Dione and I would like run the mentoring course again. This this the first time doing it in the fall, but there is a bigger interest in homeschooling due to the sex-ed curriculum in schools, and it seems desirable to run it now. It runs for 8 weeks from 7-9pm on Thursday evening starting Oct. 15, 2015 at Dione’s house. If you are interested in attending or know someone else who is interested please pass this on. If you have taken this course, you are most welcome to join again, and it will cost you nothing since you already have the workbook! Please read below, and contact me at cynthia@bonzailandscaping.com if you are interested.

This will be based on Vicki Bentley's book, Home Education 101, and will require the purchase of the Parent Workbook, for $35, which will be due the first meeting. This just covers the cost of the book, nothing more.
This program is for any new home educating family interested in more personal mentoring from an experienced veteran – that’s “experienced” not “expert”.

This program may be for you IF:
- you are brand new this year with young children
- you are on the edge of a decision to home educate but want to know more about practical aspects
- you have been at this for a couple of years but still feel you require more of the basic information to go forward more comfortably
- you have older children recently removed from the public or private school system
- you are a veteran and would like to sit in on a session in order to become a mentor with CHEN 

 

Topics to be covered are:
Beginning the Incredible Journey
Choosing Curriculum
Organizing Your Time
Home Education with Style
Getting Dinner on the Table (The Same Day You Homeschool)
Testing and Evaluation
Teaching Tips
Organizing Your Home
Lessons Learned

You will notice that these topics are not all strictly home educating how-tos but deal with the general flow of your household. I believe that choosing to home educate your children is not about making an education choice. It is truly a lifestyle choice. How you organize (or don't organize) your home and household tasks can and do directly affect your "school" time. If you already have done the course you are welcome to join us again.

CM Book Study Meetings in Bradford

I want to extend a warm welcome for any home schooling parents to join our local Charlotte Mason Support Group in Bradford. If you are pursuing a Charlotte Mason style of education in your home - or are just interested in this philosophy of education, you are welcome to join us once or regularly. Our meetings are drop in and don't require registration (though it's nice to know how many cups of tea to prepare.) ;)

 

If you are unfamiliar with Charlotte Mason and her philosophy of education, she was a British educator about 100 years ago who strongly believed in the value and potential of all children. In fact, in a time when children were very much considered in light of the socio-economic class they were raised in, she felt that children were already persons of great value not potentially so. She saw them as intelligent, inquisitive and creative and so argued that all children should be given a liberal (as in broad in scope and deep in content), child-centred (meaning focusing on the needs of the student rather than the needs of the teacher) education. 

 

As such she advocated for three main tools of education: atmosphere, dicipline, and life. By atmosphere, she insisted that children not be isolated in an environment contrived for children but that learning should take place naturally in real life situations and that children should learn to love to learn for its own sake and not because they are compelled by marks or rewards or by the desire to please or appease their teachers. By discipline, she was describing the value of instilling good habits, life skills, character traits in children as these are just as much the measures of success as knowing specific subject content. And finally, life was meant to encompass the total sum of academic learning, not just limited to a few subjects in school but very broad in subject matter.

 

She a pursued these goals by using several key methods: narration (oral, written, and otherwise) as a method of testing, living books (written with great vocabulary by people who were passionate about their topics), lots of time in nature, short lessons, and much experiential learning over textbook work.

 

The goal she said was a science of relations, or that the student build a relationship with the subjects they were learning rather than simply learn many facts related to the subject.

 

If this style of educating resonates with your family, please be encouraged to join our discussions.  We will be reading For the Children’s Sake by Susan Schaeffer Macaulay this year.  It is so inspirational; you’ll love it!  If you need a copy of the book, let me know as I have a few in stock now and will likely need to order more in before the school year starts.  They are $18.75 each, tax included.

We haven’t yet divided the book into readings for the year but will send that out once we have it.  As well, at our last meeting in June, we decided that we will, this year, make a bit of a change and will be adding in “Mother Culture” time rather than subject practicums as in past years.  We have often read books that are quite meaty and philosophical or just plain homeschool-inspirational and when that is the case, we have traditionally taken part of the evening to practically look at different ways to live out this educational life, looking at topics like spelling, geography or math.

This year’s change up is because we wanted to do some practical learning that was centred around our development as Mamas as we recognize that our own educational passion is reflected strongly on our kids. I will also pass on the subjects as we develop a list for the year.

Math Tutoring

MATH TUTORING

for homeschool families

 

-          Math tutoring for all grades K-12+ from a Christian worldview

-          I offer in-person tutoring at your place or mine (travel fees will apply if at your place).

-          I also offer on-line tutoring which allows students to access math tutoring without the need for travel.  Your student can access all the help she/he needs from the comfort of your own home – even on vacation - as long as you have a computer and internet access.  I use the same on-line platform as many university math departments.

-          Tax receipts provided.  Math tutoring fees are eligible for the Ontario Children’s Activity Tax Credit for children < 16.

 

Other Services:

-          Free consulting services for home school families

-          Free Math Resource Centre (Fridays)

-          Math Assessments. 

