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24 Borderline Genius Ways To Relieve Language Arts Boredom

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It can be challenging to add fun to homeschool subjects that can become stale and boring, like language arts. After all, how can you possibly jazz up phonics?

Today, I’m sharing 24 borderline genius ways to relieve language arts boredom.

24 Borderline Genius Ways to Relieve Language Arts Boredom @ Tina's Dynamic Homeschool Plus

Sparking a Love for Language

Too, some of these tips can be used across multiple ages and other ideas will apply to only certain ages, but it will get your creative juices flowing.

  • Try a scavenger hunt. This was a life saver for me while teaching my middle son phonics and sight words. And it doesn’t take long to set up. Use index cards, flashcards  or sticky notes and hide them around the house.
  • Send cards to grandma. For reluctant writers, sending a card to grandma or to extended family gives his writing a sense of purpose. 
  • Find a pen pal. A pen pal encourages a budding writer and other kids are not so judgmental of writing; it gives the novice writer a place to express his creative outlet whether it’s Lego playing, paper engineering or coding.
  • Learn phonics, through nuts and bolts, make a tube, use letter cubes, create flip books, dig for them, rhyme it, make a phonics phone, an I spy game, make clip cards,  and make an ant mobile.
  • Go Fish.  By grabbing more than one card deck, I wrote on the card and then the boys played together matching up sight words. Simple.
  • Bingo. A fun way to learn letters, phonics, grammar and sight words.

More Language Arts Activities

  • Add magnetic letters or puzzles to the refrigerator. My boys loved to stand and learn and the refrigerator was the perfect pallet.
  • Scrabble, Jr. And my boys never tired of games that were fun.
  • Combine P.E/phonics. Though I never recommend jumping off furniture in the house, it was the only way I could get one son to recite the vowels and sight words. He would jump off the couch and clap. Of course, this can be done outside when the weather is good, but at the time he was learning, it was pretty cold outside. So we did P.E. inside.

  • Go see a Shakespeare play. The local college in our area hosted several plays throughout the year and it was a fun way for my boys to learn about subjects they initially found boring like Shakespeare.
  • Make up a funny story. I would have the boys narrate back to me a silly story using the sight words or phonics word they were using. The sillier the better.
  • Vocaroo. Your kids will love recording their voices so they can write back what they recorded.
  • Mad Libs. They are always a hit in our home and anytime we could move away from a textbook or workbook to do a mad lib story, we did.
  • Do crossword puzzles to learn spelling. Lists are a great way to learn spelling but crossword puzzles breathe life into learning spelling.

  • A real audience counts for writing. Writers of any level are inspired when they have a breathing human being on the other end reading their creative expression. From elementary to high school writers, they can start a blog or enter creative writing contests.
  • Have your kids keep a journal of words or phrases they find amusing. The first time my kids heard me use the phrase come-uppins or come-uppance they said it all day long. I never dreamed it was so comical, but apparently it is. They added it to their journal.
  • Turn a book into a unit study. Look at a unit study about Charlotte’s Web.
  • I love this idea of using matchbooks to do chapter summaries in a novel.

Though it may seem that only science, history and art are easier to bring to life, language arts is the glue that bind the other subjects.

Teach language arts in a way that makes reading, spelling, phonics and even poetry a delight because when a child can read and write well, he nourishes his mind for a lifetime. What a gift!


Grab some other tips. How To Teach Your Homeschooled Children Shakespeare, Shakespeare Unit Study Starters and Free Middle and High School Homeschool Language Arts.

Hugs and love ya,

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Don’t forget to follow BOTH of my Pinterest accounts for AWESOME pins.

Visit Tina Robertson’s profile on Pinterest.


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Teach Your Homeschooled Teen the Art of Studying (without nagging)

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How to Teach Your Homeschooled Teen the Art of Studying (without nagging) @ Tina's Dynamic Homeschool Plus

Teaching your homeschooled teen the art of studying is a bit like not having a parent’s manual that comes with your kids when they enter the world. Well – almost.

