Hands-on activities are a great way to add variety to your homeschool, reinforce learning, and incorporate creativity. When your children are coloring, cutting, and building, there is opportunity to both review and organize what they’ve learned or even explore rabbit trails of curiosity. One great type of hands-on learning I’ve recently rediscovered is lap books. These fun paper crafts offer an alternative to boring worksheets while offering a fun opportunity to talk about what your child has learned!
To be honest though, sometimes lap books can be a bit of a chore for moms. There is a ton of printing, organizing the projects, and gathering supplies. Thus, I was at first a bit skeptical about lap books and hadn’t even given them a fair try.
Have you ever sat down to work on a lap book and can’t find a brown paper bag, a cotton ball, or a glue stick? With BookShark’s Lap Book Kit, almost everything that you need to put your lap book together is included. The folder base of the lap book even comes folded and ready to use. When we have used lap books in the past, it took me a few tries to put the folder together correctly! It is massive sanity saver to have all your supplies in the box, ready to go!
2. The Pages Are Pre-printed
Often lap books come as a digital file that requires a ton of printing. BookShark doesn’t leave you hanging like that. The set comes with all of the pages pre-printed. You’re saving both time and printer ink. The kit takes 98% of the of pre-planning out of the process; you just grab the pages you need, and you’re set!
3. The Instructions Are Easy to Follow
I love doing hands-on activities with my son, but sometimes I have to step away or have him work on his own. With this kit, each activity is covered in the Instruction Booklet with a brief history lesson, a list of needed materials, and clear, colorful, step-by-step instructions. The guide truly makes completing the activities a breeze!
4. It’s Scheduled in Bite-sized Chunks
We’ve found some lap books that are a lengthy process to assemble, and my son loses interest about halfway through! With this Lap Book Kit, the 25 hands-on activities are distributed throughout your history lessons. You complete one portion at a time, so it’s fun and interactive—not overwhelming. Often when we pull it out to add another element, my son likes to look back at the others we’ve already added. In this way, the lap book is a perfect vehicle for ongoing review!
5. The Activities Are Varied
This lap book isn’t all about cutting and pasting. The projects incorporate creative writing, coloring, and drawing. When your children are finished with the lap book, they’ll have a collection of work that is uniquely theirs and demonstrates a concrete proof of learning.
The Lap Book Kit has been a great asset to our homeschool this year, making our history lessons more interactive. Mom bonus—it’s easy to simply pull out and use whenever we are ready for it which is clearly marked in our Instructor’s Guide.
If you are looking for a creative way to reinforce your history lessons this year, we highly recommend an American History Lap Book Kit. It is something we look forward to working on together each week!
About the Author
Krista is the homeschooling mom of 3 boys. After 13 years she has learned the value of chilling out, going with the flow and keeping homeschooling fun! She is the blogger behind Far From Normal where she hopes to encourage parents and homeschoolers, and inspire a life lived happily outside the box!
With our flexible homeschool schedule, we’ve had the space and control to achieve a perfect rhythm for our days. This schedule has not been imposed on us by public school, and we’re reaping the rewards! Life is much more relaxed, and the kids are learning more, too. Flexible routines and schedules are another reason why I say homeschooling is best.
The Science of Routines
Science backs the importance of routines for children. Psychology Today speaks about the comfort that children get from having a predictable routine. When they know what is happening, they feel safe.
A study found that a fixed family schedule actually helps children with behavioural issues such as oppositional defiant disorder and hyperactivity/impulsivity. I can attest to this! Our son has elements of both of these disorders and benefits from knowing what is going to happen during his day. When he is in a routine, he has far fewer meltdowns and is much more willing to learn and to engage.
Based on the data, it would be easy to think that a rigid public school routine is the ultimate comfort. But I have found the opposite to be true. And I’m not the only one!
Rigid Public School Routines Are Old School
In his TED Talk from 2010, Bring on the Learning Revolution, the late Sir Ken Robinson explained that the current public school system is based on an old model from the 19th century, “We have to go from what is essentially an industrial model of education, a manufacturing model, which is based on linearity and conformity and batching people.”
The public school schedule is an example of this conformity. Children do thrive on predictability, but they are often forced into a learning routine that does not work for them mainly so they can be batched and managed.
My kids did not thrive with the one-size-fits-all timetable of public education. In fact, the early, rushed starts caused them a huge amount of anxiety.
Some kids are better later in the morning or in the afternoon. An article in TIME says that teenagers are actually better suited to staying up late and sleeping late, so a more flexible school schedule could lead to more motivated teens. I know that my 9-year-old twins, who do like a set routine, benefit from a later start.
