I'm so excited about this conference this year.   I can't wait to hear Sue talk about the workboxes, Tiany-about being a work at home homeschooling mom (I could sure use ideas how to balance it all) and many more.  All the speakers look great!   You get a goodie bag full of freebies, a download to all the seminars to listen to whenever you want  and much more.  You have to check it out!

Our coop did a 20th century unit study. Every class did a different decade. They studied the history of the decade, the President, things that became well known in those years, etc. My oldest studied 1900-1910 and my youngest had the 1990s. Here they are dressed up, the did a play last night where each class did skits for their decade. It was so good and then we had tables set up for each decade.

Here is my son's skit for 1900-1910.  He is sitting down, he is the immigrant worker.  The one who has to check in the immigrants coming in from Ellis Island.  This is the 3rd-4th graders. 

This was my other son's class.  They represented 1990-1999, So one of my children started the decade and the other finished it.  They are singing the Veggie Tales Song.  The writer of the play was our speaker who read all the intros and things that were happening in that particular decade (we even had video footage)  I love this line.  One small company had a BIG Idea and of course that was Veggies. And this happened in the 90's.  This was the 1st -2nd graders.  I dressed him like one of the kids from saved by the bell, I think he looks 90's, don't you?

The high schoolers danced in the 50's to dance around the clock. Poodle skirts and all, it was GREAT

 Here are some of the table displays.  This is 1900-10, we studied all the wonderful inventions and headlines of the decade.

 One of the assignments for the students was to do a newspaper headline of a major event.  My son's was Mckinley Shot, Teddy Roosevelt takes office.

 This is the 90's table, remember Furby?  They also did a web page in the back talking about the World Wide Web!

Some other classes of our coop this past year.  The Lego/Knex class.  My kids loved this class so much.  They had to build certain things and learn all about the mechanics of it all.

We did a unit study on weather and our younger children did weather lapbooks  One of these is my girls.  I taught this class and we had a lot of fun learning about weather together.

I was so proud to teach this class.  Goverment-it is a passion for me and I think I did a good job making it fun!  Not always easy for goverment.  We did this class first semester so we displayed them at open house too.  Every student was assigned an American symbol do a tri-fold board on and they could make the project too if they liked.  This one is my son's paper mache eagle.  I'm going to post pics soon of everyones.  They were so good, we had a clay liberty bell, a foam captial building, and much more.  The kids were so CREATIVE!

 We had a great time in coop this school year, looking forward to things to come in September.

I'm so excited.  This weekend is the Cincinnati Homeschool Convention.  It is getting so much buzz this year.  It's going to be at the Duke Energy Center which is a great facility and big!  I can't wait to see all they fit in there.  There is just nothing like the smell of books at the curriculum booths, AAh I could just inhale!  I love homeschooling and being at convention just brings homeschooling alive, it makes you feel excited about it!  There are so many workshops to encourage you, uplift you, and remind you that you are doing the greatest job on earth by teaching your children.  If you are discouraged at all in your homeschooling or wondering  is this really for your family make sure you visit your local convention.  It will light the flame that is still there and encourage you, I'm sure of it.  I can't wait to to share with you all that I learn, I just hope I can pick my workshops(it's really going to be hard this year)  they all look WONDERFUL!  If your going to be there, let me know! 

Don't forget to check out my giveaway here!

It seems like many homeschoolers begin to see the fire die out around this time of year. Yet it doesn’t always take a whole lot to get the flames burning bright again. It may be one small change in your routine. Maybe it’s trying out an idea you’ve been pondering for awhile. Or you might need to throw on a bit of kindling on to fuel that fire.

Let’s see some sparks of imagination as we encourage one another, sharing ways to get your homeschool efforts cooking again. What is something you’ve done, or thought about doing, to “fan the flame” of waning motivation?

It's funny this topic shows up now because just last night I took some time to reorganize school books and supplies-I felt they were loose all over the house and it's one of those things that kills the flame for schooling for sure!  I felt so good this morning seeing how nice they looked.  It also helped me to know what I had and the projects that have been put aside to do so I can work on those!  Out of sight, Out of mind-if I don't always see them I forget they need to be done and some will be lots of fun for my kids too so I'm glad I found them. 

The other thing I have started to do is dream about next year, I know that is crazy being I have many months left but it always seems to help if I can look through catalogs, plan going to convention, and just getting that spark of new things to come!  It puts a spring in my step and motivates me to finish this year so we can start next school year with new things to discover.  I tell you, I learn more with this homeschooling business then my kids, lol!  I just love it and wish I could have been taught this way!

