Home School Mother's Journal/Weekly Wrap UP

     In Our Life This Week: things have been pretty good. I have been doing lots of praying & reading, thinking & planning for next year's curriculum. Most of the time I feel anxious when it comes to our home schooling, like any other home school mom, wondering if we are doing enough, are we covering the things that we need to be covering, etc. But, when I take the time to pull to the side, pray, really focus on what we've done & what we need to plan to do, I ALWAYS feel refreshed. God always speaks to my spirit and lets me know that it will all fall in place & in the end my children will be educated. My soul always feels refreshed also & feels the leading of the spirit. The leading of the spirit always puts a calmness in me, one that makes our home schooling flow smoothly.

     In Our Home Schooling This Week: Math was another great week, accomplishing four lessons in our Saxon 8/7.

     Science: Exploring Creation With Physical Science, we have made it to the end of Module 7, only our Study Guide & test left to go.

     History: has only been a review week. We've basicly just been walking through history in our conversation reviewing for the S. A. T. Test we will be taking next week. I always like to make sure that things are a bit fresh in their mind before we go to take our test. Monday will be a day of review in all of our subjects before we strike out on Tuesday for the big test. We use the test results to see if we are progressing. I know that the results to these test aren't always accurate if they have things on the test that we haven't covered, but it does show me what they do know.

     Literature: We began Johnny Tremain. After the second day of reading my children were begging for more. I did not give in this time. I made them wait until the next day. This has kept their enthusiasm up for the next day of Literature.

     Art: We combined our Art work with our Literature this week. They have been painting a picture after each day's reading about some part of the story. Here are a few pics of their Art Work:

Matthew sketching a scene from Johnny Tremain

Sarah's painting of Johnny carrying Isannah to the wharf to get fresh air

Display of Sarah's paintings from the book Johnny Tremain

Matthew's paintings from Johnny Tremain

Sarah & Matthew busy painting their own scenes of their read-a-loud of Johnny Tremain

     English: Did not get to it this week, but this was our plans. We are going to write paragraph summaries to go along side of our Art pictures to make our on Johnny Tremain book in the end. We have plans to catch up with our pictures next week.

     Places We Are Going: made a trip to the library this week. The children schooled there while daddy & I pulled books from shelves and made plans for our next year. We have a ways to go, but much was accomplished. I also took me a few hours at the library to sit and read. The ME time was great! Daddy took the children to the doctor while I was enjoying my ME time, thanks daddy, you're the best!
My diligent scholars:

         

     Home Schooling Tip For the Week: "Set your house in order." I have found that as my children are getting older their schooling intensify's. By keeping up with our household chores, the house is decent, & we have more time to devote to our school work. When the house is maintained on a day to day basis it keeps an appearance of being presentable when company arrives, and also allows for plenty of time to do schooling. If we let the house go it may take us all day one day to clean it, leaving no time for school that day (probably leaving a grouchy mom behind, upset because of no schooling being accomplished). Twenty to thirty minutes a day gives 2 to 2 1/2 hours of cleaning each week. If you use team work, as we do, multiply your minutes time the amount of people on the team & look at the results of how much house work can be done. Plenty of time to keep the house in order.

     What I'm Reading: Lots & lots of things from books I'm wanting to use next year to books about home schooling.

     What I'm Praying About: Lots of needs for others & a closer walk with the Lord. I need His closeness to guide me along this journey. And not just along this journey, but until I make heaven my home. I want to be one of the chosen few.

     I think this about wraps us up for the week. Check out the other home school blogger's weeks at the HMJ & the Weekly Wrap UP.

HAPPY HOME SCHOOLING!

Christmas Book, Hot Chocolate, & More Give Away

     I love reading Christmas books after Thanksgiving. There is just something about the atmosphere that makes me enjoy a great book with a nice cup of hot chocolate or coffee filled with a luscious flavored creamer. I would like to share the atmosphere with another wonderful blog reader. Here's a wonderful give away to set your atmosphere and a great book for the moment.

Here's a pic of what you will receive in the give away.

