Category: Learning Lifestyle

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Delaware Shakespeare’s Community Tour: The Merchant of Venice

Entering its third year, the Delaware Shakespeare Community Tour brings the Bard to under-served populations in and around Delaware.

Most of these performances are also open to the public with a required RSVP to (and subsequent confirmation from) INFO@DELSHAKES.ORG.

This special tour has given me the opportunity to take my sons inside a senior center and homeless resource center to experience Shakespeare alongside men and women in a much different place in life. It has been one of the many blessings of our home education lifestyle. Different from volunteering or donating, here we sit together as an audience, sharing a couple hours of laughs, gasps, and a few tears. Before and after each performance is the opportunity to mingle with the actors and attendees, to be a part of the community.

This year, a twenty-minute discussion will be facilitated after each performance to discuss the modern implications of the themes of The Merchant of Venice. There’s even a cheat sheet to get caught up on the controversies surrounding this play and prepare for the discussion.

For our part, I’ve prepped my sons with the outline of the story using some interesting resources. The Merchant of Venice graphic novel by Gareth Hinds offers modernized language without being crass and covers much of the plot. The Thug Notes summary of the play is hilarious, but not necessarily safe for children. He gives the skeleton of the plot and wraps up with a discussion of some of the themes. It’s worthwhile if you need a quick catch-up.

The tour begins tonight and I strongly suggest purchasing tickets to one of the Studio Performances at OperaDelaware on November 17th, 8:00 pm, and November 18th, 2:00 pm, to help support this effort.

Wednesday 10/24 at 6pm
Ministry of Caring/Sacred Heart Village (Wilmington)

Thursday 10/25 at 6pm
University of Delaware hosted by the Jewish Studies Program (Newark)

Friday 10/26 at 7:00pm
Christina Cultural Arts Center (Wilmington)

Wednesday 10/31 at 4pm
First State Community Action Agency (Georgetown)

Thursday 11/1 at 7:00pm
Siegel JCC (Wilmington)

Saturday 11/3 at 7pm
CAMP Rehoboth (Rehoboth Beach)

Sunday 11/4 at 2pm
Route 9 Library & Innovation Center (New Castle)

Wednesday 11/7 at 6pm
Delaware Center for Homeless Veterans (Wilmington)

Thursday 11/8 at 5:30pm
Groves Adult High School – Red Clay (Stanton)

Friday 11/9 at 6pm
Latin American Community Center (Wilmington)

Sunday 11/11 at 2pm
Dover Public Library (Dover)

Tuesday 11/13 at 5:30pm
Group performance for Georgetown-area substance abuse treatment facilities (Georgetown Public Library)

Wednesday 11/14 at 6pm
Polytech Adult High School (Woodside)

Friday 11/16 at 2pm
Delaware Psychiatric Center (Wilmington)

NOT OPEN TO THE PUBLIC: Baylor Women’s Correctional Institution, Howard R. Young Correctional Institution, Sussex Correctional Institution 

And don’t forget: SHAKESPEARE IS FUN!

Photo credit: Jaime Javier Hernandez

God bless,
Jason

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Don’t Teach Your Child to Read

My boys have found their own roads to success every time I’ve gotten out of the way. My job is to litter the sides of the road with resources for easy access. Make things available and voluntary and children will be excited and learning just by digging through what you’ve left them.

I struggle with screen time, but Teach Your Monster to Read is an online reading game that my younger really took to. There’s no app, but it’s free and he could play it on his own early in his reading development.

I fought (literally, yelling) with my older to read things I knew he could. I panicked that I was killing his love for stories and words and I backed off big time. I still read aloud, went to story time, and played lots of audio books in the car, but I stopped “teaching” completely. Within months he (and his younger brother!) was picking up books beyond what I would have introduced.

God bless,
Jason

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Maximum #Unschool Friday

Registered our FLL Jr. team, Delaware International Moon Mission (yes, D.I.M.M.), for our very first FIRST Expo with Hornet City Robotics; off to a homeschooler-organized tour of Wharton Esherick Museum in Malvern, Pennsylvania, this morning; then to family camping to make fire, pitch tents, pick up bugs, find danger, fish, play, hike, get dirty, stay up too late, pick up litter, make friends, cook new things, stack wood, and make more fire.

Education happens everywhere, at all times, if you allow it. Don’t permit society to tell you when, where, nor how your children should learn and when, where, nor how they shouldn’t.

