school
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a little mid-term school update.
It’s hard for me to believe that we’re well into our second quarter of the school year! Well, I guess we sort of cheated by taking off and hitting the road for three weeks in September (and truly, I was out four weeks because of Charleston). “Road-schooling” was amazing for all of us. It involved tons of learning but zero workbooks. So as you can imagine, it took us a bit to get caught up and accustomed to our normal routine, but we’ve made the transition and are enjoying this semester more than ever after the gift of exploring our great big country. First, Classical Conversations. After a year off,…
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august.
Hi there! So, I’ve had a bookshelf post in the works for a couple of weeks now, but the truth is, between school and trip prep, my brain is mush. I love writing Bookshelf posts, but there’s a good change this one will never, ever be finished. So how about this: Can I tell you about our month in photos, and then pretty please, just give you a list of books I read at the end? It feels like a cop-out. But it’s better than nothing, right? Despite the craziness of starting school and planning a long road trip, and just normal life with a family of six, August has…
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the first four weeks.
Hi friends! The new school year is off to a great start. We added in Classical Conversations this week, and everyone was happy. It’s good to be back. We feel so welcomed at our new campus. Judah and I were a bit shell-shocked after our first afternoon of Essentials (Grammar, Writing, Math games), but after two days of doing the work at home, we feel a little better, and we’re even learning the lingo. He was excited to show his dad his first ever Key Word Outline. If you’re looking for school tips, I feel like I owe our smooth start to: 1. Working hard to get…
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fifth year of homeschooling: the details.
Thanks so much for your kind feedback about my post on homeschooling with depression. It’s always good to know we aren’t alone, isn’t it? But I know that if you’re a homeschooling friend you may be thinking, “Julie, I’m very glad you made it through a year with depression, but, um, I need some details. How did school go? Did you like your curriculum? How was your year without Classical Conversations? What will you do differently next year?” These are the burning questions in the minds of homeschooling mothers (and sometimes fathers too), and it makes me laugh that we must ask them of one another. We’ve got an…
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fifth year of homeschooling (with depression).
Friends, today is our last day of school! We made it! We celebrated with a surprise trip to Dunkin’ Donuts and big smiles all around. As I gather pictures for this blog post and remember our year, this fullness welling up in my heart is gratitude. Sheer gratitude, that we were able to complete this school year. Allow me to reflect a tiny bit. This is the first time that I nearly spent an entire school year living with depression. It descended like a thick dark cloud last summer and has dogged me ever since. I’m telling you this, first of all, because I want to tell you about…
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book club for kids: my side of the mountain.
One of the most memorable parts of our school year is always the books we enjoy together. Actually, you could say that a big reason I decided to homeschool my kids is so that we could read lots and lots of great books. We’ve logged many hours reading and listening together in the last four and a half years, and they’ve become wonderful memories we share. At the top of the list of favorite books are those we read and celebrate with our homeschool group. In the fall you may remember that we had a Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe book club. On Friday, we gathered at a hiking…
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book club for kids: the lion, the witch, and the wardrobe.
The Chronicles of Narnia, by C.S. Lewis, are one of my favorite series ever, so I was happy to be assigned to help lead the book club with two other families from our homeschool group. Our group reads and discusses three books a year together, and The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe is our first for this year. Families can choose between reading the novel aloud together, having older kids read it to themselves, or listening to the audiobook. We kind of did all three because we read the book before together awhile back. Last month, Judah and I brushed up on the story by reading it alone again,…
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a new school year.
Here in South Carolina, most schools don’t start back until after the solar eclipse on August 21, but we officially began the new school year yesterday. We’re traveling this month and next month, so I wanted to give us a little bit of a buffer to get in our full 180 days. I take that back — I wanted to give us a huge buffer. We finished last year at the end of April, and I had every intention of starting us back at the beginning of July. Or earlier. I just adore those school-year-round, the-world-is-our-education homeschoolers. I want to be them. But I’m not. Wait, this sounds familiar. Haven’t…
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homeschooling littles using charlotte mason.
Happy Monday, my friends! Can you believe we made it to Christmas week!? Today I want to answer another question from my recent homeschooling q and a series. I thought I’d separate it from the series, because I think there are some lovely quality-time ideas in here for any parent (or grandparent! or babysitter!) of littles, whether or not you homeschool. Perhaps your child does part-time preschool and you’re looking for some ideas for the remaining days. Or maybe you’re thinking ahead to those long stretches of boiling hot summer days and what you’ll do with all that free time. Or you’re a nanny and would like to give your…
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morning time.
A few of you have asked if we use Morning Time in our home school. I love the idea of it, but haven’t successfully incorporated it into our rhythm yet, so I thought I’d ask my friend Kelly to tell you about her experience. I also wanted to separate this post from my homeschool series, because I actually think anyone can do Morning Time! It could happen any time of day. I plan to work hard to create a routine like this for our summer, to give our mornings some structure. And now, here’s Kelly . . . It all started 2 1/2 years ago on a drive to my…
