Our Home School Group's Expo Event

Here are our handsome boys, it was THEIR idea to dress up like this!! The second pic is of the boys, their Mee Maw and me (mom). Thanks Mee Maw for coming !!

Here is our table where we shared things we have been doing in our home school (life) this school year. For most moms this is an end of the school year celebration. We school all year round though so we won't be ending until July. It's a lot of fun to share what we do and to see what other's do. It's an encouraging and inspiring evening. We use the Charlotte Mason method and Ambleside Online as our core curriculum plan. Nature Study is big in our school/life and we use lots of Living books. Just about the only worksheets we use are for math. I still try to do lots of hands on math instead of worksheets with my oldest (1st gr) and we also use Math Living books (ex. Greg Tang's books). The Charlotte Mason includes Bible, Habit Training, Literature, History, Natural Science, Nature Study, Out Door Time, Hymn Study,Poetry, Artist/Art Study, Composer Study, Shakespeare, and more ... We also include fun Science experiments, an occasional project like a lapbook (ex.Weather, Mammals), caring for farm animals, camping, field trips, life skills (building Construction, Gardening, Sewing, First Aide, etc..) I am very happy with the way things are going BUT I have learned something that has really helped and that is.....................really limit T.V. and Video game playing time. When they first were given the video game system I let them play it quite a bit but I began to notice that they especially my oldest acted like he didn't know what to do if he wasn't doing one of the above mentioned past times. He would even come into the living room when his daddy was just watching the news. There were also some new behavior issues and attitudes that were increasing. I decided that we would just about completely cut out the video games and we would also drastically cut down t.v. time. I do believe that this decision has made a huge difference in our home school and life in general. Believe me it's not perfect but it's a lot better!! Well, enough about that =)

This Expo included a talent show and it was a lot of fun watching some of the kids in our group sing, dance, play the drums, etc.. The boys said next year they were going to sing and dance to Toby Mac (Christian Hip Hop/Rap) and I can't wait to see it!!! It was an enjoyable evening for the boys and I and I am glad our home school group has this event.