Archive for the ‘Homeschool’ Category

We are so excited to be doing an Advent devotional this year! I’ve been trying to get my act together enough to do this for a couple of years now.

I was delighted to find a friend’s recommendation on Facebook, and I eagerly purchased (inexpensively!) Truth in the Tinsel: An Advent Experience for Little Hands.

The book has an easily broken-down shopping list of supplies – most of which are things you’re likely to have around the house anyway (or can substitute for such things).

Each day has a Scripture reading, tagged to a “clue” that the kids find in their Advent Calendar (several options for how to do that).

Then there’s a fun craft project for the kids to do, along with some other discussion ideas for you to use (or not, or as you see fit).

The projects are set up to be done as a series of Christmas Tree ornaments, but for a variety of reasons, we’ve decided not to go that route.

We’re going to “flatten” everything, and mount each artwork on a sheet of paper. Then each of the kids is going to assemble their 24 projects into an Advent Book (in a 3-ring binder, to give it some protection), which can be stored away in their memory box, or enjoyed again next year, or whatever other use we can think up!

The photo is the Littles at work on Day 1 – a candle, for Jesus, the Light of the World.

I’m not going to post our project each day, partially out of respect for the book’s copyright (go buy one, I tell you!). I’ll post perhaps weekly or so, with the highlights.

Who else is doing something special for Advent?

Be sure to stop by the Carnival of Homeschooling, hosted this week over at SmallWorld at Home.

Aside from my post, which you probably read here, you’ll find lots of good information, and inspiration from a wide assortment of homeschool moms (and dads).

You may recall that I’m using Sonlight for the Littles, working together, and it is my current plan (accepting fully that things may change) to continue to use this base method for a number of years to come – perhaps until Jewel hits High School age.

This year, though, she is in 1st Grade, while R.T. is just 3, and not officially being schooled at all. But as I’m sure many of you recognize, he’s very anxious to “do school” with his big sister, so he sits with us for the first half of the school day.

We are using Core P 4/5 – yes, its primary designation is as Preschool for 4 and 5 year olds. This is “too old” for R.T. and “too young” for Jewel… but looking at the path over the next few years, this seemed like the right starting point to strike a balance. Obviously, I’ve made some adjustments for each of them.

I was pleased to get some tips – and some reinforcement – from a recent post on Sonlight’s blog, Practical Pointers: Combining with a single core.

• We do not use the Bible Memory Verses listed in the Core, instead focusing on Jewel’s AWANA memory work for the week.
• All of us do the basic activities of the Core together: Bible, storybook reading, Readiness Skills (I bought a second set of the “Developing the Early Learner” workbooks so that they each have one), Science (this will probably be separate later, but for now it’s fine), World Cultures, Song of the Week, and Developmental Activities.
• We’re also adding Music – all three of us are going to learn to play piano. So far we’re at the most basic stages, and we have John Thompson’s Easiest Piano Course ready to go.

That’s the end of the shared experiences for the “formal” part of the day. Naturally we also do all the other fun parts of “schooling” together, from field trips, to housekeeping, to bread baking, to tree-house building…

• Jewel is also doing the Language Arts program for Grade K Readers. This includes Phonics / Spelling, Vocabulary Development, and Creative Expression segments.
• We’re utilizing the optional Go For the Code workbooks (phonics)
• She enjoys A Reason For Handwriting (having switched after trying Handwriting Without Tears, which was just not a good fit for us).
• And she’s working quickly through the Horizons Math K.

Although she is 1st Grade by age, we did not do a lot with these writing-focused subjects last year, and this is the correct starting point for her. Presumably we will get “caught up” to her age-designated place (or beyond) at some point in the process. Coming from a “Better Late Than Early” kind of place, this is not something I worry about.

We got far off track with the schedule I was planning for the year with our recent move, so we are only on the third week of Sonlight’s schedule. I was pleased with how easy it was for all of us to to get comfortable with this curriculum and schedule.

You know it’s good when the kids ask to do school on Saturdays!

My wise and wonderful friend Yane’ posted this information on Facebook, and it was just too well-done not to share.

