Geography-Travel the World Series

Almost ten years ago was that terrible tsunami in Sri Lanka.  I'm embarrassed to say that my hubby and I huddled around the globe to locate the tiny country that received such devastation.  We had a general idea....but that was it.  

At that moment, I decided that my children would learn better geography skills than I possessed.  So I've come up with this study program for them to do.  The wonderful thing is that this program can/will be used for years as they can do as many levels each month as they wish.  

I have a blank world map hanging on the wall that we use to test with.

Each month, I print out the sheet corresponding to that month's study and then I give them a blank map to fill in themselves.  It gives them ownership of what they are doing.  I designed the program to go over countries, capitals, vocabulary terms, oceans, lakes, rivers, mountains, deserts.  Here's a look at month one and two.  September is a short month because we're getting into the swing of things so that only has two levels.  If your child knows these already you can move onto level two.  I've designed a ten month program.  

Month one

Level one – Back to Basics

North America

South America

Europe

Asia

Africa

Australia

Antartica

Level two

Atlantic Ocean

Pacific Ocean

Artic Ocean

Indian Ocean

Southern Ocean

Vocabulary:

Continent

Island

Ocean

Month two-North America

Level One

Greenland

Canada

United States

Mexico

Cuba

Level Two

Newfoundland

Quebec

Ontario

Manitoba

Level Three

Alberta

British Columbia

Northwest Territories

Saskatchewan

Level Four

Lake Superior

Lake Michigan

Lake Huron

Lake Erie

Lake Ontario

Vocabulary

Bay

Peninsula

Coastline

There is a printable version of this here.

Enjoy!

Organization is key

So many of you are talented enough to just go with the flow of the school day and remain calm, cool, and collected.  I would love to be like you.  I am not that way at all.  In fact, when I'm not organized with copies ready to go, lesson check off list printed off for the kids, and my desk cleaned off......well, let's just say it isn't pretty.  I'm not...that is.

I cannot function this way.  Perhaps its because I have so much on my plate between homeschooling, full time college, American Heritage Girls, and Boy Scouts?  Probably not...I've always been this way.  Making lists checking things off.  I've even done things for the day not on the list and then written that item down just so I can check it off.  I know, I'm pathetic.

With homeschooling I struggle to juggle five different levels.  I have two that need one on one time for all their lessons and two that work independently that need one on one time for certain things and one that is almost exclusively independent.  And of course, they are all clamoring for my attention at the same time.

This year I made a very organized detailed schedule.  Listing what happens when and if mom is needed for the lesson.  Now I do answer questions or give directions as needed but the kids know that I am working with someone else and are pretty patient for a few minutes until I get to them.

One saving grace is Homeschool Tracker.  I love that I can plan out lessons for the entire year for each subject and each grade level.  Once the lessons are in, I just use the scheduler button to plan out each week and I can even include a time for the subject to be started and completed.  A lot of times, the girls are done ahead of schedule so they just move onto the next subject. No problem there.  Several times during the day, I grade their work (with the girls its usually after each subject) and mark it completed.  The program records attendence, grades, and books for me.  I have purchased a yearly plan of $60 for the online version.  I used to use the Plus program but when the computer crashes there goes your lesson plans.  I enjoy having access wherever I am at.  It also saves lesson plans for me to use for the kids that are moving up so I don't have to replan or retype or rewrite in plans.  What a blessing!  I can even type in goals if I wish.  I'll do a more in depth post on the tracker program later this week.

On the homefront, I'm canning up a storm.  I did eight quarts of spaghetti sauce, 6 quarts of chili, and 3 quarts of pickles in the past week.  I still have to do relish, salsa, and the carrots.  I've already done the green beans and the apples will be ready in the next week or so.  We still have apple butter left from last year so I'll do applesauce and some apple pie filling recipes.  I'm hoping my friend will let me have access to her pear tree which is loaded with pears and they don't plan to use.  That would be a huge blessing!  And of course, tomatoes are still coming in so I'll be doing more spaghetti sauce and chili.  I already pickled beets for Kevin.  I think they're yucky and so do the kids.  Peppers and onions are all in.  We now have 12 quarts of bread and butter pickles so I'm pretty sure we're set for the year with those.

Have a wonderful week!

School year 2014-2015

Tomorrow starts our new school year.  I will be teaching five different levels.

