Kids reading, writing, speaking and listening

Read Stories For Learning & Avoid Dull Textbooks

During our family’s time homeschooling, regular trips to the library were among our favorite activities. The kiddos would each return home with an armful of books spanning topics from A to Z. While some were purely for entertainment, others helped to build knowledge about the world. They learned content in all the major subjects without […]

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Science Concepts - Related Experiments

Exploring Science Concepts With Fun, Related Experiments

Spark interest in learning basic science concepts by organizing experiments around a central theme. Here are some creative ways to structure and present related sets of science experiments. These are all free to access and are designed with everyday materials so you can do them at home. Book-Themed Experiments Turns out there’s lots o’ science

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Biographies for Students: Free Books and Lesson Ideas

Dive into the captivating narratives and unique perspectives of noteworthy individuals through biographies for students. From inventors and explorers to activists, artists, and leaders, these stories inspire with tales of resilience and discovery, and showcase the power of positive contributions to the world. There are a variety of biography series that are written specifically for

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How To Improve Writing Skills: Free Workbooks and Tips

Despite the fact that we are now living at a time when generative AI tools can be easily prompted to complete writing assignments for our kids, it’s still a good idea for kids to develop and improve writing skills. Good communication skills, critical thinking, and independent thought are all human attributes that writing helps to

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Thematic Unit: U.S. World’s Fair Landmarks

Here’s a thematic unit idea: explore American history, geography, culture, science, and art through the lens of world’s fairs. These grand global expositions featured technological marvels, cultural exhibits, and some of our nation’s most iconic architecture. Researching the landmarks originally constructed for world’s fairs is one way to launch an engaging cross-curricular study. Here are

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Transform Videos Into Custom, Interactive Homeschool Lessons with Edpuzzle

If you like using videos in your homeschool, check out Edpuzzle. It’s a free site that lets you embed existing videos with questions so you can test your kid’s comprehension of the information. It’s a way to turn passive video-watching into a more interactive homeschool experience. Here’s an example of how it works. This Crash

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Exploring the Past: Creative Activities for Studying Ancient Civilizations

When navigating through the study of ancient civilizations, timelines and maps were, of course, standard go-to activities. They provided a visual roadmap to help us connect events, and understand the context of what we were studying. But l also liked to add variety by throwing in other types of projects that not only looked good

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Podcasts to Supplement Your Homeschool Curriculum

Several years back, while roadschooling across the country, we made frequent use of audiobooks to provide welcome distractions during those long stretches of highway where there’s not much to hold your attention. We’d pull up one of our favorites, an audiobook from The 39 Clues series, with fun settings and storylines that would inject some

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Essay Writing Tips with Free Resources

Need some essay writing tips for your middle- and high-school age students? The following is a list of the most common types of essays designed to help develop critical thinking, analysis, and communication skills. Included with each essay type are graphic organizers that provide a framework for structuring information; writing prompts for practicing specific essay

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Food Chain Fun: Picture Books and Activities for Learning About the Circle of Life

Picture books are a great tool for helping kids understand complex science concepts, in this case, food chains and food webs, the relationships between organisms and how they depend on each other for survival. Free Online Readers, Videos, Interactives and Activities: Take a look at these free online books, which can be downloaded as PDFs.

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