“…the more a man looks at a thing, the less he can see it, and the more a man learns a thing the less he knows it.” – The Twelve Men, GKC Like nearly all of the homeschool moms I know, I approach term planning with a mixture of anxiety, guilt, and eager anticipation. I…
Category: Homeschool
Burgess Bird Book
In all of my childhood, I never heard of Thornton Burgess. It took motherhood and homeschooling for me to become acquainted with his genius and I am very sorry that I missed out on knowing him sooner. I personally do not love his writing voice, but I love his approach to the natural world and…
The Next Step: Blended Families
Part five of our Spelling series: Blended Families You’ve been working with your child on the single-sound consonants and the first sounds of vowels. He knows that most of the e’s on the ends of words are silent but busy. He’s wanting to know how to spell everything and trying to read signs and cereal…
Rory Story Cubes
Several years ago I *really* discovered Rory Story Cubes from a homeschool friend. Until that time, I understood that these funny little dice were a family game. Gathered around a table, families would roll the dice and then make up stories based on the pictures rolled. Interesting, potentially fun, but also anxiety producing in my…
Let’s Get Started
Let’s Get Started I’ve established that simply telling children, “English spelling doesn’t make sense, just learn it,” doesn’t work for me. I have also asserted that teaching phonics is essential. After my foray into a bit of the history of English, someone commented, “Fine, but I still don’t know how to teach spelling.” All right…
How Came We to Spell Thus
Part of our Spelling Series: How Came We to Spell Thus? Something to keep in mind in the midst of the “exception” frustration with English spelling is the fact that “way back when” (not to be too specific) there were no silent letters. All of the letters are there because they were pronounced at some…
A Severely Abbreviated History of English
Part of our Spelling Series: “The English have no respect for their language, and will not teach their children to speak it. They spell it so abominably that no man can teach himself what it sounds like.” – Pygmalion, Bernard Shaw The other day, my daughter (who is just now beginning to homeschool her first-born) and…
On Teaching Spelling
I have a confession, and I hope you won’t hate me for it . . . Spelling is easy for me. I started first grade in 1968. They weren’t teaching phonics. It didn’t matter—I already knew how to read. Everyone else was working their way through Sally, Dick, and Jane. What I remember about spelling…
Overview: Childcraft Children’s Encyclopedia Series
In my childhood home, we had a room called “The Library”. It was a beautiful room with dark wood built-in book cases and glass doors. It was always my favorite room in the house. My dad had a deep and lovely leather chair which was perfect for getting lost inside of a good book. My…
Exciting and Educational Brain Games
ese f A year or so ago, my family discovered the National Geographic Channel show Brain Games. It isn’t perfectly family-friendly, but there is much about it to love. We are a puzzle family and love Mad Libs, brain games, Ravensburger puzzles, etc. We love to exercise our mental muscles. Several years ago we removed…
Roman Roads Media: Old Western Culture Review
In the last year my life has been transformed and blessed by the CiRCE Institute and their partners. Specifically, God placed Sarah Mackenzie’s Teaching From Rest in my path at a time when I desperately needed permission to return to a classical way of thinking, teaching, and mentoring the souls in my care. Sarah’s little…
Teach Them to Learn
In the middle of a phone conversation with my oldest son the other day, he said, “Oh, Mom, I’ve been wanting to remember to tell you something. I want to thank you for teaching us how to learn.” What? Huh? I’m choking up already. “Young people these days (he’s 33 and already complaining about the…
Loving Evening Read Aloud
When I was eight years old, my parents took our young family to Europe including my six year old sister and four year old brother. It was 1984 and the dollar was worth almost one British Pound. It was too good an opportunity to pass up. My mom packed three canvas army duffle bags…