The Cyber Classroom

Access to fast, affordable internet has become as important to modern-day schooling as paper and a pencil. After all, where else will you find the same (virtually) unlimited access to project information, homework support, test-yourself quizzes and fun tutorials? Nowhere. It’s the truth. Just ask Google. To get the school year off to a good start, we’ve rounded up some helpful go-to resources for learners and their parents. Bring it, 2013, we’re ready and willing to learn. Click here to read the Afrikaans version. *with broadband powered by Telkom
Early start Little children learn through play. That’s easy enough, but before you know it, it’ll be time for ‘Big School’. Start the search as soon as possible with this handy tool.		The foundation Younger kids need a lot of assistance when it comes to school routines. Steer your child towards independence in the early grades with these downloads.		Growing up Instil a love of maths in your child from an early age by making it fun and understandable. Yes, it is possible – especially with these zany websites.
Aiming high Teenagers need you to speak their language. YouTube talks the talk quite nicely on a number of their dedicated learning channels. Warning: it’s addictive.		Further study Tertiary students often find themselves in a sink-or-swim scenario, especially in the early years. Encourage online study groups to lighten the load.		For life Learning is a lifelong process. It’s never too late to take up music or teach yourself about technology. Try some of these for fun.
Special thanks to Warren Sparrow of Rondebosch Boys' Preparatory School for sharing his insights. For more resources like these, visit his blog http://wsparrow.blogspot.com/
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Getting Back into the Swing of Things

We’re almost at the end of week 3 of the New Year. With Jesse already well into his second week of schoolwork, Misha also started his schoolwork this week.

We have decided on starting him off slowly on getting used to the Switched on Schoolhouse system. He’ll be doing English Language Arts and Health Quest to get used to how the program works.

Next week he starts his group lessons with Brenda again. For most part he’ll remain pretty much unschooled for the time being. I still need to look at field trip venues for the year, but  between Co-op, Education Support Science lessons, hands-on Maths and his 2 SOS subjects, he should be fairly occupied. I still need to look into drum and horse riding lessons for him as well.

The whiteboards we got on special at Makro have been coming in very handy these days. I’ve managed to find him a set of 10 different coloured whiteboard markers so he can use the smaller board for drawing. Here he’s planning how we can add a pool to the back yard so we can survive the heat.

I slipped up a bit on my year planning this week. Forgot to check the starting dates for Honey Badger club & ice skating so we missed the  January sessions.  Fortunately I had arranged for Misha to play with Damian and Suzanne for the day so he was none the wiser that he was meant to have been at the zoo. I asked Jesse to check what's on some re-writable DVD we got side-tracked with memory lane 2003... Priceless memories...

Misha spent much of the week in his favourite camping chairs with the pets as well as doing his SOS subjects. These have been met with much less resistance this year. It seems laying off the curriculum for the last year and a bit is now paying off. He’s showing more interest as well as willingness to do schoolwork.

I have also noticed a vast improvement in his speech and vocabulary. His reading and spelling have also shown great improvement even though we haven’t been doing much of that lately.

This year we decided the boys would each have one day a week to make supper for the family. Misha be learning how to make easier meals like toasted chees sandwiches and Jesse started off learning to cook his favourite “Spaghetti Bolognaise”. Even boys need to know how to cook. I don’t want them to end up leaving home one day not knowing how to take care of themselves where meals are concerned.

Today Misha had Damian and Suzanne over to play again. He had insisted mommy must have a birthday cake for tomorrow so I baked it this afternoon and the kids decorated.

Since we missed last Friday’s homeschooler’s ice skating, we’ll be spending some time at the ice rink tomorrow before they have their first Junior Engineering session in the afternoon. This term Misha will be doing Mechanical Systems 2 and Jesse’s going to do Mechanical Engineering.

We will be closing off our week with supper at the Spur with some family and friends.

Back to School

With the boys having had 8 weeks of school holiday since the end of August, we started our new school year very early on the 2nd of January this year. Jesse still has a few assignments to finish for his first semester with Alpha Omega Academy that closes by the end of January.

