everyday snapshots

Hey Girl! He Shows His Love in So Many Ways.

noreply@blogger.com (Pam Barnhill) — Mon, 13 Feb 2012 15:10:00 +0000

I'm not going to lie. I find the Homeschool Ryan Gosling Meme hilarious. The things that he says -- such sweet talk. I emailed the link to Matt, and even he appreciated the humor. His response:

"Hey girl. I love it when you send me pictures of good looking guys saying things you want to hear. Tells me the kids are watching some fine educational show on TV."

Yeah, they were at the time. The man knows me so well.

Which is why I like Ginny's idea even better. So in honor of Valentine's Day, my sweetie, and over 20 years of V-Days together:

Head over to Ginny's to see the rest and link up your own.

Seven Quick Takes Friday {No. 1 in 2012}

noreply@blogger.com (Pam Barnhill) — Fri, 10 Feb 2012 14:51:00 +0000

1 - I'm just wondering if I am the only person who can make even the Internet feel socially awkward? I have found a few new bloggers whom I love to read and they seem like kindred spirits homeschool-wise, so I have really been enjoying leaving comments on their blogs. Except I can't shake the feeling that I am just popping into their party and chatting away without being invited. I keep trying to remind myself that the blog and comment box are the invitation -- I certainly feel that way here (comment away please). Old habits die hard, though. I would have a tough time starting a conversation with someone in person, and I'm finding it is not much easier online.

2 - Olivia and I have our first Spanish class today. We have a new gentleman in our parish who will be working with the Hispanic community. He is from Colombia and is a teacher, so our homeschool group asked him to teach a once-a-week Spanish class. I am really excited. I took two years of Spanish in high school, but I never enjoyed the class so learned little and even chose a different language (Russian) for college. We have been using various resources for our language studies and it has been going really well, but I love the idea of adding time with a native speaker to the mix. Olivia will be the youngest in the class and I am the oldest. I bet she will do much better than me. I am going to have to set aside some time to buckle down and study. Can't have my 6yo showing me up.

3 - I just finished reading Homeschooling Our Children Unschooling Ourselves last night. Got it Wednesday evening and plowed through it that quickly. By far one of the best books on unschooling that I have read. She talks quite a bit about breaking free of her long-held ideas about education and how kids learn. That is great, because that is my problem exactly. One thing I found especially telling was that she chanted to herself each morning, "show me the way, show me the way" as a reminder to step back and let her kids show her how they needed to learn. Even after years of unschooling and seeing the fruits of the philosophy with her kids, she still needed the daily reminder to do that.

4 - Date night tonight, thanks to GG. There is nothing to do in our town except go to the movies and there is nothing at the movies that looks remotely interesting. Dinner and conversation should be great, but I am looking forward to a weekend away later this spring. Sometimes I miss living where the action is.

5 - Update 1: The Valentine Garland is still a big hit except that I keep forgetting to write the activity on the heart the night before. The kids keep bringing me the heart in the morning and then have to wait for me to run and write it on. I have no excuse for this other than being a complete slacker mom sometimes.

6 - Update 2: The BUILD system is going well except for two things. First, math journals are just out. Too contrived for this bunch. We will just stick with mental math on Tuesdays. And the activities I have for Thursday on numeracy are just too varied to be effective. I think I need to pull them all from one source for continuity. For now I am going to pull them from First Grade Diary for Olivia. Not sure yet for John; at this point we may just do a lot of counting and skip counting.

7 - It is finally supposed to be on the cool side again this weekend. We may get in our last fire of the season. Matt is home (yay!) and we will be trying to finish up the new fort/sandbox/swing set. In the meantime we still spend lots of time in the park. These were taken with the point and shoot last week. Yes, it was warm enough for shorts. Monkeys, I tell ya.

Head on over to Hallie's. She is hosting Quick Takes at Betty Beguiles for a few weeks while Jen finishes up her book.

Weekly Learning Notes {Vol. 2 Issue 2}

noreply@blogger.com (Pam Barnhill) — Thu, 09 Feb 2012 14:27:00 +0000

The kids do individual work in language arts and handwriting that I track in Scholaric. This is everything else we did.

Read Chapter 10 from Our Heavenly Father (Faith and Life).
Watched Episodes 1-5 of Liberty's Kids.
Read Chapter 5 from The Burgess Bird Book for Children.
Completed coloring page of American Robin. Watched Robin eggs hatch.
Explored iBird Backyard Plus app.
Read Cradles in the Trees : The Story of Bird Nests.
Worked from 50 Great States Workbook I picked up in to Target Dollar Spot last August.
Listened to and watched versions of The Velveteen Rabbit. Audio here: Velveteen Rabbit (paperback & audio cd). Movie here: The Velveteen Rabbit. Discussed the differences between the two versions and preferences. (She said she like both equally.)
Played Scrambled States game.
Watched an episode of Salsa.
Read and worked through Math For All Seasons: Mind-Stretching Math Riddles.
Olivia read from Frog and Toad All Year.
Olivia dictated and illustrated a book called Olivia and Arabelle are Friends.
John dictated and illustrated a story about him and his friend Ellora.
Gymnastics class
Art class

Math Build Boxes

John
B - Chutes and Ladders
U - none
I - Too Many Monkeys They loved this one and asked for it multiple times.
L - none
D - Made brownies

Olivia
B - Count the Sheep
U - none
I - Clocks and More Clocks
L - none
D - Made brownies

As you can see we didn't get to every day of the BUILD boxes. We just shifted it to the next week.

Wordless Wednesday :: Nature in Shallow DOF

noreply@blogger.com (Pam Barnhill) — Wed, 08 Feb 2012 14:11:00 +0000

Pinning It Down Vol. 5 :: Heart-Shaped Cinnamon Rolls

noreply@blogger.com (Pam Barnhill) — Tue, 07 Feb 2012 13:50:00 +0000

Sarah is hosting this week.

Our Valentine garland has been a huge hit around here since last Wednesday. I have a confession, though. So far all of the fun events have included some kind of food. I need to work on that.

Thursday the heart read "tea time," and for that we needed a treat. I do believe these cinnamon rolls were the first thing I pinned to my Valentine board a few weeks ago -- so cute. Except the description said the tutorial was for canned cinnamon rolls. Instead, it was for homemade rolls. I'm a by-the-book sort of girl, so I really hate that sort of thing.

It turns out that it wasn't that hard to recreate these. I simply unrolled each individual roll and the rerolled it again from both sides.

Then I pinched the tip of each one to accentuate the heart shape.

We frosted them and served them with hot chocolate, because we were out of herbal tea.

And as you can see they were a big hit.

And yes, before the end of the tea party Thomas's cup smashed to the floor. I was doing so well at moving it back and then got distracted by Robbie Burns on the Internet. The worst part is they were unimpressed by Robbie Burns -- must be their father's genes.

Head on over to Sarah's to see what everyone else is pinning and doing this week.

There's a Caldecott in Her Future

noreply@blogger.com (Pam Barnhill) — Sat, 04 Feb 2012 06:30:00 +0000

Warning: shameless proud mommy moment follows. That is all.

I have been trying this week to offer and inspire more and require less with our learning. Some moments I have done a poor job at this (Ahem. Copywork time), while other moments I have been a star. And when I look back on our week, the moments where I've done well there has been much quality learning and creating taking place -- food for thought.

There was such a moment yesterday as Olivia and I finished reading the last chapter of Frog and Toad Are Friends together. This was our second time through buddy-reading the book, and we both commented on how much we liked the stories.

In a moment of inspiration I suggested, "Would you like to write a story? You could call it Olivia and Arabelle are Friends." She bit and quickly the plans for a story became plans for a book complete with multiple illustrations.

She dictated, and I typed. I tried not to comment too much, but did sometimes retell what she had said for her approval, removing some of the surperflous "and then's." I also suggested a couple of times that the tale might be rambling, and the part about church was totally my doing. "What do we do on Easter besides get Easter baskets? Why do we go to church? What is something you see at church on Easter?"

She was really into working on this project. She began it yesterday, and she was able to finish about half. Then this morning she asked about it first thing. I had to drag her away from the final picture to make our park play date. This afternoon she completed the cover, and miracle of miracles, wrote the title and byline without complaint. This is the girl who melted over being asked to write four words on Wednesday.

