FreeBEE Friday - FREE Character Training Resources

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Welcome to a New Year of FreeBEEs. Every Friday I will share a great list of educational FreeBEE resources. PLUS...there's the added bonus of this being a monthly link up...where you can showcase your freebie posts or discover more amazing freebies from my blogging friends. The blogger link up will start on the first Friday of every month and end on the first day of the following month. Each month there will be a new link up. Link up anything that is educational and FREE including GIVEAWAYS!

FreeBEEs:
Character training is very important to our family. It is one thing that we are constantly working on...and not just with the children. Both my husband and I have things we could fix in our own characters and improving ourselves is just as important as helping our children with their character. It is our hope that we will raise our children will have good attitudes, perseverance, respect, honesty, self-control, contentment, etc. We also want them to be kind, loving and helpful to everyone. And hopefully with good character qualities they will one day become great leaders.

Are you frustrated with your children's attitudes? Do you wish the children helped around the house a little more? Are you constantly yelling at your children? Then keep reading.....

This week I started watching the "Building Character With Children" videos by Shirley Solis. Currently 2 videos have been posted so you are just in time to sign up and join in the fun. Video 1 discusses, "how to teach new habits to your children" and Video 2 discusses, "why children don't want to do their chores." The videos are really short less than 10 minutes and provide lots of great information. Best of all they are FREE. They are great for ALL parents and both secular and Christian families.

I must admit that the habit trick in video 1 really works and is so simple. I had tried something previously but it never really stuck...but this trick did!

Also be sure to check out my Character, Virtues and Organization for Kids Post from 2012 there are lots of helpful FREE resources in that post too. Also Spirituality For Kids Tools To Win The Game Of Life is another fabulous FREE resource for helping children with character training.

More information:
Building Character with Children is a brand new video-based program with homeschool mom, author, and speaker Shirley Solis. In these short, 7-minute videos, Shirley shares her experience as a mom of 6 children, with tips and tricks to build strong, desirable character traits in your children!

In Building Character with Children, you will learn:

• How to train your children to learn a new habit in just a few minutes a day (so you won’t have to keep repeating yourself!)
• The 3 reasons why your children don’t do their chores AND what to do about it!
• What to do about sibling rivalry and how to resolve conflicts easily and peacefully!
• The #1 reason why children are lacking character today and how to change that!

I hope you find these resources useful. If you ever have any questions feel free to leave me a comment or email me. Also be sure to follow my FB page where I post FreeBEEs daily.

Link up: FreeBEE Fridays with Kathy's Cluttered Mind.

Remember when it comes to FREE resources the internet and a good search engine are your best friend. Oh and a library card!

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Linking up with: 3 Boys and a Dog

Schooling in the Kitchen - 10 Lessons That Can Be Learned In The Kitchen

This week several bloggers from the The Schoolhouse Review Crew are sharing posts on 5 awesome subjects: Delight-Directed Teaching, Schooling In The Kitchen, Toys, Games & Puzzles, Homeshooling in a Crisis and Hands-On Projects.

Don't forget to enter the HUGE giveaway!!!

Today I am sharing my thoughts on Schooling in the Kitchen. Have you ever thought of your kitchen as a homeschool classroom? Both of my kids enjoy spending time with me in the kitchen. There are so many things can be learned from the comfort of your kitchen and it's also a way to spend time together and make special memories.

Top 10 Things That Can Be Learned In The Kitchen

1) Math Skills - measuring, fractions, money, conversions and more can be taught in the kitchen.
2) Reading/Vocabulary Skills - kids can work on their reading and vocabulary skills while in the kitchen by reading recipes and ingredient labels and by learning the names and purposes of tools and ingredients.
3) Science Skills - like why does baking soda help baked good rise, why do eggs help bind, etc.
4) Arts and Crafts - have you ever tried your hand at making homemade playdough, salt dough maps, floam, goo, lipgloss, bouncy balls? There are so many fun things you can make in your kitchen, utilizing common household ingredients be sure to check out my Craft Recipe pinterest board.
5) Teamwork - working together as a team is an important skill and by spending time together as a family in the kitchen your children will be able to learn what it means to work as a team. Each person can have a job in the kitchen...even the littlest ones can help out by being a taste tester or a timer watcher. My kids generally take turns stirring, dumping ingredients, measuring, etc.
6) Life Skills - I don't know about you but I don't plan on cooking for my kids forever. Cooking is a very important life skill that all children both boys and girls need to learn. There are also other life skills like that can be learned like time-management, organization, planning, responsibility and confidence!!
7) Health Skills - while working with your kids in the kitchen you can teach them about eating healthy, making healthy choices and how food nourishes our bodies. Kids can also learn about food safety, kitchen safety and cleanliness.
8) Photography - so you know I got a new camera well my new camera actually has a food scene mode. Silly right? Well I decided to research why and apparently food photography is becoming very popular so I guess to make it a little easier for the amateurs there is now a food mode on many cameras.
9) History and Geography - over Christmas we had so much fun making Christmas dinners from around the World. Through this the children learned not only about cooking but also about geography and history. I had a great time making memories with my children as I taught them all about our German ancestry.
10) Foreign Language - can you pronounce masala dosa, poutine, ankimo, kebab? Well why not try making some dishes you cannot pronounce and learn a foreign language while your at it?

There is a great $1 express lapbook on A Journey Through Learning called Cooking Day. You can view the sample here.

