National Homeschool Book Award

 I'm so excited about this opportunity!  A group of homeschool moms here in Minnesota have organized a National Homeschool Book Award.  Here is how they describe it on their website:

The NHBA is a readers' choice book award designed to recognize and celebrate current juvenile fiction that explores learning experiences occurring outside the traditional classroom setting and that resonates with homeschool readers.

The group has nominated four books for their inaugural award:

Alabama Moon by Watt Key
Every Soul a Star by Wendy Mass
The Remarkable & Very True Story of Lucy & Snowcap by H.M. Bouwman
Savvy by Ingrid Law

Homeschoolers are asked to read these four books and in October vote for their favorite.  The winner will be announced in November.  During this time their website will offer activities based on these books.  It costs nothing to participate in this award.

The website offers summaries of each nominee and explains the process in depth. They also have a facebook page!  Check it out!

Now you know what AH and I will be reading for the next few months!

Car-Schooling

AD, our college student son, needed some important items brought to his apartment at the University of Minnesota last week.  AH, our homeschooler, needed to memorize the books of the new testament for confirmation, review some math facts, and do some independent reading.  What's a mom to do?  Take school on the road, of course!

We are about 35 - 45 minutes away from the University of Minnesota, so I packed up our iPod Touch, the flashcards I made up for AH to learn the new testament books, his bible, and the book he has been reading independently. As we backed out of the driveway, AH went right to work on memorizing the New Testament Books.  He took the flashcards and worked on placing the books in order and memorizing them.  He really wanted to learn all of them by confirmation on Wednesday evening.  I believe there was a reward or prize at stake here.  After we dropped off the forgotten items to big brother, AH worked on his math review by playing a game on the iPod, and then finished his independent reading.  We were able to get most of our "schooling" done by the time we pulled into the parking lot for swimming lessons.

All too often these days, we find ourselves in our car traveling to museums, classes, clubs, gym, and field trips.  Instead of writing off those times as wasted, we try to use them so  that we have more time to play, learn and read together outside of the car!  Our history spine, The Story of the World, is available as an audiobook - MP3 downloadable version and that is what we order.  We get it immediately and we have it loaded on each of our laptops and our iPod Touch.

One of the most popular homeschool helps, Netflix, is now offering streaming video to computers, iPads, iPods, and game consoles.  We have often used this feature to watch documentaries about subjects we are studying.  This way there is no waiting for a disc to arrive.  When AH expresses an interest to explore a topic more, we jump on our Netflix site and find a movie or documentary!  While he's watching, sometimes I'm on another device finding supporting sites and reserving books from our local library.

There are many wonderful iPod apps available (a lot for free).  One of our favorites is WW Capitals by Mulishani which is available in the iTunes app store for free! It is a clever app that has flash cards with a country name, flag and capital.  The flash cards can either be scrolled or looked at individually.  Our favorite feature of this app is the quiz.  It is NOT easy!  But AH loves this app and often plays it while waiting for performances or classes to start.  He has become so good at knowing the flags and capitals of many countries that he can beat his 25 year old sister at it (and remember, she is a geography major!) The same company also has similar apps that cover state capitals and the US Presidents.

Besides the apps stores available on your mobile devices how does one find these apps?  One of the best resources for finding cool educational apps is the Apps-School website.  They also have a facebook page and that is where I found a fun fractions review game for AH.  Motion Math ($ .99) is fairly basic, but it makes a fun review of fractions, decimals and percentages.  Beats a worksheet any day! Since it is a visual representation of fractions, decimals and percentages it made everything click with my right-brained learner.

Some of my most memorable and interesting conversations with AH have occurred in the car.  I don't want to lose that, so we don't always pack our gadgets when we are out on the road.  But I am very thankful for the wonderful technology available and will take advantage of it if it enhances our learning.  Gotta go now, AH is waiting to read an old-fashioned paper book on the couch this afternoon!

Out and About

Wow.  What a whirlwind month January was!  February is beginning to look like it'll be a busy month, too.  Generally, AH and I love our time at home together, but there have been so many opportunities lately, that we couldn't say no.  Here are just a few pictures of our exploits this January:

Science Museum of Minnesota: Geometry Playground

We visited the U of M Chemistry Dept. for a Chemistry Demo and Hands on experiments!

