Homeschool Den

Making Homeschooling Hands-On, Engaging, Meaningful & Memorable! Be inspired by all the possibilities!! Check out our unit studies, packets and printables!

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Honoring the Mars Exploration Team and How You Personally Have Benefited from the Space Program 0

Homeschool Den / Must Read / Science / Science: Astronomy Unit / Technology

Honoring the Mars Exploration Team and How You Personally Have Benefited from the Space Program

Later today, the mission team for NASA’s long-lived Mars Exploration Rovers Spirit and Opportunity will be awarded the Haley Space Flight Award.  Mars Exploration Rover Project Manager,  John Callas,  will accept the award on behalf of  the team. Previous recipients of this prestigious award have included Alan B. Shepard, John Glenn, Thomas Stafford, Robert Crippen, Kathryn Sullivan and the crew of space shuttle mission STS-125, which flew in 2009 on the last shuttle...

Where Were You on Sept. 11? 0

Homeschool Den / Homeschool: Random Thoughts / Mom Stories / Must Read

Where Were You on Sept. 11?

It was a day that few of us will forget. I’m sure you remember where and what you were doing that terrible day.  I was in my sister’s guest room in Nashville, Tennessee and watched in horror as the second flight flew into the World Trade Center. And then, glued to the TV,  I watched it again and again and again as the news replayed it, as the towers collapsed,...

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Ages 2-6: Preschool (Age 4) / Homeschool Den / Must Read / Science / Science: Garden Science / Science: Plant Unit

Plant Activities: Symmetry, Vascular-NonVascular Plants

In our discussions about plants, the book pointed out that many leaves are symmetrical. We talked quite a bit about what symmetry is. First we took turns laying items out on a paper to make both sides symmetrical: Then we brought out paint and the girls made a number of symmetrical paintings. ED took a lot of care making small dots and pressing the paper down, then making more dots...

When We Need A Helping Hand… 2

Homeschool Den / Homeschool: Random Thoughts / Must Read

When We Need A Helping Hand…

Don’t be afraid to ask! On Saturday, Hubby and I spent time doing chores around the yard.  Our house is set down among some very steep hills. Mowing the lawn on the ride-on mower can be harry and nerve wracking in a few spots. At one point, I tackled a tough, steep portion of the yard that is bordered by huge rocks (probably put in by the previous owners for...

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Freebies / History: Africa Unit / Homeschool Den / Must Read

Africa Unit: Basic Facts About Africa

As I’ve mentioned before, we are studying World Cultures this year and are starting with Africa. Last week we started with some basic facts and the geography of Africa.  We’re using a really terrific basic textbook on Africa that has lots of pictures and is wonderful for the ages of my kids.  The first few days we worked through this Africa Learning Packet I created that was loosely related to the...

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Ages 2-6: Preschool (Age 4) / Homeschool Den / Must Read / Science / Science: Garden Science / Science: Plant Unit

Preschool Science: Plants

After doing a couple projects that talked about things that live above ground and below ground, we then delved a bit more into plants. We did a cute sorting project from Kidssoup (a paid membership website) which shows where certain fruits and vegetables grow: ED also sorted a whole series of cards into fruit and vegetable baskets. I’m not sure where I got these cards, but I made a set...

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Critical Thinking Activities / Games for Thinking and Learning / Homeschool Den / Must Read

Games for Thinking and Learning: Acuity and Clever Castle

Wednesday’s Games: Last year I wrote a post about how we added in some critical thinking activities into our homeschool. This year I’ve made a special point to add in some logic and thinking games into our week as well.  This is a series about some of games we include in our homeschool. We have a table that serves as our games table (the table with the red and white...

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Ages 2-6: Preschool (Age 4) / Freebies / Homeschool Den / Must Read / Science / Science: Biomes; Animal Habitats / Science: Plant Unit

Preschool Science: Above-Below Ground

In ED’s preschool science we are still talking about plants and animals. On this day we talked about animals and plant parts that live above or below the ground. We talked about how some animals like the grub or the cicada live part of their life under the ground, then live another stage above the ground. Some animals shelter under the ground when it is cold (like frogs and turtles)....

Yesterday’s Family: Today’s Family – Can you imagine your 4 year old working to help pay the bills? 4

Holiday: Labor Day / Homeschool Den / Must Read

Yesterday’s Family: Today’s Family – Can you imagine your 4 year old working to help pay the bills?

According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics this is how American adults spend their time: And according to the statistics, most American high school students spend very little time working (in employment): Times were quite different when Labor Day was first established.  Labor Day became a national holiday in 1894 to honor the contributions of the American worker. Between 1860 and 1900 the population of the US more than doubled from...

Fun Outdoor Game: Frisbee Golf 0

Must Read / Outdoor Fun

Fun Outdoor Game: Frisbee Golf

LD got a really fun game for his birthday that we’ve all been enjoying — Mini Frisbee Golf. It’s a huge hit! The weather’s just about perfect now to spend time outside (not too hot) so we’ve gotten lots and lots of use out of it. The game comes with six colored frisbees (four of each color), so up to six people can play.  We keep our stands pretty close...

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Ages 2-6: Preschool (Age 4) / Freebies / Homeschool Den / Montessori (general info) / Must Read / Science / Science Experiments / Science: Vertebrates - Invertebrates

Preschool Science: Living, Nonliving

We’ve been having a discussion of what makes something living. Living things eat drink (need water) breathe grow reproduce We’ve been observing mealworms for the past couple weeks.  We saw evidence of their growth because they shed their exoskeleton. Yesterday we noticed they had transformed completely into darkling beetles! We’ve been keeping track of the growth of three sunflower plants out in the garden. Our sunflowers have grown an inch...

Aesop’s Fables – Free Book, Free App 0

Ages 2-6: Preschool (Age 4) / Freebies / Homeschool Den / Homeschool: Useful Resources (websites books etc) / Language Arts: Reading / Must Read

Aesop’s Fables – Free Book, Free App

In our daily biography a few days ago we learned about Aesop, a Greek slave and story teller who is said to have lived 620-565 BC. Each fable contains a cautionary, ageless moral. And just in time for us, the Library of Congress released Aesop’s Fables Interactive Book. When you click on the link you can either read the fables on your computer or you can get the app for...

Last Year’s Homeschool Plans (Grades 1 and 3) 0

Homeschool Den / Homeschool: Our Homeschool (what our day is like, curriculum choices, etc.) / Homeschool: Planning and Preparation

Last Year’s Homeschool Plans (Grades 1 and 3)

Yesterday I laid out some of the plans we have for this year. For those who are new to my blog I thought you might be interested in looking at some of the plans I had for last year (Fall 2011). Our focus in geography/history last year was on the USA and (some) American history. There was a lot of material that we covered that weren’t in my initial plans/post...

Our Homeschool Curriculum (Grades 2 and 4) 6

Homeschool Den / Homeschool: Our Homeschool (what our day is like, curriculum choices, etc.) / Homeschool: Planning and Preparation / Must Read

Our Homeschool Curriculum (Grades 2 and 4)

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...