Dr. Jean's Marcarena Bones Song

Private and Public Schools in the News

Private and public schools are once again in the news for problems that are catching the media's attention. Apparently, Minnesota's own Anoka-Hennepin school district is at the top of the attention. As the largest school district in the state, they have determined to no longer reject homosexuality but to now teach and encourage that it is neither right or wrong. You can read the Associated Press' article here:
http://www.onenewsnow.com/Education/Default.aspx?id=434750

Unfortunately, Christian private schools have their share of problems. With other states to eventually follow suit, Illinois has issued an edict banning prayer over PA systems prior to games at PRIVATE schools. Private schools have no say in this. So much for rights to God in private Christian schools.

Just as with public schools, Christian private schools are facing problems of cheating on tests. They are so bad in a North Carolina Christian school that teachers are having to confiscate cell phones. It appears that these kids are using their cell phones to text test answers during class.

This isn't to say that homeschooling doesn't have its problems, but this is an example of issues that parents have authority over in a homeschool setting.

St. Patrick's Day Projects

With St. Patrick's Day coming up, we're starting our lesson ideas this Monday so we'll have two weeks to learn about it. Of course, the most important part is teaching the true story of St. Patrick. It's hard to find things that don't get into leprechauns, pots of gold, rainbows, etc., since we've gotten so far away from the original intention of celebrating this man of faith. St. Patrick brought so many people to the Lord and it is now celebrating by getting drunk on green beer. Strange how that happens.

Anyway, I'll get off my soap box and share some of the ideas we've come up with. A good book for little ones to learn about the real St. Patrick is "The Story of Saint Patrick's Day," by Patricia A. Pingry. For older kids, I haven't found much for good ones so let me know if you do. We'll be going to the library this week and if I find something good, I'll let you know.

A good resource is the VeggieTales Sumo of the Opera movie. On it, there's a short skit at the beginning about St. Patrick. It includes how he taught the people of Ireland about God the Father, God the Son, and God the Spirit with a shamrock. It's a good introduction for kids, although it takes a few fictional spins here and there.

To make a complete unit study, we'll explore the continent of Ireland, including it's geography, history, society, etc. Try searching online for some Irish food recipes and cook a few. These will cover social studies and home ec.

Here's a recipe I found for Irish Soda Bread:
2 cups white flour
2 cups whole wheat flour
1/2 cup sugar
2 tsp baking soda
1 tsp salt
4 tbsp butter, chilled
1 cup raisins (Oh, come in--leave them in. It'll be good for the kids to get used to them!)
1 1/2 cups buttermilk or plain yogurt

Heat oven to 350. Combine dry ingredients in a bowl. Cut in the butter until it's in pea-sized clumps. Stir in the raisins and buttermilk or yogurt. Turn onto a floured surface and knead for 1 minute. Shape into a disc and put on a greased baking sheet. Cut an "X" in the top and bake for 45 to 50 minutes. Let cool 20 minutes before slicing.

By the way--the history on why the Irish made bread with soda instead of yeast is an interesting story in itself. See if you and your kids can find out why.

For art, make sure to have lots of green craft items on hand. Green construction paper and green pipe cleaners can be used to make shamrock headbands. You can also make a giant shamrock by making three hearts from green construction paper and sticking them together. This would be a good project to then write the names of each of the trinity members on: one for the Father, one for the Son, and one for the Holy Spirit.

There are tons of links and stuff for printables, activities, etc. online, but I haven't found that many that don't include all the leprechauns and stuff. If you are interested in incorporating those, then you shouldn't have a problem finding things online. We chose not to in order to stick to the original account and not fall into all of the things that take us away from the real meaning. The fact that this man followed God's call to go back to the people that enslaved him in order to led them to the Lord should be enough of a fascinating story for our kids (and for us adults)! I will post any good links I find in the next two weeks. Hope you enjoy!