-          Test Prep for GED, SAT, ACT exams

-          High school, college, university prep, planning & admissions

-          Scholarship acquisition help

 

I am a Christian and a former home schooler; my sons are now at university, both graduated with math scholarships.  I have helped numerous home school families and can provide references upon request.

 

Contact Jill Scalzitti, B.Sc.

jillscalzitti@sympatico.ca

705-727-4634 for more information or to book your free consultation in-person or via Skype.

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

“The universe is written in the language of mathematics”    

                                                                      Galileo Galilei

 

Ladies,

 

I am glad to finally share with you the reading list for this year’s Charlotte Mason Meetings.

 

Back in June, when we last met, the general consensus for the book choice was that we all wanted to try something from Simply Charlotte Mason.  In particular, one or two of her free e-books.

 

Jacki and I sat down today and looked over many options and decided on Education is… and A Thinking Love.  Both are quite quick reads and so we thought that it might be most interesting to read through each of them over the course of 3-5 meetings.  Please find further descriptions of these books at http://simplycharlottemason.com/books/#CMHowTo. 

 

In addition to this, we usually like to try to look at both practical and philosophical issues and so we decided that while the books will help us to delve into the philosophical side that perhaps we would simply look at the practical by choosing 8 subjects to focus on and that we would ask to draw on all of your expertise.

 

That means that, this year, we are proposing to challenge all of you that if you have a pet subject that you can share from your expertise.  Please share secrets of how you keep the learning exciting, how you have used Charlotte Mason’s methods to tackle the subject or what your favourite resources are.  If you are willing to do this then we would love for your to steer part of the evening’s discussion.

 

As such we have made the following schedule of readings and topics.

 

September 19 Education is… An Atmosphere, overview of Charlotte Mason’s philosophy

October 24 Education is… A Discipline, nature study by Jacki

November 28 Education is… A Life, math by Cori

January 9 A Thinking Love Chapters 1-4, subject TBA

February 13 A Thinking Love Chapters 5-8, subject TBA

March 20 A Thinking Love Chapters 9-11, subject TBA

April 24 A Thinking Love Chapters 12-14, subject TBA

June 5 A Thinking Love Chapters 15-17, subject TBA

 

Other subjects to look at…  (Obviously we won’t cover them all.)

Bible

Science

Geography

History

Language Arts

Arts (Fine Art, Music, Dance, etc.)

Foreign Language

Handicrafts

Physical Education

…

 

Are you willing to share with us for a few minutes (to an hour) one evening?  Please let me know and I’d be glad to slot you in for one of the meetings.

 

Finally, as we prepare to get into these books, since they are free e-books, we have several options for acquiring the readings:

1)      you can download and print the book yourself from Simply Charlotte Mason at the link above;

2)      you can download and read the book on your ereader or other device from the link above; or

3)      I can have my printer make several print copies for those of us who like a hard copy. 

 

If you are interested in getting a printed copy of these books…

Please let me know ASAP.  I have asked my printer to create these books for us but will need to give him firm numbers soon so that he can have them ready for us by the first meeting.  If you choose to order a print copy, please note that I have asked him to keep the price down, preferably under $5 for each book.  Also, please note that I will be passing these books on for the price of printing; I am not making money on these books.

As always, all home educating parents are welcome to these meetings whether you come for one or for all of the meetings, and whether you choose to participate in the readings or not.  We do ask that only babes in arms attend though.  Meetings are always on Thursdays from 7:30-9:30 at my home in Bradford.

 

Please let me know if you plan to attend the first meeting and I can send address information and answer any questions that you may have.  It also helps me to anticipate how many people to expect.

 

I look forward to hosting many of you in my home again this school year for our special time of refreshment and encouragement and learning!

 

Blessings,

Cori

Summer is almost gone

So here we are, after a less than stellar summer for weather. We only had a few weeks of using the pool sadly, due to the cooler than usual temperatures, and for most of that time, two of the girls were out of province. And here comes September, and we start buckling down preparing for school. I have somewhat scheduled the dates for the CHEN support meetings. If you have any other ideas you would like to see, let me know.

September 9 or 23rd, which depends on whether or not we can do our family holiday
October 28, a couples evening, with a speaker about peacemaking, a skill we all need help with I suspect
November 25th, which I am hoping to have a speaker from ARPA, to speak on Christianity and politics.
December 9 or 25, hoping for a Family Christmas Square Dance
January 13 or 20, 2014
February 24, 2014
April 14, 2014, Annual Used Curriculum Sale
May TBA, hoping for a Family Potluck

Cori has arranged dates for the Charlotte Mason Support Group. They are not doing a book this year, but rather topics and use articles available to all on the internet from what I understand:
September 19
October 24
November 28
January 9
February 13
March 20
April 24 or May 1 depending on when OCHEC conference is
June 5

Here are some conference dates you might like to also put on your calendar as well:

Kitchner - KWCHEA - Saturday, April 5, 2014, 8-5, Rockway Mennonite Collegiate
Hamilton - OCHEC -May 2-3, 2014??
Barrie - Parents Conference, May 31, 2014, 8:30-3:30
Toronto used curriculum June 7th or 8th, 2014?
Brantford Used Curriculum Sale, June 13, 2014?

