The Adventures of Familia Bajaboy

One of the most asked questions about our decision to move to Mexico was if we were going to homeschool Mikayla and Gabriel.  After all, Tracy and I have been successful teachers for many years.  Well, we decided to make a video and share our thoughts and experiences after a few years living here.  Gabriel also has some great perspectives as well.  I hope you enjoy!

 Trash is a big problem in Mexico.  Fortunately, there is a growing population that is addressing pollution and taking steps to mitigate it.  Today, our village encouraged people to come out and clean up trash around their houses.  We took advantage of the opportunity to get out and do our part.  Here are some pictures from this morning.  Mika helped out as well but didn't get into any pictures. We decided to focus on an empty lot just to the east of our place.  Most of our neighbors do a great job of keeping their properties clean.  But this lot has been a dumping ground for many years. Our town is collecting the plastic lids from bottles.  There is a program that gives out money for the lids.  So we removed any lid we found before putting the plastic bottles in trash bags. Gabriel found an old carpet halfway buried in the dirt.  He finally managed to extract it. The city garbage truck will come by and pick up our haul.  We picked up a lot more than we had planned, which is good a

 Come join us on our hike today.  One of the things we have always enjoyed about Bahia Asuncion is the variety of things to see and explore.  The coast line changes dramatically from north to south with the former resembling the coast of Central California while the later is very similar to Southern California.  The desert also changes from mile to mile as well.   Our hike this morning started about 5 miles east of town.  I hope you enjoy!

 Zac and I both value education, and in particular, the value of public education.  We believe there is so much to learn from teachers, but additionally, from the interaction with other students in a school setting.  We anticpate our children continuing their education here at school in Bahia Asuncion, when the time is right.  However, we also firmly believe there is so much learning that can happen each and every day, wherever you are!  As for now, we've switched our role to homeschool teachers and are super proud of the learning we are seeing. For those of you who know Gabriel well, he's really a self starter.  He's very meticulous, task oriented, and wants to finish his work to move on to the next thing.  Mikayla is a great student as well, but at times, a little less organized.  However, we were so proud of how she took to this week of school.  First, she woke up earlier than normal.  She had a "first day of school outfit" ready to go, and instisted on the fir

 When we made the decision to move to Bahia Asuncion full time, one of the things we were most excited about was for our children to go to school here, to really experience full immersion.  As of now, things are still up in the air as far as what school reopening here will look like.  Additionally, Mikayla has not had the opportunity to be vaccinated, which makes her a bit anxious.  Zac and I decided we will start the year by homeschooling the kids.  Between the two of us, we've taught grades 6-8, so we feel pretty confident about the education our kids will receive.   It's important to us to involve both Gabriel and Mikayla in the planning of their education.  Math, reading/writing, and Spanish is mandatory, but we wanted the kids to have input on the rest.  For math, we'll be using Khan Academy.  The kids will start the year with a novel study for reading and writing.  Also, both kids will continue working on their Spanish with Drops and Duolingo.  To begin the year, we&#