The Link Magazine

The Link: the Nations Homeschool Magazine offers a free full download of their magazine by email. Check out their website to sign up: http://www.homeschoolnewslink.com/

My favorite things about homeschool magazines, along with the new ideas from the articles are the ads. Yes, I love homeschool ads. I really enjoy seeing the exciting new products and materials coming available for homeschooling.

Because you know your feelin' crafty this December

Arts_and_Crafts_book
Originally uploaded by PopKulture

When I was a kid, I was extremely creative. I would cut things up and refashion them into some amazing new creation, much to my mothers dismay. Fortunately for me, my kiddos have inherited this wonderful trait from me: the need to create. Since I'm not a huge fan of large messes, this can be a fine balance to keep, the creativeness and the cleanliness. I love quick easy and not so messy projects to spark our creativity. That is my main criteria for projects: maximum creativity, ease of project, and tidy technique. It's also important to keep in mind your child's skill and developmental level, don't choose complicated projects that aren't age appropriate. It's really not fun for anyone if you are pretty much doing the project for them, it'll just be frustrating for both you and your child.

Christmas is a great time of year for crafts and artwork. Your December arts and craft projects can serve double duty as a gift. Here are a few fun projects I have found that we are working on this month. Enjoy!

Kusudma Sphere (for older kids and parents)- We used white printer paper cut into 2X2 squares to make ornament sized balls. I recommend practicing with a large piece of paper till you get the technique down

Flower wall art using toilet paper rolls (for PreK and up)- Amazingly classy and super easy

Old School Pom Poms (K and up)- I'm thinking about these in red, green, and white as festive ornaments for the tree

Fabric Fortune Cookie- (for teens or parents) This is SOOO cute, I'm thinking add a string and hang it on the tree, instead of a fortune, put a prediction for next year inside."I think 2010 will find me doing more fun arts and craft projects."

Homeschool Support, Only A Podcast Away

I love using my MP3 player and one of my favorite uses is to listen to Homeschool Podcasts, while I clean, cook, and exercise.

A podcast is like a talk radio show produced by everyday people then uploaded onto the web for sharing. For more information on what a podcast is check out this article from HowStuffWorks.com: How Podcasting Works

I really enjoy listening to the other homeschool mothers share information, resources, and inspiration with me via their podcasts. Below are a few of my favorites:

Blog Talk Radio, type in Homeschool in the search-many are older archived shows 

Homeschool.com Podcasts

Cindy Rushton's Mom to Mom Radio Show

A few non homeschool related podcasts:

Satellite Sisters

Vicky and Jen

A Science Experiments You Can Gift!

I get emails from the Home School Enrichment Magazine email list and this fun recipe was in their last one:


Science experiments you can use as gifts:

Fizzy Bath Bombs

This science-gift project, when mixed together with water, creates a chemical reaction. Don't be scared: you will not be blowing your grandma up when she uses her bath bombs. The chemical reaction occurs when the combination of citric acid and baking soda gets wet in the bath and forms carbon dioxide. Grandma will see fizzing and bubbling in the tub, but no explosions.

Items Needed:
• 2 tablespoons citric acid (look in canning supplies or health food stores)
• 2 tablespoons cornstarch
• Baking soda
• Fragrance oil (optional)
• Food coloring (optional)
• 3 tablespoons vegetable oil
• Mixing bowl
• Measuring cups and spoons
• Waxed paper
• Small cup or bowl
What To Do
Mix all the dry ingredients (citric acid, cornstarch, and baking soda) in mixing bowl. Next, in a small cup, mix the oil, fragrance, and coloring together. Slowly mix the liquid into the dry ingredients. Be sure to mix it very well.

Form 1-inch balls and place them on the waxed paper to dry. They should be semi-hard within 2–3 hours. However, let them dry 24–48 hours before placing them in a storage or gift container.
Label the container: "Add two or three to your bath and enjoy!"

This Enrichment Tip was excerpted from the "Give it a Try!" column by Melissa Pinkley in the Nov/Dec 2009 issue of Home School Enrichment Magazine.

Got Worksheets?

 WOW what a find!
Check out this post over at Freely Educate.

Need Free Worksheets? Check out Super Teacher Worksheets

One of her readers sent in this incredible find!!
Lori's blog-Freely Educate is amazing, I love seeing what she finds next.

Thanksgiving Unit

My computer may have been down the last couple of weeks but I wasn't! We've been busy with a Thanksgiving Unit Study. I love Kendra's 30 Days of Thanks and Giving. I always love Homeschool Share and here are some great Thanksgiving Lapbook plans by the infamous homeschooling mom Jimmie. We have a membership to ABCTeach and I got lots of good printables there.
So there's lots of ideas- now just make it work for your family! We made a big sign saying "30 Days of Thanks & Giving" and hung it up in our dining room; we do our traditional thankful journals every morning (well, the kids do, my mother-in-law correctly pointed out that Mom and Dad should, too... maybe next year!); we love hand-print crafts here (so far corn, the Mayflower and of course turkeys); we're reading Dora's Thanksgiving a bazillion times each day... enjoy the season!

Art Journals

This year I am doing Art Journals with my two oldest boys (8 1/2 and 7). Do not think that I am any kind of artist- but I want to encourage creativity for everyone in my home. So I googled "art journals" and found so much inspiration online that I knew this was something we could do. Specifically, I found this website chock full of information. Incidentally, she also posts other Art Projects For Kids ideas (that's the name of her website).

I decided to purchase 3 art journals so that I could participate as well. This has helped my boys "buy-in" immensely. It's also increased the time we spend on the project so that no one (mainly Nate) is done in 2 minutes, leaving me frustrated at the terrible ratio of set up and clean up to time spent on a project. And it's been great fun for me, too.

My goal is to encourage creativity in both materials and subject. So far we've used watercolor paints, oil pastels, markers, crayons, colored pencils and lots of fine point Sharpies. We've been setting up at the kitchen table about once a week, during the little ones' naptime, and I usually have a theme of some sort. They are free to do something completely different but this helps if they can't "think of anything!". Some recent themes have been choosing and copying a creativity quote then decorating the page; a fairy watercolor suggestion from an Usborne art book I have; also, my mom sent the boys some photos from their visit so they scrapbooked a few on one of the pages.

Here's a photo of Trent's art journal page from last week:

For this page, we lightly taped index cards on a blank page (we used a double page spread; you are seeing the right side page). Then we sponge painted the page using our own selection of colors and way of painting. After the paint dried (it didn't take long at all since the sponges helped it go on thinly), we removed the index cards. Then we wrote something about our week in each blank spot. Trent chose to use 2 index cards on each page and then write one thing in each card, drawing a picture to go along with what he wrote about.

I love quotes, so I've been putting a quote on most of my pages:

That's the watercolor fairy painting from the Usborne Big Book of Fairy Things to Make and Do... and also proof that I am NO artist! But I am enjoying this project and trying to just focus on letting my creativity out without worrying about the finished project... something I want to instill in my kids.