Teaching Generations

Getting Serious about Math Games!

2011-11-04T14:14:00.000-07:00

image from: http://www.todaysparent.com/activities/10-kid-friendly-card-games

When it came to addition facts, my daughter needed to get them down. The only problem was if she sees flash cards or I use a timer, she freezes. She starts panicking and gives me the wrong answers at a slower pace. I didn't know what to do. I had to think of ways for her to practice her addition facts without the drill.

We started focusing on combinations of 10. Now her favorite combination is 7 + 3. I came up with some games that she has loved. Now my 5 year old knows most combinations that equal 10! We made math games a priority. Every morning after breakfast, we play 1-2 games. Here are games that I have made up. Each one has a little dance and song we do :)

Which Combination will Win?
(Probability for Combinations of 10)
Take 10 small objects that have 2 sides (like pennies or circle tokens with different colors on each side). We were actually studying poison dart frogs at the time, so I took beans and painted then blue on one side, let them dry and then red on the other side. First, my daughter made a list of all the possible combinations of 10 (9+1, 8+2, 7+3, etc.). This was good practice since she had to make the list each time we played. Then, we each chose one combination. Then, I put all the beans inside a cup, she shook them up and then poured them out. She counted how many blue and how many red and put a tally mark by that combination on our list. We did this 10 times. The person whose combination came up the most won!

Combination 10!
I take a stack of Uno cards (only using number cards). Each player is dealed 10 cards. They turn over all their cards and find pairs of numbers that equal 10 (5 and 5, 8 and 2, etc). Each player keeps their own matches. The leftover cards without matches go into a discard pile. After all the players have found matches, each player is dealed another 10 cards (until there are not enough cards to deal out more). The person that has the most matches of cards that equal 10 wins!

Slap that Ten
We use our uno cards. I have the stack of cards and turn over two cards. I continue to put new cards face up on the two cards. When both cards together make 10, the players have to slap that ten! They get all the cards on the stack (below the combination of 10). The winner is the person with the most cards at the end.

30 minus something
Each player is dealed 5 cards face down. All the other cards are scattered face up all over the floor. The game starts when the players turn over one of their 5 cards. They have to find the answer to 30 minus the card they turned over (For example, the card is 4, so the player thinks 30-4=26). They have grab the number 2 and 6 from any of the scattered cards on the floor to make 26. They put the 4, 2, and 6 together to make a set, and turn over their next card. This is a game of speed and all players work at the same time, without taking turns. I sometimes have different players have different numbers to minus from (one has 40 minus something, another person has 100 minus something, etc.)

Addition Battle-
Each player is dealt 2 cards face up. Each player solves the sum of their two cards. The highest sum takes all the cards. This is repeated until all cards are dealt. If there are two sums that are the highest and the same number, they have an addition battle. Addition battle is when two players put down two more cards and add their numbers to see who wins all the cards. The winner is the player with the most cards.

Writing Club with Cousins!

2011-05-11T17:26:00.000-07:00

In my family, there are so many families that homeschool that the older cousins have a book club. They each read certain chapters of the assigned book, then one of the moms thinks of two writing prompts that relate to the book. Each child chooses a writing prompt and writes a response. Then, they meet weekly via skype and share their writing with each other.

Well, my oldest daughter in the first grade started loosing motivation in her daily writing journal. I wanted her to not only be more motivated in writing, but improve in her writing skills. I talked with my sisters and we decided to make a younger book club. So far, we have read Charlotte's Web, Little House in the Big Woods and Beezus and Ramona. The cousins get to see each other on skype and share their writing. After each child reads, the others comment on what they liked about it. It takes about 15-30 minutes. I found a great site called Edhelper.com. It has books for each grade level with review questions and writing prompts for each chapter from the books. Here is the link! It makes it so easy to come up with writing prompts!

Here is an example of a writing prompt for younger grades for Charlotte's web:
1. What do you like to do in the summertime? Do you like to do some of the things they do in the book?
2. Wilbur wanted to spin a web like Charlotte. Have you ever wanted to do something, but when you tried, you couldn't? How did you feel?

I have already seen an improvement in my daughter's writing. She will say things like, "Oooh, I'm going to write this like "Jen" does." or "I wrote what color my shirt was like "Amelia" does." I highly recommend doing a skype writing club not only because it will improve their writing, but they will get to see their "cousins" more often.

More Fun with Letters!

2011-01-30T14:14:00.000-08:00

My 2 1/2 year old is starting to understand that letters are everywhere! She knows about 10 letter sounds now. It is so fun to see her little mind working. She has started to notice letters as she reads books, looks on the back of cereal boxes or even plays with her toys that have alphabet letters on them. "Look! There's the c, Mommy!" I forgot how much fun it is when they actually realize letters can be found everywhere!

I recently came across a great list of activities to do with the letter Q from Confessions of a Homeschooler. I am doing a preschool for my 4 year old daughter's coop tomorrow! Many of the activities can be used with any letter of the alphabet. Make sure to check out her site for other fun ideas on letter games. I am going to copy and paste my favorites directly from that site:

**Alphabet Activity: This is called the stair game, everyone loves it! She stands at the top and I flash a letter, she says the letter and its sound. If she’s right she gets to jump down a stair. When she hits the bottom she wins!

***Finger Tracing Paint Bag: This is simple and fun, I filled a bag with tempura paint, you could also use cheap shaving cream. Then I'll tape it to her desk for her to practice writing her letter on using her finger. You could also skip the bag and put shaving cream on your counter if you're feeling brave ;o) After we do the letters we do numbers, shapes, and whatever else we can think of!

Short Vowel Readers!

2011-01-15T07:46:00.000-08:00

I always struggle to find books my children can read when they are first starting reading. When my children have mastered short vowels, they want to read books! That is why we created a few short vowel books we have posted for free here. There are so few books out there that only have short vowels :) I recently found a great series!!

The Now I'm Reading! Series by Nora Gaydos is adorable! I'm so happy I have found it.

Things I love about these books:

1. There are 20 books for short vowel words. Can you believe it, 20!

2. Each set comes with a cute set of stickers that coordinate with each book. The children have 4 stickers per book. Each time they read the book by themselves out loud, they get a sticker. I love repetition and my daughter loves putting on a sticker each time she reads it!

3. Each page builds on the previous page. Each story starts with two words, the next page has three words (repeating the first two words) and it continues to build on the first two words as the story goes on. It is a perfect way to build confidence in the early readers!

4. The stories are actually fun to read! They are cute and clever. They are not boring to read over and over again! Sorry, I am not a fan of the BOB books. It makes it so much more enjoyable for my daughter and for me to read these books :)

Click on the two sets of stories above to find out more about them, read other great reviews and buy them :)

Word Families Website!

2010-09-10T17:40:00.000-07:00

For reading and spelling, I have found that my oldest daughter really catches on quickly when she can categorize words that have similar sound endings. We are focusing on a word family each week to learn to recognize, read and spell the words.

