Wow, September already, huh? I hope you all had a fantastic weekend and Labor Day. Over the weekend my sister, Amanda, and I had a surprise birthday party Mother Dear. We had a wonderful time and she had no idea about it! We were thrilled! It was her 40th birthday and we wanted to something special, though we have been thinking about the Drews Family TX all week. Please continue to pray for them and offering your words of comfort and encouragement. We also published our September issue of Growing In Grace Magazine the layout is BEAUTIFUL. We had so many wonderful articles and three giveaways going! If you have a daughter, or are just a mother, please go check it out.

THEME

I hope last week’s theme helped you get a bigger view and maybe some ideas about different ways to homeschool or curriculum. There is so much to share and so I hope this helped, especially the new homeschoolers, narrow things down a bit. I am sure some of you are still getting into your homeschool routines. I know some people are very routine oriented while others may be more “day-by-day”, and it all depends on your family and what works best for your life-style. This week please post what your planned homeschool routine is. The theme banner should give you some ideas on how to do that. I had fun making that and adding in real info (except for the times! lol).

When you’re done posting your routines please share your prayers for this school year, and then sign the linky so others can visit.

Again, please enter in your DIRECT link to your HM post and not just your blog link. When others go back to look over the themes they will be able to go directly to your post rather than just your front page.

MY THEME

While I am going to be following Mother Dear’s lead with the routine here is what I plan to do for myself. I will be doing a lot of independent studies, I think.

7:30 - Rise, feed animals, do chores

8:00 - Read Bible chapters, prayer time

8:30 - Hygiene - brush my teeth, get dressed, hair/make-up

8:40 - 20minutes room sweep

9:00 - Check email, read comments, post (if scheduled)

9:30 - Start mathematics

10:30 - Write articles (Growing In Grace Magazine, Feelin’ Feminine, Homeschool Seniors, A Pondering Heart)

12:00 - See about lunch

1:00 - Manage business work (GGM ads, A Pondering Heart designs, The Homesteading Carnival)

That’s all I’m planning to for now. I know Mother Dear has some wonderful plans for school, including learning Spanish, Bible-Ancient History-Jewish Culture Study, Science, and lapbooking. I’m not sure how well I can stick to this routine, but at least I have some goals set forth and perhaps that will give me more motivation to stick with it.

Blessings!

Hello everybody! I haven’t posted much yet, but I’m Sheila, and I’m great! At least, that’s what I’m telling myself as I am sitting here with wet hair at 8:52 a.m. when school is set to begin at 9:00 and I haven’t had breakfast yet and the kids are complaining. But I’m great! Yeah, right.

 

In my public life, I write. A lot. I’m the author of four books, and you can check them out here. In my private life I homeschool three kids and I surf the internet and I pretend that I am not sneaking chocolate every chance I get.

But while I surf the internet, I come up with things for your benefit! So here is our Tuesday Tour.

First, for a laugh, you have to watch Tim Hawkins’ video on being a Homeschool Family. I think I posted this before, but it’s worth another go.

Now for the serious stuff. Make sure you read my post here and watch the accompanying video if your children have ever learned math in public school. Or if you’re not sure if your math textbook is really teaching your children to do multiplication and long division properly. Sorry for linking to myself, but it’s really the video you have to watch!

 But let’s talk SUMMER! The school year’s winding down, so we parents are wondering if we should throw in the towel now on school or keep slogging away. And next year’s curriculum is on everybody’s mind.

The Thinking Mother has a great post on 10 things to think about when choosing curriculum.

Our own Sprittibee is talking Elementary Grammar curriculum!

Stepping Heavenward is a recovering curriculum junkie, and has a couple of posts up about trying to decide what to do for next year. Start here and then look around.

For those still heading out to conventions, Mingo has a good post on how to handle all the pressure in the curriculum hall!

With a Taste of Chocolate helps you put standardized testing in perspective. And gives her thoughts on the end of the school year. But be sure to read her other posts; she’s got some funny stuff in there.

