October Grandview Program and Art Co-op

Wednesday we headed out to Grandview for our monthly hands on science program and art co-op.  Each of the science programs include a short program, hands on activity, and a coordinating lapbook to take home and complete.  The art co-op is focusing on a different artist every month and a project to create something similar to what the artist created.

This month's science program was the last one in our animal classification series.  So far we had done mammals, amphibians, reptiles, birds, and insects, and yesterday we did fish.  There were 32 children at the morning program.  In the program the children learned some different facts about fish such as where they live, how they breathe, what their body was made up of, what they eat, how their babies are born, and more.  They also learned about the different types of fish mouths and the different things fish with different mouths eat.

Then we did two different activities.  Children older than K got to fashion a fish.  They could either draw a fish and its habitat on paper, or they could use things like clothespins, paper towel rolls, pipe cleaners, puffy balls, wooden shapes, popsicle sticks, tape, and more to create their own fish.  There was some very creative fish making going on!!  I was so impressed with how different children created completely different fish, and I was blown away by one young man's fish drawing!

Younger children did a fish counting game and then made their own fish by gluing different scraps of colored paper onto a fish.

Then anyone who wanted to could make a fishing game by tracing a fish shape onto foam and poking a metal brad in as an eye.  We hot glued pipe cleaners to a magnet and taped the pipe cleaner to a wooden skewer to make a fishing pole.  Then they could catch fish with their pole.

We had 16 children stay for the art class in the afternoon.  Our artist this month was Georges Seurat.  We made a notebook page on Georges and then each child did a painting using pointillism.  To do this, they drew any picture they wanted on a piece of paper.  Each child was given a palette with several paint colors in it and a q-tip for each color.  They filled in their drawings by making dots with their q-tips on the paper.  I have to say I was very impressed with the children's drawings and paintings!

Here are my children's paintings.  I took that photo with my phone and it didn't turn out great.

Christian did the top left.  It is a painting of a well.  Emmie's is the next one, random pink, purple, and white dots.  Anthony's is the watermelon in the garden and Lily did two flowers.

We had a great day!

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Discipline in the Homeschool

One of the questions about homeschooling that people ask that always surprises me is, "How do you get your children to do their work?"

This surprises me because I wonder why people think it would be an option to not do their work.  It's not a choice  It's part of their responsibilities.

This is one of my favorite Bible verses:

"Children obey your parents in all things for this is well pleasing unto the Lord." Colossians 3:20 KJV

Homeschooling is an extension of everyday life.  They do their work because they have to obey their parents, not just because I say so, but because God says so.

That, does NOT mean there is not the occasional whining, complaining, or procrastinating over school work, because there is (I'm going to talk about that more here in a minute), but generally speaking, I set the expectations and they do what they are asked to do.  I try to make learning as fun as possible and allow the children to study things that interest them, but of course there are times when they have to do things they don't like and just get them done whether they want to or not.

I do believe in positive reinforcement.  I think it is a good motivator to get things done and done in a timely fashion.  In our house, the children have to get their work completed by 2 in the afternoon in order to earn 30 minutes on the playstation.  If their work is not finished (and done well), they do not get to play.  I have known other people whose children earn stickers towards some kind of prize, TV time, or even one friend whose boys get to go fishing every afternoon if their work is completed on time and done well.


So what if you are having trouble with your children doing their work or chores?

First let's take a look at the second half of that verse:

"Father's, provoke not your children to anger, lest they be discouraged." Colossians 3:21 KJV

I actually like the NASB ,"Father's do not exasperate your children, so they will not lose heart."

Before deciding if discipline is necessary, I think about that verse and try to decide if it is really a discipline issue, or is it something else.

What kind of things can exasperate our children in a homeschool setting?  I think about these questions:

Is the activity/assignment age appropriate?- This can be a hard thing to evaluate sometimes because age and maturity can differ in different children and some children are just not capable of doing things at the same rate as other children.  But, overall is it a task that my 5 year old should be able to handle, or is it too much.  The general time guideline I try to go by is 2-2.5 times their age for each subject.  So expecting a 6 year old to do 40 minutes of math is not very age appropriate.

