Homeschooler Savvy

Mud pies - follow up

The real title of this post could possibly use the "streakers defence"  or "it seemed like a good idea at the time".  Encouraging your kid to play in the mud.  So here's the down side in full visual force for you.  Here's the other downside I discovered today.  The normally unused screen door lock had to be used today, but it was jammed up with mud from above mentioned learning experience (muddy hands turning the knob to get in).  Consequently we stood for 5 minutes in the VERY cold wind attempting to jam the key into the lock, past the mud, now turned to a powder very simliar to cement....

Valentines Day Craft - Cinnamon Apple ornaments

This is a simple, slightly messy but very aromatic craft that you could use for a Valentines Day craft with your kids.   The smell is divine, all cinnamon and appley - and the feel of it is really gooey - just what kids love.  Basically you make a type of clay from apple sauce and mega amounts of ground cinnamon. 

Here's the receipe: 1 cup of applesauce to 3/4 of a cup of cinnamon.  Make a dough.  Too mushy -  add more cinnamon; too dry - add more applesauce.

When it gets the right consistency, you make shapes either with a cookie cutter, your fingers or for older kids a knife.  They take about 2-3 days to dry depending on thickness.  You could probably speed this process up by baking the shapes as if they were cookies.  If you make a hole in the shape you can add ribbons and hang the ornament.  Of course the shape of choice for Valentines Day will be .... the heart!  Originally, this craft was done by a friend of mine for our kids to make Christmas ornaments - so you can also store this idea away for that! 

Trust us, the kids will only try to eat this dough once, it is WAY too cinnamony for normal children to eat more than one taste.

We used a bowl to mix the ingredients in and wax paper to roll the dough out on wtih a rolling pin.  If you make a hole (about pencil size) about half an inch (1.5cm) in from the edge it should be strong enough to put a ribbon through to hang.   

 

If you feel like the ornament is too plain, you could always glue things onto it.  If you want the ornament to smell even more, allspice, nutmeg and cloves could be added.  Thanks to Bobbie for this craft! 

Wishing you an aromatic Valentines Day!

Mud Pies - what's the point?

With temperatures around the 75F mark (22C) for the middle of winter, we were not going to sit inside all day doing school.  OK, we were not going to sit inside very much at all - at least until the Severe Thunderstorm Warning (hail and 45mph winds) and the Tornado Warning went off.  At that stage, school inside looked like a good idea.  But until then, Mud Pies were the obvious activity of choice for outside.  Plenty of water from previous rains, large mud patch which the dogs had dug around a tree, and temperatures warm enough for light clothing and barefeet.

Mud Pies are a wonderful activity on many levels.  Those new to homeschooling with young kids should take note.  Mud Pie "work" strengthens the muscles in the fingers they write with and improves their dexterity. It allows for uninterupted (stay away from them!) play - this improves their ability to focus. 

Ever seen a child in "The Flow"?  Watch one (from a distance) playing with mud or sand.  "The Flow" is when you go into a time warp, your mind is on your activity and is not cluttered up with running through the "to do" lists.  (Remember how that used to be?) 

If Mud Pies are made with friends, then this often helps them role play social situations ("Would you like some tea with that mud?").

What better introduction to pottery or other three dimensional media?  The science of Mud Pies, you learn that if you add dry dirt to wet mud, your creation becomes firmer (Chemistry).  

What happens if you throw a mud pie that is sloppy?  Is it easy to catch (Physics)? 

I could go on and on, but you get the idea.  There's more benefit in letting your kid play outside in the mud than just a quiet house.  But the main reason I think Mud Pies are a must as part of a childhood is simply because it is fun.

Almost forgot!  Mud is another VERY cheap art material....

Note: The boy version of Mud Pies is Mud Bombs.

Aussie Kim

Introducing Foreign Languages at an Early Age

My oldest child had a wonderful opportunity to learn French. We had friends who, like us, were working on graduate level degrees. We (this other couple and my husband and I) traded babysitting. As this couple spoke only French at home, my son was immersed in it. Soon enough, he was able to understand what was said to him in French (although he would answer in English). Our friends moved away, and my son forgot much of what he had learned, but I believe that this early exposure to another language is one of the reasons that he was able to succeed in learning other languages later on.

