Christine | Heart of the Matter

August 31, 2010 By Christine 4 Comments

As a music teacher, I’m always getting questions about private lessons and ensembles to join, especially for homeschoolers. And while I do recommend a child’s involvement in formal music training if they are interested and show innate ability, it is not the only way to create a love of and appreciation for this fine art.

Children are naturally drawn to music. Even before they are born they can hear and respond to music, and classical music especially is known to calm fussing babies, focus young children and bring out creativity in people of all ages. To successfully add music to your homeschool, you need only to build off of this inherent love in your everyday life.

Since my husband and I are both classical musicians, music is a part of our life that can’t be separated from who we are. We don’t sit down with our children and show them written quarter notes and eighth notes, or formally analyze a piece of music with them. Truthfully, that would kill the joy already present.

We simply fill their environment with good quality music and opportunities to learn and discuss (even the toddlers!) what they are hearing.

Stock up on music CD’s
Classical music CDs are among the cheapest you can find. It is easy to stock up on the classics for a modest sum of money and have them playing in the background while you eat, play, or work in your home and in the car. Choose a variety: choral, orchestral, opera, different instrument combinations, different languages and time periods. Some good, accessible composers to start with are Mozart, Bach, Beethoven, Grieg, Holst, Vivaldi, Mendelssohn, Schumann, Schubert, Debussy, and Dvorak.

Discuss, using adjectives
To make the most of your and your children’s listening experience, talk about what you hear:

“Wow, that was a really loud section!”
“Did you hear how fast that was? How did they play so fast?”
“I think I heard a flute. Did you hear any other instruments?”

Fast and slow, high and low, short or long, joyful or sad. So many adjectives can express the music, and there’s no wrong way to hear something. Before you try to make a foray into music in any kind of structured way, spend months listening and let your children surprise you with their experiences.

Play simple music games
When children feel musically that they have something to say, move from there into simple musical games. Buy a number of varied percussion instruments (these are relatively cheap and can be found online at websites such as www.musiciansfriend.com for a better price than your local music store) and allow them to experiment. Here are a few examples of challenges for them:

Ask your children to play their name in rhythm- “My name-is Chris-tine” (long short-short long long), “My name-is An-tho-ny” (long short-short short-short long)
Choose a dynamic poem or story and have them come up with a way to tell it using only instruments.
Have a dinner when everyone is only allowed to sing and not speak. Opera-style “Please pass the buuuuuuutttttteeeeeeer!” can be a hoot for the whole family.

Attend concerts
Another important aspect of creating a music-appreciate family is to attend concerts in your area. Local universities and colleges often have free recitals and concerts at the music school. Our local community orchestra recently had a Star Wars themed concert with a multimedia element of pictures from the Hubble telescope and people dressed in costume. These gems are often marketed well, but sometimes not. Keep your eyes and ears open especially for these types of fun concerts to attract reluctant attendees.

Listen to Kindermusik
If you have very young children, I would highly recommend Kindermusik CDs, even if you can’t swing the classes. You can buy them on ebay or other swap-type sites. It is crucial for good musical and vocal development to have quality vocal models that young children can learn from and Kindermusik has a wonderful reputation for pleasing recordings and varied arrangements with many instruments involved. My children have also gotten a great deal of musical “tidbits” from the Disney show “Little Einsteins”! When your child can recognize a Dvorak song on the classical station, it’s pretty impressive!

Adding music to your homeschool need not be an intimidating undertaking. Not every child will be apt to study privately for years, but every child can and should be encouraged to express themselves musically. The process of creating and appreciating music is a wonderful way to share creatively with your family. And the musical world can always use more enthusiastic audience members!

Christine Hiester is a Christian, homeschooling mom to three boys and a girl, ranging in age from 9 to 2 years old. She is a musician by trade, eclectic in homeschool style, and continues to grow and learn along with her children in this journey of life and discipleship at home. Visit her blog at Fruit in Season.

August 31, 2010 By Christine 3 Comments

Listening with Purpose, Part I

A lot of us…allow music to be a background to what we do and because of that we forget that listening is an active challenge to the brain. There’s so much auditory material in the background of our lives and it has made us lazy.
-Graham Sheffield, chairman, Royal Philharmonic Society

Classical music is everywhere. Not just in elevators as the phrase suggests, but in restaurants, buses, supermarkets, and commercials. We are taught by the sheer fact that our everyday life is saturated with it, to ignore it. We are conditioned to let music in general and classical music especially, take the role of background noise. What then are we missing in the process?

