This Week in History

I have been given the wonderful opportunity to review many homeschool products over the last few years. The only compensation that I receive for my review is the free product. I feel truly blessed to have had the opportunity to participate in review groups and I have enjoyed trying out these products and giving you my honest opinion.

Thomas Jefferson Education is an educational philosophy "discovered and articulated" by Oliver and Rachel DeMille.   The philosophy is based on Seven Keys of Great Teaching and the Four Phases of Learning.  You can read all about it at tjed.org .

Thomas Jefferson Education is also home to a pretty cool resource called This Week in History.  This is the "baby" of Rachel DeMille who has put together an awesome lineup of resources to be sent directly to your email inbox every single week of the year.  (You will also have access to the same information on the Thomas Jefferson Education website.)  Your email will include information, pictures, and links to keep you and your students informed about historical events that happened on each day of the year.

For example, did you know that Florence Nightingale was born on May 12th?  On the This Week in History website you can see pictures of Florence Nightingale, read her poetry, and link over to Florence Nightingale crosswords, word searches, and paper dolls.  This is just one of the many events discussed for the week of May 12th.  Other events include:

~Louis XVI ascends to the throne of France

~the final spike was driven in the Transcontinental Railroad

~Minnesota became the thirty-second state of the United States of America.

~Israel became an independent nation

~and more!

Each of these events have information and links to more information and activities.  View Sample Weekly Lessons from tjed.org. 

A subscription to This Week in History is $9.99 a month.  As I said before you will receive an email once a week (usually on Thursday) with the following week's information.  This is especially helpful if you would like to plan lessons ahead of time and gather any of the suggested reading materials or videos.  Personally, we have been using this as more of a fun "bonus" to our week.  I'll gather a couple of the older kids around the computer screen and we read through the material together.  I let the kids choose which subject they would like to learn more about and we do a little more research using the provided links.

I do feel that I need to give you one warning first, though.  It's so easy to let the computer occupy your kiddos for awhile, but I feel it is just so important that parents are reminded time and time again that Internet is not a safe place for children to be roaming around unsupervised.  Even while we were doing research on the This Week in History site we clicked over to a recommended link about '10 unusual Ice Cream Flavors'.  This sounded harmless enough but as we clicked through the flavors, one was titled 'Viagra Ice Cream' and the number 1 flavor was 'The Big Gay Ice Cream Truck'.  Each had a description as well...neither of which I wanted my 8 and 11 year old reading.  This wasn't a huge deal for our family, since I was there to simply turn off the screen and tell our kids that it wasn't appropriate material.  I emailed Rachel DeMille about the link and she very promptly emailed me back (within about an hour or so).  She had already removed the link and explained that the link from the previous year had died and she had recently hired someone to help her replace the links.  She also said, "I'll be personally reviewing every link now."  I truly appreciate someone who is that committed to her product!

Once again, you can subscribe to This Week in History at the Thomas Jefferson Education website for just $9.99 a month.  You can also read more reviews of this product at the Schoolhouse Review Crew Blog.

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Tuesday Weigh-In: Kids Triathlon

This week, I thought I'd let my two oldest boys inspire you...

E8 and G11 completed their first triathlon this Sunday.  I am so proud of these boys. 

When we arrived, they got marked up...

...and then they checked out the pool.

E8 raced first.

50 meter swim.

On to the bike.

Bike 3k.

 And run 1k.

He did awesome!

Next G11 lined up for a 100 meter swim.

He told me later that he had trouble because he swallowed water accidentally during his swim. 

His bike was a 5k.

G11 and E8 both had an awesome cheer team.

G11 transitioned into his 3k run.

And finished strong!

He did admit that after the pool water swallowing incident, he got sick along the trail, but kept going!  After the race was over, he won a door prize for new running shoes and a gift certificate.  He was so excited about it.  His daddy was teasing him and told him he might have to give the shoes to one of his siblings.  G11 said, "No way!  I threw up for these shoes!  I'm keeping them!"

Ha!  I love it!  I've got some strong, committed boys!

How's your commitment been this week?  Weigh in by linking up with your blog post or comment below.

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Create Better Writers

I have been given the wonderful opportunity to review many homeschool products over the last few years. The only compensation that I receive for my review is the free product. I feel truly blessed to have had the opportunity to participate in review groups and I have enjoyed trying out these products and giving you my honest opinion.

My dad gave me a typewriter.  It's sort of a shame that these things don't still exist, because there was something very satisfying about pounding away on those keys.  Click, click, click. Ding.  Of course, there was no delete button.  I really didn't need one though.  I had a bottle of white out. 

My first short stories were born on that typewriter.  I was nine years old.

These days I bear babies instead of stories and its my job to pass along the love of writing to the next generation.  In case you were wondering, that's a really daunting task.  Thank goodness there is help available.

