Homeschooling: Nearing the End of Year & Summer Plans

I seem to be posting only about animals and gardening these days and since there is more to my life I thought I would update a little about homeschooling.  We just took another week off.  It was not a planned thing, but that is the beauty of homeschooling.  My parents came for a visit and my oldest two girls went home with them on a Saturday.  I thought it was worth cancelling our school week for the kids to get to spend time with their grandparents. 

We are nearing the end of our "school year" and I say that loosely because we will plan to continue some schooling this Summer.  I do not think we will finish with our math, so we will just continue doing that during the times we do not have other plans.  It is hard to stick to a plan because my husband is always off some for the Summer.  This year will be a bit different here, though.  This is his first year as an Assistant Principal so his Summer schedule will be different and we don't quite know at this time what it will be.  I think he will have the month of July off.  That will be the time that we take Summer vacation and we will definitely not do school on vacation.  We also will not do school on the week of VBS, either.  We will have a sort of end to our year.  Some things will end in early June.  We will end our Spelling books for sure, but this Summer I want to try out some different approaches to schooling.  Yes, I am always changing.  I find the more I get away from a set curriculum or textbook the more we enjoy the learning.  It is hard to tailor make each child's schoolwork, though. 

This Summer I would like to continue Math.  I also want to have the kids do daily reading.  Lots of reading.!... I won't have to beg Savannah.  We will just need to make sure she is reading nightly or during the day, but usually we have to stop her from reading.  Sierra will need lots of reading to keep her fresh and strengthen reading.  If she takes the whole Summer off that would not be a good thing for her.  So, the math and reading are the main things we will continue.  Another thing I want to do is get Savannah to continue writing, so I am going to do this with both girls.  This will also strengthen Sierra's reading.  I want to check these Summer writings for spelling errors and discuss the reasons for the errors (spelling rules, etc.) and make an ongoing list of their trouble words.  I have heard that children that use this type method advance in Spelling much more quickly than using a traditional spelling curriculum.  Sure we will probably do some Science.  Likely, it will be natural Science as it happens or as it is observed in nature during walks or during cooking and household duties. 

As for those little ones.... well, we have had a very laid back year.  Caden is so ready to learn so much more than I have been able to teach him, so this Summer I want to really focus on him.  Sahara will tag along and see what she can "catch".  Next year they will be Kindergarten age (Caden) and Pre-K age (Sahara), so I am not sweating it with them.   So, that's my schoolish update. 

Expedition Earth Week 2: China

Well, it seems I am definitely not one to do things by the book... no matter what book I am supposed to be following.  ;)  We mostly followed the plan this week, though.  We mixed it up a lot when we got to the crafts options. 
We started out by stamping our passport and boarding our imaginary plan to China with Caden as our pilot.  Sorry.... no pics.  I tend to live in the moment and with a baby in my arms and one hanging on my leg I just don't worry too much with juggling a camera.  Anyway, we located China on the map and completed a mapping and information worksheet from EE.  We read some some informational facts about China and listened to your China song.  We decided not to learn the Chinese portion of the song (too hard for us), but we sing the English portion.  My kids are already a bit familiar with some BASIC Chinese facts as we have a "China lover" in the house.  They already know how to say "hello", but enjoyed reviewing it, as well as, saying their names in Chinese and writing it.  They got a chuckle out of hearing their names!  Very interesting!  Throughout the week we learned more about their writings and did a little simple math with the writing the Chinese numbers (1 + 2 = 3, etc.).  The kids really like the Children Just Like Me book because it highlights one child from that country and tells some details of their lifestyle.  In Windows of the World we learned about their religious beliefs or lack there of.  We learned that their country really tries to control the people and there was an attempt to have one religion (non-Christian) about 60 years ago.  And I don't know details of how they "limit" family size, but you have to realize that it would be by sterilization, birth control, or abortion.  I know there is an over population issue there, but we found this very heartbreaking.  Children are a gift from God.  When we filled out our weekly prayer card my kids wanted to pray that "China would stop killing babies".  And that was a touchy subject to address.  We did re-word our prayer card to pray that "they will want babies".  Our little ones heard talk of killing babies a couple of times and I had to tell my older ones to stop talking about that in front of the little ones that do not understand.

The fact is we really are not that much different as a whole here in America.  Let's face it... most people here think that everyone should have two children and then, use birth control methods of some sort.  I am guilty of using it for most of my twenties and that is one of my biggest regrets.  I am not trying to step on toes here.... just MY thoughts.  And as far as that goes I may not be having other children in the future, so I am certainly not trying to force my convictions on others.

Back to the topic.... We made a mini-book for the "Animals of China" and started using our "Animal Classification" wall (or window in our case... sometime in the future I will try to post a pic.)  This is one of the Science portions that is incorporated into this curriculum.  We also began making a lapbook for the countries we study throughout the year.  Each week we will add a country.  We looked up some information about China via internet (National Geographic Kids, etc.) and I like that that is incorporated into the curriculum as technology is such a part of the world we live in. 

The Story of Ping is a suggested read aloud for one day.  We extended that to two days and discussed it more.  There are a lot of aspects of this book that make it great for learning and further study. 

We were waiting on the Usborne Encyclopedia of World Geography book to arrive, so I just talked about some of the information with the kids.  It did arrive and we used it by the end of the week.  This book is much thicker than I realized.  It is a large oversized book and is about 1 inch thick.  I am really impressed with this book and could easily see this book being used for our entire homeschooling life... all age levels!!!  My local library oredered it and I was so happy because I was hesitant to spend more money on books that I am not certain we will like.  I am sure I will be ordering my own copy in the future.  I am so thankful that I got a chance to preview it without it costing me!!

So, on to the crafts.... We did NOT spend $20+ on building that really cool Great Wall of China.  We were going to do a paper version that we printed from Papertoys.com, but some little sister scribbled on it and we were busy enough already.  ;)  Actually, we ended up having another unforeseen doctors appointment for Savannah's foot, so the Chinese fan got skipped, also.  Never fear though!  Instead we (joined by our little ones) made Chinese lanterns, Chinese stick puppet dragons, and Chinese masks.  We turned on our little Chinese song and set it to repeat and had a little Chinese parade with all our goods.  We wrapped up the week and our day with dinner out to the Grand China Buffet in Lumberton, Texas.  I rarely post locations for security reasons, but I have to do it here because Chinese restaurants have always scared me a little, but this one was really good... awesome really.  I was amazed and the kids really loved it and being that is was a buffet we were able to see what we were getting BEFORE we were stuck with it on our plates.  And we even got fortune cookies.

Here you can see us heading out to eat with each of the kids showing off their laterns, dragons, and masks... By the way Sienna was very frightened by these masks.  Poor baby girl screamed her little head off and only wanted Momma.

This pic shows the details of the dragon a little better.  One point I would like to make is that I try to use things we have without setting out on a special shopping trip for craft items.  When I found this dreagon pattern online I knew it would require two sticks for each one.  Dowel rods would work wonderfully, but sticks from the yard that are carefully selected work just as well.  ;)d

And pay no attention to the clothing.  We were not trying to make a fashion statement.  For those of you that have seen us all matchy-matchy this is what gets worn most of the time.  Also, I am not a Hollister fan.... I do not approve of their advertising.  The shirt was free.

These are our fortune cookies... and no, we do not believe in such things AT ALL.  It can be fun to read them, though.. just to see what they say.

 And the backs:

Apple Pie!