We love watching things go up in flames!

Hard to see, but there is a flying pop bottle launched with a chemical reaction

My scientist

An afternoon of free rides at Nick Universe at the Mall of America

Nickelodeon Universe

 

 

Homeschool Gym

Tour of KSTP TV station

Celebrated our friend Michael's birthday!

Add to this swimming lessons, art club, a comedy show for homeschoolers, and a trip to the Omni Theater and that adds up to a busy month!

Trust the Child

I've been homeschooling my now 7th grade son since the beginning of 4th grade.  We have our ups and our downs, but generally love our way of life.  Indeed, homeschooling has become a way of life.  Over the years we have less "school" time scheduled and have found that learning weaves it's way through our days in a more organic way.  I prefer it this way and I find AH's retention is higher when he learns this way.  But it is so very different than the way I was taught and it brings on episodes of panic now and again.  Take for instance spelling.  We began in 4th grade with two separate phonics lessons, both of which produced nothing but tears.  I then signed him up for an online spelling test weekly which produced more tears and, worse, frustration.  I then came to realize just how a right-brained learner cannot learn in these ways and found a better and more productive way for him to learn to spell.  It worked, but there was no joy, no spark, no enthusiasm and that brought me to tears.

Then I backed off.

I spelled words when my son wanted to write them.  But that was close to never. I just waited (and silently panicked).  All the books said that when a child is ready he will want to learn.

And still I waited, enduring criticism and disparaging remarks for my son's poor spelling.  But I still waited and clung to the belief that when he was ready, he would want to write and spelling would be a natural part of that.  And the criticism continued, sometimes directly at AH, but still I waited (and silently panicked).

In the meantime, with so many activities filling our calendars, we found that we wanted our son to have a cell phone to call us in emergencies (like the night he was left at church to attend confirmation when there was no confirmation scheduled that night!) or to simply call us with a question when we were all out doing our own things.  My husband ordered a phone with a full keyboard just to make texting and entering information easier for AH.    When AH got the phone he was so excited to fill it with contacts, starting with his big sister and big brother.  He texted them occasionally, but when one of his friends also got a phone, that was the beginning of his spelling education.  They sent texts back and forth furiously. I must have spelled most of the words he typed to his friend that first week.  During the second week, I wasn't asked how to spell words, but was asked if he had spelled them correctly.  And by week three, I very rarely have to spell out a word for him.

Trust the child.

As if this wasn't a breakthrough in and of itself, I opened my email one day to see a plea from a homeschool friend of AH's who was trying to start a newspaper.  He wanted it to be written by local homeschoolers.  I mentioned it to my son and heard nothing for quite a while.  One morning AH told me he was going to write movie reviews for the newspaper and wondered if we could go to a couple of movies. As if I was going to say no! We made sure we saw the two movies AH wanted to review (including big brother and dad in this activity made it a natural part of our family life) and AH followed through, with no pressure from me, on writing not only one, but two, reviews for the next issue of the Homeschool Gazette.  The words weren't always spelled correctly, but we worked on that when he asked for help.  The sentences sometimes didn't flow that way they should, but we worked on that when he asked for help. 

What was it that the books said?  Oh, yeah,...

Trust the child.

My Last Teenager

On December 4th, 2010, AH became a teenager!

AH celebrated with friends by hosting a sleep-over

The next day we celebrated as a family with a dinner chosen by the birthday boy.

Big brother made the trip home to celebrate!

Big Sis and MB watch as AH tries to blow out his candles.

Happy 13th Birthday, AH!

Unplanned Learning

A few months ago I signed up at C-SPAN's website to receive a free presidential poster.  It came to our house and I promptly put it in my "I'll get to this later" pile.  I completely forgot about it until I was cleaning off my desk a month later.  I opened it up and it was HUGE.  What was I going to do with this very large poster?  I was tempted to give it away. I folded it up and brought it down to the kitchen where AH was hanging out.  I showed him the poster and started unfolding it.  He was fascinated!  We laid it out on the kitchen floor and sat looking at all the information at our fingertips.  Not only did it include a list of presidents, but when they were born, other public service posts they had held, military service, what party they belonged to, America's population along the timeline, technology, supreme court rulings, constitutional amendments, and more!  We must have spent a good 45 minutes just looking and talking.  I wouldn't have considered this part of our "school day", but AH loved it so I couldn't just give this goldmine away.  It needed to be up, on display, somewhere we spend a lot of time.  Hmmmm....