God bless,
Jason

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#BJJLife

Three-and-a-half years ago my sons won a month of classes at Elevated Studios Brazillian Jiu-Jitsu. With six youth classes available per week, we were able to sink our teeth into the discipline and see if it was the right fit. But after watching co-owner and lead coach Stephen Plyler instruct for 45 minutes, I was all but convinced that we would be staying.

An introduction to Brazillian jiu-jitsu.
White belts earned.

With varying paths, my sons have thrived at Elevated. They’ve watched Stephen train at the fantastic Balance Studios and achieve the top submission of the evening at Philly’s Fight to Win 81. They’ve grown in strength, maturity, and community. When they lost their mother to a sudden illness, Elevated stepped up to support our family in spiritual, emotional, practical, and financial ways. The Roll for Zerbeys was a truly fun and uplifting experience for us and all who participated.

#BJJFamily
No Mercy
Just a little deeper…

Now these boys are taking an opportunity to tests their skills and do some good. Both are competing and fundraising for Tap Cancer Out’s Grappling for Good Tour at United Sports in Downingtown, PA, on October 27th. Click on that link to donate and be assured that pictures and stories will be forth coming. Please also consider attending and supporting their efforts on the mat.

God bless,
Jason

Header photo credit: Mark Likosky

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Lighting Fires

This has been a big week. I skated along the edge of disaster and took on three new responsibilities that mean a lot to me and provide me the opportunity to create value for others. I can’t rate them as each is aligned with my passions.

The invitation to write for Macaroni Kid Wilmington-Newark-New Castle gives me a tangible way to share and promote many of the enriching experiences our area has to offer. Nothing in my life is expressly separate from our grief journey, but this will be much more than the story of us “moving on.”

As a volunteer Community Outreach Moderator for Homeschool Delaware I’ll be able to create formal relationships with many of the local educational resource providers that we already know and love. I’ll also get to form new relationships and build connections between the home-education community and the wider world. There are many local resources not being exploited during the school day. I believe that home education is for all; not necessarily full time, but as a lifestyle outside of school. By facilitating more programs directed at smaller groups of children with broader age ranges, I believe we can benefit families of all educational stripes.

I’m also back in a managing role with Classics II, the over-30, co-recreational soccer team that has meant so much to me in the last ten years. My late wife was my co-manager, accountant, cheerleader, roster adviser, inspiration to stay fit and play hard (she wasn’t easily impressed, it was my greatest joy when she was), and confidant. A couple great friends and teammates have stepped up to help me lead the team again. 

spanish time GIF

There are FOUR new responsibilities! I’m coaching a FIRST Lego League Jr. team. I’m not quite an AFOL (okay, maybe I am), but my sons are insane for the bricks and programming, so this is the best game in town. We finally received all the materials and will start sharing that journey here as well.

So yeah, I could use some of your prayers. 

God bless,
Jason

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Temple

On Independence Day we took an uncharacteristic turn as full-on “tourons” in Washington, D.C. Mary introduced me to this term and we never used it as strongly as the Urban Dictionary describes. For us, it was just that unimaginative sightseeing and photo taking one does on holiday from time to time.

I plotted our walking route from the Metro station to the White House, Washington Monument, Lincoln Memorial, and finally a spot along the Potomac River to view the fireworks. I hardly expected my seven- and nine-year-old sons to make the journey with heat, crowds, and detours in our way.

Our saving grace came early in the day at Renwick Gallery, across from the White House. We love museums and an escape from the sun was already in order.

We found much more than an escape. No Spectators: The Art of Burning Man is an exhibit that recreates the other-worldly California desert spectacle. Within this world there was the Temple. A place of remembrance and introspection about those things that have been lost. It is simply composed of cut and sanded plywood, but the intricacies are unending.

Visitors are encouraged to take a 4″ by 4″ block of wood and write about something or someone they have lost. This could have been one of those “ambushes” you learn about as you grieve, but it wasn’t. I invited my sons to participate and was surprised at their reactions. Westen, the older and more vocal about his mom, declined and chose to quietly walk the space. Isaac has been much more reserved about losing his mom, but wanted me to transcribe something for him.

As he mentally created his message, a phrase came to me: We will gain more than we have lost. I can’t take credit for it. It was purely divine and seems all but impossible. When God asks you to do the impossible it’s because He knows it can be done. I hope my faith is strong enough to keep believing that.

For Isaac’s part, his message was all sweetness and love and compassion. It was also arms-outstretched broad for so few words. It speaks for itself.

God bless,
Jason