Another Give Away!

Check out Deb's very generous give away!

Stop by  Living Montessori Now   for the Giveaway – Alison’s Montessori Land & Water Form Cabinet

Another Giveaway!

Montessori Print Shop geography bundles....

Check out Montessori Tidbits  - One lucky reader will win a bundled set for two continents of your choice.
Commenting will close at midnight CST on Wednesday, Nov. 2. The winner will be selected by random. This giveaway is open INTERNATIONALLY!

Pop on over and enter!  Good luck!!

Montessori at Home Book/Montessori Print Shop Bundle Giveaway

The giveaway closes 10:01pm MST on Tuesday, October 25...that's today!!!

Living Montessori Now is hosting this great give-away.  (Each prize approximately $30 if purchased as a bundle; each prize approximately $70 if files are purchased individually! Total value of giveaway $90-$210 of fabulous Montessori materials!)

Living Montessori Now is giving away a Montessori Print Shop bundle of 21 printable materials as well as John Bowman’s newly revised e-book Montessori at Home: The Complete Guide to Doing Montessori Early Learning Activities at Home. Pop on over there before 10pm to enter!
 
I personally would love to win this as i am continually looking for ways to educate myself further on how to bring montessori home.  Yes, i have set up a few activities (i need to get you a few photos!) but really i hesitate as i'm worried about 'doing it wrong.'  Honestly, that's  how i happened upon the give away, i was reading this post and found a note about the give away. I just wanted to share the opportunity with you all as  well.  Good Luck!!

A Low Week

Definitely a good thing!  After much running around with baseball and horse back riding lessons along with a Confirmation and doctors appointments thrown in, we have about a week of rest.

Our oldest was Confirmed on Monday, May 16th.  The class was huge...and only about half of this year's class.  Some were Confirmed this past Fall and some were Confirmed this Spring.  The other night there were 141 teens!  To put it in perspective - imagine 141 teens + 141 sponsor (give or take a couple of them who sponsored 2 teens) + parents (for 141 teens) + siblings, grandparents, godparents, etc.  Oh my!  : ) it was a full house!  We thought - we'll sit in the cry room (where we NEVER sit), it should be less populated considering its 6:30 at night and most parents will want to be as close as they can....Now i remember why i really dislike sitting in the cry room.  And we had never been in the one at this church so we were in for a few surprises!  But all in all, we had a beautiful Mass, the Teens worked hard to prepare for this amazing sacrament, and we are so proud of our son! 

One thing the teens do while preparing for Confirmation is choose a saint to take the name of.  They research and write a report on that saint and explain why they chose him or her.  Our son chose St. Ambrose.  You can find out a bit about this amazing man from my brother's blog as he too had chosen St. Ambrose for his Confirmation saint and discusses why on his blog.  There is more there than B. was even able to find.  Very interesting information.  Funny, B. Chose St. Ambrose forgetting that his uncle had too...and then he asked his aunt (Joe's wife) to be his sponsor!  Ah, well .... just one of those things.

Baseball is finishing up in the next few weeks.  Riding lessons are over.  We have been slowly going through boxes, one at a time from the garage.  School is getting back to normal.

On the subject of school, once the new catalogs come out, the conferences start, etc don't you find yourself looking more toward next year than focusing on finishing this year?  I do. I need to remind myself that yes, they do need to finish the science, math, whatever in order to start the next year's materials.  yikes! 

Right now i am trying to focus on materials for Catechesis of the Good Shepherd as opposed to next year's stuff hoping that will keep me focused on the finishing of the year. 

B. is flying through things now...we were so far behind but he will end up finishing by the end of June.  Once he found what worked best for him school has progressed quickly.  The next two in line after him need to finish math definitely and well, i'll make them keep working at the other stuff until B. is done -  i'm mean like that. : )

Bear is working only on math and reading right now.  When they are learning to read, that is always the most important, greatest focal point of their year.  But for him, math is a favorite and he is already halfway through next year's book.  I am getting ready to add in science and geography for him in a more montessori style as well as Catechesis of the Good Shepherd  (CGS) for religion.  The funny thing about religion is that they are surrounded by it and so daily they are learning and living their faith...but there is more to learn and CGS is by far the most wonderful way to present the Truths of our faith. 

My brother is slowly making his way home from Afghanistan - thank God for his safe return!  We hope to see him and his family sometime in the next few weeks.

And last, one more bit of news!  Wee dunphy #6 is due to arrive around the 16th of September!  We are all very excited about his arrival.  Yes - this is really late to be handing out the news but so what.  I am about 23 weeks! 

Well i best run as the kids will be making their way downstairs soon and i have yet to do much of what i really should be doing!  (that translates into cleaning, cooking, going through boxes...etc)

Have a beautiful afternoon!

Quick Resource Note - Montessori

For anyone interested - Oriental Trading has plastic activity trays on sale, 6 for $7.99.

14.5" x 10.75" in size.  Perfect for little hands!