I searched around for spelling books or other types of workbooks with word families and I couldn't find any that I liked. I searched the internet and couldn't find any good sites. But then I came upon a real gem. I love this site!

Reasons why I love Word Way Word Families:

*the pictures are adorable and have more than one picture for different meanings (hook and Captain hook, for example)

*there is a variety of fun activities to do: fill-in-the-blank, word search, name the picture, cut and paste, and other games.

*each word family includes a lot of words, including compound words (for example, for the /-ark/ family, they have remark and bookmark).

*they have a configuration station page. They use these in school to help kids picture how letters are below and above the main line. I think my oldest will really benefit from this and I didn't want to have to create it myself.

We are starting with r-controlled word families found here. As we complete a set of each word family a week (taking out some activities/worksheets I don't like as much), I am also planning on doing other interactive games with the word families. I am planning on building on the word families from prior weeks to review how to spell them as well. So, we will do these activities with the /ook/ family we did last week and the /ar/ family that we learned this week.

Here are the extra games my daughter can choose from to do with me:

*Mommy Matches: Make a matching sheet for Mommy with pictures
*Rainbow Letters: Write five words with three different colors
*Finger Paint Words: Use your finger to spell out five words with a bag full of paint
*Bend it: create five words using wiki sticks or pipe cleaners
*Playdough: create five words using playdough
*Run & Spell with Mom: Mommy gives you clues and you have to run in the other room and write the word correctly
*Silent Charades: act out each word and then the guesser has to write the word down correctly in order to guess.
*Dictation: Mom will dictate a sentence using words from different word families. You will write the sentence and draw a picture.

The Power of Cereal Boxes

2010-09-05T22:11:00.001-07:00

I just posted a fun new way to enjoy breakfast over at our Spanish teaching blog here. You can apply this to anything you are teaching your children. You could use it to reinforce things they have learned or motivate them to get interested in a new subject. Check it out!

Treasure Hunt Reading!

2010-07-16T07:51:00.000-07:00

To change our reading up a little bit, I decided to create a treasure hunt for my 4 year old. It took maybe 3 minutes to do :) I wrote out simple instructions like "Go to Mom's bed" "Go to the fish" etc. At the end, she had to find a cup in the kitchen with her surprise in it. She had a few M&M's in hers, but you could put some yummy fruit or marshmallows or even a smoothie in it. She was so excited to find every clue, she was shaking with excitement as she picked up each paper and then squealed with delight after reading each one. You can make them more complicated depending on their reading level and even make fun riddles. Just a fun way to show kids all the ways reading comes in handy :)

I'm sure everyone has done a treasure hunt, but here is how we did it. For the set-up, write out 5-10 clues. Start with an original clue ("Go to Mom's bed"), then put the next clue at mom's bed (maybe the clue on mom's bed says "Go to the car") so then the next clue would be on the car and so on. The very last clue leads to the treasure :)

Peep and the Big Wide World Giveaway

2010-03-24T03:01:00.000-07:00

There is a wonderful giveaway and introduction to a wonderful resource for teaching children Spanish. There are darling little videos that teach science concepts. Then there are videos giving ideas for experimenting with each concept. What a wonderful idea. Go see this wonderful giveaway at SpanglishBaby.

Yoga in Spanish Giveaway

2010-03-13T04:50:00.000-08:00

I just heard about a great giveaway. There are two yoga workouts, one for adults and another for children. They are in Spanish by a wonderful Colombian lady, Ana Lilian. I love Colombians and the way they speak Spanish. You will understand what I mean when you listen to her speak. Since I am not a native speaker, I always say that just my heart is Latina and more specifically Colombiana. Great opportunity! Go here to enter.

5 Books Every Homeschool Should Have

2010-01-19T09:38:00.000-08:00

I am Ginny's oldest daughter Amy, who recently reluctantly began blogging after overcoming my fears that it would take over my life. My personal blog about homeschooling and rearing children, inspired by the Suzuki Method of learning instruments, is http://www.mothertonguehomeschooling.blogspot.com.

A couple of months ago I read a list online of "5 Books Every Cook Should Have," which got me thinking about what types of books each homeschool should have.

5 Books Every Homeschool Should Have

A history book that reads like a collection of stories. This year we are reading Abraham Lincoln's World by Genevieve Foster for a class taught by my mom. By telling stories from around the world during Lincoln's lifetime, Foster brings history to life and helps the reader feel the spirit of the times. To know history is to better understand humanity if the book depicts it well.
The complete works of William Shakespeare. Through her character Crawford in Mansfield Park, Jane Austen expressed the importance of Shakespeare so eloquently that I will not attempt to improve upon it. Crawford said: "But Shakespeare one gets acquainted with without knowing how. It is part of an Englishman's constitution. His thoughts and beauties are so spread abroad that one touches them everywhere; one is intimate with him by instinct." We owe so many words, metaphors and similes to Shakespeare; to know Shakespeare is to know English.
A science book that reads like a collection of stories. In my opinion, all good writers are primarily storytellers. Science can be a pageturner, too. Last year we worked in The Joy of Chemistry by Cathy Cobb, with me doing the reading and then sharing it with my children. Now I know that chemistry affects me every day, running my car, cooking my food, even making post-it notes sticky. To know science should be to gain a greater understanding of how the world works.
A math textbook that uses literature, comics, stories and puzzles to show the relevance of math to everything. When my mom told me to use Algebra by Harold Jacobs, I complied. In no time, though, as my daughter and I anticipated the next lesson each day, I found myself wishing that he had written more than Algebra, Geometry, and Mathematics: a Human Endeavor. If math at all levels were taught in the Jacobs way, everyone would know that to know math is to be able to quantify, measure, and analyze the world. Numbers surround us every day, and we need to know how to manage them.
A classic novel your child returns to repeatedly throughout their childhood. I hope every homeschooling parent can assist each of their children in finding a book they have a strong personal affinity for. Mine as an adolescent was Up a Road Slowly by Irene Hunt. My oldest daughter Karina's is Little Women by Louisa May Alcott, and my second daughter Katie's is Watership Down by Richard Adams. I am currently hunting for the right book for my oldest son, Tommy (10). To read should be to communicate with a book on a personal level, to fall in love with a story and feel its resonance in your life. Education would be empty without this.

Christmas Activities

2009-11-24T05:57:00.000-08:00

I love Christmas! 5 activities we love to do together as a family each year are:

*Sing Christmas carols around the piano. It is such a special, family bonding time. This year we are starting something special. We are having an "extravanza" where everyone in the family is preparing something musical to perform (singing, guitar, piano, anything). I will let you know if it becomes our next tradition.

*Have a big Mexican dinner for Christmas Eve, Noche Buena. We have enchiladas, fajitas, tacos, chips and salsa, flan, tamales, and cheese dip. So yummy! Add a pinata, a great story like The Legend of the Poinsettia and it is a beautiful way to start the evening!

*Go Christmas caroling. It is always fun to bring Christmas cheer to neighbors and friends. The littlest kids have to bring along Christmas bells so they can contribute even if they don't know the words.