Well, we made the Apple Pie that we were supposed to make Friday for Expedition Earth to go with the book "How To Make An Apple Pie And See The World".  Actually, we made Pear Pie, since someone shared some local pears with us.  I really turned out yummy.  Unfortunately, my kids don't like Apple/Pear Pie and I knew this, but I was hoping it might be different with the whole book and helping make it thing.  Nope!  Caden ate a little, but not much.  They did enjoy the ice cream.....

Technically, I had scheduled this whole week off, so I am trying to decide still just how much school we will actually do.  I am thinking not too much.  It is early in the year to be taking breaks, but this week Cody was off for Labor Day, we have a short appointment on Wednesday, I really want to do the Spelling since it is a "Review Week", but I am thinking that special projects might be the way we go! 

A COMPLETE Week! Started Expedition Earth: PART 1 (The Concussion)

Well, it is with great relief that I can say that we finished a complete week of our new curriculum, Expedition Earth.  I was all set to start this curriculum the previous week and had stayed up into some crazy, obscene, long hours of the night the weekend before to get everything ready.  On that Monday we jumped in... or rather, I did.... but the kids did not... they had already experienced the boredom of the three weeks prior with our other curriculum and let's just say they were resistant and cranky... I did not go well.  We got enough ready to move on to day two and had gotten up that morning and gotten off to a good start.  Most of our core subjects were done and I think the two older girls only had math to do.  I was feeling like it was going to be a better day and then, we went out to feed the animals since it had not been done at the correct time.  Caden was inside watching TV and the rest of us went out.  Sahara and Sierra tired of our animal duties and went back inside.  Shortly after, Sierra opened the back door and said that Sahara was hurt and had fallen.  I honestly did not take it serious until I got to the door and saw Sahara trying to stand and walk and stumbling around.  I took her in my arms and tried to calm her, but she was just crying and groaning.  I tried the usual tricks to see if she would "forget".  It was just not happening, but she was not screaming hysterically.  That was odd in itself.  Cody called and I told him I was dealing with a head trauma, but even then I did not take it too seriously.  I thought she would cry a little and be okay.  She was starting to fall asleep and I tried to keep her awake, but she drifted out.  I lay her in my bed and then, nurse the baby who also fell asleep.  I put her in the bed away from Sahara and checked on Sahara, again.  She was fine.. or seemed so.  A few minutes later I her rousing and crying and I went to her quickly.  I got her up carried her to the living room couch to keep from waking Sienna.  She began throwing up.  That's when I knew this was not just a little bump on the head.  Called the pediatrician.  They said to take her in.  Called Cody.  He came.  Long story short... it got scary... She was disoriented, dozing in and out, slurred speech, hard to understand, made little sense, was abnormally quiet.  Five hours later and CT scan later she was clear of major injuries and it was determined that she had a concussion and could go home. 

For this reason we only did core subjects the rest of the week and stopped with Expedition Earth, so my focus could be more on watching Sahara closely.  I am happy to say that she is doing well and we managed to complete a full school week this week.  Yeah!  

Take Two.... We Switched Curriculum!

Wow!  Was this past weekend ever a long weekend for me.  I started the weekend thinking I might make some changes to our curriculum.  I was planning some drastic changes that involved a lot of work for me.  Well, I did make some drastic changes and they were a lot of work for me... but still less work than I would have been doing.  I decided to switch to Expedition Earth and say my farewells to My Father's World.  Let me say this... I STILL LOVE My Father's World, but while my kids are all still young I need something that is even more simply laid out.  Most all of the same books are used for this curriculum.  The ones that are not used are the ones I don't like.  It is just what I wanted.  And I can still add what I want to this curriculum (not because it needs it).  There are a few things that I had ordered that were part of MFW ECC (plus the deluxe package) that I want to still use.  We will still use the Hero Tales book and the Christian Heroes series of books (six of those).  All those books are about Christian heroes and now that I have seen them I just want to read them.  I will also still use the Origami book when we do our Asia study.  We will be using the Animal Search book because we all really like that book.  It is like an I Spy book.  Another great book we are keeping is The Complete Book of Animals. 

What we will not be keeping from MFW ECC is the Student Sheets, Teacher's Supplement packet, The Classroom Atlas (because I have some others), World Geography (TCR... worksheet booklet), Properties of Ecosystems, and the MFW ECC Teacher's Lesson Plan book. 

I am also making some additional changes to our "core" subjects.  I have followed a lot of MFW's suggestion and done some of my own things.  I have used Primary Language Lessons and loved it, but I think it is too much for my 2nd grader when I look at it now.  My oldest daughter was a bit older when we used it for her.  Also, Intermediate Language Lessons and Writing Strands were part of my plan this year for my oldest.  Scratch that!!!  ILL makes and aggressive jump forward that I nor my daughter are ready for.  It is mostly just too time consuming for me to have to do with her.  And Writing Strands... well, I think it will just teach her to hate writing.  Neither of us liked it by week number two.  So, I am just going to pull together some other stuff here that I think will work better for us.  Anyway, so now we have a whole new plan!

If you are interested in looking at the differences in Expedition Earth and ECC you can click on the link above and there is a download for a sample of one of the weeks.  That download show the Table of Contents and also all the curriculum books needed. 

Getting Started With My Father's World ECC

It seems I always start a new curriculum with a bit of struggle.  This year I thought that would not be the case.  I thought I was prepared, but once again I have much to learn.  I clearly did not fully realize what I had purchased when I ordered My Father's World Exploring Countries and Cultures.  I had this vision of fun little moments of cultural adventure and pointing out the countries on the map.  That was my vision, but as usual I soon lost "my" vision.  I have been trying to do everything in someone else's vision.  And I did purchase this curriculum to get the expertise of that "someone else" and their vision, but I have got to start remembering that I must not lose my own vision in theirs.  We have to give ourselves room to change what we need to change or simply omit some things. 

This weekend I shall spend some time rediscovering my vision.  I already know some things I will change.  Right now I want to share a little about what we like and what we don't about this curriculum.  First of all, I think there is a huge mix of age ranges within the books.  The problem with that is that there are a couple of books that are way to complex in my opinion.  On the other hand I can see where some people might not like some of the more youthful books and the music CD.  I myself have to ease myself into the "hokeyness" of children's music, but now that I have I would say there is much to learn from it even for older age groups.  This curriculum also has a lot of worksheets and labelling of maps and that equals dullness to me.  I know that sometimes learning can be dull, but these worksheets require way too much labelling.  I would rather do a puzzle of the world or the country we are talking about or some other hands on activity.  I think they can learn as much that way without getting severe hand cramps.  I can see having a worksheet with a list on the side and drawing arrows to the location or using an "A,B, C..." type code.  I do see the value of some mid to older age range kids learning the spellings of the countries and geography words, but my 2nd grader is not able to write in all that information and even my 5th grader is stretching it a bit with as much labelling as the sheets have.  I will go through the books one at a time and tell what I like, so this will be sort of a product review.  Keep in mind that we are only beginning, so maybe I can update this as the end of the year. 

Teacher's Manual, 2nd Edition = Great organization; Organizational format is like Adventures and has a great weekly Grid

Parent/Teacher Supplement (required) = We have not used this, yet.; Looks like extra copies of the maps and Geography game; I am not sure if this is necessary

Student Sheets (purchase one per student) = About an inch thick; I am not fond of all the maps to label; the coloring pages look fine, but the sort of thing you could pull off the internet for free; I do not like that they have it altogether for you, though.