Helping our children listen with purpose requires our own ears to first be opened. Chances are that it has been a long time since you have listened to a piece of classical music with a critical and focused ear. How many instruments can you pick out? What’s the main melody and who has it first? How does the tempo (speed of the beat) affect you? What mood is being conveyed? Is the piece primarily legato (smooth) or marcato (marked and accented)? Lots of questions? Yes, there’s a lot to learn!

Even the youngest of children can attain aural discrimination with little effort and time. Of course, this means that classical music must be in their environment. The car is a perfect place to play listening games. Everyone is in the same place by necessity, and usually everyone can hear equally well. A bit of prep work will go a long way to making car trips fun and educational. After all, what homeschool mom or dad doesn’t appreciate logging in some school hours on the way to and from their many activities?

Some important areas to focus on while teaching your children (and yourselves!) to listen to classical music are instrumentation, pitch and rhythm, style and mood, and form. In this article I will focus on the first two topics.

Instrumentation:

When you have a bit of time to explore, visit the Dallas Symphony Orchestra’s instrument page and choose one or two instruments from each family. Listen to each example and come up with adjectives to describe the sound. Flutes might sound smooth and “hooty”; harpsichords sound sharp and bouncy; cellos sound mellow and flexible. Don’t make value judgments on your children’s choice of adjective, just get them thinking. Very few words are meant to just describe sound, so music borrows terms from visual (bright and dark) or physical properties (light and heavy, big and small). Allow them to use whatever analogies fit for them.
Once you have explored a number of instruments, find music that isolates different families of instruments. Giovanni Gabrieli wrote wonderful brass music in the late 16th and early 17th centuries. Mendelssohn’s Octet for strings is an accessible and fun piece for all ages and has a lovely melody that is easy to remember. Chanticleer is an excellent choral group that has dozens of CDs to their credit. African music often has isolated percussion sections.
After listening to music for each family, listen to symphonic works with all of the instruments playing simultaneously (Some good ones to start with are Rimsky-Korsakov’s Russian Easter Overture or Beethoven’s Eroica Symphony and you can easily find some history to go with both of these pieces to round out their lesson). Make up bingo cards with pictures of all of the instruments you’ve studied and see who can identify all of them first. Have them pantomime the way to play each instrument in a game of Musical Charades. Before long, your children will surprise you in the grocery store by shouting out, “Mom! I hear an oboe!”

Pitch and Rhythm:

Pitch refers to the frequency of vibration of the sounds you hear, the relative high or low of the notes, and rhythm refers to the orderly (or sometimes disorderly) structure and organization of the sounds in relation to time. These concepts are a bit more intimidating, but with some time can prove to be rewarding ones to study.
The best way to begin pitch experimentation with your children is by getting them to sing themselves. Young children (up to 2nd grade or so) have very limited ranges, especially on the lower end of the spectrum. Visit this online piano and after clicking on the word “scales” at the top right side, click the play button for the C scale. (Just in case you’re wondering what a scale is, watch this.) The C scale, beginning with middle C on a piano, is the main range for a young child. There are exceptions, but you will find that most children will not be able to match pitch much below or above those pitches. Adults have much lower ranges so what’s comfortable for you probably will not be comfortable for your children. Try out some recordings of children’s choirs to get an idea of the range your children can use.
Purposeful listening for pitch can include the high and low of the music, the concept that smaller instruments make higher sounds (tie in some science and acoustics while you’re at it!) and larger instruments make lower sounds, the contour/shape of the melody (I like to have my children “paint” the line in the air with a paintbrush, or even their finger- up when the notes go up and down when they fall), and the consonance or dissonance of a piece (whether the notes sound like they blend well, or grate on each other).
The best way to begin teaching rhythm is to find the beat. Whenever you hear music anywhere, tap the beat on your children, or have them tap it themselves if they are older. I used to tap when I held the babies in the snugli, or bounce with them and dance around the room. March with them to the beat, have them jump, give them pencils to use as drumsticks. Does it get faster or slower, or stay the same? Kids naturally feel the structure in music and you’d be hard pressed to have them not respond physically. As long as they’re not in danger of wrecking your furniture (or harming a sibling!), let them!
To further work on rhythm, have them divide the beat. Tap the main beat of any piece that you hear, then break that in half and tap double the speed. Can you triple it? Quadruple it? The key is to help focus your children to stay even and steady with their beat. Give them a pencil and ask them to conduct. (Have them watch this to see what a conductor does.) With concentration, they can learn to feel it rather than hear it. That is when the music really gets into their gut.
Some classical selections that are wonderful for the study of pitch are Mozart or Rossini arias from their operas. The melody lines are beautiful and have interesting contour. For easier pitch matching, choose more women singers than men but be sure to use a variety overall. Mozart’s Requiem also has a wonderful piece called the “Confutatis” that has juxtaposed sections of rhythmic, low parts sung by men against high, legato (smooth) lines sung by women. Copland’s Appalachian Spring has wonderful melodies and solo lines for different instruments. Any music can be analyzed for pitch study and you will be surprised by what your children notice when you ask them to really listen.
Likewise, any piece can be used for finding the beat, or talking about rhythm. Try Mussorgsky’s A Night on Bald Mountain or Pictures at an Exhibition. Stravinsky’s Rite of Spring is rhythmically exciting, while Bach’s Jesu, Joy of Man’s Desiring is rhythmically simple and fluid.

