Designing a home-centered life: learning, exploring, and creating with our five littles
I've been totally missing in action here lately, so I wanted to give y'all a quick update. We moved! It came about quickly from listing to sale, to packing to moving…but naturally not without complications. Praise the Lord, as of last night, we're in our new place. We have some renovations planned, which will leave us in mostly packed up mode for a … [Read more...]
If I could, I would say to my littles, "If you get nothing else, get this." I'm not sure I'm the teacher I should be with this, but I do want to be. Reading this book brought me closer than before and reading Pilgrim's Progress by John Bunyan with my littles has reminded me. Maybe today you need to be reminded of the cleansing pleasure of … [Read more...]
My husband is a Philly area native and at a young age visited Independence Hall in Philadelphia. We've since taken our littles twice. But, at home we still use something he purchased on a trip there when he was a little boy. It's a replica of the Declaration of Independence. We read it this week, made observations about the … [Read more...]
Guess what? Life has gotten very busy - we're moving! I'm so glad I made a plan for simplicity for homeschooling this year. This week we've been reviewing our history sentence by reading one of the books from our book list, the Boston Tea Party by Pamela Duncan Edwards. It's a cute book with good drawings that traces the chain of events … [Read more...]
Unfortunately, I sometimes find that what my youngest ones are doing during school is a bit of an afterthought for me. This is a mistake by me. What they need is so important to me and I want to be sure their time is well-spent, not just spent. But, I also need the preparation of these activities to be simple and quick - like pull it off the shelf … [Read more...]
You know what's funny about this A Day in the Life post? I don't technically know the Strite family, as we've only met recently through e-mail. A mutual friend, who is college friends with Lisa, introduced us knowing that we'd share the CC connection and that Lisa might be interested in sharing her family's "day in the life" here. Well, I'm so glad … [Read more...]
Y'all, please welcome Jennifer Courtney of Classical Conversations Writers Circle with part one of a guest series of posts all about getting started in homeschooling. There is something to be said for starting off right, so I hope you enjoy her series of posts! What should I do for my children’s education? Should I homeschool them? Where … [Read more...]
All of my ideas begin and end with Legos this week. Can you blame me? I'm surrounded by boys who love to build and are doing it all the time. I thought it would be great fun to use our Legos to try to build any number of things from our review: a Mayflower boat, the capital building in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, or the axial skeleton. Fun, right? I … [Read more...]
I want to say in the simplest way possible the lesson that God has been teaching me lately. I'll start at the beginning. I'm a talker…as in, I talk a lot. When I'm happy, sad, excited, nervous, angry, joyful, unsure, thinking…..I talk. You'll usually only find me quiet when I'm tired or overwhelmed or really into what I'm reading. My children, who … [Read more...]
If you're looking to mix up your school time or perhaps shop for birthday presents, there are some seriously fun and effective teaching toys out there. I've made a list of my favorites to match up specifically with CC Cycle 3 areas of study, but could really be used anytime. Here are the ones on my radar right now: 1. Periodic Table Blocks - … [Read more...]