I found a wonderful new resource yesterday. I get an email around every other day with links to free homeschool resources (apps, books, printables, etc). There is a religious aspect to some of the free resources if that is what you are interested in, but there is also quite a bit that can be used without including the religious aspect. You can follow this link to Compass Classroom and then click on Fun & Free. You'll find free lessons on social justice, literature, economics, Latin, and more.
I'm really excited to have found this new resource and to be able to share it! I've added it to the resources page also so it will be easily found in the future if need be!
Happy Homeschooling!! :)
Wednesday, July 23, 2014
Saturday, July 19, 2014
Getting Our Curriculum Ready!
Whoa!! The summer is ironically one of the busiest times for me...I'm busy preparing the curriculum for the upcoming year. Definitely check the resources page often over the next days and weeks...I will be adding pages often since this is when I'm accessing them most!
Getting the curriculum and work for the year ready is super exciting but it is tedious work. I love finding new resources and especially preparing the lessons! It's even more exciting in high school because of the interesting electives. This year he has chosen Video Game Theory, Creating Video Games, Notable People, History of Christianity, and Special Victims Law. (If anyone is interested, Video Game Theory and Analysis and Creating Video Games are free online full courses at MIT) I am still looking for resources for Special Victims Law, so if anyone knows of any good resources please leave a comment or inbox me with the info!!
Getting the curriculum and work for the year ready is super exciting but it is tedious work. I love finding new resources and especially preparing the lessons! It's even more exciting in high school because of the interesting electives. This year he has chosen Video Game Theory, Creating Video Games, Notable People, History of Christianity, and Special Victims Law. (If anyone is interested, Video Game Theory and Analysis and Creating Video Games are free online full courses at MIT) I am still looking for resources for Special Victims Law, so if anyone knows of any good resources please leave a comment or inbox me with the info!!
Monday, June 16, 2014
Summer is Boring....
Hayden is having a ball this summer...he's been away for a week and has hardly been in the house at all! I'm bored to tears though! I'm working on getting the curriculum ready for this coming session and sneakily tricking him into learning...LOL!
Wednesday, May 7, 2014
This Week Has Been Hard...
This week has been really hard. We've been getting things done, but not as much as normal. There is something you don't know about me...something I suppose I should share.
For the past eight years, I have been suffering from a couple of pain disorders. I was initially diagnosed with fibromyalgia, nerve impingement, and slight scoliosis. After more testing it was discovered that I also have rheumatoid arthritis. More recently, MRIs have shown that I have disc degeneration, bulging disks and pinched nerves.
Some days are better than others, but these days I don't have any really good days. I'm not even sure I remember what I feels like to not be in pain. Some days are really horrible and it seems I've gotten stuck with a few of those horrible days in a row.
Because I've been so miserable, I've been sleeping most of the day. When I am awake, I'm propped up in my adjustable bed trying not to focus on pain. My bedroom has been our classroom this week!
Anyway, I will hopefully be back to my version of normal soon and start posting more often again!
For the past eight years, I have been suffering from a couple of pain disorders. I was initially diagnosed with fibromyalgia, nerve impingement, and slight scoliosis. After more testing it was discovered that I also have rheumatoid arthritis. More recently, MRIs have shown that I have disc degeneration, bulging disks and pinched nerves.
Some days are better than others, but these days I don't have any really good days. I'm not even sure I remember what I feels like to not be in pain. Some days are really horrible and it seems I've gotten stuck with a few of those horrible days in a row.
Because I've been so miserable, I've been sleeping most of the day. When I am awake, I'm propped up in my adjustable bed trying not to focus on pain. My bedroom has been our classroom this week!
Anyway, I will hopefully be back to my version of normal soon and start posting more often again!
Thursday, May 1, 2014
Last Week...Otherwise Known As The Week After Spring Break...OR...Improvements To The Folder System!
Last week did NOT go well. After being off for Spring Break, Hayden made every attempt to get out of his school work. In the end, he declared that he doesn't like the folder system as is and that he wanted to make some changes.
The original folder system was that I'd give him a folder full of his work for the week each Monday. Everything had to be finished by Friday but if he finished sooner, he would have days off. However, he could not save all of his work until the last minute. He had to be working on it each day until it was all complete.
