Category: Homeschooling Ideas

My Favorite Part of My Day

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The kitchen was in disarray, books were everywhere, witnessing to the fact that my kids do indeed read and the younger children had done an amazing job of turning my living room into a rather complex fort. In the middle of this chaos I found my somewhat frazzled self sitting down at the end of my day with a cup of tea and reflecting. Did I get any homeschooling done? Did I have a productive day? What is my definition of a productive day?

It was one of those typical homeschool days where I had felt like the day had flown by in a whirlwind of activities without being productive. I was determined on a daily basis to get my checklist of homeschool tasks done and yet it never seemed to get accomplished. Can anyone relate? Your days are busy as can be and yet you don’t seem to get to the homeschooling subjects that you wanted to. I began to realize in my early years of homeschooling that I needed to have a paradigm shift on what constitutes a productive homeschool day. This is when I discovered the beauty of “Morning Time”.

“Morning Time” is a phrase that I learned from Cindy Rollins who is a veteran homeschooler of 9 kids whom have all graduated from her homeschool. She is an amazing influencer and mentor in the homeschool community. She wrote a book called “Morning Time” that changed my perspective on what was important in my homeschool. I highly recommend reading her book to get an in depth look at what “Morning Time” is all about.

“Morning Time” is a set amount of time that I set aside with my kids to study the different subjects that I want them to learn. If we accomplish nothing more in our day than “Morning Time”, my day has been a success. These subjects are usually subjects that I have always wanted to study with my children, but we just don’t seem to get around to them. For example, we might study famous artists, Shakespeare, Plutarch, science, apologetics or a famous music composer. This is also the time that I do a continuous read aloud with the kids. My current read aloud with my teenage daughter is “The Count of Monte Cristo” by Alexander Dumas and my current read aloud with my younger two children is “Prince Caspian” by CS Lewis.

This is my favorite part of our homeschool day because we come together as a family and learn about the truth, goodness and beauty in the world we live in. A Shakespeare play that we are listening to or a novel that we are reading can lead to thoughtful discussions. Another benefit of “Morning Time” is seeing a family book culture emerge in our home where my kids will remember reading certain books or topics and those topics will pop up in random conversations. My children’s humor or comments start reflecting the books we are reading. They see an artist’s painting or hear a piece of music and recognize who or what they are because of what we have studied. In my opinion, this creates more of an education for my children then simply filling out a worksheet. If my goal is to create a love of learning, then I want to introduce them to many different aspects of the world around us.

I don’t want them to learn math with the mindset of just having to fulfill a requirement. I want them to see the unique mathematic equations that exist in our world. For example, the sunflower is a mathematical creation representing the Fibonacci numbers. I want my kids to begin to see learning as an opportunity to see the world in a new way. When we study Vincent Van Gogh, what is the story behind his famous painting of Starry Night? When we enter the world of Narnia by C.S. Lewis what do we see? What is the story saying about the world around us? What are the Biblical Worldview questions that my kids are struggling with?

I cannot have these conversations when the kids are working on their everyday worksheets at their desks, but I can create a space for these discussions to happen. I began to see how this was the learning that I desired my homeschooling to have. I made a decision in my early years of homeschooling, that if we didn’t get to anything else, but we made space for “Morning Time”, we had had a productive day.

“Morning time” can look quite different depending on the ages of your kids and your family dynamics. I had years when we had little toddlers and the “Morning Time” had to be short and during the baby’s nap time. Our current “Morning Time” is actually split between my younger two kids and my teens. I wanted to read deeper books with the teens that were not as relatable to the younger kids. Our schedule has changed as the kids have gotten older and now I am able to do a “Morning Time” in the morning with my younger kids and a different time in the afternoon for my teens. Although for most of our homeschool years, I did keep all five kids together. It was logistically easier, at that time, to keep them all together and not split them up.

“Morning Time” does not have to be in the morning. There were a couple of years that we still called it “Morning Time” but my sleep deprived teens functioned better in the afternoons. Find a time in your day that works best to meet your families needs. It does not have to be complex or long. You can simply start by having a 15 minute read aloud time where you sit down and read with all your kids. You can study whatever you would like with your kids that you think would interest them. Perhaps you would rather listen to a Shakespeare play together, explore a science book or read an apologetics book as a family.

One more important thing to remember is that “Morning Time” is a journey with your kids that doesn’t always go the way you expect. There have been many “Morning Time” days that have gone far from what was ideal in my mind. I sometimes wondered why I was even incorporating it in my day. Despite the days we had of chaos, I kept cultivating the habit because I knew I was planting seeds. When you plant and water seeds, you don’t immediately see growth, but the seeds are still growing. I chose to believe that I was cultivating learning even if it seemed, at times, that they weren’t listening. As some of my kids have reached their teens, I can see the seeds that I had planted and how they have grown. The “Morning Time” was worth it! It is a lovely tool to help cultivate an atmosphere of learning. It is a part of my homeschool that I have never regretted doing.

If this concept of “Morning Time” is something that you would like to incorporate in your homeschool day, I will list some resources below that were helpful in my study of what “Morning Time” is all about. I will also list what we currently are doing for our own “Morning Time” to give you an idea of different things you can do with your kids.

