Elementary

Homemade travel brochure about the 13 colonies

13 Colonies Travel Brochure

An Easy 13 Colonies Travel Brochure Project In an effort to share more of our project-based learning, I thought I’d highlight Caleb’s latest middle school research & writing assignment.  As part of a Colonial History unit study, Caleb and I read a two great books about the 13 colonies. Afterward, I asked him to choose…

Green piggy bank with gold coin image for a post about Economics in the Homeschool

Economics in the Homeschool

Sadly, the formal study of economics is left out of most of the curricula I’ve run across in my 11+ years of homeschooling. An understanding of economics is EXTREMELY important as our children grow up to care for a family, learn to tithe and give, and become the financial leaders of our country. Unless we took…

Planning a Large Unit Study

(This post contains affiliate links.) In this final installment of my unit study series, I’m going to share with you how to design a unit study that is fairly in-depth.  For those of you new to this series, you can catch up by reading… How To Plan a Unit Study Unit Study Projects Planning a…

Planning a Small Unit Study

We’re finally into some practical posts in my series about unit studies! In my first post, I wrote about how I design unit studies for our homeschool. In the second post, I wrote about incorporating project-based learning into the units. Now, I’d like to share a very short and simple study we completed on magnets….

Project-Based Learning Ideas

I’m a huge believer in project-based learning! Keep reading to learn why and to get tons of project-based learning ideas for your homeschool! Just what is project-based learning? Quite simply, it’s a learning method in which your children dive into a subject and complete a project to show what they know.  Projects can really be…

Hands-On Volume Lesson

  (This post contains affiliate links and links to my business website, Shining Dawn Books.) Target Age Range: 3rd-7th Skills Covered: volume, length, width, height, formulas, 2-dimesional shapes, 3-dimensional shapes Snap cubes are great for teaching perimeter, area, and volume in a hands-on way.  This lesson focused on volume and understanding the formula for finding…

Economics for Kids blog image with Pancakes book and economic book report in the background.

Economics for Kids: Productive Resources

(This post contains affiliate links and links to my business website, Shining Dawn Books.) Target Age Range: 3rd-8th Skills Covered: economics, productive resources, natural resources, capital resources, human resources, sorting Last January, I took a professional development class on incorporating economics into your classroom.  Yes, apparently homeschool parents can take professional development classes…they knew I…

Bead Classification

  Target Age Range: PK-2 Skills Covered: sorting, classification, attributes Classification is both a math and science skill.  The ability to classify objects also develops organizational skills which are helpful for writing and general “life” organization. This activity is super simple to pull together.  Simply gather a variety of beads (or buttons, cereal, rocks, beans…)…