This weeks assignment is to share our reading list for our children this year.  We love books around here and we LOVE to read. 

We are really focusing on missionarys with My Father's World with Exploring Countries and Cultures so we are reading the great Missionary Books Christian Heros:  Then and Now.  My oldest son really enjoys these, there is something really special about these books-they truly deepen your young child's faith, Sam has a hard time stopping after his reading assignment is done.

Cameron Townsend

Nate Saint

George Muller

Gladys Aylward

Amy Carmichael

David Livingstone

Other books on missions and other countries

Hero Tales

Windows on the World

We are also reading or already read this school year

Nanny McPhee- Christianna Brand

Ginger Pye-Eleanor Estes

The American Twins of the Revolution-Lucy Fitch Perkins

The Cricket in Times Square-George Selden

Emily's Runaway Imagination-Beverly Cleary

Our Winter Unit Study Books are below:

Snowflake Bentley-Jacqueline Briggs Martin

When Winter Comes-Nancy Van Laan

One Winters Day-M. Christina Butler

Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening-Robert Frost

Weather Words and What They Mean- Gail Gibbons

A fun bedtime book:

The Lion Storyteller Bedtime Book -Bob Hartman  

I teach goverment class in my coop.  My 3rd-4th graders had a project due today, the last day of this semester.  Everyone had to pick an American symbol to do a project on.  They are still young to do a lot of research so the main thing was learning to collect information.  My husband and son worked on this project to help relieve mom, they did such a great job!  Sam had the eagle!

The wire frame my husband made Eagle shape (not easy)

Paper Mache

The finished Eagle

Our board showing our Eagle Facts and all the symbols the Eagle is used in America!  Plus we have a lapbook at the top, I LOVE how this turned out!

The inside of our lapbook!

For our assignment this week we are suppose to share a favorite field trip.  One that really comes to mind is when my 4th grader and I along with my brother and his wife went to St. Augustine, FL  We were in Florida a couple of days to see family and stopped here for a day.  My regular readers have already seen this slide show but for all my new readers here it is!

We do school all over the house.  We do mostly use our schoolroom however we also do some in the kitchen, on the couch, even in the bedroom sometimes.  Sometimes if I'm not feeling good but want to do school, I will have the kids bring me books and we will work on my bed.  They love that, thats adventure learning!  I love to read the read alouds on the couch or my son's bottom bunk where we are cozy!  We usually do science experiments in the kitchen, thats where they are most convenient! 

If I have studying to do its usually at my computer of course! 

If you want to see more pics of my schoolroom go HERE.

Homeschoolblogawards assignment this week is to share something new in our homeschool!  This was tough because we are not doing any new curriculum this year but then I thought of this.  This year in Exploring Country and Cultures which focuses on geography in My Fathers World we are using blow up globes.  Now of course we use maps, atlases, and regular globes but the blow up globe was something MFW recommended to play geography games with and to use to look up things as well.  We have had so much fun with them this year, they have been our favorite way to look up places for sure.  We have had a great time tossing them around too. And they are easy to bring with you when you move from room to room.  Just another fun thing to bring into your homeschool day.  We bought the small blue one from My Fathers World and the big one came from a lady at church who bought it for a partciular curriculum in our children's ministry that we are now done with.  I am not sure where she bought it though. 

Check out Canadagirls blog for more show n tells!

I love looking at schoolrooms.  Do you?  Thought I would share mine for show n tell.  I blogged about it a couple of years ago but the pictures no longer show up on it because of some problem I had with photobucket awhile back. 

This is the chalkboard my husband made for us.  Its chalkboard paint and magnetic paint right on the wall and then he framed it in red.  We love it!

Our table, we have a world map on it with a clear tablecloth.  We are going to change it soon to a missionary prayer table, we have an emphasis on missions this year.  I will Show And Tell it when we change it.

Of course several bookcases, where would us homeschoolers be without them?

Excuse the clutter, I have a goal of getting rid of it soon!

For a slideshow of our first day of school go here

 We are now on the 2nd week assignment where we are suppose to share our plan for our homeschool year.  I have shared somethings already but I will try to be more detailed for all the new people stopping by.  I have a 4th grader, 1st grader and preschooler.

For our core subjects we do My Fathers World.  This covers our Bible, Science, and History.  MFW suggest different companies for the other subjects, some of those we use, some we don't..  So here goes!