Resources exist overwhelmingly for teaching teens study skills in public schools, but teaching our kids at home can give us a slight edge.

However, it only becomes an advantage if we tap into teaching them how to study along the way. Teaching a teen study skills can be frustrating if you don’t begin when they are young.

How to Spoon-Feed a Homeschooled Teen

Learning should be active and not passive. Spoon-feeding and hovering over our teens won’t propel them to learn the art of studying.

Look at 3 things I learned when teaching a teen to study.

One/ Self-instruction is a must.

Many kids do not do well in public school because they feel trapped with confinements on what they should learn. Avoiding the popular notion that teens need a lot of supervision gives teens a chance to experience independence.

Raising independent and self-taught learners means bucking the current system period.

I learned as I have homeschooled longer to give up the control while supervising them. It begins with self-instruction in what your child is interested in.

Starting out, this doesn’t mean a child guides himself completely because not all children are inclined to even attempt learning the boring things.

Many days teaching my three teens has been more difficult and mentally taxing then when they were toddlers because you have to talk with them not at them as they learn self-governing independence.

And yes there should be sanctions when a teen is not self-studying and is wasting time. But there is a reason a teen is wasting time and it’s called unmotivated.

Two/ Motivation is a GREAT incentive.

Motivation for studying what interests a teen comes first, then self-instruction, not the other way around.

In other words, you can’t expect a teen to be self-taught and independent without him having a compelling reason to be. You can’t just heap subjects onto him, like when he was in elementary grades and then expect him to do them. That was your job then, but it’s not when he is a teen.

Micromanaging in the teen years breeds rebellion and you may end up having an adult child that won’t speak to you. Don’t let that happen.

And don’t make the mistake of swinging to the other end of the pendulum and give him total self-governing.

Teen Study Skills

Don’t stress over it, but look at these sanity-saving tips to gradually dole out independence, which then teaches your teen the art of studying.

  • Choose a topic in a subject. As soon as your child demonstrates a bit of independence, recognize it by allowing him to choose a topic in a subject that you require. Don’t ask him to cover science, but require it. But give him the choice, for example, of studying about rocks, magnets or a bird. For us this happened close to second grade for one child, close to sixth grade for another and closer to middle school for another son.
  • Then, choose subjects. After you have exposed your child to well-rounded out subjects, then give him the choices of which subjects to cover. This normally happens around middle and high school.
  • Give him checklists, organize drawers and student planners to gauge progress. Give him a checklist or some way of knowing what he is doing for the day and when he is finished. The art of how to study can be diminished when your expectations are not clear. Not only are you giving your child clear expectations, but you are doing something VERY important lasting him on into adulthood, which is teaching him how to create expectations, goals and standards for himself. How to study includes setting incremental goals and meeting them. He needs accountability to you first, then next to himself. Early on I set up drawers for each child and in the order I chose for him to cover the subject. That model morphed into choices they made later on as to which subjects they wanted to cover first. I also created student planners and my oldest son enjoyed that the most. My youngest son enjoys taking notes on his iPad. And another son likes picture doodling and part words as he note takes. Each child is different.

organized-drawers-promotes-self-teaching-and-independence-tinas-dynamic-homeschool-plus

  • Listen. More importantly, teens want to be heard. Listen and back him up by letting him try his idea. The best place and time to fail from an idea he had is while he is living with you so he can learn.
  • Take him with you to choose curriculum. My boys made a trip with me to the convention fair each year. If they didn’t have a preference in curriculum, they got a chance to look it over anyway.
  • Teach him his learning style and then help him learn that way. Don’t push your way of learning. I know, I’m probably one of the caring pushiest moms ever, but not all of my boys learn the way I do. Use color coding markers, use a written planner, use an online planner, use an iPad, music in the background works for one son (not me), quiet space for another son, flashcards, index cards and writing in a book (yes allowed). Be willing to move from your comfort zone to the learning zone your child works best in.

Teach Consequences But Evaluate Consequence Too

Three/ Consequences is a must.

Learning how to learn means that your child needs consequences, both bad and good for his habits. Shielding our child or always telling them everything not matter how well-intended can turn to nagging.