And here’s something cool: Want to teach your kids Hebrew for free? Heart of Wisdom has a link to how you can get a great Hebrew tutorial by email for no money! It looks promising, and I’ve signed up.

That’s all for now! Have a great one!

And be sure to stop by To Love, Honor and Vacuum! I’ve got a book giveaway contest going on!

 

~~~~~~~~~~~Mark your calendar~~~~~~~~~~~

 

Carnivals:

–>Judy of Consent Of The Governed will be hosting the next Carnival of Homeschooling.

–>The Charlotte Mason Carnival is at Liberty and Lily.

–>The Homesteading Carnival is at Shades of Pink this week.

–>The next Carnival of Principled Government is to be held at She’s Right.  Here is the handy dandy carnival submit form.

–>The Carnival of School Politics and Philosophy is up over at Bell Work Online.

–>This week’s Carnival of Space is up at Dynamics of Cats.

Contests:

*COH Icon - Graphics Contest at Why Homeschool*

• Don’t forget the Cates are holding a contest for icons for The Carnival of Homeschooling!  Why Homeschool’s Carnival of Homeschooling Graphics Contest

*Dianne asks, “Ready for a Contest?” *

• and challenges you to participate and enunciate something great to shoot for as a goal in 2008. You can even abbreviate, and please don’t be late. Contest ends 12:00 midnight on Thursday, January 31, 2008.

*“Write Like Mike” Homeschool Writing Contest * 

• Calling all homeschoolers who think they can “Write Like Mike.” Know any sports-crazy children between the ages of 8-12? Get them to write a sports column about a local or national event (250 words or less) and have them enter Walden Media/The Old Schoolhouse Magazine’s “Write Like Mike” Contest for an opportunity to have their sports column published in an upcoming issue of The Old Schoolhouse Magazine!  SUBMISSION DEADLINE: February 14, 2008

*MamaArcher Book Giveaway*

• MamaArcher is having a giveaway! To enter, leave a comment. If you want a second entry, please post about his on your blog & link back to this post. Please leave a comment HERE with the url of that post. The last day for entries is February 3rd. The winner will be announced on Feb. 4th. Good luck & spread the word! She is offering the following book: Upper Grade Phonics by Joyce Codesa, Sarah McFadden Fornara, Jan Martin, and Norm Sneller

*Heart of the Matter Online Homeschooling Mag Homeschool Care Package Contest*

• Sometimes it is just a bit hard to get back into the swing of things after the holidays so how about a Homeschool care package to bring a little excitement back?  One lucky winner will receive a very well-stocked homeschool care package!

*Heart of Wisdom E-Book Contest*

• I have not yet even blogged about the HOW E-Book I won in this contest! A Free Book Random Drawing will be held every Monday through the months of December and January starting December 10. Each week, THREE Heart of Wisdom subscribers will be randomly selected to receive one FREE Homeschool Book from Homeschool-Books.com. We will offer a new title each week. 1st place will receive the tree book 2nd and 3rd place will receive the Ebooks.

~~~~~~~~~~~Participate in~~~~~~~~~~~~

*January SWAP TIME!*

It is time to sign up for the January SWAP! Leave a comment and let Heather know you want to participate. If you have never participated in a swap, Check out our past SWAP Posts here at HSBA. Chances are they will answer all of your questions and more. Oh, and if you swapped in the past and forgot to send in your link, it isn’t too late! We would love to add your post showcasing your swap gift to our past posts. People still like to click back and see all the gifts, so by all means - share! 
  

*The Winter Reading Challenge*

Trish’s Winter Reading Challenge is from Jan. 7th - March 17th, 2008. It’s not really a contest, but Trish is giving away a $25 Amazon gift certificate to one participant!
You need to read her original post so you know what to do, like sign Mr. Linky with a direct link to your post once you’ve had a chance to make a list of the books you intend to read between January 7 and March 17, 2008. Also, As an added incentive, she will be sending one lucky participant a $25 gift certificate to (where else?) Amazon.com. She’ll do a random drawing from the names of everyone who posts both an initial list by Monday, February 11, 2008 and a post about their results at the end of the challenge. The drawing will be held Monday, March 17, 2008 sometime in the evening. The winner’s name will be posted after the drawing. :)I am making a list of books I want to read this year. I will be adding to it as I go, and I will try to complete as many as I can in the WRC time. Please go to her original post to get all the details! 

