2013 April

Weekend links

by Jamie Martin on April 14, 2013
in links · 2 Comments

My Elijah turned eight this week–here he is sporting the new bike he received! I honored him and the story of how he joined our family on Steady Mom if you’d like to check it out.

National Poetry Month Kidlitosphere Events :: Jama’s Alphabet Soup
The jury’s in, screen time hurts little kids :: Education News
Lessons from the new feminism :: Thomas Jefferson Education
Read-aloud revival: Library visits :: Amongst Lovely Things
Forget socialization – what about personalization? :: Hip Homeschool Moms

For those readers based in Connecticut, I wanted to invite you to Newtown on April 28th to take part in a free Family Fun Day at Two Coyotes Wilderness School from 1-4pm.

This event is completely free and will include food, drinks, and fun nature activities for the whole family like building a fire, wildlife tracking, edible plant hike, and more.

More information:

Date:           Sunday, April 28, 2013
Ages:           Boys and Girls 5-16 & their parents
Cost:            FREE
Activities:    Family Nature Stations                1-4 pm
“The Healing Effects of Nature” talk    3-3:30 pm
Discussion and Q&A              3:30-4 pm
Place:           Sticks and Stones Farm – 197 Huntingtown Road, Newtown

To register:

Click here and enter the Campfire Code: Simple Homeschool

“I am not a teacher, but an awakener.” ~ Robert Frost

Becoming brave writers: A review of The Writer’s Jungle

by Lora on April 10, 2013
in curriculum · 13 Comments

Written by contributor Lora Lynn Fanning of Vitafamiliae

Last semester, I determined my third grade twins should do a writing project. I requested a paragraph from each about their history studies. Simple, right?

A week later, we were all in tears and only after much angst did they eke out their boring four sentence paragraphs. I was baffled. I’m a writer. I love to edit. They like to write. Why was this so painful???

I spent my Christmas vacation evaluating our writing program. Or lack thereof. Apparently, my kids weren’t going to learn to write or to love writing just by living with their blogging mama. I needed something else.

I stumbled across the Brave Writer website and the correlating book The Writer’s Jungle by Julie Bogart. By the time I finished it, my copy of the book looked like this:

In The Writer’s Jungle, I found the tools to make writing pain-free:
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Lessons learned from Little House

by Jamie Martin on April 8, 2013
in curriculum · 57 Comments

Jamie Martin, editor of Simple Homeschool, also blogs about motherhood at Steady Mom

After several months, my three kids and I recently finished reading all nine books of the Little House on the Prairie series by Laura Ingalls Wilder. Reading these to my own kids was like a dream come true.

I fell in love with Laura and her life as a young girl myself and have read through the whole series three or four times. But experiencing them as an adult with children of my own gave me a new perspective than I had before.

Certain parts made me laugh, some parts made me cry, a few parts shocked me, and I took away a few lessons to remember as well.
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Extroverts homeschooling introverts (or the I’m going to lose it if we don’t leave the house soon post)

by Hillary on April 5, 2013
in a mom's education · 8 Comments

Written by contributor Hillary Boucher

I must have been around 15 years old when my parents told me that I could pick one weekend night to spend socializing with my friends, but the other would be spent home with my family. This parental declaration was met with dramatic tears and a larger than life teenage tantrum.

Looking back, my reaction may have been on the dramatic side, but it exemplifies what a big deal it was to me. Connecting with my friends and socializing was not only important to me, it actually helped me live a healthier and happier life. And it still does.

You guessed it — I’m an extrovert.
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When home is school

by Jena on April 3, 2013
in methods & philosophies · 13 Comments

Written by contributor Jena of Yarns of the Heart

We all know the feeling, right? School schedules versus family time. Housework versus textbooks. Who wins? Who should win? After homeschooling three kids to high school graduation, here are my thoughts on the subject.

#1 Life is learning.

Try to look at daily life as full of learning opportunities. Going to the grocery store is vocabulary instruction (what is a pomegranate?) and a math lesson (how much is this item per ounce?). It’s also economics (let’s stay within our budget). Here’s a link to free resources dealing with a trip to the grocery store.

Any routine family activity involves learning. Just let your kids in on your thinking processes. Why are we doing this? How can we do it more efficiently, more economically? You’ll be amazed at what they discover.
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