Flags of the World Ultimate Sticker Book (purchase one per student) = Great stickers that allow one for each country fot the passport and one for the coloring page; I think that there is only one country that will not have a sticker and we will probably find something on the internet to glue and paste into our passport and coloring page; My kids will like this.

Passport (purchase one per student) = Looks official

World Geography (purchase one per 3rd-8th grader or photocopy) = Do NOT like all these worksheets; dull; I showed my husband (teacher/principal) and he did not like it, either; just too much unnecessary busy work that could be done hands on for the most part; We might use some of it, but very unlikely that we will use more than a couple of pages

Hero Tales = Awesome book for Bible time and copywork of character qualities; I like the format with short readings 3-4 days per "hero".; I do wish that there was modification for younger children as the copywork sentences are lengthy.  I was going to make these and realized that someone on the MFW ECC Yahoo Group has done this in the files sections and there are two versions. 

Window on the World = Awesome book for Bible time; Readings appear lengthy, but the information is very interesting even to my 2nd grader.

God Speaks Numanggang = This book is read a little each day for the first couple of weeks and is written by the Hazell's; It is very informative about the need for and process of Bible translation.  This book really conveys the vision of My Father's World.  I do not know if it is schedule to read again throughout the year, but I think it would be great to re-read about once a month to remind the students of the MFW vision.

Illustrated World Atlas = I like this book.   It is definitely one of those that you would not want to read everything, but rather summarize and it gives an overview of each country. 

Classroom Atlas = Well, I guess you can not expect and Atlas to be exciting.  It is what it is... factual.  Necessary, but we will be summarize and not bogging our brains down with too much detail.  I will show the kids the maps, etc. and discuss it according to interest level.

Wall Map of the World = I do not like things on the wall... but it is a nice map; I will deal with it and it is useful.  ;)

Maps and Globes = This book looks like a child's book; however, it is quite detailed and it is great that it is read in small sections at at time over the first couple of weeks.

Geography from A to Z = Great book with colorful drawings to go with each geography word (used for weekly vocabulary terms); definitions are a bit lengthy, but good... I shorten them for the kids.

A Trip Around the World = Worksheets (more elementary level) and coloring pages; This looks good.  Even with older kids I think they need to do the fun stuff like this and not all the dull stuff.

Another Trip Around the World = Same as above

Properties of Ecosystems = I do not like this overly wordy book.  My husband and I both agree this book should be highschool to college level and is rather dull.  I do understand that it gives a wonderful Biblical perspective, but I think you can do that with something that is more relateable to children.; Definitely, MUST read AHEAD and SUMMARIZE this book and share the pictures with the kids. 

Living World Encyclopedia = This is an Usborne book and I do not like the busy-ness of the pages, but the kids seem to like them.  I think it is best to summarize some of the information on the pages. 

Global Art = Great book to have all the project options in one book; I do think this book would not be necessary and the projects could be found via internet.  We will enjoy the book and not having to look up the projects elsewhere, though.

Wee Sing Around the World = I myself have to ease myself into the "hokeyness" of children's music, but now that I have I would say there is much to learn from this CD even for older age groups.  I love the songbook and the pictures in it.  It also has great little maps of the countries that I think would have been sufficient for making copies for projects.

Deluxe Package Items:

Kingdom Tales = Ahhhh!  The controversial book in the group.  It is an allegory much like the Chronicle of Narnia.  My kids call it the creepy book, although they (7 & 10 year old) understand it is not really creepy.  It just starts out with a two young brothers at their mother's funeral in Enchanted City surrounded by fiery furnaces (represents Hell).  I thought I would not like it, but now that I have moved beyond the first couple of chapters I do like it.  It does go over MY head some, but we get the main points. 

Christian Heroes: Then and Now - six book set = Very much like the Hero Tales book in that it tells about a Christian hero, but these are individual books about one hero each.  We will like these books.

Cameron Townsend = same as above

Amy Carmichael  = same as above

Nate Saint  = same as above

David Livingstone  = same as above 

George Müller  = same as above

Gladys Aylward  = same as above

Inflatable Globe = We like this, but we have not gotten to it's use, yet.  It is a ball that you blow up... looks like a globe... how can you go wrong with that?!  I think it is for a game, but you really could use it for your globe rather than buy one. 

The Great Animal Search = My kids LOVE this book!  My kids love "I Spy" books and that is just what this is.  It has great pictures and facts to go with it as they search for each animal.  LOVE!

Fun with Easy Origami = Sure we will love this one, also when the time comes to use it.

Overall, it is the map labelling, overabundance of worksheets, and book choices for Science that I do not like. I love the Biblical perspective of MFW.  I only share this because I think the more you are prepared for what you are getting yourself into the better.  Had I realized some of these things I probably would not have gotten so panicked once we started using it and realizing how overwhelming it would be for US.  I will try to update with my plans later.  Off to brainstorm about it all....

Summer is....

Everyone is talking about Summer.  School is out for public schoolers and many homeschoolers.  Everyone is talking about plans... plans for vacations... plans for their schooling during Summer and in the Fall.  It seems there is so much to think about.  For us Summer is....

Going to be a time of slowing down a bit in some areas.  Our regular school plan will change.

My husband will be off work after next Tuesday, since he is a public school teacher. 

We are not planning a vacation this year; however, you never know when that might change.

My brother, his wife, and their daughter are moving bake to Texas this Summer.

I might rip out all the carpet in this house (my big fantasy).  The problem with this little fantasy is that there is only plywood underneath and since we want to try to pay off our mortgage within one year we don't want to spend money on flooring.  So, we have to decide if we can hold off until the mortgage is paid off or if we can find a cheap or temporary flooring solution.  I despise carpeted floors.  Upstairs we have some painted floors, but it looks "right" because it is a board floor.  If I had a faux flooring solution for plywood that would look nice I could live with that for a year.  That would allow us freedom to be messy with our artsy craftsy time.  After the mortgage is all gone bye-bye we could change if we wanted to hardwood floors. 

We will do some special schooling...  I am planning to use "Consider God's Creation" (Science) some.  I would also like to do some art curriculum that we have not been faithful to complete (or really even begin).  We will continue to keep math "fresh" for Sierra and read a lot.  Savannah will actually finish up her Grade 4 math and possibly begin her Grade 5 math.  She does not know it yet, but I have decided to detour that plan a bit, though.  I am awaiting the arrival of the first book in the Life of Fred series.  This Summer I am going to let her try that.  I originally thought it was just a supplemental thing for math, but have recently learned it can be a complete math curriculum.  I also hear that the kids who put up a fight to do math actually beg to do this... It's worth a try!  Sewing is top on the list to do with my older ones.  There should be no excuse to not have time since my hubby will be off and there are no scheduled vacations. 

And if it will ever rain I would love to focus some more on growing veggies!

Oh yeah.... we HAVE to build a chicken coop.

And we will be selling seven baby bunnies. 

And I would like to have some lazy days like this little momma (Sahara) and her babies.

Our Curriculum Choices for our 2010-2011 School Year

Animal Study: "Patches"

Character Training: "Patches"

Life Skills: "Patches"

I just wanted to post a list of the resources we will be using this year. I seem to be seeing this sort of thing all over the blogosphere, so I thought I would share mine. For the most part we use My Father's World and I highly recommend it, but we do alter it to "fit" us and some of our preferences. For instance, they recommend Rod and Staff Spelling for 2nd grade, but after that they recommend switching to Spelling Power from 3rd-12th grade. I like Spelling Power and I almost bought it last year, but we LOVE the Rod and Staff Spelling. So, for now we are sticking with it... maybe later we will change to Spelling Power and only time will tell. No more examples... I'll get on with my list.