*Do an advent calendar. It is fun to add to the excitement counting down the days. We did this advent last year and will pull it out his year.

*My husband brings out simple wood scraps and we put together a little manger scene. The kids can fill it up with hay. It helps remind us of the real reasons of Christmas

This is part of the Dora Christmas Carol's concert. Look at more entries answering the question, "What are Your 5 Favorite Holiday Activities to do with Your Kids?" here.

Why I Homeschool!

2009-09-20T17:14:00.000-07:00

This year I have started homeschooling my oldest. She is in Kindergarten. I know we are just starting out, but to me, it is a big deal. I am starting out what I want to do with homeschooling.

I have had to do some real thinking about homeschooling. Yes, I was homeschooled and I liked it. Yes, it seems very natural to me. But yes, homeschooling will be a lot of work! I needed to make sure that I felt like this was the right move for me, my husband and my family. I better really believe in it because it will definitely take enough work and there will be hard times.

As I studied and taught in elementary education, it was so interesting for me to see what public school was like- the good and the bad.

So why am I homeschooling my kids? Is it just because I was homeschooled?

First off, let me answer a few questions...

Do I think public school is bad? No

Do I think children will be ruined if they go to public school? No

Do I think moms that don't homeschool are not good moms? No

Do I secretly think every mom should want to homeschool? No

Should everyone homeschooling? NO!

Are there advantages to public school? Yes

Are there advantages to homeschool? Yes

Here are the reasons why we are homeschooling right now:

-I want to be a part of my children's education. I want to learn along with them and help them develop a love for learning. I want them to view "school" as fun, exciting and an adventure! I want to involve my husband as much as I can.

-We want to build strong family relationships. I feel like I will have more one-on-one time with my children. They play with each other so much and I think that is a good thing :D

-We feel that our children can progress academically if they are taught at their level and at their learning style. I can give my kids so much more instruction at their level than all the hours in school in a day. I can see when I need to slow down and when I need to speed up. One of my daughters only speaks Spanish when we sing, so we sing a lot :) My oldest needs to feel very confident in reading one vowel or set of words before we move to the next level.

-I want my children to have plenty of time to play with friends. I don't want them to be too busy with homework in the afternoon that they can't have unstructured play with friends of all ages! I also love having flexibility to do fun field trips and outings.

-I am used to the idea of homeschooling from the wonderful example of my mother and I love teaching!!!

As they get older, like middle school age, we will probably be homeschooling for other reasons like not wanting them to be exposed to some stuff out there. I don't want them to be super sheltered, but I think it will be okay for them not to see and hear some stuff :)

Am I worried about them being socially awkward? No. I feel like I have no problems making new friends or talking with people. It wasn't hard for me to go to high school or college. I believe that there are lots of weird homeschoolers because their parents don't relate socially very well or they never let their kids play with other kids :) Let's be honest, there needs to be more normal homeschoolers out there!

Are there problems with homeschooling? Yes, but I hope to make up for those problems. I want to give my kids opportunities to work and learn in groups. My husband wants them to learn how to deal with people with a variety of backgrounds. There are other things to consider, but I feel like right now homeschooling is working for our family. I want to evaluate each child as to what would be best for them as we continue homeschooling in the following years.

We're starting a fun adventure right now! Why do you homeschool? Or what do you think is great about homeschooling?

Books are along the wall you can't see :)

What Happens to Old Homeshool Moms?

2009-09-20T04:38:00.000-07:00

They resurrect as a homeschool grandmom.

My life has changed drastically in the last two months. Our son Jason´s oldest daughter, M, was diagnosed with Leukemia. She was a thirteen year old, healthy girl trying out for the volleyball team for her first year in public school this year. What a blow, no volleyball, no first dance, no school, much less facing no hair. Those losses seem trite now to the loss of feeling good enough to sit up all day or see friends or just be home instead of the hospital.

My husband and I decided to help out by moving me to Houston. I am now in an apartment near our son´s house. Kim drives to Houston every weekend to see me. I am homeschooling M and her sister, L, every day. So from 8:00 to 3:00 or 4:00 or 5:00 they are here and we are learning tons of things. We do classes over the phone with their cousins in Seattle. A teaches Essay Writing, Shakespeare and Grammar-Vocabulary. I teach Spanish and History.

I help out when needed by the family, still play some tennis, and play the rented piano. I have a new ward to get involved with.

I will start blogging about some of the resources we are using and activities we do.

Free Mini Books for Beginning Reading

2009-09-19T20:04:00.000-07:00

We are busy homeschooling! We had our first week with my oldest for kindergarten this last week. I will post our plan for the year later.

I had to share this incredible resource! My mom found this wonderful program and they have great lesson plans and mini books and activities for kindergartners. They have free mini books for short vowel words. They also have a plan for the curriculum. Check it out!

http://education.byu.edu/projectseel/resources/db.html

Check out the Giveaway

2009-06-30T18:53:00.000-07:00

Just wanted to let everyone know that there is a whole week of giveways at SpanglishBaby.com.

Day of the Child and Book Giveaways

2009-05-01T04:47:00.000-07:00

I wanted to share with you some great giveaways going on right now!

Last weekend I took my two granddaughters to a wonderful celebration of Day of the Child-Day of the Books (El día de los niños-El día de los libros). They made books from folded paper, listened to stories, played with play dough, made pinwheels, listened to lively Latin music and received lots of gifts including several nice books. I didn't know that this has been celebrated in Latin America for some time and is just now arriving here to the United States. Read more about it here.

Spanglish Baby (an incredible resource if you haven't checked it out yet) is giving away a book called Book Fiesta that has beautiful illustrations. Click here to enter this giveaway. It ends at midnight on Sunday, May 3rd.

The Latin Baby Book Club is giving away a book a day this week to celebrate El día de los niños/El día de los libros! Be sure to check out their giveaways every day. Click here to enter the giveaway.

Can I? Short Vowel Word Game

2009-04-18T05:23:00.001-07:00

I decided it would be fun to review reading words with all of the short vowel sounds. I had the idea to have the sentence "Can I _____ the ______?" and then have two piles of words, one pile has verbs (only simple short vowel words) to put in the first blank and the second pile has nouns (only simple short vowel words) to put int he second blank. She will get some silly phrases like, "Can I rip the sock?" and then more normal phrases like, "Can I hug the Mom?" We do a couple of these a day and she enjoys it. If you are going to print these, you have to save the first picture (above) as a .jpg. The rest should just print fine by clicking "more" and then "print." You might just want to print one sheet of verbs and one sheet of nouns to see if your kids like it :) The first four sheets are the nouns, the last two sheets are the verbs. My mom is going to use this with the grandchildren she is visiting right now and wanted me to post this. Hope someone else can use this too!

Publish at Scribd or explore others:

Click on "more" above the documents and then press "print"

Fantastic Resource

2009-04-17T08:06:00.000-07:00

There is this wonderful resource that I have been using and checking out. There is a free homeschool resource everyday. On Monday they send out a list of all the resources available for the week. You can check them out and come back to download the ones you want.