Are my expectations realistic?- This too will vary depending on the child.  Sometimes we set our expectations based on our experience with a previous child.  When my now 12 year old was 7 he could do the majority of his school work independently.  But my 7 year old now needs a bit more hand holding and needs me to work alongside him.  It is not realistic for me to expect him to do it on his own because his older brother did.  I think too about the differences between boys and girls.  My 5 year old girl will sit and color forever getting everything perfectly in the lines.  But, I know many 5 year old boys that would put a few streaks on the paper and consider it beautiful and completed.  Even though we want our children to strive to do the best they can, our expectations may be above what they really are capable of doing.

Were my instructions clear and understandable?- Ok parents.  I will confess to being guilty of this and I know I am not alone.  Have you ever given instructions that were not completely clear and then gotten annoyed when your child didn't follow them?  I have.  I have told the children to do something thinking they understood completely what I meant even though it wasn't what I said.  Guess what?  Children cannot read our minds.  If we want them to do something correctly, we have to be specific in our instructions and not expect them to read our minds and know what we meant even though we didn't say it that way.

Another thing I wanted to mention here is that sometimes we give too many instructions all at the same time.  I do that a lot.  I will give a list of things that I want done.  Unfortunately my 10 year old especially simply cannot follow a list of instructions  ( it is part of his dyslexia) so if I tell him go upstairs watch you math DVD, then come down and finish your grammar worksheet, and then work on your writing paper, he will forget the 2 and 3rd item before he even completes the first one.  That is not his fault and not a discipline issue.  He is not deliberately disobeying, he just cannot remember a list of instructions.  I know better and should not put him in a situation where he becomes exasperated.

Is the task overwhelming?  Sometimes we forget what it is like to be a small child.  We give them a task to do and think it should be an easy one.  Then they have a meltdown and it completely surprises us.  Why?  Because what seemed to us to be an easy task was terribly overwhelming to your 9 year old.  If you can, break it down into smaller steps or work along with your child.  If it continues to be an issue, it may just be something they are not ready for and you may need to set that task aside for awhile.

Is it a matter of I don't want to, or is it really I just can't do it?  When kids start acting out during the school day, it may not be a discipline issue, it may really be something they just cannot do.  Sometimes it can be a readiness thing (they are not ready) or it may be a learning disability or difficulty, or a physical issue such as hearing difficulties, or vision problems.  My nephew started throwing tantrums every day when it was time for school.  At first it was thought to be a discipline issue, like he just didn't want to do his work.  But discipline didn't solve the issue.  It wasn't a discipline issue, the tantrums were because he has a difficulty with fine motor skills and is unable to do his work the way it was assigned.  A tweak in his school day stopped the tantrum problems and some muscle strengthening exercises will help him develop his fine motor skills.


I am not saying you should not discipline your children if they disobey.  There are times when discipline is necessary.  I do not tolerate temper tantrums no matter what the reason.  The tantrum thrower is sent to their room until they can stop and rejoin the rest of us.  There should be consequences to disobedience and of course what is appropriate consequences depends on the family, the child, and the age.  We should discipline in love, not anger and not by being harsh and it should not be done in front of others.  But, I do think we need to look at the reasons behind what may be causing the issues and make adjustments as necessary.  I want my children to love to learn and I never want them to "lose heart" because I am causing them to "be exasperated."

One more thought I am going to leave you with.  Do not beat yourself up for past mistakes.  What happened yesterday is over.  Today is a new day.  If there is an underlying issue in your homeschool, you can't do anything about how you handled it yesterday, but you can change today and make more changes tomorrow.  His mercies are new every morning! " Great is His faithfulness; his mercies begin afresh each morning." Lamentations 3:23 NLT

Happy Homeschooling!