When I was a teen, I did learn by example. Not all teens learn that way and some have to experience pain.

Teaching my boys that learning by example is more preferable than learning always by experience was important to me, but my boys have to be willing to accept that mindset.

Teaching teens is not always a two-way street, so be prepared for times when they have to suffer bad consequences.

A bad grade worked for one son, but it didn’t for another one.

Telling my son to think about what others will think about him and the example he set worked for another son. He didn’t want to hear my opinion, but teaching him to evaluate what he was going to do or not do when applying himself to how he studied made him think how he would appear to others.

I’ve found that clear consequences, even writing them down has been a useful guide in prodding my teens in the right direction.

After all, college, life and career are full of on the job rules, regulations and earning respect. Don’t forget to teach them at home.

This is the tip of the iceberg of things I’ve learned as two of my sons have now entered the adulthood.

And when your adult sons tell you often how much they deeply value what you taught them about how to study, you won’t be able to hold back tears.

When you take time to teach your teens how to study, you teach them for a lifetime.

Grab my Free Student Planner, 3 Unique Things a Homeschooled Teen Learns From a Teacher’s Manual and I found this book, The Art of Self-Directed Learning: 23 Tips For Giving Yourself an Unconventional Education very inspirational.

Hugs and love ya,

Signature T

Don’t forget to follow BOTH of my Pinterest accounts for AWESOME pins.

Visit Tina Robertson’s profile on Pinterest.


Visit Tinas Dynamic Homeschool ‘s profile on Pinterest.

10 Biggest Homeschool Burnout Triggers (and how to cope)

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This post may contain affiliate links. For more information, please see my full disclosure policy.

10 Biggest Homeschool Burnout Triggers (and how to cope)

No matter what you do, positive person or not or how well-organized you are, homeschool burnout looms because the 10 biggest homeschool burnout triggers are linked to life. Avoiding the unexpected is not possible, but you can plan for the unexpected.

Look at these 10 biggest homeschool burnout triggers and a tip or two on how to cope. Besides, instead of telling you how wonderful homeschooling will be, I want you prepared to dig your heels in when times are tough.

One/A pregnancy (complicated or not).

It may seem obvious that a pregnancy causes burnout, but when you have pregnancy brain it can seem otherwise. Somehow I thought I could keep on pushing because we were in a school year.

It took my third pregnancy before I actually planned activities when I would have to stop and rest.

Laid up on the couch and on bed rest for a few weeks, I pulled out activities for my preschooler and kindergartner, which nowadays are called busy bag activities.

Key to keeping your kids entertained and learning is to have everything they need for an activity in a bag. I could get up once, pull down several activities from the closet and have my two boys sit at my feet on the couch while we learned.

Two/ A long term sickness whether it’s your immediate or extended family.

In addition to pregnancy, I have experienced an ICU stay for my husband, an ICU stay for my sister and a long-term facility care for my mother-in-law.

At the time, it can seem that your life will never return to normal. It might not and may be changed. But change is also part of homeschooling.

I did four things to cope with what seemed like insurmountable stress.

  • I divided our school subjects in half and did half one day and the other half the next day.
  • I bought each kid a backpack so that we could learn on the go and moved our schoolroom into the backpacks.
  • I purchased easy workbooks because this is the time to use them.
  • I purchased an online subscription to Time4Learning.

Avoiding Top Homeschool Burnout Triggers

Three/ The transition to high school.

You will eventually get to high school and hear my heart when I say that is not the time to quit, but it may seem like it at the time.

If you have a rebellious teen it can make this time period worse.  One tip I learned was to be sure that your teen has a say in what he wants to learn and pursue.

Don’t feel like you have to give up everything you have dreamed of for your child, but know that they are entering adulthood and are a unique person.

Part of being a unique person is recognizing their interests, strengths and weaknesses and then allowing them explore them. When you’re at this point in your journey, remember what brought you to homeschooling, which is being able to raise a unique individual.

