Homeschool Atheist Momma: Nine Disadvantages of Homeschooling

Take a peek at this great post at Homeschool Atheist Momma: Nine Disadvantages of Homeschooling:

My comment on the post ~
The biggest disadvantage that I could come up with is teaching writing! Nearly every single FRUSTRATION that we run into here revolves around writing and KM's PTSD-like response, but really this is the fault of the school teachers that she had, if only I had saved her earlier!

You Tube Monday - Annoying Orange - Avocadbro

Ganson Sculptures at MIT Museum

We visited the MIT Museum during their Second Friday program and had a great visit. The Ganson Sculptures had to be our favorite area - we could have watched them for hours! Here is a TEDTalk about how he was inspired and created his sculptures - 

Volcano in a Beaker Science Project

Home Science Tools has some really great simple experiments that can keep your kids doing science all summer long! Here is a super simple one that we found soooo much fun!

Summer Session - Another example of why we do lessons year round!

Monday was the perfect example of why we do lessons year round. KM's alarm went off at 9 and she came bouncing out of her room and was dancing through the kitchen. When I asked why she was so happy she said "I get to start my cosmetology book today!" Now we have had this book for months and she could have begun it at anytime, but today is the first day of our summer session which is when she decided to have the cosmetology added on to her schedule. She is really driven by her schedule, it keeps her motivated and focused. Without it she tends to just motor along with no real direction and SHE notices that she doesn't seem to be herself.

She had a little over 4 weeks off from book work, but by the beginning of the third week she was really getting bored, losing focus and started asking about doing different sports - volleyball at the high school, taking gymnastics, maybe trying a dance class, but when I said most of those things start in the fall she said well I won't have TIME for that then! Each and every time we take a break longer than a week or two she gets like this EVEN when we have things planned most days. I see a very REAL difference in her personality, demeanor, and attitude. Don't get me wrong she has days where she enjoys doing nothing - like when we spent Sunday watching almost the entire first season of Gossip Girl on Netflix -, but if it goes on for more than a day or two she is just off.

Today was a great start she went and completed her volunteer hours in the morning, we had lunch after I picked her up and she was off and running with the Hands-On Banking for Teens, her cosmetology program and she began her history assignment for the week. Summer lessons are much more laid back, but she knows that it allows us to have greater flexibility in our schedule throughout the rest of the year. I am think of switching it up a bit more and cutting back the two lengthier breaks - Sept and June - and adding those extra weeks throughout the year so that we don't get this funk again. 

You Tube Monday - Spider Ride on the 4th!

Can you find them spinning out of control......

Musickid997's Road Trip Pics

Simulating School At Home

Simulating School At Home - Take a peek at this one!

Recognizing What is Really Important - Thinking about your child's future

Should have known then
 she would want to go
into cosmetology!

There is no time like the present to think about what your child wants in the future. If you have been a reader of my blog for more than a week I am sure that you have seen more than one post about changes that we have made - in curricula, scheduling, hair colors you name it! We are all about changes, going with the flow, following interests and dropping things that just don't work, but I also really REALLY like a plan so that I have a constant direction.

When a parent is looking ahead at their child's home education path they need to have an end goal in mind in order to help their child achieve their goals - be it college, trade school, internships, job skills, entrepreneurship or whatever else they can think of. In order to focus on what is important to the child you need to be aware of their likes and dislikes and allow them to have some say in what they are doing. You also need to be observant of your child and by recognizing their strengths and weaknesses you can often discover at a young age which path might be a good fit for them and help to lead them in the right direction. I am not saying that you can determine at the age of 5 whether a child will be a doctor or a runway model or a gas attendant, but if you pay attention you will be able to acknowledge that your math hating 14 year old will probably never be an engineer.



I hear so many parents complaining about fighting with a child to get work completed, especially when the kids enter the teenage years. The cries of "when am I ever going to use this?" bring frustration and resistance into a relationship at such a critical stage which requires nurturing and continuity. Listen to your child and really think about whether they are likely to "use this" or are you just following someone else's pre-designed plan. More than 90% of people never use the advanced high school math that they were forced to learn in the "real world". That is JUST math. How many adults know how to diagram a sentence, know all of the functions of the organs, can recite the periodic table of elements, can name all 50 states - you homeschool mom's don't count, since you probably learned it while TEACHING it to your kids!!!


I am not discounting any of these as important or not, just using it to point out that different people have different skill sets and different kids have different interests. Families have things that are important to them and parents have some things that they are not willing to bend on for various reasons. You should expose your kids to EVERYTHING, introduce and encourage exploration, but if no spark is lit then what is the point in forcing drudgery and disdain for the topic. This "one path fits all" approach that many homeschoolers start out with really is not much better than school. Not all children are going to head off to college and they shouldn't! We need people who work at the grocery store, at the gas station,on the theater stage,and  to invent the next must have gadget, just as much as we need doctors and engineers. There is no less value in any particular path and all are necessary for our society to function.