Some things we will do together, some things, seperate and I will try to note that clearly.





1st Grade-- for Sierra:

• MFW 1st Grade (minus Drawing With Children; minus the recommend Math book -- for now)


• A Beka K Math that we did not finish, yet. We will zoom through this really because I have it already. Once we finish it up we will get the recommended Math or something else. I kind of forgot this detail this Summer. Shhhhh!! No big deal, because I won't need it right away. ;)

4th Grade-- Savannah:

• MFW Adventures (because we did not finish last year or this Summer as intended. Once we finish this up we will go straight into MFW ECC and it is likely that we will speed up some of Adventures where we can)


• Rod and Staff 4th Grade Spelling


• Primary Language Lessons (1-3 Lessons per day: I confess I was adjusting to homeschooling and this is recommended for 2nd-3rd grade, but we are using it for 4th: once done we will order Intermediate Language Lessons and begin that)


• Rod and Staff 4th & 5th Grade Math (We used A Beka last year and I used it a slower pace, but still Savannah has done most of what is in the R/S 4th & 5th grade books, so I am going to pick and choose what she needs from the two books. She should complete the year ready to start the 6th grade books even though she will only be going into 5th grade level... ??? Confusing, huh?! David Hazell says that if your child knows what grade she is in you are probably doing something wrong... We must be doing something right!)


• Letter Writing.... not a book... we are just going to have Savannah write! We met Amish Pen Pals this Summer and possibly some others.

All Ages-- Together:

• MFW 1st Grade (All will participate in calendar time, Science, Storytime & crafts when possible, and phonics & math games)


• MFW Adventures (All will participat in History & Science when possible)


• Consider God's Creation Science (This is a 2-3 year program, but do-able in 1; I just love it so much that I want to use it even though MFW is VERY complete. We will use this to add to MFW 1st & Adventures and work through the rest of it as time allows. My kids love Science, so I hope it can be a great motivator to get Savannah to focus.)


• Cooking/Sewing/Homemaking-- I do not have a "curriculum' for this, but I want to really train my kids this year to be helpers to one another. We need teamwork and I plan to have them in the kitchen as much as possible, as well as, helping with daily chores that are in need of focus. I want them to leave home one day knowing how a home should function and well equipped to manage their homes and families. To make it fun we will be using two children's cookbooks ("Williams-Sonoma the kid's cookbook" and "Kid's fun & healthy COOKBOOK" by DK).


• Art: We will be continuing with "I Can Do All Things" that is recommended for Adventures; Draw To Learn About Jesus by Notgrass (Had I been thinking I might have bought the one for Proverbs, since you learn Proverbs weekly in MFW 1st); Dover Coloring Books (Sea Life; Exotic Butterflies & Moths; Backyard Nature) & Dover Stain Glass Coloring Book Kits (Wild Animals; Fairies; Butterfly Designs)


• Music Time: I will try to play random music all day (children's music; Bible songs; bluegrass ... my kids want to learn to play fiddle; worship songs); hopefully, violin lessons (online or in person); Violin study using "Violin Primer For Beginners" by Jim Tolles and "A New Tune A Day for Violin: Book 1" by Sarah Pope


• Audio Story Time: This will be used for listening to things such as Jonathon Park CDs, books on tape from the library, etc.


• Video Time: When we left in June on our five week vacation we cancelled or Dish Network. I believe it needed to be done for several reasons: commercials, inappropriate content on even children's programs, personal self control (my husband), & it was waste of our money for the lack of usage other than cartoon channels. Caden was addicted, also... and that is all he was wanting to do. Regarding my husband, what I mean is that he watched very little, but what was drawing him in was not appropriate. He might want to watch the Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC), but the Spike channel is full of trashy commercials and "bleeped" out words. I think your mind still "imagines" the words and that is as bad as them being on the TV. Back on topic....... I want to still allow my kids some movie time. We still have our own movie collection and I think one every other day or so would not be so bad, especially the ones from Lifeway, etc..


• Exercise & Free Play: Thank God Fall is coming!!! I want to get outdoors. I NEED TO to prepare my body for labor, but have been taking it easy until the end of the first trimester. The kids need exercise to, of course! Gymnastics is still up for consideration, but I just do not know if we can swing it in this "season" of our life.


• Computer time: Games, Learning games, Typing, Spanish, etc.
• 4-H (not sure what we are doing, but "Patches" could get involved
• Co-op classes (For us it is all about friendships and anything they learn is just a "bonus"; Savannah will be taking World History and Gardening 101; Sierra will be taking Missions which includes some geography and cultures and Math Using Learning Through Literature); I am sure we will attend several theatre productions again this year as that is a love of ours and enjoy park day time after co-op.

FOR ANYONE OUT THERE READING THAT MIGHT BE INTIMIDATED BY THIS AND THINK IT IS AMAZING WE WILL BE DOING ALL THIS.... this is a ""plan" and we alter our plans alot! :) Mainly, it is a guideline, but we are not bound by it. Some of these activities are for "busywork"... You know, if "idle" hands are left with nothing to do, they start to get into trouble. If the kids are grumpy are arguing it might be a good time to pull out an "Art Activity", game, puzzle, or do a craft. I want alot on the "plan", so I have a lot to choose from.

As far as our schedule.... I don't have one, but we are jumping in full force Monday with or without one anyway!!! Sink or swim we are diving in!!! A schedule will have to "develop". Ha!!! It'll work out. Last year I fought with the perfect schedule, but by year end we had one that was very variable and it worked for us. This year we will do a similar thing and let life form the schedule.

ENJOY YOUR YEAR!!!

SETHSA 2010 & Baptism Decisions & VBS

I have been wanting to blog about my recent trip to the SETHSA Conference in Houston, TX, but time is a fleeting commodity around here. I left on June 3rd before the sun was up with a group of six ladies total to attend and be volunteers for the conference. We were in charge of helping direct attendees around the new venue, the Houston Baptist University Campus. It was a beautiful location. My team of ladies was the most delightful group of ladies that could possibly exist. Our team was so self-sacrificing. It seemed that everyone in our group was more concerned with others in the group being happy than their own happiness! It was refreshing and relaxing to be with such a wonderful group. We were provided rooms in the dorms and there were no complaints from our little team of ladies. We did have some issues with upper bunk beds, but our ladies quickly solved the problem by setting their matresses on the floor. Voila! No upper bunk beds to have to climb into. We had to divide our time up to be able to cover our work duties and still get to attend some of the workshop we wanted to experience and it went so well. I am in awe of these ladies and how quick they were to sacrifice what they wanted to be "fair" to one another! Truly they were the biggest blessing for me from attending this conference!

What made me laugh and cry at the same time? Todd Wilson of www.familymanministries.com !!! I could so totally relate to the the stories he told of life with children and homeschooling and I was moved to tears, while laughing hysterically, listening to hime talk about a true family man. I have a true family man in my house.... and he was back at home happy to take care of my four kiddos, so that I could attend this conference. I was missing them all terribly, too. I was quite excited to get to buy my hubby a T-Shirt from this family of ten for a mere $10 that says "Family Man" on it.

Also, Todd Wilson was the opening Keynote Speaker for the conference and he talked about the Dream Killers.... those people that are always killing your dreams. There is great power in words... they can be dream killing or dream reviving. He finished with reminding us not to be the dream killers for our children! It was very powerful.

