Homeschool Nature Study and More ~

Disclaimer from Journeying with Joy

2012-01-16T11:55:00.001-05:00

Disclaimer...from Journeying with Joy
I'm working on Tapestry of Grace Lesson plans this morning for Year 2 and I often Google TOG to see what other moms/families are doing. Since I have such an ecclectic style of CM and Classical Christian Education, I never know where I'll find ideas and resources that will work for my family.

In the midst of hanging out on this holiday and looking through blogs and resources, I happened across this post from Journeying with Joy . The post really hit home for me and touched my heart so I HAD to share it with you. Take a breath this morning and read it, we could all use this wonderful encouragement!

Eastern Mud Turtle Hatchling

Stay tuned for a new Nature Study post today or tomorrow. It's been TOO long since I posted a good N.S. post and with the arrival of a new "friend" to observe and care for Friday night (a baby Eastern Mud Turtle) it was good timing for one!

Love,
Tiff

Edgar Degas - Artist Study - Impressionism

2011-12-30T16:37:00.000-05:00

Our artist rotation this term will be Degas and Manet. We are beginning Term 2 on Monday when we return from our Christmas break. I'm going to break the study up into 6 weeks each- weeks 11-16 will be devoted to Degas and weeks 17-22 to Manet.

To begin our study of Edgar Degas (day-GAH) (French, 1834-1917),
I took two of the Degas paintings I located free online and sent them to walmart to be processed as photographs. I had them each printed in an 8 x 10 and then I inserted them into these great photo magnet sleeves I found for about $2 and placed them on the fridge. I love this idea, it's inexpensive but everytime my monkeys go into the fridge they will get another look at the artwork. :) Cheap yet effective and you can't beat that!

The two we are starting with (I'm planning to use 3 pieces this way- two weeks each piece) are Ballet Rehearsal On Stage and Racehorses in Front of the Grandstand 1866-68. I downloaded both pieces from Edgar Degas- The Complete Works. You'll find more than enough paintings to choose from on this website. Ambleside Online has their recommendations also if you click here. You will need to scroll down a bit because Degas and Manet were their selected artists for 2002/2003 Term 2.

I wanted a painting that included dancers because it was a favorite subject of Degas and delights my daughters but also something a bit more masculine for my son. I'm not sure he could study ballerinas for the entire six weeks! I haven't decided on the final piece yet. I'm considering letting my children choose it as they study his other works in our books and through the stickers I've purchased them.

We always begin our new artist study with the first piece of art. I'll present the painting (this term it will be Ballet Rehearsal On Stage) and have them all look at it. I'll then tell them a bit about the artist, not the full biography, just some basic facts about him. I'll tell them where he was born and grew up and what years he lived. We'll then talk about his style and with Degas I'll mention that although he didn't consider himself an Impressionist, he was always grouped with them.

Purchase from Dover

The book, "Discovering Great Artists" by MaryAnn F. Kohl & Kim Solga (one of my favorite books that I use again and again) has two very brief introductory paragraphs about Degas on pages 40-41 that I will probably begin with. I don't purchase all of our homeschool books but this is one I did purchase because we use it again and again- I would have no problem recomending this book as a "purchase book" for anyone using the Charlotte
Mason or even the Classical methods. You can purchase it through the link from Amazon. I am an affiliate and I will get credit if you do but that is not why I recommend the book. I like to add that in when I include these amazon links to be upfront. :)

My next step would be to have the children "narrate" the picture to me. This was always fun when they were younger but now that they are a little older (2-3rd graders and a 5th grader) and they've been doing this for a couple of years, I enjoy it even more. They remember so much more and when they begin to compare one artist to another or one painting to another it brings me such true delight. It's those moments that make me praise God for leading me to homeschooling! Simply Charlotte Mason has a paragraph explaining how to have children narrate a picture here.

I'll assign them to read a simple biography about Degas during this time. They will definitely be reading the book, "Getting to Know the World's Greatest Artists ~ Degas" by Mike Venezia. When we first began reading this series a few year's ago, it was difficult to find them in our library but now I've noticed my library has many of them. You could check your local library prior to purchasing. It's an easy to read picture book but chock full of good information and great cartoon drawings that my children have really enjoyed. My 5th grader will still be assigned this book to read (in one sitting of course) for our Degas study.

My plan is to study each picture at least twice a week and narrate each time. At this stage I'm looking for them to know more about the picture with each study time. I'll have them all complete a notebooking page about Degas and my 5th grader will also need to complete a page about each picture. I'm going to have him choose his favorite of the three on the last week of our Degas study and ask him to write a paragraph explaining WHY he chose that picture. You can find free notebooking pages here from Homeschooling with Index Cards free notebooking forms section. A HUGE thank you to this mom who's artist biography form I've used for a couple of years! You can also find artist notebooking page freebies at NotebookingPages.com here.

I will give them the Degas sticker book and split it evenly (very important in my house :)) and let each of them choose thier favorite paintings from the book. They then put those stickers on a notebooking page and label each of them. The sticker book I linked does include two photos that are too close to nude for my comfort so I will remove those two from the book before giving the book to my kids. That leaves 14 pictures so they'll get 4 a piece, still a good deal for $1.50 and it's a great way for them to make the paintings accessible for them to view later (we'll put the notebook page they stick them to and label them on in their art study notebooks.)

We will complete a coloring page of one of Degas' paintings. I normallly let them choose their favorite. I love the color and paint your own ... paintings! What an amazing way to get the mental picture in your mind by working on it yourself!

I have a puzzle that portrays The Dancers I found through Scholastic last year and we'll work on that together throughout the first week or two. My hopes are that the children will form the mental picture Charlotte Mason speaks about concerning art from the time required of them to look at the painting to complete the puzzle. I've posted the link to order it through Amazon but it is more expensive. You'll have to decide it's value to your art study and decide whether or not to purchase it.

We are going to complete two projects from MaryAnn F. Kohl's "Discovering Great Artists." One involves showing movement in their art and the other involves working with chalk on a damp fabric piece. I'm very excited to enjoy these with the kids.

We will create a final project from the "Usborne Art Treasury." This book has a short, one page explanation of the picture, Dancers in Blue, drawn by Dega in 1897. After the informational page there's a project using dark, rough paper and pastels to create their own pastel dancers. I'm going to use this last fun project during our final week of Degas by then I hope they have a solid feel for his work and will create masterpieces in his style.

A brief quote from Degas that can be used for copywork or dictation,
"Painting is easy when you don't know how, but very difficult when you do." ~
Edgar Degas

We'll read other books about Degas from the library. A few I've planned are:

What Makes a Degas a Degas? by Richard Muhlberger
Marie in fourth position: the story of Degas's "The little dancer" by Amy Littlesugar
Degas and the little dancer: a story about Edgar Degas by Laurence Anholt
Degas and the dance : the painter and the petits rats, perfecting their art by Susan Goldman Rubin

I found all of the above titles at my local library so check your library for books on Degas in the juvenile section. I do not make these books "difficult reads" in general because I want to introduce them to the artists and their art and teach them to love, enjoy, and remember it.

For my 5th grader, I've requested the following book from our library:
Meet Edgar Degas / National Gallery of Canada ; [compiled by] Anne Newlands

I have not previewed it yet, I was interested because of the following description:
Presents the life and paintings of Edgar Degas in a first person narrative drawn from letters, notebooks, and people's stories about the artist.
I'm hoping it will be a great opportunity to give my son a taste of using primary resources.

That is our plan so far for our Edgar Degas artist study. Have you planned your next artist study? Is there something fun and engaging you're doing with your children? I'd love to hear about it! I'm always looking for new ideas to keep my children interested!

For more information on picture study in general, Higher Up and Further In has an incredibly organized system set up in her homeschool. You can read more about it here. Love the idea of having all of her children keep their own copies of each piece in a book of art!

Here is some basic biographical information about Degas from Wikipedia.com and some additional product links you might find interesting! Please leave comments and send photos of your own Degas artist studies! I'll be posting our results as well!

Much love,
Tiff

Edgar Degas (19 July 1834 - 27 September 1917), was a French artist famous for his work in painting, sculpture, printmaking and drawing. He is regarded as one of the founders of Impressionism although he rejected the term, and preferred to be called a realist. A superb draughtsman, he is especially identified with the subject of the dance, and over half his works depict dancers. ~
Wikipedia.org

Inspiration

2011-11-17T07:51:00.001-05:00

Inspiration by definition is the stimulation to do creative work, somebody or something that inspires, creativeness, a good idea, or a divine influence.

As homeschoolers we are inspired in innumerable, extraordinary ways. As Christian homeschoolers, we are inspired by "divine influence" through the calling and leadership of our Lord supporting, guiding, and loving us through our journey. We are blessed by the opportunity to cultivate loving, positive relationships for ourselves and our children. I've felt particularly rewarded by the inspiring friendships my children and I have acquired through our lifestyle of home educating.

A popular remark among homeschooling parents is the consummate relationships between children of varying age groups. It is not unusual to witness 9th graders tending to preschoolers or 7th and 4th graders playing games together. Each of the children gaining enjoyment and education from each other, even in their time of play. The benefits reaching the younger children and the older children in life lessons and encouragement.

As a homeschooling mom, I've had the opportunity to gain insights, support, and wisdom from countless other moms I've grown to know and love. We all realize the staggering importance a support system of like-minded and caring families are to the modern homeschooling family.

In the past year my family and I have been particularly fortunate to know and love another homeschooling family that moved to our area. We have become like 2nd family to each other with amazing impact for the kids and parents alike. Just as I mentioned the older children learn from the younger children, adults can benefit from and be educated by the children and young adults the Lord brings into our lives. Our "2nd family" has blessed me with just that situation. A is the daughter of my dear friend and her maturity and compassion for the world at just 13 years old astounds me. I joyously catch glimpses of the world and its abounding opportunities through her young eyes. She is creative, caring, and artistic. A delights me and reminds me a bit of myself at her age - the world still my oyster!

Recently, A wrote an article meant to "inspire" others. I was incredibly moved and inspired by her article. I thought, "If even 1/4 of the 12 thousand viewers who frequent this blog are inspired and sparked by her words... well, then the world is already a better place!" So, A, thank you for the motivation and INSPIRATION! YOU will change this world in astonishing ways!

Now, dear readers, A's article:

Do you think, that when we're old and dying, we'll look back at life and laugh and say, "I got all A's in my senior year?" Or that our only regret will be, "Why didn't I try harder to get into Harvard? Yale? Stanford? Why didn't I become CEO of my company? Why?

No.

When we're old and dying, we'll look back at the memories we made, laugh at them, remembering the good old days. Childhood summers. First loves. True love.

And we'll regret those things we failed to do. Not coming home from work on time. Not being there for our children's big moments. Not taking that trip to Europe. Not asking that big question. Not taking risks. Not coloring outside the lines.

It's the memories that matter. Not the merits. Go out there, and live. Live a life you'll want to look back on. Do crazy things. Risk it all. And love like there's no tomorrow. The possibilities are limitless.

You are limitless.

It's your turn. So go out there. And live.

Author: A. E.

Love,

Tiff

World History- The Middle Ages, Medieval/Early Renaissance, 400-1600 A.D.

2011-10-09T18:25:00.000-04:00

Some great FREE history resources

Middle Ages History-

TWTM Year 2 History

Story of the World Volume 2 Free Resources

Free Lapbook Pages for SOTW Volume 2 created by a homeschooling mom as she teaches her children using the curriculum.

Fantastic Memorization Cards - created by the same mom above. The cards are perfectly aligned to the memory reomendations in TWTM for Year 2 History

Resources from Paula's Archives- an abundance of lists to help plan and use SOTW

List of living books from Penny Gardner to use along with your SOTW reading.

Some other links to free Middle Ages resources

Make Your Own Coat of Arms ~ Not only does this site have amazing (FREE) maps that you can print as large as 7 feet, but it also contains a great software program that allows you to create your own coat of arms and then print it out. You can print it as a single page (8.5 x 11 size) or choose to make it large enough to glue to cardboard and play with by printing it on 4 pages.

They've also included a web page entitled, How to Make an Authentic Medieval Coat of Arms that details the history and use of the medieval coat of arms. Here you will find educational software to create and print an authentic coat of arms and traditional medieval devices for them. There's information on blazonry, or description of one's coat of arms, and simple explanations concerning emblazoning. I'm very excited to work on this project with my kids, especially my son. Learning history while enjoying the opportunity to create his own "identity" is perfect for him.

Make a Paper and Cardboard Medieval Castle

Another model castle, this one is suppose to be from the 13th century located somewhere in the south-west part of France.

How to build a Tatebanko Castle

5 weeks into our school year and Weekly Schedules

2011-10-09T17:21:00.001-04:00

A & Z at the pool

After a FUN summer with friends and family, we're beginning our 5th week of being "back to school." While I love having time to relax and hang out with my sweet children, starting school back is always a welcome back to a more organized schedule.

C at a Global MMA Kickboxing Exhibition

Fall is my favorite season (unless we are at the beach, of course!) The weather is perfect and the colors sing in delight with God's glory here in Virginia. I can't wait for the leaves to begin changing their colors so we can take our annual family vacation to the mountains.

A,B, & C downtown on the 4th of July

It's been exciting starting this year with the kids but as with most years, there are "bugs" to be worked out. C is in 5th grade so it will be his first year (and mine) in the Logic Stage of the Trivium.

A and her doll downtown

After looking at and praying over the past year using the Classical Christian style of education, I find myself yearning again for a more Charlotte Mason style approach. I miss the poetry, the nature study, the art and composer studies. Although all of these CAN be a part of (and some say SHOULD be a part of) the Classical style, it's not the CORE and much more difficult to implement than it was when we were a more strictly CM homeschool.

C at Tae Kwon Do Practice

My goal this year will be to balance those two styles and combine them to make a fit that is right for OUR family. One of the blessings of home education is the flexibility of a mother to make that perfect fit.

A & B at Tea house birthday party.

C at Sheriff's Dept. football camp

I believe it begins with prayer and then meditation on the direction the Lord has for our family. I'm learning (slowly but surely as I can be hard-headed) to be more patient. Things don't have to be decided here and now and not every decision is life or death. :) It's our fourth year home schooling and YES, I just figured this out! Did I mention I was hard headed? I only want what's best for my children's future- as we all do or we wouldn't be homeschooling- but the stress and RUSH of trying to squeeze EVERY single topiI and minute out of our day to accomplish that "perfect" classical christian education has caused me to miss the most important things- those splendid moments of learning and bonding with my sweet children!

C & B at the pool with Friends

I began the year with a schedule that included all that I wanted to cover- not what we NEEDED to cover but everything I WANTED to cover. We began slowly, and I was able to get a feel for how things would work. I found, however, that I have been pushing my 3rd grade dd's as much as my 5th grade son. I had to pray and step back and look again. The girls were becoming frustrated and stressed and that's never a great way to have school! <3 I've been so accustomed to handling so much of the grammar stage together- memory work, history, and science that I had to change my thinking a bit.

A, B, & C at KD with friends.

Five weeks in and I took this weekend (with having Monday off because when my dear husband is home from work for a holiday we take a holiday) and sat down to read parts of , "The Well Trained Mind" yet again. I must have read certain chapters in this book 40+ times each! Yet I find myself going back to it again and again! This year, however, I am also pulling back out my "Charlotte Mason Companion" that I read as many times during our first couple of years of homeschooling. My prayers are that I will glean wisdom from these authors, mothers, homeschooling veterans, and educators those things that will work for our family and create a model which provides solid education, a great love for and desier to better know the Lord, senses of value and kind but strong character, and many joyful memories for my amazing children.

New Nephew, J born on July 4th!

I'm adding the weekly schedules I created for my 3rd graders and 5th grader.

It's a tweak on the schedules we've been using the past couple of weeks. I've rearranged things and split certain things up based on how our days and weeks have resulted thus far after 4 weeks into our school year. I'm certain to continue tweaking and praying over it. I'm just as certain I will do this throughout the rest of our homeschooling careers! <3 As homeschool moms we have to be flexible in order to meet the needs of our households and our children. It is a great joy to be able to spend my life caring for my family! It is also a difficult and time consuming job- one that I wouldn't change! Feel free to use these schedules to assist you in your homeschooling journey.

My goal is to create history schedules and POSSIBLY some literature schedules that will include quality literature from the history time period we are studying. We're focusing on the Middle Ages this year. I've been pulling together resources and looking over different curriculum. I have an eclectic bug that requires I do this! I'm very happy to find some time to blog once again and I will prayerfully be adding many new posts, resource links, notebook pages, photos, and free materials and/or quality materials I come across in our journey. I have missed my dear readers and I look forward to more as we continue on our journey!

