Homeschoolers have Style!  Lots of it, in all kinds of flavors.

With the freedom homeschooling affords, comes individual style.  We can afford to experiment, jump around, take a leisurely path through phonics, or whatever suits our family best.

Check out these styles!

Proactive

ChristineMM of The Thinking Mother shares thoughts about unique classes taught by subject matter experts that homeschoolers can take advantage of in her article The Thinking Mother: Homeschool Filmmaking Class for My Kids This Fall.

Shannon tells of her experience with filing a “notice of intent” to homeschool: Get this . . . posted at Mountaineer Country.

If you’ve wondered why public schools don’t teach based on skill level instead of age, Susan Gaissert writes about how that may be changing in:  Who is Leading When It Comes to Educational Innovations? posted at The Expanding Life.

Elena LaVictoire presents A few tips for Ohio homeschoolers posted at My Domestic Church.

If you’ve given some thought to a homeschool name or ID cards, Beverly has some tips in “Do You Name Your Homeschool?” at Beverly’s Homeschooling Blog.

Barbara, from Barbara Frank Online, motivates us with some encouragement for the new school year in Fasten Your Seat Belts…..

And Christine gives us her take on planning the school year and juggling paperwork in Planning the School Year at Our Curious Home.

Playful

Need a fun, make-at-home, game to liven up your school drills?  Kris presents Giant Board Game posted at Weird, Unsocialized Homeschoolers.

Kaye presents Rainy Day + Chuck E. Cheese = Happy Grandkids & Grandparents! posted at SandwichINK.com.  “Chuck E. Cheese can be a great “friend” to grandparents who help with their grandkids’ homeschooling programs!”

Summer presents A Day In Our Homeschooling Life posted at Wired For Noise.

Beautiful

In How to Educate for Beautiful Results, posted at Pajama School Blog, Natalie Wickham shares the importance of identifying and working on the parts that ultimately contribute to a whole education.

Make sure to check out these great art ideas:  Julie Moses presents Follow the Yellow Brick Road- More Oz projects! posted at Kids Art Projects and Lessons at Ms. Julie’s Place.  “Just a few projects to get us going somewhere over the rainbow!”

Annette Berlin presents 37 Ways To Share Crafts With Kids posted at Craft Stew.  “If you love crafting, chances are good you want to share that love with your children. Here are some easy (and frugal) ways to help your child also develop an interest in crafting.”

Studious

Kathy presents her review of Andrew Peterson’s North! Or Be Eaten: The Wingfeather Saga Book 2: Homeschool Review posted at Homeschoolbuzz.com Reviews.

Dave Roller presents Reading Programs posted at Home School Dad.  “I wanted to share some of the reading programs my children have been participating in.”

Amanda gives an in-depth look into the history of the atomic bombs dropped at the end of WWII in The Daily Planet » Blog Archive » The “Little Boy” Was Dropped posted at The Daily Planet.

Stephanie shares her excitement about learning Latin for the first time together with her children in I Am Just The Lead Student, That’s All at All About Homeschool.

Ruby shares her insight into using computers, the internet, and online learning to have a positive impact in schooling with one article at Freehold2 called “Internet as a Teaching Tool” and another titled “Online Learning Benefits” at School’s Out.

Adventuresome

Need some ideas for field trips?  Kristen Hamilton presents A Day in the Life – Field Trips posted at A Day in the Life – Homeschool Blogger.

If you’re trying to plan for fun AND learning this fall, check out this post:  The Family presents What to do, what not to do posted at Once Upon a Family.

Lynda at The Adventures of A Princess and the Bear writes Bear’ Geography: “about our doing geography and learning the continents with literature and lapbooking. We are making an apple pie in this post, to go along with the book, How to Make an Apple Pie and See the World”

John shares thoughts along with the inspirational story of a Zac, a homeschool teen who sailed around the world alone.  He writes Home School Encourages Independence In  Learning and Life at Independent Learning and Home Schooling.  He says, “Rather than isolating students, home school encourages students to develop independence in the way they handle the way they live and the way they learn.”

Amy shares her summertime adventures in Summer Time Learning posted at Kids Love Learning.

We can all empathize with Janine at Why Homeschool who writes about struggles with starting backup with school in “Not Quite Ready to Start School.”

Successful

Margaret writes about her plans for not teaching history this school year at Semi-Schooling History posted at Two Kid Schoolhouse

Barbra Sundquist presents Do You Need to Get Angry Before Anyone Listens? posted at Barbra Sundquist.  “Have you ever found yourself thinking, “Why is it that I have to get angry to get what I want?”

Lynn shares her successful first week of school along with some great resources, ideas, and links.  Check out First Week of School Done! posted at Eclectic Education – Homeschool Blogger.