I didn't nitpick, but noticed that she was forming many of the letters correctly and it is certainly legible. I think I'm going to stop stressing about the handwriting a bit, back off, and give her some space.

So without further ado, I present to you Olivia and Arabelle are Friends. Please excuse the streaks from my scanner and any typos the low-rent typesetter/copy-editor missed -- there are a few. I am sure she would love your comments.

Living Learning List Printables

noreply@blogger.com (Pam Barnhill) — Fri, 03 Feb 2012 21:49:00 +0000

Last Wednesday I hastily typed up a blog post including the Living Learning Lists that a group of moms from The Well Trained Mind forums collaborated to write. Mainly I did this because we needed a place to put the entire list so it could be easily copied and saved. Little did I know that this post would shoot up the list of my most popular blog posts ever and quickly become the most pinned thing from Everyday Snapshots by far.

All I can say is I am really glad everyone likes the lists and hope they find them useful.

Then Jimmie piped up in the comments that a pretty printable of the list would make a handy addition to homeschooling folders everywhere. Now why didn't I think of that?

So, without further ado, here are the printable Living Learning Lists.

You can download them here. Below are previews of each page of the document. Please feel free to share these with your friends, but do so by linking them back here. Thanks!

Homeschool Day in the Life :: 2012 Edition

noreply@blogger.com (Pam Barnhill) — Fri, 03 Feb 2012 02:23:00 +0000

Simple Homeschool is once again collecting Day in the Life Posts. If nothing else, it is fun to keep a record and compare from year-to-year.

You can see the 2011 Edition here.

Another year has come and gone. This year we have a six-year-old, four-year-old (almost five-), and two-year-old. Our homeschooling style has not changed much. We are still very relaxed and eclectic. I am still a geek about schooly things and way too uptight. I am still trying to follow their lead. I still fail miserably at it sometimes. Our story begins here:

4:45 AM Bodies start arriving in my bed. First T and then by 5:30 John as well. Sleep from that point is intermittent dozing at best.

6:30 AM Matt has been up for about 30 minutes. The boys and I are fully awake and snuggling. Thomas leaves to join Matt in the kitchen when we hear a big bang. "That doesn't sound good," John says astutely. That is my cue to get up. Matt ~~escapes~~ leaves for work, and the boys and I make coffee and hot chocolate, play, watch Octonauts, check email and comment on blogs from this week's Pinning It Down post. Before long Olivia emerges and joins the fray. At some point Thomas removes all of his clothes, and I take that as my cue to get everyone dressed and start the day.

8:00 AM I check that all the doors are bolted at the top and jump into the shower. My goal is to be in by 8:00 each morning so we don't spend the entire morning vegging out with media. I shower for only four minutes, but am visited by two kids during that time. That's okay -- tells me everyone is safe. Ah, but there is a dispute over boxes. Two boxes. Three kids. You can do the math. I go the garage in my towel to retrieve another big box. All is right with the world.

After getting dressed I prod the troops into action. They get dressed (John: "Can you help me? My arms hurt!"), and we work from the back of the house to the front straightening and cleaning. They have no set chores, because that is just a pain for me. Instead I give them little jobs as we go. "Olivia, you can make your bed or clean the floor. John, open all the blinds. Thomas go throw this diaper away, please." And so on, with me working beside them until everything is done.

9:00 AM Our Feb. 1 Valentine's heart reads: "Make strawberry smoothies," so we pull up a stool and the circus ensues. Actually, it goes really well and within a few minutes the kids are thrilled to be drinking ~~healthy~~ yummy treats. While we drink I read aloud a chapter from Our Heavenly Father. Olivia can answer all the questions from this week and remember the ones from last week as well. Our new topic is the birth of Christ, so we locate Bethlehem on the globe and talk about a few other locales. Olivia's next question: "Where is heaven on here?" Back to the theological drawing board. We sing the Our Father and start our school work.

Today is Wednesday, so I pull our math readers out of our BUILD boxes. We enjoy Too Many Monkeys and Clocks and More Clocks. The kids ask for the monkey book twice. Since Thomas has spilled the Unifix cubes across the table, I have them use the cubes to illustrate the book as we read it the second time, pausing occasionally to make sure their blocks match the number of monkeys on the page. By this time Thomas has made his way out the back door. I leave it open so I can keep an eye on him playing in our fenced back yard.

I start "reading" with John while Olivia plays math apps on the iPad. I read The Nicest Newt and we work a page together in Get Ready for the Code. About this time Thomas wanders in, and we discover what has kept him occupied outside. We break for a diaper change.

After the change, Olivia and I buddy-read a chapter from Frog and Toad are Friends. We then mark up her copy work for the week noting punctuation and spelling in the passage. Then the fighting begins. She is determined not to do copy work. I am determined she do some copy work. We end up compromising on four words before it gets too ugly, but I worry about her writing stamina. I make a mental note to email the curriculum writer and see if she has suggestions. Regardless Olivia starts writing at 10:45 and doesn't get done until 11:00. For four words. The lessons I plan are short, but somehow with the interruptions and resistance, one hour of school turns into two hours out of our morning.

11:00 AM The kids head out back to play, but soon return as it starts to sprinkle (rotten timing). I had given the big kids a couple of quarters earlier for folding towels. Someone noticed they were state quarters, so the map had to be pulled out to check if we had those states or not. This led to singing the states' song a few times and them working in their 50 Great States workbooks while I make lunch. I picked these up in the Target Dollar Spot last fall, and the kids work in them whenever they want.

Over their peanut butter sandwiches we read Cradles in the Trees and talk about the birds in the book. Of course our meal would not be complete without at least one big spill. Then the big kids watch an episode of Liberty's Kids on the iPad while I lay Thomas down for his nap and have lunch with Matt.

1:15 PM Matt heads back to work, and we play a game of The Scrambled States of America. I ask if they would like to watch some Shakespeare (I've been having an unschooling discussion with a friend on my Facebook page. One of her unschooling techniques is to offer to watch the Bard with her kids. We were wondering what would happen if I did the same.) Olivia instead requests The Velveteen Rabbit. She has been listening to the audio story at night before bed and wants to see the movie version. Netflix streaming has a copy so we head upstairs to view it. It quickly becomes apparent that the story and movie version will be very different. As we pass she flips through the Shakespeare picture book I had dropped on the counter and asks a few questions. We will save it for another day.

While we watch, I search the library catalog and print a list of books for our afternoon library trip. Thomas wakes and joins us right about the time I hear the phone ring downstairs. It's my friend Tyra, and I debate calling back, because I know the conversation will be long. I give in to the opportunity to chat. Yes, the conversation was long, but it was so worth it -- even worth the bucket of lacing beads that came cascading down the stairs. We dished everything from Downton Abbey and figure skating to homeschooling and our mutual hatred of exercising. As I talk, the movie ends, and the kids troupe downstairs ready to go to the library. Of course by now the rain is really coming down.

3:30 PM The library trip does not go well. Olivia is tasked with playing with Thomas at train table while I look for the books. She is not always the most observant baby sitter. Between trying to read the convoluted library print-out, find the books, and keep one eye on Thomas, I am already flustered when John starts the 'Great Harry Potter Campaign." I look down, and there he sits with a basket containing at least one of every Harry Potter book. He insists repeatedly that we need to check them out. I explain as patiently as possible, repeatedly, that we own all of those books (We didn't even get into the fact that he isn't old enough for them anyway!). I think I heard snickering from the librarians as he argued on and on and on. He was most insistent and my temper ran short. Thomas escaping Olivia and the children's section was the final straw (She couldn't go after him, because she "was playing.") I grabbed him by the hand, dared the other two to move through clenched teeth, put back all seven Harry Potter books and checked out about half of what was on my list.

5:00 PM The big kids are banished to their rooms for their library behavior while I make dinner. They can play together as long as they don't fight -- soon they are separated. Matt turns on Team Umi Zoomi for Thomas, and I am able to chat and make the French Bread Chicken pizza in relative peace, letting Matt handle the squabbles and whines. Dinner is fairly peaceful, and Olivia and Matt leave. He will drop her at Faith Formation and then enjoy some quiet at the bookstore.