The Beauty of a Flexible Homeschool Routine
Schedules and routines are great, but I don’t think the public school ones should be forced on everybody. And this is where the beauty of the homeschool schedule comes into play. There are so many ways that you can mold your daily schedule to best suit your child. Here are some of the freedoms we’ve discovered in our years of homeschooling:
Kids can get enough sleep and are rested and ready for the day. They can then start the day when they feel ready to learn.
Kids can have a peaceful morning routine rather than feeling stressed and rushed.
You can decide if you want to follow year-round homeschooling, take breaks periodically or use a 4-day schedule. You have the flexibility to decide what works best for your family and to change your mind whenever you like.
You can homeschool on the road and take holidays when you want to. Kids can experience the world, without having to wait for designated periods in the year to go on vacation.
Kids can have a break if they’re sick or even just having a bad day. We do this a lot! It’s difficult to expect concentration and engagement from kids when they don’t feel their best.
You can dive deeply into child-led learning, letting children focus on what delights and engages them. A flexible schedule means that subjects can easily be moved around to accommodate these interests.
The world is changing, and education needs to change too. Even though public schools are constantly improving, they are not doing so quickly enough. The old way of managing kids is still prevalent in most schools, yet this way of teaching is not going to prepare all of them adequately for the future. And that’s why homeschool is the best!
When you school at home, you can adapt learning, content, and schedules to give your children the best education possible. And then they can be ready to face a changing world that needs people flexible enough to navigate its complexities.
About Our Author
Charlotte Jones is a multi-tasking mom who works from home. She spends her days blogging at My Little Home School, homeschooling her twins, and teaching English online. Her home is a small house in a quaint little town on the coast of South Africa. You can often find her swimming in the lagoon or hiking in the forest with her husband, special needs twins, and furbaby. She loves her family, spending time in nature, running, red lipstick, and drinking too much coffee.
Homeschooling is an adventure. There are so many paths that it is difficult to choose which is right for your family. It’s different from sending your kids to school in many ways with the most obvious being that youmake all the decisions, including your teaching methods.
Maybe you are wondering if a literature-based curriculum can provide a excellent education? I’m here to tell you that it canand will. I should know! I’ve shifted from a literature-based (Charlotte Mason) approach to a classical one and finally back to literature-based curriculum with BookShark.
“If we encounter a man of rare intellect, we should ask him what books he reads.”? Ralph Waldo Emerson
Along my journey of homeschool styles, I read everything that Charlotte Mason wrote, re-read The Well Trained Mind and even delved into The Lost Tools of Learning. The one thing all experts and philosophers agree on is that children should be reading. They vary somewhat in the application of the reading habit, but not in the method.
“The most common and the monstrous defect in the education of the day is that children fail to acquire the habit of reading.”? Charlotte Mason
This past year I even attended a classical homeschooling conference to pin down whether or not I should go with a fully classical program. Although I ultimately decided against it, I learned so much about teaching that it was time well spent. After all, the ideas espoused by classical educators are admirable. Who doesn’t want to cultivate wisdom and virtue in their children?
For years, I straddled the fence between classical and lit-based, trying to split our year into different approaches. Sometimes it worked, and sometimes it was a fail.
A careful look at reading during the three stages of a classical education shows that the same goals are equally attainable through a literature-based approach. Because all three stages can be implemented through BookShark, I don’t feel like I have to straddle that fence between Charlotte Mason and classical education anymore. I get the best of all worlds!
Reading in the Grammar Stage
This first stage is the foundation of your child’s education. They begin to read and learn the number sense of simple arithmetic. Kids this age love to spout off random facts; therefore, memorizing math tables and rules of phonics is usually fun for them. This stage lasts roughly through the fourth grade. In a literature-based curriculum, stories read both to and by the child increase vocabulary and open their minds to the rest of the world. Also, there is no better way to learn proper grammar. Most well-read kids instinctively pick up proper grammar just by knowing what sounds right based on their experience with great writing.
Reading in the Logic Stage
Beginning in the fifth grade and ending after the eighth grade, pre-teens are questioning and thinking analytically. This is where reading widely is a massive benefit. Kids are able to start putting the pieces of history together. The cause and effect of events becomes clear as the stories relate to their history studies. The facts aren’t merely dates on a timeline but real experiences that through historical fiction are much more memorable. I’d like my kids to know what it was like to live through the American Revolution and comprehend why Americans revolted more than I want them to memorize the dates of battles.
Reading in the Rhetoric Stage
In high school, the student should be capable of accessing both the facts and causes of history. That they can now consolidate that knowledge into their own written and spoken opinions. This is the stage when most homeschool parents turn to textbooks, and in my opinion, it is the worst possible time for that. Here’s why: Literature is more interesting to read than textbooks. If you are interested in what you are learning, you will have a longer attention span. Hopefully, at this stage, your teen is ready to begin studying the subjects that they’ll need to pursue their long-term educational goals.