*Homeschooling Boys Website and Yahoo Group*

HomeschoolingBoys.com is a site I just found a couple of weeks ago. It is a site for homeschool families with boys and covers topics from homeschool issues to discipline to field trips. There is a Yahoo Group you can Click to join here!

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~Take A Look~~~~~~~~~~~~~

English and Grammar Curriculum: 

English for the Thoughtful Child 1 is an English/Writing for children ‘Grades: 3-4′. A Simply Grammar-like course for a younger child following the Charlotte Mason approach from Greenleaf Press. It contains everything you need for language arts - wholesome classic literature excerpts, narration, dictation, memorization, and composition. Lessons are self-contained and the book is very easy to use with short, manageable exercises and assignments. Like Simply Grammar, this volume is also a revision of an older book, complete with quaint, but stimulating, period illustrations.

English for the Thoughtful Child 2 is the English/Writing for children ‘Grades: 3-4′. This sequel contains all the distinctive features of the original. It contains nature lessons, oral composition, picture lessons, memory work, and a gentle introduction to grammar, all centered around the development of writing skills.

Simply Grammar by Charlotte Mason and Karen Andreola is an expanded version of Charlotte Mason’s First Grammar Lessons. The exercises use Miss Mason’s method of narration. Most work is oral, but any of it can be written. One grammar rule is taught per lesson, and all exercises that follow refer to the rule. Your child will learn to create his own sentences, describe pictures, and tell stories using all the important parts of speech. It is nonconsumable, and can be used for a several-year program, and will enhance any language course. For 4th to 8th grade.  

Easy Grammar
I used this for my girls in high school. It is actually available for all grades. In the high school workbook, students start by learning a list of prepositions. Then, by identifying and crossing out prepositions and prepositional phrases, students can see the core of each sentence. Concepts are presented in small, understandable increments, followed practice pages. It is a complete grammar course. I had the girls do their worksheets and correct them themselves. We did the pages that they needed to complete what they already knew.  The workbook pages and tests are reproducible for families, although you will probably want to purchase the student workbooks because of the sheer volume of copying involved (200-300+ pages). Tests can be reproduced from the teacher book or a test booklet purchased for convenience.

Reading Fiction:

These are some of our favorite reads. I tried to categorize them into the best age groups, but many of them fit into any category, so you will have to see how it fits for you!

Blackberry Hollow by Paul Peabody

The Wind in the Willows by Kenneth Grahame

Little Faith by Mrs. O.F. Walton A young child on the streets in the last century, the little orphan girl learns to trust people agin.

Anne of Green Gables by L.M. Montgomery Oh, the lovely stories of Anne with an e, the little orphan on Prince Edward Island, who finds the real meaning of family.

Jeb Stuart by Gertrude Hecker Winders A true story about a famous American boy in the saddle.

The Bronze Bow by Elizabeth George Speare The scene is Jerusalem, the time is of Christ, the characters are realistic, and you will love this historical fiction.

Sign of the Beaver by Elizabeth George Speare A young family in Colonial times must make a choice to leave their young son in Indian country to get their entire family to their new claim in Maine.

Chronicles of Narnia by C.S. Lewis Classic story of the children who find the passage to another world in the wardrobe.

Lord of the Rings by J.R.R. Tolkien Classic tale of good and evil in Middle Earth. There is far too little space on this page to give this justice. I love these books.

Lamb Among the Stars series by Chris Walley  Amanda loves with this series. It is a fully realized futuristic sci-fi/fanatasy epic. If you are interested in this series, “One thing about this series is in order to understand what is going on, you have to take yourself out of our sinful world and imagine a place where there is no sin and “The King Reigns”.”` Read The Lamb Among Stars Series.