6:00 PM I clean the kitchen and get the boys in their PJs. We read one of the (age-appropriate) books John got from the library that day, brush teeth, and head off to bed. I rock Thomas while John lays in my bed, but he is melting fast. I lay Thomas in his room sure I will get a fuss and am pleasantly surprised. Then I rock John a bit, and he is out like at light before 7:00. He refuses to nap or sleep late, so is so worn down by the end of the day.

7:00 PM I put on my PJs, get a glass of wine, and turn on the TV for background noise. My intention is to work on this post, but I just can't muster the strength to be productive, so I poke around on Facebook, Pinterest, and read blogs instead. Thomas is quiet until Matt and Olivia returns, and she rings the doorbell on the way in. I am less than gracious as I herd her off to bed. She must have been tired, because she quiets quickly. Later I discover John and her in our bed. Finally Thomas calms back down without intervention, and Matt and I share an evening of exhausted, companionable silence broken only by a brief call I make to my Mom to check in on her week.

10:30 PM We head off to bed, moving kids, ushering them to the potty, and digging Thomas and his pillows and blankets out of his closet and back to his bed (his new night-time thing). No two days are ever the same, but it will all start again early in the morning to be sure.

I wouldn't trade it all for the world -- even the exceedingly frustrating parts.

Beat the Yellow Bus Blues :: Combat Homeschooling Burnout

noreply@blogger.com (Pam Barnhill) — Wed, 01 Feb 2012 13:03:00 +0000

Ahem. I know I can't be the only mom who has ever said, "If you can't learn this from mama, then you are just going to have to go to school to learn it." Please tell me I am not. It's possible I have even said it more than once. Homeschooling is tough. It's not for wimps or sissies, but requires strong doses of prayer, faith, and Diet Coke. And February is the toughest month of all.

What is it about February? Maybe it is SAD related -- we have finally reached our limit of reduced light and vitamin D deficiency. Maybe it is the fact we have been nose to the grind stone since August. Maybe it is that we are all sick of being cooped up together as winter continues to howl around us with no spring in sight. I imagine it is a combination of those things that make February so tough. We are ready to throw in the towel -- or at least throw it at that skittish chipmunk who can't buck up and bear the sight of his own shadow so we can go to the park.

So for the days you glance longingly at the yellow bus as it passes your window, I offer you a list of ideas for beating burnout. Maybe you've thought of some of these or even done them. Maybe one or two is something new to you. Hopefully, having a selection of choices in one location will be the spark you need to choose something, do it, and save your sanity for another day.

Ten Ways to Beat the Yellow Bus Blues

Pamper Yourself More
Take some time this month to take an extra bubble bath or lengthy shower often. Treat yourself to a pedicure and a home-made facial scrub. Take an extra minute to put on lotion after a shower, spend more time in prayer, or sit and sip a cup of tea in the afternoon. Do whatever makes you relaxed and happy, but be purposeful in scheduling it in this month and following through.

Do More Field Trips
Yes, for some the weather can make it a pain to get out, but that is exactly the time when we need to make the effort. Go to the ice or roller rink, go sledding, visit the art museum, aquarium, or science discovery center, take the kids to a matinee.

Visit every roadside historical marker in your county. Snap a photo, read the sign, and see if it sparks any additional interests. Be sure to take your smart phone along for impromptu web searches. While you're out grab a bite to eat at a local restaurant (not a chain!) and chat it up with the people there.

Here's a fun idea: have ice cream at the mall food court and then go on a scavenger hunt about the mall. Come up with categories where teams have to locate items. Some ideas are: Find an item made in Africa. Find an item that relates to a historical period we studied this year. Find a synonym for durable (or insert any word). Find a platonic solid. Find something printed in a foreign language. You get the idea. The hunt can include cameras or be done on the honor system. You can form teams or work cooperatively.

School Four Days a Week
It's only a month, and the shortest one of the year at that. Take an extra day off each week to let the kids (and mom) play, read, and pursue their own interests. It might be the refreshing change everyone needs.

Let Them Choose
Take a day each week or better yet do it every day this month where you ask the kids what they would like to learn about that day. You may have one or two non-negotiable subjects (or not -- remember it is only for the shortest month of the year) but other than that, pursue their interests. They want to take a foray into Ancient Egypt, volcanoes, bubble science, cooking school, the history of comic book art -- do it. Simply provide materials and offer assistance as they need it.

Tell Them Why You Love Homeschooling Them
What if every day this month your child woke up to a candy Kiss and a note from you listing one reason why you love being home with them each day? Would that make a difference in their attitude? Would writing the notes each night make a difference in yours? Can't do an entire month? Then do two weeks or one, but showing love makes people feel good -- the receiver and the giver.

Try Some Professional Development
There are a number of free or inexpensive online opportunities for homeschooling moms to grow as home educators. Try an MP3 workshop or order an inspirational book you have heard about, but just never got around to reading.

Some of my favorites include:
Teaching Boys and Other Children who Would Rather Build Forts all Day
Freedomship Education
Homeschooling the Real Child
Any number of the free podcasts at Homeschool.com. Many are very good.
A Little Way of Homeschooling
Better Than School: One Family's Declaration of Independence

Or Instead Just Fuggedaboutit
Instead of professional development, take the opposite approach and forgo reading any homeschooling or parenting books for the entire month. Instead indulge in Regency romances, mysteries, or the latest fiction bestsellers. Re-watch favorite feel-good movies, musicals, or period pieces while munching popcorn. Maybe you can even watch a couple with the kids.

Do Something Fun -- Often
If you can't ditch the curriculum for the month take time out regularly to add a little spice to your days. Replace your normal "Word of the Day" with a "Joke of the Day" instead. Grab a joke book and type the jokes on slips of paper. As each one is revealed, family members can put them in order of funniest down to the bombs -- the debates will be the best part.

Stage a cook-off between siblings and enjoy the fruits of every one's labors. Institute regular tea times with a warm drink, light snack and fun poetry or old favorite novels to read aloud and share. Play board games for math or language arts time.

Serve Others
Many times simply by serving others our own situation doesn't seem so tough. Visit shut-ins as a family and offer to serve them by doing some household chores, running errands or providing a meal. Make Compassion Bags -- lots of skills to be learned in the shopping, decision making, budgeting, and card making on that one.

One of the biggest blessings I have received as a mom of little ones was almost three years ago when some friends hosted a gingerbread party. Our family was invited to the event with a story, crafts, songs and snacks at this family's home one afternoon. Olivia and John were showered with attention from the older kids. All I had to do was sit back and watch while they had a fabulous time with no effort on my part. Those kind of acts of service are invaluable to a mom of multiple little ones. I think the homeschooling family putting on the party had a great time too.

Find a New Family Hobby
Do a quick poll and see if there is something you can all agree to learn together. Maybe everyone would like to try their hand at calligraphy, cupcake decorating or catapult building. Have a family book club (meet at the local coffee shop) or start a family walking or running club. Can you accumulate enough miles to equal a run across your state in one month?

Whether you do school-at-home or lean towards the more relaxed end of the homeschooling spectrum I hope you can find an idea or two here to help you through the doldrums of winter. And I would love to hear from you. What is your favorite way to beat homeschool burnout in February or any time of year?

Photocredit: Photo from Wikipdia Commons Caseydchap14 at en.wikipedia

Pinning It Down Volume 4 :: Valentine Countdown Garland

noreply@blogger.com (Pam Barnhill) — Tue, 31 Jan 2012 02:38:00 +0000

Welcome to our fourth Pinning it Down Tuesday! Do you find yourself pinning projects to Pinterest, but rarely getting around to doing them? Do you need a bit of encouragement to make some of those projects come to life? Join Sarah and me every Tuesday for the Pinning it Down link-up, where we're making a Pinterest project happen in our homes every week.

This Pinning it Down just goes to show that what you make doesn't have to be nearly as cute as the original to be effective. I was poking about on Pinterest last week and this cute banner caught my eye. Turns out it was a count down of sorts -- something to do each day for the first 14 days of February leading up to Valentine's Day. All the better as we could use a does of levity around here. Sometimes Mama needs help not being so serious. It's an issue with my personality.

