Homeschooling

How to Create Simple Work Files for Homeschooling

Well, hello from California, where schools are closing and masks are abundant. When I wrote words of hope back in March, most of us might not have assumed that we’d be homeschooling our students for yet another stretch of the school year. My mom once told me she was glad homeschooling wasn’t a choice she knew about when we were kids, and I know a lot of people who are wishing it weren’t the only option right now.

So, here we are. And let’s make the best of it! For me, the best is often the simplest. Take the day-to-day thinking out of the equation and we’ll all be a lot less stressed out. Work files = simple. You can do this!

How to Create Simple Work Files for Homeschooling

Click the video below to play the tutorial.

Steps to Creating Your Own Work Files

  1. Buy file folders. You will need to purchase as many as you think you will use in a week’s time.

    3 files per day x 5 school days = 15 file folders

    4 files per day x 5 school days = 20 file folders

    5 files per day x 5 school days = 25 file folders

    6 files per day x 5 school days = 30 file folders

    (I did the math for you because, math.)

  2. Decide how you want to label them. Mine are cute but yours could be cuter.

  3. Add a page or two of work to each file folder per day. Ideally, you’ll have one subject or one activity per folder. Once the work or activity is complete, you can instruct your student to put it somewhere so it can be checked. For us, that’s simply back into the file folder, where I will inspect the work and then empty the folder to be ready for next week.

Work files don’t eliminate prep time altogether or the fact that you’ll have to figure out how long it will take your student to finish their work that will be spread out over the course of a school year. You will have to calculate how many school days you’ll have and how many pages of, say, English grammar your student needs to accomplish, and then divide it up.

One more thing: Don’t be surprised if your student finishes before the traditional school-year length. Homeschooling eliminates a lot of things that take up chunks of a school day: waiting in line, walking between classes, breaks, lunch, recess, chit chat, getting everyone on the same page . . . both your school day and your school year can be done far more efficiently because there’s literally no classroom management. I mean, the students can be cheeky, but there are a lot fewer of them.

Products Mentioned in the Video

Affiliate links are included where appropriate. If you are reading this in your email, you won’t be able to see many of the links (it’s an Amazon thing).

File Folders: Pendaflex File Folders

File folder labels: Give maker Jennifer Martinez a follow on Teachers Pay Teachers to thank her for her generous gift! Workbox Labels-Editable

Laminator: Scotch Thermal Laminator

Family Tree with Peppa: Give Maker White Cat a follow on Teachers Pay Teachers to thank him or her for their generous gift! Peppa Pig Worksheet

Flash Kids Harcourt Complete Curriculum: Complete Curriculum

Other Items to Include in Your Work Files

We’ll be reading several books aloud this year, so I will include a work file page with a picture of the book cover:

Don’t forget: You can also include a picture of an activity you’d like your student to do rather than a workbook page. The sky’s the limit here!

  • Puzzle time

  • Outside play time

  • Play dough time

  • Art time

  • Snack time

Any questions? Ideas you’d like to share? Comment below and let us know!

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Review: Compass Classroom's Grammar for Writers

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Disclaimer: We received this product free for the purpose of reviewing it. All opinions expressed are my personal, honest opinions. This post includes affiliate links.

Homeschooling a middle or high schooler in need of a solid grammar program?

This past fall, we tested Compass Classroom’s new video-based Grammar for Writers curriculum in our homeschool and in a small group setting. I know quite a lot of homeschoolers are looking for a solid high school grammar program geared toward their older students and I wanted to give you a comprehensive overview.

What Grammar for Writers Consists Of

The details, which you can also find on the Compass Classroom site:

  • 41 video lessons (6.75 hours total)

  • Lecture Notes (PDF)

  • Quizzes for each lesson

  • Teacher Key for the quizzes

  • Offers a 1/2 high school credit

  • Formats: DVD, digital (streaming), or DVD & digital with PDF materials or printed (spiral-bound) materials

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What You Can Expect from Grammar for Writers

Grammar for Writers is a lecture-based format. Your student will watch a lecture/lesson, and then take the accompanying quiz, which can be approached as a worksheet instead of a quiz, if that’s better for your student.

The lecturer is Jonathan Rogers, a beloved author in his own right. His novels include The Wilderking Trilogy (The Bark of the Bog Owl, The Secret of the Swamp King, and The Way of the Wilderking) and The Charlatan's Boy. He has also authored non-fiction titles The World According to Narnia, Saint Patrick, and The Terrible Speed of Mercy: A Spiritual Biography of Flannery O'Connor.

