What is Part-Time Homeschooling?

I'm sure you have all heard of homeschooling. Some of you may have even heard of Unschooling. But what is Part-Time Homeschooling?

Part-Time or Partial Homeschooling is a very broad term for parents taking charge of their kids' education. It doesn't mean that the family has left the public or private education system. You can even call it supplementing or tutoring. 

For example, Mr. B goes to his Montessori Pre-School Prep Class three times per week and we home-school on Thursday and Friday. Another variation is when the child goes to school full time and the parent home-schools in the evening and/or on the weekend. 

All children and families are different and it's impossible for the school system to meet everyone's unique learning needs. Many parents already partially home-school their kids without even thinking about it or calling it homeschooling. 

Personally, we love Mr. B's school and feel that it's important for him to play with his friends, engage in arts and crafts and take a sports class on Monday. In addition, Mr. B has shown an eagerness to study some subjects on a deeper level than he would at school. So we would like to have our cake and eat it too. It's the best of both worlds. As long as Mr. B enjoys school he can go and have fun. We'll worry about meeting his personal learning needs at home by finding appropriate reading materials and activities to encourage his interests. 

Book Haul

Quick little haul this week. I picked up two perfect books for our Continent Boxes. I finished Antarctica last week and am currently working on Australia. Kippy Koala is cute pop-up book about Australian animals. The Boy and the Tigers by Helen Bannerman is a PC version of Little Back Sambo. We don't have any other books about India so it's perfect for our Asia box.

We checked out Owl Babies by Martin Waddell from the library when Mr. B was a baby. We loved this book and I've been wanting to add it to our collection ever since. It's a little young for Mr. B and a little advanced for Baby G but they both enjoyed it when I read it to them yesterday. I'm very happy to finally own this sweet little book.

I got The Extreme Team: Skateboard Moves by Matt Christopher for Mr. B because he has been begging for a skateboard. Mr. Husband has already read this book to Mr. B several times and he loved it. I'm looking forward to reading this story!

I found a nice hardcover copy of Alexander, Who's Not (Do You Hear Me? I Mean It!) Going to Move by Judith Viorst. We love the Alexander books (or "Mad Boy" books, as Mr. B calls them) and recently discovered LuLu and the Brontosaurus (which is also by Viorst).

Finally, Long Ago and Far Away looks like a nice introduction to ancient history and Ding-Dong is a fun book of sounds in French (for Baby G who likes French).

One of Our Favorite Toys: Learning Resources Pretend & Play Doctor Set

Mr. B received this amazing Doctor Set for his second birthday from his friend from school. We initially asked for this set because we were dreading Mr. B's two year doctor's visit (shots!!!) and wanted to prepare him as much as possible. At two Mr. B was finally aware enough that we worried that he would hold anything scary or painful against us. 

This kit is amazing. We practiced giving Mr. B a shot (explaining that it would hurt), kissed his arm and then put the toy band-aid over it (we then had him give us shots). We also introduced him to other other instruments that the doctor might use during the appointment (specifically the stethoscope, the blood pressure cuff, the thermometer and the tongue depressor). 

We played with this kit every day until his appointment and Mr. B was very excited for his check up. When we met with the doctor we found out that Mr. B would not receive any shots but instead would need to have his blood drawn! This was definitely not something we prepared him for. 

Shockingly, while he was having his blood drawn Mr. B was delighted. He watched the entire procedure in awe and yelled "that's so cool!" as his blood traveled though the tube. When he was done he looked up at us and exclaimed "that was fun!" 

So Mr. B has been obsessed with being a doctor ever since (but he also wants to be an astronaut and Darth Vader). He insists on coming to all our appointments (once he cried when the doctor's office was closed and Mr. Husband needed to pick up a prescription) and loves learning about the human body. 

He still keeps the kit in his room (under the reading chair) and plays with it every day. He has since amassed a collection of stethoscopes (one real thanks to Dr. Auntie) that he also keeps in the kit. 

Overall we highly recommend this Doctor's Set! 

Making the Best of Bad Luck

I was supposed to get a day to myself yesterday. I've had a stressful week with very little sleep so I was definitely looking forward to a few hours to myself. The morning was pretty hectic but I finally got the kids into the car to take them to school.