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Review: When Mercy Rains by Kim Vogel Sawyer

Suzanne Zimmerman was sent away from her Old Order Mennonite home at the age of seventeen by her mother to have her baby, give it up for adoption, and then return home.  But things didn't exactly turn out that way.  She instead stayed away from home, became a nurse, and raised a daughter, Alexa, on her own.  Now 20 years later her brother sends a letter requesting that Suzanne come home.  Her mother has been injured and is in need of her nursing abilities to help care for her.  Returning home means that Suzannne will not only have to face Paul Aldrich, her first love, but also her family and faith that may not forgive her for her mistakes in the past.  Suzanne makes the decision that she and Alexa will return to Kansas.  Alexa is excited at the prospect of meeting the big family she never had an opportunity to get to know.

Paul Aldrich is doing some work around the Zimmerman home to make it more handicap accessible. He is excited that Suzanne is returning home.  Now widowed with an eight year old son, he never had the chance to ask her forgiveness for his past indiscretion.  After meeting Alexa though he begins to wonder if there was more to the story of Suzanne's leaving and staying away so long.

How will Suzanne's uncovered secrets from the past affect her family and friends?  Will she be forgiven and can she herself forgive?

Kim Vogel Sawyer has become one of my favorite authors.  I have loved each of her books that I have had an opportunity to review.  I was very excited when I found out that she was coming out with a trilogy a little different from her usual historical fiction. This trilogy was to feature an Old Order Mennonite family and take place in the present time.  When Mercy Rains is the first book in the trilogy.

Download chapter one here.

Visit Kim's website at www.kimvogelsawyer.com



I LOVED it!  I actually sat down on a Friday evening to read while the children were watching a movie.  I could not put it down.  I kept reading all the way until it was bedtime and I had to stop with only two chapters to go! After getting the children into bed, I finally got to go back and finish. Kim Vogel Sawyer does an outstanding job of pulling her readers right into the story.  I loved the story and the characters.  There was a character that I had made my mind in the beginning that I wasn't going to like, but it turned out I was wrong.  There is a wonderful message in this story about our lives and the effects the decisions that we make have on other people.  But, more importantly there is a message of compassion, forgiveness and mercy.  The importance of extending compassion, forgiveness, and mercy to to others and accepting it for yourself as well.

"Remember not the sins of my youth, nor my transgressions: according to thy mercy remember thou me for thy goodness" sake, O Lord." Psalm 25:7

Now the only problem is I have to wait until spring until the second book, When Grace Sings, comes out.  I will be looking forward to that book's release as well.

Disclaimer: I received a complimentary copy of this book for the purpose of writing a fair and honest review.  I received no other compensation and all opinions are my own.  I am disclosing this in accordance to FTC regulations. 

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What Do You Do With Your Little One During School Time?

I was asked this question the other day, so of course I had to turn the answer into a blog post!  Our first year of homeschooling I had an 8 year old, 3 1/2 year old, 20 month old, and a newborn.  20 months later we had another little one.  22 months later we had another, and almost exactly 24 months later we had another.  So I am no stranger to homeschooling with babies and toddlers.  In fact this is this is the first time I have ever had a 3 year old without having a baby too (but I don't want to talk to much about that because it makes me sad missing babies.)

But that is a question that a lot of people want to know the answer to.  How do you homeschool with little ones underfoot and what do you do with them during your school day?  I have always wanted my younger children to be a part of our homeschool.  I have never wanted them to feel like they were in the way or not welcome.  In our house, most of our school work is done downstairs in either the family room or the playroom/schoolroom.  If we are reading in one room, children can be playing in that same room or right in the next room, and when we are working at the table they can be playing on the floor or doing an activity with us at the table.

To be honest, Emelia has always been the most disruptive child I have had as far as our school day goes.  From the time she got out of the sleep all the time phase she has found a way to wreak havoc on our day.  I spent most of the 2011/2012 school year teaching standing up holding her.  Then when she started becoming mobile, I would assign one child to keep an eye on her while I was working with the others.  She is the baby and really enjoys being in the center of everything and being involved in everything we do.