    I have not read this entire book. My children & I will be working through it after Thanksgiving as a jump starter in to our family devotion. We will read the story from this book, look up the scriptures in the Bible that goes along with the story, & read the prayer that is in the book to motivate our mind toward the Savior throughout our day. The book apppears to be a great book.
    If you are interested in this give away just leave a comment below & if you know of a great Christmas book that I might would enjoy please leave the title in your comment. That's all it takes & you will be entered into the drawing. The winner will be selected on November 28, 2011. I will contact the winner so I can get your gift in the mail so you can enjoy the weeks before Christmas. Just leave your comment!

Educating From Library Books To Encyclopedias To Erupting Volcanos & Even A Blog Give Away

In My Life This Week:
    My scales are going in the wrong direction. I'm not sure if it's the week I don't pay much mind to the scales because of mother nature or if I've been enjoying too much food. Regardless of the case, it aggravated me that the scales went in the wrong direction after I counted calories & carbs, 20 carbs or less each day & less than 1600 calories per day, with excercising. Can you believe that? Uhh!!!!

Uhh!!!

Me trying to thin down

I'm Grateful This Week For:
    the relationships I have with my children. I know we only have that closeness due to all the time we spend together. Here's a link to a post with a pic of the card my DD left on my desk for me.
I have special tea parties with my children (individually) to build our relationship. My DD sends me little notes & cards from time to time laying a few building blocks to the relationship. I'm grateful that we are both working on the building.

I've Been Inspired By:
    two tapes that I checked out from our local library this week. They are by Inge P. Cannon. I have not heard of her before this week. It appears that she has lots of books/audio tapes that I am interested in reading/listening to. The two that I listened to this week are: Schooling or Educating: Which Are You Doing? & Eliminating Crucial Gaps While Individualizing Education. She never mentions Charlotte Mason, but her teachings could very well pass for CM methods. These tapes were a great encouragement this week to remind me (again) that we don't have to move at the pace of the public school system. We can remain in our subjects/topics for as long as we desire.

In Our Homeschooling This Week:
    we accomplished three math lessons in Saxon 8/7. My children are enjoying their lessons right now. The lessons have had geometry & prime & composit numbers. Their words are, "This is easy. We like this." My son has decided this week that he wants him some drafting tools.
We have not yet returned back to our Exploring Creation with Physical Science through Apologia yet. Hopefully that will be next week. We chose another library book this week. It is:

Exploring The Sky By Day by Terence Dickinson

    This book is easing us in to the different types of clouds & the water cycle. Our next Module in our Physical Science is going to be on water so I just eased this book in to introduce them to the water cycle a bit more in debth than what we have studied in the past. I like to ease in a library book for a review from time to time.
    We place two different bowls of water outside for an experiment, one in the shade & one in the sun. We are checking the temp. of the water each day & measuring the debth to see the warmth & how much it is evaporating. This is to reinforce our Module that was bringing out humidity. We've been testing to see if there was already enough of moisture in the air already or not. We've also checked the sky for clouds to see if we could identify them.
    We are still reading Little Pilgrim's Progress for Literature. We should have this finished up by next week. My son said this has become one of his most favorite books.
History has been a pretty relaxed week. We finished reading our book about Pompeii & pulled down the encyclopedia for further reading. After that Sarah & Matthew drew maps of Italy for some geography skills. Here are the pics of their maps.

Sarah's map of Italy

Matthew's map of Italy

    We've done this in the past, but my children thought it only right that we do another volcano experiment since Pompeii was buried by Vesuvius erupting. Here are some pics of them recreating Mount Vesuvius's eruption burying Pompeii again.

This is the Lab Tray

They are filling the 2 litter bottles with their mixtures

Matthew's volcano erupting and destroying Pompeii.

Sarah's volcano erupting. We used to big of a bottle and not enough mixture to have a more powerful eruption. So now we are planning to do it again for the third time to get it right.

    For English/Grammar this week they wrote narrations on what they have learned about Pompeii. Here are their essays.

Sarah's Essay on Pompeii

Matthew's Essay on Pompeii

    Other than getting in a drawing lesson today, I think this about Wraps up our week.
I am linking up with Kris over at the Weekly Wrap Up & with Sue for the Homeschool Mother's Journal. If you'd like to read more about other's weeks, drop over to one of these blogs & check out the others that linked up also.

On another note, I am having a give away on my blog. Click here to check it out.

