Almost Unschooling Grama

“Christians shouldn’t participate in traditional “Christian” holidays because they have pagan roots.” If you’ve been involved in evangelical Christianity for any length of time, it’s likely you’ve come across this teaching, and many of you have chosen to celebrate the Jewish feasts and holidays instead as a result. While I am all for Christians celebrating Jewish holidays, I still have no qualms about celebrating Christmas in spite of its pagan roots. Here’s why: Many years ago, I read the book  “Peace Child “. It’s about a missionary couple who felt a call to reach the cannibalistic tribes of New Guinea with the gospel. The culture of these people was the polar opposite of Christianity. Lying was held up as a virtue and violence was revered. In the book, Don Richardson explains that all religions and value systems have their roots in the true religion practiced by Noah. Satan has never created anything. He only perverts the truth. Therefore, the strategy of these ...

Confession: Grampa Tom is a Scrooge.  OK, I can't blame him. He grew up in a large farm family. My father-in-love was a fantastic worker but had no business sense. They lived hand to mouth and every penny earned from the farm usually went out the door as soon as it came in at harvest. By December, money was always tight and the pressure to provide gifts for 9 kids always caused a lot of fights between his parents. Not only that, but many of those kids had December birthdays. Christmas for my husband was always a time of great stress.  On the contrary, Christmas in my family was always a joyous occasion that my upper-middle-class parents were comfortably able to afford. My expectations and my husband's dread of the season created some stress between us in the beginning, but when we went through the farm depression of the early 80s, things got serious. My overwhelming desire to give came into full clash with his insistence that we absolutely could not afford Christmas. ...

Give your children the opportunity to experience the joy of giving! Start a tradition of giving by challenging them to do an act of kindness every day in December up to Christmas. Brainstorm with them some of the things they could do and then have a time at the end of each day to share what they have done and how it made them feel.  Here's some ideas to get you going!  1. Unroll the toilet paper in a public restroom a little way. Then roll it back up with a dollar bill so the next person who comes in will find it. 2. Go for a walk and pick up litter. 3. Message someone. Tell them how much you appreciate them. 4. Take cookies or bread to a neighbor. 5. Give good toys to a toy drive. 6. Write encouraging notes on sticky notes and leave them around town. 7. Do a chore for someone. 8. Roll down your window and yell "Thank you" to road construction workers. 9. Take the neighbor's garbage can back to the house after the tru...

In our first year of homeschooling, I took my cues from the only type of schooling I had ever known and let my kids have the summer off. The next year, I was quite irritated to find that the first 2 months of the curriculum I had bought were basically a review of what my kids had learned in the last year. Then, I found out why. They had forgotten nearly everything! I decided that wasn't happening again. I set my sights on 4 days a week with mini 1 to 2 week vacations as we needed them.  It worked fabulously! In our third year, the kids were so far ahead in November, I decided to put aside everything but reading spelling and math drills until Christmas so we could concentrate on creating handmade gifts for everyone on our lists!  I could not have anticipated the results!  We learned to sew, paint, and craft and had all sorts of fun, but that wasn't the best part.  My children were so excited about the gifts they were creating that they pretty much forgo...

Here's a great game to teach math terminology. One person secretly picks a number. T he other has to ask questions using math terminology until they can determine the number. I printed out a free 100s chart and put it into a plastic sleeve. We use an erasable marker to mark off the numbers we have eliminated. You cannot ask if the number is "79" or "14" Questions must be worded with math terms such as "Is it a prime #?", "Is the product of the ones digit equal to 3 times 3?" Is the number greater than 47?" "Is this number divisible by 9?", "Is your number even or odd?" As you ask the questions, mark off any numbers your question has eliminated. The Flash and I are having a great time with this game. He's not multiplying or dividing yet so we aren't using some of these terms but that's OK the game is adjustable. I printed out the chart and put it into a plastic sleeve. We use an erasab...

"Read aloud to your children and they will become great readers." Have you heard this message? It's everywhere. Schools, libraries, even homeschool blogs proclaim this optimistic message from the rooftops! It sounds so simple, such a no-brainer, obviously true ... But is it? "Of course, it is!" They all shout. "All the studies show that children who are read to have a much greater chance of becoming good adult readers." True, but a link does not necessarily indicate the cause. For instance: There is a very strong correlation between retail ice cream sales and summer murder rates. Given this information, we should all probably steer clear of ice cream. 😉 Let's look a little deeper. I would really like to know more about the parents of the children that were studied. What about their socio-economic backgrounds? What kinds of jobs did they hold? What about their education levels? Were they good readers themselves? I asked my siblings...

Do you live in an older home or is there a building in your town that you find intriguing? Hunting down the history of buildings is a great way to learn about the history of your town with lots of fascinating rabbit trails to go down. To start with, you will need to make a list of questions you would like to know about the building. As you investigate, you will think of more, but try to start off with at least 3-5.  You might want to know: When was the building was constructed? Who built the building? What is the style of architecture? Has it been remodeled or added on to? Who was the original owner and how many owners has it had? Are there any interesting events that happened there? What was around the building when it was built and how has that changed through the years? Has the building had different functions over the years? What was the original cost of the building and how much is it worth now? There are a variety of resources to help you answer these ques...