Trusted homeschool expert with 25 years of experience homeschooling her own eight children, Durenda Wilson offers a better way and promises that you already have what it takes to give your child a healthy, successful future. In The Four-Hour School Day, she unpacks the lifelong advantages of home education, both for the health of your family and your child's future. With inspiring stories about parents just like you, she demystifies homeschooling and addresses common fears like, what if I'm not qualified, how can I homeschool as a single parent, and what if I don't have enough time? Packed with encouragement and practical advice, this resource equips you with all the information you need to create a sustainable homeschooling plan customized to your child's needs. Wilson will help you to:Work with your child's interests and passions for an enjoyable learning experienceCultivate independent learning in your child so you have more time and your child develops more curiosityNavigate the different schooling stages your child will go throughFind an engaged community so that you can start this adventure with all the support you need. Explore the rich and wonderful world of homeschooling because it's not only more doable than you think, but far more beneficial than you can imagine.

    Encouragement. Sanity. On any number of homeschooling days, I've needed all three. It's not that homeschooling is an unwanted chore. Homeschooling my children is one of my greatest joys. It's a privilege. I'm so incredibly blessed by this undertaking. And I'm challenged. I'm pulled. I'm stretched. I'm growing. I'm finding my reheated coffee in the microwave at 2 p.m. wondering where the morning went. Trying hard to soak up the sweet and sacred moments with these souls and miss stepping on the Lego pile in the process. Friend, I'm sure you've felt the same. The pages of Hope for the Heart of the Homeschool Mom is a collection of encouragement to prayerfully strengthen your soul for this God-given journey. A journey that's beyond stretching and beyond worth it.

    

    Bruce Lesh believes that this is due to the way we teach history—lecture and memorization. Over the last fifteen years, Bruce has refined a method of teaching history that mirrors the process used by historians, where students are taught to ask questions of evidence and develop historical explanations. And now in his new book “Why Won’t You Just Tell Us the Answer?” he shows teachers how to successfully implement his methods in the classroom.Students may think they want to be given the answer. Yet, when they are actively engaged in investigating the past—the way professional historians do—they find that history class is not about the boring memorization of names, dates, and facts. Instead, it’s challenging fun. Historical study that centers on a question, where students gather a variety of historical sources and then develop and defend their answers to that question, allows students to become actual historians immersed in an interpretive study of the past.Each chapter focuses on a key concept in understanding history and then offers a sample unit on how the concept can be taught. Readers will learn about the following: • Exploring Text, Subtext, and Context: President Theodore Roosevelt and the Panama Canal • Chronological Thinking and Causality: The Rail Strike of 1877 • Multiple Perspectives: The Bonus March of 1932 • Continuity and Change Over Time: Custer’s Last Stand • Historical Significance: The Civil Rights Movement • Historical Empathy: The Truman-MacArthur DebateBy the end of the book, teachers will have learned how to teach history via a lens of interpretive questions and interrogative evidence that allows both student and teacher to develop evidence-based answers to history’s greatest questions.

    

    Achieving success in this more challenging world requires knowing many more words. 100 Words Every Middle Schooler Should Know helps students in grades 6 to 8 (ages 11-14) to express themselves with distinction and get the most out of school.The 100 words are varied and interesting, ranging from verbs like muster and replenish to nouns like havoc and restitution to adjectives like apprehensive and imperious. Knowing these words enables students to express themselves with greater clarity and subtlety. Each word has a definition and a pronunciation and appears with at least one quotation—a moving or dramatic passage—taken from a book that middle schoolers are assigned in the classroom or enjoy reading on their own.Both classic and contemporary works of fiction and nonfiction are represented. Among the authors are young adult favorites and award-winners such as Kate Di Camillo, Russell Freedman, Neil Gaiman, E.L. Konigsberg, Lois Lowry, Walter Dean Myers, Katherine Paterson, J. K. Rowling, and Gary Soto. Readers can see for themselves that the words are used by the very best writers in the very best books. It stands to reason that they will see them again and again in higher grades and throughout their lives.100 Words Every Middle Schooler Should Know helps students to gain useful knowledge and prepares them to step into a broader world.

    The 128 lessons are self-explanatory and require almost no teacher preparation. The lesson pages were carefully designed

    Also suitable for home school programs and independent study. Reproductible. 85 Pages

    As Cindy gathered her family for Morning Time on a regular basis, she realized that the routine had become a liturgy, a regular practice and pattern that carried love and life to her children. The things that Cindy and her children discovered together in Morning Time were the very best things, and those things have proven to endure in their hearts.The practice of Morning Time is simple to implement into one’s homeschool, family, or classroom. This book gives readers a practical, road-tested way to make Morning Time a beautiful liturgy of their own. It includes Cindy’s Morning Time Anthology—over 150 pages of poems, hymn lyrics, Scripture passages, catechisms, Shakespeare passages, and other Morning Time selections gathered to make your Morning Time easy to put into practice.