Love,
Tiff

Yummy way to stay cool

2011-07-22T17:26:00.000-04:00

PRE heat wave heat

We are in the midst of a record-breaking heat wave here and it's been difficult to stay cool even in the house with air conditioning! I decided it would be an ideal time to complete some of this coming school year's plan while we are cooped up indoors. I'm a bit of a procrastinator! :)

I was reading through the homeschooling blogs and websites I'd tagged here and there that contained information I planned on using when I stumbled upon this great little recipe for a Caramel frappe.

The recipe was put together by the mom from Domessticated. I froze my coffee when I found the recipe about 2 weeks ago. Life happened and I have put off taking the time to make this treat for myself.

With the heat and the fatigue from just being inside for a week, I decided to pull out those frozen bits of energy and give the recipe a try. I hoped they would still be fresh enough to make it a hit.

IT WAS-it is SO heavenly, delicious, gratifying, appetizing, tasteful, scrumptious, sweet, palatable (I'm starting to sound like a grammar student's IEW paper! Just a joke! :) :) No one get upset :))), and COLD that I absolutely HAD to share it!! <3 Thanks and much love to Domessticated and her faithful taste testers because this frappe is beyond "spot on" as she'd hoped! Its perfection in this HOT, HOT southeast mom's kitchen! Muchas gracias amiga!

Love,
Tiff

Friday Photo Bliss

2011-07-02T00:16:00.000-04:00

Inspired by Rita at the CoffeeShop Blog , I'm posting a photo for "Friday Photo Bliss." The goal is to post a photo that makes you smile, makes you happy, the photo from your week that just puts that big, cheesey grin on your face! You know the one! The goofy grin that you get without even realizing it and then when you DO realize it's spread across your face- you look around to see if anyone else sees you sitting there, alone, with that big, funny smile! :) I LOVE that kind of happiness!

So, thank you Rita for such an inspirational idea! My photo this week is of a dear, sweet friend of mine nursing her gorgeous baby. You only see the baby's feet ;) because I noticed her feet first. They were rubbing together :) so comfortably as if she was the most peaceful, happy, and secure infant in the world! Just an amazing moment - a blessing from God that we dont' always take time to notice. I didn't interrupt, I just snapped those sweet, soft little feet from across the way and smiled.

So, that's my Friday Photo Bliss... and here she is... I hope it gives you a big, silly, happy grin! Or at least warms your heart!

Sketch Tuesday - Something that lives in the ocean.

2011-05-09T12:59:00.000-04:00

Sketch Tuesday- Something That Lives at the Beach

Thanks again to Barb (Harmony Art Mom) for another fun week of sketching! This week's Sketch Tuesday was to draw somethig that lives at the beach. Below are the drawings my three children completed for this past week's challenge.

BOLD- Home is where you start from photo contest

2011-05-02T09:58:00.001-04:00

BOLD-

Jenny at Home is where you start from - posted BOLD as her L.E.N.S photo challenge of the week. This photo reminds me of BOLD because my son, C., reminded me of just how BOLD he is when he began body surfing with his uncle this past summer. Thanks Jenny for putting this out and allowing me to participate! If you'd like to enter a photo, visit her blog Home is Where You Start From.

Online Flashcards for Latin Practice

2011-04-26T01:55:00.000-04:00

Online Latin Flashcards

I created some basic flashcards online for Latin lessons 1 & 2 in Prima Latina by Leigh Lowe that I wanted to share. The kids enjoy them for something a little different so I assign them once or twice a week. We are on Lesson 11 now but it's always important to go back and review.

Tweet & See- March (late)

2011-04-22T11:10:00.000-04:00

Tweet & See List for March

Heather at Kingdom Arrows had a great idea she calls, "Tweet & See." We keep a running list of all of the birds we see throughout the month and then submit the list to her blog at the end of each month. It's simple, fun idea and a great way to share our hobby of bird watching. I created a simple, free notebook page to keep track of the birds we see each month. It's easy to pin it to the refrigerator or I make copies for each of us and keep them in the front of our daily notebooks. This month's photos are blurry to say the least. I apologize, I was shooting through the glass doors.

Here is our March list (better late than never this month!)

Apologies for the blurry photo,
it was shot through the sliding glass door.

1. Northern Cardinals (male & female)

2. Blue Jay

3. American Robin (our trusted, constant compaions)

4. Tufted Titmouse

5. Carolina Chickadee

6. House Sparrow

7. Northern Mockingbird (we think!)

8. Slate Colored Junco? (on the ground in the photo below

9. White-breasted Nuthatch? (the bird on the feeder below)

This bird (to the left) is not on our list because we were unsure as to its identity. Comments are welcome if you could provide its name! I'm tempted to identify the bird on the ground as a "slate-colored" junco.

We just moved to our new home in November so we're curious to see how our birding goes this year. We've finally put out our feeders and our bird bath. We've been pleased so far. Although it's a short list, for the amount of time the feeders were out in March, it's a good list and we've developed some "frequent flyers" that are visiting regularly already!

We're so blessed that in the new house, we have sliding glass doors beside the kitchen/school table with a clear view to our "birding area." :) It's so refreshing to have our feathered visitors in view all day!

If you need assistance identifying birds during your birding time, we love the All About Birds website from The Cornell Lab of Ornithology.

Thanks, Heather, for putting this idea together. I know we are going to love it!!

Blessings!

Tiff

Keepers of the Faith & Contenders for the Faith

2011-04-11T10:45:00.004-04:00

A learning to bake a lasagna

Cooking & Baking with my girls...

For several reasons, I have been focusing on reducing the amount of processed foods and chemicals that my family is exposed to. In doing so, I'm so blessed to enjoy such lovely time cooking and baking with my girls. We're having fun with the trials and errors (Dad isn't enjoying the errors so much :)) and most importantly loving each other and the extra time together.

I've had "Keepers of the Home" from Keepers of the Faith for my daughters for about a year but with homeschooling, our hectic schedules, and life in general, we've been a bit "hit or miss" about it. Our new focus on natural and organic foods and cleaners is giving me the opportunity to involve them and work through the KOH program as an added bonus.

B enjoying our lasagna

I thought I'd share our HITS with you :) maybe laugh over some of the misses and blog about how we are accomplishing or failing at using our KOH series! :) If you've not heard of KOH or KOF, you may want to hop over to their website. I also purchased the "Contenders for the Faith" book for my son. It's such a blessing!

The Keepers of the Faith series provides an organized collection of life skills and habits that are important to the spiritual growth of our kids and providing much needed life skills at the same time. Too many children miss out on these things and this a fun and productive way to pass on knowledge to our children.

To have a clearer picture of what skills are taught through these two books, the company has a skills index you might want to peruse.

One of the first skills the girls and I are working on is baking and cooking. What a blessing to be working towards a new, healthier eating style for our family together with my daughters! We have what I considered healthy habits in general but after my daughter, B , recently had a seizure, I have become more focused on cooking and baking from whole foods and purchasing less processed and "put together" grocery items.

Cake we made for C's birthday

It is more time consuming but it's time consumed with my girls! We are spending time in each others company; I'm providing training on necessary skills for them at an early age; they're learning a life long skill to enjoy and use to provide for others; and of course, working towards thier Baking Pin. :) By the way, these motivating little pins cost a whopping $2.50! :) It's an economical way to reward them for hard work!

Two of our first very succesful baking attempts were Fresh Zucchini Muffins and a Whole Wheat Bread. Not only did the girls and I find them delicious, but Dad and brother did as well! A & B were blushing with pride and excitement as they watched the "boys" devour thier hard work! Instilling this godly confidence in them was a rewarding and touching experience!

Here are the two recipes we used. I'm hoping to continue blogging about our amazing experiences and sharing recipes, craft ideas, and what does and doesn't work!

Love,
Tiff

Sketch Tuesday with Barb (Harmony Art Mom)

2011-03-22T14:32:00.000-04:00

This past week's Sketch Tuesday was "Jewels". Here are what my children created for this assignment. Sketch Tuesdays are a lot of fun and a great "reason" for taking some creative time out and getting in some drawing practice. Find out more at Barb's (Harmony Art Mom) site.

Here is Briana's Sketch- A ruby ring with pearls on either side ;).

Alyssa's was a bit different. She couldn't help sketching pets in her picture somewhere. She always finds a way to add them in so she sketched a girl with her dogs. I asked her what that had to do with jewelry and she said, "Mom! ;) The girl is wearing earrings, bracelets, and a neckalce and the dogs are wearing jewels on their collars."

I think my son had the most difficult time with this week's sketch. :) He's a boy's boy so to speak and jewels are not his area of focus. In the end, we had a comprimise. He sketched jewels but in his way.

Art Project - Visitor Guide

2011-03-17T06:52:00.000-04:00

Weekly Schedules & School/Chore Charts for Mom & Kids

2011-02-04T16:40:00.004-05:00

Week 11 in our homeschool... As usual, :) we didn't finish ALL that Mom had planned because as homeschoolers, life happens, we had two kiddos who picked up a nasty virus, and I tend to overbook us. However, we did have a great time and enjoyed our studies on Ancient India. I hope you find some of the information and ideas useful. I also created new chore/school charts for my kids and I'm posting them for anyone who might like to use them.

Math-
We had basic lessons this week, nothing fancy.
Saxon 5/4 for C - my 9 yo 4th grader
Saxon 2 for A & B- my 7 yo twin 2nd graders

Spelling
C- MCP Spelling Workout D Lesson 21- we are still working our way through it and doing well, I wanted to be in E by now but things happened (another post) that put us behind by almost a month this year. :) We are moving forward and he'll do fine. He's a solid speller as long as I review the rules well.
A & B - MCP Spelling Workout B Lesson 18 which is a Review of Lessons 13-17.

Memory Work -
All three work through a set of flashcards I set up for them each week. I handwrite most of our flashcards because I include several subjects. I handwrite Latin, Grammar, Science, Poetry, and I use the Saxon flashcards for math and SOTW Review cards for review of history. They each take a few moments daily to look through their flashcards. They don't mind this, they are all in the Grammar Stage (my son in Upper Grammar and the girls in Lower) and seem to enjoy their time practicing their flashcards. When they master something they've been working on, such as The Sanctus in Latin, they come running to show me. I find it amazing that they are capable of the memory work they complete with little effort from me and truly an easy effort from them. I do want to put more focus on their memory work and spend more of my time practicing with them but for what I've put into it we have had amazing results. This is one of the reasons I became sold on TWTM. SWB and JB couldn't have been more correct in their assessment of children at this stage of learning.

A practicing with her memory cards on the stairs.

Grammar
C- First Language Lessons Level 4- We worked together through Lessons 15-17. He seems to enjoy diagramming the sentences. He's NOT a strong auditory learner so he tunes out sometimes during my oral part of the lesson but he enjoys his turn. I'm considering Rod & Staff for him.

A & B- First Lanuage Lessons Level 2 - I wouldn't change this choice for the world. My girls do amazing with this program and they enjoy our lessons together. We worked through 113-115 and practiced several of the poems they memorized previously.

Writing

C- Dictation x 3 days and IEW's Ancient History Writing Lessons x 2 days -we worked on Lesson 2 of the IEW AH. He added strong verbs to the lines on page 13. I gave him section one and two (1 section per day as recommended in the Teacher's Guide) but he enjoyed it so much that he chose to complete all three and I didn't stop him.

I have been back and forth on which writing curriculum to use. Writing is probably the subject I'm most nervous about teaching. I have read book after book and blog after blog on the different curriculum choices and recommendations. I was against using IEW based on comments from well educated friends on the overuse of dress ups. My son also took a short course of an IEW theme book at our co-op and by the end of the course did not like it at all.

I had decided to go with Writing with Ease because I liked FLL and felt so comfortable with TWTM. I also liked that it was similar to the CM method of language arts with the dictation and copywork. We did well with WWE. My son took to it and completed the assignments with me. He learned a lot about putting "pen to paper" and how to narrate written and orally. However, after a year and a half of this, he seemed to become bored and not look forward to writing. I began to wonder if he was "ready" to try something else. Rather than purchase another expensive program, I remembered I had IEW's Ancient History Theme set on our bookshelf. I brought it out to try it and he loved it.

I believe this is going to be an area where I may need to tweak and change things as we go along to make the right "fit" for our family and my children. It's going to leave "gaps" (please see Barb from Harmony Art Mom's blog post about this) and I do worry about that but I also worry about making writing drudgery. Yes, it's something they have to do and yes they don't have to love it but if changing things up a bit with another solid course help him to love it AND teach him the foundational skills he needs - I'm on board.

A & B - Writing with Ease Level 2- the girls are following in their brother's footsteps with WWE Level 2 and excelling. I do love this program for the younger students. I definitely recommend it as a starting program- and I plan to continue it through at least 3rd with them. It's solid on narration and copywork and this week they started dictation for the first time. It was just like when my son was their age. It began a bit slow but they were giddy when we were finished and quite proud that they had completed it correctly. We completed WWE Week 12, Days 1-4.

Cursive- A, B, & C- Worksheet with cursive practice each day that I printed from Donna Young's Big Cursive page. I LOVE this website. I learned from her website that learning cursive writing does not take an expensive curriculum but rather a LOT of practice. I print out two sets of pages per week. This week I printed out the "bf" and the "AC". I printed two sheets of each and placed them in my children's chore/school work folders. They take the paper to the table when they are ready for cursive. I show them how to form the letters on the first line and then they practice. The kids bring me their page when they are finished. I'll give them pointers and if I think they need to (usually on the first day they work on a new letter set at least) I send them back to the table to practice a few more with my advice.

I created a sheet that helps me to keep track of their progress. With this sheet I check off letter combinations once I feel they have mastered them. The ones that need more work I'll put an X on and that lets me know to print more copies of that letter for next week's work. Once they master a set I still print copies of that set for practice every couple of weeks. Once we are finished with the letter sets and everyone has a good grasp of them, I'll move on to Donna Young's new Cursive Words Printables. She has an extroidnary website with a lot of free printable resources for homeschoolers. I can't imagine the work she's put into this website for the rest of us to benefit from. For handwriting alone, she has other helpful resources such as cursive animations and how to create your own cursive worksheets.

Latin-
C, A, & B- Prima Latina Lesson 5 (C only- completes coordinating workbook pages) & (all) memory flashcards. We use the Prima Latina Latin for now and when we are complete we will continue on to the Christina Latina. The children watched the DVD for Prima Latina Lesson 5 (on the way to a practice in the car - it's a fantastic use of travel time and they pay attention becuase there's nothing else to do :). I practice along with them. I usually make up the flashcards to go with the lesson while they are at whatever practice we are heading to with just some index cards and markers and put them into their memory card boxes.

Currently, C is the only one using the workbook pages. It's just too much writing IMHO for the girls. I'd rather they focus thier writing on their copywork and dictation, narrations, and penmanship. They have plenty of time for workbooks. I may even go through Prima Latina with the girls again next year before starting them in the Latina Christina with their brother. Anything they pick up (and so far it's been a lot of vocabulary and the Sanctus) is a wonderful bonus that will help them move through it next year faster.

B, A, & C building their Indus Valley from Legos

History- all together
We use a combination of SOTW, VP, & TOG + living books. I plan on sticking closely with SOTW & the SOTW Activity book. We really enjoy SOTW and after purchasing the other curriculum, we're sticking with SOTW. I'm not sure we'd enjoy it as much without the SOTW Activity Guide. It's well worth the cost IMHO.

This week's focus was Ancient India. We had a lot of fun with it. I had more planned than we were able to accomplish unfortunately, due to a flu virus that didn't want to go away but I feel strongly they learned some great history facts and a solid "peg" as they call them in TWTM to hang thier facts on later.

Day 1- We read aloud SOTW Ch. 9 together and the children colored the SOTW coloring pages from the Activity Guide while I read.

Some of our friends choose not to do this, they don't think thier children are absorbing the information. I find that the movement they get from the coloring pages keeps their hands busy (yes even my 9 yo- sometimes especially him) and since coloring doesn't require incredible thinking skills, they still pay attention to what I'm reading. If they do not, I'll know because the next thing I do is narrate and review.

We use the Review Questions and Narration prompts from the SOTW Activity Guide to discuss what we just read.

Next, we completed the mapwork from the Activity Guide and then my children used these free notebooking pages to write a brief narration from one of the sections we read.

