This post is my entry to win a camera in the "Share Your Favorite Lesson Plan" Contest sponsored by Sprittibee and Academic Superstore.

Last year William was getting bored and frustrated with math. He was doing addition and subtraction daily and was also trying to learn multiplication. After working out of textbooks for a while we decided to come up with a game to play for his math lesson one day.

Items needed: 2 6-sided dice or other multi-sided die.
pencil and paper or whiteboard and marker

Rules: Parents must play too. The child (or children, taking turns) rolls the die. Using the 2 numbers rolled, the child who rolled must come up with a math problem for the parent to solve. The parent writes the problem on the paper or the white board and figures it. The child can check the problem on paper or with a calculator. Then it's the parent's turn. The parent rolls the dice and gives the child (or children) a problem to do using the numbers rolled on the dice. The children have to solve the problem on paper or the whiteboard, not with a calculator.

We didn't have a winner or loser for the game. It was just fun for William to try to stump me by doing things like using dh's 20-sided die and giving me a multiplication or division problem with multiple numbers. We did agree on prizes at one point - if William could stump me, then I had to do something for him and if I got the problem right he had to do something for me.

We still play this game whenever math gets boring. It still provides practice in basic math skills but is much more fun than completing a worksheet page.

Labels: contest, education, game, math

I thought I'd post this week about how we are using the Lifepac curriculum and how it's working for us.

The material is sufficient and is in a scope and sequence like we wanted, so I have no complaints on that end. One lesson flows on top of another. I can't say that I've really even looked at the teacher editions once except to mark grades on tests. I know they have additional tips for projects, but I've just never felt a need to go over the information.

Planning is very easy using the Lifepacs. I have used The Full Year Notebook system for over 2 years now. I basically go through the lifepacs and plan how many pages will be done using the notebook system. I usually plan 12 weeks at a time - 5 weeks on, 1 week as a catch up week or week off. William can usually go through 4 or more pages in a day depending on the subject. Math is usually only 2-3 pages depending on the topic covered. The math has a lot of repitition, so if he knows the topic I only have him do a few of the problems presented. When doing my planning, I also search the United Streaming website and use our Tivo to find educational programming that corresponds to the material in the Lifepac.

I stated in another post that I had a hard time with the grading system. The self-tests and Lifepac tests are easy enough to grade. What I found difficult was a points system they use to compute the final grade using the grades from the individual tests as well as in-book practice work and an arbitrary point amount given by the teacher for the student's expressed knowledge. Instead of using the point system, I have chosen to average the grades from all the tests and get a final grade that way. I also know if William knows the material, so if he misses something on a test that I know he knows I will usually offer him a make-up lesson using the whiteboard to verify the knowledge. Then I give credit for the missed question.

Even with the ease of the books and the planning, we won't be using Lifepacs again next year the way we are this year. William is bored with the history and geography, so we'll be going back to a literature approach for those subjects. I'm already making a short list of curriculum we'll be using after the Lifepacs are completed. At this rate, he should be finished with some of the subjects by Christmas.

After posting a few weeks ago about us not being sick since homeschooling, I have to change that. My dh brought home an illness from work. He came down with a cold as well as a slight fever and now William and I are also showing symptoms. Not a lot of book work has been done this week, but he may be able to watch some of the videos that have been waiting in the wings and doing some reading. We did go to park day today, but ended up leaving early when William got too hot and started feeling worse. I still have to work, so I'm doing what I can to rest and keep my voice going so I can speak on the phone. Hopefully this will blow over soon and we can get back to normal.

Labels: lesson planning, Lifepacs, sickness, update

As part of William's paragraph writing, he chose to write about our dog, Jenna, who died suddenly last week.

Jenna wase a good dog. She whood looke ate you and you cant help to pet her. Jenna had a smile that neve whent away. She wase sneky she whood get your food and you whood not no it. We love Jenna and we miss her we love you Jenna.

I don't have the heart to correct anything on this paragraph this week.

