Over the past couple weeks, I’ve been working on a series on helping our children and students learn to love Reading and Writing. This has included the initial post as well an article about helping your kids (of all ages!) write creatively – for fun! and more ideas for easily working in some creative writing exercises […] Read more…
Creating a Positive Learning Environment As a former teacher now homeschooling my own kids, I love to create a positive learning environment by cultivating a resource-rich home for them. We haven’t yet reached an age where I feel compelled to decide whether to take the curriculum route or just keep following their lead to explore […] Read more…
Storytelling with Kids – Make Writing Fun! This post contains affiliate links. You can read my full privacy policy here. Last week, as part of my series on helping our children and students learn to love Reading and Writing, I wrote a post about helping your kids (of all ages!) write creatively – for fun! In […] Read more…
Math With Dice Colorful dice I picked up a few big foam dice (i guess that would technically be “die”) recently, thinking we could probably use them somehow to do math with dice at home. The novelty of the size and color certainly helped make math a bit more enticing :). Read more…
Curating a Literacy-Rich Home Environment Kids can learn so much when they are surrounded by interesting, creative, and informative things. These “things” can be books, toys, digital resources — or friends, grandparents, outdoor adventures … etc. When we curate* a resource-rich home environment for our kids, creating a space where they can comfortably live, play, […] Read more…
Fall Crafts and Activities for Kids We’ve been loving the Fall season this year, now that our kids are starting to get old enough to have fun on our little adventures — and we’re breaking through into a whole new world where nap times don’t always ruin our grand plans ;). Here’s some of our […] Read more…
Science experiment for finding volume using water — differentiated for use with preschool through high school; great for science centers or math centers or multi-age homeschool groups. Read more…
Water Displacement Observation Many of our best learning moments start with simple conversations. Today during lunch, N was (per usual) not focusing on his food. Instead of eating, he was dipping his hand in and out of his water cup. As I started explaining explain that he was making his water dirty, he interrupted me. […] Read more…
The dreaded B word (BORED) has begun to surface in our house – the kind of bored where the boys throw every couch cushion and pillow on the floor, jump on them like little hooligans, then flop down and complain that there’s nothing to do. Read more…
While all the other kids were busy building forts and playing in water tables, J wandered over to this rock with a divot that had collected water. Someone (probably a staff member) had left out an old paintbrush and J picked it up and started dipping it in the puddle and “water painting” on another rock. Ha! Why had I never thought of that?! No prep work needed, almost no supplies, no mess to clean up, and endless directions to pursue — use a paintbrush, sponges, roll toy cars through water, make water paint footprints and handprints, practice calligraphy, draw Anything you can think of, even do math on the sidewalk! … etc. Here’s an activity we could do at home any day for FREE (1 point!) that’s clean (2 points!) and fun (3 points!). (Points are nonredeemable but fun to collect.) Read more…