Instead of throwing in the towel and sending your kid to public school, work with him and decide whether or not an online high school is an option. Some kids do better by answering to somebody else.

My boys never had to experience this, but we also homeschooled from the beginning, which I have learned makes a huge difference.  If your child has had other teachers besides you, he may view that as normal.

Be willing to compromise, but not give up your standards always makes for a fair way of getting through the high school years.

Four/ When homeschool planning is overly ambitious.

Guilty as charged. I can always tell newer homeschoolers or homeschoolers who will burnout quickly by the exhaustive lists of homeschool subjects they think they will cover.

Writing it down is key to being sure your list is doable.

When you simply list it, and not plug a homeschool subject into a time slot on your day, it stays as overly ambitious. The next step is hitting a brick wall and burnout follows.

Overly ambitious homeschooling can backfire with sad consequences.

I have known families through the years that have lost their teens because they would not yield or compromise their plans. How sad.

Look at the tips on my three part series What Homeschool Subjects to Teach and When to Teach Them and Divide And Conquer The Ever Growing List of Homeschool Subjects.

Five/ Too many fun activities outside the house.

There have been years that we have been able to do more than other years, but balance is the key no matter how fun are the activities.

This is also exacerbated by how many kids you have. Don’t think that a mom with an only child can’t fall into this trap by trying to be sure her kid gets a social life.

Whether you are a mom of many or an only, your child needs you. There is no substitute for your guidance. Be selective on choosing outside activities and one thing I did when my kids wanted different ones was to alternate them each week.

One week we did art and the next week we did music to satisfy all of my kids. We went slower, but all of my kids benefited from mixing up and cutting back our activities.

Six/ Too many volunteer projects by mom.

When I conducted workshops, many of the moms confessed how many volunteer programs they were a part of.

I encourage you to make your family priority. Even good and worthy volunteering projects can add stress and cause burnout when it’s not necessary. As kids grow older and circumstances change, I have been able to do more things I enjoy.

From Daunting to Doable

Seven/ Failing to plan is planning to fail. It’s true.

The opposite end of overly ambitious planning is feeling like your wings would be clipped if you followed a more scripted schedule.

It takes time to find a middle ground that suits your unique personality. Key to success is knowing your personality and knowing how to rein yourself in.

For example, I know that I tend to be a drill sergeant and have my kids march to the minutes on a schedule (nobody liked me when I first started homeschooling).

All these years I have worked on being more flexible by following more of a block schedule or scheduling zones of times.

If you have the opposite problem, then start by scheduling things for 15 minutes at a time until you find a rhythm to fit your style. You can even use a timer in the beginning as you get the feel for the amount of time needed for a subject.

Training yourself to move through your day accomplishing what you plan without pushing you and your kids will lead to a productive and meaningful day.

Eight/ Job loss or change.

Coping with several of these changes too, I learned to cut back my school to just the core subjects as we adjusted to a new schedule or change in income.

We have owned our own business and my husband has worked 7 days a week for 12 hours days. In all the cases of job changes, I have allowed myself a month or so to adjust to the schedule. For example, when my husband worked 12 hours a day for 7 days a week, I got my kids up early as well so that they were ready for bed at the same time as my husband.

If you don’t get the rest of your household in sync with your husband’s schedule and try to maintain different family schedules, it can trigger stress.

Nine/Moving.

When we moved, I always thought I could keep on homeschooling during that stressful time. I learned that learning to pack and moving can come under Home Economics if you train your children while moving.

My boys always wanted to help pack and looking at the positive, moving is a wonderful time to declutter.

Instead of thinking that our schooling was being interrupted, I viewed that time as our time off of school. Of course we had to make up but it’s so much more easier making up when you choose to take time off to move.

Ten/ Unbending, inflexible, stubborn and immovable and no it’s not the toddler.

Flexible, bending and reasonable didn’t exactly abound in my life or should I say they are not my best qualities. However, homeschooling has a way of seasoning you to showcase those qualities.

Learning to adjust your homeschool course, accepting you and your kids shortcomings and allowing others to help you when you need it, keeps you on the sane road to homeschooling.