This weekend in honor of the 234th anniversary of Paul Revere's Ride they are giving away four
wonderful resources all related to Revere and the history surrounding his midnight ride. Here's the complete rundown:

Listen My Children (MP3 audio) -
This a great half hour audio story about Revere's long life and influence, including the events of
that fateful night, as originally dramatized on the radio program "Cavalcade of America", in December, 1952.

"Listen My Children" Listening Guide (PDF ebooklet) -
This PDF discussion guide with background info and questions to accompany the above audio program.

Paul Revere's Ride (MP3 audio) -
A wonderful dramatic performance of Henry Wadsworth Longfellow's classic poem,
"Paul Revere's Ride" as performed by Frederic March.

An art study lesson focusing on paintings & sculptures depicting Paul Revere (as well as
the Minutemen), courtesy of Yes You Can! Publications. This is lots of fun and a great way to combine history with art appreciation & hands-on activities to boot.

Check it out at http://www.homeschoolfreebieoftheday.com

Teaching Ch, Th, and SH

2009-04-06T14:05:00.000-07:00

My two year old knows all of her letter sounds, so I have been introducing some digraphs (two letters that together make a new sound). My mom likes to introduce these while the kids are learning normal letters because they learn them just like they are another letter. We use the letter sound cards you can find here.

Now I take two sounds like Ch and Sh. I have her put both of the cards down. Then I give her a picture (sometimes I tell her a little story as I explain each one). She has to put the picture in the right column on the floor (under the ch or the sh). We do a lot of repetition, reviewing the sounds and names of all the things aloud after we have put down a couple of pictures and then when we are done after about four pictures under each digraph.

My mom told me today another game she likes to do is like slap jack. The way you
play is have a bunch of cards with just ch, sh and th on them. You make a big deck, as you flip each one, you tell her to only slap the one of them, only the ch for example. I can't wait to try this tomorrow.

Just click here to see the sheets of pictures of words starting ch, sh and th my mom created. The last document I created could be printed and cut out to make a slap jack game.

*To print, click on more above each picture and click print. I'm trying a new way to upload word documents. Tell me if it doesn't work :)

Publish at Scribd or explore others: Fiction Other funny pictures

Publish at Scribd or explore others: job career

2009-04-03T13:54:00.000-07:00

Johanna makes a book or worksheet for her daughter every morning. They are so cute and I thought someone else might want to print some up for their beginning readers. So here is a cute one. This one is more of a worksheet for cut and paste activities.

Sight Words Dice Game

2009-03-23T16:16:00.000-07:00

My daughter has been having a harder time with learning her sight words, especially for a word like the. She can't sound it out exactly and doesn't like going over her sight word cards. So, I decided to make a fun game out of it. I made a simple die to help her learn some sight words. It took me about 5-10 minutes to create this, print it out on some orange card stock paper, cut it out and glue it together! We use a simple program called Scrapbook Factory Deluxe to do all the worksheets and activities for learning to read. I thought I would share the die template with you, so hopefully it will only take you a few minutes to create a die if you want to use it :) You could always take the image and erase the words (by covering it with white square or something) and then type or write down your own words you want to work on with your child.

Click on the image above to be taken to a screen that you can print to full page size.

*Other games to play to review sight words-
-Slap the Word- Lay out the words in front of the child. Say a word and they have to slap the right word.
-Hide and Seek- One child hides the sight words in the room while the other child leaves the room. When the child looking for the sight words find them, she/he has to say what word they are.
-Jump Up- Lay out the words in front of the child. Say a word and they have to pick that word up and jump up and sit back down as fast as they can.

Patience with Teaching

2009-03-19T12:09:00.000-07:00

Children are extremely sensitive. Not only are they affected by how we treat them, but they can detect real sincerity. I have found as I work with my daughters, if I am not really enjoying working with them (just pretending to have a good attitude) they can instantly sense it. They don't work as well. It's incredible how they can figure out sincerity! Maybe it is because they are so genuine themselves.

As I was working with my daughter with reading, we were reviewing some words she had read the previous day. She kept on making mistake after mistake. I started getting frustrated thinking I had spent so much time with her on these words and now she did not even know them. As our reading time continued, her reading became worse and worse. We ended with both of us feeling frustrated.

In my mind, I remembered a story shared by Shinichi Suzuki in his book Ability Development from Age Zero. He shared the following:

Here is another case which shows that happiness develops ability.

There was one child in my family with a learning disability. His mother scolded him very much when he was six. She said that he would not remember what she taught him. For some reason he could not remember the numbers from one to ten. "Why don't you understand? This is four and this is seven!" she scolded harshly as I watched.

"It will not do any good to scold him, " I warned. After some observation, I realized that four and seven were numbers that the child was scolded about and therefore he could not look at them clearly.

"Hey, come and play with your uncle," I called.

Then I made dice out of paper and on the faces I wrote only fours and sevens.

"Let's play dice," I said, and we started to throw. A four was thrown.

"Four! I said it first. I win, " I said. Again a four was thrown.

"Four! I won again." At this point the little boy was determined to try harder. Again a four was thrown and together we said, "Four!"

"Hey, you said it too!" I praised. His eyes began to sparkle. The game continued with both fours and sevens being thrown. Sometimes I said the answer slowly. Sometime I pretended that I did not know the answer and let the boy win Sometimes I said the wrong one and the boy made no mistake. In this way four and seven became his favorite numbers in a mere ten minutes.

I had the mother write the numbers from one to ten and have the child read them. He said four and seven the quickest and in the loudest voice. These numbers had become the most well known and fun numbers.

The problem is how to combine interest and training. If a child is always scolded about four and seven, his ability will not grow. Even if a parent overflowing with love for a child uses a bad method, the ability of the child will not develop.

Suzuki, Shinichi. Ability Development From Age Zero. Tr. Mary Louise Nagata. Secaucus, New Jersey: Summy-Birchard Inc., 1981.

Isn't this so true! When I am scolded about something that I fail at or someone tells me I can't do something, I can't seem to think clearly when I try to do it again. Now every time, I start getting frustrated with my daughter. I stop and tell myself that getting frustrated will only have the opposite effect of what I want. It will only slow her progress. If I am patient and genuinely happy working with her, she will learn at her own speed. I also love how Suzuki takes the skill and breaks it down to a more simple level. I have also tried doing this. It has been incredible to see the difference this had made!

Letter Crafts and Activities

2009-03-04T10:00:00.000-08:00

We have already posted the letter cards we use to help children learn the letter sounds, but I love to do other activities. Sometimes we can't do something special with every letter because we don't have time, but I like to pick letters that my kids are having a hard time remembering or saying. Tessa was having a hard time remembering F (she kept on saying th sound instead of f sound!) So we made Flowers from the F shape using a fun new book I found at the library:

*The picture is linked to amazon.com.

