Adventures in Homeschooling

Traditional. Montessori. Classical. Teaching to the test (yes, that's a teaching style now). Charlotte Mason. Online. Learning cooperatives. There are so many options for homeschooling today. It used to be that people had to settle for "better than the alternative" or "well, at least it's not teaching heresy" books and curriculum, but today, there are so many options , and we as teachers have the luxury of identifying both our teaching style and our students' learning styles and using the materials we see fit. So, what is my teaching style? How do I believe that students learn best? My overall teaching philosophy is that I am here to help kids learn. That's it. This is significant because I don't see myself as having all the answers and "teaching all the little people, imparting my great wisdom on them". Nope. I try to observe first, try to see how they learn best, and go from there. So, how to help them learn? I like t...

It appears that I somehow missed an entry last week,  and a very fun one too!! Complete with a glossary! How could you have known about my love of Greek Mythology? I love how the story started out seeming very realistic and then took a fictional turn. Awesome!! Without further ado, here is Delaine Mitchell's story, grade 4: The Story of When the Gods Where Mortal  It was a Friday morning and I was sitting on the couch.     "Mom" I said "yes honey" she said, "can I take Judd for a walk?".    " Sure honey" so I got Judd's leash and put it on him.     Five minutes later I was walking Judd on Taft street when a pipe burst and Sobek came crawling out.     (For more information go to the glossary).    I had heard of Sobek before which was good, but what was not good was that he crawled out as a croc!     Then my dog turned into a satyr which I realized was Pan (For more information go to the gloss...

I've kind of fallen off the writing bandwagon in the last week, partly due to craziness in my life, and partly because the only submissions for the contest I've received have been from my children, and while I'm sure you love reading their writing, I sure would appreciate some variety! So......I would like to propose another contest of.... First Person Fiction To clarify, this work of fiction does not have to be something crazy! It can be a true story that happened, like realistic fiction, told from the first person point of view. I've had students who love to begin writing about real things that have happened, and then they add a twist or a different ending, or additional details. Try to get the stories in to me by Wednesday, Thursday at the latest. I will post a story on Friday, even if it means you read another story by one of my children!! Email me with your entries at shannonelawson26@gmail.com. Don't forget to say the age or grade of your child.

First Person Fiction Calling all writers!! Write a story, a fictional story, in the first person perspective (I, me, my, us). Submit it by Tuesday night, and you will be in the running to be a published writer next Friday! The story can be any length, and your writing level will be considered. My email address is: shannonelawson26@gmail.com Include your name and grade level. Also, please tell me if you want your last name to be published. Any questions, please comment!

Every homeschool needs a bit of motivation outside of Mom. Heck, some days, without outside motivation, I fear I would leave school undone and strewn throughout the house, the dog would be barking outside (so he couldn't pee everywhere), children would lie around, vegged out to PBS kids, and I would gulp sip a glass of red wine, in my robe, at 4pm. Oh yeah, and for dinner, a pizza on the way. But I digress... I've been building up the idea that the world wide internet gets to see their work if they win, and we are a pretty competitive family. Example:after winning a sandcastle building-contest in North Carolina, Grace quizzed the recreation director about how many judges there were (only one) and if she had actually won, or just got a "participation trophy" (my kids won, but there was only one other family who competed). So....tomorrow I will announce the genre for next week's writing contest. The entries will be due Tuesday night and the winner announced Fri...

Seeing as I have a shortage of entries, I'll publish one more. Another writing genre is the personal journal. I told both my kids and my students that when you can't think of anything to write, start by writing about your day and how you feel. This is Jacob's writing from Wednesday. He wanted me to publish it. suny = sunny tere = there fon = fun I guess we'll need to work on punctuation, but pretty good for the first week of second grade.

Here is the winning (and only) piece of literature submitted. Yes, it was written by my daughter, and yes, it is partially true, but partly fiction. Without further ado: Spider Terror!                                                                                                                    by Grace Lawson   Age 8                                                                                                   Yesterday, while my mom was...

How do I turn, "Mom, I hate writing!" into "Well, that wasn't so bad." or even "That was my favorite class!" ??? How can you have a kid begging to write a research report on something they are interested in, or write a story because they were inspired by a conversation? I'm not sure I have a definite answer, but I ask myself this question every year as I always come across hesitant students. Some say they hate writing because they find it boring. Others find it challenging. Some are good at it but hate it anyway, and others can never seem to "get it right" so they don't bother trying. Every class (usually) has both extremes: the struggling student and the excelling one. Every homeschool with more than one child has this too; in my household, it seems more pronounced because my 4th grader is grades ahead in language arts, and my 2nd grader has to work a bit harder to stay on grade level in this area. How does a teacher navigate this?...

It's confession time. I'm excited to be back writing in the blog world, but I'm kinda intimidated too. For one thing, I know a lot of great people who are talented writers and have been doing the blogging thing for a while. I am in unfamiliar territory for sure! Secondly, I'm WRITING about WRITING, and quite honestly, for the last few years I've been teaching writing instead of actually writing, so I'm a bit rusty. This makes me feel quite vulnerable. If I'm bad at it, it's kind of like being a marriage counselor with a failing marriage. Embarrassing. However, I do know that a good writer is one who continues to practice, who forms a habit of writing, and the first step is to just do it. This is why I am here. So please, bear with me. Offer suggestions! Be gentle. I'm open to ideas (but I am a little nervous after reading some comment boxes on other blogs; harsh).

Want to motivate your kids to write? Read on. I am coming out of blogging retirement (note: I only have one post. Ever.), and it's all because I think kids should be encouraged to write and should have a platform to do so. My kids love to write. Just ask them. All they ever talk about is writing, do it from morning to night, and never want to do anything else. Bahahahaha! Actually, they DO like to write, and they are very creative when they do it, but they tend to get on "writing kicks" where they get excited about it for a while and write JUST BECAUSE, but then two minutes later complain about writing. I mean, literally TWO DAYS after my eight-year-old told me she hates writing, she wrote a book report. In August. Because she liked the book she was reading. In my twelve years of teaching writing, one thing I have come to notice is that few kids actually hate writing. They may enjoy doing other things more, they may have bad penmanship which makes writing difficult (...