The changes that he wanted are actually really great and really responsible changes. He still wants the weekly folder, but he wants to work on things together like we did before. He still looks over the entire folder and decides how much and what he wants to do each day, but we work on everything together. For example, this week, his civics lesson is about propaganda. We read the packet together, taking turns reading paragraphs, then watched the video clips and looked at the pictures together while he read the questions aloud and asked any questions before answering them.
It's wonderful that he wanted to do this. With executive function and ADHD, he tends to have trouble staying on task and is easily distracted when he works on his own. He also rushes through sometimes and makes careless mistakes. Then we end up spending a bunch of time going over things to make corrections. Now he is staying on task and getting more done in a shorter period of time!!
I'm really glad that he made the request for the change so that I didn't have to. This way he made the decision and he's not left feeling like he did something wrong and had to be reigned in. It also shows him that admitting to needing help to succeed with something DOES NOT mean that you have failed!!
The original folder system was that I'd give him a folder full of his work for the week each Monday. Everything had to be finished by Friday but if he finished sooner, he would have days off. However, he could not save all of his work until the last minute. He had to be working on it each day until it was all complete.
The changes that he wanted are actually really great and really responsible changes. He still wants the weekly folder, but he wants to work on things together like we did before. He still looks over the entire folder and decides how much and what he wants to do each day, but we work on everything together. For example, this week, his civics lesson is about propaganda. We read the packet together, taking turns reading paragraphs, then watched the video clips and looked at the pictures together while he read the questions aloud and asked any questions before answering them.
It's wonderful that he wanted to do this. With executive function and ADHD, he tends to have trouble staying on task and is easily distracted when he works on his own. He also rushes through sometimes and makes careless mistakes. Then we end up spending a bunch of time going over things to make corrections. Now he is staying on task and getting more done in a shorter period of time!!
I'm really glad that he made the request for the change so that I didn't have to. This way he made the decision and he's not left feeling like he did something wrong and had to be reigned in. It also shows him that admitting to needing help to succeed with something DOES NOT mean that you have failed!!
Monday, April 14, 2014
Spring Break!!
It is Spring Break here for my daughter, niece and nephew. So...it's Spring Break for my son too! I am going to slip some education in this week though. The "pink moon" or "blood moon" is at about 2am tonight (tomorrow, I guess since it's after midnight!) and we are going to look at it and take some pictures. I'll teach Hayden about the lunar eclipse and why it turns the moon red, etc. I'm so sneaky with teaching!! LOL
Tuesday, April 8, 2014
Weekly Folder
We have started trying a little something new for us. It gives my son a bit more accountability and it gives me a little bit of free time!
On Sundays, I prepare all of his work for the week as well as a list of his assignments. On Monday morning, I give him his folder and it all has to be done by Friday. If he does it all on Monday, then he can relax for the rest of the week! (That has not happened yet!) The deal is, though, that he can't do nothing all week and try to scramble on Friday. He has to work on his folder each day until it is all finished.
This is only the third week of doing this and I'm not sure yet how well it is going to work. The first week went well, the second week didn't go so well and this week is going really well so far (and it's only Monday!!), so the results are not quite clear just yet.
One clear benefit so far is that he is really getting into writing! We are doing a section on novel writing. Everything is broken down into parts (ie. character development, setting, etc). I got the idea from the site One Year Adventure Novel and I've taken the free sample pages from there and another site (I'll have to find that one again). He is also enrolled in a free online class from Future Learn called Start Writing Fiction that will begin on April 28.
We shall see how this system works as the weeks go on!!
On Sundays, I prepare all of his work for the week as well as a list of his assignments. On Monday morning, I give him his folder and it all has to be done by Friday. If he does it all on Monday, then he can relax for the rest of the week! (That has not happened yet!) The deal is, though, that he can't do nothing all week and try to scramble on Friday. He has to work on his folder each day until it is all finished.
This is only the third week of doing this and I'm not sure yet how well it is going to work. The first week went well, the second week didn't go so well and this week is going really well so far (and it's only Monday!!), so the results are not quite clear just yet.
One clear benefit so far is that he is really getting into writing! We are doing a section on novel writing. Everything is broken down into parts (ie. character development, setting, etc). I got the idea from the site One Year Adventure Novel and I've taken the free sample pages from there and another site (I'll have to find that one again). He is also enrolled in a free online class from Future Learn called Start Writing Fiction that will begin on April 28.
We shall see how this system works as the weeks go on!!
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