Resources for “Morning Time”

“Morning Time” by Cindy Rollins (cindyrollins.net)

“My Morning Basket” by Pam Barnhill (Excellent podcast on the different parts of Morning Time)

“Back to School Conference 2019” (found at cindyrollin.net)

(Cindy did two sessions in the above conference on how “Morning Time” works and she also walked through a typical “Morning Time” that she had done with her kids. You can still purchase the recordings even though the conference was last year)

Book List-

“Morning Time” with my teens

The God who is There by Francis Schaffer

The Great Divorce by CS Lewis

Plutarch Lives- Alexander

Much Ado About Nothing by William Shakespeare

Count of Monte Christo by Alexander Dumas

The Classic 100 Poems Edited by William Harmon

“Morning Time” with my 8 and 12 year old

Bible

Taming of the Shrew by William Shakespeare

Poetry- Emily Dickinson

Picture Study- Van Gogh

Animals by Thorton Burgess

Grimms Brothers Fairytales

Prince Caspian by CS Lewis

First Day of School Traditions

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What does a first day of school look like for homeschooling? Can’t our kids just stay in pajamas all day? Do I really need a first day of school when we are just staying home? What is so important about celebrating the first day of school?

When we started homeschooling 12 years ago, I wanted to make the first day of our school memorable. I didn’t want our kids looking longingly at the school bus leaving our neighborhood, thinking that they were missing out. They weren’t missing out, they were just on a different adventure than some of their neighborhood friends. I wanted our kids to enjoy the uniqueness of homeschooling and what that might look like. Yes, they were staying home, but I wanted to create an atmosphere of excitement for the new adventure that they would be stepping into this year. The first day of school became a tradition that our kids look forward to each year.

I do something a little different every year, but they know that the first day of school will have a variety of delights for them to enjoy and remember as they begin a new school year. I thought I would share with you some of the different traditions our family have enjoyed over the years.

One of the first traditions that I do is to make homemade cinnamon rolls for breakfast. Right now, we are about to have our first day of school and the yummy cinnamon rolls are waiting downstairs in anticipation of the kids waking up to start their day. I think the only hard thing for me about making the kids cinnamon rolls is the temptation of eating them. I have to keep reminding myself that they are for the kids and not me.

Another tradition is school supplies outside their door when they wake up. I usually make a little card that says “Let the Adventure Begin…” and then put some kind of school supplies outside their door. This year I bought art supplies and a favorite book that I had picked for them to enjoy in their reading time. This looks a little different each year, depending on what school supplies they need and what my budget is for that year. This also depends on the age of my kids. For example, my teenage daughter is going to have new coffee mug and a book while my younger children get the art supplies. I try to pick a school supply that is part of a subject that they really enjoy learning. I have also had small budget years when the school supplies are minimal, but the kids still enjoy the anticipation of what is outside their door each year regardless of how much of a budget I had to work with.

The last tradition we do is to go on some kind of outing or field trip. This is the kids favorite tradition and unique to homeschooling. One of the benefits of homeschooling is that we can do field trips while everyone else is in school. We have done a variety of field trips such as hiking, visiting a park, going out for pizza or even going to the zoo in the previous years. The zoo is quite fun without all those crowds of people.

It really didn’t matter what we chose to do, we just had fun celebrating our first day with a field trip. This year, we are going on a fishing trip with all their cousins. I am blessed to have my siblings, who also homeschool their children, live in the same area. We have all decided to celebrate the first school day together and take the kids to a lake for fishing. Choosing to go on an outing for the first day of school is wonderful way to celebrate your homeschooling. My kids look forward to this event each year. Again, this can be quite simple, and does not have to be a big event. I have simply gone to a park one year and the kids loved it.

Homeschooling is an adventure worth taking and one of the ways that we can communicate that to our kids is to celebrate the first day of their new school year. There are so many ways that you can celebrate that are simple and easy. I have done all kinds of simple “First day of school” activities throughout the years. We have made special lunches at home, read to them a story, or simply went outside and had popsicles in our backyard. Our kids have loved it when we have had a S’more night outside or played a family board game. Think of what your family might enjoy or what you occasionally do for fun and maybe it would be a good fit for celebrating the first day of school. The important thing is to celebrate the start of their new adventure. Kids will remember the moments, not how spectacular the field trip or activity ended up being.

What are some of your favorite first day of school traditions? What does your family enjoy doing together?

Hope you all have an amazing first day of school! Enjoy the adventure!

The Perfect Curriculum

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You are about to start a new school year and the planning of a new school adventure has already begun. One of biggest questions on your mind might be, “What would be the perfect curriculum?”. The truth is, there is no such thing as a perfect curriculum. In fact, I have found in my 12 years of homeschooling that I can use almost any type of curriculum and give my kids an amazing education. Perhaps this thought brings you relief or perhaps this thought brings on more fear because now what in the world do you choose to use?

