August 18, 2008 by KellyH.

Every now and then I stumble upon a homeschool bulletin board and find questions about using The Weaver Curriculum. Recently, I found a post that really saddened me. The woman said she could not use Weaver because of the time involved to prepare the lessons. At first, I thought she was probably over-organizing things and trying to memorize the lesson plans. But then I read how long she is taking to prepare: 45 minutes.

Forty-five minutes! This mom felt that 45 minutes was too long to spend to prepare for the day of educating her children. I started thinking about activities that take 45 minutes to complete…

• Cleaning the pool
• Quiet Time
• Making supper
• Preparing for church (includes washing my hair)
• Washing a load of laundry

I’m sure there’s more, but those are the first that come to mind. Is 45 minutes too much time when it comes to my children? Obviously not since I spend about that much time cooking for them each night.

How much time does a pastor spend preparing Sunday’s sermon? Or the Sunday school teacher; how much time is spent preparing to teach one day a week? What if a hairdresser didn’t take time to talk to the client, but just started cutting and curling her hair. The client would not get what she needs from that hairdresser! Doctors, plumbers, police officers–they all spend time learning their trade so they can do their best to serve their clients. Your children are your clients. Have you spent any time preparing for their education?

How much prep time is too much? For each family it will be different. Perhaps 45 minutes is too much, but if it is then I suggest the family check into another form of educating their children. Where are you spending your time? Is that activity more important than your child’s education? Is your child worth your time? Only you can answer that.

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July 4, 2008 by KellyH.

Although it’s just the beginning of July, thousands of homeschooling parents around the world are gearing up for their child’s senior year of high school. As school begins again in the next month or two, they’ll start to make plans for graduation next spring. Having just gone through this process, I shared how it was organized in my article, Organizing a Homeschool Graduation, at Suite101.com.

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July 2, 2008 by KellyH.

I’ve become a contributing writer for Suite101.com. My first article, titled Clean Up Your Homeschooling Area, was recently posted. I hope you enjoy reading it!

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May 12, 2008 by KellyH.

Warm weather brings so many distractions: prepping the pool for summer; hikes in the nature park; parking farther away from building entrances to get more exercise; cleaning up the yard; and the list goes on. Although I’m not much of an ‘outdoor’ person, I do enjoy relaxing outside while visiting with friends and relatives. Last week I had the opportunity to do that while visiting my mom.

My two youngest were daring enough to swim in the lake at Grandma’s house. These two are fish; they had splashed around in our in-ground pool the day before as it was filling. I think the lake was slightly warmer, but not by much!

Church activities and out-of-town visitors are another big distraction. Two of my sons are helping with the Upwards football evaluations this week, keeping them busy after supper each night. My cousin called today and we hammered out plans for her to visit with a few of her children. I say “a few” because she has twelve. Yes, I said twelve, and the ten youngest are boys. She’s only bringing five boys, leaving the other five with their older sisters and father.

How can I best utilize these distractions for educational purposes? I’m hoping to keep the children informed and involved in all that’s happening and being planned. I’ll keep them focused on seeing the world through God’s eyes with guided discussions and questions when possible. I’ll also use the distractions to keep the children busy while I plan out our next unit of study!

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February 16, 2008 by KellyH.

Our schedule has gotten off-track just a little. Last Thursday my husband returned from a business trip in the afternoon. I couldn’t go grocery shopping because I was waiting for him to call for a ride home from the airport. I couldn’t go Friday because we had the day off from school and spent it an hour away visiting grandparents. I couldn’t go Friday night because we had other commitments. I finally went this evening (Saturday) even though I dislike shopping on weekends/evenings. Not only has my “mom” routine gotten off-track, but some of the children didn’t finish up school on Thursday, so they’ll be working on Monday to catch-up. I’ll have to go through my lesson plans and rewrite them to fit in the catch-up day. But, that’s okay–that’s what makes homeschooling so great! We are not working on anyone esle’s schedule but our own. If we need to spend more time on something, we do. If we need to wrap it up quickly, we do. If we need to postpone it, we do. You’ll hear people refer to “teachable moments.” That’s where flexibility comes in. As we drove to visit grandparents yesterday, we observed the devastation caused by ice storms a couple weeks ago. Trees cracked at the top, and branches totally ripped off… the poor trees looked so sad and wounded, my heart broke. We were able to discuss how the damage happened, which led to weather and other science-related issues. There was a pile for burning branches in the community where my parents live. This led to another scientific discussion about heat, and “reactions.” Flexibility. Rabbit Trails. Teachable Moments. Call it what you like, it all comes down to educating our children according to God’s perfect plan: through the family. I am so thankful that we homeschool, and that my children feel they can ask anything, discuss anything, comment on anything… they enjoy having conversations with us!