Of course the joys of home educating allowed him to spend his first day of school at the ice rink and then going home and start his work in the afternoon. I had to fetch Misha from Matt in Fourways and he wasn’t particularly interested in ice skating so we headed off to the toy shop so he could spend his Christmas moneys from Granny & Opa.

Getting home in the afternoon still left Jesse with more than enough time to do his schoolwork at his leisure. I must admit I prefer it this way. No more nagging to get schoolwork done and I also don’t have to worry about having to mark his work every day. The teachers at AOA take care nitty of all the gritties that can be so time consuming, leaving us with time for stress-free fun & fellowship.

Happy New Year

WoW, another year has passed us by, with tomorrow being the last of our school holiday since the boys will have had 8 weeks of school holiday since August. Of course with Jesse having started Alpha Omega Academy on the 1st August, his first semester only finishes at the end of January and the end of our school year shifts across to the end of July.

It still amazes me how fast time flies by these days. This has been a hectic year with regards to field trips, think we may just slow down on those a little bit. Thus far I’ve only finished the holiday planning for next year and still need to do school and field trip planning.

The boys are sleeping out & I’m ending off 2012 with one last blog post wishing all our family and friends a wonderfully blessed 2013.

Recommended Article: Top universities want you to homeschool

Well even after 2 years of home educating, I still doubt at times whether we're doing the right thing home educating our boys, but this article once again set my heart at ease...

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Top universities want you to homeschool

Posted By Penelope Trunk On April 27, 2012 (12:40 am) In College, Extended classroom

It's not that top universities are telling people directly to homeschool their kids. Instead, top schools are using a selection process that gives homeschooled kids a huge advantage.

 

Here's why:
1. Good grades are a commodity, so they don't help in the admissions process.
Girls are doing so much better than boys in both standard high school courses and in standardized tests that their good grades and good scores don't get girls into good colleges. It's not enough anymore. White girls especially need a hook.

A hook is, ironically, something you are passionate about and engaged in that is outside of school. Top schools like Harvard and Stanford have always required a hook. Because when you're in a room full of smart people, smart suddenly doesn't matter—interesting is what matters.

Countdown

WoW, another week has passed us by and now we’re officially down to 1 week before our family holiday for our 20th wedding anniversary on the 31st October. We are really looking forward to our break and are counting the days…

This has been another eventful week, starting off with a sick teenager having thrown up most of Sunday night & sleeping through most of Monday morning. He seemed to have picked up some stomach bug, but fortunately by Monday afternoon he was looking and feeling much better.

Hubby has offered to help some friends by letting them come to us for “school” using Jesse’s Switched on Schoolhouse Curriculum. On Monday & Wednesday we had the 2 boys over to join our boys for some learning fun. It was great to see them working along. It seems they’re loving this approach to learning and I’m happy that their enthusiasm is also motivating Misha to wanting to learn some more.

I received the 2012 & 2013 Adventure catalogue from JM Cremp’s in the mail this week and boy oh boy did this spark the boys’ interest.  It’s packed with some great gift ideas for boys. Misha’s been fetching it on a regular basis and has even been reading the descriptions of the items. I’m amazed at how his reading has improved since I’ve stopped all formal reading lessons last year.

Jesse’s Alpha Omega Academy is still going strong. I’m impressed at how much his grades have improved. I’ve always known that he was capable of distinctions, although at school his highest scores ranged in the low 70% because for him school was boring. His attitude towards learning has also changed dramatically. I’ve even found him starting his schoolwork long before his scheduled 4pm starting time. At this stage he’s halfway through his 1st semester with an average total score of 92%, all because we were able to give him the type of curriculum he asked for. I’m so happy to have found a curriculum that works for him.

Last week he seemed quite impressed at his English teacher sending him a message just to tell him that he did well in his project. He seemed quite impressed since he thought the message in his mailbox meant he had done something wrong. That’s something that’s been sadly lacking during their time at school. He was so tired of hearing teachers tell him he could do better instead of being acknowledged for what he did achieve, that he made no effort do up his grades.

