Tuesday, December 21, 2010

The Homeschoolers 12 days of Christmas

Welcome to the Carnival of Homeschooling! With only a few days left before Christmas, I thought I would take the opportunity to help share what our family and many others are doing to prepare for December 25th. There is on youtube a large family 12 days of Christmas and a public school 12 days of winter version (thanks CMR!).

On the 12th day of Christmas, our homeschooling family is reading books together...
because homeschoolers do this every day! On the first Sunday of Advent I gather all our Christmas books and put them on the coffee table so we can read a few every day


nak presents an in depth post featuring the songs and books about Good King Wenceslas posted at Sage Parnassus.

Karen presents some tips on teaching your children to read aloud in A Lost Art and Why It Matters posted at Candid Diversions.

Jenn at Home Is Where You Start From branched out from the Sonlight history curriculum with books and websites in Knights and Medieval History-Learning Without School.

Amy @ Hope Is the Word shares some great Christmas books and crafts in Christmas around the World: Mexico posted at Hope Is the Word.

Annie Kate presents a common homeschool problem in Too Many Books and a Lot of Learning posted at Tea Time with Annie Kate. (with our 10 bookcases of children's books, I can relate!)

On the 11th day of Christmas, our homeschooling family is building snowmen...
because homeschoolers don't have snow days, just recess. This is the earliest snow here in Virginia that I can recall (though I remember many a Christmas Eve wearing short sleeves) so the children have already made snow forts in both the front and back yards.

Steven gives a response to parents who think bullying in public school builds character in Are we depriving our homeschooled children? posted at Hudson Valley Geologist. Hey, what do you think happened after the boys built that snow fort? Snowball fight!

ChristineMM's son combined dry ice and LEGOS to learn in Son's Self-Initiated Science Experiment posted at The Thinking Mother.

Annette teaches her son about animals, such as arctic hares changing their winter fur white in Creation Camouflage - DNG Review and Contest posted at A Net in Time.


On the 10th day of Christmas, our homeschooling family is shopping with mom... 
because homeschooling moms don't have the luxury of being able to shop without some of the kids in tow. Luckily mine can keep secrets so they don't tell what the other ones are getting.

Barbara writes about job skills that really matter in our homeschool graduates (just today I saw the cashier at KMart texting while ringing up purchases) in Our kid's competition for future jobs at Barbara Frank Online.

Alejandra presents The Best Christmas Gift posted at A Guide to Raising Great Kids.

Janine at Why Homeschool shares her family's struggle with how to squeeze in exercise in We have a new PE program.

On the 9th day of Christmas, our homeschooling family is singing carols...
I try to play our holiday CDs in the car all of December. I found some very nice Christmas music on piano CDs at the dollar store last week. 

Cheryl at Chrysalis Academy shares with us her lovely story of their homeschool journey in Why Homeschooling?

Mrs. White gives us a glimpse of  her home in The Little School at Home posted at The Legacy of Home.

On the 8th day of Christmas, our homeschooling family is cleaning the house...
So we can host family and friends without them calling child protective services. (just kidding since I vacuum almost every day)

Michelle is cleaning up the carpet after one of her 6 kids spill juice in My work is never done at Rosetta Stone

On the 7th day of Christmas, our homeschooling family is lighting the advent wreath...
Our family's tradition is that the children take turns lighting the candles and blowing them out each evening when we say prayers. It is so sweet to see Mary holding her baby sister and letting Julia Ellen blow some out.


Maureen gives us a lesson in the gifts from the Wise Men in Studying Frankincense and Myrrh posted at Homeschool Mo.


On the 6th day of Christmas, our homeschooling family is wrapping presents...
It is so sweet to see the older children buying (with their own money) and carefully wrapping gifts for their siblings. I think they have as much fun picking them out and cutting ribbon as they do opening their own presents.

Jessica helps us to think about presents to those less fortunate than ourselves in The Gift of Giving posted at Teachable Moments.


On the 5th day of Christmas, our homeschooling family is working math problems...
I take the days between Christmas and New Years to help the children get some of the more time consuming assignments completed, such as book reports. Yeah, all the public school kids have 2 weeks off, but I tell them, "some homeschoolers do school year-round, so stop complaining!" 