Columbus, indeed, was not the first person nor even the first European to see America, but he certainly was the first to open new routes to and from Europe and America. If not Columbus, then others shortly would have: Europe was interested in new routes for either war or trade.

Factually, it was Columbus.

He taught other voyagers how to navigate to the Americas, what it would cost, the amount of food, ammunition, and men to bring, and what the dangers were so that they could return to Europe safely. He was the first to expose the facts of this hemisphere to western European civilization.

Pre-Columbian American people were nomadic, with no wheel, no written language, and little growth. War between nations was ongoing, brutal, and bloody. They were not interested in peace, trading, nor human rights.

Marjory Stoneman Douglas, author of The Everglades: River of Grass, writes about a Catholic priest who was taken prisoner then disgustingly killed by the indigenous people.

Today’s “political correctness” has one goal: To deny the importance of western civilization. The followers of this movement use the term “Euro-centrism” to disgrace the values of the West.

What are the values of the West?

• Reason
• Faith
• Philosophy
• Science
• Ambition
• Productivity

(I got these images from crazywebsite.com, which has a page of cute Columbus facts and clip-art).

I’ve been looking for “classroom” map resources, so I was tickled to be offered a review copy of WonderMaps by my friends at Timberdoodle.

The product was an easy download, and basically is a linked set of .pdf files. And it’s big. Although I may have been asleep at the switch (we were moving at the time, you’ll recall), there wasn’t a lot of control over where it went, so I had to go in after the fact and move it off my overcrowded C: drive. The good news for you is that you can buy it on CD, and avoid that problem altogether…

Says the publisher, Bright Ideas Press:

WonderMaps is designed with easy-to-use layers that allow you to enjoy great customizable features with just a click. Select:

• historical or modern-day maps
• outline, reference, political, or topographical maps
• black-and-white or color maps
• features including: names, borders, rivers, cities, physical features, and graticules

WonderMaps includes:

• 60+ maps of the world
• 60+ maps of the USA
• 125+ historical maps, including 25 biblical maps
• The complete map sets from The Mystery of History vols. I–III and All American History vols. I & II

I’m sure you could find all these maps for free online. You can find pretty much anything for free online, these days. But is it easy? I dread that part of planning when I run into some specific need. A map of a specific place or event, with the right level of detail for a child’s understanding, or the right level of blank-ness for them to color on, or fill in information…

$44.95 is not an insignificant amount of money in my budget, but I can honestly say that I think this would be a great investment for any homeschooling family. After all, it amortizes over all the children, over all their years in school. That doesn’t add up to much per kid per year, does it?

Well, I’m going to go look at the cool Biblical map set for a while.

Don’t forget to check out Timberdoodle on Facebook, or visit their website for more terrific homeschool supplies!

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As a lefty, I grew up learning things a mixture of ways.

Some things I learned to do left-handed, and some even had special equipment.

Others I learned to do right-handed – often because that was the way someone (right-handed) showed me, and it never occurred to them, or to me, to do it differently.

In my experience of real life since then, these are the ways I have thought about teaching things left-handed or right-handed — a relevant topic in a house of mixed handedness.

You really simply MUST learn to use right-handed scissors. That is all.

Sports and music have grey areas. If someone wants to paly guitar, I advocate learning to play it “righty” rather than having your own guitar with “upside-down” strings, as half the fun of guitar is being able to pick up any guitar and play it. With other sports, the child may learn to throw, catch, etc. with their right hand, simply because this is the way things are modeled. But there may be other times when they may not be able to master it that way, and need to learn left-handed.

We have some illuminating stories in this regard from Jewel’s life, our little Lefty.

When she was about two, we were camping, and Wolf and Nick were throwing pine cones (into a lake, or ditch, or some such). Jewel, watching them, picked one up, and cocked her arm back… And then she stood there, as if paralyzed. All the coaxing and explaining in the world couldn’t get her to swing her arm forward and throw. It was bizarre. Then inspiration struck. I switched the pinecone from her right hand to her left… And she promptly made a lovely throw into the target area.