In all stages, classical education is language-focused. Reading widely is an avenue to understanding history in a more personal way.
At the moment, I am fully embracing our secular, literature-based curriculum, merging the principles I learned about classical education into my own homeschool philosophy. I have a sense of excitement for the year ahead because I know that each BookShark level includes enough geography, fiction, and nonfiction that my son will get a full picture of history!
About the Author
Jenny Naughton lives in Chicagoland with her husband where they have been homeschooling their four sons and one daughter since the dark ages of 2001. Her nose is always in a book, and if you come over, she will send you home with one so that she has the shelf space to get more. Her favorite social media platform is Instagram where she overshares her books, coffee, pets, and more books.
The BookShark Science for levels A through F¹ was designed with Next Generation Science Standards (NGSS)² in mind. But why would a homeschool curriculum care about outside standards at all?
Isn’t the BookShark way of reading great books and doing hands-on exploration enough when it comes to learning science? Yes!
Aren’t homeschoolers allowed to do school their own way, at their own pace, without worrying about adhering to a strict outline of what should be covered year by year? Absolutely!
And yet we never want to become complacent when it comes to providing a top-notch education for your children. So we constantly evaluate our programs to make sure the material is up-to-date, culturally sensitive, and in line with the most current, research-based instructional practices.
Updating Science to Stay Current
Science moves fast! And it’s hard to keep up! That’s why you see Science books being replaced in our packages when the technology pictured in them is more akin to what you might see in a museum than what you’d see in a modern lab or a 21st century home.
When new technology is released, we want your children to learn about it! So we periodically swap out books and add new content.
Updating Science Curriculum to Reassure Parents
With the influx of 2020 pandemic homeschoolers, we received more questions than ever about accreditation, state standards, standardized testing, and keeping kids on track so they don’t fall behind their peers. Many BookShark families feel a sense of reassurance to know that BookShark meets and exceeds state standards!
We love being able to provide that reassurance to you. BookShark works. It’s a solid curriculum. Kids love it, and kids get turned on to science as a result of this engaging program! Demonstrating how BookShark Science aligns with NGSS standards, for example, is just another way to affirm its high academic quality.
If standards don’t do much to impress you, you can safely ignore them, trusting that BookShark Science is still the robust, spiral approach curriculum you’ve loved for years.
Updating Science to Provide You a More Linear Experience
Over the years, we’ve gotten feedback from BookShark families who were confused about the weekly progression from reading to doing. Many times the end-of-week activity didn’t match the weekly reading. Although the Instructor’s Guide was purposely designed this way and in no way is a flaw in the educational structure, still many parents were uncomfortable with the jumping around.
We listened to your requests and designed a more linear program in which the weekly activity always aligns with the weekly reading. Was the older way deficient? Not at all, but this new structure provides a progression that families feel better about. And we want you to feel confident. So we flexed to your preferences!
But Why NGSS?
So of all the different standards in America, why did we pick Next Generation Science Standards when making Science curriculum updates?
First of all, NGSS standards are both widely accepted and academically solid. NGSS standards were created by states in conjunction with practicing scientists and science-based industries in a variety of fields. The goal was to enable America to continue innovating and leading in the sciences worldwide and to create science jobs for the future. A worthy cause, right?! We want your children to be those scientists and innovators of the future, so we used the NGSS to inform our curriculum updates.
And while the NGSS standards outline what to teach, they don’t preclude our natural methods of reading great books, discussing them, doing simple (no busy work) Activity Sheets, and then exploring with hands-on activities. The NGSS are standards, not curriculum. Thus BookShark Science remains true to our original design while also accommodating NGSS and giving you the more linear read-about-it-then-do-it sequence most parents prefer.
NGSS Is Not Common Core
You may be wondering if NGSS is another way of saying Common Core. No, NGSS and Common Core are different entities. NGSS standards are not a federally mandated or supported system and adherence to them is not tied to school or state funding. To learn more, including common misconceptions, read the FACT SHEET here.
NGSS Is About Application, Inquiry, and Discovery
There’s an important aspect of NGSS that we want you to be sure to know about. NGSS strongly emphasizes the application of science. In fact, the doing of science is more important than focusing on the facts behind science.
After all, facts are pretty easy to find in our digital age. What’s much harder is
knowing what questions to ask
learning how to process data and come to accurate conclusions
knowing how assimilate information across disciplines
grasping advanced processes
seeing how scientific principles apply to real-world situations
imagining the future of science
These thinking abilities—and a fascination with science itself—are our goals for your children. It’s not about rote memorization of the periodic table of elements or focusing on dates and definitions. While these things are included in BookShark science, we agree with the NGSS that learning is only complete when children can synthesize, draw conclusions, make educated guesses, and imagine innovative uses of technology yet to be developed.
