Homeschooling for His Glory

A year is ending, which means another year is dawning. With that comes new resolutions. I, for one, am not a fan of resolutions, but I had to come to realize the value of having goals. So, I will join in the challenge of having 5 major goals for the year 2012.         Here we go: 1. Wake up before 7:00 ever mornings. That will make my hubby happy and make my day go much smoother. 2. Be consistent and diligent with my meditation time.  This includes: The daily reading of God's Word Memorizing Scripture Keeping up with uplifting readings Keeping up with a couple of devotionals: Create in Me a Clean Heart ; A Devotional for the Disorganized and Encouragement for Homeschool Moms (from Deeper Roots). 3. Starting and keeping up a cleaning schedule and routine. This also involves keeping up with the different challenges I joined up to keep me accountable on this one. 4. Keeping a school routine diligently. 5. Keeping a joyful and grateful attitude all the time.

1.  We finished school for this term 2 weeks ago, and have been enjoying our first week of break. Here are some of what they had done in the past month: 2.  Our church Cantata went well, praise God. The duet my hubby and I  sang went very well as well, for which we are grateful. Right at this moment my kids are singing the cantata in their bedroom over and over with much enthusiasm. Very sweet. 3.  Christmas pictures have been taken, I just don't have them yet. These are just some I took for fun: 4. Gifts are all wrapped up and mostly given out. 5.  I experienced the blessing of God's protection as I had an auto accident ( collision) last night without injuries for my son and me. We might need a new car though, but that's still to be determined. At least I do not have to incur any cost as I was not at fault. 6.  I am very happy about the new playbook I got for christmas. Another praise item. 7.  One of our traditions from back home in the Caraibbean

We were recently given a copy of George W. Sarris'  The World's Greatest Stories CD . It has been a hit at our house. The boys have enjoyed  this CD from the start. We got the one on  The Prophets, which includes the stories of The Blazing Furnace, The Handwriting on the Wall, Daniel in the Lion's Den, Elijah and the Prophets of Baal, The Prophecy of Jonah . The stories are engaging, dramatic and well read. The best part of these Scripture stories is that they are word for word readings of the Bible. You cannot get better than that. As much as I think retold of Bible stories are good to introduce kids to the Bible, getting acquainted with the original text of the Bible is really the best. And this is what this series provides for you - a reading of the Bible stories that kids can understand, appreciate, enjoy and learn to know well. I think that these CDs are great for anyone to listen to. So what exactly is The World's Greatest Story ? The World's Greatest S

Fractazmic is a Math game that teaches kids about - you must have guessed it - Fractions. It is put out by the company I See Cards which specializes in Math games for kids from Grade 1-8. Price:   $6.95 for the 60 card deck . It comes with a how to play sheet inside the deck The game consists of 3 suits of fractions in 3 different colors: the Sixteenth (red) made up of 1/16, 1/8, 3/16, 1/4, 5/16, 3/8, 7/16 and 1/2 cards. the  twelfth (blue), made up of 1/12, 1/16, 1/4, 1/3, 5/12 and 1/2 cards. the Tenth (green), made up of 1/10, 1/5, 3/10, 2/5 and 1/2 cards. The goal of the game is to make hands that equal 1 by adding the fractions. The trick and challenge is that you can add any fractions within a colored suit as long as it equals 1. What that means is that you can make a hand by putting together 1/12, 1/6, 1/4, 1/3, 5/12 and 1/2 or 1/4, 1/4 and 1/2 for example. The winner is the one with the most hands when one player runs out of cards. This game is great because it

Well, really it is the second batch of cookies we've made this week, but the first one  (sugar cookies)got eaten before any pictures were taken. Butter Cookie Christmas Cutouts 1 cup of butter 1 1/2 cups of sifted powdered sugar 1 egg 1 teaspoon of vanilla 2 1/2 cups of sifted flour 1 teaspoon of cream of tartar 1 teaspoon of baking soda 1/4 teaspoon of salt Cream butter, add sugar gradually and cream until fluffy. Add unbeaten egg and vanilla; beat well. Sift together dry ingredients; blend into cream mixture. Chill dough about an hour. Roll on well floured pastry board to 1/4 inch thickness. Cut with floured cutter. Bake on an unbuttered cookie sheet for 610-12 minutes at 325 degrees.  

As a French speaker (born on the island of Martinique in the West Indies) one of my desire and goal is to have my boys speak French. Unfortunately I find it hard to speak French in an English context (my husband is Filipino and we live in Toronto). So, the next best thing is to teach it to them as a school subject. I have had no liking to the different curriculum I have seen out there except for one I have started using this year (thanks to a friend who gave it to me). So, when I was offered the chance to review Le Francais Facile I jumped on the occasion. I picked the junior level as my boys are in grade 1 and 3 respectively. The Easy French is a French curriculum put out by Great Commission Languages. It is written by Marie Filipino who possesses a Bachelor of Arts in Psychology (Reading), taught  French As A Second Language , spent years as a Literacy Specialist and Tutor, and is working on her Masters of Education in Curriculum development as well as gaining certification as

We finished Unit 1 of Tapestry of Grace on the Middle Ages era and here is the list of the resources we added to our study: Atlas: The Kingfisher Atlas of the Medieval World World Historical Atlases: The medieval World by Rebecca Stefoff Series: Medieval World Series by Crabtree Pubishing Medieval World by Smart Apple Media Weapons of War series Uncovering History: Everyday Life in . . . I Belong to the . . . Faith You Wouldn't want to Be ... Armies of the Past The Usborne Illustrated World History: The Viking World Life and Time The Viking Library At a Glance Ancient Civilizations That's Their Stories Ancient and Medieval People The Age of Castles DK  Discoveries (Castles at War; Crusades) Books: Charlemagne from Biography from Ancient Civilizations Series Medieval England by Cathryn Hinds from Cultures of the Past Series Barbarians! by Steven Kroll Back to Basics: The Vikings Sightseers: Essential Travel Guide to the Past How to be a Medieval Knight by Fiona Macdonald Nav