Co-op Competition Night

Posted by Cindy on April 29, 2007

Our co-op has a yearly “Expo” - a night full of competitions that the kids can enter.  What fun it is every year!  It’s such a great place for them to display their talents (and even get a well-deserved pat on the back.)  Mommas, Daddies, and grandparents fill the rooms with proud smiles on their faces, too.

This year, my kiddos entered the art, cooking and woodworking competitions.  They could’ve chosen Bible memorization, spelling bee, speech, knitting/crocheting/sewing, science fair, singing, instrumentals and drama, too.  With a newborn in the house, we entered only a few categories this year.

Here’s a picture of their art and woodworking projects.  Mahayla entered a tissue paper “stained glass” flower in the art(paper) category and a picture of our new foal with its Mom for art(photography).  She made Penne Pasta Skillet for the cooking competition.  Caleb did a printing piece for the art(printing) category, made a sand block instrument for the woodworking competition and made Amish Chocolate Chip Cookies for the cooking competition.

Every child who enters gets a certificate of participation and special certificates with ribbons are given to 1st, 2nd and 3rd in each category.  The awards ceremony will take place this Monday during our regular co-op meeting.  I love that EVERY child gets to walk on stage no matter if they placed in their competition or not.

Oh yeah, after the cooking dishes have been judged, we all get to EAT the food!  That’s a nice fellowship to end the evening.

Updating to add:  Mahayla placed 1st in the Paper Art category and 2nd in the cooking Pasta category!  Caleb placed 1st in Art Printing, 2nd in Woodworking and 3rd in Cookies!  WooHoo!

What Will We Do Over Summer Break?

Posted by Cindy on April 22, 2007

I call it summer break because we put aside the normal daily work load, but the summer is far from a break from learning.  We have so much fun, though, that I have been able to disguise the learning part so far!

Mom is “off duty” for the most part, but I always have a stash of planned out activities.  I try to give them something planned by me everyday – an art project, a science experiment, a trip to the library, maybe even a math page to keep the skills up.   For the rest of the day, I try to provide them with lots of neat ideas to keep themselves busy.  I don’t demand that they do the extra things.  If they want to hang out in the kiddie pool the rest of the day, that’s fine by me.  But most days, I hear the words, “I’m Bored!” too many times.  So here’s a list of some of the things I have available to them:

Art - a stash of idea books, some old Abeka Art books I found at a curriculum sale, and lots of materials

watercolors, tissue paper, glue, markers, colored pencils, foam shapes, foam sheets, pipe cleaners, clay, play dough, chalk, pastels, oil pastels, tempera paints, lots of paper types, fun scissors, scrapbooking materials, old magazines, crayons, rulers, googly eyes, pom pom balls, sponges, rubber stamps…………

Crafts – I keep on hand (for Mahayla mostly), books on knitting, crocheting and sewing with all the materials for these, lots of beads, and the occaisional cheapo craft set from the dollar store or WalMart.

Science experiment books – I’ve run across many of these at yard sales.  My kids love to try experiments on their own!

Science craft books – these are fun.  They include projects like making bird feeders, windchimes, water microscopes…………I found most of these at yard sales, too.

Nature study – We have a bag packed and ready for them to take off on their own nature walks/hunts.  We live on a farm, so they have a tad bit of freedom in this area.  In the bag we keep things like a hand-held microscope, baggies for collections, colored pencils and drawing paper, magnifying glass, Fandex field guides, sunscreen……………….

Library trips – We do what I call “free reading” during the summer.  Books that have nothing to do with some sort of unit we’re studying or checklist we need to check off.  The kids both pile up their stacks to take home and we just sit around and read, read, read all summer.  The trampoline is a great place for reading, by the way.

Field Trips – I like to just get up and go a lot during the summer.  We are blessed with many educational day trip destinations in Central KY!

I try to keep up with daily Bible reading to them.   Like I mentioned before, I still throw in the occasional math worksheet.  The kids like to buy and work through the fun dollar store workbooks, so I’ll pull those out some days.  Rainy days are good for computer games.  I don’t let them have too much “free time” on the computer during the school year, so I don’t feel bad allowing more in the summer.

