Rachel's Ramblings

Ontario Christian Home Educators Convention!

It was an early morning this morning as we headed out to drop the two oldest children off at different homes for care, then off to OCHEC!  What a fantastic day!  I was able to ask all my questions, find most of the materials I was looking for (Still didn't find music note flash cards), and just be encouraged to continue on.   I met up with Donna who was displaying her books, and got to see pictures of her new grandbaby!  (Yes, she is beautiful!!) 

While we were gone, our homeschooling friends hosted an "Our parents are going to OCHEC party"!  The children had so much fun, bike riding, playing outside, playing trains, lightbrite, and much more!  When the parents arrived home after a full day of conference, they even provided a delicious bbq for us so we didn't have to fuss about getting dinner ready.  Good friends are such a gift - a treasure. 

So, would you like to know what we got??

Here's our "stack"!

Let me break it down a bit for you :)

A series (7 books) of short Canadian biographies - perfect for reading aloud!


Yes, after debating between Story of the World and Mystery of History, we decided to go with Story of the World.  I am really looking forward to getting started on this!!


I haven't been pleased with the art curriculum we've used for the past two years, so I went searching for some different ideas.  The ABEKA one we were using was very "crafty" - mostly cut and paste.  I do enjoy crafts -- in fact, I LOVE crafts, but I expect Art to be more then just crafts.  Many of the other art books are copy-drawing...  showing  the lines to draw a picture and expecting the child to mirror the pictures in the books...  While this is one way to teach drawing it really isn't teaching him to draw things the way he uniquely sees them, but instead to "draw in a box".  I am excited about this program because it verbally explains the assignments, but then allows the child the creativity to do it in his own way.   This one book has grades 1-3 art in it.


Yes, those are RECORDERS that you see!   I learned to play the recorder in Grade 3, and quite enjoyed playing.  My son has been interested in it for about 6 months, so, since he's doing so well in piano and enjoying that I'm thinking that I'll introduce him to the recorder in January, depending on how everything else is going.  I was surprised that when I picked up the instrument I could still play some of the simple songs!  When I mentioned that to my friend she said she can play it rather well -- if I had known that I'd have asked her for lessons while we were still here!  Ah well, I'm still looking forward to teaching it!


I just love poetry, and so do my children.  In researching for some Christian poems to supliment the poetry in our curriculum I came across this book.  I was thrilled to find that the vendor had it in stock today when I went looking for it.  It will be a great blessing to our school days!  This book has age appropriate poems listed by grade from 1 -12


And a few more purchases -- a Map book which teaches map following by using animals in a zoo, clubhouse junior (a focus on the family magazine for 4-8 year olds), a new journal for next year - this journal has a box to draw a picture a day to illustrate the journal entry, a book of journalling prompts, and a CANADIAN money review book - since in our math books we see only Amerincan currency.


I'm so pleased with our purchases.  There are a few things I haven't shown -- a globe, a laminated (flat) world map, and some personal books to read.  The only thing I didn't find that was on my list was music note and symbol flashcards, so I'm still on the search for them.  What you haven't seen listed -- Math, phonics, reading, writing, spelling and science.  For these subjects we will be using ABEKA again.  I'm not sure how long we'll use ABEKA science, over the coming year I'll be reasearching into different types of science programs.

That's it! 

Untitled Comment

8:38 PM, Saturday, May 5, 2007 .. Posted by DanielleW

What a stash! How exciting.

I think I need to find a recorder book. We both have one and I know how to play it pretty much by ear but would love to eventually be able to teach him do control his blowing and actually play some notes.

Enjoy all your new things!

music flashcards

12:02 AM, Monday, May 7, 2007 .. Posted by Rita

I have tons of them here that I am not using but you know how good I am at getting things to you. There is a music store in the Seaway Mall called Fletchers (Joy's relatives) and they would have them. Any music store that carries lots of books (rather than an instrument store) would carry flashcards.