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January 16, 2008 by bigfamily4Him.

The new year is upon this mom of many and one thing I have found most helpful to start a new year is to do a quick reevualation of my schooling. I like to start with reminding myself of why I homeschool as it seems that after the holidays everyone can easily feel a little burn out.

Next, I like to go over our schedules and see if everything is working the best it can. Do I need to give more time to a particular student or maybe I just need to allow more time for research on those supplement objectives that my older students are working on.

After checking those off my list I look at our schedule in general. Are we able to stay with how it is or do I need to switch some subjects around to ease the load.

I realized that when I make myself (note the key word here is make) do this simple check that the second half of my school year goes much smoother and I don’t feel so overwhelmed with a scheduling problem that really was just a simple fix. This time of checking also allows me to review what we have already accomplished for the year and that is always a boost at a much needed slow time of year. Lastly, when I take time to “pull up any loose strings” my days are less likely to unravel.

Put on the kettle for a nice cup of coffee or tea , grab your school planner, say outloud “check please” and help the rest of your year to weave together.

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November 30, 2007 by KellyH.

I’m a very visual person. You can tell me that something is 500 yards away, but I’ll have no concept of how far that is, unless you say something like “it’s from here to that tree over there… that’s 500 yards.” If I can see it, I understand it best.

The Weaver volumes have outlines at the beginning of each chapter. And the Day by Day (DbD) lays out each day so I don’t have to spend hours planning. But, for me, that’s just not enough. So, I created a Week-at-a-Glance page as well as a Daily page for our lesson plans.

My Week-at-a-Glance (WaaG) page is two sided. The first side covers Bible, Social Studies, Science, Language Arts, Reading, Math, and Miscellaneous. These subjects run down the left side of the page. Across the top are the five days of the week. The other side covers Wisdom Words, Creative Writing, Spelling, Penmanship, Vocabulary, and Miscellaneous, all on the left, with the days of the week across the top again. I created this sheet with Microsoft Excel, and printed it as a landscape (sideways).

My Daily page is one-sided, with all the same categories going down the left (only one “miscellaneous”) and my children’s names across the top. This sheet was also created with Excel, but it’s printed as a portait (tall… you know, the regular way you hold a sheet of paper).

Some of the boxes are not as big as the others because the subject doesn’t need much explanation. For example, Math is a short box because I just need to write down the lesson numbers each child is working on. Spelling, too–I don’t write out all the words, I just write the lesson number. Creative Writing is a large box so that I can scribble my writing suggestions down. Bible is a big box so I can list key points and verse references.

When I sit down to plan a chapter, I start with my WaaG page. I transfer the activities and lessons from the DbD into their appropriate boxes on the WaaG page, using a different colored pen for each child, and black for activities that include everyone. Once I have the unit separated into weeks, I bring out the Daily pages. It’s not as neccessary to use different colored pens, but I usually do anyway, just from habit.

All the activities are transferred onto individual Daily pages, and the pages are dated at the bottom. As I prepare for the first day, I pull out the page for the first Bible lesson and any other objectives I need to teach and clip them behind the Daily page. I clip them at the bottom of the page, and then all the days are clipped together at the top until the week I need to use them.

As I finish teaching, and the children move onto independent work, I’ll place the pages from the day back into my Teacher’s Binder, and pull out the pages for the next day. I know at a glance what pages I’ll need because I list page numbers for each activity on my planning pages. Resource pages are pulled, books are pulled and pages are marked, and notes are jotted for the next day. The next day’s lessons are read-over and prayerfully considered.

This may be too much work for many moms, but when I do things this way I am much more prepared. I can mull over the next day’s lesson during my quiet times–this keeps me calm and less stressed.

Have you found what works for you yet? I started doing this last year, after 11 years of homeschooling. Yes, you read that right… it took me 11 YEARS to find a way that works for me!

If you’re trying to find what works for you, may I suggest trying the two extremes:

1. Picking up the volume and teaching straight from it without any preparation.
2. Planning everything the way I do.

Eventually, you’ll adapt one of these ways to work for you. But, I hope you don’t take as long as I did!

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November 23, 2007 by KellyH.

Often, on the email list, we’ll discuss how to manage the trees– er, I mean, binders when it comes to the daily use of Weaver. Tammie (Blessed Hope Academy) gave a great description of how she sets hers up. (I’ve edited it slightly, for ease of reading.)

