The nights are getting cooler and the stars have been spectacular for the past few nights - hope you've had a chance to go outside and check out the night sky. This is the time of year when we have the perfect opportunity to become familiar with the stars and do some serious stargazing.

This is also the time of year that we turn our weekend evenings into campfire nights and stargazing adventures. I recently read a wonderful article in the September/October issue of Grit magazine - the article is "Spectacular Stargazing" by Letitia L. Star, and the subtitle is "The sun goes down, stars come out, wonder begins." If you can find this issue, check out this article, along with several other very interesting articles - like the one on birdwatching.

From the time we moved to the country, we have always made a tradition of weekend campfires and trying to spot shooting stars and orbiting satellites. We invite friends and make smores, and enjoy the spectacular view of the Milky Way. Even if you live in a city, perhaps there is a park on the outskirts of town where you can have a cookout and get away from the bright city lights to see things like the Big Dipper and Orion.

Enjoy these days and starry nights,
Amanda B.
www.unitstudy.com

Just wanted to share the good news that some favorite Thanksgiving books
are now listed on BookCloseouts:

Thanksgiving, What Makes It Special?  - Boardbook
Author(s): Kurisu, Jane (Ilt), Myra, Harold 

Thanksgiving: What Makes It Special?
Author(s): Kurisu, Jane (Ilt), Myra, Harold 

Squanto and The Miracle Of Thanksgiving
Author: Metaxas, Eric  

Thanksgiving on Plymouth Plantation 
 Author(s): Berry, Holly (Ilt), Stanley, Diane  

The Very First Thanksgiving Day 
Author:  Gaber, Susan (Ilt), Greene, Rhonda Gowler 

The Night Before Thanksgiving 
Author:  Lyon, Tammie (Ilt), Wing, Natasha  

Off to Plymouth Rock 
Author:  Barretta, Gene (Ilt), Mackall, Dandi Daley

The Kids' Holiday Baking Book 
Author:  Black, Rosemary

Hope these help,
Amanda B.
www.unitstudy.com

For those of you that are good cooks, please just skip this entry. I recently discovered a wonderful new paperback cookbook at WalMart called "Mom's Best Meals" from Taste of Home magazine. So far, every single recipe that I have tried has turned out beautifully, and the recipes call for affordable ingredients that are around most homes. The magazine has almost 30 sets of recipes for Mom's best meals from around the country - and the results are exciting meals that are simple to prepare, AND the family loves them! Please recall that cooking is not one of my better-known skills. :-) I tend to cook using the smoke-detector method - when the smoke detector goes off, dinner must be done!

I;ve tried many of the recipes - including "Pillowtop Rolls" (I cheated and made the recipe in my bread machine - fantastic!), upside down strawberry shortcake, baked ziti, and many more - magnificent and the guys here are now cruising the kitchen with their noses working, trying to figure out what smells so good!

I don't know about you, but I tend to get in a rut with recipe and menu selection after a while, and infusions like those from this book are a great motivator for me.

I found mine at the checkout rack in a local WalMart - look for yours and enjoy!

Blessings,
Amanda B.
www.unitstudy.com

Don't miss this exciting and timely package which includes the Elections, American Government, Thanksgiving and Christmas Unit Studies for a very special price! Sixteen weeks of learning adventures for only $39.95 --  the package includes all four unit studies as well as the companion notebooking pages. Follow this link to learn more:

Autumn Unit Study Package

Blessings,
Amanda B.
www.unitstudy.com

Symbols of the American Government Activity Booklet

Project Vote Smart

Presidential Seal Coloring Page

Campaign Games

Hitting the Campaign Trail for Kids

Kids in the House (of Representatives)

Activity Pages for Kids about the House of Representatives

The Living Room Candidate – Presidential Commercials from 1952 – 2004

Quiz for Kids – Presidents and Baseball

Quiz for Kids – White House Pets 

Play Presidential Baseball Online

Labor Day Recipes from AllRecipes (I think the Bucket Salad sounds like our speed!

 _____________________________

Autumn 2008 Unit Study Package    $39.95
Retail value if purchased separately: $59.80
Sale ends September 2, 2008

 Get ready for an exciting season of learning with this new unit study package!

This package includes sixteen weeks of daily lessons, ready to use on arrival -
no other books required. The following studies and their companion notebooking pages are  included in this CDROM package:

 American Government

 Elections

Thanksgiving

Christmas

  _________________________________

When I am on the road speaking at conventions, I am often asked about what I would differently if I could do it all over again - and here's my list:

1. Have less textbook stress, more individualized focus. 

2. Focus on the child, not the information lists

3. Expand the family's horizons – as individuals and as a family 

4. Listen more, talk less – avoiding the "transmit only" mode

5. Encourage more often, instead of being judgmental or comparative

I wish I had known to relax and enjoy the time together as a family more. In the beginning, we were so nervous about covering everything, using all of the workbook pages, filling up the plan book ahead of time and sticking with it rigidly. So much stress, so little long-term learning, and so little enjoyment of the educational process. 

