meets are approximately every 2 months. Her best race so far is the 50-yard Butterfly.  She practices three days a week: on Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday. When asked where she swims, Aurora said, “Well, I swim all over the place because of the swim meets, but I practice at the YWCA in Midtown.”

 When Aurora uses swimming tools she uses the kickboard. When doing the Butterfly she likes to use flippers, because then she can go very fast. She says that she is fastest at the Butterfly. When asked whether she does a flip turn she said, “No,” emphatically and then described how to do the Butterfly.

So first you push off as fast as possible. Then you do one dolphin kick. Then you
             push your arms forward making an S-shape. You pull your arms out of the water at the
              back. Then you put them back in the water.

  

She finished up by saying that she enjoyed speaking about swimming.

Meet Meet Ava Holsather

Ava Holsather (Photo by Emily Weinlick)

By Nadine Sullivan-Nightengale
PHS Press staff member

1. Age: 12.
2. Favorite color: aqua.
3. Hobbies: minecraft and art.
4. Most interesting thing about your self: I once rode a horse being led by a creepy guy.
5. What she likes: animals and candy.
6. What she hates: mold.

PHS Students

PHS Students (Photo by Emily Weinlick)

Meet Willow Skidmore

Willow Skidmore (Photo by Emily Weinlick)

by Emily Weinlick

- Willow Skidmore

- 11 years old, 8^th grade

- City/town: St. Paul

- Favorite album: 35^th Anniversary LIVE in Poland

- Best book/blog you read this summer: Catch Your Death

- Favorite newspaper/magazine: Smithsonia

- Hobbies: Reading, writing and crafts

- Most interesting thing about yourself: I’m weird, I know it, I enjoy the fact

- What do you like most about Planet Homeschool? The classes and teachers

- Why did you join the newspaper/photography class? Because I like writing and taking pictures

- What do you like to write? Short fiction stories