This is a VERY popular option for maximizing your Homeschool Expo experience!

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Basic math abounds in cooking. Setting the table with the right number of plates, counting the eggs for the recipe or figuring out how many pieces of cake can be cut from the pan are great ways to exercise young math brains. Putting a cake in the oven at 2:15 and figuring out what time it will be done makes telling time much more interesting.

Fractions begin to make sense in the kitchen. Young children become familiar with fractions as they fill up ¼ cup with oil. Or challenge a bit older child by asking them to use only the smaller measures…¼ or 1/3 for the entire recipe. To challenge the math skills a bit more, double or triple a recipe (or even cut it in half!).

Reading is much more fun if you use letter cutters and spell words. Or use letter cake decorations or icing tubes to write fun messages. Simply reading a recipe helps children follow directions–and read! Using an index or a table of contents helps in finding a recipe, but it is a very transferable skill.

Perhaps best of all the learning is the fun science that is a part of cooking! The three forms of matter (solid, liquid and gas–steam) show up all the time. The magic of yeast, air pockets in pop-overs or the fun of corn-starch goop all have ‘science’ lessons wrapped in cooking fun! The tools in the kitchen are a great lesson in simple machines: levers, planes and gears.

We cannot forget about history and culture! Explore why ‘pound cake’ recipes abound in the south (hint: refrigeration and a proliferation of eggs and butter). Dig into family recipes and find some of the unusual ‘treats’ of the Depression Era. Immigration and the settlement of entire areas of the country are revealed in regional dishes. Foods reflect culture. Use foods to expand studies of foreign countries. The fun of the kitchen should not be missed. Enjoy the homeschool opportunity your kitchen offers.

-BJ

More than that, I think the presence of distractions proved to be a tool for building my focus. While teachers could be heard in adjacent ‘rooms,’ my focus had to be trained on the teacher in my area. I can not be certain of the reason, but I forty years later, my ability to focus despite distractions remains. My family has been frustrated more than once while I worked on a writing and tuned everything out around me. It is a blessing hard to describe.

So, why do I share all this–as if it has bearing on our homeschool classrooms. Because I believe it does. We teach in the midst of life. Dogs bark, doorbells ring and family needs flow in and out of our lesson plans. What a blessing for our children! Although we must impress upon our children (and often our extended families and friends) the priority of education, we do not need to stress over teaching amidst distractions. Life is rich in learning; home education embraces that learning along with the books. Take joy in the unexpected lessons being learned!

-BJ

Embracing challenges is a key to successful living, yet eliminating difficulties is the natural desire of a mom.  Furthermore, as a homeschool mom, it is easy to grow weary of the battles.  All parents bear the weight of guiding children to do what they do not naturally desire to do:  clean their rooms, learn self-discipline and sacrifice self for others.  In home education, we also have the weighty responsibility of academic success.  It is tempting to smooth the difficulties for our children so that we have just a little bit less stress as well.  It is wearying to ‘nag’ about EVERYTHING!  Truly the key is to remember we are not nagging, we are preparing our children for the future.  When it comes to our children’s studies, we must help them accept that learning is not always easy.  We can facilitate their understanding with various approaches, but we must be careful not to let them coast through their studies or always follow their own ways of doing things.  Creativity is divine—but so is order.

Every subject helps us shape our children’s character but math is the one that gave us the best lessons.  Procedures are repetitive and boring—and in the early years unnecessary.  Yet those procedures lay a ground-work absolutely necessary to advanced math.  We used kinesthetic learning…hopscotching answers to addition and subtraction problems, which gave us enjoyment in the work of education.  But the boring math fact sheets and memorization work are still bearing fruit.

Beyond the academic truth is the life truth that ‘my way’ is not the only way.  It helps our children understand that there is benefit in reaching beyond ourselves. With the exception of eternal salvation, there is always more than one way to do things.   One of my favorite quotes reminds me to “Never deny the right to be right to anyone but you.” We always want to be right, but being right is not always useful nor is it always necessary.  While we live in a world that says it values individuality, this world really tells us to conform.  We can use home education to help our children appreciate diversity while enjoying their own uniqueness!