By giving you this heads up on things that you may experience in your journey, I hope you can enjoy the high moments that you will encounter and remember that the lows will pass.

Also, look at 4 Reasons Your Homeschooled Child is Uninspired To Learn (and what to do) and 3 Tips from the Pros Before You Become a Homeschool Educator.

Hugs and love ya,

Signature T

Don’t forget to follow BOTH of my Pinterest accounts for AWESOME pins.

Visit Tina Robertson’s profile on Pinterest.


Visit Tinas Dynamic Homeschool ‘s profile on Pinterest.

7 Homeschool Lies I Want to Tell My Younger Self

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This post may contain affiliate links. For more information, please see my full disclosure policy.

Seven homeschoool lies I want to tell my younger self remind me of how homeschooling is not always easy.

Homeschool Lies

7 Homeschool Lies I Want to Tell My Younger Self. Why do we do that? Grab some super helpful, not shallow tips @ Tina's Dynamic Homeschool Plus

Having the courage to chase away secret homeschool fears is not easy to do when you’re a new homeschooler.

You’re worried about doing everything right; I was no different when I was new to homeschooling.

Fear was one of the biggest obstacles to overcoming homeschooling. If I could turn back time, I would share these 7 homeschool lies to my younger self.

When the Biggest Obstacle to Overcoming Homeschooling is YOU

ONE/ “Tina, don’t fall for it a bit. Your three year old won’t be behind by the time you get to high school.”

Focusing less on what if my children are going to get behind instead of delighting where they were at would have helped me to teach and savor the here and now moment.

TWO/ “Tina, girl, you know you love Star Wars, so remember what Yoda said. There is no try. Do or do not.”

Even coming from a family where my mom homeschooled my youngest sister, I wished my thinking was less of I’m going to try it for a year and more of what an important life changing decision my family had made.

If I had viewed beginning to homeschool like my commitment to having a child, being a new mom, having a new marriage or making big move to a place where you can’t go back, I would have stressed less.

Realizing more time should have been spent on making homeschool a lifestyle change would have been a better use of my time.

THREE/ “Tina, why didn’t you let the boys watch TV more even when school was finished?”

Instead of focusing on extreme rules for our house like not having a tv and no video games, I should have worked more on finding a balance instead of creating extreme schedules for my little kids.

Realizing that some homeschoolers don’t have a tv in their home by choice is good for their family but not ours.

My family likes tv, video games, and techie play things. A balance would have been so much better for us.

FOUR/ “Why didn’t you go out during school hours, Tina? What were you afraid of?

I wished I would have changed my school schedule earlier than I did instead of thinking that during the day I couldn’t go out because it was school hours.

Little did I know that even though I lived in Bodunk, U.S.A., homeschoolers are oozing by the thousands.

Most people have heard of it before. I was the new one, not homeschooling.

FIVE/ “Girl, you’re stressing way too much by prepping Mr. Senior 2013 for visits by grandma. Why do you feel the need to prove to others that you are exactly what your sons need when it comes to teaching them?”

I wished I would have worried less about proving my homeschool success to my in-laws, outlaws, and any other family relationship that I may not have wanted to claim kinship to and focused more on the how-tos of teaching.

SIX/ “Leave the house Tina. It’s okay. Learning is not just taking place within the four walls of your school room. You can actually skip lessons plans. Throw them away if you need to.”

Understanding that field trips, homeschool conventions and open houses are not always in my back yard or even my side of the county, I would have attended more conventions, open houses and gatherings for homeschoolers.

SEVEN/ “Don’t worry about all that homeschool curriculum you’re buying. You’ll be an expert before you know it and if you need it while you’re learning how to teach, then use it. Don’t worry when other people tell you that you won’t use all that curriculum.”