And then the car wouldn't start. 

I didn't get my day off but we made the best of it. 

I didn't have any activities planned for the kids but we still had a fun day full of learning and exciting milestones! 

• I explained the concept of subtraction to Mr. B during snack time. He had three cookies and ate one... his mind was blown! 
• We finally read Duck For President by Doreen Cronin. I was a little reluctant about this book because I thought that the humor would go over Mr. B's head. Well it didn't. Mr. B thought it was hilarious and laughed through the whole book. We are still bringing up our favorite parts!
• I learned that Mr. B can identify his printed name when I wrote it down for him!
• Baby G sat up on her own for the very first time. 
• Mr. B didn't want a nap so we took a walk to Starbucks and shared a chocolate milk and banana bread. While there we practiced phonics and reviewed geography. Mr. B rocked it! 

Overall, it wasn't a perfect day but it was one of our better ones.

Carlsbad Book Haul

I found some great book in Carlsbad! 

I'm so excited for a new Poetry For Young People Book (Walt Whitman)! This is my second one in two week!  

I also found a new Sir Circumference book. Mr. B is definitely not ready for these but when he is, math is going to be so much fun!!! It looks like there are nine of these total and I have four. 

Squids will be Squids is a new Jon Sciezka book. So far we loved The True Story of The 3 Little Pigs and have several other books by him that we haven't read yet. I hope this one is good! 

Darth Paper Strikes Back by Tom Angleberger looks like an interesting find. I have no idea what to expect from it. 

Other honorable mentions include Harry The Dirty Dog (to replace one of our favorite books that Mr. B destroyed), a new George Washington book and a Disney Peter Pan book because Mr. B has been watching the movie at school and loves it. 

I kind of regret buying the Goodnight Moon ABC book for Baby G because it looks kind of boring. We might have to get rid of it. 

Montessori Continent Boxes: Antarctica

Our Antarctica Box is finally DONE!!! I've been working on this one all week to have it ready for our Thursday together.

In my opinion Antarctica is the easiest continent to start with for the under 3 crowd. It's just ice and lots of cute animals.

Let's take a look inside the box.

Books and Media

• Polar Lands by Margaret Hynes 
• Antarctica (Rookie Read-About Geography) by Allan Fowler  
• The Magic School Bus Arctic Adventure Reader (Level 2) by Gail Herman 
• The Magic School Bus in the Arctic: A Book About Heat by Joanna Cole (I'm leaving this one out for now until Mr. B is older). 
• March Of The Penguins DVD
• Disneynature: Earth DVD ("Better Than March Of The Penguins") 
• Blank Note Cards (I'm going to leave these out until Mr. B can write. We can use them to write letters about what we're learning).

Toys

• Lego City Arctic Snowmobile 
• Lego Penguin 
• TY Jingle Beanies Icicles - Penguin 
• Earth Ball (found at Michaels for $2)
• Arctic TOOB (found at Michaels for $6 after 40% off coupon). 

Printables 

• Emperor Penguin Life cycle (leaving this out for now)
• Antarctica Labeled Map (from Wikipedia)--definitely keeping this one for later. 
• Antarctica Map with Pictures (photocopied from The Seven Continents of the World Jigsaw Book)
• Penguin Mask
• Food Chain (there are so many of these but I found this one the least overwhelming). 
• Antarctica (Wikipedia) 
• Photos of wildlife 

For Next Time

When Mr. B is older I would like to add:

• Who's Eating Who? A printable book from the Australian Department of the Environment 
• Science experiment ideas from this website 
• Penguin TOOB 
• Misc coloring pages found all over
• Paper Dolls 
• Diorama
• Board Game 

Goals

• I would like Mr. B to be able to find the Arctic and Antarctica on a map/globe
• I would like Mr. B to become familiar with some of the animals who live in the Arctic and Antarctica. 
• FUN FUN FUN

The Reveal: 

I left the box for Mr. B to find this morning and he was really excited. His favorite parts were the mask (which he wore all day), the Earth ball and the TOOB arctic toys. He's been trying to remember their names all day. We read the Magic School Bus reader at breakfast (about the Arctic) and the Antarctica (Rookie Read-About Geography) book at Lunch. 

