Homeschooling

Homeschooling Day

September 30, 2015 by mamakay Leave a Comment

I am finding a good rhythm to our days. We start our day with Bible reading, a hymn, a prayer and a Christian Shema (which comes from Luke 10:27) with my husband and daughter who is going to public school. Afterwards everyone gets their morning jobs done and eats breakfast.

I have found that the day goes better if I have the older kids get started on their independent work while I finish getting prepared for the day and then work with the youngest students first.

Our regular homeschool day is divided up into 5 main categories:

Morning Time (with the younger group)
Independent Work
Circle Time
Group Work
Read Aloud

Morning Time

I start our school day with the Kindergartner and the 2nd grader with the toddler and baby close at hand.

We sing our calendar songs to determine what month and day off the week it is. Then we put the cards up on our calendar bulletin board.

Next we read a Bible story from the Rod & Staff Bible Story book. We work on the Bible verse for the day and then the kids like to act out the story.

I go over any new things in their workboxes so they know what to do later on. We use lots of things from confessionsofahomeschooler.com , sewing cards, workbooks, tangram shapes and learning notebooks.

The 2^nd grader then plays with the two little ones while I do reading lessons with the kindergartener using Teach Your Child to Read in 100 Easy Lessons.

Independent Work

Each of the older students has an assignment notebook where we write each day’s assignments.

Every day they are required to do:

Math – Teaching Textbooks and Life of Fred

Copywork – either from our Bible reading in our Journibles or a passage from our other reading

Assigned reading

Other assignments as they come up such as book reports, writing assignments, map work, etc….

Next time I will tell you about our Circle Time and Group Work.

MamaKay

Homeschooling

September 23, 2015 by mamakay Leave a Comment

I was asked to be on a homeschooling panel for our local Moms group and it got me thinking a lot about why we homeschool and what we are trying to accomplish. Looking back over this blog I realized I had never really delved very deeply into my thoughts on the subject. It seems like a good time to do so. Over the next few weeks I plan to do a series on why and how we homeschool. It is a constantly changing life here with so many ages and stages of children and my plans and expectations have changed quite a bit over the years. We seek to glorify God with our lives and seek after truth, beauty and goodness as we remain focused on doing the 3 R’s.

This year I have the following students:

Junior (16 year old girl)

Freshman (14 year old girl) — going to public high school

7th Grade (12 year old girl)

5th Grade (10 year old girl)

2nd Grade (8 year old girl)

Kindergarten (6 year old boy)

Plus a toddler and a baby

Stay tuned to see how we do it!

MamaKay

Our Homeschool Year Recap 2013/14

June 10, 2014 by mamakay Leave a Comment

We have had a couple of weeks since out homeschool year has come to a close. I’ve been contemplating how we did this year and what we can do better next year. This past year I had a 9th grader, 7th grader, 5th grader, 3rd grader, Kindergartner plus the boys (4 and 1).

Our 9th grader took Algebra and Biology with a co-op. It was a good thing for her. She really enjoyed spending time with kids her age and found she really liked Biology. (I was really glad that she got to dissect frogs and other things somewhere else 🙂 ) For our family it was a rather difficult thing, however. The co-op ended up being two days a week and one of those days it was 30 minute drive instead of a 5 minute drive. It was really difficult to get a good routine going with all of the driving I was doing between co-op, piano lessons and 4H activities. The other trouble we found with this schedule is that she really only focused on the work for co-op and didn’t get my assignments done. She is now having to do “summer school” to get my work done.

For the 3rd, 5th and 7th grader we used the Easy Peasy curriculum from www.allinonehomeschool.com , Teaching Textbooks and Always Ice Cream. Overall we really liked the independent work everyone was able to do. The kids missed our read alouds and doing history together. We did add in some read alouds towards the end of the year.

Our Circle Time was very inconsistent due to our crazy schedule this year but everyone was able to get a few poems memorized, drew a bit with a Draw to Learn Proverbs, sang some hymns and did some devotionals.