-BJ

For example, a child praised for a good grade sometimes begins to work for the praise instead of the grade.  Over time the child becomes addicted to the praise, only feeling good about themselves when the right grade is achieved.  On the other hand, deliberately seeking to encourage a child toward good grades may produce better results–in the grade and in life overall.  Encouragement focuses on effort and attitude as a goal is pursued.  It helps the child stay on track toward a desired end.  The journey to the goal becomes as enjoyable as the accomplishment itself.

Please don’t hear that one should never praise another.  Praise has its place and a ‘well done’ may be just the snack needed.  Encouragement, though, is far more productive as a steady diet!

-Billie Jo

I was appalled to learn that the best rates never reached 90% and some states have a 50% graduation rate.  How can it be that an institution as well-respected as public education can have such a dismal success rate?  I encourage you to dig and learn about your public school’s 2012 record —not to disparage the public schools but to encourage yourself in your own efforts.  I am a ‘positive’ person and prefer to explain my decision to home educate with the emphasis on the amazing opportunity it is for a family to grow and learn together.  But I admit, the poor performance of the public option is an added affirmation to our decision.  It is also motivation for me to encourage more homeschooling families—and to work toward enhancing public education options in my own community.  A love of learning is a great thing to pass on…true education is completed when that happens.

-Billie Jo

Begin by preparing a list of the subjects you plan to cover in the next year.  Then review your finances and set a firm budget and commit to staying within the budget.  After listing the subjects, give some thought and prayer to the approach which will work for your family.

Will unit studies fit the personalities and time availability in your home?  Unit studies work great with multi-level grades.  Typically base subjects such as math and grammar are handled separately.  Hands-in learning is typical in most such programs and while that is great, it is labor intensive for the instructing parent.  Consumable workbooks are a great tool for independent learners.  The structure lends itself well to teaching goal-setting.

In addition to considering the type of instruction, give some attention to your child’s learning style.  Cynthia Tobias has a wonderful book on the various ways children learn.  Having a variety of learning modalities in your homeschool program is beneficial for all students.  Knowing the way a child learns easiest will help in choosing curriculum.  As you look at curriculum, do consider ‘looks’.   White space and color help keep material from feeling overwhelming.  Many homeschool curriculum reviews are available online…don’t forget the best reviewers may be your friends!  Often larger companies have online placement tests or offer samplers to review before attending convention.

Do your homework but do not stress.  Your choices in curriculum will likely change as the years progress.  As the parent-teacher, you will learn alongside your student(s).  Enjoy the journey!

Visit the Exhibitor Listing and check out the great array of vendors who will be on hand to answer your questions.

-Billie Jo

I’m sure it is my over-sensitive nature that feels like answering that question with sarcastic sweetness, “No, I am just sitting around snacking on bon-bons.  What could I do for you?”

I’m not really unkind and I do love to help folks.  I just resent the thought that a homeschooling mother is ever NOT busy.  In fact, I am delighted to have control over our schedule and be able to readjust activities to help others.  It is a part of the homeschool lifestyle that teaches all of us (children and adult) that life is about loving others.  I am willing, and actually desire, to sacrifice my plans for God’s plans, but I am not willing to de-prioritize our school time.  It is a challenge most home educating families will encounter.

Establishing school as a priority and implementing boundaries to protect your schooling time are vital aspects of controlling your schedule.  The telephone is not a crisis line—although sometimes crisis arise.  Screening calls—and being upfront about that—is not rude.  During our school year, our phone message typically states, ‘If we are home and not answering, we are in the middle of learning.  If this is an emergency, speak up and we’ll change our plans.  If it is not, we’ll call you later.’  There have indeed been times when school needed to stop—but not that many.

Drop-in guests are another common potential school de-railment.  Even when I am not actively ‘teaching’ the children, guests are a distraction.  Over the years we have chosen different ways to handle such interruptions.  It has been our goal to remember that our home is truly the Lord’s.  It is His to use as He sees fit.  That said, He is also the Superintendent of Schools.  The responsibility of home education is not a small one.  One welcoming but restraining way of enjoying guests is to state, ‘Oh, it is good to see you.  Come in.  We are doing school, but we would enjoy taking a short break to chat with you.’  Folks will usually sit but remain mindful that work is on hold during their visit.  On very rare occasions, I found it necessary to clearly state time boundaries to drop-in guests.