As a trained Speech Therapist, I am aware of the connection between age and the ability to learn language. Unfortunately, in the United States, many students do not encounter foreign languages in high school, if ever. Languages are introduced after the window for learning them in the easiest manner has passed.

According to the American Council on the Teaching of Foreign Languages, there is research to support the idea that learning a foreign language provides a child not only knowledge of that language but also improved cognitive abilities.

"Examination of a second grade additive-bilingual (Spanish-immersion) classroom, compared to a monolingual classroom for nonverbal problem-solving and native-language development, found significant differences in problem solving in favor of the bilingual class and no significant differences in native-language development."

Bamford, K. W., & Mizokawa, D. T. (1991). Additive-bilingual (immersion) education: Cognitive and language development. Language Learning, 41(3), 413-429. from ERIC database.

Furthermore, the research supports evidence of a connection between bilingualism and memory skills, intelligence, attentional control, and improved verbal and spatial abilities. The benefits of learning a second language is seen in all academic areas (math, sciences, etc.).

Well, that's fine and good, you say, but I homeschool and I don't speak a foreign language. How do I teach my child a second language?

It can be done. An obvious solution is the use of video-audio and/or computer programs. Here are links to a few of the more well known programs:

The Muzzy BBC Language Course for Children is available in French, German, Spanish, Italian, and Mandarin Chinese. There are DVD, CD-ROM and book programs available. From all I've read, it is a really good program, but can get a bit pricey.

Aussie Kim here: I got the Muzzy BBC program out from the library (years ago) and disliked the characters and the plots they used.  I know they are supposed to be the bees knees but unless they have changed dramatically I would make sure you try before you buy.  Have a look at Rosetta Stone first (see below). It has all the languages, works on the computer, has the necessary books and tests, plus you can get homeschool versions (see below).

Without a doubt the best way to learn a language is to hear the words and see the action or item that the words are referring to.  This is how babies learn.  This is an immersion course. If, as an adult you read a foreign word you will attempt to interpret it the way you pronounce your native language (and therefore normally pronounce it wrong).  It is always best to simply hear and watch WITHOUT seeing how the words are spelled (particularly if you are past the age of 5).  After you can speak with a good accent, then you should start to learn how to spell the words you can now pronounce properly.

Several years ago my husband paid some very good money to get Spanish Lessons from the Berlitz (world renowned) company.  Once he walked into the room, not another word of English was spoken for the entire time.  It was a Spanish "immersion" course.  We moved to Bolivia for a couple of months, I had to catch the bus into town to buy groceries - not a word of English was spoken - I got my immersion lessons for free and sometimes caught the wrong bus home as part of the learning process.

I heard some fascinating research a while back, which involved using brain scans on people speaking foreign languages.  Those who had grown up bilingual - only one area of their brains lit up, regardless of which language they spoke.  Those who had learned the language past somewhere around the age of about 6, - two separate areas of their brain lit up - depending on which language they spoke.  I drew the conclusion that if my kids were to want to learn a foreign language later in life, it would be better for them if they were exposed to different speech sounds while still under 6.  Since my kids seemed to love singing and songs, this is the path I followed.

I used Lyric Language - Spanish/English 1and Lyric Language - French/English 2 and Lyric Language I (German/English) videos.  The videos had great pictures, non irritating music, and native speakers.  The kids would ask for these videos.  It also worked well as background music when Lego or drawing was going on etc. Putting this sort of thing on the tube can give you a false sense of educating your children, but it sure seems better than cartoons for when you have no handy babysitters.  Most of the links I found through Amazon for what I used were a bargain as they were for the old VHS tapes.  This would be a cheap way to go! 

We also used the Wee Sing Around the World tapes and Cd's in the car (still do sometimes) which have a whole range of languages on them.  I was amazed at how well the children could sing the songs in the languages featured (Russian, German, Chinese, Australian....)  I loved listening to these Cd's.  By the way, I found ALL of the Wee Sing series excellent.

For more depth than just singing songs I highly recommend the Rosetta Stone instruction series.  They are immersion teaching at the cutting edge best.  My kids were introduced to it at the age of 6 and were able to work the program very well.  You can use the same program for ANY age up to and including adults.  We used it for 15 minutes a school day last year, the eldest often did it for longer than that because she just wanted too.  It comes with text for learning to spell the taught words and grammar (of course, this would ideally be used AFTER you have the accent down pat).