When my oldest was about to turn 3, we did a color a week. For example, when she had her cousin visiting, we focused on yellow one week. We painted one egg carton hole yellow to make a bee, we finger painted with lemon pudding, and I hid yellow stars throughout the house that they had to find. My favorite activity was letting them squeeze their own lemons to make lemonade. You could focus your activities on a letter or a color a week. I always loved going on letter or sound hunts. You put a blanket in the middle of the room and find everything in the house that is a certain color or that starts with a certain letter and put it on the blanket. It's a lot of fun and there are a ton of books and websites with lots of ideas.

2009-03-02T04:26:00.001-08:00

I have my granddaughter E (turned 5 last month) with me this week. She arrived last night (Sunday) and will stay till we go visit them on Friday. This is Reading Camp. I have done this once before and she can read all the short A and Short I words very well. So last night we began. She began reading the short O words and has picked it up quite easily. She still seems to stop and sound out each word. I want her to get more fluid. She still needs to stop to notice what vowel is there. As I work with her I try to notice what her strengths and weaknesses are so I can work on those.

She brought the Bob Books collection I gave her sister last year, but this is the Collection 3 with compound words and long vowels. I can tell she is very motivated to read books. She is reading all the Hooked on Phonics books I have and going through that workbook. I have all my reading materials organized so we can play lots of games. She has an incredible attention span. I worked with her for 1 1/2 hours last night. She has a room with her sister M who is two years older. She wants to do everything M does. So she is greatly motivated to write and draw. Her ability to write is impressive. Many children this age are not as motivated or coordinated with those muscles but since she is, I can use that to further her reading.

Then we read to her from more advanced books. I read her one of my favorites and discovered that my book is falling apart from so many years of use. "Hats for Sale" is so delightful. Then grandpa started reading the "Fables" book to her.

Many times I have the children read lists of words or flashcards when they are at this level and that gets boring so I do several things to make it more interesting.
1. Explain the meaning of the word to them when they first read the word. Multiple meaning
words need more explanation, but what an opportunity to make their learning deeper with
more definitions.
2. Make up a sentence with the word after they have read it. If the word has more than one
meaning I try to make up sentences with all the meanings.
3. Make up a riddle before they read the word. It is fun because sometimes they think they
know the answer and start trying to read it with the first sound of the word they think it
must be. Then they see it isn't that word and have to figure it out.
4. Last night I tried to make up a story with a series of the words. It turned out to be a silly
story.
5. Have them say a sentence with the word.

I also like to show her pictures of things because she can get a better idea of what they are like if she is not familiar with them. I doubt if she knows what a cot is. I have to buy her a fig this week so she can know what that is. I love vocabulary!

I am including one of the pages I made up for her.

Free Short i Book and Short o Book

2009-03-01T07:50:00.000-08:00

The order we like to teach our kids short vowel words as far as vowels go is:

short a

short o

short i

short u

short e

My mom likes to teach the short e last because it is so similar to the short a and short i sounds. There are also not that many short e words.

Here are the mini books I made. One uses only short i words and the other has both short i words and short o words. Again, fold them like a greeting card. The big pig has two greeting cards with one stuck in the middle. It starts with A Pig. I hope that makes sense. Enjoy!

The Dog Bit

The Big Pig

This is page one that is folded like a greeting card. It is the front and back cover.

This is page 2 that is folded and put inside page 1.

If you download these, please leave us a comment. If we get some response, we can post more.

Teaching Short a words & Free Short a Mini Books

2009-02-26T08:00:00.000-08:00

It is such a fun experience teaching my daughter, A, to read. She gets excited reading simple words and laughs so much for silly pictures that go along with them. In our family, when we teach our kids to read, we do it a little differently.

Most people teach children to sound out each sound and then blend them all together like, for the word,

Pat

/p/, /a/, /t/ = pat

The child sounds out three sounds and then says them faster and then all together to form a word.

My mother has taught all her grandchildren to say the first two letters together, so,

Pat

/pa/ /t/ = pat

The child sounds out the pa and then the ending /t/ sound. She has found that they learn to read faster because of this. She learned this way of teaching children to read from how they teach children to read in Spanish. They teach them to read the words by syllables. When children try to pronounce each letter sound individually, they tend to say the beginning sound with an "uh" sound like "puh" instead of only the "p" sound alone. So they end up saying /pu/ /a/ /t/ instead of /p/ /a/ /t/. We avoid this by combining the vowel with the beginning sound like /pa/.

We practice short "a" syllables to get fluency. So we have a list of short "a" combinations like ca, fa, da, la, ta, ga, ma, na, etc. After they can quickly say all of these with the short "a" sound, then we add the ending consonants like taking the ca and adding t to make cat.

This makes the sounds blend because you can elongate a vowel easily. So they can say "caaaaa t" and it still sounds like cat.

I have enjoyed teaching my daughter in this way and I think she has caught on faster than if she had to sound out each little sound in a word.

I have been looking for books online and plan to buy BOB books. I have not bought any of these easy readers yet, but my mom created some simple ones that A actually gets a big kick out of. I will post them here. You can fold them in fourths like a greeting card and it becomes a mini-book. Enjoy!

Dad Sat

Sal Sat

I just made up a cute mini book for short i and o for my daughter today. I will post those another day.

If you download these, please leave us a comment. If we get some response, we can post more.

Morning Devotional

2009-02-21T17:44:00.001-08:00

Something I started doing while my children were attending school in France was during breakfast we had morning devotional. I was missing the precious time I had to teach my children and I wanted to use each moment we had together. In France I used that time to work on teaching my children the primary songs in French to help them acclimate and feel at home during primary. In the process of doing this I discovered how fun it is to teach the primary songs and how gospel filled they are. For my primary song devotionals I prepare picture versions of each song. I print these out twice. Then we will spend a week on each verse of the song. Here's an example of one weeks devotionals with the example following in italics for the primary song for March: My Eternal Family.

DAY 1: I usually find a story or scripture to help illustrate the gospel theme of the song to introduce the song and sing the song with the pictures.

I took a picture of our family and various other tools (including a flashlight) and showed it to our children and talked a little about each member of the family. Then I chose one child to leave the room and hid the picture and turned off the lights. Inviting the child back in I asked them to find the picture of our family. Tell the child there are people to help him and giving the flashlight to another child have them shine the way to the picture. Explain that just like we needed to use a tool (the flashlight) to find our family there are many other tools we can use to help us build our family. Tell them to listen to the song and see if they can figure out other tools we use to build our family.

DAY 2: We go through each line of the song as I explain vocabulary/concepts/pictures

The vocabulary and concepts are fairly basic in this song so on this day I set out all the pictures on the table along with other 'real' tools (ruler, hammer, screwdiver, level etc..) As we sang through the song the children took turns choosing a tool to represent a part of the song and attached a picture.

DAY 3: We play various games with the songs/pictures

Games: using the two of each picture play memory. When someone finds a match they have to sing the matching line of the song as well.

Set out all the pictures and then have once child close their eyes and another child remove one or two pictures. Then the other child has to figure out what was removed.