So when planning ahead really take into consideration your families fundamental requirements and your child's interests and goals. Don't just follow the status quo, but challenge it and challenge yourself to truly meet the needs of your child!

The Hokey Pokey - Shakespeare style! - By Jeff Brechlin

The Hokey Pokey - Shakespeare style! - By Jeff Brechlin:

The following is from the Washington Post Style Invitational contest that asked readers to submit "instructions" for something (anything), but written in the style of a famous person. The winning entry was The Hokey Pokey (as written by William Shakespeare).

O proud left foot, that ventures quick within

Then soon upon a backward journey lithe.

Anon, once more the gesture, then begin:

Command sinistral pedestal to writhe.

Commence thou then the fervid Hokey-Poke,

A mad gyration, hips in wanton swirl.

To spin! A wilde release from Heavens yoke.

Blessed dervish! Surely canst go, girl.

The Hoke, the poke -- banish now thy doubt

Verily, I say, 'tis what it's all about.

        -- by "William Shakespeare""

'via Blog this'

Back to Basics by Barbara Frank - Recommended Reading

I think the excesses of the past few decades have not benefitted us in the important ways.

I just downloaded Barbara Frank's Back to Basics Raising Self-Sufficient Children to my Kindle and before I even finished the first page I KNEW I was gonna love it!!!

I look forward to people concentrating less on big houses, pricy vehicles and designer everything, and more on being content with what they have, helping each other and learning to become more self-sufficient.

You Tube Monday - Mister Rogers Remixed | Garden of Your Mind | PBS Digital Studios

Frog Hatchery Project COMPLETE!!!

Here is the complete outline of our 3 month journey hatching frogs! 




As part of our continued biology study work we are now HATCHING Frog Embryos. We ordered a kit from Home Science Tools and we have been very happy with it so far. The kit arrived in about 10 days and then the frog embryos arrived about 2 weeks after we sent the order in for them. Now we are just waiting and keeping our fingers crossed that some of the will hatch. Our embryos are going to be leopard frogs and we are looking forward to this new adventure!!!

Here are some resources and websites we are using - 

• The Frogs and Toads of North America: A Comprehensive Guide to Their Identification,Behavior, and Calls
• Uncover a Frog (Uncover Books)
• The Amphibian Class (Family Trees)
• Frogs 
• Exploraturium - Frogs
• KidZone - Frogs
• Alternative to Frog Dissection
• Frogs are Green - listing of more alternatives to dissection

Observations and photos - 

3/21/12 - THEY ARRIVED!!!

3/23/12 - Four of the six embryos started to hatch and wiggle there ways out of their sac. The fifth is looking like it is starting to unfurl, but the sixth has showed no sign of change.

3/25/12 - The four tadpoles started swimming around a bit today. They remain at the bottom and near the sacks, but they are definitely swimming. We will have to feed them in a day or two. The fifth and sixth have had no change so it does not look as though they are going to make it.

3/26/12 - As most of them are swimming around it was time to feed the tadpoles the powder mixture today and discovered that the 5th is squirming around a bit. The 6th embryo's outer sac is separating, but the black speck still has no change.

3/28/12 - Tadpoles are doing well. The five that hatched are swimming and we have decided to remove the unhatched tadpole when the first water change today.
Here is a picture of our malformed little guy and one of the correctly formed for comparison, as well as our unhatched embryo -

4/1/12 - The froglets are still doing well. The five are all looking really healthy and the one we were concerned about has caught up with the others and its tail has straightened out.  

4/4/12 - Three of the froglets are bigger almost twice as big as the other two.

4/10/12 - They are zipping along. 

4/11/12 - Today we poured the froglets and 1/2 of the water into a bowl in order to empty the rest of the water out of the tank to clean out the rest of the debris and waste. 

4/14/12 - watching for limbs but nothing yet - 

5/11/12 - haven't updated in a while as they really haven't had much of a change other than there size lately. The largest is now about 3 inches and little one is only 1.5 inches, so there is quite a size difference. Since we will have to eventually create a terrarium for the critters we decided to upgrade to a 10 gallon tank today, but only put about 3.5 gallons of water in it. This gives them plenty of space to swim around and grow but will not become overwhelming to change the water. It should also be ample space so that the littlest will not get eaten or taken over by the larger.

5/13/12 - So we have determined that the problem with our littlest froglet - Ozzi - is that it's organs are not centered within the body. In the picture below you can see the red mass of organs is shifted to the left side of it's body.

I am not really sure what the outcome will be, but we are keeping a close eye on this little one.