The most important thing to remember is that you want your curriculum to serve you. You do not want be a slave to your curriculum. It is a tool that it to benefit your teaching not dictate it. I learned this lesson the hard way in my earlier years of homeschooling. I am a lover of the check list. I want to make sure that I check off all the boxes on my list, so that I can feel accomplished at the end of the day. In fact, if I have done a task that is not on my check list, I will put it on my check list just so that I can check it off.

Although I can appreciate my gift of being administrative, this love of check lists can have some negative effects. This became evident in my homeschooling when I was more interested in checking off the boxes instead of taking the time to cultivate a love of learning in my kids. I ended up being a slave to my curriculum because I had a desire to see all those boxes checked. Surprisingly, this did not end up being beneficial to the homeschooling of my children. I realized I needed to think about what my actual goals were and which curriculum would best serve the purpose of reaching those goals.

One of my biggest goals is to develop a love of learning so that when they have graduated from my homeschool they will still desire to pursue learning in whatever God had for them. I came to the realization that I didn’t need a certain curriculum to accomplish this feat. I needed to quit worrying about whether the boxes were checked or whether the curriculum was perfect and just work on cultivating a delight for learning. How does our family do this?

We read great books, we study the arts and music, we talk about how math isn’t just about formulas but is evident in the very universe we live in, we explore the kids interest and see where it takes them. Throughout my years of homeschooling, the search for the perfect curriculum became obsolete and my pursuit of creating life long learners was a more prominent goal in my mind.

Now you might be thinking these are all great ideas, but I have no idea what curriculum to choose! I am going to list a few of my favorites to give you place to start. Another thing to keep in mind is the lifestyle that your family is living and the environment that your homeschool will be in. If both parents are working and homeschooling, then you want to look for a curriculum that lays each day out for you because you don’t have necessarily the time to create your own. Even with the laid out curriculums, feel free to cut out things that your kids don’t need or you don’t want. Remember that it is a tool for you to use. If you want more of a literature based curriculum, then you want to look for curriculums that are heavy with good books. Our family uses “The Charlotte Mason” Method and the curriculum is free online at amblesideonline.com. If you are interested in “The Charlotte Mason” Method, I would encourage you to research it before you start. It’s a wonderful way to homeschool children, but if you don’t understand the method then the curriculum won’t make sense. I will list some of my favorite curriculum by subject.

Ready Made Curriculums:

(These are also very literature based. In other words, lots of books)

Sonlight

Amblesideonline.com

My Father’s World

Science:

Apologia.com

Spangler Science (Science kits with ready made experiments)

English/Reading:

Houseofhumaneletters.com (Excellent Reading and Lit classes for Junior High and High School)

Veritas Press (This website has excellent options for littles that need hands on learning for learning to read)

All About Reading

All About Spelling

Math:

BJU Math

Saxon Math

Teaching Textbooks ( This was more visual for my child with dyslexia)

Music/Art/Shakespeare:

SimpleCharlotteMason.com (They have excellent resources for the arts/music and Shakespeare)

If you are looking for more wisdom and insight into the world of homeschooling, I highly recommend the online 2020 Back to School Conference found at cindyrollins.net

Books that Every Homeschooler Should Read:

Teaching from Rest by Sarah Mackenzie

The Read Aloud Family by Sarah Mackenzie

Morning Time by Cindy Rollins

Picking curriculum and planning a school year can feel quite daunting, so feel free to message me any questions that you might have. Every homeschool family is different and each of our journey’s are unique, so I am in no way saying that all the favorites that I have listed are the only options. It is not an exhaustive list and it might not be what you need but its a place to start. There are many options out there, ready to serve your unique homeschool needs. Homeschooling is an adventure and one of the best decisions I made for my kids education. Enjoy the journey!

Creating a Book Culture in Your Home

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“I have a passion for teaching kids to become readers, to become comfortable with a book, not daunted. Books shouldn’t be daunting, they should be funny, exciting and wonderful; and learning to be a reader gives a terrific advantage.” – Roald Dahl (Author of “Matilda”)

Creating a love for reading is one of my favorite goals as a parent and a homeschool mom. I believe, instilling a love of reading in your children will lead them onto the road of developing an on-going love of learning. Sarah Clarkson, author of “The Book Girl” wrote, “Reading, rather, is a journey. Reading is the road you walk to discover yourself and your world, to see with renewed vision as you encounter the vision of another. Reading is a way of walking with the wise as you trek down the road of life, offering a hand to guide you, a voice to help you look up from the dust and discover the sunset, a friend in whose words you can shelter when life sends you a storm. Reading is a way to live.” (Book Girl p. 18) I believe reading books helps shape who my kids want to be. Creating a book culture in my home is part of helping them to become who they are meant to be.

The journey to creating a book culture is full of ups and downs. I have tried different things to incorporate books in our lives that have worked out beautifully and I have done other things that were total failures. I thought it would be fun to give you a glimpse into our home of some of the ups and downs of walking out that journey of creating a bookish culture in our home.