Set out the pictures face down in a stack. Flip the top pictures over and whoever remembers that line of the song first raises their hand, sings it and wins that picture.

DAY 4: Either play more games for learning the song or plan another activity to help teach understanding of the song.

Attach each picture to a lego or other building block, also attach each family members name to a block. Build a pyramid or tower together and talk about how each family member is important to the building.

DAY5: We have a recital where every person takes a turn singing the song

I will often do our Family Home Evening on the same theme because there are so many fun ideas and activities to reinforce the lessons in the songs.

For this FHE we read several scriptures about building families and discussed them and then built a family pyramid. To make it even more fun we used the camera timer and tried to catch a photo.

At the end of the week I print out the picture-song with words onto one landscape sheet of paper(see example at beginning of post) and put it into my children's primary picture song book and they like to look at it during Sacrament meeting.

I enjoy putting together my own picture-songs but if you would like to implement something similar without much work there are flip-charts and teaching ideas galore for primary songs at sugardoodle.net

New Spanish Teaching Blog!

2009-02-21T15:21:00.001-08:00

We have decided to make a new blog dedicated to Spanish Teaching. We want it to be easier for you to find general topics of homeschooling here on this blog.

We will continue to update this blog with homeschooling ideas. We plan on sharing ideas for teaching your children to read, doing history theme study units and more. Please check back soon for a give-away.

Please visit our new blog about Spanish Teaching at www.wannajugarwithmigo.blogspot.com.

Letter Games

2009-02-10T13:12:00.001-08:00

It has been a long time since we last posted. First of all, I had a wonderful Christmas vacation and was able to see all of my siblings. I always learn so much from them and their parenting. They give me great ideas of things I should try with my kids.

My sisters who are also contributors to this blog are pros at homeschooling and I wish they could post more in this blog, but they are busy homeschooling their kids. So you are stuck with suggestions from me :)

What do we do with these flash cards and pictures to learn letter sounds? Do we just drill our kids with the flash cards? Not at all!

We play "letter games." My 2 year old, T, loves it so much that she asks me to do letter games every day. My mom has a talent with making up fun games that children love. I will share some games that she has shown me and some other games I use. I hope they are not confusing. If you don't understand them, just comment and ask me to explain better.

*Silly Commands- Lay out 4 cards (with pictures showing or just letters showing, depending on how well they know the letter sounds). Tell them to do silly things with one card. For example, Can you find a monkey toy in your room and put it on the /m/ card? Can you give the /i/ a kiss? Can you sit on /t/? Can you jump on /l/? Kids love this one the sillier you make the commands.

*Run & Get It- Have your child place 4 letter cards at the end of a hallway and you sit on the opposite side of the long hallway. After your child placed the cards at the end of the hallway, she comes back to you. You whisper to your child, "run and get me the /p/" She runs all the way down the hall, picks up the /p/ card and brings it back to you. You have to cheer and shout and tell her to run as fast as you can. My kids always want to play this game.

*Fill up the envelope- This is a great one for them to understand that there are both lower case and capital letters. Get two envelopes (or make simple envelopes) and write both lower and upper case letters on each one (like P and p on one envelope and J and j on the other envelope). Tape each envelope to a different chair (preferably across the room.) Cut out smaller pieces of papers with lots of P, p, J and j's. Put these smaller papers in a small bag or box. Have your child draw a letter out of the bag or box and run and place it in the right envelope. Make sure to say the letter sound many times or ask them what sound that letter makes.

*Musical Letter Sounds- Place 6-8 letter cards in a circle. Put on some music and walk around while stepping on the letter cards. When the music stops, each person has to make the sound the letter they are standing on makes.

Let me know if you use these games and how it goes! Maybe I will post some more!

More Letter Sounds

2008-12-09T02:58:00.000-08:00

I never just teach 26 letters but 4 extra ones are important to teach as well. Ch, Th, Sh and Wh are important to teach just like the other letters. I put in two different versions so you can do Ch with chopping or cho-cho train.

Oh, by the way, I will tell my daughter to explain the little story or movement that goes with each sound.

I will also include a few backs but these you can make your selves.

More Letter Cards

2008-12-09T02:51:00.001-08:00

We have had a request for the rest of the letter cards so here they are:

For E- Short e sound, "e" eggs, breaking an egg
and making a yucky face
For F- Fan fluttering "f, f, f" make a fan with your
hand and make the sound f sounds like a breeze
For G- Gulping gophers "g, g, g" like you are gulping
For H- Hounds hurry "h, h, h" like a dog panting

For M- monkeys munching, "m, m, m" like it tastes
m, m, good
For N- noisy noses "n, n, n" make a nasal sound and
touch nose
For I- icky, icky insects, "i, i, i" slap the insects as you say "i, i, i"
For J- Jenny jumps (can be any name) have the kids jump and say "j, j, j"

For S- "s, s, s" Snakes hiss, make snake slithering with arm
For T- timers ticking "t, t, t"move hands back and forth like a grandfather clock ticking.
For Q- Quack, quack "q, q, q" make duck beak with hands
For R- robots running "act like a robot moving your hands and making the r sound "r, r, r"
For u- "u, u, up umbrella", pretend like you are opening up an umbrella
For v- Vinny the Vaccum, pretend vaccuming the floor while saying "v, v" like a vaccum sounds
For w- washer washing, "w, w, w" make your hands twist back and forth like a washing goes round and round.
For x- x-ray, make "ks" sound as you pretend to make an x-ray
For c- cameras clicking "c, c, c" taking pretend pictures
For d- dinosaurs dancing, "d, d, d" making a little song with the sound and dancing silly.

I will try to post videos of the girls doing the movements if it is confusing.

Picture Cards for A, O, P and L

2008-11-16T13:43:00.000-08:00

Here are the cards for the letters my daughter explained about in the prior post. You can print fronts and backs.

I like to teach the lower case letters first because that is what we see most.

The hard ones are the d, b, p and q. I have learned that putting a small capital B in the corner so they can look if they don't remember. I teach them so young that they can't tell the difference. As they mature and learn right from left they will eventually be able to distinguish. Don't ever pressure them to tell the difference, just say "Oh, this one has the circle part first so it must be the d." or "Look the line is first so it must be a b." When they start reading words I still have to prompt them by saying a quiet b or d sound when I show them a word, or have a capital B or D on the card.

Teaching the children the letters this way is so much fun and they can learn all the letters before their 3rd birthday. This is actually the easiest time to teach them. They just think this is a game you are playing.

Letter Sounds for P, L, A, O

2008-11-10T11:36:00.000-08:00

Why do we teach our kids letter sounds instead of letter names? Letter names are important, but we want our kids to first think of the letter sound when they see a letter to prepare them for reading. Letter names come naturally after that!

Here are the videos I said would be done about a week ago :) Here are four letter sounds. I will put the cards we use for them here, too.

Letter P- Popcorn popping and make your hand pop open or pretend like you are a popcorn popping!

Letter L- Licking Lollipops. Make a lollipop with your hand and pretend to lick it while making the sound.