We worked through Teach Your Child to Read in 100 Easy Lessons with the Kindergartner. She has finally got her sounds down but putting them together is still a challenge. She enjoyed working on her Rod and Staff workbooks. She also loved using Always Ice Cream.

We used workboxes for the Kindergartner and Preschooler pretty successfully. We used quite a bit from http://www.confessionsofahomeschooler.com/letter-of-the-week and materials we already had like sewing cards, counting bears, shapes, etc…

Overall I felt like this was a survival year but we made it through and learned some strategies that will help us in the future. Every year has its strengths and weaknesses but we keep on pushing through and God teaches us what we need to know. I am so thankful he loves my children even more than I do and he will fill in the gaps. Next time I will let you know my thoughts on next year.

MamaKay

Homeschooling — The Easy Peasy Way

October 2, 2013 by mamakay 4 Comments

I had ordered all of our curriculum and I sat down to start planning our 2013/14 school year and then panic set in! How was I going to homeschool a 9th grader, 7th grader, 5th grader, 3rd grader, Kindergartner and keep up with 2 very busy little boys, the garden, cooking, laundry, homemaking, etc….? I was feeling very spread thin! I started searching the internet for ideas on homeschooling with a large family; looking at schedules, curriculum, other mom’s plans. Nothing was clicking.

And then…(I don’t even know how I got there) I landed on All in One Homeschool! I just know that God directed my fingers as I was searching that day. This mom painstakingly planned out all of her own children’s lesson plans using links to all kinds of wonderful (and free) sites all over the internet. She organized it and then shared them with anyone who wants to use them! It is set up in such a way that reader’s can do their school work independently. It covers English, reading, writing, spelling, typing, history, science, Bible, art, music, PE, math, foreign language, computers and more. The kids love it! There are games and all those fun things you can find on educational sites online. They can work at their pace and begin whenever they are ready instead of having to wait for everyone else.

I went through and made notebooks for every child in Evernote (one of my new favorite online tools). Then I made a note for each day’s assignments. I added things I wanted them to do and then added in the assignments from Easy Peasy into the day in checklist form. That way they wouldn’t have to click all over the place to get their assignments. Its just in one list. And we have online documentation of what they have gotten done (that I can check from which ever device I have in front of me).

For math we are continuing to use Teaching Textbooks except for my 9th grader who is using Jacob’s Algebra in a co-op. She is also taking Biology with the co-op using Apologia.

Here is what a “normal” school day looks like:

8:30 am School Begins – we have 4 different computers (various states of usability) and 1 tablet that can be used. The first one to start gets the best machine. The big kids just work through their checklists asking for help when they need it.

9 am I sit down with the Kindergartner to do reading lessons (We are still using Teach Your Child to Read in 100 Easy Lessons) and work on her penmanship

Preschooler uses tablet for learning games

Baby is usually taking a nap

9:30 am Kindergartner uses tablet to do math, Starfall and other learning apps

10 am Kindergartner and Preschooler do workboxes

10:30 am Recess/Physical Activity — step away from the computers!

11 am Circle Time: Memory Work, Art, Music

11:30 am Back to Lessons if not finished

Noon Lunch Break

1 pm Finish Up Lessons, Work on 4H, etc

2 pm Read for an Hour for Quiet Time (Littles can look at books or play quietly)

3 pm Freetime (Unless lessons aren’t done)

7 pm Family Worship and Our Read Aloud Time

I am so pleased with this way of doing school. It has made it easier to be a mom and not just a teacher. I have been able to get the canning done, keep up with the laundry and keep track of the boys better while lessons are still being accomplished. I believe the kids are getting lots more work done. My 3rd grader does have some trouble doing some of the history and science lessons on her own but I think the more she does it the more confident she will become in her reading abilities.

I also have to watch that I am keeping them accountable to getting their work done. A couple of them have slipped through the cracks only completely part of their work for the day. So I need to be extra diligent in checking in with them before they are released for the day.