Similarly, even after restringing the bow for her, two grown men who bow hunt could not teach my lefty daughter to shoot an arrow… But I walked up, had them show ME, then showed her (left handed), and she immediately hit two arrows into the target!

As we approach more formal handwriting training in our schooling this year, we will no doubt continue to explore the subtleties of this issue.

And that’s without even getting into the question of whether lefties and righties really are “wired” differently. I’m sure you’ve heard the joke – “only left handed people are in their right mind!”

Welcome, one and all, to the Carnival of Homeschooling!

I think my homeschool lesson for the last week or two has something to do with overcoming challenges.

I had some folks over last Saturday for a canning party (and our little Keepers at Home were earning a badge for their work). We overcame a variety of hurdles before, during, and after the event, including wrong size jars, last minute cancellations leaving odd groupings, a recipe not making as much as expected, and strawberries that went from lovely to rotten overnight (literally). Somehow, we came through it all, and had a great time.

Heaving a sigh of relief, I sat down to start working on the Carnival. Except that, oddly, I only had a few entries… Usually by Saturday, there are quite a few. What could be going on?

Digging around in my Inbox some more, I found a letter from Henry with the explanation:

Tiffany about two weeks ago I found out that Blog Carnvial was not forwarding the entries to the carnival. I checked with the organizers for three other homeschooling blog carnivals and found the same thing. Blog Carnival takes the submissions and saves them as part of the Insta Carnival feature, but the entries are not getting forwarded.

Nice.

He sent me the “Insta Carnival” listing, which was set up to be live links in your email box… But when copied and pasted into a blog post, the links were not, well, links. The code showed the web addresses, but it was missing the html to actually create live links, and was in a scrambled order, to boot. Someone more html-savvy than I might have known a true solution, but I sure didn’t.

I’m not sure if my laborious process of fixing those listings was better or worse than just clicking through each link and copying the address from the browser bar, but by the time I decided that I was pretty far along.

Anyhow, the struggle with merely bringing these posts to you has left me at my wits’ end, and I am totally lacking in energy and inspiration for a cute theme. I present to you, therefore…

To my regular readers, I feel I must add this disclaimer: Since this carnival is open to all homeschooling bloggers, there may be sites and content listed that I would not otherwise link from this blog. I have indicated such content, where possible. We’re not talking about obscene or outrageous, of course, as that is simply not what’s happening here.

And to all carnival participants and any new readers, the corresponding disclaimer for you: Although the Carnival of Homeschooling is not Christian, I am. Please feel free to simply skip over areas of my post (and blog) which do not apply to you, and enjoy the remainder.

Technical Difficulty: What do you do during the summer?

*Alexander Bogomolny* presents First proofs: engaging math activities for the summer break posted at CTK Insights.

*Jarnette* presents Scheduling Over the Summer at Seasons of Life.

*Janine* presents Summer School at Why Homeschool.

Technical Difficulty: Not enough time!

*Mrs. White* presents Education Must Not Be Rushed posted at The Legacy of Home.

*Dawn* presents Easy and Cheap Homeschool Organization posted at Day by Day Homeschooling.

*Lisa Nehring* presents What My Hands Would Tell You posted at Golden Grasses. (Okay, putting this in this category is a bit of a stretch. Call it “Technical Difficulty: No good category for this post!”)

Technical Difficulty: Matters of Philosophy

*Susan Gaissert* presents The Difference Between Knowing and Learning posted at The Expanding Life.

*Kendra* presents Home Education or Home Schooling posted at Pumpkin Patch.

*Chi-ann Rajah* presents Teaching Worldview: Preparing my kids to understand their world posted at A Pilgrim’s Heart.

*Nebby* presents Is there a curriculum for that? posted at Letters from Nebby.

*Dave Roller* presents Thank you Blago for the home school civics lessons posted at Home School Dad.

*Linda Dobson* presents Homeschooling: You Know Your Kids – And Like Them! posted at PARENT AT THE HELM.

*Kay* presents Why We Homeschool on Musings of Croppermom.

Technical Difficulty: [Every kid has their own!]

*Jen* presents Help Your Child Learn Multiplication Facts posted at Frugal Kids.