The more we homeschool, the broader our interests become. No longer pursuing narrow, society-defined topics alone, we enjoy the freedom to investigate topics like horticulture, sports fitness, glass painting, business and economic concepts for kids, personalized pursuits of art, music, and so much more.

You will never be able to completely fill their minds with absolutely every bit of available information – but you CAN teach them or learn WITH them about how to FIND all kinds of information that they might need to know – research skills are vital for this next generation. The overabundance of information on the internet is so overwhelming, and at the same time – provides priceless access to things that we could never have found through a local library. Give them the gift of thinking skills and research ability. 

Remember, homeschooling is not just about learning academic material. It is about opening the envelop of each child's imagination with wonder and awe – feeding their desire to learn more, to investigate, to discover and pursue their unique God-given gifts and talents.

1. The things that count can't be counted.
2. Time goes by too quickly to worry about or obsess over small things, like whether or not my child can read by the time they are five years old, etc.
3. Keep the big picture in the forefront – getting from point A (beginning homeschooling) to point B (finish homeschooling) – remember that perspective is key to success. While we might miss algebra this week due to family illness, we will still focus on the desired outcome – a well-rounded and enthusiastic learner by the time high school is complete.

 I hope you are encouraged - and know that I believe in YOU!

Blessings,
Amanda B.
www.unitstudy.com

As you move into a new season of learning, there is plenty of distraction to contend with as we try to invigorate these young minds to absorb things like algebra and long division. With so much going on in the world these days, the pace of life seems to becoming a bit more frantic as more people are becoming concerned with both national and world politics. As your children get old enough to be aware of current events, they begin to notice and ask excellent questions. Help them find the answers and get a solid understanding of the issues. With the upcoming elections, talk about which issues are important for your family and why, and help them find out how the candidates stand on these issues.  

This is a time of year when we are still enjoying the blessings of summer, knowing that the next season is just around the corner. The autumn signals are gathering as leaves begin to show changes and the nights grow a bit cooler. Catch on to the blessings of each day and enjoy them with your family. The lessons will go on and the learning will continue, just make sure to enjoy the people that you call “family” along the way!

I hope you and your crew are enjoying a long and peaceful Labor Day weekend. While most of us will be relaxing this weekend, some will be evacuating ahead of Hurricane Gustav. For those of you along the Gulf Coast, please know that you’ve got our prayers for your safety through this storm and the days that follow.  

Blessings,
Amanda B.
www.unitstudy.com

______________________

Labor Day S-A-L-E

Holiday Combo Package
 ONLY  $19.95   (through 09/02/08)
 Contains:

  Thanksgiving Unit Study CDROM

  Christmas Unit Study CDROM

________________________________

First, let me say to all of you who have just begun a new school year -- way to go! I remember when we first began homeschooling, you know - back in the LAST century, we kept the kids inside during regular school hours so that folks in the surrounding area wouldn't call the truant officer. The beginning of a new school year meant that we had to move our daily adventures indoors for a good part of the day, so launching a new school year took some creative convincing that this was going to be a great year!

In addition to our topics of interest for our studies, I learned to allow room for IFTs - Ideas from Television - favorite shows like Bill Nye the Science Guy and ZoomKids kept providing all kinds of great things to investigate, build, and try out. I'll never forget the time when they were working on an experiment that was demonstrating the ability of a plant to seek sunlight even from far inside of a dark box. The experiment called for a box with corrugated inserts (to create a maze for the plant to grow through to find sunlight) - and the best that I could find was packing boxes from the liquor store! Those boxes had great inserts that created the perfect mazes for the experiment. However, the external printing on the boxes was a bit disconcerting to the pastor when he dropped by one day and saw their boxes stacked up on the sunny end of the front porch! :-) His eyes were big round circles as he turned when I answered the door. As I recall, we were his first exposure to homeschooling, too!

Our three children cover a ten year age span, so I know just what it means to try to keep a VERY active toddler busy while the older kids are studying. I learned to plan our school day around the toddler's nap schedule. When he slept (or was supposed to be sleeping), I worked one on one with the older kids with subject areas that required individual attention with each child. When the toddler was up and roaming, and yes - he was a very VERY busy toddler - I learned how to entertain him while we worked on unit studies. He might be busy with building blocks or rearranging magnetic letters on a cookie sheet, or he might be enjoying a math lesson with an older sibling from books like "M&M Addition" or "M&M Multiplication." Matchbox cars were constantly zipping across the floor during reading time, as he couldn't sit still for long, but he would quietly send the cars flying across the room or around the Hot Wheels track! I learned to remove many of these toy cars and only leave a few out at a time - recycling them so that there were always a few he hadn't seen in a while.