Day 2: Usborne Internet Linked Encyclopedia of World History - pages 118-119

We reviewed the Test from SOTW Ch. 9. orally. I like these tests for this. Sometimes, like this past week, I'll use it for a Jeopardy type game. My kids love this. Our prize this past week was an extra 15 minutes of "screen" (tv or video game or computer game) time during the weekend. We have a lot of fun with this. I am not administering these tests as traditional tests yet although I may with my son later in the year. Right now, they are just a wonderful help to me for review fun.

We completed the lapbook piece about the castes of Ancient India and had a long discussion about these. You can download these free from this blog. The lapbook is currently the third item down on the list, it's listed as Featured. The blog I linked for the lapbook pieces is The Chronicle of the Earth and she has posted many helpful resources and links for using SOTW. I have bookmarked her page for future use!

Day 3: Read aloud, Exploration into India by Anita Ganeri
The kids built their own Indus River Valleys out of Legos. The photos are not that good, I wasn't paying attention to my camera. It was a quick photo so we could move them off of the table and get dinner on it. :) I'm sure you've had those evenings.

Our goal was to also make a Pachisi Board for this week but with two sick kids some of the hands on things didn't get completed. Not because I believe they are any less important, but because we have co-op on Thursdays so I schedule a lot of them for Thursday afternoons and for Fridays. I leave that afternoon free for the hands on things because they are tired from being in co-op all morning. I also feel much of the other things are covered for the day already during thier classes. Should you want to make a Pachisi Board with your children for studying Ancient India (we may still do it) here's a great link at Crayola. It looks fairly simple and we already had the materials here (I'm a craft fanatic). Pachisi Board Instructions.

Structured/Scheduled Reading

The kids read books during their "Structured Reading" time about history. I always try to include as many Independent Readers as I can. I believe by listening to me read AND reading on thier own, they will absorb and remember more information. I love when I'm reading and one of them mentions something they also read in a book on their own.

Here is a list of the books they read this past week:

The Story of Little Babaji by Helen Bannerman

One Grain of Rice by Demi

Savitri by Aaron Shepard

The Tiger and the Brahmin

9 Animals & The Well by James Rumford

The Monkey & The Crocodile by Paul Galdone

The Sacred River by Ted Lewin

Buddhist Stories by Anita Ganeri
Once a Mouse by Marcia Brown

The non-fiction reader I found for them was:

National Geographic Investigates: Ancient India: Archaeology Unlocks the secrets of India's past by Anita Dalal
They only read selected chapters of this book that I chose for them. We read some basic information on Hinduism and Buddhism but I did not want to delve into too many details. I wanted my children to be aware of other religious practices and why they are not what we believe to equip them for future discussions but I did not want to press too much of it upon thier young minds. This was purely a personal family choice and how much and what you read or have them read is entirely up to you. Many of the books contain Buddhist and Hindu stories but I chose to present them as I would any fable or fairy tale.

Science -

We admittedly had a weak week in the science arena. All good intentions were not achieved. The kids did read a bit about volcanoes in Usborne's Finding Out About Everyday Things. They're also working through a Magic Tree House Research Guide, Tsunamis. I also printed some pages from Enchanted Learning on tsunamis and volcanoes. We had plans on using a small science kit to create our own underwater mountain and errupting volcano from a Super Science kit I purchased from Scholastic. I could not find the item on their website to link it for you but here is a photo of the box and I will post photos when we complete this project in the upcoming week. Many of us remember how to make volcanoes with baking soda and vinegar from when we were children but for those who don't, here's a link.

Music- Music & Art (my favorite subject) did not get the time they deserved this week either. It's unfortunate but we will hop back on track next week. As we are studying Mozart, we did have time to listen to Mozart this week. The kids listened while they were doing thier chores and one night asked if they could play it in thier rooms quietly at bedtime. I was secretly thrilled at this but let them believe it was a treat :) anyway. It worked wonders! Our goal is, at a minimum, to listen twice a week for 30 minutes. With the time we spend in the car and the inexpensive tape players I purchased for the kids' rooms we can normally complete this goal and more for the listening piece. I have decided this is the most important part and the rest we will strive for (reading the bios, coloring pages, and completing notebook pages) but I at least want them to develop an ear for good music.

That was our Week 11. I'm rearranging and planning Week 12 to make up for the short days and the one day that we just decided we were all (including mom) too tired and cranky and ill to do any of it. I look forward to posting our Week 12 update next week!

Enjoy your children and the blessings your homeschool brings you this week!

Love,
Tiff

Story of the World Volume I - General Resources

2010-10-29T11:58:00.001-04:00

If you've read my blog at all, you know that I have a strong lean towards the Charlotte Mason style of education. I initially began blogging to share our journey of Nature Study in the CM style.

As my son has become a bit older I was blessed to read "The Well Trained Mind" by Jessie Wise and Susan Wise Bauer. I felt a connection to the thoughts of these amazing ladies and began attempting to merge both styles of education (TWTM being more of a Classical style).

It has not been easy and I have struggled with curriculum choices. In a recent post I discussed this and have decided to merge what I love about each style into a curriculum that works best for my family.

In his book, "Home Schooling: The Right Choice : An Academic, Historical, Practical, and Legal Perspective", Christopher Klicka discusses delight centered learning and the biblical call for it. I HIGHLY recommend this book if you've not read it. I found quite a bit of peace in the entire book but in particular the chapter about delight directed education. This is very different from unschooling.

With this information in my heart I have begun to compile lessons in the same eclectic style I used with Charlotte Mason. I want my children to have the grammar stage foundation as prescribed by a Classical Christian education but I also want them to have a "wide and varied" education as directed by Miss Charlotte Mason. My desire to use all of their senses and learning modalities plays a role in my decisions as well.

Although it is more work to gather the materials and plans I know it will be the best educational fit for my children. The Lord calls us to instruct faithfully, "She speaks with wisdom, and faithful instruction is on her tongue." (Proverbs 31:26) and work diligently, "She watches over the affairs of her household, and does not eat the bread of idleness." (Proverbs 31:27), "She sets about her work vigorously; her arms are strong for her tasks." (Proverbs 31:17).Chronological List of Jim Weisse Audio

As I write and organize our lesson plans and pull together resources, I thought I would share them. I have found so many Godly women online who have graciously shared their hard work and "discoveries" and I want to do the same. They have saved me time and efforts so my prayer is that someone else might find use out of the links, resources, and schedules I put together here.

I am including a list of resources and links that I located for use with SWB's "The Story of the World" Volume 1. I pray you will find some or all of them to be as helpful as I have! These are general resources to start but I will be posting our schedules as we go for History as well as Music, Science/Nature Study, Literature, and Art.

I pray you and your family are blessed by the Lord's presence in your homeschool today!

Love,
Tiffany

Some General Resources for "The Story of the World" that I have found helpful. Most of these are for Volume 1 but there are some that are for the other volumes as well.

FREE!! Story of the World Volume I Planning & Workbook Pages created by Kay Barre - 2 days/week format- why recreated the wheel? :) This was such a blessing to me! Many thanks to the author!

Sonlight Book List organized into the Trivium Stages as recommended by "The Well Trained Mind"

FREE! Timeline to use for SOTW or any history curriculum. I also use this with my children to add authors, musicians, composers, artists, and scientists!

Great printable card game created by a homeschooling mom for use with SOTW Volume 1 and posted to her blog The Chronicle of the Earth. She also has many other resources for SOTW Volume 1 and 2 available.

Historical Movies & Documentaries for SOTW Volume 1 listed by the mom mentioned above. PLEASE review first for appropriate content for your family and children. I have not reviewed all of these and every family has different views and levels of appropriateness.

Book lists to complement SOTW by Chapter from mom above.

Remembering what's important

2010-10-14T16:43:00.000-04:00

We ended last week with a trip to a local museum on Friday with our Co-op. Although we are not currently studying American History, I always try to attend as many field trips as our schedule allows. It's a wonderful time for fellowship for the kids and myself and they always learn something whether we are in that cycle or not.
The day was beautiful here, the humidity gone, the wind a gentle breeze, and great light from the sun. I took advantage of the weather and the crowd-less downtown area to get some photos of my kids. I haven't had the time (or taken the time maybe?) to do sessions with them for awhile and we really enjoyed it. They wanted to keep going when it was time to get home and start dinner. I realized I did too.

It was an awesome reminder of the important things in my life and why I began to home educate my children. I want to spend time with them, not just time teaching them, but time enjoying them and getting to know them and their personalities.

As I have been reviewing our schedules, I am pleased with the educational work we are accomplishing but not as pleased with the "quality" time we are spending together. All of us (myself included) have seemed a bit more easily frustrated and tired the past couple of weeks. I wondered if we just need to adjust to "school" being full time or if I need to adjust our schedule.

Of course, this means leaning on the Lord and praying about it. I have found myself so incredibly busy that I forget that it's not my decisions to make- that I must take time out to TRULY pray and TRULY lean on the Lord for His wisdom and understand that it is He that is in control, not I.

My twin girls.

With that, I leave you with scripture I often find encouraging and some beautiful photos from our peaceful afternoon.

Remember why we homeschool and enjoy your children today!

More photos of our walk.

Curriculum 2010/2011 Decisions

2010-09-05T16:03:00.000-04:00

Our Curriculum Choices for 2010/2011

Ch- 9 years old (JUST turned)

A & B- 7 years old

Language Arts:

Spelling- We are using Modern Curriculum Press' Spelling Workout. In the past, I have used McGuffey's Spelling Lists and created a schedule of my own. I have also used Natural Speller. Both of these are great programs for spelling. I wanted to simplify our Spelling. I wanted to spend less time than the children on their Spelling assignments!

I read about MCP's Spelling Workout in "The Well Trained Mind" and it fit the bill. It is a workbook, however, there isn't TOO much writing involved and it requires less than a page a day. I do not use the writing suggestions as they do not fit my taste or philosophy so we skip over that. My 8 year old son (9 years old in 3 days!) is finishing Level D from last year and will move on to Level E in a few weeks. My 7 year old daughters are using Level B and are beginning on the 4th lesson as we completed a few lessons sporadically over the summer.

Grammar-

A & B - 7 years old- First Language Lessons of the Well Trained Mind - Level 2

Ch- 9 years old - First Language Lessons for the Well Trained Mind - finishing up Level 3 and then beginning Level 4

This was one of my more difficult decisions this year. I was back and forth between programs for Grammar and Writing. My children have not had much formal Grammar up until this point because we were adhering closer to the Charlotte Mason philosophy which does not recommend early formal grammar. Due to this, I was hesitant and unsure about which program to use.

My son is not as strong in auditory learning as he is in visual and kinesthetic. This caused concerns about First Language Lessons for me as it is primarily oral for Level 1 & 2. After hesitantly trying Level 2 with him last year and seeing his eyes glaze over everytime I tried to repeat things three times, I decided to move him into Level 3. Level 3 does have worksheets for each lesson which he appreciates. I appreciate that it is not TOO much writing which seems to make him frustrated.

I worry still that he is not "getting" enough out of the program. It is not that the curriculum does not CONTAIN enough grammar information, it does. My concern is if MY SON is absorbing enough of the material based on his own learning style and personality. He doesn't seem to mind the curriculum anymore. He rather enjoys circling and underlining in his copy of the program. He even tolerates the "say it three times" now that we have laughed about it and talked about it helping him to memorize the information. He usually chimes in, however, while I'm reading my section 3 times rather than waiting for me to read it three times and then us reading it three times together. If it is not the first day of memorizing and repeating a rule than we don't always repeat it as often as the book recommends. He just doesn't seem to respond to saying it 9 times. I believe all programs - even the best of them - have to be tweaked for the child.

I purchased Shurley English and have spent quite a bit of time looking through it and considering it, I just think it is A LOT for what they are getting. My son is very bright but his attention span is not terribly long. He's not "unusual" according to my pediatrician for an 8 (almost 9 year old) boy - just a typical boy of his age. I'm afraid the SE will make him bonkers (and possibly me!) He did ask me one day if I had any songs to help him remember the parts of speech. My friend taught IEW at our Co-op and taught the kids some jingles for simple parts of speech that he enjoyed. He does NOT enjoy the long, drawn out songs such as the ones in SE. As a matter of fact, the Veritas Press songs I was so excited to purchase him just made him laugh at me! :) It needs to be fairly short and to the point.

My friend taught him "Verb, verb - action word!" I guess he's looking for quick memory rhymes versus songs. I'm considering looking at some of the Grammar Songs CDs.

We are going to move forward for now with the First Language Lessons Level 3 and probably move quickly so as not to bore him.

Reading:

A & B- Both of my girls are proficient readers. I am still determined to read through The Ordinary Parent's Guide to Reading with them. Practice makes perfect, and certainly won't hurt anything. They find it easy but don't complain, partly because it is private, one on one time with mom where they can show off thier "skills". I am considering taking 5 minutes a day to briefly review it with my son as well. I am not using it to replace anything and adding 5 minutes of reading practice to our day will not seriously throw off our schedule.

The other nice thing is I purchased the .pdf version and placed it in a 3 ring binder. Not only was it a bit cheaper, I can also just take the page or two out that I want to practice with them for that day and lay it in my planner. This allows me to take it with us without the bulk of a reading curriculum or heavy textbook. I did not purchase the .pdf version for this reason. I actually purchased the .pdf (admittedly!) for the instant gratification of having the program THEN and THERE! :) This explains my love for Currclick!

This past week, for our first "week of school" I took it with us to music lessons and quietly went through it with the girls while their brother was in guitar lessons. It was perfect! It was casual and fast but I felt good that we had that few minutes for practice.

My children also are required to read daily. I assign different books for the girls and Chance sometimes but with thier reading ability I am finding that I can probably assign them the same book more often. I set a longer time for reading for my son than my daughters but they will often ask if they can read another chapter or "just a few more pages" so they exceed him.

I believe my daughters caught the "book bug" from me. I could read for hours on end. My son did not. I have taken a lot of advice from other homeschoolers on types of books to provide him. I take him to the library with me and allow him to choose books. I check out and purchase books for him more often than my daughters because I am trying to find that ONE that will call to him. I believe the Lord makes us all unique, however, and for good reason. My son is just an active boy. He will grow to be a strong and active man. He will be an amazing provider for his family and his wife will love it! He just may never choose a book over football or martial arts or a book over building something. He would rather RAISE the ferrets and bearded dragons than to read about them! The trick for me is to find that interest in his sports or nature studies and grab books for that and continue to assign his reading. School is not always going to be what they WANT to do over all else. I can't blame him, I would rather be painting or reading than washing dishes :)! My goal is to continue with his assigned times and stick to it. He is an obedient child, thank the Lord so it's not a problem. I may find him one day sitting and reading a book without having it assigned to him but for now I am blessed by him and WHO he is! He will grab "how-to" books and care guides when he needs them, the literature will come from his education. That's a part of it, isn't it?

Assigned reading-

A & B- 30 minutes

Ch- 30-45 minutes.

I am not STRICTLY adhering to this. If they finish a history biography in 20 minutes, we will discuss and make a notebook page on the book, I will not go hunting down another book to "fill up" the missing 10 minutes! These guidelines I set to help me choose how much reading to assign the kids. I am tweaking it as I go, assigning chapters or pages based on how long I think it will take them and we'll move from there. I will watch for frustration levels AND enjoyment levels.

My son enjoys biographies and Usborne books with a lot of great history illustrations and building information. He loves battles and heroes. He might not want to read as much of "Tara" as he does the others. He may take longer to get through that book due to lack of interest and I will adjust for that. The same goes for my daughters. They might find the chapters on war boring and emerse themselves in the romance and family sections. Again, it is going to be a constant change.

I will be posting a list of the books I'm assigning them very soon. I will also be posting books from thier fun reading time.

Fun Reading- I am asking them to read on their own, an approved book of thier choice daily:

Our goal is for:

A & B- 30-60 minutes

Ch- 60 minutes.

All of my notes above from assigned reading on this time limit is the same.

I thought that I would allow them to "blog" about their fun reading books. I am going to try to start a page for each of them to do this. A book review/report is a great way to keep them motivated. They love to share with other children and maybe once we are organized and consistent about it, I'll be able to post it on our blog and other children can chime in with thier own book likes and dislikes! :) hint! hint! Moms!

Phonics Practice-

A & B- Finish Explode the Code Book 4 and move into MCP Level C

Ch- Finish MCP Word Study D & possibly move into E - only 1x per week now on day he does not have a spelling page to complete.

