Back to "Home"- Schooling!

It’s that time of year again, the time when kids are back to school, sitting at their desks, and you’re enjoying that warm cup of coffee in silence. At least that is what is happening, for those of us who are not homeschooling. If you are a homeschooler, than you are either starting your new school year or you are preparing to start your new school year. For us, it is a little bit of both. How you may wonder? As year-round homeschoolers, we never really stop learning, but once a year I do sit down and review what we have learned and plan for the next year. Change whatever isn’t working, stock up on schooling supplies, etc. This year most things will stay the same. We will continue on with Time4Learning as our core curriculum, my youngest will continue with Science4Us, and both will use some other learning websites (VSC, LGFK, T4W, etc.) 

My goal this year, however, is to dream bigger, to do more! Take more field trips, do more unit studies, and hands on science experiments. I also want to do more fun arts and crafts projects, as my oldest is getting older, and I am not sure how much longer I can get her to really be into them, lol.  My new addition this year will be calculators!!! Up until now I have not allowed my children to use them, but this year I will be teaching and allowing my oldest to use one, as she is progressing nicely in her Math.

Until Next Time…

Year-Round Homeschooling

June has arrived and before long so will summer. Of course, if you live in the south, it may feel as if it has already arrived ;)

For many of us who homeschool, this may be a time for family vacations. Time to take a break and recharge, but for others who homeschool year-round, it is just like any other time of the year. Personally, we fit into the “other” category. In the past, we tried to follow a typical school year calendar, but for our family we found that we prefer to take our vacation days throughout the year when we choose. Plus, I have found that continued learning without long breaks between, allows my children to retain what they are learning. If the idea of homeschooling year-round appeals to you and you are thinking about giving it a try this summer, below are a few resources you can check out.

·          Online Summer School Curriculum 

·             Unit Studies 

·           Free Learning Games for Kids

                       Until Next Time...

The Solar System

So, we just did a Space themed unit study in honor of Space Day. We started our lesson by reading through some fun facts from a few websites: apples4theteacher.com and nasa.gov 

 

I am not sure if it had been just too many years since I had been in school myself or if I just wasn’t taught certain facts about our solar system when I was in school, but I was surprised by some of the  information we went over. For example, “Sol” means sun. So, The Solar System could also be called The Sun System and the sun is actually a star. 

Another interesting fact is that Venus spins backwards and they have also discovered signs of ancient floods on Mars. Then there is Jupiter, this planet's swirling cloud stripes are punctuated by massive storms such as the Great Red Spot, which has raged for hundreds of years. Just fascinating! 

The kids and I also enjoyed looking at all the amazing photographs of the sun and all of the planets. (I definitely do not remember images this amazing when I was in school!) We also watch some cool videos on YouTube and they played a few space games online. 

Afterwards, I had each of my kids draw their own solar system and label each planet. Then when it got dark enough, we went outside and got some great real life experience with our telescope ;)

This has been one of my favorites so far. It is a Great topic to learn about in your homeschooling, on space day or any day of the year!

Until Next Time…

Free Fun Easter Ideas for your Home-School!

Easter is almost here. Yes! That is what I said, Easter!!!! I was quite surprised myself when I looked at my calendar recently and seen that Easter would be here a couple of weeks earlier than last year. I will admit I am a bit disappointed in the earlier date, as I was planning for a few more weeks of Easter Fun, in our homeschooling. Of course, my children are not complaining, as they cannot wait for the Easter Bunny to arrive! 

So, if you are like me and just realized on April 5^th, 2015 it will be Easter, and would love to add some last minute fun Easter themed activities into your school day ~> below are a few things that you could add over the next week to your homeschool days ;)

~ History of Easter

~The resurrection of Jesus

~(Free) The Action Bible Easter Story-Kindle edition

~(Free) Easter spelling list

~ (Free) Easter fun activties

~Easter craft ideas

~(Free/cheap) Easter eBooks

Until Next Time...

Homeschooling Mom + Broken Toe = Learning Opportunity

There is nothing like a real life event to teach kids. This past week I had the unfortunate luck to break my toe. Long story short my little piggy’s got pushed all the way backwards until you heard a nice loud crunch! It was an accident obviously, but a painful one. Surprisingly, this is my first broken bone. So, of course being a homeschooling mom I had to make this a learning opportunity. I took pictures, documenting the process so far. (I plan to show this to the kids all at once to show the transition of injury through healing). A quick internet search provided loads of info on the subject and my Anatomy books from college helped a lot as well. 

This past week we have read about what a broken toe is, learned about the different types of breaks/fractures, and played some health games as well. We also focused some time on foods and vitamins that help to keep bones strong, to prevent future breaks and osteoporosis. As bad as I hate that I am in pain, at least it was a great learning opportunity for my kiddos ;)

Until Next Time...

What are Home-school looks like for February

Wow! Hard to believe that the first month into 2015 is almost over. I have to admit that this past few weeks have been slow in our homeschool, mainly because we have been battling GERMS!!!!. 

Seemed like every well day we had, we had two sick ones :/ We did, however, utilize lots of educational videos and online learning games. I figured even when you feel too ill to sit down at a table etc., you can still watch educational TV/videos and play fun games online while in bed, laying on a couch, etc. 

Even though the kiddos have enjoyed their time off of the regular school day, thankfully we are over the worse and are ready to reboot our homeschool for the New Year. 

With February, aka “Valentine’s Day” around the corner we will be focusing now on V-Day themed crafts, poems ( we will be using one of my fav freebies "SpellingCity" using poems I find), and learning about the cardiovascular system (The Heart) over the next several weeks. I also am planning on teaching my oldest how to tell your blood type with a kit I ordered.

                                        Until Next Time <3 <3 <3