Christmas School Ideas...

CHRISTMAS SCHOOL:

I started in 1990 the week after Thanksgiving! This was not a good time, but we were desperate. [To see why, go here]. At any rate Christmas and all its activities was looming.
I was so stressed out--I mean really! Ugh! School, decorating, shopping, cards, school, shipping presents--oh, my--I mean I was totally stressed out.

So, the next year I got smart. I planned for Christmas. We did no formal school for the two weeks before our Christmas break [for late middle/high school kids I did have them keep up with their math]. I had the kids help with cleaning, baking and addressing the Christmas cards. I had them help with wrapping presents, deliver goodies to neighbors and everything else there was to do. It was part of the school day.

In addition, I read great Christmas Classics--I read the Best Christmas Pageant Ever  annually for 20 straight years. Several years I read the original Christmas Carol by Dickens aloud and then we watched the Mickey's Christmas Carol Cartoon. Christmas was fun and not stressful. The difference--I planned for Christmas, made it part of school and included the children as much as possible. The work got done and we were not stressed out at all.

So, my advice: Plan for the times you will be stressed and incorporate your children as much as possible.f

More later,
Jill

Jolly Gingerbread Men...

In the next few weeks I want to give a few ideas for how to make the holidays less stressful if you are a homeschooling parent. I call it Christmas School. The first year I homeschooled I had a 7th grader and 4 and 1 year old at home and a 3rd and 5th grader still at the local elementary school. I was totally stressed at Christmas trying to get it all done. [Whatever that means.]

At any rate, the next  year I got smart and planned for Thanksgiving and Christmas and made the preparations part of school and not in addition to school. One part of this is having the children help with the baking and making the Christmas cards.

For years our children each did some sort of art work or wrote a poem and then I put it all together and got it printed. Then they helped fold, stuff and put labels on the envelopes. There are lot of skills involved in this and it made getting ready for Christmas a fun, family event.

We also made caramel corn and Scrabble [our version of Chex Mix] to give away, plus baked a couple of types of cookies. Though I didn't have the recipe for Jolly Gingerbread back then, I want to share it with you. As you can see in this photo [taken after the kids were mostly grown up] I arranged the cookies, took photos and made this the front of our Christmas card. Another year, we put holes in the top of the dough before baking [cutting out a hole with a drinking straw works great] and we hung them on the Christmas tree. That along with some strung cranberries and popcorn gave our tree an old fashioned look.

I will give some more hints in the coming week or two, but for now, here is the recipe for THE BEST gingerbread cookies I have ever eaten. I thank my old homeschooling mom friend, Cheryl, for this recipe.

This simple recipe is really THE best gingerbread man recipe I have ever tasted. They can be decorated, but we eat them plain. The buttery goodness of these cookies are wonderful. I always make a double batch for a total of about 100. They don’t last long and make terrific gifts.

JOLLY GINGERBREAD MEN

These are the best gingerbread men I have ever eaten

Thoroughly cream together:

1/2 C butter

1/2 C shortening

1 C white sugar

1/2 C brown sugar

1 egg

1/4 C light molasses

Mix the following together and then stir into the butter mixture:

3 1/2 C flour

2 t baking soda

2 t cinnamon

1 t ginger

1/2 t ground cloves

Mix till all is blended and chill.  Roll out cookies to desired thickness , cut with a cookie cutter and bake at 375° for 7-9 minutes.  After you get the dough  mixed up it may still look pretty dry, but just take it in your hands and work it into a ball. I use a 3” gingerbread (tin) cookie cutter and this make about 50 cookies.

As a tip, it is easier if you dampen your counter and lay a plain cotton (not terry cloth) dish towel on the dampened counter.  Sprinkle the towel with a couple of tablespoons of flour  and  then put 1/3 of the dough (rolled in a ball) on the towel.  Flatten it slightly with your hand, sprinkle it with flour and roll out like a pie crust on the towel.  If it gets sticky, sprinkle with a bit more flour.  After rolling and cutting out all the cookies, shake the towel off outside and  throw in the dirty clothes hamper.  

Take care,

Jill

Stretching Cores--How can I do this?