I also make and print out a 100 Things To Do If I’m Bored list.  I’ve found several on the internet that I paste into a Word Document, then tweak to fit our family.  Do an internet search.  The lists have great ideas!

One thing my children have come up with that yours might enjoy – they’ve created spy journals.  The spy journals are just steno pads.  They have the most fun creating secret codes, spying on Dad or Papaw and writing down what they’ve seen, meeting in secret hideouts to discuss a mission……Hey, it’s creative thinking and writing practice!!  I love it!

Summer is not a time to slack from chores!  They continue to have assigned chores daily.  I love summer break!!  Twelve days to go!

Record Keeping

Posted by Cindy on

The end of our school year is quickly approaching.  It’s been a long, drawn out year for us – starting July 1st, taking a huge baby break and then starting up again.  I think we’re down to 12 “official” days.  We’ll continue some light, fun learning through the summer, but more on that in another post.

So many people ask me, “What do I need to keep for records of our school year?”  So, I’m going to tell you what I keep.  In KY, we are required to keep an attendance record and proof that we have taught the required subjects.

Each year, I keep my record of attendance, lesson plans, curriculum list, letter of intent, certified letter to the DPP receipt, any other legal correspondences, and narrative report cards in a 1″ three-ring binder.  I keep the entire binder as part of my yearly records.

As you can see below, we keep everything we’ve done all year in various folders and notebooks – one for each subject.  At the end of the school year, I go through most notebooks (or subjects) and pull out a sampling from the beginning of the year, middle of the year and end of the year.  I only choose well-done work and try to choose things that show a good progression of skills from the beginning of the year to the end.  The subjects I narrow down like this include Bible, math, handwriting/copywork, grammar, phonics, spelling, writing, reading lists, and art.

For science and history/geography, I keep all the work.  We spend a lot of time putting together nice notebooks, lapbooks and timelines.   They make great resources for us to go back through as we move on to other science topics and history eras.  Not to mention, if the DPP ever shows up at my door, I would just love for him to see the fun we have learning as he looks through these!

After I’ve gathered the lesson plan book, the science and history things and the folder with a sampling of all other work, I add any co-op awards, school pictures, certificates or other important things to each child’s pile.  In such a lovely and highly technical fashion, I rubber band each child’s pile and then file them away in a Rubbermaid tote!  This tote is holding five years worth of records.

So there you have it.  It’s a very simple system.  I have proof if needed and a great reminder of each school year!

Fire Safety

Posted by Cindy on April 18, 2007

Our Keepers At Home group is just turning out to be so wonderful!  This afternoon’s class was at the fire house.  One of the firemen taught the girls (and their brothers) about how and when to use fire extinguishers.  I believe the moms learned just as much as the kiddos!

Thanks for organizing this, Lisa!

Next class – sewing……

A Great Week

Posted by Cindy on April 6, 2007

It’s Spring Break around here this week.  Even though we weren’t on Spring Break, we took advantage of some special programs being offered in the area – and what fun they’ve been!

Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday mornings the 4-H/Extension Office offered classes – an oil pastels art class, basket making, electricity (lamp making) and a horticulture class.  They were WONDERFUL!  Here’s a picture of the projects.

Wednesday afternoon was our regularly scheduled Keepers At Home meeting.  This week’s class was taught by my Mom and the topic was CAKE DECORATING!  The girls all seemed to have a great time.  My Mom sent them all home with their very own decorating tip and a little booklet of cake decorating how-to’s.  It was a messy day, but beautiful cakes were created.  Here’s a picture of Mahayla’s finished product.  Thank you, Momma!

EclecticEducation left a comment letting me know she saw my blog was nominated for a couple of blog awards.  I think I have Nancy from Nancysnook to thank for those nominations.  Thank you, Nancy!  You can see all the nominees’ sites at www.homeschoolblogawards.com – there are some really helpful blogs out there!