Homeschool ABC

Combining My Efforts

2009-02-18T09:00:00.001-05:00

As my life gets more and more hectic, I'm finding that I need to combine some of my blogs. So I'm combining my Good Mornin' God and Homeschool ABC blogs into my latest life-styles blog http://pinkpotpourri.blogspot.com/ in an effort to relieve some of my blogging stress. I will create a label Homeschool ABC so that you can easily find the latest posts for that section.

Homeschool ABC will remain active until I can remove all the content I need from it. Visit http://pinkpotpourri.blogspot.com/ for all new posts from today onward.

Need Maps?

2009-02-11T08:24:00.000-05:00

Below is a great site to download maps for your geography lessons.

http://nationalatlas.gov/printable/reference.html#list

Baptist Curriculum Site

2009-02-09T08:14:00.004-05:00

Preserving God's Word through Christian education with total curriculum for grades Pre-K through 12th grade. Six subjects taught: Bible, English, History, Literature, Math, Science.

Check out Landmark's Freedom Baptist Curriculum at www.landmarkbaptistchurch.org/lfbc

College Scholarships

2009-01-14T08:42:00.004-05:00

Our older son is heading to college this week. A while back I posted about how he is finishing his last semester of high school in dual enrollment - one class at the high school and 9 hours of college courses at the local college. He goes to public school but he would still encounter the same things we're going through if he were homeschooled. By the way, they are including ways in the instructions now for homeschooled individuals to be able to enter college. This used to be a nightmare for homeschooling families. Many simply require that you keep records of the child's grades (there are online sites that will do this for you) and make the required scores on the ACT, SAT or Compass tests to enter. Hopefully I'll remember all of this when it's time to send our younger one to college.

It's still a bit of a nightmare as I'm learning as I reach each new step. The college courses the older son is taking are payed for by the state. Many states have this type of enrollment. It takes a few phone calls both to college and high school, your child has to make a B average, fill out registration papers, etc. and your child has a free semester of college. I'm just finding out from my husband that there are 2 summer courses our son can take free of charge also. That will be the next thing to check into.

Anyway, I need to start applying for scholarships for him to continue his college education after this semester. You have to re-apply before each semester; there isn't a scholarship that will take them all the way through college. There's a very tight window in which you can apply and very many processes to go through. You can only apply for fall semester after you have your income tax return. You need to apply with FAFSA before you can apply for any other scholarships. Many scholarships aren't available for summer classes.

In a nutshell, to apply for a fall semester scholarship that has to be turned in by March 2nd:

He signed up for Selective Service (all males have to do this to be eligible for financial aid, receive grades, transcripts, etc.). Rules are that they have to be 17 years and 3 months to sign up but won't be officially registered until 30 days before their 18th birtdays and will receive their number within two weeks of that. This number has to be turned into the college.
We are waiting for W-2 forms to arrive so we can fill out the income tax returns.
We will fill out a FAFSA application.
We will fill out Hope, State Lottery and other financial aid applications offered from the FAFSA site.
We will fill out the college's financial aid applications.
Check and double check to make sure all i's are dotted and t's are crossed and that all documents that are required go with the application are with the application. You won't even be considered for the scholarship if anything has been overlooked or is missing.
Some of these scholarships require a cover letter and resume of school performance, work history, extracurricular activities, etc. to be considered for a scholarship. That's what we're working on right now while we're waiting on those W-2 forms.

Wish us luck.

Moving Along

2009-01-09T11:11:00.002-05:00

Our first week back from Christmas break has moved along very well. As a matter of fact, it's been MUCH better than I anticipated. We're back to routine - working on all subjects - now that those fractions are finally over with.

I hope to add more educational sites and teaching tips soon so stay with us. Have a super day!

When to Slow Down

2008-12-18T10:37:00.002-05:00

Slow down and spend more time on a subject when it requires more concentration. For the past month, that's what I did to teach our son fractions. The only other two subjects we studied during that time were Spelling and Government. I didn't want to rush through fractions every day so I set aside Reading, Writing, & Language Arts so that he'd be able to study fractions for a couple of hours on a daily basis. We were even able to begin decimals before we began Christmas break.

