Homeschooling: History "Whats in the Bible?"

Every Friday night is our Family Movie Night. We purchase a new-to-us movie (usually paid for and downloaded online) and watch it together while eating some healthy snacks.

For the past 11 weeks we have been enjoying the 11 DVDs "Whats in the Bible?" by Phil Vischer. You may be familiar with Veggie Tales? Well, Phil Vischer does some of those voices ;)

These DVDs cover the bible from Genesis to Acts, they include some stories and also the history of how the bible was written and put together. As adults both Michael and I learnt new things every week, some things were taught to Michael when he was in Bible College.

So if your looking for a quick and easy family friendly way to teach Biblical History, this is one of them ;) 

To download a Whats in the Bible DVD click here
Or view some previews below (or on You Tube)




5 Things I am Thankful for: 
1. Family Friendly and interesting Movies
2. Relationship Building and Nurturing through Home Schooling
3. Costs spread out over a period of 11 weeks rather than a lump sum
4. Children (& Adults) learning through family times rather than 'school hours'
5. Being together, and birthing our baby after watching a DVD

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Recycling (for Kids)

Teaching children how to recycle is REALLY easy, set up a rubbish bin for your rubbish, and a recycle bin for your recyclables.

Find out what is recycled in your area.

Show the children the sign to look for. The Triangle means it is recyclable.

Children are very adaptable and learn very fast, especially when you practice daily. 

Recycle Bin
I washed out the recyclable item, passed it onto my child (aged 5, 3 & 2 at the time) and asked them which bin it goes into. Children regularly tip the bucket of recyclable materials into our recycle bin.

Children would then search for triangles on grocery items at the shops before even being purchased.

Bush Walking
Another natural learning activity we took part in was picking up aluminium cans from the bushes, we talked about how it is not good practice to throw rubbish in the bush or on the ground, enforcing using bins.

2 years on the children still talk about doing this and how it is not good for the environment to throw rubbish on the ground

Using up what we have
We always discuss using up what we have already.

Recycling Paper
Being homeschoolers we go through a lot of paper, or a lot of paper comes through our hands. We have dealt with paper by shredding it and...

• Compost
• Worm Farm
• Chicken bed layering
• Baby duck/ Baby chicken bedding
• On the garden
• Local pet shop

Our Personal Journey

We used to live in a VERY small house where space was limited and storage was non-existent. We didn't even have a shed for storage. 

Growing up in a recycling/keep-everything-that-could-be-used kind of home I grew a stockpile or recyclable materials very quickly. The problem was I had nowhere to store it, and was not using it. 

The time came when I discovered that these items would actually be more useful in our local recycling plant than clogging up my home. I packed them all up, put them in the recycle bin, and have never looked back nor missed those items. 

Internally this felt like a much needed release of relief as my home become more manageable and clutter-free.

2 years on, I now put all these items straight into the recycle bin where they can be turned into something else. 

Okay, I admit, now that we are in a bigger home with loads of storage we are growing a 'useful' box of recyclable materials for crafting activities. 

Homeschooling

Teaching children to respect the environment and to practice sustainability naturally means they will be more likely to live it out in their adult years. Under the Government Curriculum Framework this practice falls into the category of Society and Environment. 

To further this area of knowledge, simply go for a walk to your local water ways to discover what has happened to the rivers and lakes. 

You Tube 

We've watched documentaries on what they do with the recyclable materials and what can happen if they are not. I find it interesting and so do SOME of my children ;)

There is so much available to view! Go check it out. 

Recyclable Truck

The kids love watching the garbage truck come every week receiving a double viewing every fortnight when the recycle truck comes. Even after 2 1/2years of weekly stop-what-your-doing-and-run-to-the-window/gate and it gives so much to talk about.

Tip Runs

Naturally we take children wherever we go and specifically use tip runs as educational experiences. Children are so curious as to the environments they are in and the tip is no exception. The smells stimulate our senses in such a way we desire to recycle more and waste less. We drive past the recycle shed as slowly as we can to catch the glimpse inside of sorted-by-hand recycling. 

We discuss the piles of mattress's, metals, plastics and green wastes before dropping our gear off. 

We watch and talk about the giant machinery that workers use. 

We discuss the activitiy of all the different birds. 