There are certainly needs that will arise in your own family—and others—that will create time stressors on your homeschool.  Some of our richest times came as we wove education into meeting those needs.  Aging parents with medical appointments, friends with publicly schooled children who need help when emergencies arise…those are God-given burden privileges that we can embrace.  Being a good time steward is a life lesson that will bear eternal fruit.  Our homeschool days do not need bells to move us from activity to activity—but they need the guidance and peace of following the leading of the Holy Spirit!  He is willing and able.

- Billie Jo

An inheritance quickly gained at the beginning will not be blessed at the end.

This simple scripture offers tremendous encouragement ‘and insights for our home school days. All of life is learning…and learning is a precious inheritance. There are truths we can learn about life through our experience of home schooling.

The task of home education is a long-term process that builds, block upon block, knowledge. Many times–especially in the early years–children will be able to grasp concepts quickly without fully understanding the block they have just received. That is okay, but we must refrain from rushing them ahead mistakenly assuming the nugget of learning has been fully assimilated. While repetitive pages of the same concept may seem boring, there is merit to practice. Creating real-life application practice enriches–enlivens–learning.

Understanding fractions begins with sharing an apple or a cookie…that concept of one-half will be expanded upon as time passes. Learning that a sentence has a subject and a verb happens before students learn proper conjugation of verbs and how to diagram complex sentences. Difficulties arise when pride tells our students they already know the topic at hand. “This is boring; I’ve already learned this,” derails a lesson rapidly. Helping our children look beyond what they know to what they can do with that knowledge is what makes learning fun! Rushing past learning will be the essence of the verse above–blocks of knowledge gathered too quickly will crumble when heavier knowledge comes in future years.

As parents, who are only children in God’s eyes, we must remember this truth for our spiritual growth. Slow learners are real learners. When Paul said he had learned contentment in plenty and want, those lessons were not neatly packaged, one-time instructions. He learned in beatings, in prisons and in awesome transformations. That is the essence of learning. We homeschoolers love the season when the new curriculums arrive. All of those neatly packaged lessons presented with crisp clarity excite us. About this point in the year, our books are tattered; pages are cluttered with check marks, erasures and scribbles. Sometimes it feels that nothing is being learned. Take heart. Learning is incremental. Isaiah told the people of Israel that living God’s way is precept upon precept. We are all in that process…learning a precept to place another precept upon. Don’t rush. Have faith. Learning is life. Learning is happening!

In this world of electronic communication, emails and texts, written communication is becoming a lost art.  Receiving a card in the mail or a hand-written note approaches ‘real gift’ status these days.   The beauty of cursive writing is slightly less elegant than calligraphy but far more attractive than a typewritten note.  Texting barely deserves mention as communication, so we will not even compare those two!  Even in a world of computers, signatures are still expected to be in cursive writing, are they not?  Handwriting is personal; it reveals the personality and touches hearts when received.

Even more practically, there are other reasons to learn cursive writing.  Being able to read the writing of the past is definitely one reason.  I treasure the recipes that have been handed down to me.  I love to use the cards my mother, grandmother and friends have shared.  I still enjoy writing down favorites (sometimes in cursive) for others to enjoy.  More importantly are the historic documents or family legacies recorded in cursive.  Source documents of our nation’s history are all in cursive.  Many other treasures lie in handwriting as well.  While we could always find a ‘translator,’ why not teach a skill that takes so little time…and comes before children when they are still eager to learn?

Interestingly, the SAT scores from 2006 may offer another incentive.  That year, only 15% of the test-takers employed cursive in the essay portion of their tests.  That 15% scored measurably higher on their overall scores.  It is suggested that the fluid movement required by cursive writing, the fine motor skills and hand-eye coordination impact the development of brain synapses.  Often history shows us making adjustments to enhance culture—only to find that we have misunderstood the full implications of the changes.  I wonder if cursive writing may be that sort of endeavor.

Maybe relegating cursive writing to artistic expression is an option to explore.  The flow of words across a page is sweeter when the letters link.  Handwriting does not need to be perfect, but it is a perfectly enjoyable task.  I hope you and your students will embrace it!