Making Homeschooling Hands-On, Engaging, Meaningful & Memorable! Be inspired by all the possibilities!! Check out our unit studies, packets and printables!
History: American Colonies / Trips We've Taken
by Liesl - Homeschool Den · Published October 13, 2010
We’ve had Grams and Gramps visiting us for the past several weeks. Last weekend Grandma and Grandpa also came out to visit us to celebrate DD’s 5th birthday. Happy Birthday DD! Then we headed off for a four day holiday. What is AMAZING to hubby and me is the fact that we can drive a few hours and be someplace completely new! When we lived in central Australia it took...
Ages 2-6: Fall Theme / Ages 2-6: Theme Time (age 2-4)
by Liesl - Homeschool Den · Published October 11, 2010 · Last modified October 23, 2015
We collected leaves in the woods to do a science experiment from education.com on why leaves change colors. This was such a great activity because we went over the types of leaves (let’s find a maple leaf, oak leaf, etc.) Then we chopped up the leaves, put them in glass cups, added rubbing alcohol and hot water. Then after a half-hour we put in coffee filters to see what other...
Ages 2-6: Fall Theme / Ages 2-6: Theme Time (age 2-4)
by Liesl - Homeschool Den · Published October 8, 2010 · Last modified February 20, 2016
We’ve been doing a lot of fall related activities–especially for our 2 and 4 year olds. We’ve had a lot of fun with this unit so far! The girls had a blast making this fall display with fall flowers, leaves, pipe cleaners, buttons and fall-colored pasta. I’ve seen this tree-hand-print activity a number of places on the Internet and ED really enjoyed it (she’s done several this past week). I...
Ages 2-6: Fall Theme / Ages 2-6: Theme Time (age 2-4)
by Liesl - Homeschool Den · Published October 8, 2010
A teacher shared this fall-related science activity — soaking Indian corn in a bit of water to see what would happen. We have a large tray with a paper towel and about 1/4 inch of water. We also pour water over the cob every 2 or 3 days. By day 2 we saw a few sprouts. And after a week, there was quite a bit of growth. Our acorns, on...
Ages 2-6: Fall Theme / Ages 2-6: Theme Time (age 2-4)
by Liesl - Homeschool Den · Published October 8, 2010
The girls really liked this crow popcorn seed counting activity. DD and I worked on counting by 2s (up to 10) and 10s (up to 100). Meanwhile, ED simply worked on one-to-one correspondence counting up to 10. She did this a number of times as well! I printed this from kidssoup.com. There are some great fall-themed printables at Print Activities LD did skip counting by 3s up to 300 and...
Homeschool: Planning and Preparation / Homeschool: Random Thoughts
by Liesl - Homeschool Den · Published October 6, 2010 · Last modified January 17, 2019
I love visiting people’s blogs when they share a good overview of their daily activities (workboxers call it “What’s in the Box?”). It’s been in the back of my mind to share what’s in our workboxes, but haven’t gotten around to that. Instead, I’ll share some the other aspects of our homeschool environment. Montessori talks a lot about having a prepared environment, one in which the children can choose from...
Homeschool: Useful Resources (websites books etc)
by Liesl - Homeschool Den · Published October 2, 2010
I’ve been kicking myself because several of my favorite websites were not in my sidebar (or in my bookmarks) and I just spent ten minutes trying to remember what one of them was called. Argh! So, I’ve added them in but I’ll mention these in a post too if you’re not familiar with them. If I’m getting a themed unit together for any of my kids even my second grader...
by Liesl - Homeschool Den · Published October 1, 2010 · Last modified April 1, 2016
Yesterday, I showed the kids a few pictures of Japanese Zen gardens before we settled in to make our own. We listened to a couple of beautiful Japanese pieces as we worked on our Zen gardens. We used sand and a few objects I had on hand for the kids (rocks, acorns, fake grass, pine cones). We used forks instead of rakes. DD and ED wanted to do it again...
Elem-Children's Music 1 (6 yr old) / History: Japan Unit / Music
by Liesl - Homeschool Den · Published September 30, 2010 · Last modified April 1, 2016
I have found the glockenspiel to be a wonderful first instrument for LD and DD. (LD has since moved on to the piano.) In our music classes, we are learning the basics of rhythm (quarter notes, eighth notes and the half note at this point). And, I’ve introduced a few notes to the kids. The first song DD learned on the glockenspiel was Bee, Bee Bumble Bee (to the tune...
Sorry for yet another picture, but we’re just thrilled watching the deer! We’re at a timeshare with Grams and Gramps for a few days and have been having a wonderful break. Yesterday we spent all day at an indoor water park. I must have gone up the stairs (about three floors) at least 25 times with LD and DD!! Whew! But there were no lines. How amazing to homeschool and...
This is another Mom-Story I’d like to share with my kids/family/friends (well for the kids, maybe I’ll share this when they’re MUUuuuuch older!). It’s a story about a scary drawing, potential kidnapping (and worse), and the police! Bear with me as I set the scene–it takes a few minutes before I get to the story itself. When I was at university, I studied anthropology. I started out being interested in...
We had fun on our nature walk and found such beautiful things!! We have a full grocery bag of acorns and pine cones for crafts in the coming weeks. The kids have never seen fall leaves (and Daddy and I haven’t seen fall for 14 years or so!) It is so, so amazing to be experiencing autumn again! Gorgeous! And the kids are so excited to see the white-tailed deer...
We’ve had a lot of mosquito larvae in our make-shift frog/toad habitat. We watched a fascinating, informative video about the mosquito’s life cycle here. We didn’t know that the mosquito larvae breathe through a tube at the surface of the water. Also we learned that mosquito eggs can live through the winter and hatch in the spring. Meanwhile, we have about 20-25 tadpoles that have survived in our habitat and...
Arts and Crafts / History: Geography Activities / History: Japan Unit
by Liesl - Homeschool Den · Published September 23, 2010 · Last modified April 1, 2016
The theme of our music class these next two or three weeks is Japan. Each week we sang the continent song together. This week, we pulled out a new kind of map, a Montessori flag map. We learned where Japan was located and placed the flags we knew on the map. Then everybody piled outside to do a scavenger hunt for Japanese flags. (from Japanese Flag printables) We then looked...
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.