MN Family Decides Price of Charter School’s Free Education Is Too High

An article recently released by the HSLDA (Home School Legal Defense Association) discussed a Minnesota family's experience with charter school and the many problems with it. The moral of the story? "School at home is not the same thing as homeschool." After finding out the hard way, this family resorted back to homeschooling. For the full article, click here:

http://www.hslda.org/hs/state/mn/200901230.asp

Favorite Picks for Elementary Homeschooling

Now that I've been homeschooling for at least five years and taught 3 children their elementary school basics, including learning to read, write, and math, I would like to post my favorite curriculum materials. As much as you can do for free, I've found these books to be essential. If you buy anything when you start out homeschooling young children, these are the books I recommend. Most of them are very inexpensive and some can be purchased used (if not all of them) as I have done.

Since learning to read was our first priority, finding a good phonics curriculum took precedence over other goals. After trying various methods and curricula, I have found my all-time favorite. I have used this book to teach two of my children to read; who, by the way, have VERY different learning styles. It seems to work for all different learning styles. It is called "Teach Your Child To Read in 100 Easy Lessons" by Siegfried Engelman. It uses a different type of method to teach children, called the DISTAR method. I was a bit skeptical of it at first and wondered if it would help them read anything outside of the book itself. Well, it made our son that we thought would never read well read chapter books by age 7. We usually start it around age 5 or 6 as long as they have a desire to learn to read. We want them to be excited about it and have a passion for learning to read before we move forward.

Here's what the book looks like, and here's a link to it on amazon, where you can look at the inside of the book.

http://www.amazon.com/Teach-Your-Child-Read-Lessons/dp/0671631985

It's a non-consumable book, meaning that you don't write in it and it can be used over and over again. It even shows parents what to say in each lesson and how to teach it. If you have a used homeschool book store in your area, they are likely to have at least a few copies of it. Once you use it for all of your children, you can sell it to someone else.

For math, we have found math-u-see to be an excellent curriculum. We bought it used at a homeschool book sale and although we bought the older style, the website offers updated student workbooks to go along with the older teacher's books. This is a good way to get it for a lot less, as long as you can find the teacher's manual and videos, since the company no longer offers these. The student workbooks offered through the company are fairly inexpensive. The biggest cost with this program are the manipulatives (blocks), which I would definitely recommend as necessary. They help young children begin to see math and numbers in a different, practical way than most of us learned. (You may find it worth the time to look at homeschool book sales and such to find them used for a fraction of the cost.) I've barely ever used the videos and when I have, it's mostly been for me to learn the math-u-see creator's way of teaching a particular concept. Like the reading book recommended above, this program stimulates a completely new way of thinking. The creator, Steve Demme, points out that because of the way we pronounce some of our numbers in the English language (especially the "teens"), American students have more difficulty with math than children from languages that say certain numbers differently. He explains this better in the video and shows how to display and pronounce numbers in a new way to overcome this problem.

Overall, this method has proved to excel our children to a degree that I cannot take credit for. It's worth the investment, especially if you can find it used, which is not that difficult in today's world. You can get a free demo, either online or via mail, by clicking the following link:

http://mathusee.com/demo.html

For those of us who include training up our children in the Lord's teaching as one of our main reasons for homeschooling, I would like to recommend our favorite writing program. "A Reason for Handwriting" series uses Scripture for handwriting practice, similar to the way children learned to read in the 1800's. Book K is the first book and instead of using scripture, it simply introduces children to letters and words that begin with that letter. I actually skipped this book since this was stuff I could do with a $2 pad of lined-paper. Once I felt they had learned their entire alphabet well, we started with "A Reason for Handwriting Book A." Starting with this book, the daily assignments are broken up into four separate days for each lesson, which is great for homeschoolers who do four days of school a week like we do. (We leave Fridays open for writing letters and doing field trips.) On the fourth day of each week's/lesson's assignment, the child writes the verse from which they have been practicing words each previous day.