This has been a difficult week all around. I don't know what hit us all on Monday, but we've all been in a funk. School work is behind for the week once again and we are very sad about losing Jenna. We're also beginning a new phase in our lives. My dh has enrolled in classes at a local tech school and has quit his job. The next few months are going to be difficult as he tries to swing a part-time job as well as school 2 days a week. In January I will also be returning to school. I've changed my major yet again to English with a literature concentration. The goal is to finish within the next 3-4 years and be able to get tutoring jobs. We have a long term goal for our family that we are beginning to slowly work towards. It's just been a very stressful week and I'm glad it's over.

Thank you, everyone, for your kind words about Jenna. We still miss her greatly, but we are blessed for having her in our lives for this brief time.

Labels: college, Jenna, school, update

This afternoon we had to rush our dog Jenna to the vet. She fell over suddenly, we had no idea what had happened to her. Scott wasn't at home so it was up to me and William. We got her to our vet and was told they would call us back after blood work had been done. In about an hour, she was gone.



The vet said it was a sudden aneurysm that happened in her abdomen. It was just a fluke. There were no symptoms, it just happened. He said there was nothing we could have done.

Jenna was a Spitz mix that we adopted from a shelter when she was just about a year old. She was the most loving dog I've ever known. She loved to be pet and even liked to sit on our laps. She would try to sleep between me and Scott, even trying to push us off our pillows.

We have no idea why this happened. Sometimes things happen with no explanation.

We are already missing her so much. It's hard to believe she's gone.

I urge all of you, if you want a dog please look at a shelter dog. Help give a sweet animal like Jenna all the love you can for as long as they are allowed to be with you.

Labels: dog, Jenna, pets

My youngest brother, Matthew, got married yesterday afternoon. We spent the day at the park where they got married and William helped out a lot as an usher. He helped set up some tables, helped people with parking passes for the park, and seated people. As part of the ceremony, he and his cousin seated the parents and grandparents for the wedding, then walked them out again before the reception. It was a really beautiful wedding.

Here is a picture of William in his dress clothes.

High school is around the corner it seems and I'm already beginning to freak a bit about what we're going to do. I thought I had settled on a correspondence course, but then I read a review that wasn't favorable. I feel that I want to be more involved in William's high school, though, not just hand him off to a correspondence school.

I would like any information that anyone can offer regarding homeschooling high school - plans you made, how you prepared for high school through junior high, how you handled weaknesses in any subject areas, books you read, blogs you know about from homeschoolers that have high school students, figuring credits, taking the SAT or the ACT, pretty much anything.

Please leave a comment or email me at the contact link above.

Our week has ended early as this was a catch up week with no new work planned. William does still have some Bible lessons to do, but that's all.

As a finish to his first 6 weeks of school, I created a report card for him and averaged all of his grades for the completed Lifepacs so far. He had Bs in Math and Science and As in history/geography and bible. His paragraph writing is also much better. Here is his newest paragraph:

I like comics because the peaple do things you can't in real life. I like to read Spider-men Bat-man and athers. The tv shows are based on the comics. I wach the movies to. The moves are based on the comics to. Tats y I read comics.

He did indent and he did use some very good handwriting. Near the end I noticed he didn't take as much care with his spelling as he did earlier. This is the most writing he's probably ever done and he did listen to instruction with a much better attitude this time.

Tomorrow he plans to read more of Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban, play some games, and work on his bible lessons. Friday will be busy because he has to get ready for my brother's wedding rehearsal that evening, then Saturday is the wedding. I went shopping with my future sister-in-law last Saturday and we bought clothes for one of her sons and William since they are both ushers. We found charcoal black slacks, silver gray shirts and black ties with small polka dots. I also found a blouse on sale at Cato's. We had a lot of fun and we're all really looking forward to the wedding.