Letter O (short o sound)- singing ah, ah, ah, ah, ah, opera,. Put your hands in opera pose (you can even make an o shape with both hands) while singing and pretending to be an opera singer.

Letter A (short a sound)- a, a, a, ants! Pretned like an ant is crawling on you and say, "a, a, a" You can do it to them and they can do it to themselves. Lots of tickles, lots of fun!
Okay, so I have the flash cards and they are word documents. Does anyone know how to convert Word documents into .jpgs? Or is there an easier way to post a file for people to download? They are cute, so if you want them, I need some help. Thanks for the help!

Teaching Letter Sounds, the Fun Way

2008-11-03T12:00:00.000-08:00

My mother uses a fun way to teach letter sounds that even the toddler will love to do. My oldest daughter learned all her letter sounds by 18 months because it was such a fun game to play with me. Each letter has a fun action sound and movement to learn the actual letter sound. The kids love them.

I am teaching my daughter who is two her letter sounds right now, so I will be filming my girls doing the sounds and movements so you can see them. Tomorrow I plan on posting two letters along with the flash cards we use. We use these flash cards for running games,
Simon says games, etc. I will also share some of these games after I introduce all the letter cards.

(Here I am, the mother, making an addition to Tati's entry. I want to add in here that I got these ideas from my oldest daughter, Amy. A friend shared them with her and we have been using them ever since. We have adapted them as we have come up with better ideas. If you have any good ideas, we would love to hear them.)

Sand: Reading and Writing

2008-09-24T11:10:00.000-07:00

If you want to add some fun to reading and writing words (in English or another language), go to the park.

Instructions:

1. Go to a big sand box with your kids (a couple days after rain works best)

2. Find some long, pointy sticks (for pencils)

3. Have them write words and you write words for them to read (or translate)

4. Have fun!

We did our reading and writing activities at the park today. A wrote her name with a stick and I wrote the short a words we have been working on reading (hat, cash, etc.). It was a lot of fun!

This could be used for little ones learning to read and write. For foreign language, you could have them translate for you or dictate sentences and they write it down. Just wanted to share and hope someone can try it out!

Thrift Store Books!

2008-09-04T11:55:00.000-07:00

I just wanted to share an idea for those of you who have never browsed the children's books section of a thrift store. It is a gold mine! Usually the prices are 65 cents a book. There are books that smell and look brand new. I found an Abeka 4 math book for 33 cents that has one page used. They have many picture books from well-known, award winning authors.

Thrift stores are wonderful for finding foreign language books, especially Spanish. I have bought at least a dozen great picture books in Spanish. First thousand words or first hundred words books are pretty common and a great way to build vocabulary with your kids. On Labor Day, my best purchase was a Spanish textbook (completely in Spanish, no English) with stories by great authors along with questions and activities for 33 cents. I am planning on using this when my kids are probably in 3rd or 4th grade. I even found a fun children's book in French. Try it, I know you will find some great books!

My Spanish Long Distance Class

2008-08-10T20:30:00.000-07:00

I have three grandchildren who live far away. I want to be involved with their homeschooling so I teach them Spanish over the phone. We have been doing this once or twice a week for a year and a half. Let me introduce the students. K is 13 and has been interested in Spanish since she was very young. Her accent is very good and she remembers everything she is taught. C is 11 and excited about learning Spanish. Her accent is coming along. T is 8 and has to work to keep up with his older sisters. His mother helps him with the homework assignments. He is very bright and learns words easily. I teach him alone sometimes so that I can explain the grammar more simply and see that he understands how to do it. He needs to work on his accent but can make all the sounds so with time will develop a good accent.

My daughter speaks some Spanish. She minored in Spanish and can communicate adequately but would not feel comfortable enough to speak Spanish in the home. Her husband speaks Portuguese but is very supportive of the children learning Spanish.

I would like to share some of the things I do in this class which would be good for anyone who is trying to teach Spanish to their children. When I go to my youngest daughter´s house we speak Spanish three days of the week so her children are learning from immersion. That is the best way but any way that can be used for learning another language is certainly better than nothing.

I use the book Spanish is Fun for our basic text. It is easy to use, has lots of illustrations and a variety of activities.

http://amsco.extendsales.com/AMSCOPUB/control/productdetails?&item_id=9781567654646

Then I supplement the text with lots of extras. I make tapes for them to listen to in the car. I love to teach songs in Spanish and am working on a whole book of visual aids that we use with all our songs. I find things on the internet for them to do. We are members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints and so I supplement their Spanish with a lot of religious things. They know how to pray and one of them says a prayer to begin each class. Another time I will tell all about that.

I believe that as a child learns Spanish, he needs not only vocabulary but how to say things in complete sentences. So they must always answer in complete sentences.

If any of you are teaching your children Spanish let me know and we can share resources.

My Homeschool Story

2008-08-06T11:52:00.000-07:00

I always wanted to homeschool my own children even before I knew what homeschooling was and before I had any children at all. As a girl I used to make lists of all the things I wanted to teach my children some day. I made a list of all the trips we could take in Texas. I made a list of things we could study, taking a subject to study for a week or two at a time.

Then when I was a junior in high school I had an experience that changed my life. I participated in UIL Poetry Interpretation Contests. I had gone to several contests and never advanced to any of the final rounds. On this one particular Saturday a friend of mine did advance into the semi finals. I was so excited for her. We went off together and I helped her prepare to go into the semi-finals round. We found a place where I could coach her then we walked to her room and she performed. She made it to the finals round. We again went off and worked together. When she won that day, I was as excited as she was. Then on the bus going home I was contemplating my feelings of the day. All at once it hit me like a bolt of lightning, I was as happy as if I had won. Helping someone else to succeed was maybe even better than winning myself. Then I knew what I would dedicate the rest of my life to. I was to be a teacher. I went on to major in Secondary Education and teaching has been my greatest joy and the greatest gift in my life.

At BYU I decided to major in Spanish which was again a matter of inspiration. Spanish was not my best subject in high school, my teacher was very strict and I never made As in that class but I knew that was what I was supposed to do.

During the last semester at BYU I took my last education class from Dr. Larry Arnoldson. He told us that instead of attending class, hearing him lecture and reading a textbook, we were going to do individual research. We could choose a topic and read about it. He would meet with us at the first of the semester and help us get started, then we would have a couple of classes in which we would discuss whatever we wanted with the other students. Then he would meet with us at the end and help us evaluate our learning. We would tell him what grade we deserved for the class and without a question he would give us that grade. I chose to research “teaching my own children” since that is what I wanted to do. Dr. Arnoldson suggested some authors that he thought might be interesting for this topic. The author I still remember was John Holt. I read, How Children Learn and How Children Fail. As I studied I decided what the ideal education for a child would be. They would be able to learn what they wanted, studying a subject as long as their interest continues. They would be able to have concrete experiences. They would be able to be creative and feel good about their work. I learned so much from my reading that at the final interview I told him I deserved an A in the class. Still today I feel like that class was the most influential class of my life.

