I just had a wonderful morning of homeschooling. It was full of exactly why I love my decision to homeschool my kids. We started out reading the book "How to Bake an Apple Pie and See the World". That led to checking out our world map and finding all the different countries...Italy, France, Sri Lanka, England, Jamaica and back to the United States. Then we explored our map and found all the different oceans, which led to finding the capitals of various countries. We talked about our summer vacation to our capital, Washington D.C.
The discussion of D.C. turned into a discussion about our three branches of government. That led to discussing how a bill becomes a law. We made up some silly laws and talked about why they would be ridiculous. :) We talked about some real laws and why they were necessary.
One law we talked about was in regards to illegal drugs, which led to us discussing where they come from and why people want them. We talked a bit about Colombia and the impact that the illegal drug trade was having on a country that is tied to the girls' heritage.
All of that led us to a discussion on war and why they are fought. We talked about World War II and our recent war with Iraq. We talked about September 11th and what it means to have national pride.
We tied it all up by having apples for a snack and talking about how to make an apple pie. All in all it was a great day to homeschool. My kids gained lot of new knowledge that led to meaningful discussions and we got to have a yummy snack.
Ah....I can just imagine your sigh of satisfaction after such a wonderfully rich homeschooling day! And your kids will remember much of what you talked about because it was meaningful to them at the time - it had context and relevance within your conversation.
ReplyDeleteDon't you just love the fact that you have the time to talk to them about things like this...things that aren't necessarily in the Scope and Sequences of their respective grade levels, but things that enrich them as human beings?