Marlis presents a great and cheap way to teach little ones their numbers in Early Childhood Math Concept posted at The Itchy Homeschooler.

Alasandra tell us that homeschoolers are unique in the reasons they teach at home in Homeschool is not religious undertaking it is an educational choice at Alesandra's Homeschool Blog.

Linda shares her family's homeschool journey in You Can Help Your Child Learn: The Learning Coach Approach posted at PARENT AT THE HELM.

Jamie presents her reasons for homeschooling in Changing the Game - Blogs - Parent Community and Forum posted at Homeschool Online.

On the 4th day of Christmas, our homeschooling family is making crafts...
Paper snowflakes, cotton ball ornaments to really elaborate sculpted clay creches (I'm not saying we do any of these crafts, but I do know that other homeschoolers do).

Shay shares Homeschooling Revisited, her take on what homeschooling is really like as opposed to what she expected at Wonderfully Chaotic.


Carletta gives us some fun ideas with little ones in Last-Minute Christmas Crafts at Successful Homeschooling.

Phyllis Bergenholtz shares an art lesson with her boys in All Things Beautiful: Flexibility or Connecting to the Now posted at All Things Beautiful.

On the 3rd day of Christmas, our homeschooling family is baking cookies...
Our family takes several days off from school and bakes many kinds of cookies to send to relatives. Of course there are plenty left over for us.

Pamela turns baking bread into a homeschool lesson in Flour, Water, Salt, and Yeast posted at Blah, Blah, Blog.

Jennifer in OR was successful in organizing a group craft in Gingerbread...hut? posted at Diary of 1. (we actually attempted graham cracker houses this summer in Maine, our efforts without the proper kind of "glue" were not pretty... but tasty.)


On the 2nd day of Christmas, our homeschooling family is decorating the tree...
Perhaps with all those ornaments the children made during craft time?


Alejandra shows us how to get along better with those family members in Seeing The Good in Others: a necessary daily struggle posted at A Guide to Raising Great Kids.

Cristina gives us a glimpse of what her tree decorating (and ours to be honest) is really like in Home Spun reprints #296-8: Christmas Decorating 2008 posted at Home Spun Juggling.

Rachel Lynette presents Christmas Analogy Fun posted at Minds in Bloom.


On the 1st day of Christmas, our homeschooling family is setting up the nativity scene...
Tradition has it that Mary and Joseph take one step each day during Advent toward the stable and that the youngest child puts the baby Jesus in the manger late on Christmas Eve.



On a very sad note I regret to share the loss of Mattias, Dana's at Rosecommon Acres little boy. Our hearts grieve and our prayers go out to her family.

Merry Christmas from our homeschooling family to yours!

11 comments:

Nancy Kelly said...

Katherine,
Merry Christmas to you and yours! This looks like a wonderful carnival. I appreciate all your hard work compiling these posts during this busy holiday season. Thank you for using my post on King Good Wenceslas and I look forward to relaxing and reading all the others later today.
Godspeed,
Nancy

Amy @ Hope Is the Word said...

Great job!

AFSS said...

Thanks for including my post. I am looking forward to reading everyones. ~Alasandra

jugglingpaynes said...

The carnival looks great. Thank you for including my post!

Merry Christmas!
Cristina

Maureensk said...

Thanks so much for hosting the carnival! You did a wonderful job of putting it together. I'm looking forward to reading your blog for now on (I just now subscribed as I just now found out about your blog from the carnival).

Annette said...

thank you for posting this. :)

Carletta said...

You did a great job on this. Thank you!

Wonderfully Chaotic said...

This is great! Thanks so much for including me! :)

teaching resources mary said...

Nice post,Thanks for sharing.

Merry Christmas and hope you have a brilliant year ahead

Marlis said...

Great Job and Merry Christmas

Marlis said...

I am hosting a Giveaway at my blog. Come and visit

http://itchyhomeschooler.blogspot.com/2010/12/giveaway-giveaway-giveaway-giveaway.html

It's an interactive bookset.