Here is the Plastic Cool Craft Trays link!

Enjoy!

And the Winners are ...

Michelle from Kozy Kids Family Daycare and Fidelio from Midnight Radio!

Congratulations!

Michelle and Fidelio are our January/February Give Away winners. 

I'm looking forward to 'seeing' you both in class!

For anyone else interested in taking Karen Tyler's Online Montessori Teacher Training Program you can find more information at her web site: World Wide Montessori Online.

Give Away!

I am so excited about this!! Well, yes, i always love giving things away, but this is a doozy!

Karen Tyler, owner of Worldwide Montessori Online, is generously allowing me to give not one, but TWO of my readers a free course and training manuals!

You'll receive 12 Montessori-based Albums/Manuals filled with student presentations/lessons for the 2-6 year old child. They include:

Practical Life

Sensorial

Language

Mathematics

Physical Science
Ecology
Geology
Botany
Zoology
History
Geography
                                              Astronomy

The course starts March 1st and i'll be there with you!  You can find more information about her class here.

"Upon graduation, you will receive a certificate stating that you have completed a pre-primary training course (2-6 years old) by World Wide Montessori On-line and signed by Karen Tyler, AMS.

This course will give you the knowledge you need as well as the albums for curriculum needed to teach the Montessori Method. This course does not take the place of a course taught at a certified Montessori teacher training school." Oh, but it is well worth it!  And you can't get any better then free now can you?  :  )

I took a quarter (3 months) of Karen's course a long while ago and Karen's class is great.  I love the albums (manuals) as they are very detailed and easy to use. Even if you do nothing other than use the albums (though i would hope you'd participate in class as well!!!!) you will be well equipped to bring Montessori home.

So how do you enter??? Gosh, i am so excited!!! Can you tell? : )

OK - there are 5 ways you can enter:

1. Leave a comment here about what your looking forward to the most about the class, if you win.

2. Blog about my give away, including a link to my site, and leave a comment here with a link to your post.

3. Place my blog button on your blog and comment here, with a link, that you did.

4. Sign up to follow my blog and then leave me a comment here that you did so. (if you already do just leave me a comment stating so!)

5. Email your loops, friends, whomever! and let them know about my give away!  Leave me a comment here that you did so. - i'm trusting you on this one! ; )

You can enter starting today ... we'll end things Monday, February 14th.  That will give me time to get  your information to Karen and for you to contact her as well.

Oh, and i'll move this post to a tab at the top so its easy to find ....i think i'll put all my give aways there so check it at least once a month!

Good Luck!!!

What do you do with the little ones when the older ones are doing school?

This is a question i have gotten a lot over the years.  Now, after homeschooling for almost 12 years, i can honestly say i finally figured it out! : ) 

Early on the little ones would ask for their own school.  We tried left over workbooks, coloring books, paper and stickers ...the list goes on and on.  But what i have found with all those things is that they are done quickly and/or they need or want your help with them constantly.  Now, there is plenty of time for each child, but if you are teaching one to read, preparing one for a sacrament, and trying to figure out why another is not doing well in one of their subjects, sitting down for 2 hours with the toddler/preschooler is  not a doable option.  So you want to know the answer?

One word - Montessori...

Ok, before you start shaking your head, and telling me its too much work, too much stuff, blah, blah, blah, let me explain.  Really, Montessori at home is the absolute ideal solution to this question.  Your toddlers and preschoolers deserve just as much prep time from you as the others do (all relevant to age and grade of course.)  And many things can be done very simply and inexpensively....The most important thing here though is that they LOVE doing the work, they can do things on their own after you present it to them, and they will do the activities for a good long while.

The other night i finished making color cards for Cat.  She was still up with us so we did them for about 15 minutes before i told her we needed to stop.  It was just matching colors.  Nothing elaborate. 
I did find that she has a hard time separating and setting out the 1st set of card so I am going to make a single sheet that she just puts out and then matches the individual cards to.

This morning i made sequence color cards but they are so small that it was hard for her to go back and forth and not lose her spot.  So i am making larger cards (with less colors to start with) later today.  But either way - she loves them!  And she was very excited to show her Daddy and her brothers and sister.  And she can do it all by herself  (well, she can once i get things redone - my fault, not hers or the materials.) 

When we were in our own place i had 2 shelves just for Bear that held several activities and books to read that he could do alone.  Stringing large beads and sorting frogs and numbers to name a couple.  Cat also has a spooning tray where she moves pompoms from one bowl to another.  Sometimes she sorts them by color (black and red). 
My hope is that i can set out and present something new each week, at the least, that will inspire her to work alone, along side her older siblings. 

But also, i should mention, i am working to incorporate more Montessori style learning for all the kids into the school day.  For the older ones  we will have a theme each week (probably based on Bear's science) that i will set a shelf up for.  Then they can work on things as they finish up or take a break from their other work.  The first week is  the Universe - Stars and Constellations.  We have a wonderful telescope i would like for them to use more (especially since its still gets dark early.) Knowing how it works and the different parts of it are an important part of using it! This along with learning a few constellations and more will be a fun endeavor for us all.