Composition Comes By Nature

                What is composition? Composition is the make up of anything, a putting together of parts to form a whole such as writing sentences, making pictures, and setting type in printing.

                Teaching a child to write can be a tedious task. Words don't always just flow for every child. For some children their words flowing on their paper can sound like a trip to the ocean. The words on the paper can sound like the waves lapping on to the shore. They roll in and they roll out. Sometimes they may even appear as the ocean might on a stormy day, a might bit choppy. Regardless of how they are sounding, the child is composing. The reader may not like the tune that is being played in his or her ear, but the writer has a great composition in progress. The writer is at work and the reader has to wait for the finished product.

                Charlotte Mason said, "Composition comes by nature." A child has an inner writing ability if he or she has not been hampered by instructions. Give the child a great book to read. Leave the grammatical rules out. Let the power of the eye connect with the mind. What the child sees will be the foundation laid for the child's writing ability to derive from. Composition is the putting together of parts to make a whole. The child will take what he or she sees in the great book and begins constructing his or her paper. The power of the eye will cause the child to take notice that the first sentence in the paragraph is indented. He or she will see that the first letter in that first word of the paragraph is capitalized. As images are reflected to the eye, brain waves are sending information to the mind to be stored for later reference. When the child takes up his or her pen and puts it to the paper, those images come back to the mind. The natural ability of remembrance comes forth. As the child is writing the power of the eye is focused on the paper. The child takes notice. Something is wrong with the view. "Ah," the mind thinks, "I need to put a comma after that group of words. This sentence needs a period at the end of it. I should place a question mark at the end of that sentence because a question is being asked. I'd better put an exclamation point there where that excitement is being shown." Even though the grammatical rules aren't being taught, the images that were stored in the mind will cause the child to want his or her paper to look like the pages in the book. The power of the eye and a great book will produce a marvelous composition.

                Our business as the teacher is to provide the child with wholesome material for his or her lesson. The power of the eye will take over at that point and send the images that are reflected to the brain. Later, readily enough the child will compose in his or her own time Composition should not have to be taught. It should come by nature. Charlotte Mason said, "Composition is as natural as jumping and running to children who have been aloud due use of books." VOL 1 PG 247

                Choppy papers that a child begins writing will develop in to a master piece as the wealth of material given to the child to read instills in the mind. As the child grasps the material the reader will no longer feel as if he was standing on the seashore listening to the waves lap the shore. Structure will begin taking place and the writer will come forth. The child will take the parts he or she has learned and put them together to form a whole composition.

                As children's teachers, we should give them wholesome material for their lessons and wait for the writer to emerge.

On a different note, I'm having a Give-a-Way on my blog. So click on the link and see what I got for you.

Give Away: Social Studies Made Simple

     I have quite a bit of work books that I was blessed with that I am not using so I am going to do some give-aways over the next few months trying to clear my home of them.
    The first give-away consists of 3 work books that would go with American history. These books are not informational enough to stand as a full curriculum, but could be used as a Scope & Sequence that you could check out library books to go along with the worksheet/activities to have a fun schooling.
Here's a few pics of the books.

    The three books range from 2nd to 4th grade level (what front of book recommends). I personally don't pay any mind to what the book says if it is something I think I can use.
    The book jacket on back reads like this: Social Studies Made Simple will spark the interest and imagination of children as they explore the worlds of civics, the creative arts, economics, geography, history, and language arts.
    The Social Studies Made Simple series is packed with interesting activities and projects that are designed to reinforce the knowledge, skills, and values children need to become informed and involved citizens.
    I will choose a winner on November the 1st so I can mail the books out that week after I contact the winner.
    I have several types of work books to give away from math, history, a few science books, reading comprehension, geography, etc. that I will be giving away over the next few months. Hopefully they can be a blessing for someone.
    I don't have a lot of blog traffic on my blog, so if you think any of my give aways will be something one of your blogging friends would like, feel free to invite them over to post a comment on the give away to enter the drawing that is going on.
    Some books I have several copies of so as I do the give away I'll contact the winner to see if they will need more than one copy for their family.
    Hope this give away can be a blessing to someone. Just leave a comment to be entered in to the drawing.