We notice the plastics caught in trees and fences along the ways

We drive past the neatly packed recyclable materials ready and waiting to be trucked off to their designated places

Disclaimer: These are just SOME of the ways we are teaching recycling and sustainability to our children. I'm open to ideas if you have any available, and especially any links involved :)

5 Things I am Thankful for:

1. Having a town that recycles

2. Children learning daily and naturally in a way that supports maintaining order cleanliness within the home

3. Enthusiastic interest in the mundane

4. Over-abundance of the country we live in

5. Not feeling that I am being wasteful by 'throwing out' recyclable materials to the recycling plant

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Worm farm

Worm farming is a great way to recycle and reuse waste in your own back yard, they are fun and a positive way for small children to learn about sustainability and caring for our environment.

I view home education as a positive practice to cultivate a hands on type learning that allows our environment to grow along with our children and the natural rythyms of life.

Caring for worms is an easy enough practice to simply leave without needing daily attention like chickens and dogs and cats. Practically a must for a busy homeschooling family with lots of little kids.

Building your Worm Farm
To get started you need some sort of container with a tap/spout/drainage hole to allow excess liquids to flow out. I use a worm farm that can be purchased from local nurseries. Mine was given ;)
Layer several sheets of unwanted newspaper on the bottom, followed by soil/dirt, chuck your worms in, food scraps, dirt and shredded paper/newspaper or a worm blanket. A worm blanket can be anything plant based eg wool or cotton - i used nothing then decided upon recycling 3 cotton shirts. The worms will eventually eat it - less in landfill ;) works for me!! Water it through so it's all wet. Those 3 shirts completely disappeared!!

To feed the worms:
Gather food scraps and place under wet blanket. We have chickens and ducks so I feed the worms juice pulp when we juice our vegetables and tiny scraps. I find the worms are able to process the pulp/smaller pieces faster giving a higher turnover rate. I've heard of others blending it into worm soup..
Appealing huh?! The other animals get the bigger pieces of scraps.

What to feed worms
Worms will happily munch through any plant based food items + cotton, paper & wool. Hold off on the meat and dairy, onion and their peel & citrus. (same as composting). Worms will also chew through manure though I've been told not to give them dog poop as the dogs worming routine will have residue stuff and kill the worms. They like high nitrogen to keep breeding. I've even added in a pile of coffee grounds which I received from a local cafe.

Worm Problems
When a problem occurs give them lime, bugs? Feed them lime, sick? Feed them lime. We stopped off on the side of the road and picked up a few lime stone rocks that got crushed up though that's easy given we live upon a lime pit.

Water
Water the worms every now and then, especially on hot days to make sure their home is kept moist. Some days I'll water mine daily other days I will water them every 3-5 days.

Worm Wees/Waste water
Catch the worm wees and feed it directly onto your garden (or lawn) for a highly nutritious plant meal ;) within a few days our dying chilli plant had a new lease on life and gave us a bush full of chilli's, likewise with the goji berry bush, everything thrives on worm wees.

I used a 10L watering can before discovering your meant to use only a cup or so of water to keep the worms moist, these worms are very forgiving. Either way your worm wees will be highly nutritious.

Vermi-compost. 
After a few weeks or months empty the bottom tray, dilute by about 1:10 water and place on plants or amongst your garden bed for a natural home made fertiliser.

Worms and Home Schooling
Caring for worms and watching them turn food wastes into healthy natural fertiliser is enough of a lesson, however if you are keen to teach more google is your friend.
You can include all areas of learning into building a worm farm from Science, Maths, English, Social Studies and even Technology.

Isaiah (4), Amalia (2) showing me the worms they found in the garden 2010

My children
I have gotten my children to draw pictures of the worms and their home but usually they just want to hold them. We also discuss the benefits of worms in the garden which I then hear children discuss amongst themselves as they search the garden beds for worms.

My children have been interested in worms since they were 2 & 4 years old, digging in the mud and finding big fat healthy worms. We could even call that a sensory learning experience ;)

Given the younger ages of my children I still haven't gone into a deep study of worms but perhaps I will as they grow older.

All of this has been a natural hands on experience, and honestly we prefer it that way ;)


5 Things I am Thankful for:
1. Natural Learning
2. Healthy plants I've produced through worm castings
3. No-waste kitchen
4. Children's interest in my interest
5. Family Projects

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