Once you begin practicing focused listening, you won’t be able to stop. Every piece of music you hear will have nuggets of beauty that stand out and those jewels you find will go with you throughout your life. Sharing this gift with your children will give them lifelong appreciation for The Finer Things.

August 31, 2010 By Christine 8 Comments

There is something magical about a child’s first up-close-and-personal experience with fine art. The richness of the subject matter, the variety of styles, genres and time periods, the range of emotions and colors, all combine to make lasting memories and mental pictures that will influence our children’s perception of art for their entire lives.

The question is not what you look at, but what you see.
-Henry David Thoreau

I myself remember each time I have been to a new art museum – from the Rijksmuseum in Holland, to the Children’s Book Illustrator exhibit on our trip to Maine – and each experience has filled me with a sense of beauty that can’t be replaced.

No child is too young to take part in the expressions of beauty displayed in your local art museum.

Of course, without proper focus and direction, children can become overwhelmed and come away with nothing specific for their memory to retain. That is why, as with anything else in our homeschooling adventure, it is our job to prepare them for the journey with a well-planned “prelude” of expectations, questions and guidelines for looking at, and seeing, what is before them. Some museums have children’s activities and exhibits to start them off, but don’t be afraid to bring them to see the regular exhibits as well. Giving them specific concepts, subjects, and styles to look for will make for an exciting hour or two lost in the world of art! The anticipation is killing me, so let’s get started!

Here is a list of just a handful of ideas for the search:

a portrait of a child
a traditional still life (like this one or this one)
a cubist still life such as this one
a painting made only with dots (pointillism)
a painting primarily in warm colors
a painting primarily in cool colors
a painting primarily in black and white
a sculpture made of metal
a painting with lots of shadows (such as this one. The term for this kind of painting is chiaroscuro meaning “bright-dark”)
a painting of a celebration
a sculpture of an animal
a painting using mostly geometric shapes
an impressionist painting (in the style of Monet)
a painting using thick globs of paint
a painting with a feeling of sadness
a painting of a battle
a painting or sculture using symbols (such as an olive branch, dove, etc.)
a sculpture that is broken
a landscape with people only included in the background, or not at all
a portrait that looks almost like a photograph
a portrait that is completely unrealistic
a piece of art that doesn’t seem to you like a piece of art
a painting of a specific place (Paris, London, George Washington crossing the Delaware)
a painting with a lot of your favorite color in it
a painting of a snow scene
a painting of Mary and Jesus (there are so many styles to find with the Holy Family as subject that a lot of discussion can take place about what is different and the same- expressions, use of light, shape of face, colors, etc.)

Download this list to print and use on your next scavenger hunt.

I could go on forever! Use this list as a jumping off point for your scavenger hunt and adjust it according to the ages of your children. Have the older ones choose two to compare and contrast, or choose a style that they particularly like and write a report. Younger ones can simply find a picture in an art book and recreate it with art supplies. If you are not near an art museum have the children search in a large coffee table book on art from your local library.