Writing-

A & B -

Letter Writing- 2 x month

We are going to start the year strong with writing letters. It was a "side note" in our writing last year. We wrote get well cards for sick friends which were more illustrations and crafts than writing. I am striving for 2 letters per month from the girls.

Writing with Ease & The Complete Writer - Level 2

We discovered and began using WWE and TCW last year towards the end of the year. We were only able to get about 4 weeks done before our year completed. I did enjoy it for them because I was already doing a lot of oral narration and copywork from our Charlotte Mason roots. I contribute my daughters' ability to pen well to this as well as their ability to narrate well for thier age. They still have certain material that is more difficult than others simply because they have a harder time paying attention if it doesn't intrigue them. I've read this is normal.

It's so interesting to compare their level with my son's. He is just as bright as his sisters but with very different strengths. Much of it is the Lord's design of him for his path in life compared to my daughters. However, I find that it is also due to his almost two years in public school - 2 of the most crucial early years- Kindergarten and much of 1st grade when we began homeschooling. I continually remind myself of this when I become nervous or concerned about my ability to home educate them. When I'm floudering between this curriculum and that I remember that the girls are doing great and I didn't use any SET curriculum per say but an old fashion philosophy. It always brings me back to reality!W

We are going to skip the rest of WWE Level 1 because they already are so proficient at copywork. There will be days when they do more copywork than narration but I'd like to follow the WWE 2 - I think it corresponds well with FLL Level 2 that way and I think my daughters are capable of handling it.

One thing I've found that I want to attempt to change this year, however, is how much of the WWE workbook we use. I purchased it (again in .pdf so I can print it out for BOTH girls -I have twins) for those weeks that are busy (most weeks lol but busiser than others) and days that I get caught working with them on something longer than expected or the regular life things come up. It's great to have when I need it. It's an excellent source for the material in TCW. I, personally, am going to try very hard to find material from our history, science, and literature to use instead of the material from the workbook. This is just a personal choice. I believe in falls in line more with Susan Wise Bauer's writing philosophy. I listened to my MP3 of her writing workshop/seminar again yesterday and I think her plan was to incorporate writing into other subjects and not make it, its own "beast". I do understand and appreciate the reason for the workbook as well. I suspect I will use it more than I would like to but I know that when we do they are still getting the same material and writing skills they would otherwise. It's my back up plan!

I also will try to post how that works for me as we go throughout our year and any great narration and dictation ideas I find from our literature as they could help others!

Writing-

Ch- The Complete Writer- Level 4 section as spine-text for narrations and dictations - 2-3 x per week

(using History, Science, & Literature as mentioned above for my daughters but using Level 4 activities)

Writing Strands 3 - 2x per week- we have not used this before so we are giving it a try. He enjoys being creative so we will see how it goes and tweak the program and time spent on it as we go.

Penmanship- A & B- 5 minutes per day -

until they master cursive and then it will be included in daily writing versus being a seperate "subject" to cover.

I want to begin cursive writing with the girls right away. They both mastered penmanship well which I attribute to their home school only educations. They were never in public school as thier brother was. I have also learned that I made a mistake by not teaching my son cursive sooner. His Spelling book transitioned into cursive before he was ready which gave him some trouble. I ended up writing the words in manuscript beside those in cursive until he was comfortable with it. I have also learned since that it would be easier on a child whose fine motor skills are not completely developed for writing to write in cursive rather than in manuscript. Live and learn I suppose, my poor first born!

That sums up our Language Arts Plan beginning this school year for 2010-2011. I hope it has helped someone to decide for or against an idea or program. I will be posting our book lists and plans for the remaining subjects very soon! Thanks for spending some time reading!

Many Blessings to you All!

Tiffany

A New Year of Learning, Living, and Loving!! I am FINALLY excited!

2010-08-25T11:24:00.000-04:00

A new school year quickly approaches and I'm finally excited! I should have been excited from the beginning but I have prayed this summer and struggled with what I wanted for my children in terms of their education! I do not mean strictly academic either, so as I've went through my decisions and leaned on the Lord for his strength and understanding I've began the journey of finalizing decisions! Amen! That is the most difficult part for me and I'm so happy that we are moving on to the next step of gatherning materials and making the actual plans!

Join me over this next week or so as I FINALLY put it on paper (and computer!) and share what I am planning on using, how we are hoping to use it, and all of my other revelations and rantings! :)

I pray you may find an idea, book, or curriculum that maybe you'd not heard of or thought of before and that my crazy, mixed up mind will assist someone else! Ideas and comments are very much welcome and appreciated!

I am discovering the pages tab for blogspot so bare with me as I attempt to organize the ideas and thoughts! Hopefully you will find most of the information to the right in the sidebar under Pages. :)

Off we go!

Much love & blessings to you all!
Tiffany

Great Online Math Resource

2010-06-16T09:31:00.008-04:00

First, I apologize that I've been "offline" for so long. Our family has been through some trials and tribulations and unfortunately, as the Lord would have it - the blog is at the bottom of the priority list in those valleys.

Second- I am praying to share a lot of the information on projects and units that we've completed during this time posted soon. It will be scattered and out of order probably but I truly enjoying sharing the things that did and did not work for us with you all!

Especially our Nature Studies!

Here is a fun math program that was shared on a yahoo group this morning that I wanted to pass along. We use A Beka for our math curriculum and my 8 year old was practicing long division already. He understands the concepts well (thank the Lord!) but I found that it was frustrating because he didn't have all of his multiplication facts memorized as well as I would like.

To move forward in math - its my humble opinion that having those times tables memorized makes everything else so much smoother. When I say memorized, I mean truly memorized so that it's an instant image or answer in his mind without any thought to it. That leaves his thought process and concentration free to work the long division or word problem at hand without the mental "workout" of first mentally doing the multiplication.

There are many debates on whether software is good or bad for children. I personally believe that #1 computers are not going anywhere so the children require proficiency in them for their future. #2- If my son's learning style is not the traditional auditory style- adding some math "games" or software to assist him in learning the basic facts so we can continue on with a higher level of mathematics understanding later on (especially moving into the logical/dialectic stage) then I'm all for it. Most all classical programs use chants, flashcards, and games so why not software?

I prefer to teach him myself so I am comfortable with how and what he's learning but for the basic memorization facts - I'm comfortable in my choice of using some "helps" including software.

I posted the link above for a great (and most importantly FREE from what I've looked through so far) online program called Math is Fun that helps with different phases of math. Use it at your discretion, I have not ventured through the entire site - only what I'm looking for currently which is the multiplication tables.

I like that the site master/author has printable tables for the child to use and also several pages of tricks and ideas to help master these tables! I'm printing the tricks and hints page out for myself so I can read over it and use some of them one on one with my son and see if they help!

Many blessings and check back soon for more updated Nature & Unit Studies!

Artist Study- Claude Monet- Impressionism

2010-04-17T14:07:00.000-04:00

Impressionism was named after one of Monet's paintings, "Impression Sunrise" painted in 1873.

Monet Quotes:
"No one is an artist unless he carries his picture in his head before painting it and is sure of his method and composition."

"What could be said about me -- a man to whom only his painting matters? And of course his garden and his flowers as well."

"What I need most of all is color, always, always."

"Gardening was something I learned in my youth when I was unhappy. I perhaps owe having become a painter to flowers." --- Claude Monet

Monet's Biography and gallery of paintings.

Claude Monet in Giverny

Literature:

"Linnea in Monet's Garden"

Moving Beyond the Page has a Literature Guide and Unit Package to conincide with "Charlotte in Giverny"

"Charlotte in Giverny"

Getting to Know the World's Greatest Artists, Monet
Monet Video

I love the Venezia "Getting to Know" series. Mike Venezia combines charictures with the artists' paintings and a delightful, short biography on the life of the artist. It is a perfect book for the elementary aged young artist.

Venezia also rounds out this series with other "Getting to Know" books including composers, scientists, and presidents. I have personally used his composer book on Bach and my children found it to be as entertaining as his artist series.

Free online resources and Printables:
Jimmie's awesome Monet Squidoo lense
Monet Notebooking Page
Mystery Painting- Monet's Waterlillies
Monet Lapbooking Pages
Claude Monet's River Scene at Bennecourt Notebooking Page

Coloring Pages:

Coloring Page of "The Boardwalk at Trouville" and the Full Color Masterpiece.

Coloring Page of "The Luncheon" and the full color masterpiece.

These were samples provided by Dover Publications from their "Color Your Own " Series. Please see below for their resources. I absolutely love Dover Publications for thier inexpensive but useful art and literature resources!

Inexpensive Resources - Our Favorites:

Art Masterpieces to Color

"Color Your Own Impressionist Paintings"

"Color Your Own Monet Paintings"

"Monet: 16 Art Stickers"

"Monet Paintings 24 Cards"

"Six Monet Cards"

Christian Classical Education and the Lord's calling

2010-04-17T10:28:00.001-04:00

Isaiah 54:13 ~"And all thy children shall be taught of the LORD; and great shall be the peace of thy children."I feel both called and blessed to be a homeschooling mom. I don't think there is anything more important I could do with my life than to care for, love, and educate my children.

(Proverbs 22:6~ "Train up a child in the way he should go: and when he is old, he will not depart from it.")It is not always easy. I struggled, especially the first year with decisions and curriculum and whether they were doing okay. Then l I realized that I need to "Let go and Let God".

When I let go I discovered a teaching and homeschooling method that was a perfect fit for us.

We began using a Charlotte Mason style to educate our children. It is not perfect, I will never claim to school my children JUST as Ms. Mason did or as she called for. I am still learning along with the children. The use of narration, REAL living books, nature study, composer and artist study, copywork, and the gentle art of her methods just FIT us. It helped make us all more relaxed and happy.

Intially, we homeschooled almost strictly according to the Charlotte Mason methods. The growth and education of my children using these methods astounds me! I have been amazed constantly that this glorious, NATURAL method of living and learning has worked so exceedingly well!

Recently, we began adding a Christian Classical style of education. I was hesitant at first because I did not have a full understanding of the Christian Classical model. I was suprised, once I began reading and researching this style, to find it quite similar to the approaches I have used in studies with the CM principles.

There are only a few (although important) differences in the two styles that I can see. Many believe (see Karen Glass' article on "The Well Trained Mind" forum) that because Sayer's essay, "The Lost Tools of Learning" was written long after Ms. Mason that she might agree with the differences in the Christian Classical Education. Ms. Mason, too, reached back into the past to classical educators.

In the book, "Classical Education and the Homeschool", written by Wesley Callihan, Douglas Jones, and Douglas Wilson, there is a quote from R.L. Dabney that I believe sums up what we are all trying to do and know we MUST do, "The education of children for God is the most important business done on earth. It is the one business for which the earth exists. "

My children constantly delight and challenge me! I am so incredibly blessed!

"I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me." - Philippians 4:13

Robins & Virginia's Worst Blizzards

2010-03-29T09:40:00.000-04:00

100s of robins feasting on our holly tree. Fighting to survive in the blizzard.

Surprising to us, we observed two sea gulls flying through the snow also.

Robin tracks.

Animal Habitats - Week 3 - Animals of the Polar Regions.

2010-02-26T19:18:00.000-05:00

Animals of the Polar Regions

1.The two polar regions on the Earth are the North and South Pole, we talked about the different geographical locations of each.

The North Pole (Arctic Circle) does not contain any land - only ice! HUGE masses of ice but no real land. It is extremely cold here all year long.

As you move away from the pole towards land, the land that borders the ocean is called the Tundra.

The South Pole has land - it is covered by the continent Antarctica. This land stays frozen year long and it is very cold here all year as well.

Discuss just HOW cold it gets at the polar regions..

2. Draw a large 'thermometer' on butcher paper. Label the thermometer in ten degree increments from -100 degrees to 150 degress. Label the thermometer with outrageous (but real) temperatures from around the world.

The coldest natural temperature ever recorded at the surface of the Earth was −89.2 °C (−129 °F; 184 K) at the Russian Vostok Station in Antarctica July 21, 1983 (wikipedia.com)
The highest natural temperature ever recorded was 136 °F at Al 'Aziziyah, Libya on 1922-09-13
The highest temperature recorded in the USA was 125.1 degrees F at Death Valley, CA on 1913- 07-10
The coldest temperature recorded at the Artic was −87 °F at North Ice, Greenland on 1954-01-09.

I then asked the kids what it felt like when they went outside this morning (it was COLD here ) at about 32 degrees F.

The kids all said it was cold and I recorded the temperature on the 'thermometer' in red marker. The kids were so surprised to see just HOW cold it was compared to the cold temperatures found at the polar regions! They began squealing and jumping around! It was a very simple but fun way to help them understand how cold it was.

We then recorded the temperature of the room we were in (around 70 degrees F) and I drew that line on the thermometer as well in red marker. I provided the kids with a paper thermometer printable to put in their Nature Study Notebooks and encouraged them to all to check an outside thermometer throughout the week and keep a record of it and note in the nature journal for that day how the weather felt to them. You can find a free thermometer printable here.

You can find some other temperatures to use here.

Next, talk about your cold experiences. I told the kids about my little female pomeranian who LOVES the cold.
Pomeranians can stay warm because they have 2 coats of fur. These coats are different textures and lengths.
I explained to the kids that my dog has a very thick undercoat. Her undercoat is short but it keeps her very warm.
Above this undercoat, she has a second coat that is longer. It's this 2nd shiny, long 'top' coat that you see when you look at her.
I explained to the children that God gave pomeranians these coats to help keep them warm.
In fact, Brit enjoys the snow so much, when my son tries to call her back into the house , she will run in circles to make a 'nest' out of the snow and lay down in it where my son can not see her! We have marvelled and laughed at her for years over this. My 8 year old son always tells us he must get his winter coat and boots on when he goes to bring her in because he has to walk out into the snow to look for her!

When he finds her, she then rolls over on her back (right in the snow!) for him to pick her up like a baby and bring her in the house! On hot days, she just about knocks him down to get back in the house but in the snow- she runs from him! In my humble experience, these cute, personal stories help the children retain more of the information and gain a better understanding!

3. Discuss/review that God had given all of the animals the proper "tools" they needed to survive in their natural habitats. Review the word 'habitat' again. (the natural conditions and environment in which a plant or animal lives, e.g. forest, desert, or wetlands.)

Just as my dog has two different coats, the Lord has blessed the animals of the polar regions with thier own special characteristics that allow them to live in these extremely cold areas of the world.

Then, on the fifth day, God made the creatures of the sea and the birds of the air. Who but God would have thought of so many shapes, sizes and colors for all the birds and fish? And who but God would have planned so carefully for their homes before He put them on earth? The Bible says He blessed them and said, “Be fruitful and multiply and fill the waters in the seas and let birds multiply on the earth.”

How Amazing!

This was the end of Day 1 on the Polar Regions Unit Study of Animal Habitats. We will divide the polar regions and begin learning about each specific region on Days 2 & 3 with art, experiments, and hands on activities. We will be reading some great books and continuing with lapnotebooking. Please check back with us for our remaining units in this study!

What's Ahead:
Some things to looki forward to in the next couple of units!

Experiment:
Blubber Glove
example: Example of Blubber Glove

Culminating Activity:

To celebrate what they've learned- here is an "Arctic Expert" pin for your student(s). Give the Expert pins out at the end of each habitat as a reward and celebration of all the student(s) learned from the unit. You may sew an easy sash to put the pins on or pin to their purse, backpack, or favorite carry all (bag) for their nature study outings!

Simply print the Artic Expert pins and laminate them (I use self sealing laminating pages which only cost about $8 for a large pack at our local Walmart) then hot glue a pin to the back. The kids will be proud to show off their expertised!

Suggested Books and Resources:
FREE Lapbooks and Unit Studies that coincide with this unit and the books listed. Click here.
The Magic School Bus Chapter Book #13 - Polar Bear Patrol - (for the Arctic)
The Magic School Bus Chapter Book #8 - Penguin Puzzle - (for Antarctica)

Lewis Caroll's "Alice's Adventures in Wonderland" & A Free Online Audio Resource

2010-02-20T00:05:00.002-05:00

We are so excited to finally be reading Lewis Caroll's "Alice's Adventures in Wonderland!" I have been wanting to share this amazing read with my children for some time! I wanted to ensure my younger daughters (6 yo) would be able to comprehend and keep up with the story.