She is now 3 1/2 and does quite well playing independently.  We keep a variety of toys in the playroom including a doll house, little people princess castle and accessories, a play kitchen and accessories, and other play pretend toys that she can play with.  She often comes in and listens when I am reading and I always keep crayons, paper, and pencils she can draw with close by.  She climbs in and out of my lap (and sometimes Nick and Alex's too) as she wants to.

She participates in the activities that she is able to such as science experiments, cooking in the kitchen, and projects Lily is working on in her My Father's World Curriculum.

She also loves to sit and listen to me read Christian's literature books.

Painting is always fun, and when you are done you can stack the containers for more fun!

Magnet chips and wands are a great way to keep busy and have fun during the day.

We have all kinds of math manipulatives that Emmie plays with during the school day.

She also gets to take a turn on the iPad.

Puzzles, playdough, stringing beads, lacing activities are some other things that keep Emmie busy during the school day.

What about interruptions?  There will always be interruptions in life and that is true in the homeschool as well especially if you have more than one child.  When you have babies and toddlers there will be more interruptions then when you have older children.  Some things I tried to do when I had babies and toddlers was to keep things handy that I could possibly need (snack, juice cup, wipes, diapers, tissues, favorite baby toys) so I wouldn't have to take the time to hunt down those things during the school day to minimize interruptions.  We are blessed to have a bathroom off of playroom/schoolroom which came in very handy while potty training.  Our one on one school work took place in the afternoon while the baby was napping and I could focus on the child that needed me.

Now that Emmie is older, she understands when it is school time and she is not supposed to interrupt when I am reading.  That doesn't mean that she never does.  I do gently remind her that she needs to wait until I am finish and as soon as  I come to a stopping point will take care of what she needs.  Since she no longer naps, I try to make sure she has some things set out to do when we are doing our afternoon school  work so I won't have to stop and get what she needs.  There are times that Emmie and Lily will get to fighting over a toy or Emmie will throw a fit because she wants something that Lily has.  When she throws  fit I take her to her room and tell her she has to stay there until she can stop.  When she can stop she can come back downstairs.  Then I go back to teaching and she returns when she is ready.

There are some times that those interruptions will take over and that's ok.  When your little ones are sick or get hurt and need some extra snuggles and attention from mommy, school can wait.  Also, if you have older children that have finished their work and a toddler that is extra needy you can have the older child help your other children while you snuggle the toddler.  

I know how crazy and busy the school day can be.  There is always something to do and things that are always left undone.  But, find time during the day to do something one on one with your little ones too every day.  Read a favorite book, play a game, make a snack, play toys.  Just spend some time with them during the day that is on their level, even if they are involved in other things that you do during the school day.  They don't stay little very long :)

Happy Homeschooling!

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Review: Where Treetops Glisten

More Info

Read Chapter One

Author Bio

My latest book review, Where Treetops Glisten is made up of three stories featuring different members of the same family written by three different authors. The stories take place during World War II and are all named after three different Christmas songs that became popular during that time period.

White Christmas, by Cara Putman is a story about Abigail Turner.  Abigail's heart was broken when the boy she loved was killed during the war.  But her faith and hope returns as she seeks to help Jackson Turner solve a serious problem in his life.

In I'll Be Home for Christmas by Sarah Sundin, Abigail's brother Pete is a fighter pilot who has returned home trying to find hope and peace in his life after his time at war is over.  But, Pete is remembered around town for all of his youthful mistakes.  Grace, a recent widow, is in need of some help, but can she trust Pete?  Has he changed or is he still the bully she remembers?

Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas by Tricia Goyer features Abigail and Pete's sister Meredith.  Meredith is a nurse who is on the frontline in the Netherlands.  While there, she ends up face to face with the man who betrayed her back home.