We found Mr. Rogers’ lecturing style to be appropriately engaging for this age group, and my students looked forward to hearing what he had to say. As an author, he has “street cred”, and I think the students can sense his first-hand experience. He’s not just teaching, he’s doing what some of our writing kids dream of. Lectures average around 8 minutes long.

Grammar for Writers is self-paced. In our home, schedule flexibility is key right now. But in other seasons of our lives (and different kids with different learning styles and personalities), self-paced can mean that a student ignores the curriculum until whoever is in charge of their education realizes that nothing has actually been accomplished. Or is that just our home? You’ll need to decide if self-paced is right for you.

Grammar for Writers can be completed in a semester. That works out to roughly three lectures/lessons per week, but of course, since it is self-paced, you can make it fit into whatever time frame you require.

We used Grammar for Writers in an online group and it was a perfect setting for discussion. My daughter is there in the upper corner listening from her bedroom :) You can use it in your group, too, as group licenses are available.

We used Grammar for Writers in an online group and it was a perfect setting for discussion. My daughter is there in the upper corner listening from her bedroom :) You can use it in your group, too, as group licenses are available.

Strengths of Grammar for Writers

Grammar for Writers is a curriculum that best suits students who are strong writers or who have a substantial background in the basics of English. It will likely be best for students who aren’t put off by the intricacies and vocabulary of grammar. Prior English mechanics knowledge is helpful. For instance, Lesson 1.2, “The Main Line”, assumes your student has prior experience with diagramming sentences.

Grammar for Writers is great for group discussion but stands alone easily for a single student in a homeschool or after school setting. We used it both ways and found that the best part about the group dynamic was, of course, the discussions we were able to have after viewing the lectures.

Grammar for Writers helps the student learn to analyze their own writing, which is a tremendously helpful tool for the college-bound student or the kid who is passionately writing stories and dreams of being a professional writer. The course actually walks the student through the hows and whys of analysis, diagnostics, and best practices.

Grammar for Writers is user-friendly. There’s nothing more frustrating than a curriculum that requires multiple steps to set up. Grammar for Writers is literally a “grab and go” course that only requires a device to stream on or a student who can put a DVD in a disc drive.

View a Sample Lesson

One More Thing to Consider

Before you make a final decision about whether or not Grammar for Writers is the perfect curriculum for your students, consider:

If you are in need of a foundational grammar program for your middle or high school student, you will likely want to skip this one. As noted above, Grammar for Writers is not entry-level, and it is probably better suited for the strong English student or one who has a solid foundation with a curriculum such as IEW or Classical Conversations.

Discover 4 free Grammar for Writers lessons here.

If Grammar for Writers is just what you’ve been looking for, be sure to take advantage of Compass Classroom’s Electives Sale through January 31, 2020. Use code elective15 for 15% off any electives course, including Grammar for Writers.



Review—Kendall Hunt Pathways Heroes: Amos Fortune, Free Man

I was compensated for my time reviewing this product. I received the product for free. All opinions are honest, and I was not required to post a positive review.

Kendall Hunt’s Pathways Heroes Focus for 6th Grade: Amos Fortune, Free Man

Many of my regular readers are home educators, and as you know, from time to time I share some of our homeschooling resources and best tricks with you.

I was super interested to get my hands on a copy of Kendall Hunt’s Pathways 2.0 Grade 6 Heroes Unit, Amos Fortune: Free Man because this is the year the 6th grader and I have been studying American history. He’s a reluctant reader (ahem), so I am always looking for solid lit guides that will engage him and get him into the story.

Amos Fortune, Free Man is a Newbury Medal winning book about an African man taken to America as a slave. This particular literature curriculum, Kendall Hunt Pathways 2.0 Grade 6 Heroes: Amos Fortune, Free Man is quite a mouthful! Let me break it down for you.

The front yard swing is always the reading spot of choice for my 6th grader.

The front yard swing is always the reading spot of choice for my 6th grader.