My Father's World starts their history cycle with geography.   You start with this year when you have a 2nd-6th grader.  So my son starts here this year.  K and 1st are separate so my 1st grader has his own year.   They believe its best to have a firm foundation of where the places are in the world before learning about them.  They don't believe geography should just be an add in where you kind of learn it.  So Monday which was our first day my son and my husband and I took this geography test to see if we knew where places were.  Well, we all failed - it will be so fun because at the end of the year we will take it again and we will know them all or at least most of them.  They have some fun games and books where ones who have took it before us all say that we will be amazed how much we learn.  We will also have a strong emphasis on missions where we will read about the missionalry lives of so many, Gladys Aylward, David Livingstone, George Muller and more.  We will also learn about all the nations that still don't have the Bible in their own language and we will praying specifically for the nations in the book Windows on the World.  I hear so many great stories how this year really brings others to life to your children and how they do amazing things with praying for others.   I can't wait.  To bring missions even more alive we will be praying for the missionaries that are talked about at our church, we will have a missionary table with pictures and letters from them on that we will pray for regulary. 

We also do Singapore Math with the 4th grader, and the Complete Book of Math with my 1st grader, we do Jessie Wise's First Language Lessons for English and Sequential Spelling for Spelling.  If you go to my sidebar under catagories you will see reviews I have done for these under Book and Product reviews.

My first grader is learning about the Bible this year.  MFW really believes in starting history with the young ones with God's Word first.  So he will be doing a bible notebook-we will talk about a story and he will draw something for it.  He will also get his first bible reader and hopefully if phonics goes well will be reading it soon.  I love Teach your child to Read in 100 easy lessons so I will skip the reading section in MFW and use that instead.  Its more direct and my oldest son is such a great reader because of it I didn't want to change.  My 1st grader is loving it and reading several words now. 

We do Handwriting without Tears.  We love this handwriting program, we have had great success with it.  A while back my son had to have physical therapy for his legs and I even saw the occupation therapist there at Children's Hospital using it with kids for writing,  It is a great program.  My oldest is doing cursive and of course my youngest is learning to print.

I'm hoping to do several hands on things this year with my preschooler.  I would love to get some lapbooks in and we are doing sonlight pre k where we just read lots of great books.  She is also welcome to join us in the 1st grade whenever she likes. 

At the top I have Our Homeschool where I list all the curriculum we use, that's where you will find all the links to their websites!

I do a Tuesday Meme called Tueday Review, make sure you stop over sometime and do a review and sighn Mr. Linky.  It can be a book, curriculum, household item or beauty product you love.  Anything at all!

Well Monday we start school, I'm excited and believe it or not I think my kids are a little excited too although they hate to admit it.  We always buy fresh doughnuts the first day from a bakery and I have some special suprises at their seat when they come into the room-I thought I would share what I got for them this year.  I found these galvanized buckets in Target's 1.00 bin so they each get one with their names on it and inside I have filled them with a new set of crayons, a pair of scissors, tape, a glue stick, pencils, and a special notebook they can write or draw in.  I usually have a big bucket with all the crayons in it but we are always chasing them down with my preschooler that takes them everywhere.  I thought it might work if they all had their own bucket for their supplies.  We will see!  Here is a picture of them:

It's hard to see but my husband wrote their names with colored sharpie markers!

Isn't it wonderful teaching and learning right beside your children?  I wouldn't trade it for anything!

I have a list that I'm getting together for next year, I love planning the next school year, I thought I would write my to buy list here.  What are all your plans next year?

Sequential Spelling-Book 2

Singapore 3A and B

My Fathers World 1st grade  (bible, science, and history)  along with music and art

The Complete Book of Math (for 1st grader)

Handwriting w/o Tears -K and advance cursive for 3rd grader

Explode the Code- 1st book

First Language Lessons, Level 3 and workbook

A great friend is loaning me ECC from My Father's World for my will be 4th grader- history, bible, and science together, along with music and art!

There is a writing program I'm interested in too but forgot the name of it, when I get it I will add it.

What's all of your plans for the fall?

Angela

Well our homeschool convention starts tonight.  I am about to go on a three day journey of seeing curriuclum booths and hearing great speakers.  My dh took these next couple of days off so I could go-thank you sweetie for that!  What a blessing to me.  I just love the conventions where information just gets poured in my head.  I'm going to get to hear many of the great names we see in our old schoolhouse magazine.  Amanda Bennett, David Hazel, Jessie Wise and many more.  I won't be blogging until next week but hopefully I can share all the great things I get to hear and see with you.

