Working Through the Summer

     We finally picked our books back up this week. After a long break from books we are now back on track. We haven't jumped full fledge back in to our books, but we did get some Bible lessons done, along with some reading in our Library Read Aloud, and Literature.
      We are only in to  the third chapter in our Literature of "A Tale of Two Cities" but both children appear to be enjoying it. Earlier this year my daughter was not too fond of the Literature selections brother had chosen so we didn't finish the selection. I think this one will be a go.
     They also worked on their biographical book reports on Charles Dickens this week. Daughter finished hers, but brother still has about one more day of work. Beings daughter wasn't too fond of "The Iliad" we began just reading books about Charles Dickens or by him and turned our Literature in to a study of his life. Maybe next week we can pull in some more of our subjects.
     They both left last night going to a youth service about 4 hours away and will be gone the entire weekend. Happy for time alone with my hubby, but will sure miss my little darlings. That sounds so funny calling them that when one is about to be 14 and the other one 13. Oh well, they will always be my babies.
     I am working on losing weight again and so far it is coming along real well. I weigh in tomorrow for the third week of weighing in.
     Next week my daughter and I are going to sit down and write out her Home Economics requirements  for next year. She will check off each item on the list as it is completed and when all items have been done then she will receive her credit for Home Ec.
     Currently, I am reading lots of books on different diets, grasping nuggets from different one's. So far the one about the three hour diet is probably my favorite. I know that is the one I have been using for an outline of my daily intake and I am losing weight so that gives it a plus for me. I have also gotten encouragement from "The Biggest Loser Ever" diet book.
     I think this about wraps up our week. Not much more is going on around here. Hope all of you are having a great week and have a wonderful weekend.
     Check out some more great blogs over at Weird Unsocialized's weekly wrap up.

Reading Can Be Rewardful

  Our family discussion tonight developed in to more than I expected. We began just talking about great living books. My children's minds went back to when they would do the Book-it Program through Pizza Hut. The old memories stirred up  a challenge in them.That is when a new program was developed, "The BrOOK-It Program." Brooks being our last name set the title in place. Pen & paper came out and the rules were written & have now been typed up & slid in to their folders. A new Enrichment Reading Program began around here tonight.
   Here's a copy of the rules & requirements we discussed as a family:

Rules: If You Read One Book Per Month You Can Get A Little Ceasars Meal Deal (A Medium Pizza, BreadSticks W/Sauce, And A 2 Liter Drink). Or A Fast Food Combo Meal.

Terms And Conditions:

Child Must Turn In A Folder W/Proof Of Reading:

1. Title Page
2. Introduction Paragraph
3. Your Folder Must Have Atleast 12 Vocabulary Words.
4. Conclusion Paragraph
5. Additional Items May Be Added If Desired:
     a. Famous Quotes
     b. Pictures
     c. Extra Definitions
     d. Narrations
     e. Etc.

BrOOK-It Program

  I, as the teacher, am requiring them to write the introductory paragraph & conclusion paragraph on seperate pieces of paper, along with 12 vocabulary words with definitions. If they can write those two paragraphs and give me vocabulary words from throughout the book, I'll know they read the book. The conclusion paragraph will tell it all.
   They have one month to meet the requirements of a book just like the Book-it Program at Pizza Hut. If they meet the requirements in a month's time span, they will be rewarded. If they don't, they have to begin another book for the next month. No reward will be granted without requirements being met.

My daughter has chosen her first book to be "A Promise to Believe In" Brides of Gallatin County book 1 by Tracie Peterson. This is a Historical Fiction book about life in Montanna around 1879 bringing out  a bit of history during the stage coach days along with a touch of romance, not so much romance that my hubby didn't enjoy reading it with me. This book also has a spike of mystery in it, enough to keep you wonderng what is going to happen next. I would recommend this book to others. I plan to read it again in the future because it was so enjoyable.
   My son has chosen his first book to be "The Sword in the Stone" Book 1 of The Once And Future King Series by T. H. White. This is a Classic book pertainning to the Arthurian period, Life of King Arthur legend. Now normally, I would not like this type of book, but for some reason my son began reading it yesterday and it captured me in the first chapter. Either my book reading habits are changing or this is going to be a great book. (Wonder if daddy will give me a meal deal for the BrOOK-it Program when I finish the book)
  This post has been long. Hope you stuck it out to the end. I'll post on how things are going with our newly developed program in the future. Happy Homeschooling.

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!

Accomplishing House Cleaning Lists

I had several things I wanted to accomplish today, but forgot that I was to have my two little darling nephews who are 2 & 4. When they are here most of my time is devoted to them, especially the two year old. He is learning to talk & he wants to talk to Aunt Traci.
I had plans to dust the top's of the fridge and freezer, clean off my bar, dust the top of the bread box, cover my door so I can put my Wreath up (that I haven't gotten up), & wash the bed covers for all beds. I managed to get the bed covers done & the top of the fridge. My motto is, "Some is better than none," so I'm thankful that something was accomplished. I'll pick back up on my list tomorrow.
As for our schooling, we have been doing lots of reading. Not much of anything else. Just discussing what we have read. Oh, & they have been working out of a new drawing book that we found at the thrift store on Friday. They also worked on addressing some Christmas cards for me today.
Hope all of you are enjoying your Christmas season, we are.