Light, But Productive

      This week was a light week for us. The weather has been so nice I haven't been able to bring myself back to the books completely.
     In our English/Grammar this week we worked on writing Narratives. They quickly made a draft/outline of some facts about one of the things we did while we were out camping. After collecting their facts they wrote their Narrative. They only wrote one. We have narrated in the past so I knew they could handle that lesson with not any problem.
     Three lessons were accomplished in our Saxon 8/7 math this week. If I could only get then to pick up on their speed math would be a breeze. They have been acing every lesson.
     We started reading the Little House books at the beginning of the year for our Library read aloud. We are currently reading On The Banks Of Plum Creek. Even my DS is enjoying these books. He loved Farmer Boy. I so can't wait until they get to The Long Winter. That was my favorite when I read the series.
     After finishing up Where the Red Fern Grows, we started reading Pilgrim's Process. We are working our way through it slowly, talking about the journey that is taking place. I want my children to really grasp what is happening to Pilgrim on his journey. I'm trying to point out the encounters to them to make sure that they are paying attention & capturing the meaning of the story. Here's the only pic that we took this week. They were reading & dad snapped the pic.

     A bit of Home EC. skills were put in to practice this week as my DS helped me cook Chili for supper one night and my DD helped me cook a Key-lime pie another. We are squeezing in cooking skills all along our homeschool journey. I told them I'm expecting to have some great cooks when they get older, he he he.

     Other than a coupon trip outing & a bit of house work I think that about sums up our week. If you'd like to read more about other's week hop on over to Kris's blog & check out their Weekly Wrap-Ups. Everyone have a wonderful week!

Books Spark Imaginations

He he he, I'm so tickled right now. I know my children are digesting their Literature when I walked down the hall and heard them playing coon hunting.
We chose the A Beka 7th grade Of People Literature book to be our spine to guide us through Literature this year. As we read through a unit in the book we chose another book to read along side of it that would bring out more about a certain Poet/Author/Story/Etc. The first unit we are reading from the Of People book has a short version of Where the Red Fern Grows. So this month we chose to read the actual book Where the Red Fern Grows. It's about Billy and his coon dogs so after hearing my children pretending to coon hunt with their little animals I know the book is making an impression on them. Guess they receive an "A" for Literature today.
How is all of your studies going? Happy Homeschooling this week!

What's Cooking/Happening Around Our House

     Summer is official at our house now. We grilled for the first time this summer. You all know that's what folks in Alabama like to do during the summer. You'd think it's so hot down south we'd not want to get outside and stand by a hot grill, but there's just something about having a grill going with all those nice aromas floating in the air, Ah...
     We've had a wonderful evening of family time. Dad fired up the grill and we cooked out. The food was great, but the fellowship together was marvelous. I would not trade anything for my days with my family. Now I'm not trying to paint a picture perfect family that's as sweet as a comb of icecream because every day is not like that. But, we are family and love spending time together.

     As for our schooling for the summer, we don't have a schedule. At the present moment my children are researching the Statue of Liberty, just collecting a bit of information from the internet and putting together a short report. They turned their report in today so tonight they'll probably get out their models of the Statue of Liberty I had found and start working on them. They are the neatest little kits and I found them at a local store for only $ 2.00 each. The kit is like a model car kit, really cute.

     We are also still reading our book Tiger, Tiger about Julius Caesar, and our Hank the Cowdog book about the tornado. We are just taking our time and enjoying the summer. We have two other books we are dabbing in about the human body and one about horses. See, I told you we don't have a schedule this summer. We're just catching the breeze and letting it carry us from one study to another. We'll pick back up in August with a schedule. Until then, we'll just fly in and out different studies. Hope all of you are having a great summer.