3 Things I did that helped cultivate a book culture in our home:

  1. The simple activity of reading aloud. Reading aloud to my kids has taken many forms depending on the rhythms of our lives at the time. My favorite current way that we have included reading aloud in the rhythms of our life is “Morning Time”. This is a daily time where all my kids from teenagers to my youngest gather together and I read aloud to them. We read everything from the Bible to Shakespeare to fiction books that keep us on the edge of our seats. My goal with “Morning Time” is to read books to my kids that they might not pick up themselves and to create an atmosphere for great conversations. This is my favorite activity that we do as a family in our homeschool. It brings my kids all together and we have developed our own book culture and language based on the books that we have read. There are random references to books that we have read that will sneak their way into everyday conversations. These are the moments that bring me delight. Sometimes life has been so busy that “Morning Time” has become non-existent. Reading aloud with my family has looked quite different in the busier times of our lives. Another way that we fit reading aloud in is through the use of audible books. I remember a season where I never seemed to be leaving the car due to all the appointments that one of my children had to attend. I decided to take advantage of my captive audience and we would listen to delightful audible books. This activity ended up being one of my kids favorite things to do. Even now, as we start up the new school year, the lively discussions or you might call it arguing has started on what Audible book we will be starting with when we go to our co-op. If reading aloud is not something that you enjoy, audible books in the car are a great way to instill a love of reading in your kids. I try to remind myself in the busy times of our lives that even if I read aloud 10 minutes a day, I am still helping to create a book culture in our home. I need those reminders because sometimes, ten minutes is all the time I have to read to my kids. The rhythms of life can get busy and sometimes the last thing I have time for is reading aloud. The ten minutes a day helps me to not be overwhelmed and realize I can still delight in books with my kids, even in the busiest of times.
  • 2. Creating a Mother/Daughter Bookclub with my daughter
  • In the last year, I decided to start a Mother/Daughter Bookclub with my fifteen year old daughter. I am a mom of four boys and one girl. In our world of wonderful men, we needed some girl time. The love of books is a common language that my daughter and I share. The bookclub is simple to do because it consists of just my daughter and me. My goal in starting this bookclub was to introduce my daughter to literature that she might not pick up on her own and to facilitate great conversations that might come out of reading these books. We take turns on picking the books to keep the interest level high. My first book pick was “To Kill A Mocking Bird” by Harper Lee, my daughter’s first book pick was “Hunger Games” by Suzanne Collins. So we might go from classical to a dystopian society but the purpose of the bookclub is still in place. We are creating space for great conversations and developing a book culture in our home.
  • 3. Incorporating Books In the Love Language of my Children
  • Now I do have one child who if you asked him to read, it is probably the last thing that he would want to do. He does enjoy the read aloud time with the family or the audible stories in the car but he is going through a season where he doesn’t see reading as something you enjoy. So, how do you help develop that love of reading in the reluctant reader? You find something they do love and connect it with reading. This reluctant reader of mine loves hamburgers. So, we made a deal and decided that when he had finished the historical novel that I needed him to finish, I would take him out to his favorite hamburger place and we would discuss his thoughts on the book. The amount of books that your child reads is not important. What is important is that they learn to how to have a great conversation about what they think about a book. If you have a reluctant reader, don’t pile on the books. Pick the few books that you wouldn’t want them to leave home without reading. Pick books that are enjoyable and fast paced. There is nothing worse for a reluctant reader than a slow paced book.

3 Things that did NOT help cultivate a book culture in our home:

  1. My need to finish a book no matter what. My personality of needing to accomplish and finish what I have started has not helped create a love of reading. When I start a read aloud book with my kids, I am bound and determined to finish it until the bitter end. Even if we are all hating the book at the time. As you can probably guess, this does not endear a love of books in my children. I have learned through my stubborn mistakes that there are too many amazing books to read out there and I can indeed put the book down. I still have the strong desire to finish what I start, but I am open to the idea of putting aside those books that our family is not enjoying.
  • 2. Choosing all the books for my kids I am a bookworm at heart and one of my favorite pastimes is to curate wonderful and amazing books for my kids. What I didn’t realize is that no matter how brilliant my choices might be, my kids needed to develop their own reading life. When I started to allow them to have choices on what to read, their love of reading grew immensely. Then, it was easy to curate a book once in awhile that I wanted them to try. I still believe it is an excellent idea to expand your children’s reading taste, but I also have found the value in letting them choose.
  • 3. I didn’t create space in our daily lives for reading. Trying to be the most wonderful homeschool teacher and parent I could be, I would fill my kids day with wonderful learning and various activities that would give them the best education they could have or so I thought. What I didn’t realize at the time, I wasn’t leaving any space for reading. They had many different “required” reading assignments, but they didn’t have a time where they could read what they wanted. My ultimate goal as a homeschool parent wasn’t that they checked off all the tasks that that I have assigned, but that they develop a love of learning. My “ideal” way of doing our daily homeschooling was actually killing their love of learning. So, one of the ways that helped that love of learning to grow was our free-reading time. Everyday after lunch, they had free reading time where they could read whatever they wanted. This is now a favorite part of my kids day. Even my littles when they were younger and couldn’t read, would listen to audible books. This also created space for me to read as well, which was an added bonus.