The poster on our kitchen wall.

You wouldn't believe what we have done with this poster.  During dinner AH has taken to quizzing us on our presidential trivia (I am the worst!) and asking to be quizzed.  One day during breakfast he wondered just how many years of military service had been served by our presidents altogether.  He not only added all the years up, but then decided to make a chart with this information.  He found this exercise so interesting that it led to a series of charts that now grace the wall above the poster: Presidential states, birthdays, political parties, and more.

Years of military service.  No, Eisenhower did not serve the most years.

Presidential parties

Presidential birthday months

None of this has been planned.  It is AH's continuing interest in this poster and subject matter that has made learning history, social studies, and government so easy and so much fun.  He blew me away last week when he listed the first 8 presidents in order.  I asked if he could list all of them. He needed only one hint (he forgot LBJ).  I was reminded that learning occurs when you can take advantage of an interest and encourage a spark of curiosity to become a flame!

My kitchen won't win any decorating awards, but we sure have fun!

Vacation

We don't often go on vacation or travel, so when my husband suggested visiting his sister and her family in San Antonio, Texas for Thanksgiving I was ecstatic!  It had been 5 years since we were there and that time was busy with wedding bells and all the activity which surround such events.  AH was pretty excited, too.  He and his cousin, CN, are very close.  Whether it's been a couple of months or a year, they seem to be able to pick up where they leave off.  Visiting San Antonio also gave me inspiration for a unit study we completed before we left: The Alamo, of course!  AH had been there before, but was 2 or 3 years old at the time.  Here was the perfect opportunity to study some history and to reinforce that learning with an exciting field trip that included a plane ride!

I found some wonderful resources to use in our unit study:
Inside the Alamo by Jim Murphy
A phenomenal resource! I checked out 7 or 8 books on the subject, but this became our main guide through the unit study. We simply read one or two chapters each day and discussed the subject matter.  There are anecdotes, sidebars, maps and beautiful photographs and sketches which enhance the story.  The history is so thorough, I didn't feel the need to use any other book beside the one listed below.  As I was looking up the link to the book, I found a short study guide to the book.  I didn't use it but wanted to link to it for your convenience.
The Alamo website
The Daughters of the Republic of Texas have done an amazing job on this website.  There are facts, activity pages and curriculum, so I encourage you to explore this rich website.  Unfortunately there are several broken links but there are many other resources on the site.   Here are the resources we enjoyed:
Lesson plan for 4th grade
Lesson plan for 7th grade
Each of these extensive lesson plans has worksheets, coloring pages, a time-line, a map, diagrams of the Alamo and puzzles.
If you find that you can visit the Alamo, they have a history hunt list, a patch program and a young courier program for kids to complete.  AH wasn't interested in completing these, so I have no idea whether they are worth it or not.
Susanna of the Alamo by John Jakes
My 12 year old boy didn't enjoy this as much since it is written for a younger audience, but it did have a woman's perspective that I wanted to bring to the study.  We often hear that no one survived the Alamo, but women, children and slaves did survive and this book explores why Santa Anna released these few.

This had to be one of the simplest unit studies we've done.  AH didn't want to put together a poster or a power point presentation as we usually do, so we simply read, discussed and did the activity sheets. I did put together some "trading cards" with pictures of key men and women of this time period.  On the back, AH then wrote 3 interesting facts about each person.  I will upload the templates in the future since am finding it difficult to do right now. Of course, the big event was visiting the site of the battle.  Since photography isn't allowed within the Alamo, we don't have too many pictures to show you.  But here is what we have:

Our whole family in front of the Alamo.

We stopped by the Alamo on a Segway tour of downtown San Antonio.

San Fernando Cathedral where Santa Anna would climb to the top (of the old section, not visible) and survey his troops and the Alamo.

CN (left), Doug (AH's dad) and AH (right) enjoy a game of Balderdash with the family