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Homeschool Den / Homeschool: Our Homeschool (what our day is like, curriculum choices, etc.) / Homeschool: Planning and Preparation / Must Read
by Liesl - Homeschool Den · Published August 27, 2012 · Last modified March 16, 2019
Lots of people have shared their school plans for this next year in the not-back-to-school blog hop: curriculum week. In fact, I shared our preschool curriculum plans several weeks ago. Now finally, here are our basic plans for DD and LD this next year. While they work on their own levels for math and language arts, we do most of our other units together. As you’ll see, much of our day...
Homeschool Den / Homeschool: Organizing and Cleaning / Homeschool: Our Homeschool (what our day is like, curriculum choices, etc.) / Homeschool: Planning and Preparation / Must Read / Workboxes
by Liesl - Homeschool Den · Published August 24, 2012 · Last modified March 14, 2019
I’ve spent a lot of time reorganizing our homeschool room this year. I know lots of other homeschoolers are sharing pictures of their learning spaces in the not-back-to-school blog hop. I thought I’d share some photos of our homeschool room as well. In the picture below you see our 3-ring notebooks, the craft table, LD’s writing desk, a bookshelf and DD’s desk (back by the window). A lot of our...
Homeschool Den / Homeschool: Our Homeschool (what our day is like, curriculum choices, etc.) / Homeschool: Planning and Preparation / Must Read
by Liesl - Homeschool Den · Published June 8, 2012
This is the fifth post in a series about planning for the new school year. Here are the previous posts in this series: Here are the questions I consider. This post looks a back at our school year. I talk about what went well and what could use some improvement. I talked about how I assess our homeschooling philosophy: Am I happy with *how* we are homeschooling? I talked a lot about...
Homeschool Den / Homeschool: Our Homeschool (what our day is like, curriculum choices, etc.) / Homeschool: Planning and Preparation / Must Read
by Liesl - Homeschool Den · Published June 7, 2012 · Last modified May 3, 2016
This is the fourth post helping describe how I go about planning for the new school year. Here are the previous posts in this series: Here are the questions I consider. This post looks a back at our school year. I talk about what went well and what could use some improvement. Yesterday’s post talked about how I assess our homeschooling philosophy: Am I happy with *how* we are homeschooling? I...
Homeschool Den / Homeschool: Our Homeschool (what our day is like, curriculum choices, etc.) / Homeschool: Planning and Preparation
by Liesl - Homeschool Den · Published June 6, 2012 · Last modified May 3, 2016
There are so many different styles of homeschooling and each family will pick and choose the elements that suits their homeschool style. If your homeschooling is anything like ours it evolves continually as you find what suits each child. Some of the homeschool styles you may have heard about include: Classical education Charlotte Mason Montessori Unschooling Unit Studies Virtual Homeschooling Waldorf Eclectic Living Books — Well, I’ve never heard anything...
Homeschool Den / Homeschool: Our Homeschool (what our day is like, curriculum choices, etc.) / Homeschool: Planning and Preparation
by Liesl - Homeschool Den · Published June 5, 2012 · Last modified December 13, 2016
I started a series of posts to help explain how we plan for the next year. In yesterday’s post, I listed out the questions I ask myself as I plunge into the planning process. The next few posts I’ll tell you my answers to these questions. I’ll also tell you some of the books, websites and other resources I use in the planning process. Today, I’m going to look over...
Homeschool Den / Homeschool: Planning and Preparation
by Liesl - Homeschool Den · Published June 4, 2012
Someone recently asked me, “How do you plan for your school year?” I thought this would be an easy answer, but the more I thought about it, the more complicated my answer became. There are so many things I do as I plan. I thought I would answer this in a series of posts. Today I’ll share the general questions I ask myself. In the coming days, I’ll share the...
Homeschool Den / Homeschool: Planning and Preparation / Language Arts: Reading
by Liesl - Homeschool Den · Published May 15, 2012 · Last modified March 14, 2019
Sometimes it’s a bit hard to describe how homeschooling works. Lots of things happen simultaneously and our read aloud time is the best example of this. This semester our read aloud time has been mostly centered around American history (though we also read a book about Isaac Newton). We were studying the American West and so we read the Sign of the Beaver, Little House in the Big Woods, and The...
Homeschool Den / Homeschool: Our Homeschool (what our day is like, curriculum choices, etc.) / Homeschool: Planning and Preparation / Homeschool: Random Thoughts
by Liesl - Homeschool Den · Published March 14, 2012 · Last modified February 9, 2017
I’ve been posting a lot lately. Now it’s time to step back and remind you that this is definitely only a glimpse of what we do or what life is really like for us. You are seeing only a five to fifteen minute snippet of our day or perhaps you’re seeing snippets of several days all organized nicely into one post. And while I love, love coming up and planning ...
Homeschool: Our Homeschool (what our day is like, curriculum choices, etc.) / Homeschool: Planning and Preparation
by Liesl - Homeschool Den · Published October 31, 2011
I’ve been itching to do a posting about our general homeschool schedule/day. What things we cover aside from the units I so often post about. Reading: Both DD and LD are good readers now. DD is reading easier chapter books while LD is on longer chapter books now. They both get up in the morning and read while eating breakfast. I always sprinkle our dining room room table with books...