It was a beautiful fall day. The sun was out, the leaves were changing color, the air felt crisp and clean. I was working at a local church as a secretary. I was at my desk working on the newsletter when the music minister called me from home and asked if I'd heard about the plane crash at the World Trade Center in New York. At the time, most people thought it was an accident. This was just after the first crash. I went to the CNN website and read about the first crash. After that came the news of the 2nd crash and CNN's site was getting so much traffic the site couldn't keep up. I went upstairs to the youth room and watched some of the coverage on the television. Even with 2 planes hitting the buildings I still was in shock, thinking this was too much of a coincidence to be an accident. I went back to my desk, trying to work on the newsletter but not really being able to concentrate. My husband called me from work soon after and told me about the plane hitting the Pentagon. That was when we were beginning to understand - this wasn't an accident. I didn't hear about Flight 93 until much later in the day.

William's school called and said they were cancelling classes for the rest of the day, so I went to pick him up and brought him back to the church with me. I called my mom to ask if she'd heard from my youngest brother in Atlanta. She had and he was okay. He was attending Art Institute and they had also cancelled classes for the day. Most of the companies in Atlanta had sent employees home as well.

I remember being very scared, even after flights had been grounded. It was very hard to concentrate on work the rest of the day. How could I worry about who had given what to the church and think of cute sayings for the newsletter when this was going on in the world? I don't know how long I watched the coverage after coming home that night. I cried along with people in New York who couldn't find their family members and friends. I listened to people on the news who were sharing voice mail messages left by their husbands and wives from the top floors before the towers fell.

I really don't remember what I told William about all of this. He was 7 at the time, so he understood some of what happened. I think after about 3 days of watching the news we finally either turned off the TV or watched some movies.

While time has passed the shock of that day has never really worn off. I hope that it never does, for anyone, because we need to continue to be vigilant so we can stop it from ever happening again.

Week 5 has ended on a pretty good note.

We have a new homeschool group :) Some members of our former church / former private school are now homeschooling as the private school William attended has closed down. Two of the moms started the group and we had a meeting / field trip to the library yesterday. There were about 16 kids there of all ages, so William was happy to have some boys his age to play with after the field trip. One of the librarians read some library stories then gave a tour. She explained about the Dewey Decimal System and how the books in the library were organized. After the tour we met and discussed monthly field trips, a weekly park day, and a newsletter. I will be heading up the newsletter for the group, emailing it to those who want email and snail mailing it to those who don't have email. I'm very happy about this chance to be a part of a group made of up people who know and understand our family.

Through the homeschool group we're signed up for the Pizza Hut Book It! program. This program allows your children to receive a coupon for a free personal pan pizza every time they reach a monthly reading goal. William has already completed 2 Harry Potter books and is now on book 3. He said his goal for this month is to read a total of 3 books, through HP #5. I'm very proud of his reading. I never have to tell him to do it, he carries the books everywhere. I hope when he's finished with these he will find others to read that are just as interesting to him.

We are now only a week behind in scheduled lessons, so next week will be a make-up week. I am going to supplement with some videos from United Streaming. I love United Streaming! Since we live in Georgia we get a free membership. Yesterday William watched the Magic School Bus show about digestion. I also found an episode of Slim Goodbody from 1980 as well. Remember him :) So next week will be catching up, schooling light, and supplementing with videos, as well as park day on Friday morning.

After almost 4 years of homeschooling I still don't believe I have this curriculum thing down. It's usually the first thing asked by a new homeschooler and no matter how perfect those books seem when they are brought home something is always wrong with it. So how do homeschoolers go about choosing curriculum?

This is focused more on those who enjoy some structure in their day and like to use workbooks and textbooks as well as supplement items such as videos and literature to correspond to what is learned. So, naturally, the first step is to ask yourself the following...

What kind of homeschooling parent are you? Do you desire structure? If so, a lot of structure or a little structure? Are you a first time homeschooler? Do you prefer to have lesson plans laid out for you? Ask yourself these questions and google homeschooling terms like unschooling, school at home, relaxed homeschooler, eclectic homeschooler, unit studies, classical homeschooling, literature based homeschooling and whatever other name you can think of. Read about these definitions. You will find that many people don't stick to one definition of their homeschooling style, but by reading about these different types you will be more apt to discover what you are comfortable with as far as curriculum choices.