I hope you have all been somewhat rested to resume our tasks. Remember that you cannot do it in your own strength, but we can do it if we rely on the Lord. He is the one who has given you these children into your care for a time, and He will equip you and give you all you need carry out the task.

I have been working through dates for the fall and trying to make sure that we have planned the most important dates first.  I have added any significant dates that I could find below so that we can work around the public school schedule (as I know that many of you follow that schedule) as well as holidays and conferences.  If I don’t hear from you then I will assume that I haven’t planned meetings for all of your children’s birthdays or your 15^th wedding anniversary when you had wanted to have perfect attendance this year.

Starting to (yikes!) look forward to the fall.

Blessings,

Cori

Charlotte Mason Support Group Dates 2012-2013

September 20

(5-6 weeks)

November 1

(5-6 weeks)

December 6

(5 weeks)

January 10

(6 weeks)

February 21 (curriculum chapter – last-ish chapter)

(6 weeks)

April 4

(5 weeks)

May 9

(5 weeks)

June 13

School and Conference Dates

First day of School – September 4, 2012

Christmas Holidays – December 24, 2012 – January 4, 2013

March Break – March 11-15, 2013

Good Friday – March 29, 2013

Easter Monday – April 1, 2013

Kitchener – KWCHEA – April 6, 2013, 8-5 @Rockway Mennonite Collegiate

Ottawa – RVHEA – (April 13, 2013?, 8-5) @

Hamilton – OCHEC – May 3-4, 2013 @ Redeemer

Barrie – May 25, 2013 – 8:30-3:30 @ BFMC

Toronto – (June 1 or 8, 2013?)

Brantford – (June 7 or 14, 2013?)

Last Day of School – June 27, 2013

Maple Tree Publications

www.mapletreepublications.ca

mapletreepublications@sympatico.ca

Dear Homeschooled Teen (14-18) 

 “If you want to change the world, focus on leaders. If you want to change leaders, focus on them while they're young.” Alan Nelson, Founder, KidLead.

The Calling & Opportunity

This is an invitation for Christian teen leaders (14-18), particularly homeschooled young men, but also young ladies, to really develop their organizational leadership skills this summer by taking advantage of a very unique and effective leadership development program called LeadWell. We believe that young people, homeschoolers in particular, are very important and have a huge part to play in God’s plan for the future of Canada, the Church, and the Kingdom of God. In fact, you are the future, and a big part of the present too. This is about your future and the future of your children – you are the Joshua generation. We must equip you to rebuild Christian civilization in every sphere, in every area. We need Christian cultural leaders - entrepreneurs, artists, scientists, engineers, movie makers, writers, musicians, architects, dancers, lawyers, physicians, farmers, butchers, bakers, and candlestick makers who are not only Christian in these callings, but actually make these callings Christian!   So, let’s cut to the chase. I am writing to you young men and women to tell you that the world is in a mess and it’s your job to change it, beginning with your own family, friends, church, and local community. Young men! It is your job to lead your families, lead in the church, lead in the culture, and lead the nation!  Young ladies! It is your job to help your future husbands do this!  If you don’t do it, nobody will.    

The Offer

Now, just as some people are gifted and have aptitudes for athletics, or music, or art, some of you have been gifted in the area of organizational leadership.  While all Christians are commanded to lead personally, through Godly character, conduct, and speech, some Christians in particular have been gifted with and have an aptitude towards leading others in a group or team environment.  For our purposes, we define leadership as the process by which people accomplish together, what they could not as individuals. Organizational leaders are those who spur on this process.

If you believe you are one of those people with organizational leadership aptitude, able to influence and mobilize others, we invite you to consider whether you qualify for our summer day camp for teens called LeadWell, August 13-17, in Brantford, Ontario.  This is a pilot camp being run for the first time in Canada!  We are looking for enthusiastic young leaders, 14-18, who would like to build their leadership skills through an extensive leadership development program that is rooted in Biblical principles and modeled after corporate leadership training. This will not be a series of lectures on how to lead – it is experiential learning which gives you the opportunity to practice leading and getting immediate feedback from experienced, certified trainers and coaches.  LeadWell is not a teen program emphasizing leadership, but rather a leadership program targeting leaders when they are still moldable. Most leaders do not begin formal leadership training or gain experience until after college, between the ages of 25-35. Imagine what it would be like for you as a next gen leader, the Joshua Generation, to start your adult life with 10-20 years of leadership experience already.  

If you believe this might be a fit to you, I invite you to please email me at lvaivada@rogers.com for three attachments I can send to you via email: 1) the full invitation which outlines more details about the importance of leadership skills, the LeadWell program this August, and how to apply; 2) the attached LeadYoung brochure; 3) an article on LeadWell by Dr. Alan Nelson.

NOTE: I will be on vacation from June 18 to July 1 with limited access to email.  If you could during this period email instead Cynthia Bultje at cbultje@explornet.com requesting the attachments, she will do this on my behalf while I am away. 

Looking forward to hearing from you and hopefully seeing some of you at the camp. 

God bless

Mr. and Mrs. Vaivada
Newmarket, Ontario