The sky is the limit and the possibilities for discovery are endless! I hope you enjoy taking your family on this search-and-find mission!

August 10, 2010 By Christine 2 Comments

I have four children ages 10, 7, 4, and 3. They are all home all day with me (unless we’re out at activities, field trips, homeschool playgroups, doctor’s appointments, the YMCA…you get the picture) and so we occasionally have squabbles. If I’m really honest, there are some times that it’s more than occasional! There is one thing, however, that they rarely argue over- their toys. Maybe I’m just blessed with children who shun possessions and show Jesus-like selflessness naturally….and if you believe that I have some swamp land in Florida I’d love to sell you!

What I believe is the reason for their ability to share joyfully and kindly is a very simple one: I never force them to share.

We’ve all experienced the young child at church or at the park who comes over and takes a toy from our child. I’m sure on many occasions that curious child has been ours! The most common response in our culture today is, “Oh, let him play with it, Johnny. You have to share!”

What if Johnny doesn’t want to share? What if he’s intent on playing and learning with his toy, and breaking his concentration will cause a meltdown? And if a meltdown occurs, who will the parent blame? Little Johnny, of course!

My aversion to forced sharing comes from my Montessori upbringing and the research I’ve done since becoming a parent. One of the reasons we chose to homeschool in the first place was to avoid the imposition of unnatural breaks and transitions in our children’s learning. The bell, ringing to signal the end of a middle school class, interrupts the focus of a child intent on a task, teaches them that their concentration doesn’t matter, and eventually shortens their attention span. The same thing can happen when we allow another child (whether friend, sibling, or stranger) to interrupt the flow of concentration on a given task. In addition, forced sharing teaches our children to cling more tightly to their possessions, not less, because they are never sure when something will be taken from them.

In our home we encourage sharing and taking turns. We teach that people are more important than things, and relationships are worth more than lots of stuff. We praise our children when they choose to share. But it has to be that: their choice.

We also allow them a “protected” space- their rooms. Anything that they do not want to share (for any reason. Again, it’s their choice.) can remain in their rooms. Anything they leave in common areas of the house is fair game for a sibling to use as long as that sibling is using it respectfully.

When a child takes something from one of my children in a park or at church, I simply say, “He’s using that right now. I’m sure if you ask nicely, he will let you use it when he’s done.” My child might then choose to let the other child borrow it right away, and they would get a pat on the back from me for being kind and selfless. If it’s my child doing the grabbing, I give the toy back to the other child and say to him, “I won’t allow my child to take this. If you choose to share later, that would be great. But it’s your choice.”

Keeping the peace, when it comes to possessions, is often just a matter of respect. I find that it works well in our home and hope it continues to bear fruit in the future.

June 30, 2010 By Christine 1 Comment

We love to travel. We love that we can travel whenever we want to. I secretly wish that we had been the ones to think up the Kids Love… book series idea, but alas! We’ll have to simply benefit from the travel and research that the Zavatsky family has enjoyed together over the years.

Unlike many parents I know, we do not break out in a cold sweat when faced with the possibility of car trips with the kids. I have found that even with toddlers, if you prepare well enough, you can enjoy the time spent with your kids and not not continually pull your hair out. In the past year I have taken 3 car trips from Ohio to New Jersey or Ohio to North Carolina by myself with my four children who were 9, 6, 3, and 2. While the last hour was always a bit hairy, I really enjoyed my time with them, not to mention the sympathetic looks when we stopped for a potty breaks! All I have to say is God bless the places on the interstate with family restrooms!!

Here are some of the things I do to guarantee (OK, maybe not guarantee but at least improve the odds of) a successful trip:

Beginning weeks before the trip, I make my lists. I love lists. They make me feel much more in control than I actually am, and if I keep up with them- adding to them frequently when something else pops into mind-by the time it’s actually time to go, I don’t have that panicky feeling that I’ve forgotten something. I make lists for groceries (if needed), clothing, activities for the kids, places to visit, etc. Ahhhh, I feel fulfilled just thinking about it!

About a week before, I set aside a folder for each child and label it. I begin printing off games, car activities, coloring pages, and anything else that I think will occupy them in the car. I also take a trip to Target and Michael’s for their $1 bins. I find a bunch of things for each child that will be brand new and in their “travel bags” once we get on the road. This usually includes cheap games, little figurines, coloring books, and snacks. Snacks are crucial with my brood!