I also made sure that some of our school projects included things for him to do - whether it involved log cabin construction with popsicle craft sticks or creating Plymouth Plantation using modeling clay on the kitchen table. After teaching several ages at once, I learned the importance of keeping a toddler involved with the big kids - better learning opportunities for everyone. And memories more precious than gold, with plenty of pictures to keep us laughing for years to come.

This is a great time to be homeschooling - there are so many opportunities to share and learn, and people are much more encouraged about homeschooling families. When I am on the road speaking at conventions, I am often asked about what I would differently if I could do it all over again - and here's my list:

1.                  Have less textbook stress, more individualized focus.

2.                  Focus on the child, not the information lists

3.                  Expand the family's horizons – as individuals and as a family

4.                  Listen more, talk less – avoiding the "transmit only" mode

5.                  Encourage more often, instead of being judgmental or comparative

I wish I had known to relax and enjoy the time together as a family more. In the beginning, we were so nervous about covering everything, using all of the workbook pages, filling up the plan book ahead of time and sticking with it rigidly. So much stress, so little long-time learning, and so little enjoyment of the educational process.

The more we homeschool, the broader our interests become. No longer pursuing narrow, society-defined topics alone, we enjoy the freedom to investigate topics like horticulture, sports fitness, glass painting, business and economic concepts for kids, personalized pursuits of art, music, and so much more.

You will never be able to completely fill their minds with absolutely every bit of available information – but you CAN teach them or learn WITH them about how to FIND all kinds of information that they might need to know – research skills are vital for this next generation.The overabundance of information on the internet is so overwhelming, and at the same time – provides priceless access to things that we could never have found through a local library. Give them the gift of thinking skills and research ability.

Remember, homeschooling is not just about learning academic materials. It is about opening the envelop of each child's imagination with wonder and awe – feeding their desire to learn more, to investigate, to discover and pursue their unique God-given gifts and talents. I think that Leonardo da Vinci had a good point when he said:

"Just as eating against one's will is injurious to health, so studying without a liking for it spoils the memory, and it retains nothing it takes in."

What do I know now that I wish we had known when we first started homeschooling?

1.  The things that count can't be counted.    
2.  Time goes by too quickly to worry about or obsess over small things, like whether or not my child can read by the time they are five years old, etc.    
3.  Keep the big picture in the forefront – getting from point A (beginning homeschooling) to point B (finish homeschooling) – remember that perspective is key to success. While we might miss algebra for this week due to family illness, we will still focus on the desired outcome – a well-rounded and enthusiastic learner by the time high school is complete.

I hope you are encouraged - and know that I believe in YOU!

Blessings,
Amanda B.
www.unitstudy.com

Check it out - Amanda Bennett's Holiday Combo Package - Thanksgiving and Christmas Unit Studies on CDROM for only $19.95 through 09/02/08! Here's the link:

Labor Day Sale!

Have a GREAT holiday,
Amanda B.
www.unitstudy.com

Earlier this summer, our youngest son, who knew nothing about electronics or televisions, decided to build a projection television system. With NO experience in electricity, electronics, lenses, etc., he set out on a learning adventure to build one of these systems on his own. Of course, Dad helped along the way with GREAT interest. :-)

The system is now up and running, with a screen shot that can go up to 124" - when they played a snowboarding game through the system, it felt like I was on the slopes myself! The clarity was amazing, and now they are living for the start of college football next week - lifesize and upclose. I'll be in the den, writing...

This project taught our son so much - about how much he didn't know, how to find answers, how systems work, and on and on. I was amazed at how motivated he was to accomplish this - staying at it for hours at a time, and then working on it with Dad for hours each evening. So much learning and interest - I was surrounded by self-motivated learners and loving it. Even if he won't get into electricity in this depth until physics next year.

So here I sit, with an eager-to-learn-more fifteen year old who loves to pursue an interest with a passion - wanting to know what he can do next with electronics. Hmmm...

I enrolled him in the Electronics 1 online class at www.quickstudylabs.com taught by a college electronics professor and homeschooling dad. I ordered the electronics kit for the class, and HID it in my office until this past Monday when the class began. First thing Monday morning, my son came down bright and early, searching for the kit and ready to get the class underway.