The urge to go shop was strong, but I was determined to make this pin from my stash. I am nothing if not ~~cheap~~ frugal. So I scrounged up a few sheets of scrapbooking paper and vellum, printed a template and the hearts with numbers, and hand cut everything while watching Downton Abbey last night. Fortunately I had a bit of liquid chalk around to hide the cut edges and attached the hearts to a piece of ribbon with some plain clothes pins. Not too shabby and gets the job done. The kids' interest is certainly peaked.

Right now the hearts have nothing on the back -- I have to leave my options open and be flexible. I will write the next day's event each night before so I can check the weather and supplies. Some ideas are:

Pink smoothies
Tea party with Valentine's treats and poetry
Story time and lunch out
A picnic and nature walk at a local favorite park
Conversation heart math
Make and eat heart shaped pancakes with strawberries and whipped cream
Make Valentines for friends
Date with mom or dad
Make and decorate heart cookies

I'll keep you posted on how it goes.

Are you ready to play along? Here's how our link-up works:

1. Choose a project from one of your Pinterest pinboards and make it happen. Blog a little about it. Remember, it doesn't have to be elaborate- we just want to see what you've been up to!

2. Make sure you link back here somewhere in your post so others can find us and play along. Feel free to grab our Pinning it Down graphic if you'd like to add it to your post. Also, don't forget proper pinning etiquette and try to include a link back the original idea whenever possible. We want to be sure that cool idea credit is given to the proper person.

3. Link up below. Make sure you're sending us to your actual post, and not to your general blog address. You can add your link all the way through Friday, so if you haven't gotten a chance to work on any of your pins yet this week, you're not too late.

Weekly Learning Notes {Vol 2 Issue 1}

noreply@blogger.com (Pam Barnhill) — Tue, 31 Jan 2012 01:29:00 +0000

I used to do these WLN posts to keep up with what we were learning. Then this year it seemed be redundant because at the beginning of the year we were using a "do the next thing" curriculum. Since we have dropped that, I thought I would pick them up again so I would have a record of what we have been doing.

The kids do individual work in math, language arts and handwriting that I track in Scholaric. What's in our Math BUILD system this week can been seen here. Instead of posting the Math BUILD items and this separately I think I am going to do them together each week. That means I will put this weeks' BUILD items in next week's Learning Notes post.

This is everything else we did.

Ate Chinese food to celebrate Chinese New Year. Fortune cookies and chopsticks were a big hit.
Watched dragon and lion dances on YouTube. Sang the Chinese New Year song.
Counted in Chinese.
Coloring page of a dragon.
Located China on the map and talked about its location in relation to us.
Read Lon Po Po: A Red-Riding Hood Story from China.
Read from If You Lived In Colonial Times.
Read from Toliver's Secret.
Watched the "Thirteen Colonies" on BrainPop Jr.
Watched "Anger," "Bullies," "Caring for Pets," and "Allergies," "Head Lice," "Fire Safety," "Color," 'the Heart" (all their choices) on BrainPop Jr.
Read Chapter 9 from Our Heavenly Father (Faith and Life).
Played The Scrambled States of America Game.
Watched "Van Gogh" on Brain Pop Jr.
Picture study of Van Gogh self-portrait.
Explored Van Gogh and the Sunflowers on the iPad.
Read The Clown of God.
Learned about St. John Bosco.
Olivia read a leveled reader of The Three Little Pigs on the iPad.
Olivia read from Frog and Toad All Year.
Nature walk
Sketched pine needles and pine trees.
Watched three episodes of Salsa.
Hop, Skip, and Sing Spanish

Late January Daybook

noreply@blogger.com (Pam Barnhill) — Mon, 30 Jan 2012 13:50:00 +0000

Surrounded by...
Baby, it's cold outside. And by cold I mean the 30s. We will be back to the 70s later this week. I am loving this mild winter with small stretches of cold. I hear Team Umi Zoomi from the living room. It is Thomas's current obsession. He loves to talk back to the Umi Friends.

Thankful for...
A handy husband. He is building us a fort/sandbox/swing set combo. So far only the fort section is complete, but yay! Something for the kids to do outside.

Pondering...

This post by Sue and her comments to me in the comment section. And this one by Faith. And this tidbit from Just Add Light and Stir. Notice a trend?

Learning together...

Going to see where the adventure takes us this week. Math and language arts are planned out. Maybe some Burgess? Certainly some more If You Lived in Colonial Times. I have some ideas for Spanish games. I am resurrecting my Learning Notes posts and should have one up later today for last week.

I Said Yes...

New category -- I am putting this here to challenge me to say yes this week. I need to get back into the habit.

Domestic bliss...
The house is dirty and needs to be cleaned. I am not in the mood. That is all.

What's app-ening...
A must-have app if you have an iPad or iPod is App Shopper. This free app allows you to place apps you want onto a wish list and then sends you a push notification when the app goes on sale. I have gotten a number of apps at a deep discount and some for free. Super-cool app.

Making progress...
My Pinning it Down for the week. A little more involved craft-wise than I normally do. I am steadily making progress because I am under a tight deadline since I'm hosting. Be sure to come back tomorrow and see.

Read of the week...
Why I'm No Homeschool Superstar Sarah knocked it out of the park with this one. Funny, earlier yesterday I almost followed someone's homeschooling pin board. Then I noticed that they had pinned all kinds of little activities to make for preschoolers -- you know, file folder games, lots of printables, etc. I stopped and remembered that I would never make that kind of stuff anyway and just passed, because I didn't need the guilt. And then Sarah's post came through, and I felt validated. ;-D

A new habit...

I am working on one new habit at a time this year. Right now it is being dressed and getting the day going by 8:00 each morning. So far the weekdays are going well. (And this lasted for about five days. I MUST get back to doing this again.)

On the nightstand...

How to Unspoil Your Child Fast: A Speedy, Complete Guide to Contented Children and Happy Parents-- Recommended by the great Suzie Andres. So far, so good. I don't know that we need a shock and awe gesture around here, but I am going to work on some end stops this week.
Mindset for Moms: From Mundane to Marvelous Thinking in Just 30 Days- Am loving this one. Short little action steps that make a difference.

Prayers and petitions...
Debbie and her boys -- her hubby just deployed. Dad's travels.

Something I love...
Homemade Chili's-style salsa. Yum.

This week...
Life, learning, gymnastics, faith formation, a picnic?, art class, Dad has drill *sigh* so some kid-friendly fun for the weekend including a Super Bowl party for me and the kids.

A photo to share...

Watch out ladies, only 20 more years and you can snag him for your own.

Virtual Curriculum Fair: 5 Ways to Use an iPad in Your Homeschool

noreply@blogger.com (Pam Barnhill) — Sun, 29 Jan 2012 02:40:00 +0000

2. The iPad can be used for independent work. The kids love to learn new things on the iPad. We have many cool apps that allow them to practice skills from math to phonics and handwriting. As I work with one child at the table, the other sits with the headphones and works on an app of my choosing. I have all of the apps separated into categories so they can select a math app, Olivia phonics app, John phonics app etc. There is enough variety to keep them interested and the carefully chosen apps are well-designed and convey concepts well. This is perfect for allowing me uninterrupted time to work with the other child.

3. The iPad is a great family exploration tool. Okay, this is my favorite use of the iPad. We sit together and explore cool apps, videos, books, HD photos, and play games on a variety of subjects. We can watch, listen, point, touch, discuss and explore all sorts of topics. Some fun learning happens this way. We have apps about art, science, geography, music and so much more. Then there is a wealth of free content available online at places like YouTube and Wikipedia. From interactive books about Van Gogh to videos of Chinese New Year celebrations to photos and videos of instruments from around the world, there is so much to share and discuss.

4. The iPad is an eReader. You can download free Kindle and Nook apps and it comes with iBooks already installed. Multiple readers give you the opportunity to take advantage of free and discounted eBooks from the various sellers for kids and adults. iBooks is also a good PDF reader and there are many homeschool books and products available in PDF form. In addition there are leveled readers for kids in the app store. We have downloaded a number of free samples and Olivia likes them so much I have planned to purchase a few.