Monkey-Kindergarten
Sing, Spell, Read and Write Level K
Horizons Math K 
Handwriting without tears
Unit studies and art

Little Miss-Second Grade
Sing, Spell, Read, and Write Level 1
All About Spelling Level 1
Introduction to Science-Elemental Science
Unit studies and art
Saxon Math 2
Explode the Code

Bug-a-Bug-Sixth Grade and Princess-Eighth Grade
Explorer's Bible Study
Sassafrass Science-biology and plant science
Teaching Textbooks
Asst classics to read
All About Spelling
Easy Grammar
IEW-Fables, Myths, and Fairy Tales
History-my own design
Art

TL-Eleventh Grade
Asst Classics
IEW-Elegant Essay
Easy Grammar
Russian (Currclick Live)
Teencoder: Windows Programming and Game Programming
History-my own design
Algebra II
Dive Chemistry
Art

Of course, all four girls are now in American Heritage Girls in four different levels.  Its very exciting.  Monkey is super excited to join her sisters this year.  They also attend the after school program at our church one day a week at which Princess volunteers at.  

The three biggest attend a Friday night program at our church.  TL is also involved in taekwondo and Boy Scouts.  

I hope to get the girls into riding lessons in the spring.  Too cold and snowy here in the winter for that.  They are very excited to start.

Tomorrow I'll have an updated list of books that they will be reading and hopefully first day pics.  

Today we got out the school supplies and set up their desks with the new books, supplies, etc.  They were very excited.  We'll see how that goes at 8:30 in the am.

This week we're only doing half days.  My mom comes next week so we'll be taking that time off.

I'm sorry that I haven't posted in the last month.  With Kevin home we were extremely busy trying to get things done around here.  And now that the garden is really coming in, I've been busy trying to get the canning done!

Prayers for a wonderful week for all!

Unit Study ideas

Back when my big kids were little we took full advantage of unit studies.  I don't believe in doing an organized history program until third grade but up until then its fun to come up with exciting things to study: cowboys, Thanksgiving, Egyptians, and Indians are just some of the topics that we studied.  For Science we studied astronomy, oceans and animals, animal unit studies, and insect studies.  All very fun and interesting.

I realized with a second grader and kindergartener this year, that I need to switch back to those unit studies.  This week I'm going to work on setting up unit studies for my girls on the following topics: Indians, Thanksgiving, oceans and animals, space, and a few animal studies.  

We will be supplementing science with Elemental Science's Intro to Science curriculum.  I used part of it last year and we really loved the interesting science experiments and the girls loved to work on their science notebooking pages.  They felt like they were keeping up with their siblings by having their own work to do.  It was a blast.  I highly recommend this program!!!

The big girls will be using Elemental Science's Living Book series on the Sassafrass Twins studying zoology and then botany this year.  Last year we used their classic series and totally loved it but I wanted to change things up this year.  Princess will be in high school science next year and I wanted to make science fun and interesting this year.  You'll notice that it states the curriculum is for K-5th grade.  We will obviously be beefing up our studies plus both girls need to earn a science frontier requirement for American Heritage Girls so they will be able to work on these requirements and earn their badges.  I plan on using these studies next year with the littles.

I'm off to work on my homework and lesson plans.  I am very behind in both.  I can't believe we start to homeschool in a month.  I just ordered the books for the kids!!  And I'm on week 5 of two classes for my masters.  Only 11 weeks left with two big papers to write

Juggling

If you're like me, right now you're in the midst of homeschool planning.  Books are piled up everywhere.  Little notes are spread all over your desk.  Its an organized chaos.  Selena over at Look We're Learning just wrote a fantastic post about lesson planning with little ones.

I'm juggling right now trying to keep up with the outside chores and the garden.  I have several projects that desperately need my attention outside.  We have several areas that are really just weeds that need to be dug out and redesigned.  I've been putting it off because when I go near them the giant mosquito infestation swarms out to attack me.  I really need to get moving on that though.

My brother comes tomorrow and we need to deep clean.  The cats are all outside right now but he does have an allergy so I want to make sure that the cat hair is gone so he can enjoy his stay.

College started this week.  The one class has articles and a book that's about 120 pages to read,  plus books and articles for my paper.  Not too bad.  The other has 2000 pages in just the texts which does not include the articles or the research for the paper.  ugh

So needless to say, I'm running around from one thing to another.  I'm sitting down today and writing out a list of things to do which will hopefully allow me to stay on task.

And this week starts our birthday week.  Bug-a-Bug's is today.  She is such a sweet and gently soul.  I am so blessed that God blessed me with this wonderful child.

Have a wonderful and blessed week!

Michelle

AHG Peace camp

Dad would be proud of Little Miss sporting his Vikings hat

Waiting for craft instructions

Lunch was a four foot and 3.5 foot pizzas.  Cooked outdoors in a giant oven that this couple tow behind their truck.  There was enough room in the oven to make six pizzas.

