For more products like these, please visit Lynn's Boutique on the web.
Need help for your high school homeschool student? Then check out the video selection that Educator has to offer. Educator offers your child a chance to learn chemistry with a University of Cambridge educated professor and relieves your mind when teaching AP Calculus BC (Calculus 2). Check out educator.com for a full list of what they offer.
Hello! Welcome to Eclectic Education Homeschool! My name is Lynn and I am a Homeschooling WAHM. I write here about my daily happenings at home with my two darling sons. When I am not busy taking care of children, I write for eHow, make pages on Squidoo, and spend time designing merchandise for Lynn's Boutique. I also make free curriculum for homeschoolers to use at Homeschool Launch. I would love for you to check out my work. I hope that this blog will be a blessing to other Homeschool mothers and be a light for my Savior Jesus. So please pour yourself a cup of coffee and sit back and enjoy! Please also feel free to check out my website, Eclectic Education Homeschool Curriculum, for more homeschool tips. Thank you for visiting!
Oct. 3, 2009~ Make Homeschooling Fun ~
School does not have to be a drag! There are many ways to jazz up your homeschool, allowing your child to have fun and get a good education. Here are some tips:
1. Use living books instead of textbooks when possible. Children can get into stories much easier than they can a dry textbook. Use the living books as a jumping off point to learn more about the subject. You can build an entire study around the book.
2. Make lapbooks or an interactive notebook to go along with your studies. Most children love colored paper, stickers, colorful markers, cutting and pasting. Use this love to do something creative, fun and educational.
3. Use puzzles. Puzzles require thought and so they are educational, in among themselves, but if you do a puzzle of the United States, the World Map, fine artwork or something, then you have an added benefit. By studying the pieces, your child is learning the parts of the map or is studying the fine detail of that makes up the artwork.
4. Go on nature walks. Studying nature not only teaches your child about the world around them, but it helps them develop important observational skills.
5. Play games. There are some games, like Made for Trade , that are made to be educational even though they are fun. Then there are games like, Monopoly that were not made for educational purposes, but still have many educational components. Games are a wonderful way to have fun, but learn also.
6. Add movies and videos to your school day. Ok, I know this is a controversial one, but I truly believe there are some awesome shows and movies that teach. A few that my son loves are Word Girl (teaches vocabulary), Cyber Chase (math), Magic School Bus (science), Liberty's Kids (American History) and Between the Lions (Reading). Now obviously, you don’t want to try to watch them all in one day, but one or two of them a day a few days a week is a good balance. Kids love the idea of getting to watch tv in school and a lot of the educational shows are packed with information. It’s a good use of the 30 minutes.
7. Make sure art, nature, music and physical activity is a part of the daily activities. These extras are fun as well as good for your child.
8. Make scrapbooks for learning. These can be for history, science, geography, or even art. It’s a fun and educational way to display what your child learns and they can get creative putting it together (if they are old enough).
I hope these tips help you make your homeschool fun as well as educational!
A Craft Apron and Craft Bag you can order for your child:
Sep. 28, 2009~ Mummies, Flowers and Blue Dolphins ~
Ok, it's been a few weeks since I have posted about our school work. We've had some unorganized weeks, but I finally feel like I'm on track again. Here is a sampling of what we have done.
In the School House:
I finished the Magic Tree House book Mummies in the Morning with Little One. Then we made an interactive notebook page for the story.
I am really liking the format of an interactive notebook for the Magic Tree House series. We basically just do enough minibooks to fit in a two page spread (or a two page spread with flap) and when we are done, I glue them in on a page labeled with the title. This allows us to extend the study to include other things like geography without spending a lot of time on it. I try to do 1 book every week to a week and a half. Since there are so many books in the series, I don't want to spend a ton of time on each of them. That is why about 5-7 minibooks for each book is ideal. I try to find stickers to go along with the studies (if I can) to make the pages more colorful and stand out. They are not necessary, but since I am a scrapbooker and have tons of extra stickers, I might as well use them.
Both of the boys did some indoor nature studies since the weather has not been cooperating lately. I brought some wildflowers in from our garden for them to draw.
Prince Caspian was reading the book Island of the Blue Dolphin and he was to notebook what he read. Here is a page he did:
The notebook page is a part of the Basic Primary and Regular- Lined Notebooking Pages set by NotebookingPages.com. You can find them here: Notebooking Pages I love notebooking with older children. It gives them more practice in writing and it involves more thought than just circling a,b or c.
Being a WAHM:
I've also been busy working! I've gotten some of my Christmas line out on Zazzle. Here are a few examples:
The kids and I were kinda sick this last week, so we didn't get at as much work done as I would have liked, but we still did get some accomplished.
PC really had a rough week. He just kinda had trouble getting his work done, so I really don't have anything to show of his. He did get ahead some in math which is great. He just finished the chapter on factoring. He has also started reading the book Island of the Blue Dolphin. I don't think he likes it much especially since the only thing he wrote on his notebooking page is, "This is the most boring book I have ever read." lol!!! Needless to say, he had to do the page over. I doubt he really feels that strongly on it though, I think he was just in a bad mood at the time.
Little One read The Knight at Dawn (Magic Tree House) and Raising Yoder's Barn and did interactive notebook pages for them.
Here is a picture of his interactive notebook for The Knight at Dawn:
Here is a picture of the interactive notebooking page of Raising Yoder's Barn:
On Saturday, we went to a Colonial Days fair called The Fair at New Boston that was really fun and educational. The people there were in character and were willing to answer questions about their jobs and the things they do. We also got to see a battle reenacted which the boys loved!!! Little One was so excited, he came home and watched Liberty Kids. lol!!! So now we are studying the colonial days. Here are some resources: http://www.squidoo.com/colonial-days-study.
Pictures from our day at the Fair at New Boston (Click on them to see them enlarged):
Here are some things I hope to accomplish this week:
Aug. 29, 2009~ Using Notebooks and Interactive Notebooks in our Studies! ~
Well, we finished our first full week of school! The kids did great.
On the School Front:
Little One's Work:
Little One is coming along nicely on his reading and writing. This week in math we were studying greater than and less than and he did really well. We are doing a lot of read alouds of some awesome books. I am really enjoying this time with Little One.
We read the story: Saint George and the Dragon and made an interactive notebook page to go with it.
PC is doing really well with his math, he started factors this week. In science he is doing Geology and in history he is studying the Age of Exploration. I have added notebooking to his studied. Here is some of what he did:
Sorry, the pictures didn't turn out real great. For some reason they were harder to get centered right. The notebooking templates that I used was from NotebookingPages.com. The set I used was the "Basic Lined Notebooking Pages".
We had a very busy, but nice week.
On the Work Front:
I have been busy working!!! This week a lot of my concentration has been on my Zazzle Store. Here are a few products that I made:
, that are made to be educational even though they are fun. Then there are games like, 
that were not made for educational purposes, but still have many educational components. Games are a wonderful way to have fun, but learn also.
(American History) and Between the Lions (Reading). Now obviously, you don’t want to try to watch them all in one day, but one or two of them a day a few days a week is a good balance. Kids love the idea of getting to watch tv in school and a lot of the educational shows are packed with information. It’s a good use of the 30 minutes.