Ben presents 7 Ways to Save Money on Back to School Shopping posted at Money Smart Life.

Scott Palat presents Parental Involvement Affects the Academic Success of Children posted at TutorFi.

Freestyle – a bit of everything

Susan Ryan presents Open Education – It’s the Learning that Counts posted at Corn and Oil.  “There are many high quality, free learning resources available for homeschoolers, including MIT’s free online courses.”

Shelly presents Vintage Video – Jay Can Do It posted at Homemade Homeschoolers.  “This episode of Vintage Video – Jay Can Do It – is part of the Homemade Homeschoolers Podcasts. The post includes thoughts about the difference between how non-homeschoolers define “socialization” and how we at Homemade Homeschoolers define it. We hope you enjoy!”

And if you haven’t settled into a homeschooling style yet, check out Choosyhomeschooler’s article PURLs of Wisdom Blog » Choosing a Teaching Style or Homeschooling Method posted at PURLs of Wisdom Blog.

Help Aimee out with some new lunch ideas as she shares hers in Homeschool Talk: School lunches at Aimee’s Land.

Experimental

If you haven’t done the soda bottle and Mentos experiment, you’re in for some fun.  See how Lara DeHaven did it in A Homemade Geyser posted at Texas Homesteader.  My boys are itching to do this!

And if you need some ideas to let your enjoyment and study of nature branch out into other science topics, check out Katie Glennon and her article: Using Nature Study to Study all Areas of Science posted at Katie’s Homeschool Cottage.

Grateful

Leah at The Courtney Six shares Just In Case I Haven’t Mentioned It Lately…:  “My thoughts on why I’m so glad we homeschool.”

Amy at Raising Arrows presents “The Shame On Me Sea“.  The homeschooling parent’s life is often fraught with guilt. Amy writes about her own personal struggle to stay out of the Shame On Me Sea.

I’m grateful, too!

I hope you enjoyed this edition of the Homeschool Carnival.  Thank you for all your contributions!

Please take a moment to comment and/or spread the word by posting to your blog, Twitter, Facebook, etc.

Next week the carnival will be held at Home Grown Mommy.com and submissions are due Monday, Aug. 31st at 6 pm.  Visit here to submit your post.

Or if you’d like to peruse previous editions, they are listed at Why Homeschool.

Thank you again to all those who took the time to submit posts and share!

– Misty

It’s summer.  The kids are going crazy.  We all want to do something fun!  Here’s what I need help with:

• Where do you find ideas for fun summer activities?
• Looking back, what did your family enjoy doing the most in the summer?
• How do you choose a vacation?  A location?  What to see and do on the trip?
• And even trickier:  How do you make it fun for the teens and the littles at the same time?

Would you mind sharing with me and the other readers?

Here are my ideas:

1. Get a science museum membership or share one.  A herd of stir-crazy kids cooped up indoors during a summer storm can be frightening
2. Pick up a local travel guide for the family from your library for your own neighborhood.  I’m amazed sometimes about the cool things right in my area I had no idea existed.  Try Travel Guides Free.com
3. Put the kids in charge of mini-vacations, not the 3-year-old, but maybe a 7-year-old with a lot of help.  Let them do as much of the following as they can:  (Here’s how this is school)

• Tell them if they can find a fun place to visit within a day’s drive, you’ll make a mini-vacation of it.
• You could do one a month in the summer with a different kid in charge each time.
• Research locations, events, and history for the trip at the library.
• Buy the tickets to any events or activities.
• Calculate mileage.
• Print the Google maps.
• Make online hotel reservations (WOW, Mom!  $100 for ONE night at a hotel?!?).
• Make a to do list
• Make a packing list
• Help younger kids pack and check their bags.
• Etc.

(I got tired just typing that list – kids just don’t appreciate how much work it is to make sure they have a good time!  They’ll probably think it’s all fun, for a while.)

I’d love to hear your ideas.  Thanks in advance for commenting!  Feel free to post a link to a blog article you’ve posted on the topic.

We’ve been gone a bit, enjoying a fun vacation at the Kalahari Resort in Sandusky, Ohio.  Not only did we love running around in shorts, T-shirts, and swimsuits in the middle of February, but we were there with a huge group of Homeschoolers as part of the Unschoolers Winter Waterpark Gathering.  ’Unschooling‘ basically means that you don’t stick to any specific homeschool curriculum.  Instead, you use life to learn and encourage your children’s interests. 

The week was packed with lots of swimming and so many activities that we were running all over the place:  Webkinz parties, Pokemon trading, a Kid’s Marketplace, Dungeon’s and Dragons games, video games, two Talent Shows, dance workshops, a Medieval Ball and tons more!

