Home Education
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Beginning Our Home Education Journey
What attracted to you to homeschooling? How did you get started? Sue has shared her family’s story and would love to hear from others, how they began their homeschooling journey. I’ve touched very briefly on our journey’s beginning before, but I thought I’d now share the full story. When I was a teenager in the 80s my mum began home educating my younger siblings. I totally supported her in this decision; emotionally and practically. As her journey started, it became apparent one of my brother’s did not learn well in the traditional mode and so I began reading home education philosophies, books by John Holt, Raymond Moore, Mary Pride, the Colfaxes and Maria Montessori, all having…
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Viking Lapbook
This term Princess chose to study Vikings and was keen to make a lapbook. Searching around we discovered Homeschool Share’s Viking Unit and Lapbook The lapbook was based on Clyde Robert Bulla’s Viking Adventure and a couple of Usborne titles. We didn’t have the non-fiction titles but managed with library books and the internet for extra information. The lapbook wasn’t too overwhelming yet covered a lot of material, totally perfect for a nine year old.
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Term Reflections; Curriculum Highlights
As we have now come to the conclusion of Term 1, I thought to share some curriculum highlights from our first Term. Some I have mentioned in passing before, but I’ve compiled a more complete synopsis. For clarity; Koala is in Grade 12, Carpenter in Grade 10, Einstein Grade 8, Michelangelo Grade 6, Princess Grade 4, Jelly Bean Grade 1 and Jack Jack Pre-School. Jem of course tags along and I’m sure Bass will soon find his niche;) Highschool Didache – This is the second year we have used this program for Faith and I highly recommend it. Very solid, very thorough. Our teens have learnt so much and the books…
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Education is An Atmosphere
“Education is an atmosphere-that is, the child breathes the atmosphere emanating from his parents; that of the ideas which rule their own lives” (Vol 2, p247) “Education is an atmosphere” can be a difficult concept to translate into words. We comprehend the tangible and yet this foundation word for Charlotte Mason’s approach to education is not something so easily concrete. In our search for the tangible we may initially assume that Charlotte Mason could be referring to the physical environment. Sometimes as home educators we feel if only we had; the perfect room, the perfect circumstances, a thriving education would ensue. Whilst it is true that a little organisation can go a long way to…
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Computer Triage
When discussing with our teens what direction they wished to take with Science this term they were keen on studying and pulling apart small motors. Then the idea of dismantling computers was raised. Contacting a friend they were excited to discover the R family had 5 computers not functioning which they were welcome to have. Ideally it was hoped they could salvage at least 2 for the R family. A triage was formed, computers were gutted and parts moved around. Computer lingo began being bandied about; PC, DDR and DDR2 rams, LED fans, motherboards, hardrives, graphic cards, megabytes, gigabytes, kilobytes, terrabytes, CPU chips all became common words in our family…
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Voting Has Begun
Polls are open over at the Home School Blog Awards. I wandered over for a browse, imagine my delight to find some of my very favourite bloggers represented. But then I shouldn’t really have been surprised as they are awesome! Not sure if I’m reading it totally correct but I believe I can only vote for five categories? Anyhow playing it safe. Head on over and check out all the amazing enteries. Not all my favourite blogs made it to the HSBAs but I still think they are incredible just the same:) Some categories with some familiar ‘faces’: Best Homeschool Mom Blog wonderful thrill to find my dear friend Jen…
- Blog, Book Chat, Home Education, Home Education - Charlotte Mason, Home Education - Language Arts, Living
Immersion in Quality Literature
My childhood home was a home of books; thousands of books, I don’t recall many picture books, but we had shelves of quality novels mixed with twaddle. This immersion in quality literature encouraged my own love of reading. Making the decision early on to home educate our children, I began reading about home education approaches and knew our learning would not be reliant on text books. When I first read of Charlotte Mason I was immediately drawn to her love of Living Books, I had found someone whose experience bore out my instinctive thoughts! The past 17 years of parenting have been filled with reading, books are an integral part of…
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Charlotte Mason and Dictation
When Koala was seven I heard of Charlotte Mason for the first time, her ideas resonated with me, in particular her teaching on Language Arts and Living Books. At nine Koala began dictation lessons, they have long been part of our learning. Over the years we have used various resources, Bible passages, Psalms, Catechism questions, a current read aloud, excerpts from the Queensland School Readers(excellent quality literature) and more recently we have purchased Spelling Wisdom. The quality of literature in these books is incredible and truthfully they are making our days flow far smoother. Despite years of dictation though, I still felt we were missing the result I desired. The…
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The Big Day Has Arrived!!
Today is the day! Mary MacKillop is to be cannonised today. Searching through the 4Real forum I found a summary I shared five years ago. (I’ve altered slightly) Do read the conversation as some great links are shared. I realise many outside of Australia may not have heard of Mary MacKillop, but it is a special day for us here. She will be the first canonised saint of Australia. I have a particular love of her as I was taught by the ‘brown Joey’s’ (the order of nuns she started). Mary MacKillop was born in Melbourne. Her family fell on tough times financially so they were moved around amongst relatives.…