Front Cover Flap: Reminder note for the steps of planning a unit; and notes, craft projects, emails I’ve printed; resource listings; etc. First in the binder is a copy of the Volume Overview chart so I can easily see where we’re headed and how long it should be before we get there. Then a copy of the Assigned Credits from the Supplement so I can reference what is required to achieve the credit in the subject. Then a copy of Becky’s Dear Friend, instructional letter about homeschooling highschool from the front of my Supplement.

Tab Labeled Day by Day: DBD pages for the current unit and the next unit.

Tab Labeled Bible: Bible lessons for the current unit and the next unit.

Tab for Academics: Colored pages from the Volume and the white pages from the Supplement with another tab for the exact grade levels I’m teaching inserted. I used to just put the grade levels I was teaching in my notebook, but there were too many times that I wanted to go up or down the grade levels (either for teaching or for my own reference) that now I just put all grade levels in my book.

Tab Labeled WW: WW pages for the grade level I’m teaching.

Tab Labeled Literature: Copy of the Recommended Liturature List from TT&T. I have a copy for each kid and highlight the books they’ve already read.

Tab Labeled Resource Section: About 20 pages from the back of the Volume. I trade these out as needed as we start a new Unit.

Back Cover Flap: List of the Weaver resource books and which ones are used in each Volume/unit. I refer to this as I start each unit, to pull books that are relevant and helpful off from my big book case, and move them to my current teaching shelf. I also have inspirational and encouraging notes in this flap.

Some units are large, so I also keep paperclips, or those black binder clips, attached to the tabs, so that I can clip the pages to the tab as we move through the unit. That way when I turn a tab, I also turn to the exact spot within the section that I’m currently teaching from. It’s a very minor thing, but it does save on a lot of page flipping.

Thanks for sharing, Tammie!

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November 19, 2007 by KellyH.

The holidays are upon us. Instead of relaxing with their families and enjoying the season, many moms are pouring over curriculum catalogs and thinking about next year. Budgets need to be made and materials need to be placed on a shopping list so that the best prices can be found when the spring conventions start in March.

The first half of the year is coming to a close. Perhaps you’ll spend some time evaluating how the school year is going. If you’re like some moms, you may be feeling a bit overwhelmed right now. Perhaps you feel some of your resources are not working well for your children. Perhaps you have so many resources you forget to use some of them. Maybe your brain hurts from thoughts of inadequacy. Fear not fellow homeschooler! You are not alone, nor are you the first to experience these feelings.

I have been homeschooling for twelve years and I often still get these feelings. But, I know homeschooling is where the Lord is leading our family, so I trust Him to make it all work out when I can’t.

When I first started homeschooling I didn’t tell my husband how overwhelmed I was because I didn’t want him to suggest putting the children into school. Homeschooling was my idea twelve years ago and I felt I had to prove the benefits of home education to my husband. Of course, back then I was trying to prove a lot to my husband because I was very young and didn’t know how to be “one” with him. These days we are a team–my husband is not my competition.

Do you talk to your husband about your feelings? Have you discussed homeschooling with him? Is he supportive? Even if his role is strictly provider, you would be wise to still seek his opinions and advice.

I’ve also found, through the years, that if I put God first, all the rest of the academics will fall into place. My children know things that I don’t remember teaching them. Even when I don’t have all the answers for their questions, I know where to find them. I know my job is to teach them to do that also–to find the answers to the questions they have.

Do you put God first in your school? In your day? We can do this homeschool-thing with God’s help. If you’ve been schooling for awhile, and you think it may not be working, try changing gears–put God first for the remainder of this year. With Weaver it’s easy. Start with the Bible lesson and move on from there. Put God first. You can do this!

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November 16, 2007 by KellyH.

Each year, many moms on the Weaver email list re-read Teaching Tips & Techniques. It is amazing to re-read this book. After my first read-through, I’ve read specific chapters over the years, such as reading and writing, planning, and motivation.

Even though my teaching philosophy is similar to the author’s I’m still finding so many things to learn as I read. I’ve been telling mothers for years, “yes, Weaver takes time.” Weaver is not the type of curriculum that you place in front of your child and expect them to do alone. Weaver is interactive–you must teach it. You’ll spend less time reviewing with Weaver, too. I like how the author said it:

It takes more time to do, But the time is made up in review.

My other favorite quote is: “[Do] you teach Jesus?”

This is why I homeschool: so that I can teach Jesus. I will share more thoughts and tidbits from Teaching Tips & Techniques whenever I go through it. If you have something to share, feel free to leave a comment. I’d love to hear from you!

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