Mental Discipline: Capturing Details

    As a family, we are all working together trying to focus on training our mind. We are trying to train our mind to capture every tiny detail in a passage as we are reading it. It is amazing how we all can read the same passage, but have such a different interpretation of it.
    Our training began when my children were much younger. In the beginning of our school journey, as we would read a passage of topic, I would stop constantly in the middle of the reading and ask my children questions about things I would want to make sure they had comprehended. By asking those questions I was hoping to train their minds to learn how to sift the material for the nuggets it held. I wanted them to capture detail. For instance, instead of a man who was a soldier that fought in a war, I wanted them to know he was a soldier who lived in Virginia that fought in the Revolutionary war in 1783 who was under George Washington's command, etc.
    It did not take many times of me doing this that my children realized what I was wanting them to focus on and could soon answer most questions that I presented to them. At their young age they would give me short choppy answers. As they grew older their answers took more form. They now can tell a passage back to me as if they were telling a story. This past year and in the up coming months, they have worked on and will be working on putting their narrations on paper.
    The Art of Narration is much more than just telling a story. First, it teach's the child to develop a listening skill, which is needful their entire life. Secondly, the child is learning public speaking that will aide the child in communication skills, another trait needful for life. Thirdly, as the child develop's motor skills using pen and paper he or she can take the nuggets they collect from a passage and put them on paper. This will begin to teach the child the writing process, again, another communication tool needful for life.
    These are steps I've seen developing and growing in my own children's lives. They came about all because of us trying to train our mind to sift and collect. Narration has been a process in our lives similar to panning for gold. Our mind hear's the passage, we sift it, and only keep the gold nuggets (the valuable things).
When a gold minor is sifting for gold, he is careful to watch his pan, searching for nuggets that shine. In training a mind to sift nuggets from a passage, we need to take on this same carefulness, listening to see if we can find the things that shine (things that are important) in the passage we are hearing/reading.
    Over the years, the sift and collect process has been my means of testing of my children's knowledge. We've read many passages/books and my children can still tell me information that we read several years back. I would have to say that if a child's mind is trained to sift and collect information and then narrate it back in their own words, whether it be verbal or in writing, it will cause the child to retain the knowledge. It has been a proven factor in our family's life. I am a firm believer in proved and tried situations.
    I would personally recommend Narration be a part of any child's life due to the benefits it could add to their future communication skills. Narration is an art that has to be worked on. It doesn't just develop over night, but it is well worth the work. Take the time after read alouds with your family to point out the plot of the passage, the setting of that passage, discuss the characters and their characteristics, talk about what is happening in the passage, point out descriptive (adjectives) words the author used, sayings a person may have spoken in the passage, etc. All of these things will teach you and your child to sift and collect information when you are reading or listening to a passage.

Wrapping Up Our Week

   Here's a quick wrap up of our week. We did a couple of math lessons, read Romeo & Juliet in Beautiful Stories From Shakespeare, Started reading a new read aloud, walked for our getting fit, and read and watched some videos on tornado weather.
   We watched a version of Romeo & Juliet on TV Monday night. It was highly different, more of a 20th century version. It had some comedy in it, but not exactly what I call Shakespeare.
Our new read aloud is Tiger ,Tiger by Lynne Reid Banks (Author of Indian in the Cupboard). It is about Julius Caesar and the life style of Romans during the Gladiator period. Tiger, Tiger is giving us a great view of tragedies and triumphs in Ancient Rome. We have it on audio. The reader does a great job reading it so she is keeping my children's attention. My children were captured in the first chapter when Julius Caesar bought his daughter a tiger for a pet. The author went in to lots of detail when describing the events that took place at the Colosseum. There's no doubt of the cruelty that took place.
   As for our walking this week and trying to get fit, I am extremely proud of my family. We walked 18 miles this week. We would do our 2 mile walk in the morning and decided it would do us good to do it in the evening also. So we walked in the evenings too. It's taking us about 1 1/2 hours to walk 4 miles a day. Hopefully, our timing will get better. Oh, and our dog, Prissie, is enjoying the walking also. Walking has been an enjoyable event this week with our entire family. Dad has walked with us. That was worth the walking to me.
   I suppose this about summarizes our week. So we'll up date more later. Blessings

Parents Step to the Side and Let Living Books Become Your Child’s Guide

We know that young people are enormously interested in the subject and give concentrated attention if we give them the right books. Vol. 6 Page 171

                Sometimes as parents we put strain on the child's attention by trying to emphasize a point entirely too much. When, if we would just step back and let the book do the talking to our child more would be accomplished.

                If we make a selection or our child chooses a great selection for a living book not much more has to be said from us as the teacher to the child. Living books are spirited. The characters come alive as our child is reading the book. By taking the book in small portions and reading it, our child becomes to know the characters in the book extremely well. The characters start to feel like old friends.

