My kids are currently 9 and 13, and some of their favorite activities are making playdough, building forts, playing in the mud, and making blanket forts. All sorts of questions and discoveries arise through this sensory play that is often considered more appropriate for much younger children. Like why does Oobleck work the way it does? Why does the ratio of 4:1 make this substance but not that? What is the point of cream of tartar in playdough? Why is this mud grittier than that mud, and why does it smell like this? What makes clay from the ground turn into art class clay or stucco? You get the idea. You don't even have to come up with any sort of lesson plan - in fact, when I get all teachy, they lose interest. They don't listen. Play is important for all ages, even and maybe especially play that you think they are too old to engage in. What will you play today? ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ For more ideas on natural parenting, check ou...
Today we worked on regrouping using Math-U-See manipulatives. We used just the 100s, 10s, and unit pieces. I drew a large grid for spaces for each of the numerals, and used problems in our Brainquest workbook. We added the units together, trading them out for tens if we had more than 10, then placing that ten above the two other rows, just as you would when writing it out. Then we did the same with the tens bars, pulling out groups of ten tens and then placing the new 100 plate above the 100s place of our rows. We then wrote out what we did in the workbook. Subtracting with regrouping was a little different. We took away the number of units in the second row from the units in the top row, and moved the remaining units to the bottom (answer) row. If there weren't enough units in the top row, we converted a tens bar into 10 units cubes and put them in that upper right square. We then subtracted how many we had un the middle right square and put the remaining units cubes in...
"Scientific studies conducted by Dr. Leonard Sagan, a medical epidemiologist, ... show that social class, education, life skills, and cohesiveness of family and community are key factors in determining life expectancy. Of all these factors, however, education has shown to be the most important. ... Hope, self-esteem, and education are the most important factors in creating daily health , no matter what our background or the state of our health in the past." Christiane Northrup, Women's Bodies, Women's Wisdom p 27 (emphasis in original) Since homeschoolers tend to get a really good education, grow up feeling confident in their skin, and are often a part of a dynamic, diverse, and tight community, by homeschooling, you are benefiting your children's health and life expectancy. On self-esteem: "In addition, several studies have been done to measure homeschoolers’ 'self-concept,' which is the key objective indicator for establishing a child’s se...
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