I received three ebooks to review from Create Better Writers.  Each of these books can be purchased separately, but they are also included in their Complete Writing Program. 

 The first of these ebooks was The Home School Writing Action Plan ($15.95).  Basically, this is the Teacher's Guide for the Create Better Writers Writing Program.  I appreciated that it was very simply laid out and easy to read.  The 3 parts of this book include:

Part I - Summary of the Steps:  An overview of the program.

Part II - Pacing Charts: Helps you to decide how fast to move your students through the program (depending on age and ability.)

Part III - The Road Map: This section not only provides directions in how to implement each step, but also gives sample worksheets and lesson plans.

I read through Part I and II rather quickly, but have really only dipped my toes in to Part III.  This program stresses that students should move through each step slowly at their own pace.  I am working this program with my 2nd, 4th, 5th, and 6th grader.  My 6th grader could move a little quicker, but my younger ones have definitely needed to take it slower. 

The Home School Writing Action Plan suggests to first teach your students how to write a paragraph.   You can use your own writing curriculum or you can purchase How to Write a Paragraph ($7.99 ebook) from Create Better Writers.    

We've been working our way through How to Write a Paragraph for about the past month and are just now ready to move on to the next book.  Once again, this book is very easy to use and includes simple lesson plans and worksheets to help your students write good paragraphs using one simple "trick".  Once your students have learned this "trick", they will master paragraph writing with just a little practice.

Each of my students have enjoyed writing paragraphs using the method laid put in How to Write a Paragraph.  As they practice paragraph writing, they are always excited to share them and read them out loud.  Each one of the kids have improved their paragraph writing in the past month.

The five-paragraph essay is the next step in following The Homeschool Writing Action Plan and Create Better Writers says this about the importance of the five-paragraph essay...

"The ability to organize one's thoughts and communicate ideas clearly is the backbone of good writing. This is why many states are beginning to test students as early as fourth grade on each student's ability to write multiple paragraphs on a single topic. The five-paragraph essay is considered the foundation of good writing."

They offer "How to Teach the Five-Paragraph Essay" for just $17.95.  We are just beginning to move into this curriculum, but it looks to be set up just like the others.  You can see samples of this book on the Create Better Writers website.

Simply put, we will continue to use this writing program.  It is easy to follow and most importantly it is not in the least bit intimidating...for me or my young authors.

You'll find more reviews of Create Better Writers on the TOS Crew Blog.

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King Alfred's English

   "The language you learn as a small child is the language of your heart.  It is the one in which you call out when you are hurt, the one in which you holler when you lose your temper, the one in which you pray.
    Is English your native language?  If it is, then what we are about to study is the language of your heart...."       -King Alfred's English, Laurie J. White

    Yes, she hooked me on the first page.

     Laurie White is a homeschool mom and author of King Alfred's English, A History of the Language We Speak.  I'm not sure I would have ever sought out a book about the history of the English language.  Actually, I'm quite certain that I have never really thought about the history of my native tongue at all.  Nevertheless, when the opportunity to review this book came up, I was ... intrigued.

     After all, since I was eight years old I've considered myself a writer ... primarily of the English language.  (I once wrote a poem in French during my freshman French class.  I decided afterwards I should stick with English.)  So I figured learning a little about this tool of my trade should prove useful and interesting.

     Laurie White did not let me down.  King Alfred's English was a very interesting read.  Starting in 'Pre-English Britain 55 BC', White forges through world history and church history covering such topics as ancient Rome, St. Patrick, King Arther, the printing press, the Brothers Grimm, Martin Luther, and Tyndale.  The book reads as though you are sitting next to White as she passionately and excitedly spills forth the wealth of knowledge she has on how one event in history after another has effected the English language. 

     King Alfred's English is also written from a distinctly Christian worldview.  White discusses how our language is evidence for design.  This is shown through 'The Language Law'  which is 'Living languages always simplify over time'.  She gives several examples for this including how today we use the word 'you' when in Shakespeare's day we would have used 'thou', 'thee', 'ye' and 'you'.  White explains...

     "The complexity of primitive languages and the fact that languages are observed to simplify over time are seen as clear evidence for supernatural design."

     There are so many interesting tidbits in this book that I hardly know what to include in this review...  The English language was once considered crude to speak openly which is why we often have two words for the same thing.  Considering how a gentleman landowner might speak Anglo-Saxon to the peasant who worked in the kitchen, but then would speak French to the nobleman who dined with him, we now understand why so many of our animal names change once they reach our dining table...

                         Anglo-Saxon                               French
                            cow                                          beef
                            deer                                         venison
                            sheep                                       mutton
                            calf                                           veal

    It was King Alfred who "had understood that to encourage a national feeling of patriotism, a people needed to feel proud of their native language", which is why the author titled her work "King Alfred's English".  And it was the achievement of having the English Bible in print that proved that "English could convey man's deepest yearnings and God's greatest truths with all the precision, depth, beauty, and nuance of great literature....and English would never again be seen as a second-rate language...".

