So you bought a giant shiny box of homeschool curriculum. It looked amazing in the catalog. Great literature, history, science, and a schedule telling you exactly what to do when. No more weekends or evenings spent planning. It was an open and go choice. But your days are overwhelming. It takes all day to get…
Organization of Material Ease of Use Beauty Fun/Laughter Leads Child Into Thinking Multi-Sensory Uses the Power of Story Organization of Material When cognitive scientists studied teachers to find out what makes a good teacher great, they found only two things were needed. Connection with the students, and organization of material. If a teacher did those…
How is your school year going so far? Is overwhelm haunting you? There are a few things you can do to re-assess your plans and find smoother days. Let's dig up the root of your overwhelm. The first step is the hardest. Why are you overwhelmed? Is it because you are trying to do too…
Tables, couches, and beds, Oh My! Children who are raised to love learning take their learning wherever they go. Writing with charcoal (burnt wood from the firepit) on bark…easier or harder than graphite on paper…essential knowledge. Sure, they sit at a table when they need a hard surface to work on. Yes, that is food…
Picking out which curriculum to use with your kids can be overwhelming and exhausting. Especially if you have made the decision not to go with an entire grade-level package. In this post, I will share my process for selecting the materials and curriculum my kids will use each year. I shop my house. I shop…
I have a confession to make. We didn't study history much during the first few years of our homeschooling journey. Sure we had a few D'Aulaire books I read aloud, but other than that…the kids weren't asking questions and I was busy enough teaching reading, writing, math, and science (because they had a LOT of…
Sometimes life is really simpler than we make it. But also, when we ignore those basic, simple things in life, it can get complicated pretty fast. Everyone has a new idea, or is busy unearthing and promoting an old idea, and many times all these ideas seem to conflict and tear you apart as you…
We Need to Fill our Homes with Treasures. Some curricula is a treasure, but many are just copycats of the bland materials used in the public school system. The system we have left behind for one reason or another…perhaps the lack of treasures was a bigger reason than we realized at first? Treasures Take Time…
Let's face it, even if you love homeschooling, it can still be stressful. Just like the rest of life. In fact, I think the reason why so many meticulously designed homeschool schedules fall apart so quickly is that they fail to account for one crucial and unavoidable homeschool ingredient. Humans. Our goal with schedules often…
Learning Language Arts Through Literature is an easy to use high school homeschool literature curriculum. I have been homeschooling for over 12 years now, my oldest graduating this last spring. (From both high school and with a two-year tech degree!) If I had to choose the one most important lesson I have learned these past…