There is no perfect formula to developing a book culture in your home. These are just few things that have worked for my family, but every family is different and perhaps, even at different stages in life. For example, when I had toddlers, the “free reading” time would have looked drastically different. It might have just been a small read aloud time with picture books. I didn’t even start to think of a book club with my daughter until she was a teenager. As my kids grow, I find that I need to change things up to meet their needs in the stage that they are in. Creating a book culture in your home is a delightful journey worth taking. It has been one of my favorite things to do in our homeschool journey.

My favorite resources for learning more about creating a book culture in your home:

  1. Read Aloud Revival- This site’s whole mission is to cultivate a book culture in your home. They have an excellent podcast and website full of resources.
  2. “The Read Aloud Handbook” by Jim Trelease
  3. “The Enchanted Hour” by Meghan Cox Gordon
  4. “The Read Aloud Family” by Sarah Mackenzie

Rule of Six

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You have this amazing plan in your mind on how each day is going to go for your homeschool.  Kids are eager to learn, the housework is getting done and dinner will, indeed, be served on time.  I probably do not have to tell you that things don’t always look like what we imagine in our minds. My ideals of a perfect homeschool day rarely become a reality.  I sometimes struggle with the question on whether I am doing enough or are we really covering the things that we need to do?  Every summer, I am in this reflective mode of evaluating how our homeschool year went.  Would I change anything?  What do I want to do different this year? Is it time to look at hiring someone that could do a better job than me? Okay, maybe I don’t want to someone else teaching my kids but in the moments of failure, it is a fleeting thought.

A couple of years ago, I had the privilege of taking a class online that was about bringing focus and alignment to your year. I actually try to take this class every summer before my homeschool year starts.  I have always known that I wanted to homeschool my kids and that we would homeschool them all the way through highschool.  I felt like God has called me to homeschool and that it was the best education I could give to my children. This helped greatly when I wanted to quit. When I had those random thought of how my kiddos might have a better education without me.  

I knew that I was supposed to continue on my journey of homeschooling despite trials that we might have walked through in our lives.  But what I loved about this class was that it brought words to the calling that I felt about homeschooling.  It also brought clarity to what I knew was the most important things to focus on.  I was able to put into words what I wanted my kiddos to leave with when they graduated from our homeschool.

This class was given by Sarah Mackenzie from ReadAloudRevival.com.  The class is called “Focus and Align”. It is part of her membership classes.  Sarah Mackenzie is a homeschool mom of six who is a great encouragement to homeschool community.  She has “Master Classes” that help equip homeschoolers with more tools for their journey.  If you get a chance to take one of her classes, I would encourage you to do it.  I have homeschooled for over 11 years and her class blessed my homeschool world.  She also wrote a book called “Teaching from a State of Rest”.  I think every parent should read this book.  She gave words to what I had been feeling for the last couple of years.  God desires to have us teach from rest and to not leave the unshakeable peace that he has for us.  Definitely worth your time to read this book.

In the “Focus and Align” Class, Sarah talks about having a “Rule of Six”. This is simply a list of six top things that you want your kids to come away with once they leave the nest. When I listed my six things, I was surprised to find that none of them had much to do with being at the top, academically. Although, I do believe, the by-product of following my “Rule of Six” will result in higher academics. Each family is different, so what is important to my family and our homeschool might not be what another family values. The point of focusing on what my goals in homeschooling are wasn’t to align with everybody else, but it was to bring focus to what I really wanted to teach my children and what I wanted them to walk away with.

Here is My “Rule of Six”:

My Rule of Six

Now, does this mean that I don’t value higher academics? Of course not! I have a daughter on the journey of pursuing medical school and in that process, she has to learn high levels of math and science. I have another child that at 16 years of age has started his own marketing company and is working on being successful in his own business. My kiddos are in love with speech and debate and compete at national levels.

My “Rule of Six” is the focus I want to have and out of those pursuits, I will see my children explore higher academics. For example, my daughter is in love with science. She is chasing wonder as she explores the microscopic world. My son is seeking deeper understanding as he learns to run his own business. I will admit I am a little bit of a control freak so the realization of what I truly wanted my focus to be in my homeschool spoke freedom. I didn’t need to stress about whether I was teaching my children enough or whether I was checking off all my boxes. I just needed to guide my children in their pursuit of their own love of learning.

So, when my house is in disarray or my kids only know the language of being obstinate, I think of my “Rule of Six”. Honestly, some days in our homeschool are more character building days then getting academics done. Other days, the only thing I did was read a story to my kids among the chaos, but I learning to recognize that this is okay! Those are the days that stretch me and I learn to let go. This journey of homeschooling is not a sprint but a marathon. This is a brief season in my life where I have been given the opportunity to live life, love and teach my 5 children. I am learning to enjoy and embrace the process. It’s a gift and its so worth it!

Resources:

Master Class: ReadAloudRevival.com- Sarah Mackenzie-Focus and Align and Focus and Align 2.0

Poetry Tea Time

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A recent tradition that I have started in our family over the last couple of years is Poetry Tea Time. I did not grow up loving poetry but I do love beautiful language and after I researched the benefits of educating my children in the language of Poetry, I was sold and Poetry Tea Time began. I first heard about having a Poetry Tea Time from Julie Bogart who had a youtube video on her method of what it looked like. Julie Bogart actually sells a “How-to” book about Poetry Tea Time on her website bravewriter.com if you are interested in learning more about her method.