Overall, this project was a success!

Our Favorite Books About Presidents

Mr. B has been intrigued by the presidents (Specifically, the cool presidents: Abraham Lincoln and George Washington) since before he turned two. He loves reading books about the presidents but it has been a challenge finding books that are age appropriate and don't overemphasize themes that I am not comfortable discussing with him at this time (i.e. death and slavery) .

I first tried checking books out at our library but the ones available there were far too advanced (we don't have a great selection). Luckily, I ran into some great books about presidents at thrift stores and we have built up quite a collection. We have read the following:

Our Abe Lincoln by Jim Aylesworth: This book is so perfect for the innocent preschooler. It is a sing-a-long book with a CD. The song is sung to the tune of "The Old Grey Mare" (which was popular during Lincoln's presidential campaigns).The pictures in the book are of children putting on a school play about Abe Lincoln's life and presidency. We loved singing this one when Mr. B was about 18 months. Although slavery and Abe Lincoln's death are mentioned briefly, these concepts are presented vaguely (no photos of dead or enslaved people). This is a great introduction to Abe Lincoln for the very young.


Abe Lincoln: The Boy Who Loved Books by Jay Winters: This book is an amazing biography with an emphasis on Lincoln's interest in books. This book is beautifully written and illustrated. I skipped over the part when Abe Lincoln's mother died (and I don't think Mr. B noticed).

Abe Lincoln's Hat by Martha Brenner: This is our favorite Abe Lincoln book! We all fell in love with it from the first read. The best part? No mature concepts (even though murder is mentioned briefly)! This book is all about Abe Lincoln's life as a lawyer and his campaign for the presidency. We must have read this book ten times the first week we got it! Mr. B loved the last pages of the book which show the real life photographs of the characters from the story.

Just Like Abraham Lincoln by Bernard Waber: I love Bernard Waber so it's no surprise that I absolutely LOVED this book. This book is about a little boy who lives next door to Mr. Potts, an Abraham Lincoln look-like and enthusiast. The book has a great story and lots of great information about Lincoln. We have read this books several times with Mr. B and it's becoming one of his favorites.
George Washington's Teeth by Deborah Chandra: This is a fun rhyming book about Washington's issues with his teeth. Unfortunately, this book is a little gross (I am extremely sensitive so graphic descriptions of George Washington's teeth falling out made me a little ill). Mr. B, on the other hand, didn't seem concerned by this at all and enjoyed the book and pictures.

George Washington and the General's Dog: This is an excellent book! No one dies during the American Revolution (even though the colonists get a bit cold and hungry) and there are lots of pictures of George Washington playing with animals (whom he loved)! This book is perfect for the preschooler.


Woodrow, The White House Mouse by Peter Barnes: I LOVE this book! This book is about a lovable mouse who is elected president of the "United Mice of America". This book teaches kids about the President's duties and the White House (history and architecture). This is such a cute and informative book! We highly recommend this one!

We also have the President TOOB to make learning about presidents extra fun!

Tuesday Haul: Books and Resources

Mini haul today. I went out to specifically collect items for our Continent Boxes (I am trying to finish Antarctica so that we can get started). I'm excited to add Down Under to our Australia box since I don't have anything else in this box. Also, Drawing African Animals will be fun for when Mr. B is much older. Other fun book include a new space book, some fun chapter books (for my collections) and some readers.

I Also found some fun resources for learning geography. The Melissa and Doug USA Floor Puzzle is AWESOME! I just finished putting it together and it's so much fun. Hopefully Mr. B will be ready to try it with me during the next year. The Magnetic World Map Puzzle is pretty simple (just matching the magnets to the picture underneath) so we will probably start playing with this sooner than later.

Introducing Landmarks

Yesterday we decided to study landmarks. We don't have too many resources to start with and I was hoping to have more time to gather materials before Mr. B wanted to discuss them. He's been playing with the jigsaw puzzle (middle) for some time but just recently started asking questions about the landmarks on it. 

We've had the Haba Leaning Tower of Pisa for a very long time and we LOVE putting it together! I found it at a thrift store in perfect condition for a $1 and couldn't believe my luck. This is one of our favorite puzzles and I am excited that Mr. B is finally making the connection that it's a real place. 