5/16/12 - Legs have sprouted

5/31/12 - I awoke this morning to discover two things - one sad, one happy. Little Ozzy did not make it, this morning he was found on the bottom of the tank, barely moving and I felt it was time to end his suffering. He will be missed. Charlie, on the other hand has sprouted his front legs, so we have added the floating piece of wood to the tank. I think he will need to be moved to another tank soon. The second largest - still unnamed at this point - definitely has his hind legs sprouting and the twins are holding stable.

The second largest - still unnamed at this point - definitely has his hind legs sprouting and the twins are holding stable. This continues to be one of the most educational and interesting projects yet. I must do in all home ed households!

6/3/12 -Charlie was found upon the piece of wood this morning.

 So KM went out and gathered some greens and dirt from the yard to create a terrarium for our little friend.

We used the smaller tank for now and once the next froggy finishes morphing we will have to swap things around again, but for now we hope Charlie will be happy. 

6/19/12 - 

Charlie in his terrarium.

 Not too much has changed over the last few weeks. Charlie is doing great in his new habitat and seems to really like the pinhead crickets from our local pet store, but is not so crazy about the meal worms. Bertie seems to be on the cusp of metamorphism and should have his front legs at anytime now. Number 3 is doing well, he is substantially smaller than Bertie which is difficult to tell because of the angle of the shot below. 3 does have rear legs coming in, so it appears he is just morphing at an even slower rate. Number 4 is still tiny and although he has stopped floating upside down - possibly caused from a bacterial infection - he doesn't seem to be growing very much.   
Once Bertie has his front legs and perches on the piece of wood we will be turning the 10 gallon tank into a terrarium for the two frogs and will move 3 & 4 into the two smaller tanks. The one drawback to the kit that we got was that didn't realize at the time that we would need to upgrade the facilities to be able to keep the frog's long term. If I had known that at the time, I may have just gotten the eggs and food and not the whole kit, as the tank is not even big enough to keep one frog for more than a month or two.

Number 3 above & Bertie below

Number 4

6/20 - Number 4 took a turn for the worse. He suddenly was not moving very much and then I noticed Number 3 was poking at him a lot and he wasn't swimming away, so I felt that it was time to take him out of the tank. When CJ got home, later that day, I mentioned we should probably think about switch the tanks because Bert looked like his middle was getting a bit more defined and I needed CJ to help me so we should really probably do it over the next few days while he was home. So we went that night to get the glass and aquarium sealant to make the tank into a terrarium. 


6/21 -  CJ was looking at Bert and noticing the changes in his mouth. He went to the store to pick up a few things and when he came back Bert's front legs had sprouted out. I moved Bert and Frank - previously known as Number 3 - into the smaller tanks to get the 10 gallon prepped. I put the piece of wood into the container that Bert was in so that he could get up and rest when he was ready.

Bert relaxing!!!

6/22 - TO MY SHOCK Bert was on the wood!!! Charlie had swam around for 3 or 4 days before he got up on the wood, but Bert was ready to go. However our tank was not ready yet as the sealant takes 48 hours to fully dry.

6/23 - I noticed that Bert's tail was swiftly resorbing and he would need to eat soon, so I decided to make a temporary home for him and Charlie in the tote that we use when KM catches snakes in the backyard ----

6/24 - I tested the seal and there is a slight leak on one side so I am going to have to pick up some more sealant, but luckily Bert and Charlie seem to be liking their temporary home ---

6/26/12 - The terrarium is holding water with no problem and Charlie and Bertie are LOVING IT!!! Charlie likes to perch on the rock and grab any crickets that happen to pass by - there is quite a belly on that one! Bertie can often be found burrowed in a corner or under the fern. Unfortunately Frank didn't make the transition, I am not sure if the water ratio was not accurate or if we should have waited until his front legs emerged to make  the switch, but sadly he was found floating the next morning.

Well our frog hatchery project is complete. We started out with six eggs and ended up with two healthy frogs. This has been one of the most incredible projects we have ever done. There really is no better way to understand natural selection, evolution, life cycle and responsibility than to just DO IT!!! You can read it in a book over and over, but until you see it and experience it first hand you don't really get it!

Free Fun Fridays All Summer Long

Free Fun Fridays | Highland Street Foundation:



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Frog Update - Terrarium Complete!

The terrarium is holding water with no problem and Charlie and Bertie are LOVING IT!!! Charlie likes to perch on the rock and grab any crickets that happen to pass by - there is quite a belly on that one! Bertie can often be found burrowed in a corner or under the fern. Unfortunately Frank didn't make the transition, I am not sure if the water ratio was not accurate or if we should have waited until his front legs emerged to make  the switch, but sadly he was found floating the next morning.

Well our frog hatchery project is complete. We started out with six eggs and ended up with two healthy frogs. This has been one of the most incredible projects we have ever done. There really is no better way to understand natural selection, evolution, life cycle and responsibility than to just DO IT!!! You can read it in a book over and over, but until you see it and experience it first hand you don't really get it!