Poetry Tea Time for our family, is an opportunity to give my kids a dose of beautiful language and have them enter a world that they might not embark in, on their own. Once a week or in reality sometimes once a month, I gather all my poetry books from around my house and spread them on the dining room table. Each of my 5 kids from teens to my little ones have to pick one poetry book. Then they have 5 minutes to pick 1 poem to share aloud for us all to hear. I entice my children with snacks, tea or perhaps hot cocoa to help bring even more enjoyment to Poetry Tea Time. After they have all picked which poem to share, we each go around the room and simply share a poem. We might just enjoy listening to the poetry or if it is a poem with some interesting words or cadence, a discussion may ensue.

But you may ask, why Poetry? How do my kids benefit from reading aloud Poetry? Here are a few reasons that I have found that persuade me to make a regualr diet of Poetry as part of my kids education.

Beautiful Language

Poetry is a form of art. The composer of each poetic piece has to carefully choose their words. Sometimes a poem has very little words available to convey the author’s message. This forces the author to choose their words carefully so that the reader can still gain understanding of what their message of the poem is saying. Sometimes with limited words comes a more rich vocabulary which can result in more beautiful language.

Increased Vocabulary

You will not have to worry about SAT prep in vocabulary if you are giving your kids a regular diet of poetry. The difficulty of vocabualry in poetry can be quite advanced. I usually pick one poem that we can pick a few words to define and then analyze why the author might have chosen to use that particular word. My older teens history curriculum includes regular reading of poetry.

Oratory Presentation Skills

Having your kids read these poems aloud is a wonderful way to practice presentation skills. My children had to learn how to present a funny poem versus a more serious poem. How to pronounce made up words like in the the poem “The Jabberwocky” and still help the audience to understand the cadence of the poem. Simple presentation skills like articulation or slowing down so that your audience can follow along. All of these skills are immensely beneficial to any kids in their education.

Improves your Brain

Taking Poetry Tea Time a step further, you can have your kids start memorizing poetry. When you memorize poetry, it increases the capacity of your brain to memorize more. It can also help increase your children’s focus. There were studies done starting around 2013 that did brain research and the affects of poetry on the brain. Using MRI to study their subject’s brain activity as they listened or spoke poetry, they found that certain parts of the brain would light up just for poetry. The article about this research project is interesting. Here is the link to the article if you want to read it- Poetry on the Brain.

Improves Critical Thinking Skills

Poetry encourages abstract thinking which helps kids to critically think. When you read a poem, you can enjoy your tea and snack and emerse yourself in the beauty of the language. This is probably the way poetry tea time happens in my family most of the time, but sometimes we take it a bit further. What did the author mean when they said that phrase? Do we know what the setting of this poem is? Why do you think the author wrote this poem? How does this poem make you feel? What words did the author use to make you feel that way?

These discussions can sometimes make me feel like Alice in Wonderland falling down into a rabbit hole and not knowing where we are going but that’s okay. My kids and I are on a journey of exploring the world of poetry. We might find deeper meaning but most of the time we don’t.

Just to let you know, Poetry Tea Time does not always happen on a consistent basis. Sometimes, we might be able to do it once a month. Another thing worth mentioning is that Poetry Tea Time can be disastrous. I have had kids not in the mood for poetry and be more mocking then enjoyable. I have had other times when one of my kids read a serious poem in a funny voice and that was the end of Poetry Tea Time. I couldn’t get the kids to focus after that. Still other times, the littles start throwing fits and poetry must wait for another day.

Even though it can be quite imperfect, I still value poetry enough to keep presenting it. Maybe someday, when my kids have left this nest, they will pick up a poetry book and read or maybe recongnize a poem that they memorized. At the very least, I am helping them grow more brain cells even if they are unaware. The study of poetry is still worth it to me.

“Do Hard Things” -Book Review

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One of the things that I like to do in my homeschooling is give my kids “growth” books that challenge them to grow spiritually or in character.  The most recent book that I have given my 14 year old to read is the book “Do Hard Things” by Alex and Brett Harris.  These brothers wrote a book that challenges teens to live according to God’s way of thinking instead of the world’s way of thinking.  They call it the “rebelution” which consists of teenagers having a rebellion against low expectations.  To realize that even as a teen you don’t have to live with low expectations but can rise to change the world in amazing ways.

They give many examples within their book of teens that are currently changing the world by following in the adventure that God has for each of them.  For example, there is teenage boy named Zach Hunter who has a heart to stop human trafficking.  At the age of 12 he started with the simple idea of using loose change that you might find in between your couch cushions to loosen chains of the people who are victims of human trafficking.  He presented the idea to different peers and schools and ended up founding an organization that he still runs today as an adult which is called LC2LC (Loose Change to Loosen Chains).  He was a 12 year old that wanted to make a difference and stepped out in the adventure that God was giving him.  This is just one of the stories that can inspire young people to realize their potential now as a young person pursuing the things of God.