What kind of learner is your child? Do they learn better if they hear something over and over? What about visualizing the subject in detail? Do they learn more by doing something, such as building a castle out of lego instead of just seeing it in a book? If your child is very young you may not know the answer to this question yet, so what are you to do? The answer to that is coming up. For others, here are some online tests to help determine your child's learning type:
Paragon Learning Style Inventory
Beachwood K12 School - scroll down for the tests

What are your goals for your children, for education and for life? These goals are based on the age of your child, their strengths, their weaknesses. What do you want to improve? If writing is poor, you may want to strengthen writing but not with a curriculum heavy in writing. If reading is slow and difficult, a literature based curriculum may not be right for your child. What do you want to focus on during their studies for the upcoming year? Most parents freak out at this point. Remember, NOTHING is perfect. There is no such thing as a perfect curriculum. Even public schools teach different topics at different times of the year. They also change curriculum almost constantly. Usually the only subjects that build upon each other is math and english grammar. The various topics that cover science and social studies can by taught in any order during the elementary / middle school grade levels. It's not until high school that the subjects are split into U.S. Literature, Grammar, British Literature, Physical Science, Chemistry and Biology. It doesn't matter if your 5 year old learns about frogs before dogs or flowers before ocean animals.

So, now you have your goals, you know what type of learner your child is, you've taken into consideration your child's strengths and weaknesses, you have an idea of a possible sequence you would like to follow. Now it's time to look at curriculum.

There is so much out there, it's amazing to think of all the material available. There are a lot of factors to choosing curriculum. Religious or secular based? What is the cost? Is it complete or do you need to purchase other items? How much parental time is needed for planning and teaching the material? Is the language easy or hard to understand? If your child is old enough, have your child look at the material with you if you can get some sample pages or see the curriculum at a book fair. Can they read and understand the instructions? Do they find it interesting? Do they like the format?

One main factor of curriculum is the cost. When at all possible buy used, especially if it's a new item you've never used before. If it's a complete curriculum, see if you can buy just 1 subject to try out. If you love it, you can buy the entire set the following year. Most homeschool conferences and book fairs are around the end of the school year, usually in April or May. Have your top picks chosen before you go, or at least an idea of what you need with you before you go along with your budget. Don't let the salespeople or frilly packaging make you spend more than you intended. If you can't find what you want used, then buy it at the cheapest new price you can find. Some online searching can dig up some great small homeschool bookstores that offer great programs at reasonable prices. If you are able to do so, keep the books clean and in good shape, then resell them to get money for the following year's curriculum.

I love reading homeschooling blogs to get ideas for William. Everyone is so creative. Sometimes I'll read a blog where a mom explains how she helped her child understand a topic. I'll hooray a bit to myself and let the mom know that my son was having the same problem and I'll try what she did to see if it helps. This sharing of information is one of the best things about the Internet. If you read about a curriculum that helped one child improve a weakness, then find the website, check it out, see if it may help your child overcome the same weakness. Get involved in a homeschool group in the local area as well and find out what members are using for their children. Browse their books if they say it's okay so that you can really see what the curriculum is about before you buy.

While homeschooling is a lot of fun, don't try too much. I loved the idea of a classical education, but that was my idea of fun, not William's. Adding in art and music studies with Shakespeare is great, but not right for William at the time. That stuff will be added in with time. When school time gets to be hard on everyone and not fun anymore, that's when it's time to cut some things back - whether it's the extra activities outside the home or extra subjects that just aren't working.

And the final thought about choosing a curriculum - everything changes. What you pick now may not be right next year. But don't choose curriculum out of desperation - choose it with a purpose.

My mom, William and I went to Cathedral Canyons State Park near Grant, Alabama as our Labor Day field trip. It was about a 3 hour drive, but it was a beautiful day so it wasn't bad at all. We had a picnic lunch and got there about 2pm central time.

