Don't be afraid plant away!

A great science project K -3 is to get gads dirty and plant away!  Don't get me wrong I am not the green thumb kind, it does not come easy to me!  But goodness was it worth it.  I went to the store, picked some seeds with my kids, got a few other things and decided to get started right in my kitchen!

My husband did not appreciate it so much.  But was he impressed when we got our first carrots!

No book, no exercise, no science center, no puzzle can compare to how much we learn about the life of a plant, the difference between living and non-living things, and the hard work of a farmer than by planting ourselves.  Appreciating the food on our tables starts by knowing how much work it took someone to grow it!  And in the end it is also a great way of learning patience and perseverance two great virtues!

Go on, get brave and get started!  I did and it payed of!

As the weeks go by, you can chose a day in which you can re-enforce what she is witnessing and learning with a nice science center exercise!

Have fun and remember :  Homeschool, it will always be worth your effort!!

Math with beans!

This is a nice way of practicing Math with manipulatives you can find right at home!

Nothing better that being able to really picture what it means to ad and subtract.  To see it, to touch it, to feel it!  Well here is another nice idea I found in Pinterest that worked for my Kindergardener.

 Get a bunch of beans

Get a muffin tray and muffin paper holders.  Put them in the muffin tray and write some simple addition and subtraction equations.  Let your kid take charge !

My girl loved it !  She was the one picking how many beans , placing them in the right spot and then counting totals.  It was a great afternoon!

Have fun and remember :  Homeschool, it will always be worth your effort!!

Sorting ! Oh what fun!

Sorting is part of Math for Pre-K and K and it can be loads of fun!  We chose an art project we found in Pinterest.  It was great fun and the kids really got into it.  I was able to do it with my five year old and my three year old together.  It was a time of collaboration and big sitter teaching the colours of the rainbow.  in the end this art project kills two birds with one stone....you get a math exercise and an art project all wrapped up in one cozy and fun afternoon!  Here are the pictures, I highly recommend it!

 Look around the house and find all sorts of colourful (use only colours of the rainbow), bright and fun things to use in your collage.  We used paperclips, ribbon, paper, foam shapes etc.  The girls had lots of fun sorting them into groups according to color.

The night before you want to make a nice rainbow out of construction paper.  This one is mine, not a work of art but good enough!

 Have the kids apply glue color by color and start pasting the different objects.  They can be as creative as they wish but they need to stay within a given color!

Voila !  Finished product is gorgeous, you can proudly display it in your living room to impress your friends and family LOL.  Well the girls were happy I thought it was good enough to go in the living room !!

At the end you can have a colouring sheet to reinforce the color order!

Have fun and remember :  Homeschool, it will always be worth your effort!!

Starting early !

This year I am going to be homeschooling my three kids!  I felt very nervous about the thought of the year ahead of us.  I almost felt like asking my husband to put them in school and forgetting about homeschooling.  But then again I was reminded by my husband that every year I have felt the same nervousness for one reason or another.  Every year I get doubts and I get insecure.  My husband as always encouraged me and reminded me of just how successful and fulfilling homeschooling has proven to be.

My anxiety about the year ahead eased after our conversation, and then I decided to call my good friend Rita.  I shared how I had been feeling and she asked me when I was planning to start.  I told her as late as possible and not one second before I had to.  She giggled and sweetly shared how she actually loved starting early because in this way she did not have so much pressure as the year progressed.  She told me if they needed to take a few days off because of illness or because they were having a bad week, well, starting early just made it so much easier!

 I though about what my sweet friend Rita said, who by the way has 5 kids of her own - 8 yrs. old  and under - and I knew she was right.  Knowing she had just had a baby and that she has 2 more kids than me gave me courage to start my year.  How could I be such a chicken, my sweet friend Rita and so many other amazing homeschooling friends continuously remind me of how much we can accomplish with God's grace.


Yes I can do it!  Yes this year will be yet another amazing year!  Yes no more procrastinating and finding excuses.

Easter is our Joy!

Easter was calm, we are not home as you might know by now.   We have been in Costa Rica for six months, so everything has been harder in terms of trying to make special projects for special celebrations.  But coloring is always an easy choice and the girls have colored away! I have made sure I always carry with me a block of white paper, and enough crayons, coloring pencils and water colors as they need.  This has been a life-saver!

You know every time I read them Bible stories, I think that nothing will stick, that mine are words gone with the wind.  But not so, the wonderful stories of the Bible do stick!  Every time we are together and I share a special story, it does remain there somewhere.  And like a seed it takes hold of their heart, then one day without me noticing it bursts into life!

These pictures are inspired by stories we have read last year, and Gospels they heard at Holy Mass.  Our kids are listening!  Yes they listen, they remember and the Holy Spirit is there working within their hearts!

We give our time, we give our love, we give our best....God does the rest!

Here are some of our favourite Easter projects:

We made the egg crate Last Supper, this was really a wonderful project and it was worth the effort!  I found it in Pinterest I will put the link here ....http://www.pinterest.com/pin/209206345162339653/ for you.