    The recommended age for this book is 12 and up.  My oldest is 11 and I did not give him this book to read...yet.  Personally, I will be using this as a high school text for two reasons.  One, because as I said before, the author uses a very conversational tone throughout the book.  I don't mind this so much, but I know my young students would not stay interested as long without more storytelling.  This book moved from one exciting event in history to the next rather quickly often leaving me wanting to know more of that story.  Students who already have a good base knowledge of world history might find this book more enjoyable. 

     Secondly, White offers tons,  and I do mean tons, of supplemental teacher and student materials for King Alfred's English free on her website, www.theshorterword.com .  These include links to online articles, videos, movies, literature, and worksheets for each chapter of the book!  As a matter of fact, there is enough material to create a full semester (one half unit) of history, or a 1/4 unit history plus 1/4 unit English.

     King Alfred's English can be purchased in softcover for $16.95 retail or for Kindle for $5.95.  I did review the Kindle edition of this book and it read beautifully on my Kindle app.

     Read more reviews of this product at The TOS Review Crew blog.
Disclaimer:

I have been given the wonderful opportunity to review many homeschool products over the last few years. The only compensation that I receive for my review is the free product. I feel truly blessed to have had the opportunity to participate in review groups and I have enjoyed trying out these products and giving you my honest opinion.

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Homeschool Co-ops

We have had the pleasure of participating in a homeschool co-op almost every semester of our homeschool career.  We have a large community of homeschoolers in our community and several co-ops to choose from.

If you're not familiar, a homeschool co-op is a group of homeschooling families meeting together (usually one day a week).  This is not a drop off, 'moms day out' kind of thing though.  Because all of the moms (and sometimes dads and/or grandmas, etc) stay and teach or assist in classes.

Co-op has always been a blessing to our family.  There are women whom I love dearly and count among my closest friends today that I met at co-op.  Many of my children's best friends are fellow co-op kids.  And our kids have had the opportunity to take classes that I could have/would have never taught them like karate, ballet, chocolate class, volcano class, and drama.

For us, co-op is about fun.  But some parents participate in co-op to enroll their students in classes that they find difficult to teach.  Now that our kids are getting older, we are feeling the pressure of 'losing' one day of our core curriculum teaching to co-op.  But for now we will make the necessary sacrifice to make co-op work.  We just enjoy it that much.  Also, I should mention that our co-op is only one day a week for 9 weeks in the fall and 9 weeks in the Spring.  That's not a huge commitment.

Also, our family has teamed up with another family this year to share the responsibility of teaching our History and Science curriculum.   Two days a week, we meet up to walk through this in-depth curricula.  It has been a joy and always the highlight of our week! 

For your pleasure, here is a repost of a 2008 post:

Effects of a Full Day at Co-op






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Glimpses of our Schoolroom

The schoolroom in our home has moved three times.  We first started in a finished room in our basement.  Then we moved upstairs to the bonus room.  And finally we landed in a room on the main floor in our home.

I can remember several years ago searching online for homeschool room ideas and the pickins' were slim, to say the least.  But now we have Pinterest....a place to drool over the dream rooms that are not only impractical for our space, but also unaffordable and yet we will strive to attain them nonetheless.

My measly homeschool room pales in comparison to the beautiful rooms you'll find online these days, but I do have a few special places there that I enjoy...

Oh, organization is just pretty, isn't it?  On the top shelf is workbook curriculum my kids are working through divided by grade.  The red, yellow, and green drawers came from a drawer system that I had that was falling a part. But the drawers were still in perfect shape.  So I use them to house craft supplies and other things and store them on my bookshelf.

A couple weeks ago I shared how to paint word murals after painting in my school room.

And I also shared instructions for making this school room artwork.

My new art display center is one of my favorite spaces now and an idea that came from Pinterest!  Hey, not all of my pins are impractical.  These are just clipboards that I found for $1 each.  Chad and I screwed each on to the wall and now the kids can hang their artwork on the wall...instead of on my refrigerator!

I found something to do with all those empty spaghetti sauce jars.

Gluesticks were on sale for just 10 cents each!  I bought 90 of them!  I just love having a container full of gluesticks.  Yes, that does make me strange.

This picture shows 3 different areas of organization that are really helping to make our homeschool run more smoothly.

~1.  The two blue crates.:  I bought 4 of these a few years ago for kids to keep their individual curricula in, but when we switched rooms they just took up too much space.  However, I really needed more bookshelf space.  So I flipped the crated on their sides and stacked them on top of each other.  I thought I would need to zip tie them together, but they are actually quite stable and very sturdy.