Homeschooling Convention 2008

July 25, 2008 by mamakay 2 Comments

We had our convention this past weekend and it was wonderful as usual! It’s so nice to spend time with friends, listen to encouraging speakers and shop for homeschooling books!

My favorite session was Shelley Noonan’s Mentoring Your Daughters. She talked about purposefully teaching your daughters. She recommended spending 1 hour each week one-on-one time with each daughter. With 5 girls I’m not sure how I’m going to achieve that. She wrote A Companion Guide for Beautiful Girlhood. I bought this and intend to start it with 1potato (who is 9 1/2). I already had Beautiful Girlhood but we haven’t read it yet.

Dh went to one called How Do You Know What They Know? by Teresa Moon. He suggested I get her book Evaluating for Excellence. I think it is just what we needed! With more students this year dh & I have been talking about how we need to have more definable goals and ways of measuring their progress. This book is filled with forms to help diagnose where they are, set down your goals and measure their progress. It comes with a CDROM (which they are mailing to me) that you can print the forms out if you don’t want to make copies from the book.

This year we decided to switch from Making Math Meaningful to Math-U-See. Dh is going to take over teaching them math so I won’t have to worry about it. We are really excited about it. I bought the Primer for 3potato who is doing Kindergarten this year and Gamma for 1potato. Some friends of ours are going to give us Beta for 2potato as soon as their son finishes it (he’s almost done). We are already enjoying listening to the skip counting songs.

I’m very excited about the books we got for language lessons this year! They are from Queen Homeschool. The include full color art work for picture study, poetry, creative writing, grammar and more. They are so lovely to look at and are directed to the student so a lot of it they will be able to do on their own. 1potato also picked out Pictures in Cursive Book D to practice her cursive. It is a daily cursive writing practice based on picture study lessons

1potato got very excited about lapbooking at the convention. She got to go to a workshop where they made one. So we got Dinah Zike’s Big Book of Books and Activities. We also got a kit that has 12 folders & papers to make lapbooks with. I’m hoping she will make a lapbook every month and it will help her study skills.

We also got the Keepers of the Home Handbook. We are hoping to start a club using it this fall.

We are going to continue with our Mystery of History Volume 1 using figures from History Through the Ages for our timelines.

We are also going to continue using Draw to Learn: The Book of Psalms for drawing and Bible. We love it. We are using some hardbound books from Miller Pads & Paper to do our drawings in and Prismacolor Pencils. I’m doing it with the girls and it is so enjoyable and really helps focus on what the Bible is saying to us.

We are planning on starting back to school August 4th with everyone else around here. I’m using this planner from Simply Charlotte Mason to pull it all together. I’m really looking forward to this year — I think its going to be a great school year!

Ultimate Homeschool Expo

April 25, 2008 by mamakay Leave a Comment

Cindy Rushton is hosting the Ultimate Homeschool Expo again this year. It starts on Monday. I’m so excited to be “attending” this great convention from home with over 50 speakers, a virtual vendor hall and free gifts. Tickets are on sale now if you want to participate too. Get More Details at: http://www.cindysaffiliates.com/go.php?offer=kbickel&pid=1

Cindy said I could post this article she wrote here so you could get a peak at the great information available at the expo. We love notebooking at our house!

Let’s Try Notebooking
By Cindy Rushton

Notebooking … ahhh, just the thought makes me hyper! If I could ask every homeschooling family to do just one thing, it would be to just give notebooking a try. This is the one technique that pulls everything together—studies, research, real life, personal interests—everything! It reaches even the most reluctant writer! It makes homeschooling fun and easy! Who wouldn’t want to try that?

Not just that! Everything that normally clutters up the busy homeschool home can be tucked away into a notebook! All of those precious narrations can be safely protected in notebooks. All of those daily copywork lessons can find their home in notebooks on each of the topics that your children love so much. Even those awesome handouts that you have piled up from field trips can find the perfect home in your notebooks! Homeschooling is recorded. An heirloom is built!

Want to Give It a Try?