We'll still be able to finish Language Arts and complete most of his reading and writing assignments this year.

Decimals & Fractions

2008-12-09T13:14:00.004-05:00

Well, we started decimals this week. And we'll continue those through the end of the week. So far it's been simple with tenths, hundredths, thousandths and ten thousandths. All you have to do is count the zeros to insert your numbers into the proper place value. Tomorrow will be more challenging as we have to turn 5ths into tenths and hundredths. I'm going to switch gears next week and exchange Math for English. We should also be finished studying Government in Social Studies next week also so that we can move ahead in Science after Christmas. Have a nice week everyone!

December

2008-12-01T07:52:00.002-05:00

Well, we made it through Thanksgiving. We hope all of you had a wonderful holiday. Only 2 1/2 more weeks until we get to Christmas break. At that point we'll be half way through the school year. We're still working on fractions; this book (Spectrum 6th grade math) really breaks this process down thoroughly. We'll be finished with that and will be ready to begin with decimals after the New Year.

Have a great December!

Short Week

2008-11-24T07:43:00.003-05:00

With Thanksgiving in just a few days, this will be a short week for us. We'll finish up Life Science and complete a chapter of Spelling - no spelling test this week. It's rare that I'll not give a spelling test but knowing that it was going to be a short week, I selected the easiest group of words for us to study this week for this 9 week period. Next week it will be school as normal.

Older Son Heading to College!!!

2008-11-18T07:07:00.003-05:00

Our older son will finish out his last semester of high school at college. We're so proud of him. He took his ACT test in October and has met the requirements of the Fast Track program which allows him to go to college and earn a semester of college credits and high school credits at the same time. Best of all, we don't have to pay a dime.

He is going to public school (I did homeschool him during his 5th and 6th grade years) so I'm not sure how this works out with homeschooling parents but it is worth checking into to find out if your area has a program like this and if homeschoolers are included. My husband heard about it at work so I called the school to ask about it and thank goodness we found out in a nick of time as this is only available to Seniors during their second semester - in our area. It may be different in other regions of the world.

So now I get to coach him through this stage of his life next. He's a smart kid but he needs that extra push to keep him motivated. I'm hoping that he does well enough to get much of his education paid for with scholarships. This college has a great relationship with the local high schools and a local large chemical company for job placement. He has worked at a local grocery store (for a year) that cooperates with his high school as well. So he has a bright future if we can get his current work schedule to work out with his college level classes. Hubby works at the chemical company as well as an apprentice instructor so he has some pull to help get our son's foot in the door while he's going to college which will help pay for his college expenses too!

Thanks for listening to a gloating mother's ramblings this morning. I need to get his application in the mail before I start class with the younger son this morning. Have a wonderful day!

Great Work At Home Resources

2008-11-12T14:49:00.002-05:00

This mom has really done her homework and she is sharing everything she knows about searching for work-at-home jobs with all of us! She homeschools as well so that's why I particularly wanted to share her site and blog on this site. Enjoy!

http://www.wahrc.com/index.html

http://wahrc.com/blog/

November 10, 2008

2008-11-10T08:17:00.003-05:00

Wow! It's been a while since my last post. Time sure does fly. We're really concentrating on fractions right now in Math. We're moving along faster in Social Studies than I anticipated. We finished studying Culture and Economics. This week we're going to forge ahead with Government and will try to finish that by the end of this month. We need to finish the last little bit of Life Science in December before we take off for Christmas break. I may have to intertwine the two subjects those couple of weeks in December so that we'll stay on track with science and we'll actually be ahead in Social Studies. Everything else we can pretty much relax with throughout the year - daily Spelling lessons, a day or two of reading and writing each week. We're even relaxed with Language Arts this year and will be finished shortly after the New Year. And I haven't had to slack much on my own daily routines. If anything I've improved on my house cleaning and laundry. I'm tired but I'm keeping up.

Happy Homeschooling!