A book for moms or dads that I am reading again… and all the way through this time, is Preparing Sons to Provide for a Single Income Family by Steven Maxwell.  Though this is not a fiction selection, I really wanted to let you know about this one! For a detailed list of what I am reading for the Winter Reading Challenge, read My Books 2008.
 

New Online Homeschool Magazine: The Heart of the Matter 

The purpose of The Heart of the Matter is to provide a place for homeschooling parents and teachers to find all of the resources they desire in one convenient location.  It is our hope that you will find inspiration, practical advice, objective reviews of curriculum and products, fantastic giveaways and more! Please take time to read this wonderful online magazine. There are so many writers over there you will consider friends already. Those you don’t know, well, it will be well worth your time to get to know them!
 

~~~~~~~~~~~~~Take a Moment~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Pray for Homeschool Families: 

Heather, who is beating brain cancer. Read her testimony at Especially Heather.

Tristan Irwin, a two-year-old with Leukemia, and his family.

Lindafay’s family is being forced to leave their beloved home in Turkey. This is the land their children know as home. Please pray for them as they leave this land and people who hold a special place in their hearts, as well as their safety as they travel.

Thanks for joining me for this week’s Memo Monday. I hope I am giving you a good list to work with. If you have any ideas for Monday Monday, let me know. Is there a list you want to see kept up on or to let other homeschool moms know about?

Have a wonderful week!  Blessings!

          

Art can be a difficult subject to teach, especially if you don’t consider yourself to be a naturally artistic person. Here are some resources that you may find useful in the study of art, and in some cases penmanship, too!

Draw Write Now is a set of eight books by Marie Hablitzel and Kim Stitzer with step-by-step drawing instruction combined with penmanship practice. The books are divided by themes: Farm Life, Children & Pets, Storybook Characters, Columbus, Harvest Time, Weather, Native Americans, North America, The Pilgrims, Polar Regions, Arctic, Antarctic, United States, Westward Growth, Moving Forward, Animal Habitats: Land, Ponds & Rivers, Oceans, Forest Animals of the World, Grassland & Desert Animals of the World. With so many available themes, it’s easy to find art lessons to correspond with what you’re studying. If you go to the authors’ website you can view sample lessons and sign up for their newsletter.

A few years ago I bit the bullet and purchased the entire Draw Write Now boxed set. You can buy each book separately, I’d just never been able to pick out one or two favorites - I wanted them all! It immediately became a family favorite and has remained so to this day. The kids aren’t the only ones who love it - I love it! I have my own sketchbook and do it with them. I highly recommend the Draw Write Now workbooks, which provide areas for drawing and penmanship practice on each page, or you can print something similar using Donna Young’s Handwriting Paper with a Blank Top.

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Nature Friend Magazine has online links with instructions for drawing a covered bridge. This is an advanced art lesson utilizing the concepts of drawing in perspective, horizon line, and vanishing point. Here is the first page of the lesson and here is the second page. (Ignore the instructions for submitting your drawing for the magazine; the deadline has passed.)

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Draw and Write through History is a new series of books written by Carylee Gressman and illustrated by Peggy Dick. Designed for ages 8+, these books incorporate not only drawing, but history, and cursive handwriting! A character named Professor Doodle guides you through the lessons. The drawings are more complex and the penmanship copywork longer than in the Draw Write Now books, but otherwise they are very similar in format. There are currently two Draw and Write through History books: Creation through Jonah, and Greece and Rome.

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Want to have fun with art without the mess? Check out this fun, interactive program on the National Gallery of Art Website: “BRUSHter is an online painting machine for all ages. This shockwave interactive includes more than forty brushes and customizable size, transparency, texture, and stroke options. A rainbow palette, along with a toolbox of special effects that blur, ripple, smudge, blend, and fragment your designs help make BRUSHster a full-feature painting program.” You can save your designs, print them, or convert to PDF files!

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Did you know that the National Gallery of Art will loan you FREE teaching resources (all you pay is return shipping costs)? Their website states, “Homeschool parents and teachers are among our newest group of borrowers.” Click here to learn more about this great program.

I hope I’ve given you some ideas for studying art with your children. Enjoy!

Blessings,

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