Getting started is as easy as ABC. Let me take you through the easy steps:

1. Gather your supplies. Your supplies can be as simple as a three-ring binder per child, plastic sheet protectors, and a pencil per child. You can make this as simple or as crafty as you like! Over the years, notebooking has worked so wonderfully in our home that we are constantly on the lookout for different and fun supplies during our daily notebooking time. By doing so, our daily lessons are as fun as a scrapbooking party—every day! If you have no idea where to begin, see our shopping list on www.TheHomeschoolMagazine.com for quick ideas on supplies that work great!

2. Make your supplies accessible. Set aside a place for your material and a place for your children to work. There is something wonderful about having a place fore everything and everything reliably in its place. The work in the beginning is well worth the time during the school year. We have a shelf that contains books that I find along the way with great copywork that I would like for my children to add to their notebooks on those “no ideas are flowing” days. Just having everything there, ready to go, is such a blessing on those busy mornings. Plus, I have learned over the years that this is the best way to really utilize the resources that I have on my shelves.

Just file away any pages or pictures in either manila envelopes or file folders. If the children know where they are, they are more than likely to use them on their own. Also, you will want to use anything else that you have in your home. I keep our paints, papers (plain and colored cardstock and 20 lb. paper; writing paper, etc.), glues, templates, cutting utensils, rulers, markers, pens, pencils, etc. on a shelf and in plastic bins by our dining table (where we do our daily lessons). They are in their spot and that spot is close by. If we want to encourage our young writers, we must give them free access to the best materials.

3. Turn your children loose! Yep! This is all that is left! Inevitably, when I teach workshops on notebooking, I can almost see the brains of mothers clicking away with one tough reality—“If only I had more time to do this!” Oh, beloved! Notebooking is not another thing for you to do! The hard part is learning what this is all about and how to get everything together so we can turn our children loose!

When we began notebooking, I copied a Bible verse a day as a model for my son to copy. As he copied his verse, he would place his page for the day in a plastic sheet protector and add it to his notebook. The next day, his page for that day would slide in behind that page. The next day, he would add another page in another page protector. We built the entire notebook; not specific divisions or subjects. We chose not to divide by subjects because we wanted a nice full “product” built over time. As we added to the notebook each day, I could see the delight building in my young writers. they would sit and just flip through the pages. They loved seeing success. They loved seeing the notebook build up.

As time went on, my son began to find and copy poems that he liked, songs from the church hymnal or from his history lessons. He began a collection of art prints. He added maps that highlighted journeys. At the end of the first year, we had a bulging notebook and a young writer who had gone from reluctant to really excited! The notebook quickly became “his own” notebook. At the end of the year, we divided our notebooks (there was no room to add anything else) into obvious divisions. We had a Bible notebook, a history notebook, a poetry notebook, and another copybook. All of these have continued and several have divided into other notebooks through the years (he now has four history notebooks—Great Men and Women of the Civil War, Battles of the Civil War, Military Notebook, and World History Timeline Notebook! And that is just history!). As your children dig into their interests, they may have other notebooks that develop. Let them go! You will learn more about your children as they learn more about topics and writing!

So, What Do You Think?
Want to give it a try? If I could ask every homeschooling family to do just one thing, it would be to just give notebooking a try. So, think about it. Pray about it. Then, get those supplies. Set aside a spot for your supplies. Then, turn those budding young writers loose!

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About Cindy Rushton…

Cindy Rushton is the hostess of the Ultimate Homeschool Expo, the very first online homeschool convention. She is recording Preview Chats for the Ultimate Homeschool Convention RIGHT NOW! Join her wonderful guests FREE for the next weeks as they count down to the Ultimate Homeschool Expo (April 28-May 3, 2008–BUT! NEVER ENDING because it is an ONLINE Convention!). Get your ticket NOW and receive her awesome A Quick Start for Notebooking Mini-Set FREE today! Check out all of the details here:

http://www.cindysaffiliates.com/go.php?offer=kbickel&pid=1