We are going to learn together a few things we have all missed but would like to know more about.

I encourage you to take some time and look into making a few baskets or trays of activities for your little ones.  There is a large wealth of information concerning using Montessori at home so please do not get too overwhelmed.  Start very simply with one or two activities and work your way in.

I plan to write more about this as our journey begins again with this wonderful learning method.  Its one of those things that i keep going back to and continue, every time, to see benefits abound from.  Its well worth your time as a parent and teacher. 

Eclectic Homeschooling

I gave myself a good laugh yesterday while looking back at what all we have done for school.  People always ask "what curriculum do you use?" and i have always replied "well, we're a bit eclectic." ....."OOOOOh....."
But now, what does that mean really?  I think this year is really an eclectic year which is what caused me to laugh.  We usually use a jumping off curriculum of sorts (at least we have many of our homeschooling years) and then i change things and adjust things and voila! Eclectic.  But these past two years have been very different in that my husband was laid off in Dec of 2008 and we just had no money for the 2009-2010 school year.  That year i basically scoured my parents bookshelves (they homeschool too) and was rewarded with all that my mom has kept on hand.  Even though the youngest is now 15 she still has something from just about every grade.  Most was religion and art but there were other gems in there as well. Then i started borrowing...from her friends and from my friends, it was quite a year.  Very eclectic.  But then we hit this year.

2010 found us with some savings to purchase books and actually enroll our 9th grader in OLV (Our Lady of Victory homeschool) - which by the way, for high school, we love!  We started off using a lot of their curriculum for the younger ones  but as the year has progressed things have changed. 

The 6th grader is using some OLV, some Kolbe, some other. 

The 4th grader is using some OLV, some Kolbe, some CHC, some other. 

The Kindergartner is now using what i have found works best for that grade and age - it just never changes does it?   Why do we continually wonder if there is something better?  He is using - in a workbox style - Little Angel Readers, Math -U-See (which is our newest "everyone in our house uses it" program,) Montessori, and Catechesis of the Good Shepherd, plus some small science and history books. 

And then there is the 2 year old....my "Why?" girl.  She has (due to space and limited budget) a few Montessori trays. 

This year everyone is doing something different.  There is no real base curriculum - you might say OLV but really its not, then there is no 'the same' in how things are taught.... We are eclectic within our eclecticness - kinda goofy.

But that is one of the great things about homeschooling.  You can cater to the child ...and yes, each child is different.  There are some things that one kids can use and another cannot.  But there are exceptions... Little Angel Readers has taught all three older kids to read - we love this program.  Bear is using it now and he is the first one i have thought to add some outside influence to (the Montessori movable alphabet)

Little Angel Readers and workbooks by themselves are great, but if you need more hands on activities the teacher's manual is full of activities and ideas.  Some people feel you have to do it all, i am here to tell you no you don't! It can be very overwhelming if you think you need to do all that is in the teacher's manual, use just what you need! 

Our other 'everyone uses' program is Math -U-See.  We have tried numerous math programs (as we had with reading programs!) and we have finally found a winner.  Bear uses the number blocks, but the older kids do not.  They just watch the lesson video (a minute or so) and then do a lesson a week which includes practice pages, systematic reviews, and test. The kids all love it!  We range from the Primer (which Bear has basically finished!) to Geometry.  They all now love doing math!

I'm sure you have heard these things before from me but i felt like saying it again!  : )

Montessori Class Seat/Albums Give Away!

I have before looked into Montessori for the kids.  I am continually drawn back to it.  So recently i have begun looking again for information on presentations and materials as Cat really needs more than Dora, Diego, and Max and Ruby! 

In our current living situation we have very little 'here, play by yourself' materials near where we do school, and I really don't want to bring toys into the dinning room.  Plus, i prefer for the little ones to be learning with us ... just basic stuff, no geometry or such : ) but they can be with us as we work, doing their own thing.  All the other kids have had some sort of something up til now - its more that we are not in our own place and i did not think at the time we would be without our things for so long....its all boxed up and not very convenient to get to (about 8 hours away!) Anyway.....

Several years ago i took one quarter worth of Karen Tyler's online montessori training.  She is a wonderful instructor and her albums are very easy to use.  Unfortunately i have misplaced the albums i did get (probably in the trailer in a box sitting in the cold...and on our old computer somewhere) and am looking for a way to take the class again and actually get to finish it.  Well, guess what i found!  One of the moms on a montessori yahoo group i am in is offering a seat in Karen's class!  So here i am blogging about it just so i can get a third entry (how bad is that!)...AND to hopefully send some of you over there to enter too! (maybe i should re-think that...the fewer entries the better chance i have!)

I highly recommend Karen's Course and Albums (which you can buy without taking the class) if you are looking for good, solid montessori training (non certified) and/or albums. 

And don't forget to enter the give away!