Science Levels A through F
Visit each Science Package listing to see everything included, samples, and scope and sequence.
I wake up about the same time as the children. We have coffee and breakfast.
We do a few chores, and I do some work
Suddenly, it’s lunchtime.
After lunch, my youngest goes down for a nap, and we get down to the business of school.
Although some families swear by starting your homeschool day early, morning school is impractical for our family. I’m here to tell you that homeschooling is okay at any time of day!
I grew up in the homeschool world, and in those days, homeschooling moms spent a lot of time trying to copy each other or the homeschool celebrity they heard at a conference that year.
My mom spent hours creating schedules that we ultimately never used because they were not right for us. She often felt guilty for not following someone else’s schedule rather than feeling awesome about what she was able to accomplish (a lot).
For our family, afternoon homeschooling works best. We would not do well on a homeschool schedule that starts at 8 a.m. or even at 9 a.m.
My children and I are not morning people. The thought of getting up and immediately taxing our brains with school sounds exhausting. Morning school would cause needless frustration and tears in our home. Why should I adhere to the schedule of traditional school if I don’t have to?
In the mornings, Bo (age 3) is up early, and she is such a busy little bee that it is nearly impossible to focus on school while she is awake. Monkey (age 9) likes following a schedule she puts together includes starting school at 1 p.m.
The Benefits of Afternoon Homeschool
Homeschooling is just what it says—HOME schooling. Your homeschool should reflect the needs of your home. It doesn’t matter if you start school at 8 a.m. or even 8 p.m. if that is what works best for your family.
There are hundreds of reasons I can think of that make afternoon school ideal:
Extracurricular activities or doctor’s appointments in the morning
The only drawback with afternoon schooling is that you cannot skip it. If you procrastinate, it could easily get to be evening without any lessons having been completed. While this is okay occasionally or in short bursts, this could get you off track if it happens long-term. Even if you start school in the afternoon, it still requires discipline to sit down and teach the lessons each day.
We have defeated this challenge by creating a semi-structured afternoon schedule that helps keep us on track for school.
Learning Can Happen Any Time
Homeschooling is an amazing journey that provides flexibility and tailored learning in an environment unlike any other. Many top private schools work hard to create a home-like environment for their students that is precisely what we have in homeschooling. Your school does not, and should not, look like everyone else’s.
You chose to homeschool because it is best for your family. And if starting school in the afternoon is best for your family, then by all means skip morning school. We can enjoy our morning coffee guilt-free together!
About the Author
Brenda is a professional writer and homeschooling mother to two girls in Dallas, TX, with a passion for books, DIY, and creative education. Her blog, Schooling a Monkey, is all about homeschooling, crafts, green living, and fun.
My boys and I enjoy watching travel videos to supplement our homeschool explorations of history, geography, and sociology. We use videos in conjunction with books to gain a deeper grasp of the area of the globe that we are studying. Typically we will watch a clip or two from YouTube to get a feel for the country or continent beforediving into our reading. After viewing a clip, we like to talk about the most memorable part of each video, writing down a few facts that we learned or noting questions we’d like to find the answer to later.
Then as we work through our Instructor’s Guide, we sprinkle in more videos each day to further our learning. The switch from text to screen keeps my children highly engaged and focused. My favorite part is when they point out something we read that is repeated or portrayed in a video (or vice versa). When they make that connection, I know real learning is happening! They are listening and retaining the information!
Here are ten of our favorite YouTube videos for learning about the continent of South America:
This quick five and a half minute video from Discovery Education gives a broad overview of the entire continent. It takes a look at the various climates, the topography, and the people.
This forty-three minute documentary by National Geographic BBC takes us deep into the Amazon rainforest. It covers everything from animal behavior, symbiotic relationships, flora and fauna, and illegal deforestation of the rainforest.
This quick five-and-a-half-minute video by National Geographic gives a quick overview of fun things travelers like to do when exploring South America. Start your own travel bucket list based on this clip!
This seven-minute video by Holmwood Online Learning takes an in depth look at the country of Chile: its people, its history, and its diverse landscape.
This short five-minute travel video by BackPacker Steve brings the viewer along on a quick recap of some of the sights and activities not to be missed in the Equatorial County of Ecuador.
About the Author
Joanne Rawson is the author of the blog Our Unschooling Journey. Known around the web as Mother of 3, Joanne began her blog when she first started homeschooling her three boys in 2012. She lives in Connecticut with her family and enjoys reading, crafting, and traveling… all of which usually ends up on her blog.
