Ways to learn that worked for us....

HAHA ok so this could be consider trial and error:)

This year we did a lot of trail and error.... I had some successes and some failures. They were things I had heard worked for others but it just didn't click for us. Some of the successes were using familiar sites like Time4learning, Spelling City,  I Tunes U, Khan Academy, and for our animal loving family National Geographic.  The things that we also tried this year was educational songs, apps for the ipod, coop classes for Alex and some secular unit studies by other homeschoolers. Areas that we required more than my abilities this last year were Spanish, music and writing, these subjects I left to professionals both near by for Spanish and music. I used an online writing 8 week course for the boys with an actual teacher on the other end. The boys learned a lot from getting some outside the home resources. That is one thing that I can pass on to anyone who is new to homeschooling or maybe just homeschoolers who have less time to teach certain subjects... OUTSOURCE. You are still an awesome homeschooling parent!! And you can't do everything even though we all try!! Now I want to know what worked or didn't work for you this year... come on spill the beans!

A little play on words

This week while doing our MBTP lessons, we did some fun crafts, that actaully went with the bee class we took a couple of weeks ago. Anthony made a fun bee topper for his pencil and flowers for it to pollinate! We went over the how the bee gathers the pollen to make yummy honey. It was fun afternoon of making things and sampling some honey:)

Then on to our grammar and writing, which is always a challenge to get excited about in our house. I decided to see if he could distinguish between multiple meaning words and went to my favorite site for any related to words Spelling City! They had these fun play on words sentences.....

Never desert your friends in the desert.
Close the window before the bee gets too close.
Lead poisoning can lead to health issues.
Does the deer see the does?
The dove dove down to its nest.
Shut your mouth or a fly might fly into it.

These were part of the sentence writing and I was even surprised when they had things like capitalization of different words like... may (as in May I help you?) and May (the month). Usually, I let him do these types of lessons/games on his own but this time even I stuck around so that we could play together. It's hard to always make the days fun when there is sooo much to do, so I enjoy days like this one just as much as he did!

All About Spelling~ How we use it

Today we used our AAS workbook, to go over how to spell simple words with all the short vowel sounds. This is one of the areas that I have a problem with myself since I was never taught phonics in school. So I went to this well used program that includes a CD with the sounds that you can download to your computer and use as reference to make sure you are getting the sound or sounds right for each letter.  In as little as 20 minutes a day I can get both boys done with their lesson (or review in the case of my older son). I have them taking turns on identifying the letter sounds that I call out or I call out a letter and they  tell me the sound or sounds that letter makes. It has helped me along with them remember the sounds because it is something that we do everyday. I do see them using the skills that we work on using this program!

After we finsihed our AAS lesson, I usually have the boys go onto http://www.spellingcity.com/ so that they can use the online games to spell our list for the week.  It seems to be the most enjoyable way for them to practice their spelling lists. And at the end of the week, they do an online spelling test. I have the premium membership so that I can track the boys progress and input the spelling words for each week. This way I can get as far ahead as I want to and the lists will be there waiting for them when we get to it! But this site also has a free membership that allows you to input the words each time you visit and play all the free games, too. Most of the homeschoolers in my local homeschooling group use this site to add a fun alternative to the sometimes boring tasks of spelling.