*Robin Phillips* presents Color in Homeschool Art: A Book For Learning To See posted at Crack the Egg.

Technical Difficulty: Isolation from Other Like-Minded Folks

*AnnieKate* presents Homeschool Horizons: A New Canadian Magazine posted at Tea Time with Annie Kate.

*Mary* presents K is for Keeping it Real on Winecup Christian Academy.

*Barbara Frank* presents Great New Homeschooling Video. [Editor's Note: A fabulous video for your own uplifting, and also to share with the skeptics and critics in your life! To add to the amazing list, a friend's daughter who just graduated from High School (homeschool) just returned from Washington DC where she represented Mississippi for National History Day!]

Technical Difficulty: Keeping it Fresh

*Read Aloud … Dad* presents The #1 Way To Excite Children About Reading posted at Read Aloud Dad. [Editor's Note: This is a GREAT post that applies far, far beyond reading...]

*Angela Gray* presents When did “Educational Game” Become an Oxymoron? posted at Team Gray!

*Kathy* presents How to get started Geocaching at Kathy’s Cluttered Mind.

*Ina* presents Twisted Geography on Ina’s 5 and our Native Homeschool Blog.

*Nadene* presents Re-using Sonlight and Doing it Differently posted at PracticalPages.

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Whew! We made it!! Thank you for reading… Please let me know if you find any errors or broken links (it certainly wouldn’t surprise me).

I want to thank each of the bloggers who submitted these interesting, challenging, and diverse posts. As always, it has been a joy to read through them all while putting the carnival together (I confess I don’t typically get to read through an entire carnival!).

Please take a moment to post a link to the carnival on your blog, your Facebook page, your Twitter feed… help spread the word about homeschooling, and the carnival, and send some traffic to all these terrific folks!

And of course, good Carnival manners includes the hope that everyone will link their submitted post to this Carnival post, as well as possibly including one of the adorable COH Graphics. Thank you!

And don’t forget to send in your post for next week’s carnival! Just visit Why Homeschool for all the details, and email the info anytime before next Monday.

For the moment, there seems to be no resolution to the Blog Carnival situation, so please check their site and email in your entry. Next week’s host will thank you!

It’s that time again!

As For My House will be hosting next week’s edition of the Carnival of Homeschooling.

If you blog, I hope you will join is by submitting a post:

• Old, recent, or written just for this – anything is fair game!
• Your blog does not have to be about homeschooling – only the post you submit has to be “on topic.”

Submitting your post is simple, with the Blog Carnival form.

More details about the carnival, and submissions, are always available from the good folks who run the carnival, “Why Homeschool“.

Just submit your post by Sunday night, then come back on Tuesday to enjoy everyone else’s words of wisdom.

To help spread the word about the carnival, and get more readers for all of our terrific contributors, you are encouraged to include one of the following icons/links in your submitted post:

Small:

Medium:

Large:

I was recently sent a selection of Critical Thinking Press books to review from Timberdoodle.com, for each of my little students:

• Math Reasoning Beginning 2 for Jewel
• Math Reasoning Beginning PreK for R.T.
• and Editor In Chief (Level C1) for Nick

We are not a fan of “busywork”, so we don’t have a lot of workbooks in the house. I like these because they are geared towards thinking skills, not rote memorization of facts or lists.

Nick was actually interested in doing the Editor in Chief lessons, when I showed him the book.

Once we did the first lesson, and he got the hang of what they were really wanting, he actually asked to do another one – which turned into two – just to do better and explore it some more. For some children that might be typical behavior, but I assure you that around here that is not usually the case!

As always, we did have some discussions about the finer points of punctuation rules and writing style. With an 11th Grade student, it’s not all as clear-cut as the Little’s punctuation rules.

I think this book would be a great review or supplementation resource for High Schoolers, maybe mostly 9th and 10th Grade. I’d be curious, now, to check out the higher levels in this series.

Each of the Littles is working through their own Math Reasoning book. R.T. is right on age for his, while Jewel is actually a little old for the “recommended age” on the other… But because they are fun and visually appealing activities – and probably because they aren’t doing any other workbook type work – they are having a great time.