With seven years of homeschooling I’ve racked up more than a few successes and failures, but nothing has been so black and white as our science journey. I’m sorry we wasted so much time but grateful we’ve finally found our perfect science fit. Here are six tips that would have gotten us learning and loving science much sooner.
#1 FAIL: Keep Using Science Curriculum No One Likes
We started out doing science with a grade-specific textbook for our oldest daughter. As time marched on and we added another student, we discovered that juggling two science programs was possible. I would sit down with each girl separately to read the assigned pages and ask the coordinating comprehension questions. But there wasn’t ever any additional discussion. They didn’t talk to each other about what they were learning, and they weren’t ever waiting at the door when their dad got home, bubbling with excitement over the new information they had learned.
Our time doing science didn’t cause any sparks; it was clear that we were just serving our time in order to check science off the daily to-do list. Unfortunately, there seemed to be a disconnect between my kids’ innate interest in all things animal, weather, or nature-related and how disinterested they were during our science time. It didn’t make sense, but we kept plodding on.
#2 FAIL: Stop Doing Science Altogether
The walk from the couch to the school bookshelf took approximately seven steps when it was time to start art or literature. Oddly enough when it was time to grab a science or handwriting book, the floor expanded to approximately seven hundred foot-draggy steps, complete with moaning. Ultimately, we threw in the towel when our third child, accurately dubbed The Tornado, skipped walking and graduated right to running at one. I didn’t have the time or energy to keep multiple science plates spinning, especially with the song and dance required to keep my kids motivated. To be honest, I wasn’t all that excited about those science textbooks either, and I couldn’t fabricate enough curiosity for all of us while chasing The Tornado.
We took a break from the textbooks, which meant stepping back from science, too.
#3 FAIL: Attempt to Design a Whole Curriculum from Scratch
Our break didn’t last very long since I couldn’t shake the feeling that I was letting my kids down by leaving big gaps in their education without science.
I tried following several book lists and checking out science-themed books from the library, but that required lots of free mom-time I didn’t have. I spent too many precious hours trying to figure out charts of topics, wondering if I was missing a major -ology.
The books we did bring home, however, were devoured without any pushing on my part. We were getting closer to a solution. I sensed that winning was just around the corner.
#1 WIN: Trust a Solid Curriculum Plan
Reading about another family’s success with BookShark this past spring got my curriculum-investigating wheels turning. It didn’t take long to see that it might offer a solution for our science-loving, but textbook-hating, multi-level family.
We settled on one science program that we’d all do together BookShark’s Science D. My kids clock in at ages 10, 9, 6, 4, and 1 1/2. It’s already a zoo, even before baby number six arrives this winter. The option of doing science as a family with a single science program is ideal.
Spiral Science Homeschool Program
Based on our experience, I knew that a literature-based, hands-on program would work well for our family. What I didn’t realize was how BookShark’s spiral approach is perfect for multi-level families like ours. With the spiral approach, students explore a wide range of content with the understanding that they will cover those same topics in greater depth several times in the future. My school-age children who can’t read can still listen and help us complete the experiments without being shamed for not being able to answer all the same questions as their older siblings.
The best part?I don’t have to organize that master plan. I don’t have to remember when or how to cover topics. Experts have already thought through exactly when to cover and re-cover every topic. It’s one less thing (more like one hundred fewer things) for me to worry about.
#2 WIN: Go Beyond the Textbook
In my past homeschool science teacher life, I wanted to figure out appropriate experiments or find the perfect coordinating videos online. But it just took too much time. I half-heartedly checked out some hands-on science books from the library, flipped through them, and quietly slipped them into the return box without showing the kids, feeling like a failure for not doing more.
By blending hands-on activities and experiments, high quality literature, and videos, all my kids can get something out of what we’re doing this year with BookShark. Obviously my preschooler and my middle schooler won’t finish the year with all the same factoids floating around in their minds, but they will have memories of completing experiments together.
They each glean what they can from the books we read, and I know that they’re internalizing so much more than they would otherwise.
#3 WIN: Have Fun
We spent far too long dreading science in our homeschool. I reached that sorry conclusion when I was unpacking all our BookShark science supplies for this year while my kids looked on. They weren’t drooling -because that would be weird -but they were pretty much drooling. They were so excited to see how the materials in the little supply box were going to get put to use, and I had to squirrel away the included books so they wouldn’t be read secretly under covers in the dead of night with a flashlight ahead of time. They flipped out at the thought that sometime this year we would be growing our own popcorn. Popcorn! When my husband came home that night, he could barely squeeze inside due to four little people at the door, bursting to tell him about all that science holds for us this year.
The moral of our story is that we can win at science whether we have one child or ten, if only we just give them the right tools to enjoy it.
