The School Room: Education at Home

August 2008 - Posts

• Homeschool Supply List

  Kids..check Books...check Sanity...that has to go on the needs list, I wonder if it ever goes on sale.   What does a homeschool really need to be stocked and ready for lessons? Being a veteran homeschooler, I really should know the answer to this but starting over after not having worked with a primary student in years left me at a loss.  How many bottles of glue does a five year old use in three months? How much paper will a five and a thirteen year old both need to last the year? These were the questions I asked as I worked on stocking supplies while the sales were hot. Oh and how many bottles of glue a five year old needs depends on how many packs of paper you buy that can be glued together. How much paper you need in turn depends on how much glue you buy to paste it all together.     Posted Aug 21 2008, 03:13 PM by Brandy with 1 comment(s)

• The Whole Life Adventure

  Homeschooling takes the teacher and student out of the conventional classroom and into the real world. Often this may also mean adventures are on the horizon.The past two weeks have been very busy for us. Last week, we were a living example of how whole life and whole family schooling works. My husband is a broadband technician and a martial arts instructor. Both of these things allows us to be more active in what he does. We had three guests who came to stay in our home for martial arts training. During this time, my son was released from his routine schedule with books to be able to devote the time to training. So they were running around kicking and punching instead of learning? Or were they?It was four days packed with new learning experiences and physical fitness for my son. The young men worked on their Korean language skills, discussed philosophy and Asian history, researched and critiqued martial arts techniques, researched business practices and marketing and even pulled out medical encyclopedias to research a physical issue one of them is struggling with.Through all this, my husband was monitoring the work outs and instructing them later in the evening. The research was not all self led, my husband would raise questions and also leave specific topics for them to look into while he was away at work. He would lead discussions on this specific things as part of their evening instruction. My son has been practicing and reading through some of our technical manuals and philosophy books to gain a greater understanding of the things that were discussed and to answer the questions he has. I consider this a very successful educational week. May he always view life as an adventure and a quest for knowledge. Posted Aug 16 2008, 07:00 AM by Brandy with no comments Filed under: whole life, unschooling, homeschool journal, hands on education