Here's the link to it on christianbook.com where you can see sample pages:

http://www.christianbook.com/Christian/Books/product?item_no=785381&event=CF#curr

That pretty much covers the basics. As far as anything else goes such as science and social studies, that can all be natural learning for those early years. Explore the world around you in a natural and interest-led way and use the library! Please leave your comments if you have any questions or would like any more information. Homeschool blessings!

(I would also like to note that I get nothing by recommending these products. I have simply found them to be such good products that I would like other homeschoolers to experience the same benefits from them as I have!)

Thanksgiving Unit

I know I haven't posted for a while, but I still use the links to the left all the time. I found one for Thanksgiving that is great and wanted to point out to other homeschooling/non-homeschooling families checking out this blog. Click on the link to the left for the free social studies curriculums and click on either the American Heritage elementary, middle school, or high school link according to your child's age. Scroll down and open the pdf file for the Thanksgiving Unit. It's brief but it's a good start.

Here are some more links to other Thanksgiving projects:

http://www.enchantedlearning.com/crafts/thanksgiving/

http://www.sail1620.org/teaching_games.shtml#ColoringBook

http://www.crayola.com/free-coloring-pages/celebrate/thanksgiving-coloring-pages/

http://abcteach.com/directory/seasonalholidays/thanksgiving/
This one has some really fun stuff, including some cards to print off on card stock for a Thanksgiving memory game that we have already played and loved. It helps develop terms like "Mayflower" "Squanto" and "Pilgrims" in little kids' memories.

Most importantly, may our eyes be focused on thanking the Lord this Thanksgiving ahead of all of our modern-day traditions, just as our leaders have done before us, including Abe Lincoln. The main focus is what the pilgrims did: they left a life of what most Americans would consider "comfort" for the freedom to worship God as their almighty, merciful Father whom they each knew through a personal relationship with Christ. That kind of intimacy was against what the Church of England and those state churches allowed and thus, the pilgrims endured incredible hardship and for almost half of them, death, all for the freedom to continue their personal relationships with the Lord Jesus Christ. (Praise God for those of us who know that it's worth it!) Happy Thanksgiving!

Biblical Commands to Homeschool

I wanted to share a couple of articles that share what the Bible says about homeschooling. As said by HSLDA (Home School Legal Defense Association):

"God has delegated the authority and responsibility to teach and raise children to the parents first. Parents can delegate their authority to teach and raise children to someone else, but they can never delegate their responsibility to teach their children to anyone else. God will hold parents responsible for what education their children receive (whether from teachers, books, projects, or peers). To whom much is given, much is required. We have a free choice in this country to not send our children to an ungodly public school—we will, all the more, be responsible. Remember, our children are dying souls entrusted to our care!"

For the rest of their article, including Scripture to back this up, go to:

http://www.hslda.org/docs/nche/000000/00000069.asp

According to another online article, "Spiritual training is even more important than academic training, and it doesn't happen by accident; it must be purposeful and habitual."

Later, the article says, "Public schools are spiritual battlegrounds for our children. They are inundated with anti-Christian doctrine, relative morality, and secular humanistic theories. The Bible says, "Do not be deceived: 'Bad company corrupts good morals'" (1 Corinthians 15:33, NAS). Children tend to adopt the values of those with whom they spend the most time. In school, they are daily exposed to the value systems of non-Christian students, teachers, and faculty. They may be told that homosexuality is simply an "alternative lifestyle," that abortion is acceptable, and sex before marriage is normal, and even healthy."

Opting for private school doesn't eliminate the problems of peer dependency as listed in the Socialization blog entry below. "In biblical times, children were primarily educated and socialized by their families and simply by living and working in society. Instead of being put in age-segregated classrooms for the majority of the day, they learned to communicate with adults and children of all ages."

For the rest of this article, go to:

http://www.gotquestions.org/Christian-homeschool.html

I wanted to say one thing: Doesn't it seem odd that so many moms desire to be or train to be teachers? Could this have something to do with the way the Lord created moms with the desire and passion to teach their own children? Maybe, just maybe, our society has deceived us to think that the passion to be a teacher should be used to benefit other children at the risk of our own children?