About the Author
Alicia Schonhardt lives in Iowa with her husband and five homeschooled kids. She loves reading aloud with all the right voices and pretending to be crafty. She is not-so-great at planning and organization but dabbles in minimalism, so it isn’t quite so tricky. With two medically needy kids, Alicia strives to choose happiness even when things are hard. She blogs at Sweeping Up Joy, about finding beauty and humor in life right now, even when it’s hidden behind piles of laundry and chewed up books.
I am the product of public school, and cannot say enough how much I loved my experiences growing up. Yes, I stumbled across a few bad apples during my 13 years as a public school student—one overtly racist teacher, one teacher who made no attempts to hide his very pleased gaze, one teacher who cursed like a sailor, and more. But overall I knew that these teachers were not representative of the profession as a whole, and I truly loved school.
When it came time for my own children to start school, it was a no-brainer. Public school was the only option. I’d loved it, my husband had loved it, and our kids were going to love it.
And they did… for a while.
My oldest child is a people-pleaser and brilliant—exactly the kind of student every teacher would want in their class. He makes their jobs easier and never makes waves. My middle child, however… well, if you have more than one child, you’re aware of how very different that second born child tends to be from the first!
When My Child Became a Target
My middle child is not an easy student. He is profoundly gifted, sarcastic. He questions everything he learns, which is an admirable quality in an adult but not one that is so warmly embraced in a classroom of over 20 children. He was already several years ahead of where his classroom curriculum was teaching, and he is not the kind of child to sit quietly and wait patiently to be challenged.
Eventually this middle child of mine became a target. Not by his peers nor by the parents of the other children. No, instead he found himself in the crosshairs of members of the school administration. Actual adults who showed up to work every day at a school, supposedly dedicated to the care and advancement of children, went out of their way to chastise, dismiss, constrain, and persecute an 8-year-old child.
His hard-fought IEP paperwork was never filed legally; his accommodations were intentionally dismissed. One staff member in particular made it her mission to knock my son from his presumed pedestal and jeopardized his mental health in alarming ways. When he was intentionally placed in a classroom his IEP strictly forbade him from entering, she said, “He should be able to handle it.” When his extensive IQ testing hinted at possible dysgraphia, she said, “If he’s this smart, he’ll be able to figure it out.” The real doozy, though, the jewel in the cruel crown this adult bully wore, was when she filed a bullying report against my son because of his high IQ. “He can run circles around the other students with his vocabulary, and there’s no way they could keep up.” You read that right. Because my son has an extensive vocabulary, she had him formally declared a bully.
Are you mad yet? Because I sure was.
In fact, I spent most of his few years in public school seething with rage. I had other children at this school, and they definitely never encountered these issues. My youngest had several years ahead of him at this school, so I didn’t want to rock the boat too much. Teachers are often protected by layers of bureaucracy and paperwork. What exactly could I do?
I could do anything my child needed, and I’ll tell you how to do the same. Here are my angry-mom tips on what to do when your child is being bullied by a teacher.
1. Document Everything
This is the most important step and the first thing you should start doing. Every story that your child comes home with, immediately record it in any way you can. Type the details into emails, record with your phone, make note of the date, names of any other children who may have witnessed what happened, your child’s emotional state… all of it. Any emails that you receive from the bullying teacher, save them. If your class has a Facebook group or an app where photos of daily activitiesare shared, look carefully to see what your child is doing in them. Is he placed in a corner, away from the fun? Is he being left out? Is he unhappy and to the side? Save these, date them, and document everything.
2. Work Up the Ladder
Once you have documentation to back up your complaints, start by sending an email to the principal, outlining your issues. Be sure to copy any vice principals, the grade level chair, and possibly even the superintendent’s office. Don’t start with the superintendent, but don’t be afraid to include them either. Every level of leadership in your school district has a higher level they’re accountable to, and sometimes it takes seeing their boss’s name on an email to get your complaint taken seriously.
Request an in-person meeting with the principal. If you still are not satisfied or if you feel dismissed, then proceed up the ladder. And remember to keep documenting everything along the way, copying the next person up the leadership ladder on every email you send.
3. Stay Squeaky
I am a non-confrontational person by nature. I don’t like rocking the boat, ruffling feathers, or calling people out. But when it became apparent that my discomfort with confrontation was costing my child in mental wellness (and allowing an adult to bully a child), I had to get loud.
You’ve heard the saying that the squeaky wheel gets the grease, right? The same is true when advocating for your child. You will have to get loud, frequently. You will have to send emails, lots of them.
You will have to tackle the feeling that your requested meetings are inconvenient to administrators, stop hoping that everyone in the room likes you, and get squeaky. Squeak all over that office. Squeak in every meeting. Don’t let your concerns be quieted with charm and half-attempts at justice. Don’t let your child pay the price for being uncomfortable calling out people in power.