                Charlotte Mason exclaimed, “Having found the right book, let the Master give the book the lead and be content himself with the second place.” (Vol. 3 pg. 229) Living books capture our child’s attention. They are books that keep our child interested in a particular subject. If we have chosen a book of this nature, we can gladly step back and let the living book unfold the information before our child. No words from us will be necessary. Yes, we can have great discussions with our child, but the book will have already presented the material in such a manner to our child that we can relax and enjoy listening to our child expound on their knowledge they’ve retained from the book.

Charlotte Mason says in Vol. 6 Page 183 We spread an abundant and delicate feast in the programs and each small guest assimilates what he can. The child of genius and imagination gets greatly more than his duller comrade but all sit down to the same feast and each one gets according to his needs and powers. The surprises afforded by the dull and even the 'backward' children are encouraging and illuminating.” She is saying that if we as our children's teacher will give them books that are alive and in-depth in a particular topic each child will receive. Each child will digest what he or she has eaten (took in). All of your children sit around the same table and listened to the same book, but each bit off what they could chew. When you set your dinner table and all of your children gather round, all of them may not eat the same food. Some will have their preference over certain foods that you have prepared. That is the way it is when they sit around and listen to you read a great book. Even though all of your children may not always eat the exact same foods at your dinner table, all of them are growing. Whatever your child receives from the books you read to them is going to grow. One book that you read to them will lay a foundation for the next book read about that same topic. The more great books they read on a particular topic only keeps laying another stone on the foundation. You and your children just keep right on building a wonderful model. Before long your model is finished in that particular area and can be used as the example for another.

                There's an old saying that we all hear today and that is, "The proof is in the pudding." Well, my daughter is our proof of our pudding. When we started our home school journey I wasn't familiar with many curriculums and did not know very much about homeschooling so I just did what most people do. I copied my neighbor. It didn't take me long to realize that I had made a mistake. The curriculum I had chosen was not the curriculum for my family.

So I did what most people do for their second step, I switched to another curriculum. Again, this was another mistake. My daughter was growing to hate certain subjects by this time because the dry facts where just too much for her trying to memorize them for her test at the end of the chapters in her books. I knew I had to do something and I had to do something fast. She was getting further and further behind.

                At this point, I started doing my homework. That's when I discovered the Charlotte Mason style of homeschooling. It sounded great so we decided to try it. I asked my children what they wanted to study and went to the library and got some books on that topic. It didn't take me many months to realize that my daughter was retaining the information. When we forgot about all the dates and the ... my daughter just looked at this time as another reading session and comprehended the information. The living books that we had chosen were enjoyable stories to her, not obligations holding her to memorize dates, etc.

                It was at this time that I realized that my daughter wasn't behind. She was just biting off what she could chew on, while her brother was being a pig, gobbling up everything. She may not fill her plate as full as her brother, but she is growing right along beside him.

                We don’t use living books for our entire curriculum, but for the most part. We choose a history ... book and use it for our Scope & Sequence. Our family will read in that book until we find something of interest. That is when we pull away from that book and go to the library, our learning begins. We’ll read book after book on the topic that interested us until we have gotten our fill of it. Then, we go back to our curriculum book and read some more until the next interest arises. Back to the library we go. This is our routine in our education. Living books have been tried and proved with our family. I can see the growth in my children’s knowledge regularly. We recommend living books.

                Oh the excitement you and your child will share!

P.S. If your family has not ever read Nothing Is Impossible by Dorothy Aldis, it’s one of our favorites. It’s about the life of Beatrix Potter and how she came about writing her short stories. The book really makes her characters come alive because you will see where they derived from.

Peaking Their Interest in Shakespeare

                My children’s interests are being peaked. We went to the library yesterday for our book club presentation and this is what my children came running up to me with afterwards.

                These are two of the plays that we have read this year by Shakespeare. I say plays, but we are actually reading from Beautiful Stories From Shakespeare by E. Nesbit. We are also watching animated videos. All I am interested in this year is familiarizing them with Shakespeare.

                When they came running to me with the books that have a comic book style and wanted to check them out, I knew something had to be arousing their interest.