We do have a portable DVD player but we use it sparingly. We love to play music instead because it gets everyone involved in singing and bopping along. We also love books on tape or the Classical Kids series of CDs.

We have some great car games by Melissa and Doug that are well-made and pass the time more creatively.

I make mileage cards for each of the kids who is old enough to use them. I take an index card, write the beginning and ending location of our trip on top with the total mileage next to it. Then I break the trip down in 50 mile increments and write down as many 50′s as we’ll be traveling with the remainder following. Each 50 miles, the kids cross off one 50 and before you know it you’re there! There are not nearly as many “Are we there yet?” moments this way!

I have a nice cube basket between the kids in the back and the kids in the middle of the van. They are packed with age-appropriate reading material, usually stuff that I find that they haven’t read in a while, and that have a high “activity” content. We love the “Where’s Waldo?”, “Can You Find It?”, and “I Spy” books for this purpose.

Last, but certainly not least, I adjust my expectations to fit the crowd. There are occasionally times when someone is melting down. Usually this doesn’t last for more than 10 minutes at a time, but those minutes can seem like forever! I do some deep breathing, try to engage the whiner in a game of “count the red cars that pass us by” or “wheels on the bus”, and take it in stride.

As we get ready to go on another family road trip, I am enjoying the process of getting ready for fun! That fun can include the traveling itself if you plan the good times into your car ride. Happy Traveling!

May 26, 2010 By Christine 14 Comments

Right now you like being homeschooled because you can do math in your underwear, call going to the zoo a field trip, and use Legos for a history project. You think it’s really cool that, if you choose to get your work done in a timely manner, you’re finished hours before your friends in the neighborhood get off of that big yellow bus. You enjoy the perks of learning at home: a leisurely morning reading till we start school at 9:30, an empty library or grocery store during off hours (and even, on vacation, a less-populated Disney World!), snacks on the couch while we read aloud all afternoon, and a picnic in the backyard on a sunny school day. From your perspective, homeschooling is just plain fun. On most days I completely agree.

But there is so much more I hope you remember. When the wisdom and maturity that come with age cause you to look back on your time here, learning at home, nurtured and protected, I hope you see that the privilege of homeschooling brings more subtle, and more important, blessings.

I hope you remember the times you struggled with something and we were able to work on it again and again and again and again. I hope you remember when you finally got it, and the sense of accomplishment you felt. I felt it too.

I hope you remember that I said I’m sorry. Often. Because I’m not perfect. And I hope you remember that you were so generous with hugs and kisses and forgiveness after I failed.

I hope you remember when your siblings distracted you by doing something goofy, and made your work take longer than it should have. I hope, from the perspective of an adult with strong family bonds and siblings who are your best friends, you laugh at those times, realizing that they were the building blocks to the relationships you now share.

I hope you remember that every time someone clucked their tongue in the grocery store and said to me, “Well, you sure have your hands full!”, I smiled and responded, “Yes, and I love it that way.” Because I do.

I hope you remember the thousands of breakfasts, lunches and dinners when we prayed together, ate together, and talked about our day.

I hope you remember the excitement we felt over little things: the praying mantis Daddy brought in from the yard, brand new pencils, a difficult puzzle finished as a family (when you would always insist on the final piece being put in by all of us!), and the last chapter of a beloved book.

I hope you remember that when you had questions, about anything from why the bird’s egg you found outside didn’t hatch to how you forgive someone who keeps hurting you, we figured out the answers together.

I hope you remember that you wore (with pride) your “Caution: Unsocialized Homeschooler” shirt when you played with your many, many friends, and that you were homeschooling’s biggest advocate, prompting those friends to ask their parents if they too could homeschool.

I hope you remember that Daddy and I chose this life. For you, for us. That we listened when God whispered that time is too precious, and that learning is a joy, and that we should spend all of it side by side.

I hope you remember these things. I hope I remember these things. Because, though it seems to you that time drags on and Christmas and birthdays take forever to come, I can’t seem to hold on to these moments tightly enough. I don’t even always appreciate them enough. But this homeschooling life we live together is a treasure, a gift. One that is a foundation for everything you do and everything you become.

