Category Archives: Links to Explore

Lighting Their Fires

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Lighting Their Fires: How Parents and Teachers Can Raise Extraordinary Kids in a Mixed-up, Muddled-up, Shook-up World

Reading, Game & Movie List:
Our Town
Malcolm X
Groundhogs Day
Time Machine
Amadeus
Every Great Chess Player Was Once a Beginner
Scrabble
Mastermind
Westing Game
Catcher in the Rye
Wretched Stone
Animal Farm
Fahrenheit 451
Inherit the Wind
Lilies of the Field
Casablanca
To Kill a Mockingbird
The Right Stuff
Even Higher by Richard Ungar
A Separate Peace
Death of a Salesman
Monopoly
The Little Prince

Teaching Time:
* Being on time shows respect.
* Use the weekend to demonstrate how many hours they have to budget (or do full week.) Block out visually sleep, eating, dressing, chores, etc. What amount of time is left and how will you use it?
* Be cautious of time wasted to transitions.
* Anticipate the need for repetition in teaching new concepts and don’t be frustrated by it.
* Music lessons teach the longer term commitment of learning a new skill.
* Theater performances or other presentations also do.
* Make family game night instead of movie night, practice turn taking.

Teaching relations:
* Build scale models.
* Give kids a library card.
* Give kids access to a musical instrument.
* Give kids a chance to create art.
* Set tv limits (post lessons/chores, only weekends, etc)
* At dinner or before bedtime have everyone share a compliment.
* Do puzzles with your kids.
* Teach them to crochet or knit.
* Garden as a family
* Choose long term family projects.

“For children to be inspired to work hard and achieve greatness, they need to understand that their own world is a small one.”

“If it falls your lot to sweep streets,
Sweep them like MIchelangelo painted pictures,
Like Shakespeare wrote poetry,
Like Beethoven composed music.”

“There are no one man shows.” -Sir Ian McKellen

“I wasted time, and time doth now waste me.”

“When you’ve seen beyond yourself you may find peace of mind waiting there.” -George Harrison

Kohlberg moral development
1. Behave so as to avoid trouble.
2. Because you want a reward.
3. You want to please someone.
4. You follow rules.
5. You are considered of others.
6. You are following a personal code of behavior.

Multiplication in Minutes

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My sister told me about the above book, Memorize in Minutes – it’s got a story for each multiplication problem to help kids memorize them. She said it worked wonders for her daughter and I thought it was worth checking out. I ordered the eBook for students (it is only $5 and comes with the stories, too.) It’s a HIT! I thought it would be great for my almost 9 and 7 year olds, but my five year old is reading the stories aloud and giggling and telling me multiplication facts. Hooray!

15 Minutes Outside

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(Kindle edition is only $1.99!!)

I started reading this last night and wasn’t through the first chapter before I told Kit, “This is going to be a life changing book – I need to buy it.”

It’s such a simple premise – spend 15 minutes a day outside playing with your children. And there are stages of our life during which we’ve done that, but not consistently and not when it’s too cold, or too hot, or too wet. 🙂 But it struck me while starting this book that WE NEED TO BE DOING THIS. I checked this out from the library but it’s not a book you can read through and then return – you need to own it, because it literally has daily suggestions for outside activities for an entire year. Not super obvious ones, either, but wonderfully creative ideas. Go check it out!!

(It strikes me as a very Charlotte Mason approach.)

Update: You know how I love the Homeschool Blog? Kit read this post about 15 minutes outside and then emailed me something he just made:

I have the funniest husband ever.