This is the largest cavern I've ever seen. It has a massive natural entrance, however parts of the entrance were bulldozed by one of the owner's of the cavern in the 1980s. The cavern wasn't taken over by the park service until the mid-1990s.

My pictures cannot do this place justice. It's HUGE! The lighting is kept muted to keep the cave feel. It's about 52 degrees once you're in the deepest part of the cavern. Humidity is kept high in order to help the structures continue to grow. There is a even a fern growing within the cavern that has been there for over a year. It grows with no natural light.





We had passed the campus of the Kate Duncan Smith DAR School, so we stopped on the way back to walk around.

We thought it was a private school since it is funded partially by the DAR, however it is a public school and does accept funding from the local school district. The earliest building we saw was built in 1937. Most buildings have been built from natural resources in the area, including field stone and pine logs. The newer buildings use modern, tan colored brick, but they still fit in with the feel of the old campus. Part of the campus is on the register of historic places. The historic marker in front of the school states that the school was founded in order to provide a patriotic eduction with ideals of God, country and service. Since it is considered to be part of the public school system, I wonder if it still provides those ideals within their curriculum. I looked at the website and wasn't able to see how their curriculum differed from other public schools in the area, even though the Board of Trustees message says their curriculum cannot be taught in most schools in the United States. At any rate, the campus is lovely and the historic buildings are fascinating, especially the old water tower from the 1930s that was converted into a bell tower.

This was a shock to see on Yahoo News.

Steve Irwin Killed by Stingray

Well, our first month is complete :)

We are still pretty much following the plan that I set up. After next week I have planned a "catch up week" so that anything not going to schedule can be caught up and implemented. It will also be a light schooling week and probably won't include every subject every day. I'm not sure if we'll do school on Monday or not. If I can sneak a holiday past William then I want to do it. But I can also see if his cousins are out of school and if so he may like to go hang out with them instead.

So far he's finished 3 of the History/Geography Lifepacs, 2 Bible Lifepacs, 2 Science Lifepacs, and one Math Lifepac. Of course the point isn't "get through the books" but to understand the material. He is understanding it and is making As and Bs so far. Anything that he doesn't make a passing grade on I go over the next day. Sometimes it's a misunderstanding based on how the book is asking the question. When I go over what the book is actually asking for, he can answer the question fine. I then give a make-up test based on the test that was failed and that grade is counted.

William has said to me that the History/Geography Lifepacs are boring. He said he wants to study Medieval times instead. Since we've already purchased the Lifepacs, I told him he needed to finish what we had then we could find another curriculum or do unit studies on Medieval times. If all goes according to plan then he should be finished with the Lifepacs by Christmas and we should be able to begin another curriculum in January. We'll also add a Geography curriculum then as well. I admit I'm looking around, but I'm not actively shopping for one or changing right this second. I'm staying calm and telling myself I don't NEED another curriculum right now, there are still 4 more months planned for the Lifepacs. It's difficult to NOT browse a few catalogs, though.

The new grading system is working fine for us. I am averaging grades instead of using the Lifepac point system. If anyone wants a copy of the excel file I'm using, just email me at gift underscore lady AT yahoo dot com and I'll send you a copy.

His paragraph writing has improved! Yay! He read this article I found about the parts of a paragraph and his next paragraph was indented AND he used a concluding sentence! He did still have problems with a run-on sentence and some comma usage, so I still have him practice those things. However, he is writing more. He writes notes to me and his dad, he wrote goals for a game to himself on an index card, and he is writing emails to his Nana in Florida.

On another happy note, he finished Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone and has begun The Chamber of Secrets! Last year it was such a pain just to get him to read 1 chapter in White Fang. Today he's devouring the HP books! I'm so happy he's finally enjoying reading for pleasure and hope he continues with other books.

So we've had a pretty good first month of school, lots of new things learned and more new things to come. I hope everyone else is also having a good year so far.