With Tim Burton's "Alice in Wonderland" releasing in March I thought it was a great time to read the original story! My plan is to read the original story and study it with my children, culminate with a family 'outing' to see the new movie, rent the Disney version of "Alice in Wonderland," and then have my children compare/contrast the different versions! Obviously- my kiddos are 8, 6, and 6 so I'm not expecting college essays but I'm hoping to use my son's IEW lessons to assist him in writing a short review, and helping my daughters to learn to organize their ideas by way of narrating (while I write) their opinions to me and allowing them to illustrate it and put these with thier 'lapnotes' and notebooking pages. My prayers are this will be a fun and enjoyable unit study for us all!

My goal is to complete the weekly unit study lapnotes and notebooking pages about a week ahead of my children (always the goal!) and post them here so others can enjoy them as well. The chapters can be long and I want to stop often for narrating to ensure that my children understand the plot and characters. This is such a lively and interesting story but has so many off beat twists and turns - I want to be careful that they are not lost! If you would like- I would love for you and your children to journey with us into Wonderland!

**NOTE: I am not promoting the new movie in any way- I have made a personal choice knowing my own children and what we find appropriate for them and after reading several reviews, parents' guides, and advisories chosen to take my children to this movie. This does not mean that I am in any position to make this decision for anyone else! It is a personal, family choice. **

Unit Study

Week 1- Click here

Links you may find helpful or interesting:

Lenny's Alice in Wonderland Site- Thorough site with information on Lewis Caroll and his writing. Dispells myths around Caroll's life.

FREE Online Audio Resource- Story Nory's audio download, "Alice's Adventures in Wonderland"

Music & Composer Study- Johann Sebastian Bach

2010-02-13T13:46:00.000-05:00

Johann Sebastian Bach (1685-1750)

German Baroque Era Composer

Johann Sebastian Bach was born in Eisenach, Germany in 1685. As a child, Bach's father taught him to play violin and harpsichord. His uncles were all musicians, serving as church organists and court chamber musicians. One of his uncles, Johann Christoph Bach, introduced him to the art of organ playing.

In 1707, Bach married his second cousin Maria Barbara Bach. They had seven children. In 1720 Maria died and Bach married Anna Magdalena Wilcke in 1721. Bach had 13 more children with Anna Magdalena. He was a father to 20 children in all.

In 1723, Bach became the cantor, organist, and music composer for St. Thomas Lutheran Church in Leipzig, Germany. Bach remained there for the rest of his life.

Some of Bach's most famous works include the Brandenburg Concertos, the Well-Tempered Clavier, and the celebrated organ work Toccata and Fugue in D Minor.

Johann Sebastian Bach died in 1750. Bach was not appreciated during his own lifetime and was considered an "old-fashioned" composer. Today, Bach is considered to be one of the most influential composers of all time. In fact, he is now such an important composer that the year of his death is a defining point in music history. It marks the end of the Baroque Era.
PRINT the above Biography & Picture

Day : I printed out a copy of

Another website with a basic biography where you may also listen to Bach's Music:
FREE Classics for Kids - short but nice.

Free Printables to Help with your Study of Bach:
Printable Sheet Music, Coloring Pages, Biography, Wordsearch, Dot to Dot, & Music Lesson Plans

2010 Winter Olympics

2010-02-11T13:17:00.002-05:00

2010 Winter Olympics

Great lapbook resource from A Journey Through Learning ~
The 2010 Winter Olympics 2010 Lapbook with Study Guide

I purchased this unit this morning - it's on sale at Currclick for only $3.75! It had everything I needed in it to teach my children about the Olympics prior to the opening ceremonies and great information that I think we will use as we watch! I'm hoping to put a schedule up today or tomorrow showing how we are going to get the information in (since I'm late starting it) while enjoying the Olympics together!

Basic information on the 2010 Winter Olympics
From Wikipedia:
The 2010 Winter Olympics, officially the XXI Olympic Winter Games or the 21st Winter Olympics, will be a major international multi-sport event held on February 12–28, 2010, in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada, with some events held in the resort town of Whistler, British Columbia and in the Vancouver suburb of Richmond. Both the Olympic and Paralympic Games are being organized by the Vancouver Organizing Committee (VANOC). The 2010 Winter Olympics will be the third Olympics hosted by Canada, and the first by the province of British Columbia. Previously, Canada was home to the 1976 Summer Olympics in Montreal, Quebec and the 1988 Winter Olympics in Calgary, Alberta.

Following Olympic tradition, then Vancouver mayor Sam Sullivan received the Olympic flag during the closing ceremony of the 2006 Winter Olympics in Turin, Italy. The flag was raised on February 28, 2006, in a special ceremony, and will be on display at Vancouver City Hall until the Olympic opening ceremony. The event will be officially opened by Governor General Michaëlle Jean.[3]

The Torch Relay
The clock counting down to the opening of Olympics Games in downtown Vancouver.Main article: 2010 Winter Olympics torch relay

The Olympic Torch Relay is the transfer of the Olympic flame from Ancient Olympia, Greece — where the first Olympic Games were held thousands of years ago — to the stadium of the city hosting the current Olympic Games. The flame arrives just in time for the Opening Ceremony.

For the Vancouver 2010 Olympic Winter Games, the flame was lit in Olympia on October 22, 2009. It will then travel from Greece, over the North Pole to Canada's High Arctic and on to the West Coast and Vancouver. The relay will start its long Canada journey from the British Columbia capital of Victoria. In Canada, the torch will travel approximately 45,000 kilometers over 106 days, making it the longest relay route within one country in Olympic history. The Olympic Torch will be carried by approximately 12,000 Canadians.

Lapbook Piece - World Map
You could use this map to track the torch relay or to identify the countries that are participating in the Olympics!

Sports

Fifteen winter sports events have been announced as part of the 2010 Winter Olympics. The eight sports categorized as ice sports are: bobsled, luge, skeleton, ice hockey, figure skating, speed skating, short track speed skating and curling. The three sports categorized as alpine skiing and snowboarding events are: alpine, freestyle and snowboarding. The four sports categorized as Nordic events are: biathlon, cross country skiing, ski jumping and nordic combined.

Alpine skiing
Biathlon
Bobsleigh
Cross-country skiing
Curling
Figure skating
Freestyle skiing
Ice hockey
Luge
Nordic combined
Short track speed skating
Skeleton
Ski jumping
Snowboarding
Speed skating

Snowboarding-
Chenille Snowboader Craft

Hockey:
Crossed Hockey Sticks Craft

Olympic Games Resources from Homeschool Share

Ancient Greece & The Olympics Lapbook components
Ancient Olympic Events Lapbook Component
Famous Olympians Lapbook minit book
The Parthenon minit book

Resources from the Canadian Olympic 2010 webpages:
Spectator Guide
Schedule & Results
Search Athletes
Historical Medals
Fun craft for the kids - printables to create the 2010 Canadian Olympic Mascots: Print & Fold Mascots

Olympic Crafts for Kids
Olympic Crafts from Kaboose

Geography- Book Review, "Mountains and Volcanoes/ Geography Facts & Experiments" By Barbara Taylor

2010-02-06T11:08:00.000-05:00

I truly enjoy this entire series written by Barbara Taylor. It is perfect for younger and older elementary students. We homeschool and my children are in 1st, 1st, & 3rd grade and this geography series has been a perfect match. I originally discovered Barbara Taylor's series on the Mater Amabilis website (a free Charlotte Mason style curriculum) and I was not dissapointed.

The illustrations are colorful and pertinent. They assist the younger child in grasping the concepts without being "twaddly". You may find free schedules and lesson plans to go along with this book at:

http://www.materamabilis.org/mountains.html

I will be posting more on this geography book and others as I finish developing our new geography studies. I am trying something a bit different and so far, the children are not only truly enjoying the studies but quickly absorbing information. I highly recommend this little book as part of your elementary geography studies.

Animals in Winter- Part 2 of Animal Habitats Unit

2010-01-17T12:56:00.002-05:00

Animals in Winter- Week 2 of Animal Habitats

For this week's Nature Study and this week in my animal habitats co-op class, we focused on animals in the winter and how differently they survive this difficult season.

We talked about what the Bible says about our role in caring for the Earth and its inhabitants.

Read, Gen. 1:26 ~ The Message and discuss what it means to have “dominion” over God's creation.

God has entrusted us with the care of His creation and that means we have a responsibility to be good to the animals and our planet.
Children can start by being kind to their pets and helping with their care and helping care for their own backyard.
Different examples of how to show having “dominion” is not an excuse to use the Earth in any way we want but rather a GREAT responsibility that God gave us! How amazing it is to be in “charge” of something SO important and how much God loves us!

(We reviewed what we learned last week about how to classify animals.)
Why is it important to know how to Classify Animals?

According to the Bible, God charged mankind with being the stewards of the Earth, wouldn’t we need to know what all of the flora and fauna are and what their needs are in order to care for it?
Examples to help with understanding of this – what if we didn’t know about fish and we put them in the desert? What if we put polar bears in the rainforest? The kids got a laugh out of this! If we don’t understand the characteristics of God’s creation, how can we know how to care for it?

Gen. 2:15~ Stewardship is not God’s afterthought.

What is the first thing God has Adam do?

God declared creation “good” many times before man was even on the scene. (Gen.1)
God created plants and animals to live in perfect harmony (balanced ecosystem)
Having “dominion” is not an excuse to use the Earth in any way we want but rather a GREAT responsibility that God gave us! How amazing!

Book: "Animals in Winter" by Henrietta Bancroft - part of the "Let's Read & Find Out About" series

We read the book, “Animals in Winter.” This is a book from the “Let’s Read & Find Out About” series. This is a wonderful series for children of this age. We discussed the three ways animals survive the winter: Hibernation, Migration, and Overwintering. We learned what these different terms mean and the different animals that adjust to the winter using each of them.

We also discussed how animals that overwinter adapt to survive the colder temperatures and food shortage. Some of these are:

• Changing their summer coats to white, winter coats – hares, foxes

• How foxes hunt mice differently and quietly for winter food.

• How deer and other animals (including the hare) change WHAT they eat to survive the winter. – nice, fresh foliage to tree bark for one example

• Storing food so they do not have to leave their shelter- pikas

• Storing food outside of their home and finding it (or not) – squirrels

We took a brief detour here to discuss how often squirrels forget where they stored their food and how they actually plant a large portion of the world’s tress on accident!

Weekly Project:
Materials:
This is a simple (yeah!) project for even the youngest nature study participant - you only need:
Bagel
Peanut Butter
Bird Seed
Yarn
Yes! It's that easy!!

Directions:
Tie the yarn in the middle of the bagel hole so you can use it to hang your feeder.
Coat the bagel with peanut butter.
Roll the peanut butter coated bagel in bird seed.
Hang in a easily viewed location.
YOU'RE READY FOR SOME WINTER BIRD WATCHING!

Make bagel bird feeders to help feed the birds in your own backyard. This is a first step in caring for God's creation.

Hang the feeder in a location the children have access to (even if from indoors- maybe a location they can easily view from a window.) We will use this feeder for their new animal habitat nature study for this week.

To do this, allow your child to just relax and watch their feeders, they can keep an eye out and stop and do their study when they notice activity around their feeders or you can have a set time for them to sit and watch for 20-30 minutes to see what animals visit their feeders. Take notice if you normally have squirrels in your area if any squirrels visit. Does it seem they visit more now or in the summer? Have the children (your child) to draw (and make descriptive notes) if they like of what visitors they have. For younger children/reluctant writers- feel free to have them tell you about the animals they see and you may do the writing for them.

If they are not sure of the species have them describe the details to you and spend some time identifying the birds (or squirrels) they see either using field guides or online. As always, this does not have to be a perfect or difficult time, just a very laid back time to work on their observation skills and prayerfully learn something new about the ecosystem in their own backyard (without even realizing it!)
If you live in a location with snow and/or the opportunity to view other wildlife that overwinters- keep an eye out with your child to see which animals you notice and if they act/look differently.

We have squirrels that are constant visitors to our yard (and our bird feeders) so its a great way for the kids to see them preparing for the winter in the autumn and take notice of how much more/less they see them now. In the summer we have squirrels at our birdfeeders almost within minutes of the daily fill up :) so we are curious to see if they visit these bagel bird feeders before the birds can eat them. I told my children (and my class) if they find thier bagels just totally gone or on the ground and almost gone they may want to watch for squirrels! We are going to take note of how many students had squirrels versus birds!

Follow- & Other Books:

“Taking Godly Care of the Earth.” ~ This book has a lot of worksheets and information that further go into the topic of our dominion over God's Creation.. I am using this workbook as a reference to help keep God’s word in our unit.

I look forward to this upcoming week when we will go into animals of the tundra and artic! Come back to visit my blog for book ideas to gather together for next week's habitat!! :)

For those who are using this in a group or co-op or using the rewards system at home: do not forget to review their nature journals from last week and provide them with stickers on thier "homework cards" and thier "award" (we used Skittles and Starburst in the small sizes.)

"Handbook of Nature Study" by Anna Botsford Comstock
For those using Anna Botsford Comstock's "Handbook of Nature Study" - here are the pages that reference

Quote of the Week ~ Doug Phillips

2009-08-24T09:26:00.004-04:00

The Bible calls debt a curse and children a
blessing; but in our culture, we apply for a
curse and reject blessings. Something is
wrong with this picture." ~ Doug Phillips

HEAV Convention - Don't Miss Out!

2009-04-21T07:27:00.001-04:00

HEAV’s Virginia Homeschool Convention offers 301-booth Exhibit Hall; a giant Used Curriculum Sale (39,000+ items last year); a Children’s Program; 119+ workshops on preschool, high school, college and career, special needs, character training, culture wars, courtship, home business; and MUCH more. Speakers include Voddie Baucham, Carol Barnier, Joel Salatin, Inge Cannon, Jessica Hulcy, Steve Demme, Dianne Craft, Adam Andrews, Debbie Strayer, and many others! Four FREE how-to-begin sessions on Thursday and FREE shopping Saturday from 3 to 6 p.m. Qualifying parents of preschoolers and non-homeschooling grandparents attend FREE! For more information, call 804-278-9200, e-mail office@heav.org, or visit http://www.heav.org/convention/convention.

Free Bird Watching Resource!

2009-04-13T09:26:00.004-04:00

Homeschool Resource of the Day is offering a wonderful FREEBIE today.

The title of today's "Freebie" is "Birdwatching for Beginners: A Guide for Homeschoolers (PDF ebook) "

How to get started, what resources and equipment you need, where to find birds and how to identify them, how to keep records of your sightings, "etiquette" for watchers, how to attract birds to your own back yard, and much more!

I downloaded a copy for myself and there is some great information - download your free copy today only at

http://www.homeschoolfreebieoftheday.com/

Love & Blessings!

Tiffany

We're BACK!

2009-03-23T09:55:00.006-04:00

After what was suppose to be a "brief hiatus" during the holidays (Thanksgiving & Christmas!) I came back to add to the blog only to find I was unable to access my blog.

I am not a technical expert. I can find my way around the computer and MOST software well enough but I could not access this page no matter how I tried. Then LIFE took over, homeschool, coop, home making--- generally being a mom and a wife (and teacher). I tried here and there and FINALLY asked for help from the Blogger community. Thank you so much to those who take time to help people like me lol to fix thier mistakes. I am (as of today lol) able to access this blog again so I can NOT wait to upload all of the outings and plans we've ben doing since November!! I hope I can catch up and provide everyone with some helpful tips, lesson plans, and insights as before! Bear with me as I try to revamp the blog and get fresh information out!

I will tell you that we have been studying mammals - more specifically lagomorphs. Yes - Lagomorphs- I had not heard of them until we began the study. Lagomorphs include rabbits, hares, and pikas. We are using the Burgess Animal Book for Children, Beatrix Potter, and library books for this study so if you have those resources or want to gather them - I hope to get some notebooking and lapbooking pages as well as some lesson plans up in the next couple of days! Glad to be blogging again!

Blessings!!!

Tiffany

Free Thanksgiving copywork, NB pages, Lapbook, book recommendations! :)

2008-11-24T09:04:00.022-05:00

Since Thanksgiving is Thursday, I am taking a "break" from our normal literature and history schedule to spend the next few days enjoying America's TRUE Thanksgiving history! I have found NUMEROUS free items and have not had to buy anything so I thought I would "share the wealth!"
"Give thanks in all circumstances; for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you." ~1 Thessalonians 5:18

As we read and study the Bible in chronological order, we will continue our regular readings for the week as we make our way through God's word. We will, however, be focusing on thankfulness in our devotions. We use SEVERAL devotional books throughout our Bible Study- this way I always KNOW I have one that relates to what we need.