Check out these great Free resources:
-The Nourishing Home has a free printable that lists age appropriate tips and ideas.
-Clemson Cooperative Extension has some great tips as well as a list of some books that encourage children to cook.
-A dear blogger friend of mine does a great link up each week called Kids in the Kitchen. She is the mom to 3 boys who love cooking.
-Be sure to check out all the great kids cooking resources on YouTube like Telmo and Tula and Weelicious.
-This homeschool website has lots of great links to kitchen math resources.
-The USDA has lots of great links to resources for nutrition, safety and more.
-Betty Crocker has lots of fun, kid friendly recipes.

Be sure to browse through all of our other Top 10 Posts!

What is something fun you have made recently with your kids in the kitchen?

Be sure to check out the other great posts from participating bloggers...




*Disclaimer - Many of the links found on my side bars and in my blog posts are affiliate links. Please note that prices indicated in the post are subject to change. As a result, I might get paid money and I will most likely spend the money on homeschool supplies.

Linking up with: Schoolhouse Review Crew, Top Ten Tuesday

A week in the life of homeschoolers - August 25th - 31st

August 25th - 31st

In our homeschool this week...

We had a rough start to the week I think we are still trying to find that back to homeschool grove. But on Thursday and Friday things went much better.

Here are some highlights:

Saturday and Sunday we just enjoyed some time at home. Monday we were supposed to have our 1st homeschool book club meeting but everyone except 1 family cancelled at the last minute so plans changed. Instead we met the other family at a local park and played on the playground, ate lunch and took a nature walk. And we brought some visitors home with us too, read here. Tuesday we had a fun morning making puppets to use with our Speekee Spanish class. And we played our new math board game. Then we headed to speech therapy. Rowyns speech teacher said his evaluation went very well and he is doing so much better. Wednesday we had a fun filled day. We read lots of books, made some fun sand art crafts, made a sand timer (using two bottles) played one of our fabulous playPlay games and had fun playing I Spy with books and our sand unit study box treasure. Thursday we did homeschool at the grocery store. Gwyn learned how to weigh bananas and both kids learned how to compare prices. When we got home Rowyn helped put away the groceries and of course he did it the boy way and made a tower out of the cans before putting them in the pantry. Later in the afternoon we attended two story times one at the library and one at Barnes and Nobles. At Barnes and Nobles we got to met the fabulous author Kevin Henkes. Friday we finished up our sand unit study and had a great day. We finished up worksheets, science experiments and a bible lesson. We also built the Great Sphinx and Pyramid using Legos. And we watched some YouTube videos and played our Dr. Seuss game.

Helpful homeschooling tips or advice to share…
Let your kids make their own lunches from time to time. Gwyn picked her lunch items out one day this week and picked some very healthy items she also made a silly face out of her food selections (see picture below).

I am inspired by…
My kids love for learning about nature.

Places we’re going and people we’re seeing…
Monday we had a great time on our nature walk (which replaced book club due to everyone cancelling at the last minute). Thursday we went to the library for story time. The Roswell Historic Society read a cute little book called Rucker the Lost Country Dog. Then we headed to Barnes and Nobles to attend the Kevin Henkes book reading and signing. He read his newest book Penny and Her Doll, drew some of his characters for the kids, answered questions and signed our book. It was a great experience for the kids to meet a "real live" author.

Next week we are gong to the Decatur Book Festival, having friends over for Labor Day, possibly going to the Booth Western Art Museum, hitting up a great used library book sale, taking a nature hike,  and then on Saturday I am having my much needed moms night out.

My favorite thing this week was…
Our wonderful nature walk with friends.

What’s working/not working for us…
I tried something new on Friday with Gwyn in hopes to help her with her OCD Type A needs (she totally takes after her momma). I still don't want to go back to having strict structured days but Gwyn NEEDS to know what our plans are for the day so I wrote down everything I had hoped to accomplish that day on the giant wipe off board. As we completed them I let her and Rowyn check the items off the list. Gwyn especially liked this and I think we will continue to do this each day.

Questions/thoughts I have…
Why can't my children sit still? Anyone have any tips or tricks. I don't mind it so much at home but I do when we are at a library event or field trip.

Things I’m working on…
Organizing and cleaning. I reorganized the schoolroom a little bit. I added another bookcase and go rid of my recycled cd tower. I have been trying to make things easier for the kids to access and clean up.

I’m grateful for…
Great friends who call to chat on the phone and help me feel much better.

Favorite Resource(s)...
Recyclables...we love to make crafts using recyclables. We also enjoyed using this worksheet How to build a sand castle. The kids verbally gave me the steps and I wrote them down.

A photo, video, link, or quote to share…

How was your week? 

Linking up with:

Learning All The Time, Weird Unsocialized Homeschoolers,  Homegrown Learners, iHomeschool Network, Living Life Intentionally, All Boy Homeschool, A Little R & R, Becoming a Strong Woman of God, Adventurez In Child Rearing,

Cooking Lessons - Muffins and Solar S'mores

This week we didn't do anything fancy..and I have not recipe links to share. Gwyn helped me make some package corn bead muffins. Which turned out very well! They were so tasty they were gone in 1 day.

Then we had some fun outside of the kitchen, literally outside! We made Solar S'mores at the pool. Thanks to the very HOT sun our chocolate and marshmallows melted quite nicely. While the kids waited for the sun to do its job they cooled off in the pool. I know this really isn't a cooking lesson but it is a super fun Summer activity which I highly recommend you give a try. This is also one of the many fun things on our Summer Bucket List. 

What kind of cooking fun did you have this week with your kids?

Linking up with:

Cooking Lessons - Zucchini Bread

A good friend gave us 3 LARGE Zucchini's so I decided to try to make Zucchini bread. With the help of my two little chefs we were quite successful. They kids helped measure out the ingredients and grate the Zucchini. This is the recipe we used Moms Zucchini Bread.

What kind of things have you made with your kids in the kitchen?

Linking up with: