Category: Homeschool: Random Thoughts

Looking Back over the Year, 2009-2010 0

Looking Back over the Year, 2009-2010

This year (2009-2010) our main units included natural disasters,China,  biomes/animal habitats, ancient Greece (we did ancientEgypt just before this school year officially started and before Istarted this blog), flowers and apples (the last two  were gearedmore towards my preschooler).  We also enjoyed lots of scienceexperiments (almost weekly) and the younger kids really enjoyedthe theme time tables.  We did a lot with geography throughout the  year and reallyenjoyed doing  country/continent swaps...

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Jesse Gap

One of the few things we did out-and-about last week was to go to Jesse Gap with friends. The older kids had a lot of fun climbing up the rocks. There was a “cave” up behind the trees and the boys spent a long time exploring while the younger ones hid plastic Easter eggs in the grass. (Yes, we kept a hawk’s-eye out for snakes!) Meanwhile, on the home front...

Simpsons Gap 0

Getting Ready to Say Goodbye: Beautiful Simpson’s Gap Photos

Our time has been taken up more and more by our move away from central Australia. We are both excited to move on and sad to leave this beautiful area. We’ve been here 12+ years and have amazing friends and memories. It has been overwhelming the number of things we need to do to be ready to pack up and leave, so expect fewer and fewer posts. Just another 6...

A Day in the Life of Our Homeschool 4

A Day in the Life of Our Homeschool

I wrote up a detailed post about our homeschool routine (I hesitate to even call it a schedule).  I took notes all day so I could show what a real homeschool day looks like here at the homeschool den. The link is in the right sidebar or click here. We have various ways we keep our homeschool materials organized.  We use workboxes for most of our academic things (math, math...

Cursive Writing; Homeschool ID Card 4

Cursive Writing; Homeschool ID Card

Someone shared this wonderful link to an article on the benefits of teaching kids cursive writing http://www.donpotter.net/PDF/Cursive%20First.pdf Also, if you need a homeschool id (for teachers or for students) card, you can make one (free) at the homeschool buyer’s co-op. I need to update ours before we go on travel and thought I’d mention it here in case you hadn’t heard about them. The homeschool id card was beneficial when...

Things Around the House 0

Things Around the House

Homemade Graham Crackers:I’ve been making our own graham crackers for a coupleof months. While they can made to look very authentic,I’ve recently been putting the dough into a large rectangularloaf in the fridge. Then I cut slices and bake them on asilcone baking sheet whenever we want them. Here is the graham cracker recipe if you’re interested. Here are a couple household hints you may or may notknow about. Getting...

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Just Life

    I had a wonderful conversation with my sister the other evening. (My amazing sister who homeschools her three kids, holds a full-time job and whose husband is currently deployed for nine or ten months. Truly an amazing, inspiring person in my life.) Anyway, I was talking about how the blog world is so inaccurate and really doesn’t show what life is really like for us. The reality is,...

ED Turns Two! 0

ED Turns Two!

Our cakes these days always have decorated cookies onthem instead of fancy icing. For one thing, my cakedecorating skills are lacking, but also the kids lovedecorating the cookies and everyone gets to be involved. We had a lovely birthday, though ED was a bit under the weather.

Avoiding the Stress 3

Avoiding the Stress

These days I’ve only been posting about our homeschool activities and really haven’t talked about life in general at all.  I think that’s because I’m avoiding the major things and enjoying the little things.  You see, we’ve been here a long time (12 years) and are going to be moving.  We don’t know where (away from Australia at any rate), though we do know when (probably in about five months). ...

Planning for the new Semester 0

Planning for the new Semester

Here in Australia, most kids will be starting a new schoolyear at the beginning of February.  We follow the Americanschool year, so LD will still be in first grade and DD is stillin preschool. Since we take days off as we need to, I generally continueat half speed after the holidays (getting together for play datesor going to the pool at the drop of a hat).  Still, I’ve beenspending time...

Breakfast Independence 0

Breakfast Independence

The older kids are always given a small pitcher to pourtheir milk into their cereal. ED now has a very smallpitcher of milk to pour into her bowl. (She’s been doing thisfor a couple of months now, probably starting around 20months old, I think.) If she dribbles any milk she knowswhere the washclothes are and will go grab one out of thedrawer to wipe the table.

How do you homeschool with kids of different ages? 1

How do you homeschool with kids of different ages?

One question that I’ve been asked pretty regularly is “how do you homeschool with kids of such different ages?” My first response lately has often been, just imagine taking your three favorite students out of a class of 25. They have different needs and abilities, but so do the kids in a traditional classroom setting. I get to work every day with the kids that I most enjoy being with...