More Christian Magazines

2008-10-20T07:45:00.000-04:00

I received a few more correspondence mailings after all my textbook orders went through. Below are links to a few more Christian magazines you may find interesting.

God's World News
http://www.gwnews.com/ - 4 reading levels Pre - K through 9th grade

Creation Illustrated
http://www.creationillustrated.com/ - Readers call it "The Christian answer to National Geographic." The leading Bible-based nature journal.

Keeping Up

2008-10-17T07:31:00.002-04:00

Well, I must say that we've been very busy the past couple of weeks. Our new school schedule is really working out well for both my son and me. He is able to accomplish a lot on his own while I create items to sell on my website.

Teaching gives me great pleasure. Whether it's homeschooling my son, creating tutorials & patterns or offering tips about crafting, cooking, cleaning or life in general for my website customers and Sew Practical blog readers http://sewpractical.blogspot.com/ and www.sewpractical.com, or helping people cope with their day with the two blogs below.

Mom is taking care of the Devotions Magazine Blog http://devotionsmagazine.blogspot.com/ on a near daily basis. She is concentrating on being thankful now through Thanksgiving - using the Bible to reflect on life. I originally started this blog as a different venue to take my thoughts but I haven't had much time to carry out my ideas and Mom is doing such a great job and having so much fun with it that I think I'll let her carry on.

I have been busy taking care of the Good Mornin' God Blog http://goodmorningod.blogspot.com/ with Christmas as my theme. As we finish Christ's birth from the Bible, I'll begin to explore the meaning of Christmas around the world for readers through Christmas Eve. After Christmas, I'll explore the life of Christ through Easter. Each Monday I try to include a thought for the week to challenge myself and other Christian women to be our best. And I'll carry out my ideas in this blog as they slowly come along through poetry and other ways that I like to express myself.

Thanks for dropping by to read this morning. Have a nice weekend.

Christian Magazines

2008-10-06T07:34:00.001-04:00

Below is a website that offers subscriptions to a couple of Christian magazines.

www.cph.org
Portals of Prayer - Published Quarterly
My Devotions - Encourages 8 to 12 year olds to build a daily Bible reading habit

http://devotionsmagazine.blogspot.com/
A free online magazine written by women, about women and for women

Finally A Great Lesson Plan

2008-09-30T08:00:00.003-04:00

After 2 months of school, we finally have a lesson plan that's working for us and I thought I'd share it with our readers.

Many people think that you have to cram every subject into each day. I learned early on that it's very difficult to do this and that the child doesn't seem to learn very well under those circumstances. So I've broken this down to a workable plan that we tweak as we go until it works. And we get our 4 hours each day that is required by our state.

Spelling - Monday - Wednesday, test on Thursday

Reading - Reading Comprehension on Monday
Read a chapter or two from his favorite book on Friday

Language Arts - Complete two pages each day Wed., Thurs., & Fri.
Analogies as extra learning on Tuesday

Math - Wed., Thurs., Fri. - One of each: add, subtract, multiply, divide
Work on new lesson: weight conversion, fractions, etc.

Social Studies/Science- Wed., Thurs., Fri. - Work on one subject one month and the other
subject the next month. You need to really get as much accomplished
as you can each month. Both subjects have a lot of information to cover.

Writing - Fridays only. You should be getting a lot of writing assignments with Language Arts.

If you finish early, EXERCISE. Remember those deep breathing & stretching exercises I discussed earlier in the school year. Many public schools are working that into their lesson plans as well.

History Help

2008-09-29T07:31:00.002-04:00

Below are a couple of different ways to venture into History.

www.time-lines.net
See Bible and World History together!

www.bfbooks.com
History through Literature

Grammar & Spelling Help

2008-09-22T07:28:00.002-04:00

Need help with grammar & spelling? Maybe you can find it at the following links.

www.egumpp.com
Master grammar

www.spelling.org
Tools for spelling

Writing Help

2008-09-15T07:25:00.002-04:00

Below are a few sites you might want to check out for writing help.

www.vantageonlinestore.com
Because writing matters

www.excellenceinwriting.com
Consistently the best

Gas & School

2008-09-12T07:32:00.003-04:00

My older son called me when he arrived at school awhile ago. He told me that he had overheard a conversation yesterday about gas stations in our area possibly eliminating regular gasoline. While he was driving to work he glanced over at the grocery store marquis where he works (they have a gas station also) and noticed that the regular prices were missing meaning that what he overheard was true.