Historical fiction is my favorite type of book to read, and I have read several of Tricia Goyer's books, so I was excited to have an opportunity to read this story.  I think all three authors wrote beautiful stories of faith, hope, and love during a very difficult and painful time in history.  Each author does a good job of showing the character's feelings and difficulties, being truthful about what went on during the war without getting into the graphic side of the realities of war.  Even though the stories were written by different authors, each story flowed very well into the next.  I loved the characters, the story, the setting, the message, and the title.  It was a wonderful read and definitely on my read it twice list :)

Disclaimer: I received a complimentary copy of this book for the purpose of writing a fair and honest review.  I received no other compensation and all opinions are my own.  I am disclosing this in accordance to FTC regulations.

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Homeschool Wrap Up Week 7

Boy did we get a surprise in our homeschool this week!  But you are going to have to read the whole post to find out what it was because first I am wrapping up our homeschool week.  I did not do a good job taking pictures this week.


What we have been up to in Week 7:

Bible: We finished Chapter 5 in What On Earth Can I Do? and started reading through the iWitness Old Testament book.

History: We finished lessons 10-12 in Mystery of History Vol III.  This week we learned about the death of Savonarola, the Safavid Empire, and Leonardo da Vinci.  We made the memory cards and added the time line figures to our board, but I forgot to get the maps printed out, so we skipped those (oops!)

Science: We did all of the fun experiments for Chapter 4 of Exploring Creation through Chemistry and Physics and finished reading the chapter last week, but we had a few notebooking assignments to finish up.  Also, we are working on a review of Fascinating Chemistry, so we watched the videos for lesson one and took the test.

Spelling: Alex completed step 17 in level 4 of AAS.  Anthony and Christian completed step 4 of level 2 of AAS.

Math: No math problems or missing DVDs this week!  Everyone completed their weekly lessons of their various levels of Math U See.

Literature: Christian was supposed to read The Napping House for Literature this week, but that is one I did not buy and our library did not have, so we skipped that lesson and moved on to the next which was The Tale of Peter Rabbit.  He had to write a story that had a moral.  Anthony's new book for Level 3 of Lightning Literature is Rickshaw Girl.  We did not have that one either, but I was able to buy a Kindle version of that book and download it to the iPad.  His paper that he is working on is to write an instructional paper teaching someone how to do something.  Nick and Alex completed Lesson 6 of Fix It! Grammar and Lesson 5 of IEW Medieval History Writing Lessons.

Language: Alex and I completed Lesson One of Chinese and Nick completed Lesson 32 of Visual Latin 2.

My Father's World Creation From A to Z

Lily started working on a leaf unit this week.  We have read about leaves and what they do for the plant, completed worksheets on the letter L and the number 3, and had Bible lessons with the theme "I Will Live and Grow in Jesus."  She collected leaves, drew leaves, made her leaf badge, and pained leaves.  We also had an opportunity to use the plant presses we made at Grandview last fall to press some leaves.  Christian and Emmie wanted to collect and press some leaves with us too. The My Father's World Units are supposed to last 6 days each so we still have two more days to work on leaves.  Tomorrow we will take our leaves out of the plant press and see how they turned out.

Other Activities This Week:

We had soccer on Monday and Thursday.  Thursday's game only ended up being played a little past half time due to some bad storms we had.  We were on the field when the lightning started.  That was NOT a fun drive home.

Tuesday Lily had gymnastics.  It is fun to see how much she is improving already!  And Miss Emelia wants to be like her big sister!