5. The iPad can be used for research and planning. It's a great little web device for Mom to sit on the couch next to Dad while he watches the game and still read curriculum reviews or blogs. I use Scholaric to plan out language arts, math, and handwriting. It is web-based and can be accessed from the iPad as well as my computer. There are also a number of lesson planning apps in the app store. Evernote is also a tool I use to take and sync notes between all three of my devices. I keep lists of resources and books in there. I especially use it to categorize links to webpages that do not have photos and can't be pinned onto Pinterest.

So is the iPad necessary for homeschooling? Of course not, but it sure does make it a lot more interesting and exciting at times. We are extremely blessed to have ours, and I feel like it is a tool that adds great value to our education.

Check out the other entries in the fair this week:
Weekly Homeschooling Schedule by Julie @ HighHill Homeschool
Virtual Curriculum Fair: Week 5: The Nuts & Bolts: Pulling it all Together by Leah @ The Courtney Six Homeschool
Our Schedule's Working! by Eunora @ All Things NoriLynn
Homeschooling: How do I do it all? by Debbie @ Debbie's Digest
Virtual Curriculum Fair--- Wrap-up Angie @ Petra School
Virtual Curriculum Fair: 5 Ways to Use an iPad in Your Homeschool by Pam @ Everyday Snapshots A Peek Into Our School Day by Melissa @ Grace Christian Homeschool
A Day in the Life... by Nicole @ Schooling in the Sun
Homeschool and Life: How we get it done by Jen @ Forever, For Always, No Matter What Homeschooling at My House by Jessica @ Modest Mama
Getting a Grip on Things by Susan @ Homeschooling Hearts & Minds
Making Home School a part of LIFE by Cindy @ For One Another
Now Where's That Pencil Again? by Beth @ Ozark Ramblings
Something About Homeschooling I Really Didn't See Coming by Letha @ justpitchingmytent Curriculum, Kids, and a Frazzled Homeschool Mama leads to Controlled Chaos! by Laura O from AK @ Day by Day in Our World
The Virtual Curriculum Fair – Nuts and Bolts by Kristen @ Sunrise to Sunset
Staying on Top of Everything by Brenda Emmett @ Garden of Learning

Indoor S'mores :: An Easy-Peasy Tutorial

noreply@blogger.com (Pam Barnhill) — Fri, 27 Jan 2012 21:49:00 +0000

The kids just love s'mores, and I have to agree. What could be better than chocolate and marshmallows on a cookie? S'mores are fantastic at a cookout or on a cold day in front of the fireplace. Unfortunately they are not without their issues. First, what if it's 90 degrees outside (possible most of the year here), or you don't have a fireplace, or you have a fireplace but really don't want the toddler getting close enough to roast anything? Also, there is the perennial problem of not being able to get the marshmallow hot enough to melt the chocolate, and it ends up staying in one big chunk and not melting much at all -- ewww.

So in an effort to help my fellow moms, I present the easy way to make the perfect s'more. I wish I could take complete credit for the no-fail s'more method, but the original idea came from the children's librarian in our old town. I took the idea and perfected it by tweaking the ingredients a bit -- and the perfect s'more was born.

First carefully select your ingredients. Choose chocolate chips over chocolate bars to facilitate quicker and more complete melting. Mini-marshmallows fit better on the graham cracker of your choice. I like the fresh stacks because the square size is the perfect snack size for the kids -- the rectangle is too big for the richness of the treat. This half-size is just right.

Next cover your ugly pan with foil because ~~you will be taking photos~~ it helps with the clean-up. Lay out your bottom crackers. Then you and your various helpers can cover the crackers with chocolate chips. I usually let the kids put them on, and then I make them stop a minute while I pick up all the strays and add them to the piles.

Once the chocolate is on, then do the same with your marshmallows. You should then have little mountains of chips and mallows on your crackers. And yes that is a fat foot in the background, as someone who will remain nameless likes to sit on the bar while we cook.

While you have been ~~supervising the three-ring circus~~ preparing the s'mores, you've also been preheating the broiler on your oven, right? Once it is ready to go, simply slip the pan onto the top rack positioned at least six inches away. Watch them ever so closely. It will only take a few minutes for them to cook, and it only takes a few seconds for them to go from just-right to garbage-can-fodder. These came oh-so-close.

All that is left to do is smush on the top and feast your eyes on the finished product. Yum, yum. Crispy crackers, slightly-toasted, melty marshmallows, and completely melted chocolate all without smelly smoke or burned body parts.

Oh, and eat it with gusto because it is so good.

Have you adapted a snack to make it easy to prepare? I am always on the look-out for a shortcut, so would love to hear about it.

Shameless Self-Promotion

noreply@blogger.com (Pam Barnhill) — Fri, 27 Jan 2012 15:23:00 +0000

We have a busy day on tap, but I do hope to be back later with a proper post. In the meantime, I wanted to chat about some of the changes around here.

I am so excited -- I started a Facebook page for Everyday Snapshots. Why? Because I can, and I like geeky things like that. I have always shared my blog posts as well as other items about homeschooling on my personal Facebook page. Having an ES page will allow me to do that there instead, and all the folks who are my Facebook friends who have no interest in homeschooling will be so grateful. Then you can comment on them, and I can comment back, and we can have a fun discussion (told you I was geeky). So I invite you to LIKE Everyday Snapshots on Facebook by using the button in the sidebar over there, clicking on that cute photo of Mr. Thomas, or by visiting the page here.

I am also going to use the Facebook page to post a weekly Pinning It Down reminder. So, if you need an extra nudge on Friday to remind you to get your pin done and your post ready, you will get it there. I will post the reminder every week whether the hostess for the next week is Sarah or me.

PSA: If you have always read this blog through my Facebook links, I will double-post the links on my wall for about one more week, and then I will only be posting them on the ES page.

And finally, if you read this blog through a reader, be sure to click over and see the new look and tell me what you think. It includes cute kid photos, so it's really worth the click.

Thanks for reading and commenting -- you guys make blogging fun, and I really appreciate you!

Kicking Curriculum to the Curb with Living Learning Lists

noreply@blogger.com (Pam Barnhill) — Wed, 25 Jan 2012 15:04:00 +0000

Note: You can now download a printable version of these lists by clicking here: Living Learning List Printables. Enjoy!

I have long been a fan of the Bravewriter Lifestyle List. I love the ideas in it and how an entire language arts experience can be built on a few rich, real-life routines. And then one day it struck me. Wouldn't it be cool to have a list like that for all the subjects? What if instead of following a curriculum there was a way to help worried moms facilitate learning in the home without freaking out that things were not being "covered." And so an idea was born.

I kicked it around in my brain for a while, sure that I was perfectly unqualified to make such lists (and am probably right there). Then the opportunity came up to throw out the idea over at The Well-Trained Mind forums, which has its own little not-so-secret group of relaxed homeschoolers who were receptive to such an idea. So the Living Learning Lists were born.

These lists are the brainchild of a group of women at WTM who shared their ideas. I am posting them here to compile them in one easy-to-snag location and to share with you.

Science

Read living science books
Nature study
Conduct an inquiry experiment with a discovery box
Discuss and add questions to the science board for further exploration
Science field trip (science museum, zoo, animal habitat)
Watch a science documentary or edutainment show (Magic School Bus, Bill Nye)
Subscribe to, view, and discuss a science video- or photo-of-the-day
Subscribe to and discuss science magazines of interest
Look for and discuss science current events
Explore a science-themed app or website
Read biographies of scientists.
Strew experiment books and let kids choose experiments that interest them.