The Vtech Fly & Learn Globe is a $5 Goodwill find. Honesty, I hate it. I should trust myself when I ban electronic toys. They are beyond annoying. The only feature on the globe that I don't hate is the international music setting. Other than that, I prefer to keep it off and just point out the landmarks with Mr. B. 

I also found a Wonders of the World lift-the-flap book and a World Landmark reader. The flap books is great (because Mr. B LOVES flap books) but only has natural landmarks, not man-made ones. The reader is good for showing Mr. B lots of different landmarks and has very simple descriptions. Unfortunately, some of these descriptions have some disturbing concepts (death, death, death) that I'm not ready to discuss  with Mr. B so I read this book selectively. 

The best comprehensive resources are the landmark/world jigsaw puzzle (which I believe was a Target Dollar Spot item at some point. I picked it up at a thrift store a few months ago) and the flash cards that I printed off another blog (I am trying to find the link to that blog so that I can give the author credit). 

Mr. B learns best by forming emotional attachments or making connections (For example, the Eiffel Tower is in France where Ratatouille takes place. The Taj Mahal is in India where daddy traveled last month.... ). 

I would also love to add these landmark Toobs to our resources (Around the World TOOB and World Landmarks Toob):

Once we have these Toobs, I think it will be fun to combine them with our Melissa & Doug World Map Floor Puzzle (this thing is HUGE!). 

When Mr. B is older, we also have this beautiful Haba Colosseum Architectural Block Set, a Puzz 3D - Empire State Building and Usborne's Sticker Atlas of the World. I think we'll wait another year or so for these.  

I would also love to get the LEGO Architecture Sets but they are so expensive (and a bit overkill). It may be more fun to just use our imagination and recreate the landmarks from the Lego we already have (this is someone else's brilliant idea as well).

Space Study

We spent last Sunday at the science museum in Balboa Park and watched Journey To Space at the IMAX theater (Mr. B's first movie theater experience!). Mr. B loved the movie and has been talking about it non-stop!

So we start our science study. I pulled all the age-appropriate books on space from our library and arranged them on Mr. B's downstairs bookshelf. 

Mr. B has already out grown some of our books about space. He loved these three when he was about 18 months-2 years. The Elmo book isn't specifically about space but Elmo has a very exciting trip through outer space to get to Sesame Street. I believe that this is the book that got Mr. B excited about space.

We also have a few additional resources for our unit: a space Toob, Target flashcards and Here Comes Science (CD/DVD by They Might Be Giants). These are excellent resources and make learning about space so much fun. On the CD/DVD, tracks 7-10 are about space.

Mr. B loves My Big Book of Space (he slept with it last night) and My Big Busy Space Activity Book. These two books are full of pop-ups, tabs, flaps, etc. One of my favorite parts is a map of the Earth's Atmosphere in My Big Busy Space Activity Book. The map shows the location of the International Space Station and the Hubble Telescope and Mr. B and I had fun matching them up with the Toob pieces. 

I really enjoyed the Cat in The Hat There's No Place Like Space but Mr. B wasn't as impressed. Most of the books in this series are deceptively complex but this one was a little more simplistic. We may be done with this book. If the show that this book is based on is still on Netflix, we'll give it a try. 

Mr. B was very interested in the Magic School Bus Sees Stars book. We read it and then I found the corresponding episode for him on Netflix. I'm not sure whether he likes/or is ready for the Magic School Bus Show. We may have to put it on hold for now. 

The last book that we read today is The Planets in Our Solar System (a Let's-Read-and-Find-Out Science book). Mr. B loved this one. He was familiar with a lot of the information in this book but also learned a lot more. He had me read it twice to him today. 

Some of the other space-related activities that I would like to do with Mr. B are:

• Put together a Solar System Model (from Michaels) 
• Put together our LEGO Shuttle Expedition (this is a very difficult project) 
• Visit the California Science Center in LA (we are planning on going end of Sept/beginning of Oct).
• I would love to get a telescope or go star gazing (by Mr. B has a 7pm bedtime and good telescopes are very expensive so this plan will have wait...maybe next year).