Here are a few pictures of our fun (and socialization, which we take very seriously as homeschoolers – ROFL)

Our beautiful Princess in her ball gown and hat for the grand finale, the Medieval Ball!

Showing off his own dance moves – the definition of EXUBERANT!  Why can’t I suck off some of their energy and use it myself??

He won the 1000 ticket jackpot in the arcade – and it took him FOREVER to decide how to spend them.

His favorite moment of the Conference:  buying his own bag of cotton candy at the Kid’s Marketplace.

And dressing up in the kid’s lounge is always fun!

Sometimes homeschooling is just way too much fun!  We love this life!

My husband decided early on that he’d like the kids to attend half-day kindergarten, mostly for the fun of it.  And what do the kids say their favorite part of kindergarten is?  Well, besides recess, gym class is a close second.

We love our homeschool gym classes, too.  Here are some of our gym classes on vacation:

Jumping on our cousins trampoline until the sweat pours down our faces and we look like we just had showers.  Mom loves how we sleep at night.

When’s the last time you brushed up on your lasso skills in gym class?  Here we are at the Fielding Garr Ranch on Antelope Island located in the middle of The Great Salt Lake.  Gym, history, bison biology, etc., etc.  It’s a homeschool bonanza!

And this is sadly as close as Chris came to riding a horse, cow, or bison   But, at least it doesn’t buck!

Skateboard skills and helmet safety class with our instructor, Tim, the daredevil 3-year-old.

Look at those happy, sweaty faces!  The Classic Fun Center and it’s huge selection of bounce houses, climbing structures, and a skating rink kept the kids happy and breathless for hours.

Gym is my kids’ favorite class, too!

Also in this series:

• Part 1:  Science Classes
• Part 2:  Art Classes
• Part 4:  Language Arts
• Part 5:  Socialization

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Here is a sample of all the art classes we had on vacation:

Halloween Theatre - starring Grandma as “Witch Zaugg” in her annual presentation covering such topics as “Where Do Pumpkins Come From?” and “You may wonder how I ever got a husband”.

Talk about art!  We joined our Utah family for their annual crazy marathon pumpkin carving event.  Here’s Alex’s Darth Maul. 

Check out the amazing line-up of all the pumpkins everyone carved!

And to top of the art lessons, we learned all about fondant and cake decorating from Aunt Lynette who spent a whole day making this awesome R2D2 cake for Alex’s 9th birthday party.  Amazing, isn’t it?

Who says you have to go to school to learn?  Why not find ways to learn while experiencing life?  It’s so much fun.  Don’t you think?

Do you have fun ideas for adding art to your homeschool adventure?  Please share with us in the comment section.  Thanks!!

Also in this series:

• Part 1:  Science Classes
• Part 3:  Gym Classes
• Part 4:  Language Arts
• Part 5:  Socialization

The Great Salt Lake – a science smorgasbord!

Tracks in the sand – Can you guess what animals made them? Answers at the end of the post.  (The first one is much smaller than the second ones)

We learned about the brine shrimp in The Great Salt Lake and how the cool sand is made of oolites which are ”particle(s) with a shell of concentric layers of calcium carbonate deposited around a central core–usually a tiny piece of brine shrimp “poop” or a mineral fragment.”

States of Matter – liquid turning to solid salt crystals - A splash of water from The Great Salt Lake happened to land in a perfect teardrop and dry into this cool salt crystal shape.

Biology and Animal Husbandry Class - We watched the Great Bison (“Buffalo”) Roundup on Antelope Island where they roam free the rest of the year.  We watched the tagging, immunizations, and pregnancy tests that are part of the yearly health maintenance routine for these amazing animals.

Cranes, Pulleys, Shapes, Patterns, Blueprints, and more at the Salt Lake Children’s Museum.

And a final lesson in nature:  The wondrous autumn molting cattail!  Moms everywhere dread them and boys love them.  Here are two of my boys shreading them into a huge pile of fluffy ‘cotton’ to make a bike trail booby trap.  They loved watching me ride right through their trap, cotton flying everywhere.  Just remember to get the vacuum hose out before letting any ‘cotton’ covered clothes in the house.

(Answers:  The first track is an everyday dog print.  The second are bison tracks, something you’ll have a hard time finding nowadays)

See.  Science is everywhere and a lot more fun to experience than to learn about sitting in the house reading a book.  This lighthearted series about our great vacation school trip will include followup posts of how we learn art, gym, language arts, and the infamous socialization while having a fun vacation.  Enjoy!

How do you turn your everyday life into homeschool moments?  Please share with us in the comment section.  I appreciate all your input!

Also in this series:

• Part 2:  Art Classes
• Part 3:  Gym Classes
• Part 4:  Language Arts
• Part 5:  Socialization