Another thing that impacted me were the workshops about focusing on making a "heart change" in your children rather than focusing on discipline punishments. The speaker was Debbie Bryan from The National Center for Biblical Parenting. In the future I might try to blog about this in more depth, but I would just say that is worth researching on your own and I will leave you with this from my workshop notes: It is not about the suffering... It is about the heart change! So, we want to work on character training and not making our kids "pay" for how they have done wrong.

I also got to hear Debbie Strayer speak about using a unified approach to tying teaching together. It was great stuff! A brief example would be to have the child do some writing, then use that writing to develop that child's spelling list, as well as, focus on the grammatical errors that child is making. She is a friend to Ruth Beechick and her Editor. She is co-author of the Learning Language Arts Through Literature Series and she the co-author to a new curriculum that looks fabulous called Trail Guide to Learning by Geography Matters. Now, I am not running out to switch from My Father's World, but it looks good... just saying. I am sticking right where I am at, but it might be something I look at one day... just never know.

Well, that is my brief run down in these stolen moments. I came back Saturday just in time to snuggle with my kiddos before bedtime and tuck them in. Sunday we went to church and my SIX YEAR OLD, SIERRA, WALKED DOWN TO MAKE HER PUBLIC PROFESSION OF FAITH AND SHE IS EAGER TO BE BAPTIZED!!! Yippee!!! She truly is ready! And now we are on Day Four of our VBS week and it is amazing, also! Life is grand!!

A great resource for studying butterflies is the Stokes Butterfly Book (pictured below).

Last week we were supposed to be doing our Fox week for MFW K. We have stopped the Adventures, again for a while. The kids like it, but I find it difficult to do it all and cuddle my babies. Adventures is supposed to be and "Optional" year, anyway. At least, we have done some of it. It has given me a chance to see how the MFW curriculum is. I do like it, but we have had a lot of adjustments in a short period of time. I am satisfied with doing what we can. We might do some of the Adventures this week and try to get back on track for a while. Like I said, we were SUPPOSED to be doing our Fox week for MFW K and we did get started on it, but I will repeat it next week and through in some extra stuff. Maybe we will do some more phonics and reading. We had lots of company... lots of the sleepies... and BUTTERFLIES! Our butterflies were "by the book". I looked at the calendar on Wednesday and told the girls that the butterflies MIGHT hatch as early as the next day. Guess we awoke to? Two butterflies had just emerged from the chrysalids! I called the kids to see and one more emerged as we watched the whole thing. Well, technically I watched and saw it all... they had drifting attention spans and missed the first few moments. We went outside to experience the beautiful day and came back in to the fourth one being hatched out. It was so amazing to watch their wings get larger and harden up and see the fur on their backs. If you look really close they have golden hairs on their back and their "tongues" (sure there is a real word for it) curl down like a little party blower. So strange! Sierra was the first to want to hold the butterflies, so after a while... and lots of begging... I let her put her hand inside and the butterflies would crawl on her fingers. The next day Sierra actually let one go in the house and I had to recapture the poor little guy. Savannah did hold them, also. The following day the last one emerged and we waited until Daddy was home that evening to release them. And as a bonus for the kids their Daddy and uncle were there to watch them release the butterflies.

It was a great week... very laid back... probably too much so in many ways, but we had a busy weekend before that with a church Musical on Sunday night. Cody and Savannah were both in that, so they had practices and such. We also had some friends over throughout the week and let me just say to those that struggle with this.... Stop school for playmates. Our kids are home with us all the time. They need to play with friends when they can. I have learned that it is wise to put playtime with friends high up on the priority list. We had some visitors on Wednesday for about an hour and on Thursday we had some more visitors (my neighbor teaches piano lessons and gets a lot of homeschoolers that we meet). Wednesday night was Wet-N-Wild at our church for and end of year celebration for all the kids. They had waterguns and water jumprope, relay races and some other stuff. Also, on Thursday my dear friend Michelle brought six of her seven children to the house for a backyard picnic. To finish off the week Cody ended it with walking in Relay for Life with his twin brother as a tag-a-long. They got back in around 11:30 PM and stayed up all night playing some crazy video game. Weird... I do not get it, but it is there thing. His brother moved back to the area recently and they have done the video game thing twice now. I totally don't get it, but whatever floats their boat! I did stay up with them until after 1:00 AM (reading a book and munching on popcorn). Saturday was company all day. The brother stayed the night, so he was there and then, my daddy came up for a visit for the day. Shortly after my daddy left, my sis-in-law and family showed up. What a week!

This weekend I spent some time planting some container gardens... I don't know how it will work out, but it is just nice to watch things grow and play in the dirt! To mark my plants I wanted something that would last. I had stuck the seed packets in the side of the pots, but we all know that will not last long. I tried to find some wooden popsicle sticks, but I could not find those. Instead, I got the idea to use old margarine bowl lids. I cute the lids in half and cut out a flaglike shape and wrote the name of the plant with a marker, then stuck it in the dirt. I was also thinking that using old empty margarine bowls would work great, too. You could just cut strips down the bowl the width you want and probably get 15+ that way.

Off to bed with me...

A Glimpse of our Last Two School Weeks

The week before this past one was Spring Break for my husband's school, but the whole family was sick so we stayed home. For Savannah we did 3rd grade Math some and did some light reading. For Sierra we did light reading, a bit of phonics like games and discussing words, and just mostly played when we were feeling up to it. Our biggest venture out was a trip to the Sno Cone stand once. There was a bigger plan, but life happens and we are still recouping from a virus after two weeks.

This past week I had planned to jump back into MFW Adventures, but that did not happen and I just am not going to worry about it. It may take us two years to do this little one year program, but I am more concerned with enjoying it than just getting it done. "Just getting it done" was my focus for a while and I have learned that there is no benefit from that. We are all quite excited to start the state studies and bird study, though. I'll shoot for starting that this coming week. We will be more prepared that way anyway. For Savannah (3rd) we did our Spelling (Rod & Staff) with double lessons. We did a "Review week" lesson and a normal week lesson at the same time. I was confident in Savannah's ability to handle two weeks of study at a time, so I did not feel this was too much for her. She aced her end of week test with a 100. The normal week lesson was with words like cutting and other -ing words and adding suffixes (-ing, -ed, -en). We did four days of math lessons and speed drills (and I still don't get why she is suddenly liking these, but I will go with it... Hehehehe!). We do "math extras", which includes using "wrap ups" and other math toys or flashcards, as well as, writing mulitiplication facts. I hear that using math songs for skip counting works well, but I have failed at implementing it so far. Maybe we will do it sometime. I also, want to start using math games online, etc. more as we just purchased two more computers as part of our school expenditures. We have saved money by borrowing some of our curriculum that has made this possible. God supplies all our needs!! Since Savannah did double lessons in Spelling I only had her do one day of handwriting practice. A normal spelling lesson consists of 16 spelling words (3 review) and the review week consists of five weeks of words (13 words each) totalling 65 words. She had only previously missed one of the 65 words so her testing consisted of the 16 words from the normal list and the one previously missed word. She made a 100. And by the way I "grade like so... all correct = 100... any missed = -1 (etc.). I don't give number grades. I have no concern for grade numbers and I would only move on to the next thing if she really knows the information. I like a Content Mastery approach and a focus on actually learning. I don't want my kids simply memorizing information for a test. Anyway, back to the handwriting... She did one day of writing her spelling words (the 16) in cursive. We usually do one day of a Bible verse, two days of the spelling words, one day of family names , and one day of other random words/sentences/verse. As long as she is writing I do not care what as long as it fills a page and is dated and signed. I had a handwriting curriculum this year for both my girls, but found it to be monotonious..... write " j j j j ..." ... we skipped all that and grabbed the old style writing paper and did what comes naturally. Much more enjoyable! Savannah read library books and some of our books. That was reading!