I must admit, I’m quite impressed with our current setup. It’s no-stress for me, since he has allocated teachers for each of his subjects. His work is 80% auto graded and the 20% that I would have needed to grade is graded by qualified teachers within 24 to 48 hours after submission. I think Jesse has the best of both worlds here. The freedom and flexibility of being able to study when & where he feels comfortable seem to be making all the difference.

 I m still waiting for Jesse’s friend’s dad to confirm when he’ll be able to help Misha complete his cheetah painting, but this week I found he’d started out something all by himself. Unfortunately he ran out of some colours and stopped. For the time being, I’ll just make sure he has canvases and his paints are stocked. I may just have found and inexpensive art school in Cresta that could help us with singing, drum and painting lessons next year.

Today I took the boys to Loraine’s home for their guitar lessons. They have already advanced to Session 8. At the rate they’re going through this homeschool curriculum, they might still manage to finish the first year of the curriculum. I’m happy to see that they’re still enjoying it.

Misha was fetched early to go bumper car riding at Northgate. After guitar I took Jesse through to Northriding for his Junior Engineering lesson. Whilst they were busy I went to visit a friend in the area for coffee. I found him still sitting on the floor with his creation when I returned at 2pm. Misha had already left JEFA with his friends by the time I got there. I got to spend a few quiet hours at home before having to fetch Misha from his friend at 5h30. Except for having Gerhard & Keanan over for “school”and guitar lessons, next week should be a fairly quiet one. Of course I’ll need to start preparations for our holiday.

SA Home Schooling Blog Carnival ~ October 2012 Changing Curriculum

Calling all Homeschool Bloggers: I'm scheduled to host the October 2012 SACHS Blog Carnival which is due to go live on 29th October. This month we focus on the topic of "Changing Curriculum". All children have different learning styles resulting in curricula purchased that may not work for all children in a family. Many of us have found fitting curricula through trial and error. With this post we'll looking how other families have dealt with non-fitting curricula & adapted or changed it to fit their situation. Please email a) the exact URL of the blog post you are contributing b) its title and c) a brief description of your blog post to trixishomeed@live.com by 26th October.

Mooikrans Equus Horse Camp 2012

The long awaited horse camp has come and gone. After a long two and a half hour drive, we dropped the boys at Mooikrans Equus on Sunday afternoon. Misha was overly excited at being able to ride again. Jesse didn’t seem to excited upon arrival, but when we fetched them he would have gladly stayed another week, although he admitted to having missed his own bed.

Mooikrans Equus Horse Camp 2012 VIEW SLIDE SHOW DOWNLOAD ALL

The photo CD we received had over 1,000 photos, so I’m sharing some of the highlights here… Some more are available on my Facebook page.

The next homeschoolers’camp is scheduled for 10 – 16 March 2013 and we’re already contemplating how to make it possible for the kids to attend that.

Technorati Tags: 2012,SACHS Blog,Mooikrans Equus,Horse Camp,Camps,Grade 4,Grade 9,Environmental Studies,Horse Handler,Homeschooling,Home Education,Home Schooling

Ann van Dyk Cheetah Centre

When we visited the Rhino & Lion Nature Reserve in April this year, Misha wasn’t allowed to touch the cheetah at the Animal Crèche due to his being too short & possibly being mistaken for prey by his favourite animal. This had him extremely upset so I decided to add the Cheetah Centre on our list of field trip to-do’s for next year.

Ann van Dyk Cheetah Centre, De Wildt VIEW SLIDE SHOW DOWNLOAD ALL

However, an opportunity to visit the centre presented itself much faster than I expected . Dad took a day’s leave and we joined a group of homeschoolers at the Ann van Dyk Cheetah Centre today.

Misha was ecstatic about being able to touch his favourite animal at the end of the tour & purchased some cheetah memorabilia for his room.

Afterwards Jesse went home with his friends for an afternoon visit, we dropped Misha at his friend for a sleepover, went for lunch & spent the rest of the day chillaxing home alone.