    What really happens inside a Montessori classroom? How do teachers teach? How do children learn? This fascinating day-by-day record of a year in the life of a Montessori classroom answers these questions by providing an illuminating glimpse of the Montessori method in action.

    Rebecca brings us back to our better selves! -Naomi Shihab NyeIt's no secret that reading aloud to children every single day is one of the most important things any teacher, parent, or grown up can do to help children become better readers, thinkers, and frankly, better human beings. There are many resources available-scores of books, articles, web sites, videos, podcasts, and more that highlight the research on why reading aloud to kids is so vital, how to incorporate it into the day, and lists of texts to choose from for each grade level.The Artful Read-Aloud is a user-friendly guide that builds a bridge between the artistic world and the classroom, providing a deeper dive into the artistry of reading aloud. Rebecca Bellingham draws on her experience as a performer, teaching artist, classroom teacher, and literacy coach to make explicit connections between the arts and reading aloud, providing dozens of easy moves teachers can make that can enhance, elevate, and deepen the impact of interactive read-alouds.Each chapter focuses on a specific guiding principle that is drawn from the arts and is meant to spark engagement, provoke inquiry, and inspire deep thinking. She includes practical tips for how to bring each principle to life in the classroom, including:how to embody the text by making small shifts with your body and voice to bring the words to life, helping kids envision different characters and their actions more completely learning when to slow down, pause, and read in an deliberate and careful way to give kids time to think, feel, process, and connect when and how to create opportunities for talk, giving kids the space to ask questions and reflect on what they notice, wonder, and predict how to give kids a chance to move around as they try on characters, recreate scenes, learn about new concepts, and live inside the book prioritizing read alouds that give students practice listening to and learning from diverse voices while creating space for meaningful conversation about important issues relating to injustice, identity, inequality, and more ways to be intentional in your choices, from matching books to the students in front of you to choosing passages that support instructional goals and teaching points. Reading aloud to your students supports a balanced, rigorous, and joyful literacy curriculum that not only feeds the souls and minds of your students but your own as well. Dip into The Artful Read-Aloud and see what's possible inside your daily read-alouds. By learning to make simple moves that model what real reading looks and sounds like you can help your students become the kind of readers all of us hope they will become: engaged, thoughtful, lifelong ones.

    In it, you'll discover exactly how you can use your life insurance to benefit you while you are alive—and help you build financial security. In addition, it will reveal ways to make the best of your policy no matter what age you are. Most people don't realize what a powerful tool they have in their life insurance policies—this book will be your guide.Life insurance is one of the oldest financial products around, and yet it is one of the most misunderstood. People debate its efficacy from every angle, but rarely is it championed. That is, until recently. Now, in this landmark book, you'll discover:• The invaluable CLUE concept• How to leverage opportunity and investment capability• How one dollar can do many jobs• How to use your death benefit while you are alive• Why you should set up a family bank• And much more."Live Your Life Insurance" is a book about life and living—using and benefiting from your life insurance while you are alive to enjoy it. And, in today's economy, it is more important than ever to understand and utilize all the financial tools we have at our disposal.

    New studies show that young kids learn best through play and need at least 30 minutes of structured physical activity each day. There’s no better way to engage your child than through the simple practice of yoga. Yoga can help your 18-month to five-year-old child have: Fewer tantrums Better and longer sleep Increased motor coordination Improved listening and ability to follow directions Better self-expression Higher self-esteem Easier relaxation A healthy and physically fit lifestyle Named the “Baby Yoga Expert” by Newsweek, Helen Garabedian, a certified yoga instructor, created her program with 8-minute sequences easy to fit into a young child’s day. Fully illustrated with beautiful photos, Itsy Bitsy Yoga for Toddlers and Preschoolers features more than 50 simple poses and games kids love, offering creative ways to get active. Yoga can even help your child throughout the day-from taming tantrums to teaching cooperation-On the Go advice and Super Duper Poses show you how. Enjoy the fun of yoga with your child today!

    Full-color photographs of actual early childhood programs demonstrate that the spaces children learn and grow in can be comfortable for children, teachers, and parents alike.Margie Carter serves on the adjunct faculty at Pacific Oaks College Northwest, Seattle, Washington. Deb Curtis works as a child care teacher at the Burlington Little School in Seattle. Their other books include The Art of Awareness, The Visionary Director, Training Teachers, Spreading the News, and Reflecting Children’s Lives.

    Now fully updated to reflect the latest research on how children learn language, this newest edition is easier to use than ever.The Spalding Method helps train the right and left sides of the brain as children see, hear, read, and write. It is cost-effective and efficient; students use pencils, paper, and their minds. The results are stunning: Children learn to connect speech sounds to print and begin to write and read almost magically. Spalding students perform well in the classroom and on tests -- and most important, they love to read and write.