Here are a few good books we use as children's devotions and the page numbers we'll use this week:
God and Me! Devotions fo Girls Ages 2-5 -
`Pages 71-71 - Sharing - we will discuss the sharing of blessings that took place between the Indians and the Pilgrims. We'll also begin discussing ideas for our service work for this term and really look at just how blessed we are to have love and family during this season.
-Pp. 74-75 - Comfort - discussion on the losses the Pilgrims suffered (the lost lives) during that first year and how Jesus kept them strong and comforted them.
-PP. 78-9 - Compromise - "Two are Better than one." ~ Ecclesiastes 4:9 - the relationship between the indians and pilgrims and how they survived with their help.
-Pp. 82-3 - Possessiveness - "Be devoted to one another in brotherly love." -Romans 12:10
Gotta Have God! Fun Devotions for Boys - Ages 6-9 -

Pp. 58-9 - God's Awesome Power - trusting in God - The Pilgrims put all of their faith in God and He provided for them
Pp. 70-1 - God's Awesome Power- God's strength -
Pp. 84-5 - God wants me to share with others
Pp. 88-9- Big things can happen when I pray
Pp. 130-1 - God will not forget me
Leading Little Ones to God
Chapter 13 - God is Faithful
Chapter 18 - God Always Does What Is Best

"Just and true are thy ways, thou King of saints." ~ Revelation 15:3
Chapter 28- God Takes Care of Us

Chapter 29 - God Turns Our Troubles into Good

Chapter 30- God's Angels Watch Over Us

"But if we have food and clothing, with these we will be content." ~ 1Timothy 6:8

Child's Prayers for this week:

"For what we are about to recieve May the Lord make us truly thankful. Amen. " ~ Anonymous

"O God, I thank Thee for all the joy I have had in my life." ~ Earl Brithnoth

"Thou art great And Thou art good, And we thank Thee for this food. " ~ Traditional

"God is great, God is good, and we thank Him for our food. By His hands we all are fed, Give us Lord our daily bread. Amen. " ~ Traditional

"Let the words of my mouth, and the meditation of my heart, be acceptable in Thy sight, O Lord, my strength, and my redeemer." ~ Psalm 19

Books that we are reading this week:

"Mary of Plymouth: A Story of the Pilgrim settlement" by James Otis. IF you take advantage of it right away - (before Monday, Dec. 1st - you can obtain a FREE copy of this book at Homeschool Freebie of the Day. Click on the link and downoload a free version of this fascinating "living book". This book is on the "Living Books Curriculum" 1st grade booklist.

"Pilgrim Stories, Book III - Little Pilgrims & The Red Men" by Margaret Pumphrey. You may also find this title free for download this week at Homeschool Freebie of the Day. Click here for the link. Description from Homeschool Freebie of the Day site -

"Pilgrim Stories III: Little Pilgrims & The Red Men (PDF ebook) - This absolutely delightful three part serialization of the story of the Pilgrims - perfect for “read aloud” and sharing with the kids
over the next couple of weeks! In Part Three, we learn how children from the Pilgrim settlements fared with their encounters with their Native American neighbors - this includes some outstanding stories of danger, adventure & friendship! Also included in Part Three: A short but helpful “Teacher’s Guide” to learning more about the Pilgrims’ life and times through play-acting and other fun activites. Great stuff! SPECIAL NOTE: All three parts of
“Pilgrim Stories” will remain available here on the site for you until the end
of this week, so be sure you get them all… and tell a friend!

Here are the link for Book I & II.

Book I - "From Old Homes to New"

Book II - "The Wild Land & Thanksgiving"

"An Old Fashioned Thanksgiving" - by Louisa May Alcott -

YES! They are being so incredibly generous for this gracious time of year! YET ANOTHER freebie that is STILL available this week from Homeschool Freebie of the Day! Here is the description from their site:

"An Old Fashioned Thanksgiving by Louisa May Alcott (PDF ebook) - In this delightful short story, the author of “Little Women” tells this classic tale that re-captures the celebration of Thanksgiving as it wasobserved in the early 1820s in rural New England. It is a tale full of family, fun, humor, long-lost
traditions, and the smells and tastes of a Thanksgiving day “way back when”.

" Three Young Pilgrims" by Cheryl Harness - I REALLY like this book. It is exactly what I want out of a "Living history Book" for my young children. It is both well written and beautifully illustrated. The author tells the story from the viewpoint of three young children of the Allerton family. It is a book about a family which is in MHO exactly what Charlotte Mason called for in a "living book." For your visual learner - the illustrations are great! The book begins with a fascinating map of their journey and the following page has an illustration of a ship with the bottom "cut away" so the children can have an idea of the ship's layout. It also helps to see just how CRAMPED the space was. I will note that Mama and the new baby pass away in this book so you may want to take note for younger or sensitive children. I have one daughter in particular I was careful with explanation in the story because she is quite sensitive.

"Thanksgiving on Plymouth Plantation" by Diane StanleyGREAT little book discussing the true meanings behind Thanksgiving. There is an author's note in the back for parents giving a nice timeline of the true dates of "Thanksgiving Day". Depending on the age of your children - you can discuss the information there.

Here is a map of America in 1621. Point out to the children how large Virginia is (just as they say in "Thanksgiving on Plymouth Plantation."

Find a FREE lapbook minitbook to go with this map here.

Crossing of the Mayflower Map from Enchanted Learning -

The Pilgrims' Voyage Map & Mayflower Projectx at Enchanted Learning.

"The Story of the Pilgrims" - by Katharine Ross - There were a couple (2) negative reviews about this little "Read to Me" book on Amazon. They noted the "historical inaccuracies" of the book because the Pilgrims were not Pilgrims at first but Separatists. While I agree with this comment - I chose to still read this book to my children. It is delightfully illustrated and gives a very brief overview of Thanksgiving. It was clearly written for YOUNG children, however, while I am using the other books for a more historical standpoint - I chose to read them this book for enjoyment. My fear being that the text is quite simplified so it could easily be considered "twaddle". For this reason- we are reading it as a bedtime - type book. You will have to decide if you want to read it to your children. I wanted to make everyone aware of the negative comments. :)

Easy Reader -

"I am the Turkey" - An I can Read! Book 2 - This is a cute little book. I will tell you there is one or two spots of young humor that is a bit crude - crude may be a strong word - there's an incident with a brother's nose. Although this book is about a school play - my children still enjoy it and I love how the boy decides to help out in the end although he didn't want to be the turkey. This is NOT a Charlotte Mason type book or educational book - just purley a bit of fun for Thanksgiving and for us - a book that is easy enough for my son to read independently to his sisters. :)

Thanksgiving Handicraft & Art Ideas:

Decorating the House Together - NOTE: Something I do not consider twaddle but rather an enjoyable time with my children is decorating our home for the holidays. I understand the desire to stay away from "busy" projects that are just that - projects to keep the children busy. However, I find that baking, cooking, and decorating with my kids add to our holidays. I have chosen projects - art, baking, decorating, etc. that we are using this year for fun but that do have a place in the home during this season. My children are still young (7, 5, & 5 yos) so a string of cut out leaves to dawn our dining room doorway might be fun and bonding for my children and I - someone with a 15 year old might not. To me - twaddle is at the discretion of the mother and family and what's right for you. Anyway - here's what we're hoping to do. :)

String of Leaves Project from Enchanted Learning -

My children had a bit of a difficult time cutting out the more detailed leaves from their leaf template so instead, they began using real leaves to draw and color their own leaves and then I helped cut them out. It was more fun, creative, and they recieved a study in leaves and their shapes and characteristics without realizing it :)!

Corn Husk Dolls- What a GREAT time to do this project! I've had the husks dried out for some time just waiting on the opportunity to make these with my daughters and here it is! I found SEVERAL links to instructions in this native american craft and they all seem basically the same other than different patterns in the "skirts" and "legs". Just choose which you and your children like best!

http://www.michigan.gov/mikids/0,1607,7-163-15941_20571---1_A,00.html

http://www.nativetech.org/cornhusk/dollinst.html

http://jas.familyfun.go.com/arts-and-crafts?page=CraftDisplay&craftid=10747

These Corn-Print Placemats also caught my eye- I LOVE setting the dining room up for the holidays- esepecially when it is done at no/low cost and created by the hearts and hands of our family! :) We have a modest home, nothing fancy to it but I believe when you decorate with your children - with things made with your children - you look around and see the power of family and love and most importantly our Lord!.

These also go great with the placecards you can print out on cardstock and create from the FREE Thanksgiving lapbook from Melissa (below). Just have your kids use similar colors as your fabric paint and you're coordinated!

Ship Shaped Favors- http://familyfun.go.com/arts-and-crafts/season/feature/famf117tabletop/famf117tabletop5.html

These were just adorable ~ and that's all ! :) Just plain old adorable!

Autumn Wreath: What better way to invite your guests in than with an autumn wreath - celebrating the end of the season! The kids and I took branches from our flowering pear trees while the leaves were still beautiful! They had turned to an amazing burgundy color. We carefully bent the branches into circles and used bag ties and gardeners' twine to hold the branches together (you can use just about anything and cover it with bows or flowers). We read that you can also soak the branches in water first to make them more pliable but we didn't have to do this. We then walked the yard and found pinecones (you could use acorns or anything you find in your own yard) and picked some autumn colored flowers (we used yellow lantanna).

I brought the wreath and our finds in the house and used a hot glue gun (adult's job of course) to glue all of the different cones and flowers to the wreath. We added some seasonal ribbon that I picked up for $1 at Walmart and then gathered some more of the pear tree leaves to glue on. We used the extra leaves to fill in holes or cover pieces of the twine that was showing through. My husband happened to bring home some strawberry popcorn indian corn that he was given at work and it was perfect! Certainly not professional ;) but the BEST wreath I've ever had! WE are so proud of it and the enjoyable few days we took in gathering and creating it! If you can do just one project - we REALLY enjoyed this one! :)

Free Materials:

Free Thanksgiving Lapbook - from Melissa Telling -

Thanksgiving Notebook Pages - This is from Homeschool Notebooking.

It is their free page. For Thanksgiving, she has a coloring page, several notebooking pages with Thanksgiving designs and lined paper, and also a card you can print out for your kids to make.

She also has a "Student Sheet for your homeschool yearbook" page on this freebies list. I realize it may not have much to do with Thanksgiving but if you've not started anything like this (we hadn't until I saw this) - it might be a fun project to sit and do together with your children on Thanksgiving Day (you know - :) between the cooking and serving and entertaining :)) Part of it Provides a place for your child to note what they are most thankful for right now. Its a great time of year to take time and do this together then allow the kids to decorate around the box (while you cook :) as a fun project :).

Other Links:

Character & Etiquette - FREE copywork - The Goops

2008-11-21T14:22:00.018-05:00

Character & Etiquette -
"Goops Style"
(free copywork below)
For those of you who have not heard poetry about "The Goops" ~ you are missing out! :)
These DELIGHTFUL poems have been enjoyed by children and families since 1900. They are amusing little poems written by author/illustrator Gelett Burgess some 100 years ago that teach children how NOT to behave!

THE GOOP DIRECTORY
OF
Juvenile Offenders Famous for their Misdeeds and Serving as a Salutary Example for all Virtuous Children

with Pictures by
GELETT BURGESS
Author of "Goops," "The Lively City o' Ligg," etc.

Mr. Burgess' hilarious "Goops" poems go over everything from not eating your crust to playing with matches! I happened across "Table Manners" last year while looking for some poetry for my young children. It has been enjoyed over and over by my family since. We often laugh at the dinner table and call one another a "Goop" if a bad manner is observed! :) Much more fun than constantly scolding and nagging.

I have found that my children WANT to have better manners so as not to "BE A GOOP!" Of course, for direct disobedience- a joke is not the way to go. But for those thoughtless times when one of them (especially the five year old twins who seem to ALWAYS tell a story at the same time!) becomes so excited about thier part in the story being told that they slip and speak with food in their mouth or forget their fork ~ "The Goops" seem to work quite well! :)

I attempted to find a portrait of Mr. Burgess for our timeline but could not seem to locate one. I did find the "Self Portrait" above on the right and I think we will print this out and post it on our timeline for his year of birth (1866). It's interesting to note that the infamous ""Purple Cow: Reflections on a Mythic Beast Who's Quite Remarkable, at Least" poem was also written by Mr. Gelett Burgess. It first appeared in a magazine, "The Lark" on May 1, 1895. To the right please find a picture of that first issue if you'd like to also add this to your timeline. It turns out, Mr. Burgess primarily edited and wrote this periodical - under a pseudonym. The story of this can be found here as well as on other sites the web.
Although the children and I QUITE enjoyed "The Purple Cow" it appears Mr. Burgess was not fond of being known for writing it.

Upon being associated with this poem, he wrote "Confession: and a Portrait Too, Upon a Background that I Rue" in "The Lark", number 24 on April 1, 1897.

Ah, yes, I wrote the "Purple
Cow"—
I'm Sorry, now, I wrote it;
But I can tell you Anyhow
I'll Kill you if you Quote it!

Among other places, "Purple Cow" is listed in Favorite Poems of Childhood" compiled by Philip Smith. You can also find a copy directly from Dover Publishing here. "The Purple Cow" in audio can be found for FREE here. I also found a free coloring page of a cow here for those with much younger children who want to print it and let the children color her purple. :) I simply googled "cow coloring page" and MORE than I cared to imagine popped up :). There is also a "Purple Cow Craft" found here.

I realize this is quite "twaddly" for most but when reading and discussing poetry with an older child - these "twaddly" coloring pages have come in QUITE handy for my younger twins! As well as sometimes to help my VERY kinesthetic son to have something to keep his hands on while he listens. I simply prefer it to watching their knees bounce or chairs come off the floor and back down again :)

Now- on to the promised copywork...
"The Goops" found themselves into several books and Mr. Burgess provided us with a very gentle way of teaching manners (habits). Of course, these poems will never take the place of parents providing good foundations in habit and child training but they are a fun bit to add in with your poetry studies. Anything that assists with good character building is welcome here!

A Free copy of "The Goops Directory" can be found here on Project Gutenberg in the public domain.

A FREE copy of "More Goops and How Not to be Them" can be found here in printable format

These are great for supplements to character training and study, for a short "mini" unit on the poet himself, or a "Fun Friday" copywork! :) However you choose to add "The Goops" into your homeschool or child training - they are a true delight!

Today, we worked on the poem "Anabella Day- Obeying Slowly." We read the poem together, lauged a bit :) , and then they produced copywork of the poem. I compiled some copywork with a coloring page for this particular poem. There is a large page with the picture below resized so it can be colored and there are three sets of copywork. The first set would be for older students - the poem is listed above and there are two pages of penmanship paper where your child can copy the poem. The second set has the poem written out on the penmanship paper with two or three lines directly below each set for the child to use. The third set (and probably for your youngest student/child) allows the child to trace/write INSIDE of the letters to create the poem. I hope you enjoy these copywork pages as well as the little gems that are "The Goops" poetry!

FREE Copywork - Anabella Day - Obeying Slowly

Botany Coloring Pages - too many to believe!

2008-11-07T10:16:00.005-05:00

This morning I came across this GREAT page with TONS of botany coloring pages to print or download as well as a seperate page with a coloring guide to the correct color of the plants! :) I'm just pouring over it this morning and printing more than I care to admit! :) I hope you enjoy it - I will also add it to our links page.

Living Nature Books....The History of Insects

2008-11-02T10:37:00.017-05:00

The History of Insects

I must first apologize for the lack of nature study entries I've had over the past month or so. The elections this year have been so incredibly important to me ~ they seem to have taken up so much of my time. I had forgotten what this log is really about~ and that is helping our children to discover the amazing gifts God has given us! His beautiful creation that is such a gift and not to be forgotten!

A dear friend sent me an email a christian woman had put out and in it, she discusses our roles in the current state of things. As Christians ~ the MOST important thing we can do is pray - pray- and pray some more. The Lord will place in command of this country who He sees fit for His will. Whether it be to "wake us up" to our sins or to lead us back into a God fearing country ~ it is HIS will. So ~ I need to let it be ~ of course not to say its not important to pray and pray about it and OF COURSE VOTE! this Tuesday ---but I want to get back to what the Lord calls me to do ---and that is educate my children and use my passion, interest, and abilities in nature study to help others with thier children's education as much as I humbly can :) :).