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“Do Hard Things” is a book that I would encourage to be on your homeschool list of “must read”.   They have also wrote other books to follow up the “Do Hard Things”.  The next book that they wrote is called “Start Here” which gives the next step for teenagers in their journey of discovering the adventure God has for them.  It gives more direction on how you might start walking out your individual adventure that God has designed specifically for you.  They are also in the process of releasing a parent book that talks about parenting world changers.  Their website is therebelution.com.  You will find current inspiring stories of teenagers changing the world and other helpful resources for your teen.

I believe that God has amazing and unique plans for each of our children.  We have the awesome privilege of helping them discover the gifts and talents that God has given them and leading them to discover their own intimate relationship with Jesus.  One of the things I try to do as often as I can with these books I give my kids, is to read them myself and cultivate an atmosphere of discussion with them to help them start thinking.  I am excited to see how each of my children walk out their own adventures with God.

Homeschooling and the Holidays

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We are in the middle of the holidays approaching Christmas much too fast.  Christmas is a time that you ask any homeschool family how they handle homeschooling and the holidays in December and you will get a different answer.  I know some homeschool families that take the entire month of December off and others that change their curriculum to more of a Christ centered theme to emphasize the meaning of Christmas.  Our family has different traditions that we like to do every year and some traditions that change every year because of my love of having variety in our lives.

This year for the Wright Family household it looks a little different because I had to have foot surgery.  We have had to scale back a lot of things that we normally do but the family is enjoying relaxing at home and finding fun things to do that don’t require leaving the home as much. We have many traditions that the kids have enjoyed over the years and I thought I would share some of them and give you a little picture of what Christmas is like in our home.  We take the month of November off so we still homeschool in December but on a more flexible schedule to allow for holiday fun.

Advent Calendar

We have always done some type of advent calendar.  If you google types of advent calendars, there are a million ideas on how to implement them in your home.  This is a tradition that gets changed every year because its fun to do it different.  One of my favorite advents is a book that my mother-in-law got us one Christmas when the kids were younger.  Its called the “Advent Book” by Jack Stockman.  It has beautiful illustrations that look like works of art and it tells the Christmas story straight from scripture.  Each day you read a new page and there is door on the page for the kids to open.  Behind the door is another part of the Christmas story.  The way the book works is that you are reading from the beginning of the book each day up to the new day that you open another part of the Christmas story, so that by the time it gets to Christmas day, your kids have memorized the entire Christmas story.  I find its a wonderful way to help the kids be reminded of the true meaning of Christmas. This is an advent that we end up doing every year but add another type of advent calendar for fun.  We usually do this book as a bedtime devotional in the month of December.

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Another fun advent countdown that we do is to put little burlap bags hung on a ribbon with numbers that the kids get to open one of the bags each day.  You can make the little bags and there are a ton of creative ways to do it that you can find easily on pinterest.  I am missing that creative gene and to me it seemed like a lot of work to try and do it myself, so I bought them on etsy.  I don’t have a picture of mine but I wanted to post a picture so you can get an idea of what I am talking about.

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Each bag is filled with a piece of candy and a fun thing that we get to do that day for the holidays.  It might seem overwhelming to think of 25 different fun things to do with your kids but its not when you think of all the holiday stuff you might already do or how it can be as simple as read a Christmas story or watch a Christmas movie.  The kids have helped me sometimes put a list of fun things that they want in the advent calendar.  You can be as creative as you want to be.  I know of a family that put acts of kindness in each of the bags, so that each day the kids did random acts of kindness.  I thought that was an awesome idea.

Snowman Soup

Snowman Soup is a fun tradition that is a simple activity that the kids love.  Its usually put as an activity in the advent calendar.  Snowman Soup is just hot cocoa with marshmallow and a candy cane.  There is a poem that goes along with it that you can find online.  We usually play family games or watch a Christmas movie as we enjoy snowman soup.  I have even seen it given as a gift.  Its a fun possibility for a party favors or neighbors.

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Christmas Lights

I love Christmas lights and doing fun activities that involve looking at Christmas lights.  This may sound silly, but one of the most fun Christmas lights traditions that our family does is we all get in the car and try to find the best neighborhoods with Christmas lights.  Its also tradition to bring a package of candy canes to enjoy while we look.  We have found that the best neighborhoods are the ones that have contests for Christmas with the lights.

Another favorite Christmas lights place is Warm Beach “Lights of Christmas” if you live in western Washington.  They do a great job of displaying millions of Christmas lights.  Besides the beauty of the lights, my favorite spot to stop is the homemade donuts that they make every year.  They are amazing and worth the long line you have to wait in.

 

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Gingerbread House Contest

Now we don’t always make it a contest.  In fact when the kids were younger we just usually bought a big gingerbread house that we could make as a family.  As the kids have gotten older, we have made it into a contest where they each have their own gingerbread house that they are making.  One year, I was feeling adventurous and I made a train cake, not gingerbread, that we decorated and then we watched Polar Express.  That was a lot of work and I probably will never do it again but it was a fun family memory for the kids.  It looks a little different every year but the kids have fun and we usually end the event with watching a favorite Christmas movie.  If you live in the Seattle area, there is an amazing gingerbread contest that is free to tour at the Marriott hotel.  The gingerbread housed that they create a amazing and elaborate.  Its a fun tradition for some families to go to Seattle and tour the gingerbread displays.  I believe you even get to vote on which is your favorite.