What You Need to Know About the Kendall Hunt Pathways Heroes: Amos Fortune, Free Man Curriculum

From the publisher website:

Pathways 2.0 is a comprehensive elementary reading program with integrated language arts. This approach allows students to follow a variety of avenues to become readers, writers, and learners. Organized around broad themes and a scope and sequence of skills, Pathways 2.0 uses award-winning trade books that children want to read to deliver the skills that they need.
— from the Kendall Hunt website
  • The full curriculum includes a hardcover copy of Amos Fortune, Free Man and an ebook version of the Teacher Daily Lesson Guide. Score for the homeschooler who doesn’t have a lot of shelf space; I love printing only what I need from an ebook format.

  • The curriculum is designed for a classroom setting. This can typically be seen as a negative for me, because it means I have to wade through the classroom management sections, the group activities that can’t be replicated with my one student in a homeschool setting, and a litany of standards guidelines, irrelevant to our family.

    In this case, I didn’t find it difficult to pick out what would be most useful or helpful. I simply made notes about what I wanted to cover and circled the pages to print copies and use as a worksheet where applicable.

  • The curriculum is more than just a literature guide. In addition to questions about the text, the Teacher Daily Lesson Guide offers vocabulary, spelling, writing mini-lessons, independent writing exercises, handwriting practice, and grammar mini-lessons. There are also opportunities for interactive read-alouds. As a homeschooler, I see this as a benefit. While we might not need spelling practice, the option to use it is great as we pass down curriculum to a child who might.

  • For us, there were important lessons and worksheets that taught my son to RACE: Restate the question, Answer the question and all its parts, Cite evidence from the text, and Explain the evidence. He is continuing to use this as we’ve moved on to other studies.

    He also learned to skim a non-fiction passage for the main idea, how to recognize denotative and connotative meanings, and how to spot allusions.

  • As of this writing, the package (book and teachers guide) is priced at $40.

About Kendall Hunt Publishing

Kendall Hunt is an Adventist curriculum publisher. The Teacher Daily Lesson Guide references an Adventist worldview, but as a non-Adventist, I did not find it to be an issue or to conflict with our own views of Scripture and faith. More on how the topic of Adventism shows up in the curriculum later, but for now you might want to be familiar with the faith connections made in the Teacher Daily Lesson Guide:

Unit Essential Question: What can we learn from heroes that will enable us to be heroes for God?

Unit Big Idea: God uses heroes to reveal who he is.

The Faith-Based Worldview of Kendall Hunt Pathways Heroes

If you’re curious as to how that plays out in this particular curriculum, the publisher has given us an explanation of the Adventist Worldview:

Adventist Worldview, from the Kendall Hunt Pathways Heroes text

Adventist Worldview, from the Kendall Hunt Pathways Heroes text

Out of this meta-narrative of Scripture, the publisher has given us thoughtful questions to ask our students as they read the text, in this case, Amos Fortune, Free Man. I appreciated the focus on the faith of the story’s main character and was able to enter into some thoughtful conversations with my 6th grader using the chapter questions as a guide.

Occasionally there would be some Adventist-specific questions, but I found it easy to skim past them or to engage my son in a discussion about differing practices and beliefs within Christianity. This is one of the reasons we so value homeschooling, so we don’t shy away from educating our kids on the differences amongst believers.

By way of example, the following questions are posed in the section covering chapter 4 of Amos Fortune, Free Man:

  • Is your view of the Sabbath more like the white people’s view (it was a day of many rules) or more like Amos’s view? Explain your answer.

  • Some students will feel that Sabbath is a day full of “thou shalt nots”, and some students may not observe Sabbath. This is an excellent opportunity to teach students the joys of Sabbath observance and to allow the students who already have that understanding to share the Sabbath celebrations of their families. It is also a good time to share with students that loving God makes it possible to follow Sabbath observance out of our desire to spend time with Him.

For us, the language about Sabbath isn’t common in our faith community, and it was how I was tipped off to Kendall Hunt’s faith background. But the questions are really good, and we personally wouldn’t avoid having such a meaningful discussion with our own students. It’s your call.

How the Kendall Hunt Pathways Heroes: Amos Fortune, Free Man is a Benefit to a Christian Homeschool

As you well know, good literature has the power to transform our thinking and positively affect the way we view the world. By choosing solid books such as Amos Fortune, Free Man and providing a thoughtfully written guide, Kendall Hunt is empowering the home educator to encourage our kids to be thinkers and world changers.

As a homeschooling mom of many (as in, my 6th grader is our 7th homeschooler), I appreciate curriculum that I can grab, quickly make a plan to implement, and go.

You can see all of the titles in the Kendall Hunt Pathways Series here.


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