Sep. 14, 2008 - Win $100 in Nature Books
Schooling Adventures

what a perfect addition to your family's nature walk.  Go to the The Green Parent today to find out the details.

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Aug. 27, 2007 - Perhaps it's just me...
Schooling Adventures

...but i simply DO NOT get all the hype about dictation.  I am sure there are daggers flying my direction from all over the homeschooling community as they read this- or at least from teh 2-3 people who read this post.  At least I am being honest.  I struggle with it for a few weeks every year just knowing that this will be the year I finally understand why I do it.  Instead I am on my 4th year of scratching my head wondering why I waste our time. 

Clearly there must be some benefits that I am missing because Sonlight uses it and even after revamping their LA program, it is still on the schedule for once per week.  And now here I sit again beginning week four of school, once again scratching myself on the head asking WHY, WHY, WHY???

I just feel like any benefit I can get from dictation, such as spelling and handwriting skills, I can get from creative writing or science.  Is there anyone else out there with me on this or have I COMPLETELY missed the mark on the purpose of dictation all together?

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Aug. 10, 2006 - Long time no blog
Schooling Adventures

Well, I noticed that the tumble weeds were starting to roll through my blog so I thought I better check in or people would start to think I abandoned this place.  Wait, that would insinuate that people besides me actually read this thing!

We started school this week.  It has been a blast.  At the same time of course we started up our school year schedule.  I base my schedule from the wonderful tool Managers of Their Home.  The school week has gone really well.  I was worried how it would all work out teaching two different ages groups.  I shouldn't have worried- God had it all worked out.  I had committed it to enough prayer that He had it all under control.  Now I just have to follow His will. 

I have missed blogging and I hope that as we settle into a new routine that I will pick back up on my posts.  Prince "T" and Princess "C" are posting every Tuesday and Thursday as part of their typing program so be sure and check out their latest entries.  The other thing they are doing for typing is the BBC: Dance Mat Typing free typing program.  They seem to really be enjoying it. 

In other news I spent 2 hours and 1 minute on  the phone yesterday with my best girlfriend!!!  It was so wonderful to be able to catch up with her.  I chatted with her during my scheduled hobby/special project time.  We are making plans for a wonderful, fun filled camping trip to Fort Richardson State Park, Historic Site
& Lost Creek Reservoir State Trailway .  I am getting so excited as this will be the first time our family has gone camping. 

I have lots more to say so I better split this into multiple posts.  Glad to be back and can't wait to hear from all my Bliends. 

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Jul. 8, 2006 - new find
Schooling Adventures

I was checking out new blog entries on homepage and came across a great website over at Peakmore Academy

I am already a HUGE fan of  Living Books for the Ears

and now I am blessed to find this great site over at  Kiddie Records Weekly

It looks like I need to go buy some more cds and get busy burning.  I hope you enjoy these sites as well!

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Jul. 7, 2006 - I'm a winner
Schooling Adventures

OK, I practically NEVER EVER WHATSOEVER win anything....

BUT....

while gone on vacation I received notification from Maria at Home School Math

That I won one of her ebooks!!!

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Jun. 19, 2006 - Art Curriculum: Artistic Pursuits
Schooling Adventures

I have finally found an art curriculum to use for the fall!!  This looks like the perfect thing to teach the kids very specific techniques yet allow them the artistic freedom to decide what exactly to draw.  I love that they divide all the upper levels into two sections.  The first book is artistic element and composition and the second book is color theory.  Each book is designed to take a year to complete if you do art 2x/week.

In the past we have been involved in co-ops where the children had wonderful art teachers and I really didn't have to worry about art.  In the early elementary years we studied and played around with different art mediums as we used our Five in a Row Curriculum.  The kids love art, but with my lack of experience I had to choose just the right curriculum.  Oh, did I mention this also includes a certain level of art appreciation with every unit!  

I have never had any formal art training and all the artistic elements I have learned was through scrapbooking.  I am so excited about the curriculum I am going to buy myself a set of art supplies and learn right along with the kids!

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Apr. 30, 2006 - October Sky
Schooling Adventures

This week we finished up our Astronomy Book.  On Friday the kids finished their Astronomy Notebooks.  Our last chapter of Astronomy was on space travel.  We talked about everything from the launch of the Russian satalite Sputnik to the International Space Station.  The kids were fascinated with life on the space station.  Sadly they are in a potty humor phase and couldn't stop laughing about how they had to use the restroom. 

     To celebrate our unit on space travel we watched October Sky tonight which is based on the true story of Homer Hickam.  This movie does have some bad language and child abuse scene.  We used our Clear Play DVD player to take care of the bad language.  As far as handling the abuse with our children we didn't have to stop and explain this particular scene because we were recently foster parents and have thoroughly addressed abuse with our children.  I do recommend this movie but not without a filtering system for the language and not without explaining the abuse scene.  Overall, this movie is a very inspiring story about a boy and his dream.  A dream to accomplish something with his life. 