History/Geography

Read living history books
Read and discuss a This Day in History book or website each day
Visit a historical reenactment or museum
Attend a history lecture or class
Play a history/geography board game, app, or computer game
Put together a map puzzle
Add people and events studied from week to timeline (anything we study or discuss in any subject -- music, art, science, literature)
Ask kids about people or events they want to learn about and add the topic to a "History interest" list
When reading a historical topic, mark a map to indicate the relevant countries, cities and major landmarks
Collect articles from newspapers and magazines on current events and add to a scrapbook
Use sticky notes/arrows to track the time setting of books on a timeline
Historical movies and documentaries with discussion
Study the history of your child’s interest or passions (i.e. history of juggling, coins)
Map things interesting to your family
Make timeline cards, the scramble them and put them back together. Or use the $1 decks of Presidents, Ancient Wonders, etc. and put them in order (history) or place them on a map (geography)

Math

Cook a recipe
Read a living math book
Play a math game
Play a card or board game
Play a math app or computer game
Watch a math documentary or show and discuss
Chart interesting data -- the weather, plant or puppy growth, conduct surveys among family and friends. Graph and discuss the data
Add things up at the grocery store, weigh produce/bulk foods, learn to check price per unit
Use math with a hobby or project. Design something (bird house? quilt?) Plan materials needed, including amounts. Go to store or check online for prices. Figure out totals based on prices and amount needed. Make it!
Play store or start a store or business. Decide what to sell and then buy the products. Then figure out how to market, display, and what the mark up should be. Once items are sold figure out if enough money is made and decide what items to continue to sell.
Jump on trampoline, or in the house or with jump rope, doing times tables. Toss bean bags and you need to say the next number when it is thrown to you. You can do this with skip counting too.
Practice practical estimation and measuring. Measure a large piece of furniture (couch, table) and then figure out how to get it out of the house. Estimate an object's size first, and then measure it afterwards, to see how accurate the estimate is. Estimate paint needed for a project or dirt needed to fill a flower bed or pots.
Compare objects - at first easier ones, then harder ones (such as containers with different shapes)

I am not quite sure yet how I am going to use these exactly. The thought right now is to put them in checklist form, print them, and put them in my learning notebook. If I leave it out on the counter and check things off with a dry-erase marker, I can keep track at a glance of things we are doing on a regular basis and get ideas for other things we can do. That is a start anyway.

So, my questions for you -- do you have any ideas to add to the lists? How would you use them in your home?

Pinning It Down Vol. 3: Capturing Christmas Cards

noreply@blogger.com (Pam Barnhill) — Tue, 24 Jan 2012 13:54:00 +0000

Sarah is hosting this week.

I knew getting my pin done this week was going to be a challenge. In fact as I rode out of town with my Mom and kids for our three day trip to Orlando this weekend, I told her that I needed to think of an easy pin to do because I wouldn't have much time when I returned. Then it hit me.

We were driving to the land of Ikea.

I knew then that not only did I need to make my first trip to that superstore, but I also needed to pick up a couple of those spice racks to make into bookshelves. I had pinned the idea months ago and either you can't order them online or I have simply been too lazy to do so (can't remember). We were on a quest.

And now I have a love-hate relationship with Ikea. The good: the play place for the kids, the selection of cool items, the prices. The bad: many of the employees' attitudes were less than stellar, the layout of the store (When we were done shopping I could see where the kids were playing, but to pick them up I had to go up an elevator, walk around to another elevator, and go back down to the floor I was just on to get to the back of the area to pick them up --oy.), and the fact that the spice racks I wanted were on three week back order. So despite dragging my sainted mother to two different kitchen areas of the store on two different floors (don't ask), I still had nothing for my pin. I came home empty handed.

Until I was getting out of the van in my driveway. When Mom said, "Oh these are for you," and handed me three huge jump rings. "I got them for the Christmas card book from Pinterest. I made mine and these are for you." Mothers. Are. Awesome.

Here is the link to the original idea, and here is mine.

Those are some BIG jump rings, so I am thinking that next year I will just use another card as a divider and add on. I can probably get three years at least on the same rings before I move on to another set.

I love this idea. I have never kept these before because I didn't know what to do with them, but now I wish I had. It will be fun over the years to watch all of the kids grow up in our card books. And hopefully this will inspire me to get some of our own sent out next year (every once and a while I miss a year).

Head on over to Sarah's to see what everyone else is pinning and doing this week.

Math Monday: BUILDing Living Math

noreply@blogger.com (Pam Barnhill) — Tue, 24 Jan 2012 02:46:00 +0000

I thought it might be a fun idea to post each Monday on what I am putting in the BUILD boxes each week. I am going to try to be consistent with this.

You can read about the BUILD boxes here.

Olivia
Monday - Place Value War
Tuesday - Mental math problems and math journal prompt. Journal: The answer is 6. What is the question? Can you think of four different questions?
Wednesday - The Grouchy Ladybug
Thursday - 100 Board Puzzles
Friday - M&M Graphing

John
Monday - UNO MOO
Tuesday - Math journal: Draw numbers 5-8 and illustrate.
Wednesday - Size (Math Counts)
Thursday - Counting Pots

Materials: containers with dot labels; counting objects
Instructions: Have the child count the dots on the label and then count out either the same, fewer, or more objects to put in the pot. The child should be able to tell whether the amount in the cup is the same, more, or less that what is represented on the label.

Friday - Activity from Math Fun at Home, and I am sure he will be right in the middle of the M&M graphing as well.

More US Geography for First Grade

noreply@blogger.com (Pam Barnhill) — Thu, 19 Jan 2012 04:20:00 +0000

We've been on a geography kick for the past few days, and all of the interest has reminded me of a few things I forgot in my post on Monday.

We bought a state quarters map from the local hobby store and have been pilfering Dad's change looking for state quarters. We have all of them except for a handful.

As we find each quarter we use an iPad app named Quarters to have a look at the details of the coins. Sorry I can't link the app. The only name the app shows is Quarters, but every search I do is pulling up drinking games! The app is simple -- it just shows a close-up detail of the coins and gives a brief blurb about the symbols on each one. It was also free.

Everyone is getting into this one, pulling out the map to see the ones we have and the ones we still need.

In addition to the quarter collecting we have also been viewing these two YouTube videos:

Fifty Nifty United States - Olivia can just about sing all of them. I think in a few days more she will have them all down. This is how I learned the states in the fourth grade and still sing them in my head today when I need to name them.

Wakko's 50 States and Capitals - This one is just fun. We need to listen a while more on this one, but I bet we'll get it in the end.

In addition she asked to start a state book the other day. We will see where that one goes. I am not sure what she has in mind. Regardless, she is learning an awful lot about states, capitals, and her country.

Pinning it Down Volume 2: BUILD a Better Math Program

noreply@blogger.com (Pam Barnhill) — Tue, 17 Jan 2012 04:00:00 +0000

Welcome to our second Pinning it Down Tuesday! Do you find yourself pinning projects to Pinterest, but rarely getting around to doing them? Do you need a bit of encouragement to make some of those projects come to life? Join Sarah and me every Tuesday for the Pinning it Down link-up, where we're making a Pinterest project happen in our homes every week.

We were thrilled with the response last week to our little link-up. Such fun to travel about and see everyone's projects. Thanks so much for playing along.

I have to be honest, I was thinking of what this week's project would be as soon as I clicked publish last Monday night. Pinning It Down has not only lit a fire under me to get some things accomplished, but it has also renewed my interest in perusing pins and finding great ideas. Fortunately I knew exactly what I wanted to do for this week as soon as I saw it -- last Tuesday.

Yep, this is a brand new pin for me. I was so floored by the idea I had to implement it as soon as I saw this pin. (Quick! Go read about it here.) This is the BUILD math system based on an idea used by public schools to integrate a variety of activities into classroom math studies. I wrote last week for the Virtual Curriculum Fair about how we do living math here in our homeschool. What I didn't talk about was how we had fallen into a rut, and I was having a hard time integrating all of the great math resources that we have. I knew as soon as I read about it that BUILD would fix that little problem. So here's what I did.

First, I adapted the system to better meet my needs. I knew I wanted to work in some things that were not in the system as described, so I tweaked the acronym.

So for us, BUILD stands for:
Buddy Games -- Games that we can play together.
Using Mental Math and Math Journals -- Yes! A way to work in those two things that I have been wanting to do, but have been so inconsistent with.
Integrating Literature -- All of our math readers go here.
Learning Numbers - Numeracy and becoming familiar with numbers backwards and forwards is so important to math understanding.
Doing Math - This day is for projects where we actually put the math into action.

In addition to this, Olivia will still continue to do a page from Miquon on Monday, Wednesdays and most Thursdays.

Next I sat down with my lesson planning grid and filled in five weeks worth of BUILD activities, pulling from all of my math resources.

Finally I set up the system on our shelves. I knew that we did not have room to use crates as the original blogger did. Instead I grabbed five more of those magazine holders from last week and repurposed them again. Since the BUILD acronym would be pretty meaningless to my kids, I labeled the holders with abbreviations for the days of the weeks using supplies from my scrapbooking stash. I filled the holders with the materials for this week, and we are set to go.