I wouldn’t trade a moment. And most of all, I hope you remember that.

Love, Mom

April 21, 2010 By Christine 3 Comments

All four of our children (9, 7, 4, and almost 3) are at home- learning, loving, sharing and experiencing life together. It wasn’t always this way. We were not a family that decided to homeschool our children right from the start. To be honest, it wasn’t even part of our educational discussions until our oldest was four. By then he was in a wonderful Montessori program and we decided to let him finish through his Kindergarten year before jumping into homeschooling.

Fast forward a couple of years. Colin was in first grade so we began our homeschooling journey with a significant amount of trepidation and a lot of prayer. Our daughter was beginning the Montessori program that our oldest had just finished, and I was expecting our third child later that year. We weren’t ready to keep everyone home. Not yet.

This brings us to the present year. As much as we loved the caring and child-friendly environment of our beloved Montessori preschool, it was time. Time to have everyone home. With 4 years of homeschooling under my belt, and no more babies with colic to vie for my time and attention, my husband and I decided to begin to homeschool preschool with our younger two boys in addition to first and fourth grades for the older two. It has proved to be a wonderful decision for everyone.

I have my own history with the Montessori program as I myself attended a Montessori preschool and Kindergarten. I love the educational philosophy which emphasizes a child’s curiosity as the basis for his motivation to learn, a lovingly constructed prepared environment, child-sized materials to ensure success, and allowing the child to have some choice over his educational decisions within a structured framework. I continued to read books by Montessori experts as well as Maria Montessori herself and realized that children don’t need to go anywhere to benefit from those learning suggestions. So we have created a preschool environment in our home that is modeled after Montessori’s ideas.

Our day starts with circle time for all of our children. We use this orienting time for songs, scripture verse memorization, poem readings, geography, artist study and some activities that help our younger ones with their coordination. Montessori advocated activities such as walking the line to help with balance and coordination; we do variations on that theme: silent follow-the-leader, passing a marble around the circle in yogurt cups, etc. I also use this time to demonstrate new “works” (activities in a Montessori classroom, as Maria Montessori believed that the work of childhood was exploring their world), engage in intentional prayer with my children, and talk about the calendar and the seasons on a daily basis.

Once circle time is over, the real preschool action begins. We have low wood shelves (which my husband made) so that the children can easily get their own work. On the shelves are different activities (placed neatly and sparsely on trays- clutter is counter-productive to a young child’s focus) in six categories: math, language, sensory, practical, science, and art. Some of these are official Montessori materials (purchased in large part from these great websites), and others are materials I have acquired or already had on hand. Each category has specific activities to best develop conceptual understanding in an orderly and consecutive manner. Here are some examples from each of the categories. We rotate works each week.

Math:

patterning activities- using everyday materials such as pom-poms, bottlecaps of different colors, print outs, etc.
one-to-one correspondence- this is the concept that every one object gets one count. It is very important for preschool children to tactically experience this concept. Activities we create are simple and inexpensive to make, such as mini terra cotta pots each marked with a number from 0 to 9 and an exact amount of colorful beads to fill each pot correctly. There are dozens of ways to create this type of activity with items around your house.
shapes- tracing with stencils, matching different sized caps from food jars to a prepared poster board with same sized circles, etc.
sizing activities- three or more similar shapes of different sizes (laminated for longer use), pipe cleaners cut into graduated lengths, jars of different volumes and a tub of sand or rice, etc.

Language:

vocabulary- books, pictures cut from magazines, dollhouse miniatures, sets of picture cards. Anything that can initiate conversation and help the child recognize the connection between an object and its name.
letters and their sounds- we have a moveable alphabet and sandpaper letters. Combine them with a bunch of little manipulatives of things that start with a specific letter and you have a ready-made activity.
felt boards and characters
play doh with letter stampers
wiki sticks for forming letters

Sensory:

sandpaper letters
feel and find bag
sensory bin- I fill this with any measurable material: sand, rice, oatmeal, beads, etc. and add measuring cups and spoons, yogurt cups, and small jars.
color gradations- paint strips from hardware stores are great for this. Simply cut them out, laminate them and have your child put them in order.