Before I go into Sierra's I want to tell you our schedule. Sick people just don't care..... we rested... we played when we felt like it and sometime in the late afternoon we would start some schooling. I usually started with Sierra this week and let Savannah start her independent work in Spelling or Math. We did school outside, on the couch, in the school area.... whatever felt good at the moment... sick people take a lot to motivate... especially, when it is Momma. Most of our school took place after Daddy arrived home and after dinner. It worked quite well and I would highly recommend it for those that are struggling with juggling all that life offers. I actually plan to use this "schedule" more often. I think it may be the key to getting some of our chaos in order. I can spend my days focusing on guiding my kids to help with chores and our attitudes first and foremost. We can prepare for dinner ahead of time and get more laundry done, etc. The stress of that getting lost in the shuffle greatly governs our day. With that front and center I think the schooling will just fall right into place in a more relaxed way.... even if it is in the evenings. The reality is that we can still do all our school in the same amount of time we used to do on just evening homework. I am seeing that it does not matter what time of the day we do our school. It should just be part of our life whenever it works good to do it.

And on to Sierra's... we started our "Goat Gg Week" in MFW Kindergarten. I actually want to get a bit "caught up" on where we are in lessons, so I look at the coming weeks and see that there are three weeks related to farming (Goats, Cows, Horses). I thought I would combine the Goat week with the Cows, but we were feeling too puney. Monday I finished up some unfinished work from our Insect week and did a little more preparing for the farming weeks. I have really had Sierra do more reading than the lessons call for, so I was happy to see that in the Goat week this week they finally add the first sight word (the). Sierra already knew it, so that was easy and confirmed we are on the right direction with her. She is the first on that I have had to teach to read, so it is really nerve racking sometimes.... but exciting!!! She is doing great! We did an animal matching file folder game and did some animal matching with a wooden hide-n-seek type puzzle that I have. I made some extra animals to go with it. We also used it to sing Old McDonald. I had each of the girls pick five animals and we hide them in the puzzle. As we sang we opened the little doors to see what animal was there and did each one and it's sound. For future reference 10 animals is way to long of a song when you are coughing your head off. ;) We mostly read books this week and worked through the MFW Reading Plan (I leave out some things that Sierra knows well) and did the worksheets. She did great and I am so gald that the worksheets are finally adding sentences for the child to read. The one thing I think this program is really missing..... and I say this lightly because I know it is meant to be a slow and easy approach to teaching reading and I am thankful for that.... I think it is missing little phonics readers. I have found with Sierra that the key to teaching her to read has been to put little phonics readers in her hands. Once she sees she can sound out some of these words phonetically she gets quite excited. I think it is great to write little nonsense story sentences using the words that you are focus on and let the child read those. And example off the top of my head is:

The cat is fat.

The cat is in a hat.

The cat is on a mat.

The cat sat.

The cat sat on the mat.

The cat is red.

The hat is red.

The mat is red.

I don't think we did any crafts... ooops! They did not miss it. Anyway, that was our week! Gotta run to church, again! Later!

Making Curriculum Work For YOU: Insects, Etc.

I mentioned previously that I would like to start sharing how I am adapting our curriculum to make it work for us. As homeschoolers I think it is easy to think we have to do everything in our curricula and do it all just the way they say to do. First of all, I think it is important to realize we can make changes.... as many as we want. It's okay to completely leave some things out, too. As well, you should feel free to completely add something that you want to study. The example I will use is My Father's World Kindergarten's Insect Week. The main focus for the week is insects with a strong emphasis on the ant. Our ants did not come in during that week and that was okay, because we had plenty to keep us busy and to study on. Besides that... in hindsight I can see how having the ants DURING the week would have been distracting to getting some other things done. The ants did arrive the Monday AFTER studying them and that just made the learning carry on longer and more naturally. I think it is good for lessons to "overlap". We can still move on to the next lesson study while we finish up or continue some of the previous week activities. I think it just drives the information into their brains better. I will admit this is a change for me... I did think I had to complete one week to start the next week, which was really frustrating for me. Sometimes we would only have one day of study left for a lesson and if we worked on that final day on Monday, then that would throw off our next week. I just can not keep operating that way.

Back to changing things, adding things, and leaving some things out.... It is so fun to do ladybugs, but I have to say that painting a ladybug stone was not high on my list of fun things to do. At first glimpse I thought it was a cute idea, and then insect week came. First of all, where we live you can not just walk outside and get stones. You have to settle for pebbles and little hands work better with bigger things (stones). I did not want to make a trip to a store to search out stones adn then have to purchase stones, nor did I like the idea of marking on a beautiful stone once we acquired one. I prefer them au naturale! ;) I did however want some simple craft to do and what better to work with than simple craft supplies like construction paper. I quickly grabbed some bladck and red paper and went to work with Sierra. It may look complex, but it is simple a black circle, a red circle cut in half, a half circle in black for the head, some small black circles for spots, and some squiggle scraps for legs and antennaes. After we glued ours together we added some google eyes. While Sierra was doing the gluing I decided it would make a cute little booklet with some easy phonics words. No big thing... just cut six (or whatever) squares of paper to make the pages and staple them together and tape the booklet to the back of the ladybug. As you can see in the pic I wrote in some simple sentences and guided her through filling them in. On the remaining pages we make a sentence story:
Page 1 = I
Page 2 = am
Page 3 = a
Page 4 = bug
Super simple and that was the point because Sierra could write this "story" all by herself. She was so excited to show Daddy when he came home from work. We also made a paper plate ladybug craft.... Simple.... paint the whole plate red, paint a head area black, paint a black stripe down the center, use a dot brush or dot marker to dot black spots all over the ladybug, add google eyes (etc), and add pipe cleaners for the legs and antannaes. Seems like you are just crafting, but in fact both these activitiies reinforce that insects have six legs and two antannaes each. I also, printed out a dot-t0-dot page for both my girls to do that was a ladybug. In addition to that we made insects out of wooden shapes. The girls glued the shapes on paper and then, colored the wood. We put together insect puzzles and talked about insects everywhere we went... even if it was a some odd object in Wal-Mart that had a bug drawn on it. It was okay that we left out some of the stuff in the lesson plans because we did other things and the learning still happened.

Another thing that I have found difficult is finding the recommend books and even if I do find them sometimes I think it does not matter what books you use. The Grouchy Ladybug was recommended for the Insect week. I could not find it at our library and do not have it here, so we just used other books. A friend told me that she was dissappointed that this book was recommended because it expresses such bad attitudes that she would rather not use as an example to her children. I ended up being glad we did not use this book and we found plenty of other great books at the public library and in our home library.

These are just a FEW of the ways we are making the curriculum fit us. We also do not use all the "reading plan" for teaching Sierra to read because she is a bit ahead of it already. Instead, I am pulling from other sources and just trying to figure out on my own how to teach her read, since she is interested and I do not want to hold her back from that. I have been making the file folder games and printing out free printable phonics readers that are available online, as well as, purchasing some phonics readers for our little library that is quickly growing. And that is the last thing.... I am gathering lots of books to have on hand, so we do not need to go to the library as often or purchase books at full cost. I buy books on the thrift! Our two local Goodwill Stores are a great source and often run sales for 10 for a dollar. There is another resale shop in my town that is super cheap (probably 25 cents... I never ask the price of stuff there it is soooo cheap and goes to a good cause). Garage sales are great sources for books, also. It has surprised me how many of the recommended books we have acquires this way. At the library a few weeks back I was looking for the book "Make Way for Ducklings" and they did not have it on their shelves; however, as I was leaving I thumbed through their book sale books and that book was there... for sale!.... for like 50 cents! I get so very excited about that kind of thing! I think God sends us EVERYTHING WE NEED!!!

