Making Homeschooling Hands-On, Engaging, Meaningful & Memorable! Be inspired by all the possibilities!! Check out our unit studies, packets and printables!
This past summer, I spent quite a bit of time trying to decide what LD would do for 9th grade writing. Last year we used Cover Story and the kids continued doing a lot of independent writing. They also had to do some writing for history, but we hadn’t delved much into formal essay writing. It was time for LD to start writing more polished pieces, but I wasn’t quite...
Freebies / Homeschool Den / Science / Science: Earth Science Unit / Science: Natural Disasters Unit and Activities / Science: Water Unit / Science: Weather Unit
by Liesl - Homeschool Den · Published October 5, 2017 · Last modified November 19, 2020
For the past couple of weeks, I’ve been sharing some of the Earth Science activities we’ve been doing in our science club. Today, I thought I would share some other resources that are buried here on the blog for those of you who want to continue on with Earth Science this year. a packet about the Earth’s atmosphere (Find out more about this 50+ page packet here.) Weather Packet Weather...
Ages 2-6: Preschool (Age 4) / Ages 2-6: Preschool and Toddler Activities / Ages 2-6: Preschool at Home / Freebies / Homeschool Den / Kindergarten / Kindergarten Math / Math--Addition
by Liesl - Homeschool Den · Published October 4, 2017 · Last modified September 30, 2018
When my kids were first learning to do double-digit addition, I found some Montessori math worksheets that worked extremely well for them. They could follow the color scheme and also there was plenty of room for them to write in the numbers. I wound up making numerous sets for them. I thought I would make a new set in a fall theme for those of you with kids just delving...
Homeschool Den / Science / Science Experiments
by Liesl - Homeschool Den · Published October 1, 2017 · Last modified November 13, 2020
Last week, I shared that we are doing a weekly science club with some local homeschoolers. Today I’m going to tell you about our second week. We did activities on Earth Science (this week was plate tectonics) and also biology — scientific classification & taxonomy. We are doing work with various organisms this semester. In the second week we observed our mealworms and were introduced to a type of flatworm...
Homeschool Den / Math - Percents Fractions and Decimals / Math--Fractions
by Liesl - Homeschool Den · Published September 27, 2017 · Last modified September 25, 2017
ED has been working steadily on fractions this fall. I thought I would share what she’s been doing the last few weeks. Be sure to scroll to the bottom for the links to some free math resources. 🙂 Last spring, she quickly and easily went through the Fractions Packet. It’s a free download here on the blog and you can print the pages with a heart-theme or just plain. 🙂...
History: American West Unit / Homeschool Den
by Liesl - Homeschool Den · Published September 19, 2017 · Last modified September 19, 2023
Oregon Trail Packet 20+ pages! For the past few weeks, the girls have been doing a unit on the Oregon Trail. They’ve learned why people moved West, when and where pioneers started, how long the journey West took, what was needed to travel along the Oregon Trail, dangers the pioneers encountered and other basic information about traveling on the Oregon Trail. They spent about 10 days learning about the Donner...
Homeschool Den / Homeschool: Planning and Preparation
by Liesl - Homeschool Den · Published September 11, 2017
We’ve been in school for a couple of weeks now and creating good routines has been on my mind a lot. I think we all want to harness the energy and excitement we feel these first few weeks of school and keep that going all throughout the year, right?! Coming up with a homeschool routine that works well for your family can be really challenging. Some homeschoolers have a fairly...
Homeschool Den / Language Arts: Reading
by Liesl - Homeschool Den · Published September 5, 2017 · Last modified July 26, 2023
Today, I wanted to mention a free resource that might be of interest. The Glencoe Literature Library page has free study guides for a huge selection of well-known novels such as Update: UNFORTUNATELY THESE GUIDES DON’T SEEM TO BE AVAILABLE ANYMORE! Across Five Aprils The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn Animal Farm The Canterbury Tales Frankenstein Jane Eyre Shiloh Where the Red Fern Grows and many more! Visit the Glencoe Literature Library...
by Liesl - Homeschool Den · Published September 2, 2017 · Last modified June 19, 2020
My kids have always loved playing games to practice their math and learn their math facts. They would beg to play “just one more round” when it was a math board game! Today I have a really cute set of math printables for practicing those tricky addition facts! The 50-page Dragon Math Packet is for ages 4-6. This set has 13 different math board games. These include doubling games and...
This week we are starting back into homeschooling. We’ll be starting slowly with a number of projects and activiteis. I thought I’d share some of things our family is starting out with. 🙂 My kids have loved the math puzzles and challenges. Our favorite book has been Mathematical Circle Diaries, Year 1: Complete Curriculum for Grades 5 to 7 (affiliate link). These were a bit hard for my youngest daughter...
Today I want to share a free summer Astronomy Packet with you. This one highlights the amazing events coming in August 2017… the complete Solar Eclipse that will occur across a huge portion of the United States later this summer as well as other more common summer astronomy activities such as watching the Perseid Meteor Showers, looking for constellations, observing the phases of the moon and more! It highlights well...
Holiday: Father's Day / Homeschool Den
by Liesl - Homeschool Den · Published June 7, 2017 · Last modified June 6, 2017
How well does your child know Dad? Their cute answers will really make Father’s Day special. Father’s Day is Sunday, June 18th. Are you looking for a gift that is unique and really honors Dad? What about finding out just what the kids know about Dad and writing down their answers?! We started doing this when the kids were Tots and we all get such a huge kick out of...
Homeschool Den / Homeschool: Our Homeschool (what our day is like, curriculum choices, etc.) / Homeschool: Planning and Preparation / Homeschool: Useful Resources (websites books etc) / Science / Science Experiments / Science Units
by Liesl - Homeschool Den · Published June 4, 2017 · Last modified June 3, 2017
I love looking back at the year and everything we managed to accomplish! Sometimes in the short-run it can feel like we’re not getting much homeschooling done, but when I step back to look at the bigger picture, I’m amazed at what we managed to cover. This year my kids were in Grades 8, 6, and 3. We do our science activities together. Sometimes I focus a little more on...
Homeschool Den / Homeschool High School / Homeschool: Planning and Preparation
by Liesl - Homeschool Den · Published June 2, 2017
Like so many of you, I have been busy planning for next year. I think I have things mapped out enough to write a post and share our (tentative) plans! 🙂 My oldest, LD, will be in 9th Grade in the fall. SCIENCE: The first big decision for us (for me and LD) was to look at science in the coming years. We want to follow a more traditional model...
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.