Later I got married and my husband and I decided we wanted to live in Latin America. My husband had served a mission for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in Mexico and got a Masters of International Business from Thunderbird Graduate School. We went with an international company that put us in South America. I began to have children and when we lived in Panama I continued reading and researching how to teach my children. I did my own Elementary Education Children´s Literature class. Then when we got to Colombia and my oldest son was three years old, I decided to open a preschool in my home. We converted our garage and backyard into a school and advertised for “The Children’s Corner.” We had about 18 students of different nationalities but we taught primarily in English. After three years of teaching in this school we came back to the United States.

My oldest, Jake, was five years old and ready to start Kindergarten. I had no idea that I could do anything else but send him to the local public school. I had taught him a lot and he could read very well and was a extremely bright boy. I remember walking him to school and instead of him crying, I cried all the way home. Jake did well in Kindergarten and went on to first grade.

I continued teaching my next children before they went to school. Annabelle learned to read even younger and advanced on to very difficult books. When she was ready to go to Kindergarten she was reading chapter books.

Topher learned to read and the first book he read out of was the Book of Mormon. He loved to do math and had a gift for figuring out my word problems. But Topher was an extremely shy boy. I took him in twice to have his hearing checked because he was so quiet that I thought he might have a hearing problem. His birthday was in September so would start Kindergarten right after turning 5 which made him the youngest in his class. I really didn´t think he was ready but he went and seemed to do okay. His teacher helped him highlight his strengths by having him read a book to the other children every day. At the end of the school year I talked to his teacher and told her I didn´t think he was socially mature enough to go on to 1st grade the next year. She thought I was crazy and even sent the principal to talk to me, I shouldn’t “hold him back.” So the next Fall Tofer started First Grade. I watched him struggle for several weeks. He stopped showing any enthusiasm for anything. He stopped smiling and became very serious. I talked to his teacher and she said she had seen him crying at his desk but he wouldn’t tell her why. He never complained just lost his zest for life. Then he began to talk about death and I knew something was seriously wrong. So one day I told him that he didn’t have to go to school that day and wouldn’t have to go at all that year if he didn’t want to. He was so excited. He smiled and laughed that day. I think something about school scared him and he just wasn’t ready for all the pressure.

You may ask,”What pressure could there be in first grade?” All I know is how Jake used to panic thinking he might fail a grade when he was actually in the “gifted” program. The teachers insisted on having neat handwriting even when that is practically impossible for some boys whose small motor control is just not ready for it. Just sitting in a room full of other children and not being able to talk and play with them without getting into trouble is too much to expect of some children.

So I kept Topher home that year. I didn’t realize that what I was actually doing was homeschooling him. In 1982 no one had even heard of homeschooling. The next year Topher went to first grade even though he still wasn’t really ready. He would be so nervous that he wouldn’t eat during lunch and would be famished when he got home. I went up to the cafeteria to try to encourage him to eat but the discipline was so strict in the cafeteria that it was hard for me to relax and enjoy the lunch.

When Annabelle finished first grade her teacher told me that she felt she hadn’t taught Annabelle anything that she didn’t already know that whole year. She thought it would be the same in second grade. She recommended I look into private schools and find one for her. I remembered all the research I had done about what the ideal school would be like and I told Annabelle we would find the perfect school for her. I started visiting the private schools in our area and discovered that they weren’t very different from the public schools. They were very traditional and didn’t have much room for creativity and individual interests. In fact, I found none that would be worth the money. So Annabelle returned to public school for the third grade in the Fall.

That Spring I was at the library one day when I saw a magazine article about homeschooling. I devoured the article. I wanted to know more so I found the name of the author of the article and called her. I began to find out that what I had been searching for was “homeschooling.” I discovered that in the last few years that John Holt, the author I had read in college, had also discovered “homeschooling” and had become a strong advocate. He had written a book, Teach Your Own, and revised the two books he had written before and added information on homeschooling in them. In the appendix he listed university professors friendly to homeschooling among those listed was Larry Arnoldson, my college professor. I called him and he sent me a ton of articles of his own and other authors about homeschooling.

I was so excited to begin but I had one more obstacle to overcome. My husband, Ken, was doubtful. This was a very unorthodox thing to do and he was very conservative. After weeks of much discussion we agreed that I would teach the children that summer. If, at the end of the summer, he saw that they were learning and I kept my sanity that I could continue in the Fall. So the first day of summer was our first day of Homeschool. By the end of the summer we were progressing so well that we just continued on.

My husband was serving as Bishop of our ward at this time. He felt it appropriate to inform the stake president of our decision to homeschool our children. He told the stake president, “Because of the great respect that we have for you and our willingness to follow your counsel, I don’t want to ask your opinion about homeschooling. I just want to inform you of the decision that we have prayerfully considered to homeschool our children.” I’m not sure if this is the reason, but we never heard much criticism of our method of education.

One other snag came when my husband’s parents came to visit us in October. We had not told them what we were doing, so on Monday morning when the children didn’t go off to school, they asked me why not. I told them they were “homeschooling.” I had read my mother-in-law’s personal history and knew that for her first several years of school, they were living on the Indian Reservation where there were no schools so her mother taught her reading, and her father taught her math. Then when she was ready for third grade, they moved into town so she could attend a regular school. So I told her that I was just doing what her parents had done for her. About an hour later they came out of their room with their bags and left. They didn’t say anything, just left. I realize now that they were so upset they didn’t want to say anything to offend us so they thought it would be better to leave. In the next few years they saw how the homeschooling was working and became comfortable with it but it was quite a shock for them.

As the years have gone by more people have turned to homeschooling and many people have told me they thought I was crazy at first but from seeing the results of our children, they see that it has worked for us.

All five of my children were homeschooled, some only a few years, others almost all their school years. All attended some public high school. All of them went to BYU and received academic scholarships. Now Ken and I, all five of our children and all their spouses graduated from BYU. All of my daughters homeschool their children thus the name of this blog, Teaching Generations.

Tati's Introduction

2008-07-25T11:32:00.000-07:00

We are excited to be starting this blog. My mother homeschooled all of her five children. Three of her daughters are now homeschooling. We each will share some of our ideas, suggestions and lessons learned when we have the time to do so. I will go by Mamacita since I will be homeschooling bilingually.

I am a mother of three little girls, A will be 4 in August, T just turned 2 and L is just 2 months old. I know it seems a little young to start homeschooling, but I feel like what I do with them each day is homeschooling. It will develop into more as they get older. I have a Bachelor's in Elementary Education and a Spanish minor. I took all my classes knowing that I wanted to stay at home and homeschool my children.

I am going to try a new twist with my homeschooling and homeschool bilingually. Both my husband and I are fluent in Spanish. We speak Spanish strictly 3 days a week at home. It has been fun to see our children really learn to communicate in another language. I hope others who are doing the same thing, considering homeschooling bilingually or just teaching their children another language will give me suggestions and ideas.

Teaching Reading

2008-05-26T20:56:00.000-07:00

Sounds are more important than letter names.