                Here’s what the books look like on the inside of them.

                They seem to be pretty basic, but appear to be great as a review. My children want us to act out the plays, using these books. They also informed me that I could be the queen so I could hug on the donkey (he he, such love they have for me).

                My children also found these books on the table that the library was discarding.

                Naturally, my children knew we needed them. “Especially this one Mama, so we will know how to act out our plays,” they are insisting. For $ .25 each, we brought them home with us.

                There’s going to be a live theatrical production of Julius Caesar about two hours from our home. We are hoping to get to attend.

                The Shakespeare interest is arising. I’m accomplishing my goal for this year, yea! Happy homeschooling everyone.

Cookies + Books = Great Family Time

It's Library Read Aloud time and Mamma made Chocolate Chunk Pecan Cookies, mmm...good.

　
One of our most favorite family times is grabbing our read aloud book and gathering around daddy so he can read to us. We have such wonderful discussions over our books during this time. These discussions have proven to help my children retain the information we have read. There has been books that we have read several years back that my children still talk about, act out scenes from, etc. My family enjoys our family time over a great book. Memories are being made and relationships are being developed.
Oh, and sometimes we make that time just a little more special with a nice snack. Fresh hot cookies straight from the oven sets the atmosphere for a wonderful reading time, or it does in our family. So tonight whip up some cookie dough, grab a great book for your family to share, and make some memories with your family. I promise you, you'll not regret it.

A Change in the Weather

Brr, I don't know what has happened to all of that beautiful weather I was enjoying last week. Today, it is cold and cloudy. You know I am from the south when I say it is cold at 58 degrees outside. The wind is blowing so it feels colder than that.
Not much schooling is going on around our house today. I have been a bit under the weather & just haven't felt like bringing the books out. Maybe my children will take it upon themselves and do some school work later on today. I do have my children typing their Writing Strands story they did last week for Creative Writing on their blogs today. I am trying to encourage my children to keep their blogs updated. I want to use them as another means of writing. The old saying, "Practice makes perfect," That is what I am aiming for with my children's writings.
My children are using Writing Strands as a prompter for story ideas. I know we can use our other studies to narrate back from, but my son needs a little nudging in his writing so we use Writing Strands to motivate his mind. He just has to have a boost. I've seen much improvement in his writing so I am looking for the day that the writer is going to come out. I'm waiting, I know it will come in due time. I'll just keep spoon feeding him wholesome books to eat from and it will digest eventually.
For the most part we follow the Charlotte Mason style of education, but sometimes we have to tweak her methods a bit to fit our needs. Again, that is the beauty of homeschooling. As our child's teacher, we can determine the speed of our child's learning. If we see there is a problem in an area we can spend more time there. When our child is gobbling up the material we place before him or her we can zoom on to new information.
Happy homeschooling everyone. Until next time, Traci

Being Educated Through Reading

  I am so thankful that our family ran acrossth Miss Mason's method of education. If we had not, I would not be so familiar with using living books with my children. And, if  I was not familiar with living books this week we would be getting behind in our curriculum due to sickness. My sister had gotten sick so I had to take care of my two nephews, who are under the age of three. As soon as I had taken them back home, one of them got sick, and then the other. Of course us being exposed to the virus it was bound to come, so that's where we've been this week. Dealing with sickness.
   Due to all of this, school has been light. Great books have pulled us through though. We have still been able to school through read aloud. Everyone just laid around and the reading went on, the children picking up nuggets along the way. What a wonderful way to be educated.!
    We have also gotten some Narration, a bit of Copy Work, and some Simply Grammar done. My children and I are enjoying Simply Grammar being able to do it orally.
    In the past I would begin to feel so overwhelmed during times like this because we would be getting behind in our curriculum, feeling in blanks, etc. Writing doesn't go well when your tummy isn't feeling o.k. Simply Grammar has saved me from the stress and kept us moving along with our education this week.
   I look back on those days when we did just use curriculum and think how our days were so plain, no excitement, just our same old text books. Now that we have changed our method of educating, the children and I both look forward to our studies.
    I think the greatest thing about reading to get an education is that you can do it just about anywhere, home, yard, going down the road, park, etc. Time doesn't have to be wasted having to travel, etc. Another thing is our books have taken us all around the world. We are able to travel through time, through Space, sail on the waters, and trudge across the land within our own home. It's so great!
   Here I am again rambling. I'm sure you've gotten the idea now that we love to educate ourselves through reading. So until next time, EVERYONE HAVE A BLESSED AND HAPPY HOME SCHOOLING, Traci

Tablets Waiting To Be Written On

     I read in one of Charlotte Mason's books that our children are tablets waiting to be written on. I had never thought of my children like that. But oh, how true that statement is. When they are born it's like having a clean slate in front of you, just waiting for you to pen something on it.