     Next week the kids will work on their final science project.  They will be doing a team project of building a model of the  International Space Station.  They are very excited to get started.  I will be sure to post pictures once they finish.  We are sad to be wrapping up our science program but I am already looking forward to starting Zoology I next year. 

     Until we meet again...

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Apr. 26, 2006 - More science adventures
Schooling Adventures

I meant to get this added lst Friday and it just didn't happen.  On Friday we finished up another chapter of science which included rapping up our notebooks for the chapter.  We were studying stars and galaxies.  The kids learned that Earth is in the Milky Way Galaxy.  There are 4 different shapes of galaxies and the Milky Way Galaxy is in a spiral shaped galaxy.  This roughly looked like the eye of a hurricane in the kids opinion.  Thee outside "layers" of the galaxy are like "fingers".  Our Solar System is in one of the "fingers" of the Milky Way Galaxy. I happened across the perfect notebooking activity on a spiral galaxy.  Take a look at what the kids created.

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Apr. 21, 2006 - We actually do school around here...
Schooling Adventures

I know with all the talk about sewing and moving it would seem that school never happens around our house.  But we actually only have 4 weeks left in the school year and many subjects are already coming to a close.  Of course there are other subjects we will be finishing up on that last scheduled day!  One of the subject we just love is science.  We use:

Exploring Creation with Astronomy by Jeannie Fulbright

This is an Elementary Science Program from Apologia Science

With all the preparations with the move we got a bit behind.  This week we have been diligant and have been working hard in one of our favorite subjects.  We just finished a chapter on Pluto and the Kuiper Belt.  We talked about how different chemicals effect the freezing temperature of water.  Normal freezing rate is 32 degrees but if you add something the freezing rate can change.  To let the kids get a hands on understanding of this the kids made homemade ice cream.  Here are some pics of the kids finishing up the experiment and enjoying the spoils of the experiemtn.  And believe me Mom did her own bag as well!  What a YUMMY experiment

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Mar. 8, 2006 - Two incredible school days this week
Schooling Adventures

This week has been such blessing in the "classroom".  We are in Acts for our Bible study and the we are all enthralled by Paul's false imprisonment.  The kids are amazed that he is being held with no cause.  Even more amazed that the Romans are willing to play along in the Jewish leaders games.  They have been in awe at the many ways God is sparing Paul's life.  This is the first time we have gone through the book of Acts together and it has been a blessing to watch the children jump for joy as I open the Bible.

We are reading about the Lewis and Clark expedition right now in History and we have all enjoyed the details we are learning.  Today we Finally got to see the expedition make it over the Rockies.  Even though I knew the obvious ending I was still holding my breath right along with the kids as we read our chapter today. 

We are a bit behind in our memorization so we are working on the Preamble to the Constitution this week.  I love the words and their meaning. 

     "We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union,   establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America. "

It defines the complete purpose of the Constitution.  There are no hidden agendas.  It was about protecting what they so valiantly fought for- the freedoms of a new Nation.  Sadly, It doesn't seem that we have much of what they were trying to protect.  I certainly understand that life could be so much worse than we have it in our country.  I know I have much more than our forefathers ever imagined, yet today I don't think our Nation has the peace they had then.  War brings suffering and hardship but I would say overall our Nations defense would make proud the writers of this great document.  More often times it is the war of words that we need to worry about.  These words are ruining this nations domestic tranquility.  People are so loose with their tongues it is heart breaking.  As hearts are breaking people in this country are losing hope.  The more they lose hope the more they are looking in the wrong places to find it again.  Of course the only true source of hope is Christ.  He is also the provider of our Tranquility and in Him we have Liberty "Freedom".

OK, time to get off my soapbox and finish talking about our school day...

Princess C is still fretfully behind but she is working so hard to get caught up.  I am very proud of her!  I will be spending the next week making sure she is caught up and stays caught up so that she can enjoy her last nine weeks of school.  Dad and I are brain storming on how to deal with her sensory issues that so easily distract her from her school work. 

I am also organizing all the books in the schoolroom.  I am using my nifty little label maker and putting tags on the shelf to define an area (ie, series, horse books, picture books, FIAR books, sonlight books, American history, Bible, Art, sports, etc)  I am also listing my books on my Library Thing site .  I love this site.  I have signed up as a lifetime member now.  I have SO MANY MORE books to go, but it will so be worth it when I am done.  I am already finding duplicates I didn't know I had!  YIKES!  The kids have enjoyed watching me get all the books organized too.  They love the labels I am adding to the shelves.  We do love our school room that we have been blessed with.  Now we just need to finish organizing it so that we can make it more "preschool friendly"!

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