Angela

This was part of my talk I gave on Homeschooling and Loving it!  I believe if we are not loving homeschooling we should pray to.  I know it sounds so simple but I think so often forgotten.  God cares about the deepest desires of our heart, he cares deeply for us.   As much as I love homeschooling I have never liked homemaking, I could find myself pretty miserable when thinking of my to do list in the home.  I had and still do sometimes have a hard time accepting that cleaning my home, making meals, and keeping the family on track is my calling.   How boring, well I thought boring.  Sometimes I would cry out to God, surely you have called me to more then this?  This can't be my exciting life that I once thought I would have.  The answer that kept coming back was YES, YES, YES-I have called you for this.  Wow-that was hard to hear.  So I asked God, how can I ever enjoy this?  I finally started to pray about it, really pray about it.  Lord if this is what you want for my life, please help me enjoy it-show me that it can be meaningful!  And guess what?  HE started to, all of a sudden I was reading blogs from women who LOVED homemaking.  They saw the art of it.  Books started coming my way on the lost art of homemaking, and how to make your home welcoming to others.  I started to look at it different, this wasn't a boring chore, this was a talent, a gift that some women had and I could have it too.  My outlook started to change and you know I don't hate homemaking anymore, some days its still a challenge for me, it doesn't always come easy but its so much better.

I believe it can be the same way for homeschooling.  If God has called you to it you can love it!  Begin to pray God will give you a love for it, pray about it everyday for a month and see how different homeschooling will go for you, I bet there is a big change.  If you do this let me know how it goes.  I would love to hear.  Make sure that you pray about your curriuculum choices every year, I do this and I have never really felt I have made a big mistake, pray about the conventions and homeschool support group meetings (its amazing who God will bring in your path)  pray for your children (their hearts, their attitudes during school, their progress, their strenghts and weaknesses)  Don't feel that schooling your kids is low on God's priority list-he deeply cares in this area of your life.  Too many times we talk about prayer without following through.  Make it top priority on your to do list!  Sit back and watch how wonderful God is! 

Next week I will talk about some joy busters and how you can prevent them!

Angela

This is the first part of my outline on homeschooling and loving it.

Where is God during your day? 

I used to sit down to make out my schedule and I would write down all the things I needed to do, places I needed to go, school that I needed to teach and on and on with my daily activities.   And then I would squeeze God in there somewhere, I mean surely I could fit HIM right?  Actually no I couldn't ,usually he was pushed aside and many days would go by and I hadn't even prayed until my head hit the pillow where I usually fell asleep!  Where was the joy in my day, why was things not going right?  So many times we say Loving God is number one in our lives, our top priority, but we don't act like we do. We make excuses- we have small children, we are just so busy, we have a larger family then most, we homeschool, and on and on we go but we have a hard time understanding why things are not going well, why we don't seem to have joy?  Until finally it hits us-we need God in our day.

God is our spiritual food, without it we feel depleted and empty.  When we wake up in the morning and we try to go about our day without any breakfast, its not too long and we feel tired, sick, and we just can't seem to stay the course, its the same without God in our day-we just can't go on and on and not have HIM for nourishment of our spirits.  He is the one to get us through the fussy babies, strong willed toddlers, a student that isn't getting a subject, housecleaning and all the up and downs of our day.  We can't do it in our own strength, we get weak and we fail.  When you make out that schedule start with your Savior and then feel the rest in, your day will improve drastically.  It doesn't have to be first thing in the morning though, it can be anytime.  Some moms like to have some prayer time during their shower, while they are doing their daily load of laundry, while they are running errands and driving in the car, some do get up early in the morning before the house wakes up.  It’s up to you but make sure your getting the time in.  Every stage of life brings different times, you may have to have prayer time while nursing a child, later when kids are older you may get a specific quiet time.  A great thing to do is incorporate independent Bible and Prayer time for all the family members (of course the exception is the babies) Even toddlers can go and get their picture Bibles and look through them for 10 minutes a day.  This is a great way to get your children loving their time in the Word from the time they are small.  Like anything they will have to be trained in this area, at first it won't be easy but it won't be long and they will be looking forward to it.  I have heard of moms doing this and they have teens loving their time with God.  What a gift?  What mom wouldn't want that?   Sing praise songs and hymns throughout your day, play gospel CD’s.  There is nothing that lifts the spirits like Praising God! Make sure your making time for God, without that you will never have joy in your homeschool day.        Next week I will be talking about praying for a love of homeschooling!