File Folder Games

I have been making file folder games for the kids. This one is available for free through www.FileFolderFun.com and all you have to do is register for free. You will get occassional emails from them, but nothing annoying. Just this week they sent me a link for a spiritual game and some St. Patrick's day cards to give out to friends.

This particular game was one I made for Sierra (K) for phonics word practice. I quickly realized that I had underestimated it. I showed the "game" to Caden (3 yr 5 mo) and he quickly became interested. I thought I would just have him put centers on the flowers and not worry about the words, but he pointed to the words on the flowers and asked, "What does that say?" So, I read the words phonetically to him (bu-uh-g, bug ...while pointing out the letters) and he would place the appropriate pic in the center of the flower. I must say that I was quite impressed with my little guy. It is also made me realize that teaching him will be easier than my two older ones because I will have some experience behind me and I will be able to teach gradually from the beginning with him. Anyway, back to the game.... Sierra did the game as intended. She would read the words on the flowers and match the pictures. She did great. Savannah (3rd) wanted to do the game, also. It was obviously too easy for her, so I told her to match the pics with the words as fast as she could and I would time her. She did it in 20 seconds! They all did a great job and it was fun.

One thing to note is that some of these take a long time to make. If you are going to make file folder games you should know there is a time investment. Also, if you want them to last through several kids you might want to laminate the pieces and store them in a zipper lock bag or envelope. I laminate mine with contact paper. This week I managed to get about five games made.

Also, you could add a "dry erase" page in with any of these games simply by inserting a blank lined page into a clear page protector. For the one above the child could write each of the words with a dry erase marker for an added level to the game. Another idea might be to make a "tracer page" by printing the words on a sheet of paper and inserting that in a page protector for the child to trace and that would help with practicing proper letter formation.

Also, check this site... www.homeschoolcreations.blogspot.com for more file folder games.

FREE Curriculum Online for Future Christian Homemakers & Random

I was just blogging around and came across a great site with a FREE curriculum online for teaching girls to be Future Christian Homemakers! I love it! It is the same stuff you would do if you were teaching your girls, but they have it all ready to go with the handouts and some cute ideas for added delight already done for you. Just to see what a lesson looks like I clicked on the one for Yeast and Breadmaking and the handout (about 11 pages) has a pictures of them making a bread bear! So cute for kids to do! You can include your boys, but this is designed to be done with girls. As we all know when we are at home schooling our kids all day we just have to include them all. Caden is going to be so cute in the kitchen with us in his new apron we got him for Christmas.... he was wearing the girls pink ones, so when I saw a simple blue one at Target in the $1 bins we snatched it up as a gift from us girls. He LOVED IT!! This might be the very thing I need right now to ignite some excitement around here that has been lacking. We just need to spend some time doing the fun things we used to do all the time before homeschooling took over our world. And I know.... that was supposed to add to the fun, but it has added a whole new level of stress around here. Being the Teacher is a bit overwhelming and some days I just want to go back to being Momma... only now since it has become a conviction I know that I must search out that way that they are ONE AND THE SAME. It was only a hundred or so years ago that THIS WAY was the NORMAL WAY. So, I am working on it. And crazily I have been thinking that as much as I like some aspects of our curriculum (MFW) I have been considering a different way.... more like the way it would have been done a hundred years ago. I just feel so stifled sometimes following "someone else's plan". I really knew this before I started this curriculum, but being new to homeschooling I wanted to have some guideline to follow to help me know where to begin. My Father's World is great for that!! What is hard for me is that one week in K we are studying the Senses and alongside that we are studying the Seasons for Adv (Science portion). I feel like I am in a constant juggle and trying to just get each week done and go from one thing to the next. I would much rather have a Yearly lesson plan that has Topics we will study and us just go through them like we want to. Maybe we would want to do the Senses during the holiday season for a week (because Christmas time lends itself to studying the Senses naturally) and do the Seasons for a day or two at the change of each season. Doesn't that seem more natural?.... I think so. Right now we are studying George Washington, but I would rather do that during President's Day week. Of course, I guess that is a bit ridiculous because we need to study in chronologically and then, on President's Day it would be a great day to "review" it. {{{I am just thinking and typing here}}} I think I might always use MFW's LESSONS PLANS as a guideline, but I think I might choose my own read-alouds and move some parts around. I do love it, but sometimes I just want to go to the bookshelf and pick up a book and start studying whatever is in that book! Or maybe I just need to break MFW up into sections and do 3 weeks of it and then, 1 week of a Unit Study... Like I said... I am just thinkign here... Uhhhh.. does typing while my kids wander off to play Candyland count as school... Sahara is running around here with the Candyland instruction pamphlet singing herself a sweet little song... I just want their hearts!

M. I. A. and Ponderings

I have been M.I.A. (Missing In Action)... and I do mean ACTION! In the last month I have packed up (and unpacked) for three trips out of town. Craziness! It has nearly killed me, I think. I have actually considered cancelling the trip we have been trying to plan for Christmas. We have been doing very little of our school and that just makes me feel awful. I try to "prioritze" and, of course, getting school done should be top on the priority list, but two of these trips have been to see out-of-state relatives and that is a high priority, too. We were able to visit with my husband's twin all the way from California and only have to drive the two hours to our in-laws. So much closer than the 20 hour drive to California! [And yes, we drive to get there.] The second visit was with my brother, his wife, and their six year old daughter and again, we only had to drive two hours to my parents house as opposed to the 10 hour drive to Alabama. The last trip was supposed to be a "joy ride" kinda two day getaway to recover from the other travels... let's just say it was not so much!

So, I awake this morning pondering what to do... Originally, I had planned to take the whole month of December off for a Christmas break and do only Christmas related schooling. The thing is we ended up taking off most of the month of November. Well, we did some schooling, but it was such a "half-effort" that I just do not think it was as beneficial as it could have been. I am totally glad that I decided to school year round because we seem to have to take a lot of off time. The recent months have also shown me that I am probably going to want to switch to four day school weeks, so we have day to run errrands, do shopping trips, appointments, visits with friends, Co-op days, "field trips", cleaning, etc. (all those things that still draw for our attention).

Just to throw in something random... I have not done Christmas cards! Not that that is really earth shattering, but I usually do send Christmas cards. Last year I did not do it because I just had made so many changes in my life with having a new baby and switching to homeschooling mid-year and trying to learn what I was doing. I was just "treading water" and trying to survive it all.... uh, same this year, too! LOL! Well, I guess I still have time.... we'll see if I get it done. ;) That is the thing.... if we don't do our "usual" school I could get some of these things done and the kids could be involved in it. Hmmm... and it is only really two weeks that I am talking about because we will be taking the usual time off that our public school takes off [remember my husband is a Teacher]. Anyway, I am just pondering it all and for me this year I have really been pondering how we will make school a "way of life" and life a "way of schooling"... not so much about a curriculum, but with them still learning and achieving the appropriate academics. By the way, I haven't mentioned that we are naming our school! For the most part it is decided that we will call it "Way of Life School". [Reasons for "naming" our school vary, but some of it is for the future when they need highschool transcripts.... some of it is so they can have a "school" to say they attended and not just saying, "I am homeschooled."... some of it is just for FUN!] I pondered a few variations: "Way of Life Academy", but our focus is not purely academic; "Way of Life Christian School", not opposed to that one for sure; "Way of Life School", just like the flow of it and the simplicity of what it says and the profound statement of it even with the simplicity. I obviously stayed away from my first choice with something about Little Things because they will not always be little and therefore, not want to be referred to as such in their teens. :)

Anyway, I just wanted to share my ponderings and let you all know I am out here still... alive and well exhausted!