He opened the kit and couldn't get it all out on the table fast enough - he could not wait to begin the first lesson. I left him at it for a few hours, didn't smell anything burning, and kept an ear out for unexpected snaps, pops or crackles. Not a sound, UNTIL he discovered how to build a circuit involving sound and sensors and a potentiometer - and then I thought aliens had invaded! :-)

He had completed the entire week's worth of lessons, taken the online test, got a perfect score, and then moved on to see just what he could do with all of the components. This is going to be VERY interesting.

I am sharing all of this, and hopefully not boring you, to show that there are so many unique interests and gifts in our children that we have yet to uncover! I would NEVER have expected this child to absolutely thrive in the world of electrons - I could never get him to sit still for a few minutes when he was a toddler! I am thrilled that we've discovered a new interest and intrinsic knack for knowing how to create with all of these parts, and it reminds me that we've had these "aha" moments with each child.

When we first started homeschooling, I thought it would be great to be able to do things with the children that involved their interests - perfect! However, the first thing our daughter wanted to do was to learn how to sew. TO SEW?? I didn't know how to sew, and I had hated home ec and sewing and all things having to do with fabric - what was I going to do now?

To make a long story short, I received a new sewing maching for my birthday that year, and our daughter taught herself how to sew. She went on to become quite a gifted seamstress and quilter and entered a quilt in the local county fair and won a prize for her effort! She had worked so hard to follow her interest, and we had done all that we knew to accomplish her goal. She is now a very gifted veterinarian and talented surgeon - can you imagine what might have happened if I had said - no, not sewing - I don't know anything about sewing, how about crocheting? :-) 

Thanks for hanging in there with this post, and I hope that it encourages you as you venture down this path with your own very gifted and talented children.

 Blessings,
Amanda B.
www.unitstudy.com

Check out the new unit study package for this fall - save some money and enjoy this great season of learning! The Autumn 2008 Unit Study Package includes timely titles with a total of 16 weeks of daily lessons - Elections, American Government, Thanksgiving, and Christmas. Here's the link:

http://www.unitstudy.com/autumn_2008_package.htm

Sincerely,
Amanda B.
www.unitstudy.com

For those of you studying the Olympics, here is a link to a Time magazine photo gallery called "What the World Eats: What's on family dinner tables in fifteen different homes around the globe?"

http://www.time.com/time/photogallery/0,29307,1626519,00.html

It is fascinating to see the variety of foods and people, and of course, you have to go look up where each of these countries are located. It can also raise many questions, like how many of these families have gardens and how does their weekly food cost compare with ours? The Olympics provide such great learning opportunities in so many areas of life.

Blessings,
Amanda B.
www.unitstudy.com

For those of you with younger students - keep an eye out for inexpensive world globes at garage sales and thrift shops this week and through the weekend. I learned to do this when we first began studying the Olympics - most of ours were purchased for under $1 each. I made sure that we had many globes, so that each child had one of their own to find the country that was competing or being studied, and could see where it was relative to our town. Visual learning is a favorite tool of mine!

However, I learned a powerful lesson about kids and geography and their creativity when I discovered that the children had learned to carefully take each globe out of their stands and use them as bowling balls in the long hall with a set of plastic bowling pins. Imagine - "I got that pin with Australia" or "there goes Africa!" :-) I have learned so much while homeschooling!

Blessings,
Amanda B.
www.unitstudy.com

We are now only 28 days from the opening ceremonies of the Summer Olympics 2008! Kick off your new school year with an amazing adventure with the brand new four-week Summer Olympics Unit Study:

Summer Olympics 2008 Unit Study

This new unit study title has several new features - it includes the Olympic-themed notebooking pages and Word Search puzzles - for a total of 194 pages!

Blessings,
Amanda B.
www.unitstudy.com

Just a quick reminder - free shipping on unit study orders ends tonight at midnight!

Blessings,
Amanda B.
www.unitstudy.com

Hurray - it is finally released and ready to enjoy! 

From now through July 4th, 2008, the new Summer Olympics study will be on sale - here's the link:

Summer Olympics 2008 Unit Study

This new unit study title has several new features - it includes the Olympic-themed notebooking pages and Word Search puzzles - for a total of 194 pages!

The sale price of $10 only applies through Friday, then it will go back to the regular price of $16.95. Don't forget, if you order it on CD before midnight tonight, shipping is free!

And now, I'm off to cook dinner and work on getting the newsletter on the way! Thanks for your patience...

Blessings,
Amanda B.
www.unitstudy.com

Only $5 for the downloadable new one-week study! Here's the link:

http://tinyurl.com/5zw9sx

Happy Independence Day!

Blessings,
Amanda B.
www.unitstudy.com