Squeak for your child.
Squeak and squeak and squeak until someone finally realizes your wheel really does need the grease.
4. Consider Your Alternatives
Sometimes, despite the most meticulous documentation, running appropriately up the ladder, and squeaking non-stop, nothing gets changed. Sometimes a teacher’s bullying behaviors may be dismissed, allowed, or even defended. Sometimes the one-size-fits-all model of public education just doesn’t fit all, and you have to consider your options.
Keep your child in the same school. You will have to be a constant presence in the office, advocating and fighting and squeaking, making a full time job out of hoping the school does the right thing.
Consider private schools. These schools are often not within most families’ budgets, and as they are not bound by the same standards and requirements as public schools, you could very well find yourself in a similar situation with fewer avenues of accountability.
Look into homeschooling. It’s not what you think it is, and it’s not what it used to be. Use this guide as a starting point. There are near-countless opportunities for the ever-important socialization worry, co-ops, parental support groups, and freedoms. Programs like BookShark empower a parent to lead their child in academics with a flexible 4-day week that eases the transition from working parent to a homeschooling parent.
Run for a seat on your city’s school board. If being a squeaky wheel hasn’t afforded you the opportunity to see change, then perhaps becoming a part of the wheel will allow you the influence to begin steering it.
Should you ever find yourself in a situation where your child has become the target of a bullying adult, where your child’s mental health and educational well-being are jeopardized because someone in power cannot control their own biased feelings and actions, you are not alone, and you are not helpless. You can fight for your child. You don’t need to make friends with everyone on staff. You walk your child through those front doors as a pathway to their future, not your own popularity. Risk your reputation for your child. Squeak for your child. Do whatever you need, whatever is best, whatever will rescue your child and put them in an educational option with an adult who truly cares for them. Your hard work may end up saving future children from the same abuse.
About Our Author
Jennifer Vail proudly lives in the great state of Texas with her very handsome husband and three very funny children. All three kids are educated in three very different ways according to their very different needs, which is exhausting but fulfilling. Jen’s hobbies include naps, 90’s pop culture, Netflix binges, buying books with the best of intentions to read them all, photography, and extroverting. She holds a degree in counseling but has found her calling by writing for and spending time with families of differently-wired, outlier kids—the square pegs of the round world.
She stays up way too late and drinks way too much caffeine, but has no intention of changing either. She is the community manager and contributing author at Raising Lifelong Learners where she writes about homeschooling gifted, anxious, and otherwise different kiddos, but also rambles at This Undeserved Life from time to time. She feels compelled to mention that she still very much loves the Backstreet Boys and rarely folds her laundry.
Parenting a child with ADHD is difficult. For a mom with ADHD, though, it can feel nearly overwhelming.
There are the typical symptoms of ADHD, which often pose a challenge to a person’s ability to think clearly on demand. But, since parents with ADHD are more likely to have children who also have the disorder, these moms may struggle to manage both their own symptoms and those of their child.
How can moms with ADHD cope with the stresses of their own lives while parenting and homeschooling successfully? These tips for the ADHD mom can help. (Really! I use them!)
Tips for Living as a Mom with ADHD
Do one thing at a time. Multi-tasking is almost impossible for moms with ADHD. Giving each task full attention reduces the likelihood of mistakes and becoming overwhelmed.
Delegate. Moms already have a lot of responsibilities, so it’s easy to become burdened with things to do. Teaching kids to help out around the house can make this load easier to bear.
Be realistic. No mother should have to be a superhero. Being reasonable about the amount of things that can be done each day will help to avoid frustration.
Parenting as a Mom with ADHD
Slow down. Moms with ADHD may experience racing thoughts that can make it difficult to parent with patience. To avoid a meltdown, try to slow down and approach each situation calmly.
Develop a routine. A predictable routine can make it easier to structure the day ahead. Keep things simple by developing a natural rhythm that can be followed by everyone in the family.
Expect the unexpected. Parenting is full of unexpected moments. While a routine is helpful, it cannot predict the events that will arise each day. Ease stress by giving yourself time to manage last-minute needs that kids may have.
Homeschooling as a Mom with ADHD
Focus on the essentials. Some mothers who have ADHD may tend toward hyper-intensive planning. Since homeschooling already requires a fair amount of planning, these mothers may overwhelm themselves with lesson plans, activities, and state objectives. Instead, concentrate on the most important subjects and approach the others with a more relaxed method.
Use a block schedule. Unlike timed schedules, which require that each lesson be completed by a certain time, block schedules consist of time slots for each subject. This routine can be easier for moms with ADHD to follow because it allows for structure without adding the stress of a timed deadline.