So --- ENOUGH of the election on THIS blog :) ;) ! And I apologize to those of you who have been such devout readers and whom I've neglected the past month or so by not sharing our studies! :)

The children and I have continued nature studies ~ though not as diligently as usual and I'm sorry for that but I have taken pictures and notes on all that we have done and my goals is to post it all for you this upcoming week.

We've planted our fall annuals ~ including pansies ~ which have their own lesson in The Handbook of Nature Study.

We've completed our "Weeds & Seeds" three part series with a fantastic study on Dandelions (blog post on this is almost complete - check back - this was a great one!) And also an ongoing seed study as we continue to harvest, dry, and package our seeds for next year. This has been such an exciting time as we harvest and talk about harvesting in the Bible and how we relate to the Biblical times. It went well with our Ancient Egypt studies from The Story of the World ~
see our Nile River projects also!

The kids have planted their spring bulbs after I received a blog post from Barb at Handbook of Nature Study about her gorgeous bulbs. We then divided our own perrenials and moved their bulbs or gave them away.

The grasshopper study was TONS of fun and suprising - even for mom :) - there was so much information in The Handbook of Nature Study and the children had a great time really looking at our grasshopper friends and releasing them. The blog from that study as well as a "lesson plan" that I wrote up to use with the HNS for this topic will be uploaded this week. You'll find the release of the grasshoppers was the best part of the study as we marvelled at the amazing distance they were able to travel in one jump!

I can't forget the other fall activities --- the corn maze, pumpkin carving, gathering fallen leaves and pinecones, and making a fall wreath out of our gathered materials... the blogs should be great this week as I document our adventures. ;)

Now --- The History of Insects -- this is a GREAT little living science book about insects for the early elementary grades. It can be found for free at Project Gutenberg.
The files here are in html, however, it wasn't in a pdf format or word doc format so it was quite difficult to isolate just a page to print or particular insect. If you are like me, you don't always print entire books at once. Paper and ink have become expensive so I print weeks or subjects worth of the online books as they are needed. To do this, I copied the online book into a word document. It is available here for you. I hope this helps. We will be using the introduction, History of Insects, as well as the Honey Bee section this week to try to wrap up our insect studies during the (probably) last mild weather week we'll have here in Virginia. :)

Another great living science book on Insects is The Insect Folke by Margaret Warner Morley. You can find this literature online free also at Project Gutenberg. Here is a link for this book.

Prayers for our country needed NOW!

2008-10-21T08:33:00.010-04:00

I saw this in my HEAV email this morning and thought it was too important not to pass along...

The Upcoming Elections - A Call to Prayer

"If my people, which are called by my name, shall humble themselves, and pray, and seek my face, and turn from their wicked ways; then will I hear from heaven, and will forgive their sin, and will heal their land." 2 Chronicles 7:14 (KJV)

As the elections approach, please spend extra time on your knees for this land--we are in desperate need of God's healing. During WWII, an advisor to Winston Churchill organized a group of people who dropped what they were doing every night at a prescribed hour for one minute of collective prayer for the safety of England and its people, and for peace. There is now a group of people organizing the same thing here in America. They are asking people to stop at 9 p.m. Eastern Time and spend one minute praying for the safety of the United States, our troops, and our citizens; for peace in the world; for the upcoming election; that the Bible will remain the basis for the laws governing our land; and that Christianity would grow in the U.S.

If you know anyone who would like to participate, please pass this along. Someone said if people really understood the full extent of the power we have available through prayer, we might be speechless. Our prayers are the most powerful asset we have.

[ Modified from a note we received from Penny Richardson ND, CNHP. Thank you, Penny, for sharing! ]

Virginia Senate Race - Mark Warner speaks harshly against Christians, Pro lifers, Homeschoolers...

2008-10-20T11:30:00.001-04:00

MARK WARNER FINALLY ADMITS TO DEMEANING REMARKS ATTACKING PEOPLE OF CHRISTIAN FAITH, PRO-LIFERS, HOME SCHOOLERS AND THE NRA

October 12, 2008 For Immediate Release

MARK WARNER FINALLY ADMITS TO DEMEANING REMARKS ATTACKINGPEOPLE OF CHRISTIAN FAITH, PRO-LIFERS, HOME SCHOOLERS AND THE NRA

Gilmore Campaign Demands Warner Apologize for the Remarks and for Lying About ThemAlexandria - The Jim Gilmore for Senate Campaign released a statement today after Mark Warner admitted this weekend that he made disparaging remarks about people of Christian faith, pro-lifers, home schoolers and NRA members -- calling them "threatening" to "what it means to be an American": "After repeatedly denying for years that he made these intolerant statements, Mark Warner this weekend finally owned up to the hurtful remarks after an audio recording of him making these demeaning comments was made public, " said Ana Gamonal, the Gilmore Campaign Communications Director. "What is even sadder than his admitting that he had lied, after of years of denial, is the best Mark Warner could offer was that his comments were perhaps "over the top" and that he had "learned a lot" since then, with no offer of an apology to the people he attacked by inferring they were un-American," Gamonal said.[1] "Mark Warner owes Virginians several apologies. One, for making these statements in the first place; Second, for repeatedly "angrily" denying he did so and calling those who were confronting him on it, "disrespectful", when in fact he was the one being disrespectful.[2]And third, for his lack of sincerity throughout this entire Senate campaign, where he has attempted to paint himself as a "centrist", while at the same time attesting to the sentiments expressed in these statements, by affirming he would not support Supreme Court justices like of Justice Scalia or Justice Thomas, calling them "out of the mainstream," Gamonal declared.[3] "Now, Virginians will be able to hear first hand and in his own words, how Mark Warner really feels about so many of the values Virginians hold dear."
Click here to hear the audio recording: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WpicD6UIq8A

"One of the things you are going to see is a coalition that is just about completely taken over the Republican Party in this state and if they have their way it's going to take over state government. It is made up of the Christian Coalition, but not just them. It is made up of the right-to-lifers, but not just them. It's made up of the NRA, but not just them. It is made up of the home schoolers, but not just them. It's made up of a whole coalition of people that have all sorts of differing views that I think most of us in this room would find threatening to what it means to be an American." Mark Warner, May 1994 ________________________________________

[1] Quotes taken from the Northern Virginia Daily 10/11/08
[2] Quotes taken from the Richmond Times-Dispatch 10/31/2001
[3] Quote taken from the Virginian Pilot 10/4

The "un" socialized issue...

2008-10-15T12:11:00.007-04:00

The "un"socialized Issue...

For most of us who homeschool- this wouldn't even be considered an "issue". However, we still deal with the rest of the world. If there was a world of just homeschooled kids/parents - well then - the "un" socialized issue wouldn't be an issue at all! :) Am I right?

I started this blog with the picture to the left because believe it or not - this is my "Shy Guy"! Yes, this was the 3 year old that clung to my leg the first day of preschool - which was with my neighbor at our neighborhood church! This is my 4 year old (the county pushed me and I did NOT know better at the time) Kindergartener who BEGGED me to stay at home! He couldn't stand it. I KNEW it --- and yet the "socialized" issue of today's standards forced me to go against my inner knowledge. And what is that "inner knowledge" really? To me- it's my own instincts - God - speaking to me - God's gift of maternal instincts -- and yet - I pushed this BABY - because at 4 years old -aren't they really babies???? I hugged him, assured him he would be okay, and pulled out of the parking lot. Then I fell into MY MOTHER'S ARMS and cried and cried. I KNEW BETTER but couldn't stand up to society's idea of "education and socialization".

I saw this question on a yahoo group post recently that generated quite a bit of responses. The post was as follows--

Date: Monday, October 13, 2008, 5:51 PM

"Hello! First, let me apologize for the mass email, but this seemed to be the easiest way to get my question out to the most amount of people in the shortest amount of time. I'm a mom first and seriously contemplating homeschooling my 7 year old daughter come sept for her grade 3 year. I'm also a masters of ed student who currently takes a lot of flak from fellow educators for my support and choice to homeschool my daughter. So, because of this flak, I'm doing my thesis on homeschooling and socialization. So far, ALL the literature within academics so far speaks to the positive aspects of homeschooling. And yet, academics still don't acknoweldge this. So, I'm going one step furthuer and trying to find homeschool articles and personal accounts of what socialization is for those who currently homeschool or have done so in the past. If you can help in anyway (cause this is to also help convince my hubby that this IS the right decision for our daughter) would be greatly appreaciated.

Please email me off line though at dandelionsmom.

Nicole, Dandelions mom, Future homeschool mom

I began typing an email to Nicole about my personal experiences with the socialization of homeschooled children. Of course, the email ended up being QUITE long and so I thought I'd go ahead and share it with you all through the blog. I'm sure it will hit the mark with so many of you! :)

Here was my response to her:

"Your post asked to email you offline so I didn't reply to all. I hope that's okay. I'm going to be blogging about this very same issue soon. I've even thought about doing nothing more than an entirely pictoral blog of my children socializing :) and not have to say a word. I will let you know when its done. In the meantime, I also had my son in public school until last year and socialization was admittedly my husband's and MY largest concern. If you do not homeschool or do not know anyone personally who does - it can be scary.

But once I started, it was like, "what was I worried about?" lol. I began homeschooling my twin girls this year as well and I have no intentions of ever going back to state schools. My son has MORE of a social life now than he ever did in public school. From my own experience - I do not see where they obtain any real socialization skills in state schools. They are stuck at a desk all day long. They lose priveliges if they speak to each other. The state has cut their available recess time to 20 minutes per day - yes folks, 20 minutes- for what was then a 6 year old boy! 20 minutes out of his chair - mostly they just took off running outside to let off their energy and before they could really have enough time to "socialize"- to see who they might connect with- it was time to go back in. Worse yet, the privelige that they lose if they speak in class IS recess time. When can they "socialize"? Not at lunch either! My son's school (and this is not a "bad" public school. It was brand new and in a "great school district") anyway, in his cafeteria they LITERALLY had a stoplight installed. When the stoplight was yellow- the entire cafeteria had to whisper because if the noise level went up at all - the stoplight went to red and guess what? NO TALKING! And can I tell you - anyone who has children knows this- if you take 5 classes of 26 children that ran the ages of 5-7 years and leave them in a desk with "busy work" most of the day because the teacher is dealing (alone mind you) with one of the 3-6 "bad" students and take away the small 20 minutes of recess- the lunchroom is NOT going to be quiet. They can't help it! I truly believe their little bodies can't help it. Each time I was in the cafeteria (which was at least once per week) - that light was on red at a minimum of 10 minutes - out of a 30 minute lunch. I have been in there with my son during times that the light stayed red the ENTIRE time!! Where IS the socialization???

My son had a teacher last year when I pulled him out of public school that actually ENCOURAGED homeschooling. I would never tell the school this and cause problems for her but she was amazing. She was alone in a classroom with 26 1st graders!! 5-6 of which were being reviewed for "emotional" or learning problems or the big state school push on ADHD. She had been teaching for 15 years and said most of her close knit friends that had been teaching as long as she had- had either pulled their children or their grandchildren out of state schools and were homeschooling them! She told me that her husband begged her to retire because teaching wasn't a joy for her anymore - after 15 years she barely made it through her day with her sanity. She said when she first began teaching, the kids had plenty of outdoor time, time to talk on the playground, to make friends, to giggle at lunch --- and they wonder why so many young children -especially boys- are aggressive and frustrated -- or "ADHD".

Anyway- from my own PERSONAL experience - I can vouch for the completely reversed socialization question. Most every homeschool child I have met since we began this amazing journey has been far more socialized than any public school child I had to work with. I'm sure since you've mentioned the statistics you've read, that you are aware of the positives. I sat at a park with my new "homeschool mom" friends when we first began homeschooling and marveled at the "social" skills of these children!! To them, it was normal--- kids speaking to adults with ease, no nervousness or shyness. Older kids and younger kids all playing together. Older kids helping the younger kids. No bullying or mean spiritedness. Sharing!!! Sharing without being told to share more importantly!! Laughing and just plain having fun! Families together - sharing the same circle of friends and enjoyment. Moms talking to other moms' children - not in a fake way but KNOWING them and having REAL conversations! I was so blown away that I knew in my heart that it was right for us.

I didn't touch upon the bullying and violence and lack of morals in state schools today. That is another "socialization" issue - I will mention one thing, "If the peer pressure, violence, degredation of morals, lack of self control, lack of manners, lack of plain, old kindness, every child on Ritalin, every child having to share in the same history or beliefs no matter what their own thoughts, sexuality of children, loss of morals, I could go on- anyway - if this is what the state schools and general society consider socialization - they can have it! I'd rather my children be hermits!!

My son was shy, not one to necessarily start the conversation but so easy to get along with and laid back once he did. I honestly worried that he may become more withdrawn if I homeschooled him. That was one of my biggest concerns. What I have experienced is a now a confident, moral, friendly, strong young man. Homeschooling was the BEST thing I ever did for his social life! He's active in tae kwon do (3 days per week minimum) - even to the point of sparring every friday night in front of a room full of peers and older children and adults. Competing in martial arts tournaments and jumping up in front of a panel and room full of people for belt testing. He takes Spanish, PE, and Science classes once a week with a homeschool coop group. He heads over to an "open gym" every friday for the afternoon and I barely get a quick "bye mom!" before he's run off looking for someone to play with! Of course, they also have friends at church and other activities just like any other child that attends public schools. We go on field trips, bowling with other homeschoolers, BINGOs, play dates, birthday parties, park days weekly when the weather is nice. We go to other children's homes and have their friends over our home for play. When he was in public school - outside of a birthday party once or twice a year - there wasnt any socializing outside of school. We attend shows, plays, special events. My twin 5 year old daughters and I recently attended a CYT play of "Snow White" that one of our coop friends was performing in. Most of the girls from our coop were there and they had so much fun!

There are, of course, so many studies and books that promote the positive roles that homeschooling plays in healthy socialization. There is certainly the moral factor - largely due the omission of the Bible and God in our schools - but that is another subject. I'm not sure why there is still the "socialization stigma" on homeschooling other than lack of knowledge. People are afraid of what they don't know - or things that are outside society's "norms" or they don't want to feel guilty that they choose not to give their life to their own children and homeschool them. They don't want to think about having to give up some of the material things that come with two working parents or their own ambitions and goals to stay home and do what the Lord calls us to do in home education. I have pulled up lists of famous and "important" American figures that were homeschooled - obviously capable of socializing. There are quotes from competent and intelligent Americans and World leaders concerning the lack of christianity and moral education in our schools. You can find it with a simple google search. I'm currently reading an amazing book by R.C. Sproul Jr. titled, "When You Rise Up". His passion and case for parents being the children's educators is moving. Of course, there are so many books and studies with positive homeschooling results. There's James Dobson, Greg Harris, James McDonald. Phil Lancaster, Douglas Phillips - and two of the "pioneers" Raymond Moore and John Holt. Raymond Moore being a former employee of the US Department of Education and Holt, an ivy league graduate and teacher.

Here is a link to a 2003 study conducted on the "first generation" of homeschoolers who are now adults and the impact of homeschooling on their lives. This study specifically targets socialization questions and results of formerly homeschooled students in comparison with adults of the same age group from the general US population. The study provides critics with the proof that "...homeschooling produces successful adults who are actively involved in their communities and who continue to value education for themselves and for their children." ~conclusion taken from the study. The link to study results and a pdf of the full study is http://www.hslda.org/research/ray2003/default.asp

I'm certain you will find all of the answers you are looking for in statistics, studies, books, and the Internet but I wanted to give you a personal experience to think about. Please feel free to email me with any questions. :) I'd love to help in any way that I can. :)

Now that I've written so much :) I'm going to post this to my blog along with the pictures I told you about. You can find it (it might be especially helpful to show your hubby) at
http://homeschoolnaturestudy.blogspot.com/

http://www.cafepress.com/homeschoolnatur"

I'm sure so many of you come across this "issue" and I hope this helps you feel supported in knowing what you are doing is THE BEST thing for your children! If my experience can ease even one homeschooling mom's mind ~ then its worth the post!

Blessings! Tiffany

Happy & Socialized

Great New Site for free audio downloads...

2008-10-07T09:06:00.009-04:00

Audio Downloads - Free!

Since we have a field trip this morning (to a working dairy farm :) - I was browsing the internet for some other free audio sites. Oftentimes, I find that listening to some of our literature and living books in the car creates great narrations. I haven't quite figured it out entirely but I believe the relaxed, no pressure environment encourages the best narrations. Also, my three children tend to "feed off" of each other's ideas and it becomes a wonderful discussion forum.