Sci-Bono Discovery Centre

Although we’ve already been there 4 times, my boys were quite eager to join another field trip to the Sci-Bono. We were fortunate not to have traffic & arrived early for a 9am start.

Sci-Bono Discovery Centre, Johannesburg VIEW SLIDE SHOW DOWNLOAD ALL

They started off with the Murray & Roberts building project. Big & small alike had loads of fun building the walls & breaking them down again & then packing all the material away. Then off to exploring electricity & various other exhibits. They also had an opportunity to build a bottle rocket & shoot that up in the air. Finally after 1pm, we needed to bribe the kids with the promise to come again in order to get them to agree to going home because it was quite busy due to the school holidays…

After the holidays we’ll plan a 9-3 day at the centre, in order for the kids to roam around & explore all the exhibits at their leisure whilst the moms relax with coffee & a “kuiertjie”…

Chillax & Celebrate

And here we've reached the halfway mark of another year and the end of our first week of school holiday.

I was quite impressed with Misha this week. He was home alone with me all week & not once did he request a friend to play with. After all this time home educating he's finally managing to entertain himself & has become less dependant on friends to keep him busy. Instead he helped me bake muffins & entertained himself with games inside as well as outside. On Wednesday he helped me bake pancakes. Thursday morning he ate up Daddy's pancakes & insisted to make new ones before dad got home. However by Thursday evening he was missing his Ouboet & couldn't wait for Friday when Jesse was due to arrive back home. Then on Friday he insisted on surprising Ouboet with some pancakes which he made with very little assistance & then he crowned himself the "pancake masterchef".

Last Saturday our eldest turned 15 & with him having been on holiday with a friend, today became the chosen opportunity for his birthday party. We set out to the Northgate Ice Arena for an early afternoon start at 12pm... Although very noisy & cold the kids seemed to have had loads of fun. By 5pm all the adults were quite happy that they were all done & ready to head home.

Of course Misha opted to go home with a friend for a sleepover & Jesse brought his bestest buddies home for some more fun & gaming...

Having wrapped up Jesse's birthday, now it is time again to plan for the next one our list. Clive will be 42 next Sunday, so that doesn't really leave all that much time in the planning department which besides cooking & baking do not rank very high on my gifts & talents lists... At least the next birthday is only in September, leaving ample time to sort out arrangements... but for now I'll head to bed & allow myself to dream up some ideas for Sunday...

June 2012 SACHS Blog ~ Extra Curricular Activities

Hi everyone it's time for the June South African Carnival of Homeschooling blog. This month our theme is Extra Curricular activities and moms from all over South Africa will be sharing their experiences.

Extracurricular activities are activities performed by students that fall outside the realm of the normal curriculum of school or university education and they exist at all levels of education. Activities that often involve some time & commitment outside of the regular school day, such as band and choir, are also considered extracurricular activities.

For us these activities include Chess, Music, Junior Engineering for Africa (JEFA) and Tutur/Co-op for Technology.

Misha still goes to his old school twice a week on Monday & Wednesday for an hour of chess. On Thursdays, Jesse has Technology with a tutor and the same tutor teaches Misha art & drums. After his art & drum lessons, Misha attends a Technology co-op for 8-12 year olds in Constantia Kloof. On Fridays they both attend Junior Engineering classes in Northriding for 1 & half hours. Jesse will be taking part in the Robotics competition in July.

The boys have also done some earth science courses with Barry Byrant from Education Support which they quite enjoyed.

1. Volcanoes Day 1 (12 March) & Day 2 (26 March)
2. Earth Quakes & Working with Clay (11 June)

Last month Misha checked out the Honey Badger Club at the Johannesburg Zoo. He loved it so much that I’ve signed him up to attend there once a month as from next month as well.

My boys are not very keen on sports and the highlight of our month, is the monthly ice skating at Northgate Ice Arena. Except for once this year due to sickness, my boys won’t miss this for anything.