Practical: most important in this category is everyday tools in a child-friendly size

spooning- use different types of spoons (For Small Hands has a wonderful variety of these), bowls or jars, and any transferrable material such as beans, small stones, etc.
transferring with tongs or tweezers
pouring from one container to another- water, rice, beads, etc.
stringing beads
table setting
jars and lids

Science:

puzzles
books
little animals and bowls marked with pictures of arctic, rainforest, and desert scenes to sort into
nutrition activities with the food groups and manipulatives to sort (File Folder Fun has some great activities to print and laminate.)

Art:

plenty of basic art materials
symmetry activities- a folded 5×5 piece of paper with half of an object drawn on and scissors to cut and see what it creates
stamps, stencils, etc.

These kinds of activities can be made simply and cheaply utilizing materials from your local craft store or dollar store. I frequent Michael’s and JoAnn’s for their dollar bins and shop Oriental Trading for their clearance. I also love this blog for ideas and links to other preschool bloggers.

The more you begin looking for fun but focused activities for your toddlers and preschoolers, the more you will notice how easy it is to plan and create your own. Maria Montessori’s philosophy relates beautifully to the homeschool and is rewarding to put into practice.

Christine is a Christian, homeschooling mom to three boys and a girl, ranging in age from 9 to 2 years old. She is a musician by trade, eclectic in homeschool style, and continues to grow and learn along with her children in this journey of life and discipleship at home. Visit her blog at Fruit in Season.

March 16, 2010 By Christine 5 Comments

I admit it. I wish away certain moments and stages in my children’s lives. I guess I don’t know anyone who doesn’t occasionally do this, but I know many older women who tell me not to.

From their perspective, it’s clear that the moments and stages will pass quickly; from mine it often feels like an eternity till bedtime. The future seems bright and full of promise; today often feels like drudgery. I battle this feeling on some days more than others as I change diapers, sit someone in time out again, correct the same spelling word over and over, and say, “No, you can’t watch TV” for the 15th time.

The more I read in search of the perfect formula for saintly motherhood, the more I realize that the books on my nightstand are written to portray an ideal, and not a daily reality.

Failure today is inevitable; thankfully, forgiveness is failure’s close companion.

The future [is] not where real life [begins].
Each day [is] God’s perfect will for me.

In fact, it’s not just because we’ll regret time passing when we’re old and the children are gone. It’s not just that these moments will become sweet memories to savor as we rock on our porch decades from now. It’s instead that each moment, each today, is a block with which God is building us into the mothers, the teachers, the individuals, He plans for us to be. There have been times in the past few months and years when I didn’t, couldn’t, see the plan. I have questioned whether there even was a plan and, if I were to stumble upon it, why I should follow it at all.

Whatever the Lord requires, He also enables.

God’s perfect will for me is today. And isn’t it true that tomorrow never arrives but instead becomes today? I don’t want to pine for the elusive greener grass on the other side of midnight only to find that waking in the morning provides merely another opportunity to pine again.

Give your entire attention to what God is doing right now, and don’t get worked up about what may or may not happen tomorrow. God will help you deal with whatever hard things come up when the time comes.
Matt. 6:34 (MSG)

God is doing a good work in me (and you!) today. He is building, refining, preparing, requiring, enabling. My prayer is that today, we’ll let Him.

Quotes taken from Sally Clarkson’s The Mission of Motherhood.

February 2, 2010 By Christine 3 Comments

In our schooling, I’ve always struggled with what to require for writing. I love to write, always have, and I believe a big part of that has come from my love for reading good literature. In one sense, I want to allow that natural desire to write flow from loving the way words can be crafted in the books that my kids love. I do, however, think there should be some guidance from me.

While I haven’t ever used a set in-depth curriculum with my children, I have tried a few books on writing and have found them each to be lacking in something, whether it’s the “coolness” factor of the assignments (which would then spark some creative genius), or the cohesiveness to develop true writing skill. Until this year I have been at a loss as to how to proceed.

This year, spurred by a good assessment in the summer, I decided to follow the advice of the woman who assessed my son. She encouraged us in our writing pursuits and basically said,

If he’s reading well (he is) and writing occasionally (including organization, first and final drafts), then that is enough.

It was a freeing idea- no writing stress! Instead of trying to follow a set schedule of writing projects (do this on day 1, this on day 2, etc.), I made up a list of writing prompts for my oldest two and require them to choose one per week.