For Lent we love to do Pysanky Eggs.  There are some designs that are not so hard, some are ok for children 5 and over if you supervise.  My daughter loved making them, she could not get enough of them!  And then you can decorate the house for Easter in a very creative, colourful and personal way!

We also found this craft in Pinterest.  You can get shaving cream mix it with glue and add food colouring.  The use it to decorate an egg on paper.  The kids will love it and they will spend a long time in a project that will bring out their creativity!

Have fun and remember :  Homeschool, it will always be worth your effort!!

Life-sheets - a great way to learn science or any other subject !

Life-sheets is our own term....the girls love them.  We use the kind of cards you find in any tourist shop.  They are colorful, attractive and you find them on pretty much any topic from animals to national parks you name it.  You can make them into a book at the end of the year, and kids get to really learn their facts while they practice handwriting.  It is a win win win kind of deal!  Easy for trips, no carrying around big books, Internet always handy!

Have fun and remember :  Homeschool, it will always be worth your effort!!

Why Homeschool

This blog is to share some of the learning adventure my kids have begun by embarking in the homeschooling journey.  We are happy to share and hope some of it will encourage you, some of it will be helpful.  I will continue to work on each post as time allows.  Please be patient.  (Picture above "let them be little" borrowed for my collage from the fantastic site Simple Homeschooling).  My kids are happy to be working on this blog and specially happy to share with you some of their joy of homeschooling!

Now to our topic, why homeschool?!  Well I was one of those people that at first thought:  homeschooling?  What in the world is that?  See I am from Costa Rica and although I grew up moving from one country to the next I never met a home-schooler and never heard about it.  So the first thing that passed my mind was, the kids would not meet anyone they probably 

turn into weirdos.  I know, very open minded of me!  Yeah right!

But at this time in my life, when i started hearing about homeschooling, I was living in Canada.  British Columbia to be exact and it so happens that in BC there are many families that homeschool.  So,  as time passed and I met more homeshooling families.  And the more I met the more impressed I was.  The kids were friendly and outgoing, they actually were so nice, that they made me and my classmates (when I was in school) look like the weirdos.  

I was so impressed my heart stared opening and warming up to the idea.  Then one day my husband came home and told me about a great scandal that happened in Vancouver that involved about four Private schools, two of which we had been seriously considering for our oldest girl that was fast approaching kindergarden age.  I will not tell you details because they are truly horrible, but it involved some kids filming a special needs girl in a very personal and embarrassing way and sharing that on the internet.  Passing it to the other schools, where this became so bad the police had to come and take the computers and everything.  It was terrible!

So this got me seriously thinking that homeschooling could be an option for us.  My husband and I t down and weighed the pros and cons and let me tell you the pros won by a mile.  For us the list was like this:

Why homeschool?

- you get to chose the curriculum that fits your child best.  If they are advanced there is no limit as to how fast you can advance.  If they are special needs or they just do not get concepts that fast you can go slow,a s slow as they need without the teacher pressuring them or classmates making fun of them.

-  no bullies.  You can really find a great group of friends that fit well with your family.  There are many great homeschooling families, some religious some not at all.  But for sure even if there are not many homeschoolers in your area you will help your small child find friends that are worth having.

- better chance they will be protected from drugs.  Drugs, sex, alcohol will be addressed by at home lovingly but not glamorized or misrepresented.  Who knows more your kid, you or a teacher that has twenty others?  Who cares more for your kid?  You or that same teacher?

-  the time kids spend at school now days is way too long.  Homeschooling allows your kids to be kids.  They get to play and enjoy while learning.  For K-1. We homeschooled four times a week maximum of 1 hour a day.  And my girl's official grades were mostly exceeding expectations.  They 

learn at home next to you their favorite person!  They learn more and faster!  There is no wasting time, this means more time to play, more time to go to field trips, more time to be a kid!

-  There are many different styles of learning and many easy curriculums you can select from.  You can investigate until you find the style that fits you and your child.  There is no limit to what you can do!  These awesome, complete and easy to follow curriculums take you by the hand and guide you step by step explaining in great detail what to do.  There is all the help you need out there, if you want it.  If you are confident and you want to go a different way, there is room for that to.  You will find a curriculum, or a style that fits your kid and your family well.

- There is a supportive homeschooling community out there.  .   We all share info and encourage each other.

-  and as of turning into weirdos that is far from the truth.  They turn into confident friendly kids that reach out to meet people because  they have to make an effort if they are going to have friends.  And kids do want to have friends, so they try harder and they use all their charm.  They stop caring about ages, no a homeschooler does not discriminate based on age!  Anyone is game!  If you are friendly and nice you are a candidate  for a friend.  A homeschooler does not live in a box, literally like school kids are.  A homeschooler sees people for who they are, they do not judge based on size or age.  They  great kids to be around!

I will continue my list in a future post because, yes there are more reasons to homeschool!

Have fun and remember :  Homeschool, it will always be worth your effort!!