Here's what's inside for this week:

B - Cards for games of War. Olivia and I did addition War today. John and I simply played the version where he told me which number was larger. Big hit!
U - I have a card of mental math questions for Olivia taken from this website of math ideas. Olivia will be writing about her favorite month in her math journal. John will make a chart of the numbers from 1-10 with drawn objects for his. The blank paper is for the journaling to add to their notebooks.
I - Math in the Bath: (and other fun places, too!) and How Do You Say It Today Jesse Bear We'll discuss each.
L - A bag and Unifix cubes for John's activity. He will reach in the bag, pull out cubes of both colors, build two towers counting as he goes, and tell me which one is the biggest. We will likely do this a few times with varying amounts each time. There is another card there for Olivia's activity. Each letter of her name will be assigned a value, and she will determine how much her name is worth using Unifix cubes. Once the she has cubes for each letter of her name she will group them into tens and ones to count them. Knowing her I imagine we will do names for most members of the family too.
D - There is no D for this week as we will be heading out of town on Friday. Future D ideas include making brownies, M&M graphing, and tracking the temperature over the course of the week and creating graphs from the collected data. I also included a page of Math Fun at Home ideas to do with John. It involves things like sorting and counting silverware while setting the table or talking about how your house is alike and different from your neighbor's house.

I am so excited and think this little idea will fill a need we have had for quite a while -- providing a framework for our living math studies.

Are you ready to play along? Here's how our link-up works:

1. Choose a project from one of your Pinterest pinboards and make it happen. Blog a little about it. Remember, it doesn't have to be elaborate- we just want to see what you've been up to!

2. Make sure you link back here somewhere in your post so others can find us and play along. Feel free to grab our Pinning it Down graphic if you'd like to add it to your post. Also, don't forget proper pinning etiquette and try to include a link back the original idea whenever possible. We want to be sure that cool idea credit is given to the proper person.

3. Link up below. Make sure you're sending us to your actual post, and not to your general blog address. You can add your link all the way through Friday, so if you haven't gotten a chance to work on any of your pins yet this week, you're not too late.

Playful US Geography for First Grade

noreply@blogger.com (Pam Barnhill) — Mon, 16 Jan 2012 23:16:00 +0000

I added a few more resources in another post on US Geography. Be sure to check it out.

I am joining up with Susan from Homeschooling Hearts and Minds and about 30 of her friends for the 2012 Virtual Curriculum Fair. I loved this idea when I first read about it on Susan's blog -- an honest look at curriculum and what works and doesn't in your homeschool. There will be a new topic each Monday in January. Today is Exploring Our World: Social Studies and more Science. Read on to see how we do US Geography here and then enjoy the links at the bottom from around the fair.

Oh, I had high hopes for history and science this year. I bought open and go, already-planned-out curriculum for both subjects, and it was going to make my life so easy. And I guess it did. It also made us so bored. The activities were the same week after week or just not interesting at all. We trudged through for about 10 weeks and then just let it go altogether.

One of the components of our history study was US geography. Each week we were to read about a new state and then make a notebooking page for that state using the pre-planned notebooking sheet. *yawn* Yet despite the monotony of the assignment, somewhere in there Olivia developed an interest in the states and US geography. Fortunately I have some other resources that we have been using to continue our studies with a little more flair.

iPad Apps
Stack the States -- This iPad app is a current favorite in our home. You answer various questions about the states, their locations, landmarks and capitals. Each correct answer earns you a state to stack (all the states have cute eyeballs and are proportionally sized which is cool). Be careful stacking -- it can be really tricky. Once you have stacked past the finish line, you pass the level and earn another state to put on your state map. The kids really love this game. The bad news is the app does not read to you, so younger students have to rely on a parent for help. In addition I would say that Olivia can't answer about half of the questions (the ones on cities and landmarks) on her own, so needs help with those as well. The good news is she is learning those answers, she is learning to use a map to help answer other questions, and she is learning to read better so she doesn't need so much help to play the app. There are some other games in the app. The only one we have unlocked so far is a game where you choose the correct state based on its shape. She's getting really good with that one.

Wood Puzzle USA - It is exactly what it sounds like -- a wooden puzzle of the US states. It has three different modes. The first has outlines of the states on the game board. As you drag the state to its correct location the app tells you the name of the state and its capital and there are no pieces to lose! There are also more advanced levels which quiz your knowledge. This one is not as popular as Stack the States, but it gets chosen for play about once a week.

Games
Scrambled States - The kids love this game. Olivia asks to play it at least once a week and recently John played with us for the very first time. You don't have to have tons of knowledge about the states to play, but it does increase your familiarity with them. We play the version for young players, but the game will grow with the kids and become more fun and competitive as they get older. This is going to be a hit for a long time.

Books
The Scrambled States of America (Books for Young Readers) and The Scrambled States of America Talent Show These are favorite book around here. Kansas and Nebraska were two of the first states learned, not to mention Nevada and Mississippi (because they are in love in the books). Both big hits!

United Tweets of America: 50 State Birds Their Stories, Their Glories - We've read this one a couple of times but not in a while. Since we are gearing up our bird study, I am going to bring it back out again. It was well-received.

Smart About the Fifty States (Smart About History) This was the original book from our curriculum. I think it would be better received as a flip-through-and-read-about-what-looks-interesting or as a reference kind of book.

The United States Cookbook: Fabulous Foods and Fascinating Facts From All 50 States - We used this a number of times in the beginning of our geography study. We need to pull it out and use it again. I think the approach to take with it would be to look through it for something that looks yummy, make it, and then discuss the state it represents.

The plan for now is to continue with our hodge-podge study as we finish up our US History for this year. I am considering a fun project like having Olivia make a book of favorite states -- something small. My main goal is to familiarize her with US geography and keep her from looking like an idiot if she is ever stopped by Jay Leno. So far she is doing pretty well for her age.

Check out the other entries in the Virtual Curriculum Fair this week:
Science and Worldview by Beth @ Ozark Ramblings
Nature Study as Science by Christine @ Crunchy Country Catholic
Virtual Curriculum Fair Week 3- Social Studies and more Science by Leah Courtney @ The Courtney Six Homeschool Family
Curriculum Fair–Exploring Our World by Angie @ Petra School
Paths of Exploration by Jen @ Forever, For Always
Learning Geography at Our House by Jessica @ Modest Mama
Mapping Out Our Social Studies by Susan @ Homeschooling Hearts & Minds
The Fascinating World Around Us by Cindy Horton @ Fenced in Family
More Heart of Dakota Praises by Nicole @ Schooling in the Sun
Our History by Melissa @ Grace Christian Homeschool
Heart of Dakota-The Fine Details-Part 3 History by Lynn @ Ladybug Chronicles
Exploring Our World Through History & Science by Brenda Emmett @ Garden of Learning
Two History Must-haves by Letha @ justpitchingmytent
Learning About The World Around Us by Laura O from AK
Social Studies and Science - What do we do? by Joelle @ Homechooling for His Glory

Pinning It Down Vol 1: Repurposed Magazine Files

noreply@blogger.com (Pam Barnhill) — Tue, 10 Jan 2012 03:56:00 +0000

Don't you just love it when you can find a new use for something of which you have a surplus supply? We have tons of those old plastic magazine holders; I blame it on Matt and his copious magazine collections -- mostly because it's his fault. But I digress, because this turns out well. Read on.

I also had a hot mess of tall wrap boxes in my upper cabinet -- you know aluminum foil (does anyone else besides me still call this tin foil?), cling wrap, wax paper, parchment paper, freezer bags, and on and on. I wish I had taken a "before" photo, but I didn't, so you are going to have to use your imagination. The boxes were stacked high on the top-most shelf, one on top of the other in a teetering heap. Whenever I wanted to get something specific, I either couldn't even see it or could spot it but not quite grasp it. More than once in grabbing a box, another came toppling down on my head. So out would come the step-stool. In a normal household this isn't a huge deal. In a house with a toddler, it is a major fight to wrest it away once you are done so that it is not co-opted to aid in illegal activities. Mostly it was a pain.

