One of the main goals I set early on in our homeschool was to give my children a love of learning. Creative homeschooling is the mode I’ve used to successfully do that. Don’t think that you can never put your child in front of a textbook or computer screen to homeschool creatively! Instead, think of it as offering your children curriculum and styles to meet their needs. Sometimes that will be a textbook or computer class. Other times, it may be a unit study, living literature, field trips, games, project-based learning, co-op classes, or interest-based studies. These articles show you how. Be inspired!
A question I hear quite often is, “Am I really qualified to homeschool? Am I going to ruin my children by schooling them at home?” Read This First: Animal School by George Reavis Once upon a time the animals had a school. They had four subjects ~ running, climbing, flying, and swimming ~ and all…
I’ve got a fun math activity for you! It’s important to me that my children not only know how to read graphs, but know how to create them as well. Mahayla is a pro at gathering information and creating her own graphs on paper. Caleb is just beginning, though, so I wanted him to make a “concrete” graph…
Why is it that you usually feel dirtier after showering at a hotel than you did before you showered? Why is it that once the baby finally falls asleep in his carseat, somebody else in the car decides they have to use the bathroom and can’t possibly hold it – thus waking up the baby…
We are SO pleased with the first edition of the Westward Gazette! I bought a $20 software program from WalMart called Perfect Pro Office that made our computer work simple. (Word Perfect is the only office-type program that came on my computer and it stinks for projects.) The newsletter includes a story or journal entry from…
What fun we had visiting WKYT TV in Lexington today! They took us on a tour of the newsroom, video control room for broadcasts, video control room for taping shows, and the live set. The kids all had the chance to stand in front of the green screen to try their hand at pointing correctly on the weather map. …
If writing isn’t a natural passion for your child, it can be a subject full of drudgery. Believe me, I know. Up until this year Mahayla has fought me tooth and nail over any sort of writing assignment. This year has been different, though. I believe she’s enjoying writing partly because of maturity, but I’ve made…
(This post contains affiliate links.) Picture Prompts Inspire Writing Here’s a fun way to get your kids to write – and it’s VERY easy! Use homemade picture prompts. Simply cut out interesting pictures from magazines, old calendars, old books, etc. and paste them on card stock. Let your child choose a picture, then write a…
My son loves baseball. He’s also excited about his new interest in learning to read. (Thank you, Lord!) So, we came up with a fun way to show his reading achievements – a “book”ball chart. Everytime he reads a book by himself, we’ll add a baseball to the field. We came up with the idea…
Here’s the newest summer center at our house – Birds! The box of books on the right includes nonfiction books about all sorts of birds – everything from birds we see around here to penguins to toucans. I’ve also included some really good children’s literature that have birds as characters – Make Way for Ducklings…
This week’s art center focuses on Mary Cassatt. I’ve only put out pastels and watercolors this week to encourage my kiddos to really use each medium. I found that putting out more than a couple of choices last time didn’t give them much practice with any one thing. As a side note, if you need…
Whether it’s a unit, a special holiday, someone’s birthday or just something you want to do to peak your children’s interest in a certain subject, think about creating a special place of learning in your home to create a buzz of inquisitiveness in your children. We call them learning centers, but you call them whatever…
If you’re anything like me, art tends to take somewhat of a back seat to other subjects during the school year. So, I’ve decided to make an art center that will stay around all summer long! I plan to fill it with all sorts of goodies, but only a few at a time. I’ll change out…