Thursday was supposed to be baby rabbit day.  This is our first year with both male and female rabbits and the children wanted to raise rabbit babies.  When we transported the rabbits to the fair, they were in the same cage, so 31 days later we were expecting baby rabbits.  The lady we got the rabbits from told us our black rabbit was a female and the gray one was a male, but I guess it is really hard to tell with rabbits until they are about 3 months old and I never thought to make sure when they were older.  So a few days before they were supposed to be born we put a nesting box in the cage but we saw no signs of the rabbit making a nest.  The morning they were supposed to be born there were no babies in the black rabbit's cage.  Lily opened the gray rabbit's cage to pet it and found....you guessed it...a nest full of babies!  8 baby bunnies were born.  So far they seem to be doing well.  Now we know that Olaf should've been named Elsa and Elsa should've been named Olaf :)

And we added two kittens to our family as well. A friend was trying to find homes for 4 kittens that had been rescued.  She found home right away for the two females, but not the two males.  I told her if they got a little older and still didn't find a home I would take one and it could live in the shop as we have mice out there that get into the chicken feed.  Well she didn't find homes for either one of them, so we added Jack and Lucky to our family.  They are sweet little curious kitties that seem to have made themselves at home.  Tomorrow though, I am running Jack to the vet because he got fixed last week before he came to live with us and it seems as though he may have an infection.  Hopefully they will fix him right up!

Oh and Anthony decided to make a homemade ant farm.  He put a scoop of dirt into a jar with air holes that had fire ants in it.  The other night during the storm he brought the jar in so they wouldn't get wet and even fed them some of his grilled cheese sandwich.  Luckily the jar didn't spill at all and the next morning when I found out they were inside, asked him to take them back out :)

I hope you had a great week in your homeschool!

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Homeschoolers and Standardized Testing

Every state has different homeschool laws.  Some have no requirements for homeschoolers, some have very strict requirements, and others fall somewhere in the middle.  Here in Arkansas we have a few requirements.  We have to file a Notice of Intent before Aug 15th or Dec 15th of the semester you want to begin homeschooling, or 15 days before you pull your child out during the year.  We also have to sign a waiver stating that the State of Arkansas is not responsible for the education of our children, and finally we have to take the same norm referenced standardized tests in the same grades the public school is required to take.

The test we have taken for years is the Iowa Test of Basic Skills.  Grades 3-9 used to have to take the full battery, but a few years ago that was changed and now they only have to take the math and reading portion.  The parents are the only ones who get the individual results.  The state get results for homeschoolers as a whole, not individual results.  You cannot pass/fail the Iowa Test, it just shows how well you answered the questions compared to other students in the country.

Personally, I thin the requirement for homeschoolers to take standardized tests is absolutely ridiculous.  It makes me take a day off from our productive school work to take a test that means nothing and cannot accurately gauge what your student knows or doesn't know.  But, we do it because it is part of the law.

There are some homeschool parents who like to know where their child is compared to public school children, but I don't believe a standardized test is a good judge of that.  We do not test with the public school, we have our own testing site, but for many students it is the only time they are in that kind of testing situation.  When each of my children reach third grade, I have to sit down and shown them how to fill in the bubbles on a test answer sheet because testing is not something we do. Plus, many children just do not test well.  That doesn't mean they do not know the answers, but the testing situation itself makes them nervous enough that they don't do as well as they should.  Also, many children have tons of strengths and talents and knowledge that just cannot be measured on a standardized test.

When they call the test a "Basic Skills" test, it is truly what they mean.  The questions are VERY basic and not a true measure of what a child at that grade should know.  Also, the questions are repeated from year to year.  When my oldest son took the test in 3rd grade he remembered some of the same questions from that test the next year, and the next.


So, if standardized testing is not a good measure to see what your homeschooled child knows, what is?  In a homeschool, you are right there alongside of your child.  Even with older children who may be completing much of the work on their own, you still have the opportunity to discuss and go over their work.  You will know what they know.  You will learn their strengths and weaknesses and what areas they may need to work more in.  No two children are alike and we do not have to compare them to other children in the country in their grade to know that they are doing ok in school.

If you live in Arkansas, you may already know that there will be changes in our testing requirement voted on this year.  I strongly suggest for Arkansas homeschoolers and also homeschoolers in other states to know the laws in your state and stay informed as to what is going on in the homeschooling world.

Happy Homeschooling!

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