CONVENTION!

One day after convention and I am still overwhelmed with the things I heard.  My favorite speaker was Mark Hamby from Lamplighter Publishing.  He has several audios on his website that you can listen to. 

The first session was The Great Awakening.  He talked about the media, TV influence, violence.  It made me really think about the TV shows we watch and how much TV time we have in our household.  I am thankful that we no longer have cable/dish.

The next session of his was Raise Them Up, Don't Crush Them Down.  The main idea of this session was it doesn't matter what we're doing for Christ, it matters how we're modeling Him at home.
Jesus became a servant, that's the model we want to follow.  Our children are more likely to follow us if we are humble.

The last session I heard from Mr. Hamby was I Will Not Let Go.  He talked about Jacob's (from Genesis) life and finally when he wrestled with a man that touched his hip and crippled him.  Even after we was touched, he said he would not let go.  When we are going through a trial and it hurts, we need to hold on to God - don't let go.  God will put us in situations when we have to trust Him by faith.

Other things I heard:

How parent our children Biblically
How to teach our children character - encourage often
Some ideas for kids in setting up their own business

We decided to purchase a new math program - Math U See.  It's video and manipulative based.  We decided to change because as we get into the upper elementary levels, it's becoming harder to explain effectively.  It's also becoming tedious for me to teach every subject.  This is a way to give me a little bit of a break by having a "teacher" teach them.  The manipulatives are small blocks that they use to help them "see" how the solution makes sense.  We had watched the demo about 3 years ago when we were looking a math curriculums, and we were impressed then, but because our boys both are good in math and because of the price, we decided to go with Horizons, which was cheaper.  I feel comfortable with our decision.  We did the first lesson today, and both boys really enjoyed not having to listen to mom, and using the blocks to solve problems.  They are both excited to start the next lesson.  I hope the enthusiasm sticks!

Also, after hearing Mark Hamby, we invested in 6 of the lamplighter books.  These are republished books originally written in the 1800's that develop good character qualities.  These books are not cheap (that's why I used the word "invested").  These will be family read-alouds before bedtime (instead of TV).  Ryan will do the reading of these books (they hear my voice so much.)

Our last big investment was 10 more Heroes of History/Heroes of Faith books from YWAM (Youth With  A Mission.)  These are well-written biographies about missionaries or someone from history.  We bought 10 last year at convention and I have really enjoyed reading them.  When Nicolas gets a little bit older (maybe by next school year), I plan to read these as school-time read alouds to go along with units we do.  (Example - when we study Africa, we might read David Livingstone, or when we study China - we might read Gladys Alyward, or if we are studying the Civil War, we might read Abraham Lincoln, etc.)

Because of these big ticket items, I decided to not choose a separate history or science textbook.  We will pull geography into our unit studies next year along with some Ancient history, and we will pull science into our units (weather, water, aviation, etc.)  We will have a little more relaxed homeschool and focus more on Bible (which I heard about this weekend) and on our unit studies (which has felt rushed this year.)