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!

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.

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.

Weekly Wrap-Up

 



    Here's a brief look at what we've been doing this week. Our official school year is over, but we never stop schooling. We take breaks from time to time, but even then someone finds something for us to dab into and that turns into schooling.
    We are reading a family read aloud at the present moment. It is, " The Case of the Swirling Killer Tornado" by John R. Erickson. It's #25 in the Hank the Cowdog series. Time to time we try to pull in just a fun read aloud so I figured sense we have been studying about tornadoes this would be a cute read aloud that would bring some family laughter. It has done just that. Due to this part of our read aloud time it sure is making my getting fit a hard task.   

    Dad and the children decided to work on some woodwork this week. Here are a few pic's of their handy work in progress.

Dad teaching children woodworking & saw safety.

Dad teaching children how to make their Roman projects as part of the Ancient Rome Study.

Sarahs dressed up as Julius Caesar (looks serious)

Matthew said, "I looked so mean that I scared myself."

Matthew's homemade short sword (these swords are made of wood & are NOT SHARP)

Sarah's homemade sword.(we are going to paint the blades silver to add the finishing touches)

　
    Of course, if you've been reading my blog this week, you've already seen the Home Ec. pics of my DS's fabulous strawberry pie. He and his sister did a great job helping me with supper one night this week. (You all know I'm from the south now, I said supper and not dinner, he he he.)
    Be sure to see Kris at Weird Unsocialized Homeschoolers and checkout her Weekly Wrap-Up: The One Where My Baby Turned 16. I'm sure you will enjoy Kris's blog as I did and you will find great homeschooling ideas and a good friend that understands homeschooling life.
    Other than walking and bicycling I think this about wraps up our week. We've enjoyed quality family time this week, just being with each other.

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

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.

Feeding the Appetite of my Child or Lesson Plans

Does anyone else have the same problem I do, lesson plans getting changed from day to day? It does not matter how much time I dedicate to sitting down and writing out my lesson plans, they always get changed, regularly.
Beings we are under a Homeschool Covering we have to have our school year finished up in May. I have several things I am wanting to finish up by then. My daughter must have other plans for us. Last night she pulled one of our volumes of our Junior Classics books off of the bookshelf in my bedroom and began reading the Three Little Pigs. Today she wakes up and decides she wants us to read the tale, draw pictures of the characters, write out character discriptions, and write an essay/narration on it. What do I do? We are working on her plans as I am typing, but I am trying to decide how will I fit everything I am wanting to accomplish by the end of this year in if I let my children's appetites be fed and do the things they are wanting to do. I don't want to discourage them from exploring in their own ideas. Help! Anyone else faced with this?
I suppose I should drop back over at See Jamie's Blog. and reread the post on how we don't always get to accomplish our goals We are schooling and they are learning so we'll just keep sailing along. The curriculum books I am using can not drive us.
Can you tell I am trying to convince myself that it doesn't matter if we don't get everything done?? I am the type that I like to make my plans and watch them vanish away as we do them each day. When I don't see my lesson plans moving, I question our schooling.
Not only are we working on an English/Literature lesson of the Three Little Pigs now, but we also like Tatiana's spring essay project over at World Star Academy.so we have decided to do that also. My plans, my plans, my plans are falling further and further behind. There's just too much freedom in homeschooling. Thank God for that freedom though that we can teach them according to His & our plans & not someone forcing certain curriculums on us. As David said in the Bible, "Sometimes we just have to encourage ourselves." (paraphrased) I am feeling better about this change already. Until next time, everyone have a happy homeschooling

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

We Interrupt Our Schooling

My nephew started attending a private school last year. He was in the 10th grade. Before he came to school on the first day he was informed he had to do a book report to turn in the first day of school. We thought it was some type of entrance exam because of it being his first year attending the school. We find out that they give their students a book report every year a few weeks before school starts. Due to that, our schooling was interrupted.




My nephew came over this morning and we have been reading the book "The Crucible" by Arthor Miller. It is a play written about the Salem Witch Trials. My children and I haven't covered this part of history very much so we decided to read and discuss the play with him. We have talked about the Salem Witch Trials just a bit, but not anything like this play goes in to detail with it. The play its self was pretty good. I just didn't like the occasional curse word here and there. It was a little meaty for my 9 and 10 year old, but not anything they didn't comprehend so I think we'll be ok. We are going to write a narration/book report on it also. I guess our school work wasn't exactly interrupted, just a change of lesson plans. I think it stirred up the researcher in my DC because they act like they want to research further in to the Salem Witch Trials now. Charlotte Mason said we should let our children's interest lead us into a world of study so I guess as long as we are grasping new information we'll just keep traveling on through the atmosphere of education.



We have swimming tomorrow with another home school family so we'll get back to our normal lesson plans on Monday. Until the next post, bless you all, 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