 

This will link you straight through to the site where you can download up to 3 times and test it out before you buy.

Auf wiedersehn, salute, chow, hasta la vista Baby..........................

Okay, now that Kim has covered most of the major ones, here are a few extra links that I found on the net. I'm not recommending any of these, as I am not really familiar with them, but I thought I would include them for your perusal.

Discovery Foreign Language Program

This site has parent reviews:

http://www.emboldening.orgy/Foreign Language.shtml

If anyone has any experience with a foreign language system, and would like to share the experience with us, please leave a comment. Grahsie Arss.

New Homeschooler Q & A: Part 5 - Teach kids separately?

Question: My 2-year old daughter learns by watching her brother, and I like that. Do you keep your kids together and let them bounce ideas around, or do you teach them separately?

Basically there is a 2 year gap between my two, and I have done all their stuff together except their math and grammar. 

The younger kid will bust themselves in an attempt to keep up with the older kid, and before you know it they’ll almost catch up!  The older kid will become surprised that the younger kid is catching up, and will put more effort into their work, to prevent this from happening. 

This is the ideal situation when you teach them together.  As the kids get older, it will be easier for you to teach them together.  Many curricular cater for large families so that you can teach over a range of ages.  The Sonlight curriculum I use for History and Geography (see earlier posts) has built in about a 3 year range, but you can spread it much wider, once you have got used to accommodating the differences in the kids.

Aussie Kim

Here is what we do. Histories, sciences and foreign languages, etc. are taught together. Of course, the older ones are expected to perform at a higher level and are given supplemental readings. Math and language arts are done separately.

My middle child is largely responsible for her younger brother acquiring his pre-school and kindergarten skills. A born mother, she would play school with him while I taught her older brother or did house work. She taught him colors, shapes and quite a few of his letters and numbers. I was delighted to let her do it. He was entertained and learning, two for the price of one.

The gap between my oldest and youngest is five years, but, perhaps because they are both boys, they have a lot of the same interests. This has led to a great many extracurricular (not taught my mom) learning activities.

LA Sue 

New Homeschooler Q & A: Part 4 - Kindergarten homeschooling schedules

Question: Can you give me an example of a homeschooling schedule for a kindergartener?

Answer: Sometimes it's good to know word origins. Kindergarten is a German word, kinder means children, and garten means garden.  This means the young children are out in the garden doing young children in garden stuff.  Note: They are not inside doing workbooks. 

However, my young children did do some workbook stuff.  It’s been a while, but I think we did about 15-30 minutes on the Singapore Math kindergarten books AND playing with the Montessori Math manipulates, about 15 minutes going over the letter of the week (sandpaper letters), I spy etc, and perhaps an hour of story time (reading GOOD books to them).  The books that you read to them should be about 2 grade levels above the child’s reading level.  Also maybe 15-30 minutes of doing practical life stuff.  I also gave mine unlimited access to art stuff, and we have a big yard, a veggie garden, sandpit, and containers for water play outside.  They also "helped" with household chores and looking after our cat and dogs.

As a side note, I just read through Louisiana Sue's book (see books we don't lend out, on right column) "The Well Trained Mind".  Of course, to borrow the book I had to leave my secret Anzac biscuit recipe as collateral. Despite this setback, I found the book to be one of the most comprehensive books I have ever seen on homeschooling.  Among many other things, it also gives examples of a homeschooling schedule for different grades for a typical "Classical" education method.  This book should be in the library, or if you want it for keeps see the link on the right, below.

I think the key thing about the "how long" question is that this depends very much on your child's interests - follow the child!  If you are from Louisiana you probably need to factor in time for lessons on gator fishin', Gumbo cooking, boating instructions, how to make a Roux and of course time to teach the funny accent.

Of course Australian kindergarden homeschoolers will have to break for morning and afternoon tea.  This was one of the fun things I taught my kids, how to make tea (properly) and serve it for their friends with teapot, cups, saucers, milk jug +milk, sugar bowl (limited to 1 cube each) and biscuits (OK, cookies).

Aussie Kim

I would only add that I think it is very important that children are introduced to foreign languages at a young age. Don't wait to start. You'll miss your window of opportunity!  I'll be posting about that before long.

Also, no one has ever asked Kim to translate for me! Can she say the same?

LA Sue