Angela

My kids LOVE Richard Scarry, I know most kids do.  I'm so amazed that out of all the new shiny books we have on our shelves, my kids favorites are still the great classics!   My husband and I are blessed enough to have some of the books we grew up with, and several of them are Richard Scarry.  The covers are so old I couldn't find images of them, but they are the real big thick books that have several books in one.  My 5 and 4 yr old loves these, we look through these at night and even though the covers are faded it and the pics seem so out of date the kids LOVE them still.   I remember as a little girl loving Richard Scarry's Best Mother Goose ever, I still have this book too but it is really worn, falling apart actually.

The illustrations are so great!  They are colorful and bold and the images just burst off the page..    I love the rabbits ,cats, mice, and all of the wonderful characters you come to love in these books. 

I love reading these books again with my kids and it just tickles me that they love them too!

Angela

I was the keynote speaker at my local homeschool support group recently.  It was a real honor and I was excited to do it.  I have a real passion for homeschooling, I absoluty LOVE it!  I hope it encouraged, it seemed to-I had many people come up to me afterwards and tell me it is exactly what they needed to hear.  I know it was God and not me and just feel great that he used me to tell his message.   One lady had said that she brought her son home recently because of a GI disease that he had was making school very difficult, she said that she knew she had to homeschool but never imagined in her dreams that she could love it until hearing my talk.  That was worth it all!  How wonderful to encourage others in their homeschooling and help them realize that they CAN do it and they CAN LOVE doing it! 

I wanted to share my outline on my blog, it won't be quite the same written and not spoken but I thought maybe it could encourage others.  I can't tell you how much your blogs have encouraged me, they have truly been a gift from God to me!  I thought each week I would just talk about segments of my talk until it is done-if I tried to do it in one entry it would be too long and I would lose my readers.  Keep in mind I love to speak but I am not a writer so don't judge that part.  I just speak from my heart and when I write I try to do the same but I don't worry about all the writing rules, I just write what I am thinking out loud so be forgiving on that.

I once thought that everyone who homeschools loves it!  You would have to, it takes so much time and commitment and self sacrifice but I soon learned not everyone does.  Some wake up every morning dreading school time, hating it, not knowing what direction to go in.  Some get excited when school starts and its not long and the excitement has wore off!  Another homeschooler once said to me, wow, you love homeschooling, I wished I did.  That is what had me thinking, why do I love homeschooling and some who have made the same choice dread it.  What tips could I offer that might change their experience with homeschooling and make it a more joyful part of their life. 

This is the writeup in the local newsletter so you can get a feel about my talk.

Can you believe another year has gone by?  This is the time of year we reflect on our past and hope for the future.  Many of us are so busy we barely notice a year has gone by and another is starting, but there are those that feel the passes with some regret.  Did we accomplish all we planned?  Are we doing what we want to do with our lives?  Are we doing the right thing when it comes to raising our children?  These are questions we have asked ourselves at some point or another in our life even if we try to ignore them.  We at THINK strive to be an encouragement and resource to the homeschool community, we want this year to be the year you excel in your homeschooling endeavors!  To start the year off right we have a wonderful guest speaker in January!  Angela  is a homeschool mom with three children and she loves homeschooling.  Angela has avoided the pitfalls most of us find ourselves in when it comes to homeschooling by keeping her focus on the heart of homeschooling.  Start the year off right with a wonderfully encouraging night, you won’t regret it.

Homeschooling and Loving It, Bringing the Joy Back Into your Homeschool Day!

Angela  

Have you been called to homeschool your children?  Why did you start?  To protect your children, to give them a better education, to give them a Biblical Worldview, or maybe you just wanted them to LOVE learning.  Maybe you know this is what's meant for your family but do you LOVE homeschooling or do you find yourself dreading school time everyday. Has homeschooling become such a chore to you or maybe you just have burnout?  I would love to speak to you about why I love homeschooling, maybe I can impart just a tip or idea that can bring the joy back into your day.  I will talk about joy busters and how we can prevent them.  Even if you do love it, come on out, maybe you can take one idea to add to your day or better yet give me another one to share!

Hopefully that will give my readers an idea of where I'm going when I write about it.  This is just the introduction part, I will get into the outline soon. 

Angela