Enter this nifty idea I pinned 10 weeks ago. Oh yes, I had something similar to that. So, I sent Matt to fetch a couple from the boxes in the garage, cleared off a space in a tall, lower (child-proofed) cabinet, and set up my stash. Bliss. And a big, "Why in the world didn't I do this sooner. This was soooooo easy."

I just love reaching in and easily grabbing what I need.

Sarah is hosting Pinning It Down this week, the Procrastinating Pinterest Phan's Kick in the Rear (That's not really the tag-line; I just made that up.) To play, pick something you have pinned, do it (I know!), blog it, and head on over to link up and share. Hope to see you there!

Flying Without a Parachute: Math with no Curriculum

noreply@blogger.com (Pam Barnhill) — Mon, 09 Jan 2012 20:04:00 +0000

Bugs from our reading of Best Bug Parade. We made them and then compared their sizes in various ways.

Math readers. We love a good picture book, even when the topic is math. I use the list of readers at the Living Math website to help me choose stories about every thing from perimeter to sorting and making patterns. The kids love them, and we often use a reader to introduce a new topic.

Math game and activity books like Games for Math or those from Scholastic. These books provide a wealth of fun, hands-on ways to explore numbers and math. My kids especially enjoy ones like Munchie Math: Dozens of Skill-Building Math Activities That Use Edible Manipulatives to Meet the NCTM Standards that include food. Math with M&Ms is often requested here.

Of course doing math in this fashion takes quite a bit more work than simply handing a child a workbook, DVD, or computer program and telling them to go at it. There is nothing wrong with that, but as a former math-phobe I wanted to be proactive in making sure that math is something that is enjoyed and understood here in our home. I want the kids to be mathematical thinkers and not simply able to recite rote facts or plug numbers into the correct algorithm.

So far it is working for us. Olivia actually knows quite a few of her math facts and has a good understanding of addition, subtraction, and multiplication. In addition she has been exposed to place value to the 100s, time, money, geometry, and fractions. I can see some holes in her learning, but I have no doubt that those will be filled as we continue to cycle through and practice various topics. Periodically I will take stock of her knowledge and compare it to a grade-level S&S and create some units to fill those gaps. For now, we I am proud to say we have never shed a tear over math class, and I intend to keep it that way.

Check out all the other great math and science posts with the Virtual Curriculum Fair this week. Math Lapbooks---Virtual Curriculum Fair Week 2 Angie Wright @ Petra School
Virtual Curriculum Fair Week Two: Discover Patterns, Mathematics, Logic and Some Science by Leah @ The Courtney Six Homeschool
Our Choices For Math by Melissa @ Grace Christian Homeschool
A Magnificent Math Manipulative by Letha Paulk @ justpitchingmytent
Our Math Choices - Virtual Curriculum Fair by Tristan @ Our Busy Homeschool
Math Literature?!?! by Christine @ Crunchy Country Catholic
Learning Math at My House by Jessica @ Modest Mama
Math Using Hamburger Paper by Debbie @ Debbie's Digest
Math Facts or Fun? Why Not Both! by Beth @ Ozark Ramblings
Heart of Dakota- The Fine Details- Part 2 Science by Lynn @ Ladybug Chronicles
Learning Math Block by Block by Laura O in AK @ Day by Day in Our World
Plugging Along with Math by Cindy Horton @ Fenced in Family
What's Working and What's Not: Math Edition by Leann @ Montessori Tidbits
Math Anyone? by Cindy @ For One Another Ahh, Math. by Nicole @ Schooling in the Sun
Flying Without a Parachute: Math with no Curriculum by Pam @ Everyday Snapshots
Math in Our Homeschool by Christine T @ Our Homeschool Reviews
Math, Math, and More Math by Dawn Chandler @ tractors & tire swings
Thinking Mathematically- How I Choose Math Curriculum by Kristen @ Sunrise to Sunset Discovering Patterns: Math, Logic, and Some Science by Christa Darr @ Fairfield Corner Academy

New Year Daybook

noreply@blogger.com (Pam Barnhill) — Sun, 08 Jan 2012 23:47:00 +0000

Surrounded by...It's unseasonably warm today. I am really loving the weather pattern so far this year. We'll have a few days of cold to remind us its winter and let us build a fire and then a few days of warmth and sunshine for playing. I could just do this until spring. It's quiet, because Thomas is napping, and I am letting the big kids have some media time.

Thankful for...
Feeling better. Thomas has been fighting a fever the past couple of days, but no sign of it this morning and even his cough sounds better. I am glad we are all on the mend.

Pondering...

A TV fast. We've just gotten more and more dependent on it. I am thinking of going cold turkey next week.

Learning together...

Lovely week of learning this week. The iPad has added some spice to spelling around here. We also got picture study done for the first time ever thanks to that device. More on that in a future post.

Domestic bliss...
We took down all of the heavy drapes in the house, and we are loving it so much better without them. Yes, I know they were custom, designer drapes, but they were not us and were blocking so much of the light. I think we have a plan for replacement. In the meantime there is much hardware removal and wall patching to be done when we get a free weekend.

What's app-ening...
Going to share some of my favorite apps with you in this spot. This week -- Flipboard. If you love things visual and pretty then this app is for you. There is a version for the iPad and the iPhone/iPod. It is a feed aggregator that pulls content from your social networks and Google Reader and puts it into a beautiful, magazine-style format that is easy on the eyes and oh so enjoyable to read. With the swipe of a finger you flip the page to another beautiful layout of content. This is my new way to read blogs, Facebook, and Twitter -- love it.

Making progress...

Pinning It Down starts Tuesday at Sarah's and I admit to putting my project off until the last minute. Gotta get busy.

Read of the week...
Lesson 2: Don't Carpe Diem Just what a mom needs to read.

A new habit...

I am working on one new habit at a time this year. Right now it is being dressed and getting the day going by 8:00 each morning. So far the weekdays are going well.

On the nightstand...

Nurturing Inquiry: Real Science for the Elementary Classroom - a great read

Prayers and petitions...
Debbie and her boys -- her hubby just deployed. Sarah's upside down bundle. Amanda and her mom.

Something I love...
Downton Abbey Season 2 starts tonight!!! I can't wait.

This week...
Back to gymnastics and Faith Formation and more of a routine schedule around here. Olivia has two basketball games next weekend. Dad will be home tonight!

A photo to share...

Pinning Down Some Accountability

noreply@blogger.com (Pam Barnhill) — Sun, 08 Jan 2012 04:11:00 +0000

I can't remember half of what happened yesterday, so it comes as no surprise that I can't remember exactly how I got turned on to Pinterest. I do remember that as soon as I saw all of that digital, visual, yummy goodness I knew I had to join right away. This was all about three minutes before Pinterest really exploded into popularity, right before anyone and their sister could send you an invite. To my delight, my photographer Tina was already on the inside and set me up fairly quickly.

And then the pinning began.

It's a wee bit like I imagine crack would be -- not that I have any comparison mind you. I can understand the siren's call that keeps a persons clicking on all of the beauty that is there. Fortunately, the new has worn off a bit, and I don't find myself pinning so obsessively any more. Instead, I am using the site as a tool -- connecting and networking, organizing ideas and links, providing inspiration. It's all good.

Except that I need some accountability. I pin so much, yet rarely make time to create or use the ideas I have pinned. I once quipped to my sweet pal Sarah that someone should start an Internet link up, a weekly show-and-tell for those of us who pin and need a little extra nudge to move away from the screen and actually make some of the goodies we have saved. I was tickled pink when she suggested that we pair up and be the ones to do it. And Pinning It Down was born.

Starting Tuesday, January 10, Sarah and I will alternate hosting a weekly link-up to help you move those lovely items off of your pin boards and onto your list of accomplishments for the year. All you have to do is choose an item you have pinned, do it, blog it, and then link it up each week -- one week at Sarah's and the next week here. Choose a craft, recipe, scrapbook page, DIY project, homeschool idea, or shoot, just go on out and buy that entire outfit. But when you do, please come share with us. We love to be enablers that way.

That's it. Grab the graphic and meet me over at Sarah's on Tuesday -- just go on and add her to your subscriptions while you're at it. She has a new camera and a new baby on the way. Lots of yummy things to see there in the next few months no doubt. In the meantime, I can't wait to see what you've accomplished.