They write, I correct and suggest, they rewrite, and they’re done. Sometimes I include a report about something in our study (history, geography, science) but usually it doesn’t revolve around academics. I want them at their age to learn to love ideas, theories and events without being pushed into “research”, thereby squelching their desire to learn.

My writing list looks something like this:

Write about a time when you felt sad (or scared, or angry).
Write a paragraph from the perspective of a kite on a windy day.
Write an acrostic poem about yourself using your first and last name.
Write a fairy tale beginning with “Once upon a time…”.
Describe what your ideal pet would be like.
Interview someone and write about what you find out.
Write a short play with 2-3 characters. Include the setting and any extra sounds, movements or emotions.
Write a story about the journey of a penny throughout one full day. Use first person.
One word prompt. (I would give them a word such as “bagel” or “desert” and have them craft a story around it.)
Write out the directions on how to do anything you like to do. Include every little step!
Choose a character from one of your book and write a story that fits him/her.
Zoo story- write about a certain group of animals and an adventure at the zoo.
Write about someone in real life who you admire.
Write a poem about the season or month that it is now.
Write a letter of encouragement or thanks to someone.
Write your penpal a letter.
Compare and contrast two characters in books you have read.
Complete this sentence in a full paragraph: “If I could breathe underwater (or out in space), I would…”

I consider writing a worthy and exciting pastime and I want my kids to enjoy it too!

What works for you in teaching your children to write?

December 18, 2009 By Christine 7 Comments

My then 8-year-old bounds down the stairs to find my mom and me as we are discussing nothing in particular.

“That pot on the stove, it’s chittering; I think it’s ready.” And off he runs, ready to conquer whatever is on his lego-conscious mind.

“Chittering?” my mom says. “Is that even a word?”

“Yup, something he must have read somewhere,” I answer with a smile.

I want to raise children with good verbal skills. I love when my toddlers use words like “actually” or “suddenly”, and string together colloquialisms that sound like they should be coming from an adult. In my experience, there are specific ways to encourage this kind of vocabulary in children and it begins very early. Though my mom didn’t know what ‘chitter’ meant, she was really the one with the natural ability to encourage conversation with babies and older children. What I learned from her, I use in our daily life and learning, making it my own as I go.

No baby talk. This doesn’t mean that we should never speak in a cutesy tone to our infants, but as a rule, conversations with babies should be full of fun and colorful words and descriptions about the world they are absorbing. A child who understands more at an earlier age, will eventually speak in the same way he’s been spoken to.

Answer their “whys” with big words. Just when we want to pull our hair out from all of the questions that toddlers and preschoolers ask is when we need to instead take a deep breath and give a truthful and detailed explanation. Whether it’s “Why does the sun always shine on my side of the car in the morning?” or “Why do I slide better in my socks than my bare feet?”, we shouldn’t be afraid to use big words that they are not familiar with. Of course, hearing the question “What does that mean?”, is an inevitability we should then be prepared for.

Choose good literature for read-alouds. We as homeschoolers are always on the lookout for the best books for our children, and there are better book lists by homeschooling companies than there are by anyone else. Some books are just light years beyond others in quality, especially considering the pop-culture atmosphere of mediocrity today. Books with not only good vocabulary, but also long sentences and intricate sentence structure should be at the top of our list. Children can grasp so much when read to by an adult who adds flair and meaning to the words on a page.

Be a walking thesaurus. If my son were to say of his sister, “Maddy’s being really annoying asking me to play with her over and over,” I could respond by saying, “She’s quite persistent that way. Why don’t you oblige her just this once?” He might not know the definitions of “oblige” or “persistent” but he can infer those meanings by their context and be better able to define them if they come up again.

Play word games. Scrabble, Bananagrams, Scattergories, and many more, are fun ways of introducing new words into children’s vocabularies.An atmosphere of intellectual respect goes a long way toward helping children fulfill high expectations. Verbally, our children are capable of absorbing language and making it their own, naturally and without compulsion, if we love language ourselves.

Christine is a Christian, homeschooling mom to three boys and a girl, ranging in age from 9 to 2 years old. She is a musician by trade, eclectic in homeschool style, and continues to grow and learn along with her children in this journey of life and discipleship at home. Visit her blog at Fruit in Season.

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