I wished I would have found this quote about the piles of curriculum I had bought and may not get to in a lifetime by Sally Clarkson out of her book Educating the WholeHearted Child, “It is nearly a rite of passage for new homeschooling families to buy curricula that ends up gathering dust on the shelf. Usually, it turns out to require more preparation and involvement than they are willing to invest, or it doesn’t fit their lifestyle. It becomes an investment in experience.What we all learn, though, is that any curriculum is only a tool — it doesn’t really “teach” anything. The attitude and commitment of the teacher is far more important than the tool. So if it doesn’t work, don’t worry. Put your unused used curriculum on the table with everyone else’s and buy real books next time. You’re experienced now.“

Beginning to homeschool doesn’t mean you have to give up the educational tools you learned in public school.

Through the years Tina, I’ve learned that changing my expectations opens the way for a whole new way to learn and that is powerful! THAT is how you grow.

Homeschool fearlessly Tina and rock on!

(Psst, from my struggle I wrote a book for YOU)

Also, Tina look over these posts and gently remind yourself today:

Hugs and love ya,

Signature T

10 Days Why A Homeschool Mom Is Not Better Than a Public School Mom (but could be). Day 3

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10 Days Why A Homeschool Mom Is Not Better Than a Public School Mom (but could be). Day 3. Promoting Independent Learners is a natural fit in a homeschooling environment @ Tina's Dynamic Homeschool Plus

Rockin’ on in this series, I’m sharing 10 Days Why A Homeschool Mom Is Not Better Than a Public School Mom (but could be) Day 3 – Promoting Independent Learners.

Many parents would agree with me when I say that we normally teach children that independence is earned and not  something kids are instantly entitled to.

However, promoting independent learners and wanting to be independent of parental authority are not the same.

The difference between a homeschooling family and one that doesn’t is that homeschoolers teach their children to be independent learners, not passive recipients.

I’m not saying that public school children don’t learn this, but I am saying that the whole homeschool environment feeds independent learning.

Is Being an Independent Learner Overrated?

Why does it even matter? It’s important to teach our children that learning is their responsibility. Each child is unique and deserves more than a cookie cutter education.

When a child is an active partner in his education and not a passive standbyer, his whole attitude changes because he realizes he has a huge say and sway in what and how he learns.

Too, here is another fine difference between a homeschooling and non-homeschooling family. A non-homeschooling family can nurture an independent learner, but a homeschooling family not only nurtures, but promotes it.

When a child is not in a class of 30 kids, he learns that he needs to be the one asking questions about what he is learning. His creative thoughts are mustered up from the curriculum or material that he is learning and not from a kid that is his own age.

He realizes that he needs to learn to effectively manage his time. When a child learns for intrinsic value and not because of a grade or for a test or to perform for peers, he is motivated.

The learning environment at home should not mimic the environment at school. They are two completely different environments.

Taking this one step further, think about the environment in college or in a workplace. Both of these environments call for a self-motivated individual and our children are adults in training.

It doesn’t mean that we have to step back and let kids teach themselves because it’s our job to guide them.

However, guiding and force feeding them following a set of standards based for the majority of people are two completely different concepts.

Homeschooling is about appreciating the unique differences of each child and being willing to part with what we have whether it’s curriculum or our view to advance the way each child learns.

Being comfortable in what we are teaching our kids is not always a good thing.

We don’t want to do what is comfortable for us or familiar to us if it’s not working for our child.

Promoting independence starts with home, which is our environment and then it creeps forward to allowing our children to learn in the way that best fits them. Whether that manner is normal to the majority of people is not something we seek acceptance for.

Teaching kids to ask questions, think about what they’re learning, manage their time and to move ahead in their studies gives them a skill set that even adults struggle to have.

How do you teach your kids to be independent learners?

Also, look at my other tips in 10 Days Why A Homeschool Mom Is Not Better Than a Public School Mom (but could be). Day 1 Patience Is not Instantly Bestowed and 10 Days Why A Homeschool Mom Is Not Better Than a Public School Mom (but could be). Day 2 Confidence.

Hugs and love ya,

Signature T

Don’t forget to follow BOTH of my Pinterest accounts for more AWESOME pins.

Visit Tina Robertson’s profile on Pinterest.


Visit Tinas Dynamic Homeschool ‘s profile on Pinterest.

 

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