~2. The 6-drawer unit: (Actually, it's two stackable 3-drawer units.)  Each drawer is labeled with a different child's name and is just big enough for their workbooks, notebooks, and readers...also a pencil.  Basically, everything they need to do their individual studies is right there in their drawer. 

~3. The 6 stackable trays on top.:  Their are certain items that we use everyday in our homeschool.  Mostly certain books.  I could keep them on a bookshelf, but often when kids pull things off bookshelves, they don't do so nicely.  Instead, they rip them out, pulling other books with them.  And when kids put books back on bookshelves, they don't usually find the spot where it was, sliding it in right side up, spine facing out.  Instead they toss it on the bookshelf sideways and on top of the fallen-over books they left earlier.  So, I found these trays to be a useful spot to place our daily textbooks.  I have a tray for each of the following: our Biblical Worldview textbook, our history textbook, our history coloring/notebook pages, our science textbooks, our current read-aloud and dictionary, and a "For Mom" tray for kids to place work that needs to be graded.

Finally, who doesn't love a basket of books?  I select books that go along with our current studies for 'book basket' time.

Now for the fun part...seeing everybody else's school rooms!  Check them out at the links below!  Pin It Now!

Streamlining School Planning

Oh, the hours and hours I spent in school planning those first few years of homeschool.  For months, I would painstakingly comb over curriculum, ordering in early Spring so that it would get to me in time to map out weekly lessons.  By the time summer rolled around, I would be working through next year's January lessons.  I bought planners and planning software and gradebooks.  And each year I had every intention of following my plans exactly.

Every year I failed miserably.

By week three.

Planning is great.  I have to admit, I actually enjoy planning.  But I don't always enjoy implementing. 

Let's face it, sometimes things just don't go as planned.  Curriculum doesn't always work out.  Things take longer than you expect.  Eight children all develop strep throat or a stomach virus simultaneously and school has to come to a halt for a week. 

So I gave up on meticulous planning and I now opt for a more streamlined approach.

This is my school binder.  It has a place for homeschool catalogs that I am considering purchasing from.  It has a folder to keep my school attendance log.

Press PAUSE.

This is by far my favorite school attendance chart.   The entire year fits on two pages and you can add your attendance days as you go to make sure you are on track. 

You can also use this chart to plan your Start Date, Last Day of School, and all the breaks in between.  Just decide when you want to start, fill in your breaks, tally up the number of days to be sure that it aligns with the number of days your school district (or curriculum) requires, and you're golden!  Be sure to use a pencil as it sometimes takes some finagling (that's fu-NAY-ga-ling, do we only use that word here in the South?) to make it all work. 

Once I've got my calendar planned.  I do some evaluation of the curriculum we used last year.  That means, I ask myself two questions.

"Did I like it?" and "Do I want to use it again?'

If I answer 'no', then I do a little online and catalog research until I find what I want.  I label one section of my binder "curriculum" and give each child a notebook page.  As I choose, I make a list of the needed curriculum to purchase for each child on their pages along with the cost.  (This helps the hubby to see where our homeschool budget is going.)  Once these details are finalized, I sit down with Chad and discuss the curriculum I've chosen and what our goals are for each child for the school year and write those down as well.

If I'm really feeling on top of things, I might jot down some field trip or craft ideas as well.

After that, I order the curriculum and we go with it.  No daily or weekly lesson planning.  It's pretty simple.

I did want to talk a little about our student planners though...

This year I made a planner for each of the older kids (grades 2 and up).  I used some folders I had bought on sale as the front and back cover.  I just slit them down the middle and inserted the sheets I wanted in order, then dropped them off at a local office supply store to have them spiral bound for just a couple dollars each.

I like that using the folders as the cover not only makes it more sturdy, but also creates a pocket folder on the inside cover to store extra papers in.  I included 2012 and 2013 one-page calendars in the front that I printed from my Schoolhouse Planner pages.  (You can get the Schoolhouse Planner free when you sign up for a paid membership to SchoolhouseTeachers.com .  See my review here.)

The bulk of my planner pages are made up this two-page spread.  It's a place for my kids to write their co-op homework each week and to check off the individual work and chores that they've done.  If their planner is filled out correctly and they've completed all of their work for the week, they get to pull a prize from our prize box.

You can download these pages here.  I'm afraid they can't be edited and they are pretty specific to our family's needs, but perhaps you'll find them helpful... Homework Assignment Planner Pages - Page 001 Homework Assignment Planner Pages - Page 002

In the back of the student planners, I've added several other planner pages like book logs, field trip logs, their own attendance sheets to track the number of days they've completed school, and more.  Again most of my planner sheets came from the Schoolhouse Planner.

I had to share a pic of this quote that A10 apparently thought was inspirational enough to jot down in her planner.  Love it!

I'm not the only one discussing Homeschool Planning today.  Check out the Back to School Homeschool Blog Hop for more ideas and inspiration!  Pin It Now!