So far we haven’t hit anything that either of them doesn’t know, but there’s nothing wrong with reinforcing some of these types of basic concepts (as long as everyone’s having fun). Both book have used the first few lessons to cover counting, colors, and shapes, with the older book having more varieties of each. The older book also moved on to some more sophisticated geometry concepts, and some fun logic and matching games.

I’m not sure if you would use these as part of your primary curriculum, either, but they are certainly a nice “fun” way to get some learning done in spite of Spring Fever.

If you need a late-year pick-me-up for your homeschool curriculum, I’d definitely give all of these a look!

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I recently had the opportunity to check out some really neat spelling software – SpellQuizzer.

You enter your child’s spelling list, make a recording of yourself, and then SpellQuizzer can help your child study!

Click to watch some video demonstrations of SpellQuizzer.

Some points to consider, from SpellQuizzer:

- SpellQuizzer was not designed with any one spelling curriculum in mind. In fact, it should compliment virtually any spelling curriculum since you create your own custom spelling lists.

- There is a page on the site specifically directed toward homeschoolers.

- SpellQuizzer’s built-in spellchecker recognizes both US and UK English spellings. The spellchecker warns the user when creating a spelling list if they enter a word that appears to be spelled incorrectly. Because of this safeguard it’s reasonably safe to let children create their own spelling lists guided by the curriculum they are working on.

- It’s always a good idea to try to make the sound recordings for word lists amusing for the child. Funny phrases or voices make it more fun and help to children engaged.

- There are several free downloadable spelling lists for SpellQuizzer on our web site. These lists include pre-made sound recordings. We are in the process of adding new lists to the site.

- Users can easily export and import SpellQuizzer spelling lists to share with other SpellQuizzer users. This makes it easy for members of homeschool groups to share their lists rather than everyone having to record their lists individually.

- We have recently added a community area to our web site with discussion forums and an area where users can upload their own lists to share with others and download lists other SpellQuizzer users are sharing. This makes it easier than ever to share your lists with other SpellQuizzer users and for them to share their lists with you.

- If a user doesn’t have a PC microphone (many computers come with them now free but they get lost or tossed in a drawer and forgotten) they can usually be purchased at any department store’s electronics department for under $10. There’s no need to invest in an expensive microphone as the inexpensive models usually produce acceptable recordings.

We did not have much opportunity to really put the software through its paces, as our kids ages are split to either side of the “spelling test” target range. It seems easy to set up and run, and certainly a great idea! I’ll be interested to hear what you think…

You can download the SpellQuizzer software, and check it out on their 30 Day Free Trial.

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WIN IT!

One lucky As For My House reader will win their own SpellQuizzer license (a $29.95 value)!

Make sure to leave your email address with each comment. (Used only to contact the winner. If your email is entered in the form it will be saved for me but not displayed).

1. Head on over to SpellQuizzer, and let me know something you found exciting, or a question you have…

Extra Entries (leave separate comments for each).

Once you have completed #1, you can earn additional entries by doing any or all of the following. For those worth multiple entries, please leave that number of separate comments – each comment is one entry when I draw a number at the end!

2. Subscribe to As For My House in your favorite feed reader, or by email. (Current subscribers count, too!)

3. and 4. Post this giveaway to your Facebook wall (leave your Facebook name), or Tweet about it (and leave the link)! Each may be done daily for extra entries.

5. Enter any of the other giveaways posted here, or over at Life on the Road, and comment back here telling me which one. (HINT: There will be a couple on each blog over the next few days!)

6. Leave a (reasonable) comment on any non-giveaway post, and comment back here letting me know which one.

In additon to these, there are MANY more ways to earn extra entries. You know, all the usual stuff like sharing on Facebook, Tweeting, and so on? Just click over to our Giveaway Policy page for all the details!

This giveaway ends 1/10/10 at 11:59pm (Central), or more likely some time around 5 am the following morning when I log in again.

The winner will be chosen using random.org and announced on the blog, as well as contacted by email. Winner must respond within 48 hours, or a new winner will be selected. Your license will be emailed directly from the publisher.

** Comments are now closed. Look for the winner to be announced soon in a separate post! **