Freebies / Homeschool: Our Homeschool (what our day is like, curriculum choices, etc.) / Homeschool: Planning and Preparation / Science: Ocean Unit
by Liesl - Homeschool Den · Published August 30, 2011 · Last modified November 19, 2020
Sorry about the endless postings about our ocean unit… just a couple more and that’s that! Blogs are funny because they sure don’t show the whole picture. From looking at our blog our days are consumed by oceans!! Heh heh! Well, that’s not at all accurate. I read and read, planned and planned and finally the older kids started back to school last week. As you’ve seen, ED has been...
Ages 2-6: Preschool for ED - Fall 2011 (age 3 1/2) / Arts and Crafts / Homeschool: Planning and Preparation / Science: Ocean Unit
by Liesl - Homeschool Den · Published August 12, 2011 · Last modified February 3, 2016
ED’s Tuesday Routine: So you heard yesterday that I’m planning to use biome/habitat themes with ED this fall. This is what I have planned in a general way for Tuesdays: Arts and Crafts (based on the theme) Montessori Math Beads; Math Activities Science Sorts (Long post and link to my 30-pages of notes, etc.!) Arts and Crafts The girls painted boxes to make a diorama. Now all this needs is...
Ages 2-6: Preschool for ED - Fall 2011 (age 3 1/2) / Ages 2-6: Toddler/Preschool Activities / Homeschool: Planning and Preparation / Montessori (general info) / Science: Ocean Unit
by Liesl - Homeschool Den · Published August 10, 2011 · Last modified February 20, 2016
ED’s Monday Routine: The idea of planning all this is so that I can change up ED’s activities, keep them fresh, interesting with the minimum of thought on my part. I expect to skip days, but then I’ll just pick up on the appropriate day and continue on. The routine is (hopefully) to make it easier on me to keep things engaging for ED. Mailbox Letters and Scavenger Hunt Montessori...
Ages 2-6: Preschool for ED - Fall 2011 (age 3 1/2) / Homeschool: Organizing and Cleaning / Homeschool: Planning and Preparation / Workboxes
by Liesl - Homeschool Den · Published August 9, 2011 · Last modified March 14, 2019
I often enjoy having a glimpse at other people’s homeschool setups. We had quite a small house over in Australia, but we are now blessed with this amazingly large, airy homeschool room. We have bright colorful workboxes. Each kid has their own row, but I do not fill them every day with new things. Instead their basic subjects get stored here (including the manipulatives, new games, activities and printouts). It...
Do you believe education can be exciting, inspiring, and full of joy? We do too!
I love the quote by William Butler Yeats, "Education is not the filling of a pail, but the lighting of a fire." It's about getting the kids involved, engaged, and fired up about learning (while juggling the rest of life too!)
A bit about me: I have my Master's from Brown University. I have more than 20 years of teaching experience. I was a high school teacher for many years both in the U.S. and internationally and also taught for the University of Maryland before leaving to homeschool my 3 wonderful kids.
To read more about us CLICK HERE.
Click on the image to find out more about the units and packets we have available.
This post has links to dozens of posts and resources both for new and veteran homeschoolers for everything from finding homeschool curriculum to general homeschool advice and encouragement.
Click on the image above to see the History Units we covered in our homeschool.
What science topics could I teach my 5-7 year old - Homeschool Science Curriculum
Click on the image above to see the Science Units we covered in our homeschool from elementary through middle school (and beyond!).
A list of the books we've used most in history, science, math, language arts, etc.
Click the image to check out our packets on Earth Science, Rocks and Minerals, the Atmosphere, Weather, Energy and More!
Units are also sold separately.
This is one of our most popular units. It covers the Layers of the Earth, Plate Tectonics, Earthquakes, Volcanoes and More! It is included in the Earth Science Bundle (see the picture/link above).
Click the image to see our Biology Units on Animal and Plant Cells; the Biology Unit on Biomes, Food Chains, Symbiosis; Scientific Classification & Taxonomy (Domain/Kingdom/Phylum/Class, etc.); Botany - Plant Kingdom and Oceans and Oceanography.
Click on the image to see our Animal Bundle - including the Animal Unit, Life Cycles, the Rainforest, Winter (Polar Animals) & Hibernation, Chameleons, Wolves, Cicadas and more!
The Human Body Systems, Skeletal, Digestive, Circulatory, Muscular, Nervous, Endocrine Systems and More (with lots of hands-on activity ideas)! We usually study a different body system each year.
Click on the image to see our units on the States of matter, Properties of Matter, Electricity & Circuits, and the Chemistry Unit (Get to know the Periodic Table in a fun way!)
This is a free checklist I put together of the various science units I hope to cover in the elementary and middle school years.
Do your kids know the 4 largest countries? Which countries have the most people? The longest river? This packet covers basic world and U.S. facts and also covers geographic features and land forms.
Click on the image to check out our 100-page unit on World War I.
We have used AAS for 6 years! AAS is an affiliate link.
Dozens of posts about how to create a homeschool writing workshop.
Click on the image to check out all of our fun K-2 Math Packets.
This is one of the best values we have... more than 20 PDFs with games, activities and worksheets to learn/practice the multiplication facts ($7.00).
Click on the image to discover some of the pages, posts and homeschool resources within our blog that might be the most useful for you including a long list of our freebies!
Click on the image to check out our 100+page Rocks and Minerals Unit.
This is a fun, hands-on unit for early elementary students!
How the body is organized from cells to tissues... organs to body systems
Click on the image to check out some of the Spanish worksheet bundles we have available!
Click on the image above to check out our German worksheets.
Click on the image to find out more about our units and packets.
