Making Homeschooling Hands-On, Engaging, Meaningful & Memorable! Be inspired by all the possibilities!! Check out our unit studies, packets and printables!
Homeschool Den / Homeschool: Organizing and Cleaning / Homeschool: Our Homeschool (what our day is like, curriculum choices, etc.) / Homeschool: Planning and Preparation / How to Start Homeschooling / Starting to Homeschool
by Liesl - Homeschool Den · Published August 5, 2015 · Last modified September 7, 2015
It’s that time of year again! Back to school sales are on and it’s a great time of year to stock up on homeschool supplies. This year, I have added to our original Back to (Home)school Shopping List to include some homeschool science supplies we have used (and are on our shopping list for this year). More about that below! Even though I’m sharing these very long lists now, I...
Homeschool Den / Homeschool: Planning and Preparation / How to Start Homeschooling / Science / Science Units / Starting to Homeschool
by Liesl - Homeschool Den · Published June 2, 2015 · Last modified March 15, 2024
Science in the Elementary and Middle School Years – Free Homeschool Checklist – K to 8 When I’m planning our units for the upcoming year, I think a lot about the science topics should we cover in our homeschool by the time they finish 8th grade. I have a general checklist of topics that I go consider… and try to fill in the gaps as we go (and as the kids’ interests...
Arts and Crafts / Homeschool: Planning and Preparation / Homeschool: Random Thoughts / Homeschool: Useful Resources (websites books etc) / Summer Activities
by Liesl - Homeschool Den · Published June 1, 2015 · Last modified April 23, 2021
I typed up a list of more than 350 activities, projects, trip ideas, and patches the kids can work on this summer. When I handed these pages to the kids you should have seen them pour through the list! Their eyes nearly popped out of their heads, they were so excited! Each of the items on this list have patches that scouts (and others!) can earn. But let’s face it, it’s just...
Holiday: Easter / Science / Science Experiments
by Liesl - Homeschool Den · Published March 23, 2015 · Last modified January 24, 2019
Egg-tivities to get egg-cited for Easter!! Lots of Egg Experiments for Kids in this free printable!! Last year around this time we had an egg-cellent time with eggs. I wrote a series of 4 posts sharing all of our activities. At the end of the series, I put together an Egg-speriment Packet. It is 16 pages long and has 13 egg experiments and activities. A few of the things we talked...
Science: Cell Unit / Science: Chemistry Unit / Science: Garden Science / Science: Plant Unit
by Liesl - Homeschool Den · Published March 20, 2015 · Last modified April 2, 2021
This week we spent a few days talking about photosynthesis. We covered the basic differences between plant and animal cells last week and I wanted to briefly talk about the process of photosynthesis before moving on to our Human Body unit. Some of the things we talked about included as we learned about the process of photosynthesis: parts of the plant, plant cells and the plant organelles, what is needed for...
by Liesl - Homeschool Den · Published February 22, 2015 · Last modified June 30, 2022
Homeschooling in Elementary, Middle School and High School One of the questions I am asked the most is “Where do I start?” “Do you have any tips for me, my child is in x-Grade?” These free guides (Creating a Homeschool Curriculum) might provide a starting point for those of you just starting your homeschool journey and may give you an idea or two if you’ve been at this homeschool thing...
Homeschool Den / Science / Science: Earth Science Unit
by Liesl - Homeschool Den · Published February 4, 2015 · Last modified November 2, 2022
This 150+ page Earth Science Packet includes worksheets about the solar system, the layers of the Earth, plate tectonics, the ring of fire, earthquake activity and volcanoes. I also included instructions for more than a dozen hands-on activities we did with this unit. This includes activities about plate tectonics, using a compass, earthquakes, volcanoes, instructions on how to make a shake table and more! My kids were in Grades 1, 4,...
Homeschool Den / Science / Science Experiments / Science: Earth Science Unit / Science: Natural Disasters Unit and Activities
by Liesl - Homeschool Den · Published February 2, 2015 · Last modified March 21, 2021
Last week I explained how we made an Earthquake Shake Table and shared a quick video on how we made ours. We first tested it with marshmallow structures. A couple days later, we made “brick” structures out of sugar cubes and peanut butter. We put on the documentary, Deadliest Earthquakes, and set to work. We all built our structures and then brought out our shake table to test them out! The most exciting...
by Liesl - Homeschool Den · Published January 26, 2015 · Last modified March 30, 2024
We are so glad you are here at the Homeschool Den! We have been homeschooling for years now, so we have a lot of resources tucked away here at our blog. In fact, let me send you to one of our latest freebies – the FREE Winter-Spring 2024 Homeschool Planner and you’ll find our Free 2024-2025 School Year Calendar Printable here. Would you like to check out some of our...
by Liesl - Homeschool Den · Published January 17, 2015 · Last modified December 27, 2018
Welcome! If you are on this page, then you are considering homeschooling as an option for your child/children or have already started! I’m so excited for you! Our family has been homeschooling basically from the start. We found that homeschooling works extremely well for our family. We love all the hands-on projects we can do and I love how I can tailor each of the kids’ education to exactly what they...
by Liesl - Homeschool Den · Published January 15, 2015 · Last modified March 1, 2024
Our most popular science packets include Earth Science Unit, a Study of Cells, Biology Unit, Chemistry Unit, Digestive System Unit, States of Matter, Simple Machines, Human Body Systems, Skeletal System Unit, Ocean Unit, Physical and Chemical States of Matter, Electricity and Circuits Unit, Layers of the Atmosphere, Magnets & the Magnetosphere, and more. Our science units are mostly under $15.00 and range in length from 20 to well over 150...
Homeschool Den / Homeschool Encouragement / Homeschool: Organizing and Cleaning / Homeschool: Planning and Preparation / How to Start Homeschooling
by Liesl - Homeschool Den · Published January 1, 2015 · Last modified December 29, 2018
The holidays are almost over… Two or three (or more!) weeks have gone by since you last “cracked the books”… The “normal” homeschool routine is a thing of the past… Are you feeling ready to start back into homeschooling? Here are some of the things I try to do before we jump back into our homeschool routine. 1) Make Sure You’ve Really Had a Break! If you have spent the...
Homeschool Den / Must Read / Science / Science Experiments / Science: Earth Science Unit / Science: Natural Disasters Unit and Activities
by Liesl - Homeschool Den · Published November 18, 2014 · Last modified March 21, 2021
We just love hands-on activities! We’ve been studying Earth Science this fall. This post shares some pictures of some of the Earth Science activities we added into our unit. Back several weeks ago, we explained how we started this unit… with an overview of our solar system, then a closer look at Earth’s geologic timeline talking about the age of the Earth (4.6 billion years) and the appearance of various...
How to Start Homeschooling / Starting to Homeschool
by Liesl - Homeschool Den · Published October 18, 2014 · Last modified July 11, 2020
Please click through to this post (which has working links to the topics mentioned below): How to Start Homeschooling and visit this newer post as well: How Do I Start to Homeschool?! Help! These posts all exist, but we’ve moved from Parents.com (we were under the Parents umbrella for 3 years)… and I don’t have the links up and running! 🙂 Hope to get them together sometime soon! You can...
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.