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(By the way, this is not a picture of our gingerbread house we made, this gingerbread house looks amazing but in our house they looked a little more shall we say “kid friendly”.  In fact some of them you might have to label as gingerbread house to know what it is. Haha!)

These are just a few of our family traditions.  I love the freedom of homeschooling because it allows families to take off all of December if they want to or focus their curriculum on the birth of Christ and the meaning of Christmas.  Celebrating the birth of Jesus is an amazing and wonderful thing to do as a family.  Jesus was born so that He could die for you and me.  He loves us so much that he was willing to give his life so that we might be saved.  A friend of mine wrote a song about the meaning of Christmas called the “Reason for the Season”.  The lyrics talk about how we are in need of a Savior and we are in need of the Lamb.  How Jesus was the perfect gift for us and how we are the reason for the season.  I loved that line in the song that said “we are the reason for the season”.  I hadn’t thought of how the entire reason Jesus was born on earth was for us. Remember God loves you and that you are the reason for the season.

Merry Christmas!

 

 

 

 

Our First Day of School!

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We had our first day of school today! The plan for the first day every year is to make it a special time for the kids and do things that they normally couldn’t do if they weren’t homeschooled.  The first thing I did was wrap a new book up in wrapping paper and set it outside their door the night before.  When they woke up they were excited to see a gift outside their door.  Here is what the gifts looked like…

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I love variety and not doing the same thing all of the time, so I haven’t really done this before for the first day but it was fun putting the gifts together.  A couple of hours later we went out with Grandma and Grandpa for brunch to continue to celebrate the first day.  After brunch we went out shopping for school supplies.  I like getting school supplies after school has started.  You can sometimes get better sales and you miss the majority of the crowds.  Some schools have already started around our area but some hadn’t so there were still some people doing last minute shopping.  We headed home after shopping for school supplies and spent the day reading our new books and creating with our new art supplies.

The last thing we did to celebrate the 1st day of school was school pictures.  I told the kids that it was time to give Mommy her First Day of School gift by taking pictures.  The younger kids were excited and the two older  boys groaned but were willing.  I bought a blank chalkboard and then wrote on the chalkboard “First Day of School” and “Grade”.  I also added the question “What do you want to be when you grow up?”  I would switch the grade and what they wanted to be when they grew up for each kid.  This was my 3 year old’s turn to hold the sign.

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I really liked how the sign turned out.  Now if you are thinking how I must have some awesome artistic abilities you can stop thinking that now because my amazing artistic sister is the one who made the sign for me.  I have no idea how this sign would look if I was the one doing the writing.  There actually might not have been a picture if I had illustrated it (haha). Its nice having an artistic person in the family.  My sister is the best and not just because she is artistically talented.  Each of my kids chose a different career that they wanted when they grew up.  It was fun hearing what they thought.

Here is what my 5 kids want to be when they grow up-

9th Grader- Missionary

7th Grader- Fire Fighter

6th Grader- Missionary Doctor (She actually wants to do Doctors without Borders)

2nd Grader-Soccer Player

Pre-K- I want to be like Daddy (This was my hubby’s favorite for obvious reasons)

I think it will be interesting and fun to see what they think next year about what they want to be when they grow up.  Well, that was our “First Day” of School.  I would love to hear about other people’s ideas for the “First Day” of school and what kind of traditions they have kept with their family.  So feel free to email me or leave a comment about your ideas.  I am excited to see what this year brings.  The Adventure Begins…

First Day of School Ideas

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As a homeschool family, the first day of school is an opportunity to get creative.  We have enjoyed making the first day of school a day to have some fun and celebrate that we are homeschoolers. There are many creative ideas out there that parents have come up with to celebrate the first day of school.  Here are a few of our favorites….

  1. Make a special Breakfast
  2. Go to a favorite park
  3. Go to a bookstore and have each of the kids pick out a book
  4. Go swimming
  5. Eat lunch at a special restaurant or pack a picnic for the park
  6. Send kids on a scavenger/treasure hunt for school supplies around the house
  7. Go and buy school supplies ( the school supplies would be cheaper because school started)
  8. Interview sheets for the kids to fill out (this is more for mom and keeping memories)  I have seen some awesome interview sheets on pinterest to give kids.  They have questions, like asking the kids what they want to be when they grow up.
  9. Taking school pictures (Another thing for mom)  I have also seen quite a few creative ways to do this on pinterest.  My favorite is writing their grade on a small chalkboard and writing how what they want to be when they grow up.  The kids hold the chalkboard as you take the picture.  The Unlikely Homeschooler blog has examples of this.  She also has an excellent pinterest page for “First Day” of school.
  10. Play Family Games together

These are just a few of my favorites.  We don’t do all of them at once, I am quite eclectic with my first day of school just like my homeschooling.  Each year is different. Some homeshoolers do the same thing each year to create a tradition and memories for their kids.  I love this idea also.  Whatever you decide will be amazing for your family.  Enjoy the journey and creative opportunity of the “First Day” of homeschool.