We’ve also tried some Geography with a twist this year by joining the World Wide Culture Swap. “What is Worldwide Culture Swap?” you may ask. It is various groups of people from across the world sharing gifts & information in order to learn more about each other’s country & culture. This adds a new incentive and great excitement to learning geography when parcels are sent and received.

This year I made it a priority to add numerous field trips in order to rekindle the boys’ love for learning & still have quite a few more planned for the rest of this year.

Field trips attended & planned:

1. Bush School Ecological Study @ Mogale’s Gate (9 March)
2. Water Purification Plant, Vereeniging (22 March)
3. Sound & Light Experiments @ Tan’ Malie se Winkel (23 March)
4. Rhino & Lion Nature Reserve & Wondercaves (3 April)
5. SAASTA Telescope Building & Science Outing (3 May)
6. Steam Train Trip & Cullinan History Tour (5 May)
7. eTV Tour (24 May)
8. SAASTA Night Sky Viewing (30 May)
9. Weather Training Centre @ Irene (31 May)
10. Museum Africa & The Market Theatre (5 June)
11. Piki Tup Robinson Deep Landfills, Waterfal Depot, Fairlands Garden Site as well as Panorama Composting Site (7 June)
12. Sci Bono Science Museum (3 July)
13. The Ann van Dyk Cheetah Centre – deWildt (4 July)
14. Nature Treasure Hunt @ Kloofendal Nature Reserve (12 July)
15. Maropeng (7 August)
16. Planetarium Day (3 September)
17. Cheese Farm & Spring Picnic (4 September)
18. Horses & Conservancy (2 October)
19. Scorpions – nocturnal walk @ Kloofendal Nature Reserve (6 October)
20. Babboon Rehabilitation (5 November)
21. Santarama Miniland (3 December)

We’ve had some hectic weeks so far but it has quietened down a bit. Next week we have 2 field trips again, but thereafter it may stay at 1 per month. Will see how it goes and what other opportunities present themselves.

The Horse Camp at Mookrans Equus is another long awaited event not to be missed. This year it’s scheduled from 26th August to 1st September.

All in all I think our new approach with de-schooling this year is slowly paying off. Jesse reckons he’s ready for some real learning again and has been signed up with Alpha Omega Academy to ease back into learning with English, Maths, Science, Health & Physical Education using the PC based Switched on Schoolhouse material. Misha will continue with unschooling for now until around 6th/7th grade when we’ll look into formal curriculum again. I pray that by then, the damage caused by private school will have been all repaired & he will be able to reach his full potential.

Now for some great contributions from other moms on how they supplement their kids’ learning with extra murals:

1. "Unofficial Extra-Curricular Activities" by Elize van der Merwe at  Bearakademie has this to say: “At first I thought, oh my… only one extra-curricular activity, but then I remembered the Masters are pre-schoolers, they participate in a lot of things that are seen as extra-curricular, but is termed "unofficial" – as they don’t necessarily do it as part of a group, or a group of their own peers. So here are our unofficial-official list of extra-curricular activities...”
2. Taryn Hayes from Hayes Happenings shares in her post All About Extra Murals how they supplement their much loved literature-based curriculum with various extra curricular activities and outings.
3. Jolene van Niekerk from MonstersEd submitted 3 posts about field trips they’ve attended as part of their extra curricular activities.
   • Reef Steemers ~ “We had the opportunity to go on a steam train depo tour at Reef Steamers.  We also got to go on a short ride on one of the trains.  It was an awesome experience.”
   • Douglasdale Dairy ~ “We had the opportunity to go to Douglasdale Dairy to learn about the milk bottling process.  We also go to go on a tour of the dairy.”
   • Rhino Lion Nature Reserve ~ “We took our conservationist boys to the Rhino Lion Nature Reserve.  Since Noo is such an avid wild animal lover (thanks to my parents owning and living on a game farm) this was right up his alley.”
4. Joanne Madgwick from Castle for Keeps has a family of 7 that lives in the rolling hills of KZN in South Africa. They value family and love creating their home to be a place that not only nurtures their children but provides a place for them to grow and be individually built into a Castle that will last for eternity. They blog about parenting, education, homeschooling, training, crafts, outings, special days and celebrations among other aspects. Castle For Keeps also provides me with a platform from which I can share with others the articles I write for the Witness Newspaper on Education and Parenting - all of which are daily laying stone upon stone to create our Castle Keeps. She shares her view on extra curricular activities in her post entitled The Soul of Education.
5. In her post, Assagay Coffee Farm, Bronwyn Marcus from Three Marcus Boys shares how they joined a few homeschoolers in Pinetown KZN on a tour of the coffee farm and tasting of the coffee.
6. Melanie Grant from Mel’s Mouthful on Mothering has these pages to share
   • “I have to be intentional in my approach to physical activity.  I am not a natural physically active person, it takes lots and lots of effort to get this lazy body moving, but like I have said before - you need to be who you say you are, and what you tell your children to be.  So if I expect them to be physical then I need to be too.  So my first priority,  when it comes to extra curricular activities is - sport, movement, exercise! And this is how we do it: Homeschooling and Extra-Curricular Activities: Sport”
   • “Extra curricular activities play a vital role in bringing balance to our children.  After I have ensured that the children have lots and lots of sporting and physical activities to do, I can then focus on taking my children out into a learning environment.  Learning comes alive when there is an authentic interaction with the subject and this is where our extra curricular activities for enrichment play an important role.  I want my children to love learning.  I want them to find joy in discovering and adventuring and questioning. Sometimes they do a little too much but they are thriving in this environment.  It's all about maintaining a lifestyle of learning.  Sometimes we take notes, sometimes we do report backs, sometimes we just have fun. We never do the same thing in the same way.  But if you ask them questions about what they have learnt you will be amazed at what they remember and their experiences.”
     Homeschooling and Extra-Curricular Activities: Enrichment
   • “Creativity is not one of my strengths but I love artistic expression in different forms.  The more varied, the better.  I don't just want my children to be limited to arts and crafts, though they do that too, but I want them to experience the joy of creating whether its from a piece of wood, beads, paper or wood.  The sky is the limit.  And so where there is an opportunity for creative expression, we do it.” Homeschooling and Extra Curricular Activities in Creativity
   • I believe that though one's life as a Christian cannot be compartmentalised, it's important to ensure that my children participate in extra curricular activities that are spiritual in nature - that feed their soul, remind them of who they are in God and develop good healthy relationships with the church.  I want to encourage them to enjoy fellowship, the gathering of the saints and being part of a body - at a young age.  We study the word and pray every day with our children but if we relied only our input into their lives, they would be limited in their growth.  This gives them many opportunities to grow, to be challenged, to  learn and to have fellowship. Homeschooling and Extra Curricular Activities:  Spiritual

Now if reading all these posts has left you feeling inadequate or overwhelmed please read Melanie Grant’s additional post entitled The Lowdown on Extra Mural Activities in order to bring some balance to all these articles.

For us newbies it is very important to remember these feelings result from our lack of knowledge & that these seasoned homeshool moms were also once newbies like us and through years of experience have found what works for their families. Finding that balance, takes time, sometimes through trial & error. However, their willingness to share their experiences with us will enable us to gain knowledge faster in order to eventually find that balance for our families. We shouldn’t compare ourselves with these families, instead learn from them through reading the posts in order to find ideas of what’s available to try and then set out to sift through those ideas to find those that will work for our individual families.

Thank you to all these lovely ladies for sharing their lives with us. May you go from strength to strength & be blessed in all that you do. I trust you will enjoy visiting these posts as much as I did.

This post features on the South African Carnival of Homeschool Bloggers (SACH Bloggers) where South African home schoolers share experiences, ideas, philosophies and much more.  You can join the carnival too by heading to the South African Carnival of Homeschool Bloggers sign up page. We hope you enjoy the carnival as much as we have!

SA Home Schooling Blog Carnival June 2012 ~ Extra Curricular Activities