Little Miss and her bestie at the end of camp.  Tired but very happy!

Coming up for air

It has been a crazy busy month here.  TL and I were desperately working outside to build more garden beds and get the garden in.  The weed eating took a hit.....its currently about two feet high.  We were trying to get it done and caught up and then we got about a foot of rain in one week.  The garden is growing really well....but so are the weeds.

I was also desperately trying to write two papers for two classes that ended last week.  Thankfully I received two As but now I am really behind in house and yard work.

TL's off to summer camp this week.  I can't wait to hear how the white water rafting, paddle boarding, and kayaking were.  I'm sure he had a blast.  

Little Miss went to American Heritage Girls Peace Camp (for Tenderheart girls grades 1-3) with her best friend.  They had a blast.  I went for the entire first day but had to head home to be with the other girls and then went back for the morning and we headed home at lunch time.  We were sweaty and sticky from sunscreen and mosquito spray.  There were tons of mosquitoes.

I will upload pics later....the girls are watching Netflix and the internet is too slow.

So between all this and swimming in the pond, its been really busy here.  And this week and next our church is selling fireworks at the TNT stand to raise money for our children and teen ministries.  Busy busy.

The kids were less than excited that some of their school stuff has arrived.  I received all the science and the history books.  I'll hopefully be starting up designing the history program later this weekend.  We're supposed to have big storms rolling through again.

I'm also trying to get caught up on some quilting and hope to work on some scrapbooking this summer.  The poor three little kids don't even have an album!  ugh!  bad momma!

So, I'm off for now.  Take care all!

Living next to the Hatfields and McCoys

That's what it feels like.  A few weeks after the chicken incident and my neighbor's dog, I started seeing it around again and knew it was a matter of time before it came back for a snack.  Thankfully I was here.

I couldn't get it to leave and it kept trying to circle me to get to the chickens.  We finally got it to go home and I followed it.  I was mad and probably yelling.  The neighbor's daughter started yelling at me telling me that they work all day and he got loose.  She had gone into the house to get his harness that was all closed up (snaps) and not in pieces.  Kinda hard for him to get loose if he's not wearing it isn't it?

Anyway, her father kept telling me to shoot the dog...to which I responded that he needed to just keep the dog tied up and then there wouldn't be any problem.  If I found the dog attacking my chickens again, I would shoot it....as it is my legal right.  I'll discuss that in a minute.  Then he told me to bring down my gun and shoot it in front of him.   ???

Then he said that friends were welcome at his house, neighbors welcome, and then waved  his had to dismiss me.  He also then told me that all the neighbors now about me and my $500 bill for $13 dollars worth of chickens.  (the feed for the last year, replacement cost, and loss of egg money for four months until the new chicks start to lay was over $500, but we had verbally agreed to about half of it....they've given me $50).  He stated that if I ever got stuck in the ditch that I'd better have my checkbook because none of the neighbors would help me out.   Wow....I've moved to crazy town.

I've resolved that I'm never getting anything else from them.  I'm nervous to even go down to their house as their craziness may have me arrested for something weird.  I've decided if the dog returns I will video tape it, call the sheriff and press criminal charges.

After the last incident, the sheriff told me I could give the bill to him but if I did I would have to press criminal charges.  In light of how they are acting now and the neighbors' statements that this isn't the first time there's been a problem with this dog and a previous dog that they had, I wish I had gone the legal route.  

So, that's the drama from the dog.  I haven't seen it since last Friday.  I'm sure it will be back and soon.

On the school note, we have two weeks left and testing.  The kids are doing well getting done....except the teen who is lagging behind a little.  They will hopefully be all done on time.

The garden is finally getting planted now.  We had temps into the 30s at night even this week but it looks all uphill from here.  I planted peppers last night and hope to get the onions, green beans, carrots, and beets done today.  I hope to get the tomatoes and cucumbers done this weekend and next week....pumpkins, watermelons, and cantalope.  I also planted 25 strawberry plants and three peach trees this year.  My raspberries are just growing....I only lost one this past winter with the cold.  I thought I'd lost the blueberries too but they are looking pretty good.  The cherry tree and plum trees are doing marvelously!  I'm working on pruning the apple and crabapple trees that were on the property.  They have never been pruned so its pretty bad.  The big issue is that they are so big, I can't get that high to prune.  I'm hoping to do a little pruning all year and then a big one in the fall.  I don't want to shock the poor things.

My college is going well.  I have a big paper (rough draft) due the first week of June.  I'm hoping to have that done and finish up the other class' assignment the following week and be done a week early.

That's about all that's going on here.  Its been crazy but busy!