I expect that soon the schools in our area will have to start making choices - eliminating a day from each week by adding hours to the other days the kids attend, charge the kids for bussing, or adopt an online public school system. This is our older son's last year of school so perhaps he can enroll with an online college or university for his advanced education. I sure would like to see free online education advance to the public schools for our younger son before I have to admit him in the 9th grade.

Now I'm going to go think of a few more things I can eliminate from our lives so we can purchase our gas. (rolling eyes)

Math & Science Help

2008-09-10T14:01:00.002-04:00

Below are a few sites I've received in the mail that you may find useful.

Math-U-See
www.MathUSee.com

Bring Science Home with Apologia Educational Ministries, Inc.
www.apologia.com

Bio Corporation for Biology Products
www.biologyproducts.com

Curriculum Packages

2008-09-08T08:42:00.000-04:00

I've received some corespondence mail about places you can check out to purchase curriculum packages from. Again, I thought I'd share this info with our readers. i hope you find this information helpful. Good luck!

http://www.lincolnchristianacademy.com/
Lincoln Christian Academy
minimal parental time needed, individualized, economical

http://www.face.net/
The Noah Plan Curriculum
Foundation for American Christian Education

http://www.clp.org/
Christian Light Education
K-12 complete program

http://www.christianlibertypress.com/
Christian Liberty Press
Affordable, consistently biblical

http://www.homeschoolingbooks.com/
Complete curriculum packages, large selection of books, Christian values throughout

http://www.basicchristianeducation.com/
Bible based curriculum, easy to use, record keeping service, reasonable rates

Schedules

2008-09-04T07:52:00.002-04:00

For the first 3 weeks of school I scheduled our son for Writing & Reading Comprehension on the same days. That wasn't working out very well as he doesn't like doing either. So for our 4th week, he & I changed his schedule so that these subjects aren't on the same day which at the time he does approve of.

So the teaching tip is......If the first schedule isn't working out very well, then change it to work better for you and your child. This may even require a couple more changes as you go. The classes have to be completed so the easiest way to get your child to complete them is what you're striving for.

Improve, Excel, Fun

2008-09-02T07:32:00.003-04:00

Below are sites that I've received information about in our regular mail. Today I'm including computer skills, animation (which is what our younger son that I homeschool would love to learn), & foreign languages.

www.MotherboardBooks.com
For kids 12 & up
Includes Computer Science Pure and Simple to help your youngster become comuter savvy.
Also Logo Adventures for a fun, creative experience in animations and drawing.

www.nr-productions.com
Ages 8 + Turn toys and household objects into animated videos with Windows computers. Affordable kit has everything you need to learn to write script, set building, lighting, sound and video editing.

www.talkingfingers.com
Phonics-to-Fluency Software for Hands-on Reading & Spelling. Read, write and type learning system online edition.

The remaining sites are Foreign Language sites.

www.queenhomeschool.com
Lessons for the little ones, very young, elementary, secondary & high school levels

www.power-glide.com
Enhanced with graphic & gaming technology; online lessons

www.learnables.com
Tested on thousands of students; combines pictures, sound & text to maximize learning.

Fun Educational Magazines

2008-08-27T09:28:00.002-04:00

Below are a few magazines I've received information about that you may find helpful in you daily teaching.

www.LearningThroughHistory.com Ages 10 & up

www.CreationIllustrated.com The Christian answer to National Geographic

www.NatureFriendMagazine.com Helping Children explore the wonders of God's creation; also looking for your stories, art, photos, puzzles, and poems.

www.UnlessTheLordMagazine.com Practical advice, encouragement, family health, home crafts, and much more