Now- please do not mistaken my comments~ my absolute FAVORITE spot to read our literature and enjoy narrating sessions is out doors in our backyard. Amongst our flower gardens, visiting birds, and pups is the BEST :). With the couch (cuddling) at a close second! However ~ with the life lesson that we do have extracurricular activities, church, coop, and sports ~ I do not waste the time generally. And my kids seem to really enjoy it!

We generally use the time to enjoy some hymns (we are currently listening to a Country Gospel CD that is fabulous - yes I live in a small town but this CD is great regardless - very upbeat for the children but with classic hymns such as Awesome God, Open the eyes of my Heart, etc.)

We use some of the time to listen to our composer of the term - this term we are listening to Debussy and have been enjoying Nocturnes in the car. Again - its a great time to discuss the music and what they do and do not enjoy about it. We dicussed how it makes them feel, what it makes them think of, etc. I also want to mention that we have been studying Debussy free as well. We have been able to obtain CD's from our local library and information and photographs (such as the one below) online for free. I will be putting our composer study outline and links for this term on the blog soon but for now - here is a short bio and photo - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Claude_Debussy

And of course - our topic today - our literature. I have used librivox and Google but the site I found this morning had several (not a huge list) of the stories we'd planned on listening to and the narrator has a wonderful, soothing voice. I have attached the link below in case you would like to 'check it out'. I hope you enjoy it! :)

http://lightupyourbrain.com/index.html

I am adding this link on my right sidebar - under Free Homeschool Resources but wanted to post it here as well so it was easily accessible. This morning, I downloaded the following stories for our travel time on our field trip (its about 35-40 minutes each way).

1~Jack and the Beanstalk - traditional - edited by Andrew Lang ~ I placed a great photo to the right for notebooking.

2~The Emperor's New Clothes - by Hans Christian Anderson

3~How the Leopard Got His Spots - Rudyard Kipling

4~The Story of Snow White- traditional- L.L. Weedon

5~Cinderella - traditional- retold by Henry W. Hewett

**Side note** I hope you've enjoyed the first few photographs on this post. They are nature study photos that I took and I've been "playing with" for my own "art & handicraft" lol ~ I am working on creating some beautiful pieces that I can mount and decoupage for my home. I hope you liked them! :) ***

Sketch Tuesday - 'Something Brown'

2008-09-28T12:02:00.014-04:00

Sketch Tuesday - September 23, 2008
'Something Brown'

This week's Sketch Tuesday was to sketch something brown. I was reading through scripture this morning and this particular verse reminded me of Barb from Harmony Art Mom who puts these together for us every week.
"...Pursue faith and love and peace, and enjoy the companionship of those who call on the Lord with pure hearts." ~2Timothy 2:22 NLT

I have never met Barb in person - only via our blogs and emails, however, I feel a certain kinship with her because we have such similar views on our children, homeschooling, nature and more. I also feel a total appreciation for what she does. When we consider how incredibly busy our weeks and days are as homeschooling moms and wives and friends ~ how amazing that she finds the time to put out these 'Sketch Tuesdays' along with thier slide shows weekly. And of course, her 'Outdoor Hour Challenges' to help the rest of us with our planning and with new and fresh ideas. I just thank her from the bottom of my heart. I know I have said it before, but if you haven't tried her blogs - by all means- do so NOW! :) They are a lot of fun ~ and very little work on our part. On Tuesdays, I recieve an email (I'm a subscriber to her blog) that gives the subject of the week's sketch and provide it to my children along with their sketch supplies and away they go! Then I simply email them to Barb and she puts together a slideshow of ALL of the children's works.

HERE is last week's slideshow.

My children get a big 'kick' out of seeing their own sketches on the computer and then we have fun looking at the sketches from other children on the slide show. It's fun to look at the ideas the other participants came up with and also the ages of the other kids. My children love to see a drawing that they really 'take' to and find out the artist is their age! :) It's a lot of fun and for those that struggle with fitting in art and drawing - here's a SIMPLE but FUN way to add it in to your plans. :) I simply block the time off for it every week KNOWING I'll fit it in because the kids want to be in the slideshow and Barb's done all the work of the ideas for us! I really encourage you to give it a try if you haven't. You can see my children's sketches for this week above.

Alyssa - as girly as she is was moved to draw a leaf and dirt (the first sketch on the right)~ then she looked outside and remembered that my husband was tearing down our old front porch and replacing it and suddenly (being the handygirl around here who LOVES watching my husband work) she was so excited to draw one of the wooden chairs from the front and a piece of lumber! :)

Briana - my little gardener - sketched (the second sketch down to the left) a robin feeding worms to her babies. Brown worms being fed to robin babies in a brown nest in a tree with brown bark!! :)

And Chance - my little extreme sports guy (he does motorcross, skateboarding, BMX biking, and tae kwon do/ kickboxing and sparring) - decided to draw a brown 'Tony Hawk' hat (above to the right).
This is always fun to talk about with the "well, aren't your kids unsocialized" type questions since all three of my children are very active in sports, homeschool & church activities, and hobbies ~ but that's another blog! ha ha ! :) Enjoy your day!

Roses, Roses, Roses,

2008-09-25T16:52:00.004-04:00

My Rose Garden

How I adore my roses! As the cooler air is coming I was sad that I would not be enjoying their sweet fragrance and soft flowers much longer, however, they seem to be thriving in our mild fall weather so I took a walk out to check on them. As I mentioned earlier- we've been a bit under the weather so this is the most neglected my roses have ever been. I was amazed that they were still holding their beauty as they were so I thought I'd share. I was dissapointed that the HNS did not have a lesson on them so this is mostly a photo walk.

WINNERS!! Homeschool Closet Giveaway!!

2008-09-23T11:53:00.004-04:00

The Results are In!!!

The kids have picked numbers for the winners of our first Homeschool Nature Study giveaway! I have tried to contact everyone by email to let them know of their wins, however, not everyone included thier email in the comments and I wasn't able to retrieve them from Blogger.

If you are a winner and listed below PLEASE email me at tburchell97@cox.net with your mailing address so I can get your prizes out to you! :) It will ship media mail so patience :). Thanks again for joining in to everyone and I hope you will visit us soon. We may be starting giveaways monthly :)!

Winners!:

Shelf 1 - - MODERATOR-Biz3Kid

Shelf 2 - anna

Shelf 3- wilda

Shelf 4 - melissa

Thanks for all who participated!

"...Pursue faith and love and peasce, and enjoy the companionship of those who call on the Lord with pure hearts." ~2 Timothy 2:22 NLT

Pumpkin Prayer Idea :)

2008-09-22T09:12:00.007-04:00

Pumpkin Prayer

Christians seem to have different opinions on whether to celebrate Halloween or not. Everyone should have the right to do as they think is BEST for THEIR family. We happen to attend a church that has a special night for the kids AT the church rather than "trick or treating". They normally have a moon bounce indoors for the kids, games, and a potluck dinner where we can all fellowship and celebrate a new season.

The Bible speaks frequently of seasons and autumn (the planting season) -

Ecclesiastes 3:1 To every thing there is a season, and a time to every
purpose under the heaven:
Ecclesiastes 3:2 A time to be born, and a time to
die; a timeto plant, and a time to pluck up that which is planted;

Our church follows up our activities with a "trunk or treat" in which we all decorate our car trunks seasonally (not scary) and the kids can walk around to the trunks (the cars are parked in a large circle in the parking lot away from the road) and obtain candy and pencils and other goodies. My children have great fun at it and we will continue to join in.

HOWEVER ~ I understand so many Christians decision to skip the creepy, scary, death ridden fiasco Halloween has become. I am not surprised that so many choose to keep their children from it all. I simply trust in the fellowship of the other parents in our church to make it worshipping of a new SEASON.

With that said :) - the reason I blogged this, this morning was to pass along a CUTE little pumpking prayer that was passed to me through an email this morning. The email arrives from a website Sunday School Lesson Plans.

My thoughts (and reason for the long explanation above lol :) are that even if you do not celebrate Halloween, you can use the activity below for baking pumpkin anything. Clean the seeds and pulp for pies or cookies. The rest of the activity can be solely focused on our Lord and the pumpkin disposed of afterwards if you wish - instead of displayed as a "jack o' lantern". I just thought the ideas was so cute I had to share! I hope you find a way to enjoy it! :)

Here's a great little "Pumpkin Prayer" activity you can use with your Sunday School aswe transition into October:

Dear God,
As I carve my pumpkin, help me say this prayer:
Open my mind so I can learn about You; (Cut the top of the pumpkin)
Take away all my sin and forgive me for the wrong things I do; (Clean out the inside)
Open my eyes so Your Love I will see; (Cut eyes shaped like hearts)
I'm sorry for turning up my nose to all You've given me; (Cut a nose in the shape of the cross)
Open my ears so Your Word I will hear; (Cut ears shaped like the Bible)
Open my mouth so I can tell others You're near; (Cut mouth in the shape of a fish)
Let Your Light shine in all I say and do! Amen. (Place a candle and light)

Is it giveaway time or what?!?

2008-09-15T21:45:00.003-04:00

Wow! It must be catching! I was checking on the comments on my blog about my giveaways and came across this new giveaway by blogmamma. You can find this contest at the link here. It's for a nice crayola scrapbooking kit. My twin girls would love it :). Win or not- its great to see so many giving bloggers and homeschooling moms helping each other out! :) So thanks to everyone - and thanks to everyone for entering my contest as well! I didn't find out about it until a bit late so you can still enter mine until the 19th! :)

Outdoor Hour Challenge #30 - Weeds & Seeds

2008-09-15T12:51:00.027-04:00

Outdoor Hour Challenge - #30 - Weeds & Seeds
(This post was actually typed up several days ago but just now being completed and published) :)
I was excited about this challenge because it fit us so well. We've had so many things going on and also been down with a "cold bug" so we've really missed our outdoor time. We are so use to having it almost daily. The Lord really set it up nice for us today. The weather couldn't have been better. A nice, balmy day but with a cool breeze blowing. It was amazing and so refreshing to be BACK in our gardens.

"The heavens are telling the glory of
God; and the firmament proclaims his handiwork.," ~Psalm 19:1 NRSV
Charlotte Mason wrote (volume 1, page 43):

"For we are an overwrought generation, running to nerves as a
cabbage runs to seed; and every hour spent in the open is a clear gain, tending to the increase of brain power and bodily vigour, and to the lengthening of life itself. They who know what it is to have fevered skin and throbbing brain deliciously soothed by the cool touch of the air are inclined to make a new rule of life, Never be within doors when you can rightly be without."

This held so true for us today :). AND our flower gardens, having been neglected the past two weeks - had PLENTY of weeds for us to study AND plenty of SEEDS to harvest as I have not been outside "dead heading" them as normal! :) What a blessing to have a nature study challenge that worked SO well in our life at the moment! It was such a good fit, in fact, I decided to break this challenge into 3 seperate lessons on 3 seperate days. So bear with me as I take you through our study of this wonderful challenge!

We started out by having the kids look around the yard and gardens for plants/flowers that they thought were weeds. I had them bring their "collection" of weeds to me.

We sorted through them at our outdoor pation table.
This was the collection of weeds my son picked up. My daughters both picked several dandelions.

I had read the HNS pages 512-514 as Barb suggested.
On page 512 of the HNS, Miss Comstock gives a definition of a weed:

"A weed is a plant growing where we wish something else to grow, and a plant may, therefore, be a weed in some locations and not in others."

I wanted to ensure the children really understood this concept. My first example of this was with the dandelions. My daughters adore them! What little girl has not spent time in her childhood blowing on their seed spheres? I explained that they were a weed and quite a ferocious one but that they may not be a weed to THEM.

I continued talking to them about other plants that may be a weed to others but not to them or vice versa. The first plant that came to mind was our glorious morning glories! We looked at our morning glories and discussed why we love them so:

1 - They grow FAST!

2- They are a vine that climbs - which WE were actually looking for to cover our fence.
3- We didn't have to worry about them spreading wildly because we spend so much time in our garden that we had the time to "train" them to grow where we wanted.

4- Their huge colorful flowers of several colors that greet us every morning with delight.

I then brought their attention to the fact that the very same characteristics we love about them may be the characteristic that make others despise them and consider them weeds! They couldn't imagine this so we went to look at our neighbor's yard.

Their yard is neat, well cared for. They created a very smart landscape design. Since they do not prefer to spend a lot of their outdoor time caring for their plants, they chose more of a shrub type landscape. They chose plants that rarely needed watering or pruning. They do not have any flowers whatsover - no color at all other than the few berries and such from the evergreens. It suits them. It is nice looking - very well "manicured".

I asked the children if they thought our neighbors would be happy with a morning glory in their yard. The children thought for a moment and agreed they would not. It was like an A-HA moment!! :) You know those when it's like, "OH!!! I understand!" :) We LOVE color and flowers and climbers and spending our outdoor time (and indoor actually) tending to our gardens, plants, flowers, animals, all of God's beautiful creation! But I have several dear friends that told me I was absolutely MAD when I allowed the girls to plant morning glory sees throughout my rose garden right under the fence! :) It's worked wonders - we Love it. But my friends will complain about those pestering weeds (morning glories) that are choking out their little shrubs! :)

We returned to looking at plants that were weeds in OUR yard. This vine to the left is a vine that my kids KNOW is a weed. l am constantly fighting this weed. I have not identified it but we have "studied" it so to speak all summer. It appears to be in every one of the older garden beds that were here before. When I created a "rose bed" near this little fence/flower bed type area I had no idea what issues these little vines create!

One of my 5yo daughter's suprised me by saying, "Mom, this is the weed that takes the roses' water!" I was impressed :) This vine is fast and vigorous- it quickly wraps itself around the plants and chokes them out. It completely covered a mature azalea bush and killed it when we first moved in.

On page 512 of the HNS it says:
"A weed may crowd out our cultivated plants, by
stealing the moisture and nourishment in th soil which they should have; or it may shade them out by putting out broad leaves and shutting off their sunlight."

It seems no matter how often I weed - this vine continuously comes back. We have been watching and fighting it all summer. The only sure help we've found is to ensure when we pull these weeds we get ALL of the root and to be incredibly persistent in trying to tackle them. I have found the only relief is to tackle them daily. I showed the kids how to pull the vines so that they would be able to pull up the root with it. They thought it would be much easier than it is and I giggled as (especially my son) was surprised at the strength of these tiny plants!!
HNS page 513 ~

"Each weed has its own way of winning in the struggle with our crops, and it behooves us to find that way as soon as possible
in order to circumvent it."

They can become difficult to get the full root once they are even slightly established

Here they are showing me what they were able pull up. They were so happy when they were finally able to get "some root."

We spoke about why I try to at least do a quick weeding each day. How it is SO much easier to pull up a young weed than a weed that even has established for a short time. I showed them the differences and allowed them to try both young weeds and the more established and they quickly realized what I meant! For this reason- we talked about HNS page 513 "Especially, every one who plants a garden should know how the weeds look when young, for seedlings of all kinds are delicate and easy to kill before their roots are well established."

Afterwards - I also browse through the Lesson section of the book and choose a few questions to discuss with my children. I never do them all and I do it all orally and very casually as we discuss our nature study from the day. For this time outdoors, I had chosen some discussion questions from Lesson 135 on page 513 in the HNS.

1- Why do we call a plant a weed? (When it grows where the gardener wants something else to grow) Is a weed a weed wherever it grows? (No) How did this weed plant itself where it is growing? (The dandelions are from seed speres that are blown by wind, children, other things. The vines seem to make their way from roots established years ago and we have yet to "get them all")

2- Where did they find their weeds? (in the lawn for the dandelions and in the rose garden for the vines) By what agency was its seed brought and dropped? (We talked about the different ways seeds travel - birds, wind, people, squirrels, etc. A great book to read about this is The Usborne First Book of Nature. We take it slow - only a 2 page layout per day but its colorful and informative and my children seem to really like it. If you want to supplement - I would recommend this book.)

3- Why must we study the habits of a weed before we know how to fight it? (Each weed has its own way of taking over our beloved gardens so we must study it in order to defeat it)

The children created their nature journal pages and sketches.

HNS p. 512~ "(God) is the great farmer. Continually (He) sows and reaps, making all the forces of the universe the plants' tools and helpers; the sun's rays, wind, rain and snow, insects and birds, animals small and great, even to the humble burrowing worms of the earth..."