Many people have asked me over the years, how to stretch a Core Curriculum out so it takes a year and a half. I have thought about this and have actually implemented the following plan and it works well. I hope it can help you too.

A school year is typically 180 days, or 36 five day weeks. However, we all know, there is no way we actually do every lesson, every day, for 180 days. I mean, no one does. That is why in my whole school career I never came close to finishing a math book. You have to figure in sick days, holiday events, field trips and so forth. So, for argument's sake, let's say we plan for 30 full weeks of school. The other weeks can be for whatever-such as I mentioned above—and/or maybe a two week Christmas school and a three week state history--something along that line. I will elaborate on these ideas at the bottom of this post. So, let's look at the 30 weeks this year and 15 weeks next year. A total of 45 weeks of school over three semesters.

Get a FIVE day core. Do FOUR days of it every week.

That's my advice.

Do days 1-4 the first week, then days 5-8 the next week, and 9-12 the next week and so on. You can either stretch out the daily work so it is an even amount each day, or do all the work in four days and use the fifth day to do science experiments, map work, time-line work and maybe give the house a nice cleaning before the weekend. Or, maybe you can have a continuing book series that isn't scheduled in Sonlight-like my personal favorite the "Little House" books-- and you read a few chapters of those on your "off" day.

Doing a core this way, gives you 45 weeks of curriculum and you haven't had to tweak or worry about pacing--just do four days every week and you will have it paced out for you.

[What this translates to, is use 12 "tabs" worth of Sonlight Curriculum every semester and you will come out just right!]

NOTES----

CHRISTMAS SCHOOL:

I started in 1990 the week after Thanksgiving! This was not a good time, but we were desperate. [To see why, go here]. At any rate Christmas and all its activities was looming.
I was so stressed out--I mean really! Ugh! School, decorating, shopping, cards, school, shipping presents--oh, my--I mean I was totally stressed out.

So, the next year I got smart. I planned for Christmas. We did no formal school for the two weeks before our Christmas break [for late middle/high school kids I did have them keep up with their math]. I had the kids help with cleaning, baking and addressing the Christmas cards. I had them help with wrapping presents, deliver goodies to neighbors and everything else there was to do. It was part of the school day.

In addition, I read great Christmas Classics--I read the Best Christmas Pageant Ever for 20 straight years. I read Dickens’s Christmas Carol and then we watched the Mickey's Christmas Carol Cartoon. Christmas was fun and not stressful. The difference--I planned for Christmas, made it part of school and included the children as much as possible. The work got done and we were not stressed out at all.

So, my advice: Plan for the times you will be stressed and incorporate your children as much as possible.

STATE HISTORY:

Most states require you to teach state history. We did it this way. We did about 2 -3 weeks or so worth of state history every year the kids were in elementary school--or at least 3-4 years.

In our case, each child got a notebook or scrapbook. They could decorate it the way they wanted. In preparation for state history studies, whenever we would go in or out of our state I would have the kids collect those shiny brochures that are in the welcome station. Also, I would have them each get a state highway map or two.

The map will have the state bird, state flower and lots of other information. Talk about this and have them cut these things out and put them in their scrapbook. Have them sort the brochures into historical things and into tourist traps. If you can, chose 1-2 historical places to visit during your state study. Take photos, talk to the interpreters or curators, learn as much as you can about these places and the people that were involved with these events and locations. Older children can do extra research and do reports, younger children can just make a scrapbook page. Keep it fun and interesting. Have your children cut up the colorful brochures and use those in their scrapbooks too.

Use the highway map to plot out how you will get to the historic site. Have your kids keep track of the miles and so forth, this will be good experience on how to read and follow a map.

Ask your librarian for good books about your state. These could be biographies or historical fiction. Do these as read-alouds during this period of study. We found some nice historical fiction about our state at the local Christian book store. Ask people in your area--perhaps the local mayor or the folks at your city hall, if they have suggestions of local historical places you can visit. My kids and I learned so much this way. It was exciting and gave us a little break from our regular routine.

Hopefully this will help you see how you can stretch your curriculum. If you have other ideas, let me know. I am always looking for ways to help and encourage homeschool parents.
[Photos of Shakertown, a historic place close to home]