Sentence Building Activity

Need a great sentence building activity for your little ones? I think this is the best thing I have come across. Take the 5 minutes to make this one and you are going to love it!

I just did this print-out and just wanted to share another way to do it for those of us that do not have a laminator. I used clear Contact paper to laminate page ONE on the front and back. For page TWO and THREE I simply slid them into the clear shiney page protectors. On page THREE they will be able to draw their picture and then simply wipe it off for their next sentence they build. Note: I did not use the Contact paper for pages TWO and THREE because it is not as easy to wipe away the dry erase on.

I saw this idea on Confessions of a Homeschooler and loved it! I discovered her blog a couple of months back and if I did not have a Pre-K or K Curriculum I would use this as our curriculum (not that I do not like My Father's World, but this one is great, too...). Be sure and read this post about her Terms of Use. She wants her stuff to remain free and wants to give it freely. What an awesome gift!

Revision: I just did this with my five year old, Sierra. Page TWO and THREE can be turned back to back and placed in one page protector. This will save page protectors (and money ... frugal!) and make it easier to store and use.... It becomes just one part! I love LESS (less really is more!). You can also store all your pieces in that same page protector. The other thing I want to point out is that you do not have to feel like you have to do every part of this activity when you do it. If you have a child that is not wanting to do the drawing part or the writing part , then skip that. My daughter drew two of the pictures and wrote one of her sentences and then her "hand was hurting"..... which is the story of our lives here, but I remember sitting in a desk at school and my hand hurting, my rear hurting, etc. and that is not want I want in my homeschool. The wonderful thing is that we can do it "our way". Even without the complete set of skills she got to feel like she was reading... which she was!! This is a great activity.

MFW Adventures and K: Week 2

I am going to leave out the major details and just hit the highlights or what I most think others would want to see ... or what I think I will want to have captured in a few years. If anyone has any questions, please feel free to ask. Also, if I "add" to a project and you want the file just leave a comment and I will be happy to email you the file.

MFW Kindergarten: Week 2

We did the Creation Numbers a bit different because I wanted to be able to add it to their notebooks rather than have a poster on the wall. I will insert this in a pocket (page protector) in their notebooks. It is four sheets of paper folded in half and taped together. When it folds up it closes like a book; however, this left a blank page at the end and a blank green cover. We just can't have that, so I created a cover page for the kids to color. Also, I added a final page that says, "God Made Me!" and an empty square for the to draw a picture of themselves.

We also stapled our Creation Art Pages to make another book which I titled, "Creation: The First Seven Days, My Artistic Creation by: ______".

This is a sampling of our art for day 1 and day 2... I started to post them all, but you get the point.

MFW Adventures: Week 2

Ooooppss!! I added this photo sideways! I just wanted to show that it is easier for the little ones to form their boat over some sort of mold..... ahem, translation = old bowl, etc.. Some kids may find it frustrating to form a boat without a mold and I suspected that with my oldest (the perfectionist) and ran to find a "mold". It worked so well. We just turned it upside down and pushed the aluminum foil down to take the form. When you remove the bowl you can press the edges inside.

This is Savannah holding an empty bottle under the water to demonstrate that the bottle is not empty as it might appear. It is full of AIR! This experiment is in the Science With Air book.

The Santa Maria, The Nina, and The Pinta successfully sailed the Atlantic Ocean (bathtub) and we continued our Science With Air experiment by blowing our ships around the bathtub to make the AIR move them. I also demonstrated that fanning a sheet of paper with a book will make the paper race across the floor (mentioned in the book). The girls designed the sails all by themselves. I was just about to do that while they formed their aluminum foil boats when I decided that it would be best if I let them have a chance to "design" their sails... and I almost drew the shape of a sail for them, too... but then, I decided that it would be best if I let them have a chance to "design" their sails.... Guess what!! They did a great job with a ALL the details on their own and with me sitting back and saying to just do it how THEY wanted to. Sierra designed the one for the The Santa Maria and Savannah designed the ones for The Nina and The Pinta.

Sahara had a great time watching the ships sail across our ocean!! She got so excited. Poor Caden slept through it all,.... but awoke, found it in the bathtub and played "destroy the ships". He disassembled the sails and stuck them to the floor and continued floating the boats. ???

I had my girls do this part TOGETHER... on the one paper. I think it is great to get them to work together to create even a simple coloring page sometimes. They have to learn to take turns and wait on the other one or move over, etc.. They also learn to share in the design process rather than it all being "their way" only. I highly encourage having siblings do a "Togetherness Project" whether it is big or small.

In my post for the week 1 I mentioned my Posty Note Cheat Sheets that have been so helpful to me. Like I said... nothing fancy... and not totally necessary, but it is extremely helpful too me. Also, I make a copy of the current week's plan page and mark off the things we have accomplished. I am thinking that I will eventually start to make a copy of the current week's plan page and make my notes on that in colored ink or pencil and then, marked that off as we do it. Both systems would work .... anyway, that is my tip of the week. Make it work for you. You have to find those tricks that make things work for you. When I was a secretary (many moons ago) I would place outgoing mail on the floor by my seat. When I would get up to do something I would grab my pile of outgoing mail and take it to the mail room. Those type of things really help me remember to do things. I love to put posty notes on my steering wheel when I am doing errands... Those are the little things that help me survive the chaos! :)

My Father's World Groups

Someone mentioned to me that there were some Yahoo Groups for My Father's World curriculum users. Since I am familiar with and have joined two local Yahoo Groups for homeschoolers I knew already how great it is to have that contact with others, so I decided to check it out. I ended up joining four of the groups!! And I love it... already the I found out that they have a daily detailed lesson plan on the Yahoo Group for Kindergarten (although I have yet to get my computer to cooperate and open the files). After joining the My Father's World Families group (http://groups.yahoo.com/group/MFWFamilies/" I got this via email. It lists all of the Yahoo Groups for MFW! So, I thought I would share it with you all.

"In addition to the group you just joined (MFWFamilies), you may be interested in joining a yahoo group that is specific to the program you are using this year.

Here is MFW's official message board to check out as well
http://board.mfwbooks.com/index.php

Customer run Yahoo Groups for My Father’s World Curriculum MFW Families:

MFW Kindergarten
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/MyFathersWorldKindergarten/

MFW 1st Grade
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/MFW1STGRADE/

MFW Adventures
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/MFWAdventures/

MFW Exploring Countries and Cultures
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/

MFW Creation to the Greeks
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/

MFW Rome to the Reformation
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/MFWRTR/

MFW Exploration to 1850
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/MFW_EX1850/

MFW 1850-MOD
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/MFW_1850MOD/

MFW Curriculum Swap
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/mfwcurriculumswap/

MFW High School
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/MFWHIGHSCHOOL

and if you are using or consider using Workboxes to organize your MFW day, here's a group to see, too
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/MFWworkboxes/ "

Let me know if anyof the links do not work for you, please.