Be flexible. No matter how well in advance a lesson is planned, homeschooling parents will always need to make adjustments. If a child dislikes a curriculum or if the lesson doesn’t get completed, learn to be flexible enough to move a lesson to another date or remove it from the plan completely. As long as the objectives are covered each year, the actual method doesn’t really matter.
Get help. Some homeschooling moms put pressure on themselves to teach every subject. Instead, enlist the help of family members or friends to help kids with some subjects. This frees up the parent to focus on the material that she can enjoy learning with the kids.
Living with ADHD will never be easy. Using these tips, though, can make some of the most difficult aspects of life with this disorder manageable for moms. In fact, even moms without ADHD will probably benefit from applying these same survival skills.
About the Author
Selena is a homeschooling graduate and a veteran homeschooling mother of four, including three with ADHD. She and her husband, Jay, use an eclectic homeschooling approach to encourage their children to learn throughout their lives. Selena blogs about her family’s homeschooling adventures every week at Look! We’re Learning!
Are you studying ancient civilizations for homeschool history, for example BookShark Level A or BookShark Level G? If so, you will probably find that ancient Egypt is one of the most fascinating topics you’ll cover. In addition to your scheduled reading, your child will probably enjoy supplementing with interactive, hands-on activities.
Are these extra activities necessary? Not at all! But some families truly enjoy making crafts and engaging in creative projects, and when those activities can connect to homeschool history lessons, it’s all the better. Here are five relatively simple hands-on activities for ancient Egypt that you can do in your kitchen with supplies you already have in your home.
Activity 1: Mummify an Apple
If you search online, you’ll find all sorts of things that you can mummify, including a chicken. If you’d prefer something a little smaller (and possibly less gruesome), try mummifying an apple!
Take a large tin can and drill holes in the bottom (so the liquid can drain).
Cut an apple into quarters.
Put the apple in the tin can.
In a separate bowl, mix together 1 cup salt and 1 cup baking soda. Pour this mixture over the apple and set in a place where the liquid can drain.
Wait two months before digging out your mummified apple!
As an alternative, you can mummify several apples, all in different containers, and take one out every two weeks to see the mummification process as it occurs. This way, your history lesson overlaps into a science experiment!
Activity 2: Build a Sugar Cube Pyramid
Buy a box or two of sugar cubes and ingredients for plain white icing (not frosting).
Have your child figure out how big the base of the pyramid should be based on the number of sugar cubes that you have. She’ll need to determine how many sugar cubes will make up the base and how many levels will be built from there. (Math!)
Use a piece of sturdy cardboard or a baking sheet as a base. Then simply use white icing as glue to hold the cubes together. If you don’t want to eat the creation later, you could lightly spray it with tan paint or even create an elaborate diorama around it, complete with sand, tiny camels, and the Nile river.
Activity 3: Build a Toothpick and Marshmallow Pyramid
If you’d like to build a bigger pyramid than the sugar cube one, try building a pyramid out of toothpicks and miniature marshmallows. The marshmallows connect the ends of the toothpicks, so your child can easily build a very large pyramid.
Activity 4: Write Your Name in Hieroglyphs
Print out this translation of the alphabet in hieroglyphs (PDF) and have your child practice writing his or her name. Or try your hand at simple sentences summarizing facts about ancient Egypt for an innovative way to narrate your history lesson. Use the colors traditionally used in ancient Egyptian art to embellish the cartouches you create: green, red, blue, yellow, white, and black.
Edible Project 5: Mummy Dogs
This project is silly and not a bit authentic. But it’s fun, so it’s perfect for the little kids. You’ll need one package of hot dogs and a container of crescent rolls.
Put one crescent roll on the counter and with a knife, slit it into narrow strips on each side, while leaving the middle intact. Put the hot dog in the middle, and wrap the hot dog with the crescent strips. Make sure to leave a space for the face. Bake as directed, and then use a dot of ketchup to make the eyes.
Edible Project 6: Date Balls
What a yummy snack! You’ll need 1 cup dried, pitted dates, ½ cup walnuts, two tablespoons water. In a food processor, mix together the dates, walnuts, and water. Puree until a paste consistency. Roll these into balls and enjoy.
Optionally, you can coat the balls first in 2 tablespoons of honey and then in ¼ cup crushed almonds.
If hands-on projects and cooking experiments make you crazy, remember, you don’t have to do these to give your children a top-notch education. But if you find you are in a rut, the kids are getting antsy, or you have especially artistic children who are hankering for more crafts, try adding a project into your week on your fifth day without BookShark lessons. If anything else, you will have special family bonding time and you’ll be keeping your kids away from screens for a few minutes. Don’t worry about the product you are creating. Even if it doesn’t turn out quite right, the experience itself is worthwhile.
