Making Homeschooling Hands-On, Engaging, Meaningful & Memorable! Be inspired by all the possibilities!! Check out our unit studies, packets and printables!
Homeschool Den / Language Arts - Grammar Worksheets / Language Arts: Writing
by Liesl - Homeschool Den · Published November 13, 2014 · Last modified January 18, 2017
In a blog post a few weeks ago, I talked about why we use the writing workshop and how it works. But this year, I also added in Journal Prompt Writing as part of their checklist of things to do. Here’s why. ED started writing with us right from the start (even before she officially started kindergarten.) She enjoys writing, but her “stories” are always about a cat (or dog...
Homeschool Den / How to Start Homeschooling / Language Arts - Grammar Worksheets / Starting to Homeschool
by Liesl - Homeschool Den · Published August 18, 2014 · Last modified June 24, 2015
Welcome back to the our series on how to start homeschooling. During the past week, I have provided information about some of the homeschool curriculums available out there in the different subject areas. Today I wanted to share some of the writing and grammar programs available to homeschoolers. This is not an exhaustive list. You may want to order the (free) Rainbow Resource Catalog, which is packed with homeschool reviews. But these...
Freebies / Homeschool Den / Language Arts: Writing
by Liesl - Homeschool Den · Published February 5, 2014 · Last modified September 21, 2019
I was so excited to come across the Young Writer’s Survival Kit by Melissa Forney. It has been an amazing resource for our writing workshop. UPDATE: Sorry to say, the resource below (Young Writer’s Survival Kit) is no longer available. You might want to check out our Writing Resource Packet. It is currently free. At times when it’s writing time, I haven’t thought of a writing mini-lesson for the day....
Freebies / Language Arts: Writing
by Liesl - Homeschool Den · Published November 7, 2011 · Last modified March 7, 2016
Over the weekend, I made a set of Build_A_Sentence-Creative-Writing-Pack for my first-grader. Build_A_Sentence Creative Writing Activity Here are my plans for them: The first couple of pages are filled with ideas. She’ll go through and create sentences (silly or not) to write in her journal. Next we’ll work together to brainstorm ideas for some of the other themed sheets. I made about twenty different themed sheets with topics such as friendship, aliens,...
by Liesl - Homeschool Den · Published May 16, 2023
Hi! How do you know what to teach? You and the kids get to decide! This is the final email in this series. A few days ago, I talked about planning in a general way. I shared our free curriculum resource guides as well as the free printable Homeschool Science Unit Checklist for Elementary and Middle School and a similar Similarly, this history checklist might help you choose the time...
by Liesl - Homeschool Den · Published May 16, 2023
Hi! Yesterday’s email was all about our Freebies. Today, I want to talk about keeping motivated as a homeschooling family. When you first start to homeschool, there’s a sense of nervousness and anticipation. You see all the possibilities. You can just imagine all the exciting things that will happen in your homeschool, all the wonderful books that will get read. But, the truth is homeschooling can be downright hard? Why? ...
Freebies / Language Arts - Grammar Worksheets
by Liesl - Homeschool Den · Published March 9, 2023 · Last modified March 5, 2023
At one point, I noticed that the kids need a bit more practice distinguishing between their, they’re, there and its, it’s so I made this grammar worksheet for them. It has become one of the most popular free worksheets on the website and I wanted to highlight it for you again! I have made the kids tons of grammar worksheets over the years and these PDFs are all FREE! Scroll...
Homeschool Den / Language Arts - Grammar Spelling Reading Writing Categories / Language Arts: Books: Children's Literature / Language Arts: Reading
by Liesl - Homeschool Den · Published September 13, 2022
As we start of this new school year we are diving deep into literary analysis! We have covered the basic literary terms like similes, metaphors, rhyme, alliteration, onomatopoeia and now we’re diving into some wonderful short stories! As homeschoolers, language arts consists of several blocks during in our day 1) independent reading (the kids read their own novels), 2) literature (our read aloud book/novel), 3) language arts (which included grammar...
Our Language Arts Activities at the Start of the Year I wanted to share some of the things we are doing for language arts in our homeschool as we begin year. For our homeschooling family, we think of language arts as basically four different activities: 1) independent reading, 2) a novel we read together, 3) language arts (literary analysis, grammar, vocab, editing, etc.) and 4) writing. We try to do...
by Liesl - Homeschool Den · Published December 1, 2020 · Last modified November 29, 2020
Often, we have a novel that we read aloud. Over the next few weeks, we are going to be doing a Short Story Unit instead. We’ll be reading 2-3 stories a day (depending on their length and the time we have available). I’ve included pictures (and tables of contents) for the two resources we’re using, but of course these pages are open-ended so you can use whatever you have on...
Homeschool Den / Language Arts - Grammar Spelling Reading Writing Categories / Language Arts: Books: Children's Literature / Language Arts: Spelling / Language Arts: Writing
by Liesl - Homeschool Den · Published October 5, 2020 · Last modified February 10, 2021
Earlier this week, I had a wonderful back-and-forth email conversation with a reader about literature and language arts in our homeschool. She had questions about the literature book/s we were using when my kids were in grades 2, 5 and 7. I thought I would share a lot of that conversation with you today. It highlights some of the language arts books/texts/resources we have used over the years. Plus, I’ve...
All About Homeschooling! / Homeschool Den / Homeschool: Organizing and Cleaning / Homeschool: Planning and Preparation / Homeschool: Random Thoughts / Homeschool: Useful Resources (websites books etc) / How to Start Homeschooling / Starting to Homeschool
by Liesl - Homeschool Den · Published July 11, 2020 · Last modified January 1, 2024
Finding materials on the Homeschool Den! I wrote this post to help you find some of the pages, posts and homeschool resources within our blog that might be the most useful for you. Over the years, I have made homeschool packets on everything from history and science to spelling, math, spelling and foreign languages (German & Spanish). And, many of those are free! We have materials from preschool through high...
Homeschool Den / Homeschool: Organizing and Cleaning / Homeschool: Planning and Preparation / Homeschool: Useful Resources (websites books etc) / How to Start Homeschooling / Starting to Homeschool
by Liesl - Homeschool Den · Published July 6, 2020 · Last modified June 28, 2022
What supplies do you need to have on hand to homeschool? This post includes a free printable list of basic homeschooling supplies and science materials that you might want to have on hand. This list covers everything from office supplies & art materials to math manipulatives and science materials we have used in our homeschool through the years. Obviously, the first starting point is access to books and curriculum. No...
by Liesl - Homeschool Den · Published November 19, 2019 · Last modified July 26, 2023
Do you know about this great literature resource? The Glencoe Literature Library page has Free Literature Study Guides (UPDATE – These appear not to be available any longer.) for a huge selection of well-known novels. The Literature Study Guides include sections such as Meet the Author Introducing the Novel Before you Read Active Reading activities Personal Responses Update: UNFORTUNATELY THESE GUIDES DON’T SEEM TO BE AVAILABLE ANYMORE! I thought I...
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.