     My children's slates were blank when they came in to this world, but very soonthings begin to appear on it. As my children watched and listened things started to show up in their personality that indicated that someone had been teaching them something. They began to do certain things and before I knew it, they had many things written on their slates. Just from a small child's observance with their eyes and ears, many things had been penned on their slates.

     I noticed that everything that had been penned on their slates was not always good. I wondered how could that be. I have had my children with me. They've only been at home with me. How could they have some bad things penned on their slates. That's when it hit me. If I'm not living by and lining up with God's word I am writing all sorts of things on my children's tablets. Also, the books I choose to feed my children for their education is also writing things on their slates. The old saying, "You are what you eat," means a lot to a homeschooler. We are trying to raise our children up in the fear and admiration of the Lord, that can only happen if we are feeding them nourishing food/books that will lead them in that direction. The table we spread before them is what they will have written on their slates.

     Charlotte Mason was so true. Our children are tablets being written upon. The things we allow our children to do, the places we allow them to go, the things they watch on TV, the books they read, the things we do around our children, etc. are all being written on our children's slates. So I leave you with this today: What have you been writing on your children's slates? Do you need to get an eraser to erase some things and rewrite them? We are our children's teacher. They will become what has been penned on their tablets.

     I pray, God be with us all to write the things that would be pleasing to You on their slates. Help us all to know day to day exactly what You want our pens to drop. We can't make it on this journey without You Lord. We love You and give You all the praise for everything that has been accomplished and everything that will be accomplished. Praise your wonderful name! In Jesus name, Traci

Getting Use To Things

I have missed my blogging friends and seeing how everyone's school year was going. Now I am starting a new account with Blogger and keeping my HS Blog. So, please bear with me while I get use to things over here.


I am looking to find more Charlotte Mason style homeschool bloggers so I can converse with them. If any of you know some that school along that line could you ask them to drop in and become friends with me so I can share in their schooling ideas.

I sat down last night putting my lesson plans for the next month on paper. It really looks like a great layout to start the year with. In my next post I will list the things that we have chosen to start our year with.

I will say this time, that we had used nothing but living books last year for our history and when my children told me that they wanted to study Ancient Egypt I thought I would just purchase the A Beka 7th grade book because it would go right along with that study, until my DS informed me that that wasn't a living book. So I guess we'll be putting together our own books to cover the content. Anyone with any great books on this topic, we are open to suggestions. I guess I have to admit though, I was a little excited that my child (that I had so much trouble with picking up on reading) was asking for books. That meant he would have to read. That's like music ringing in my ears.

Charlotte Mason said giving our children great books to choose from would give them an appetite for reading. My child has proven that to me. We have only been using the Charlotte Mason style of schooling for about 2 years now and I have seen a hunger for reading created in my DS. I have seen even my DD learn, not memorize, but learn so much by reading rich history biographies and living books. History and science was just not my DD's cup of tea, but since the living books, she love's to read them and can now tell me all about portions of history now. Sometimes we play a game while traveling down the road, I ask questions about things we have previously studied and they try to see who can answer them the quickest. My DD use to have a lot of problems trying to remember the answers, but since we come out of the text books, she gives her brother a run for his money, so to speak. We are loving our schooling. I am so glad that my DS reproved me and reminded me that we were not to follow the world's way and stick to the text books all the time, that we are to follow the guidance of the Lord and He will keep leading us on in our studies, showing us just what books to use to obtain the knowledge He desires for us to have about whatever topic we are studying.

My how the words can just pile up on the page when I start talking, or should I say rambling. I'd better cut this post off to keep it from getting any longer. so until next tiem, God bless you all, Traci