This page is where I organize all my homeschool links to articles and resources. Looking for my other Resource pages? All unattributed quotes on this page are from Charlotte Mason.
I LOVE this pinterest page. She has boards for EVERYTHING
Sources for free ebooks:
librivox MP4 files – audio books, you can listen in itunes
Open Library – over 1 mil. free ebooks
Lit2Go, audio & pdf versions of classics with readability scale.
post with list of free children’s classics in ebook format Most of these are either kindle format from Amazon or Project Gutenburg. There are lots of Ambleside books here and the post author labeled each link with title and author as well as a general grade range.
Kindergarten “In this time of extraordinary pressure, educational and social, perhaps a mothers first duty to her children is to secure for them a quiet and growing time, a full six years of passive receptive life, the waking part of it for the most part spent out in the fresh air.”
Charlotte Mason-specific
Obv, the first stop is amblesideonline.com. Everything’s FREE and VERY well organized! The original writings of Miss Mason are there, as well as her modern paraphrases and concise summaries. There is even a new page that organizes the modern paraphrases of her work by topic!! There is a page with everything you need for each additional subject (nature study, composer study, picture study, etc.) as well as booklists for each year (with the reading broken down by term, week, etc.) and even exams. My humble homeschool resource page simply seeks to add a bit to this site.
Sample homeschool day using Ambleside from Living Charlotte Mason in California blog
it all starts with an organized home here
habit training
I also really like Laying Down the Rails from Simplycharlottemason.com – a book with all of Charlotte Mason’s thoughts on habit training and a bit of how-to. I also purchased the workshop DVD but I haven’t had a chance to watch it yet.
a post on the habit of perfect execution
Will and habit “Let children alone-…the education of habit is successful in so far as it enables the mother to let her children alone, not teasing them with perpetual commands and directions – a running fire of Do and Don’t ; but letting them go their own way and grow, having first secured that they will go the right way and grow to fruitful purpose.”
spiritual development
The child and God “We are probably quite incapable of measuring the religious receptivity of children.”
“Let the child grow up aware of the constant, immediate, joy-giving, joy-taking Presence in the midst of them.”
“Let them grow up too with the shout of a King in the midst of them.”
“Children should be taught their duty toward God. It is their duty. That which they owe, to love Him “with all their heart, with all their mind, with all their strength” these things are seldom taught as they should be.”
I really like Susan Lemons’ book Homepreschool and Beyond. Her blog is also a great resource. This excellent post contains a list of spiritual goals for us to focus on for the preschool age.
Christian Classics (a list with links to free text for most)
fine arts
Learn to Draw Lessons – A Dozen Original Jon Gnagy Television Lessons
Learn to Draw – Free Lessons from Toad Hollow Studio
how to use oil pastels – a beginner guide here
Dry Brush watercolor tutorial
Sketching in Nature – an international group of artists sketching Creation (great help for nature notebooks!). Great bird step-by-step here
how to draw a bird here
How to Draw Birds (right click, “save link as” to download)
How to Read Music in Five Easy Steps
helpful websites for Ambleside books/curriculum
companion to Burgess Animal book here LOVELY cards here
companion to Burgess Bird Book here, LOVELY cards here
A fabulous coloring book/worksheet set, a site with videos of all the birds singing (by chapter), some really cool Montessori cards here. Printables from Little House in the Suburbs: ch 1-4, ch 5-9, ch 10-11, ch 12-16, ch 17-19, ch 20-22, ch 23-26, ch 27-31, ch 32-35, ch 36-39, ch 40-44, ch 45 a few extras: CH3 white-throated sparrow, CH5 bluebird, CH6 phoebe, CH7 kingbird, CH9 sandpiper, CH12 oriole, CH13 bobolink, CH15 tree swallow, CH17 blue jay, CH22 kestrel, CH30 mockingbird, CH31 thrush, CH33 finches 1 2 3, CH35 hummingbird, CH37 chickadee, CH38 loon, CH39 nuthatch, CH42 screech owl
The History of Insects (link to free book at Project Gutenburg)
The Insect Folk by Margaret Warner Morley (link to free book at Project Gutenburg)
The Bird-Woman of the Lewis and Clark Expedition by Katherine Chandler
McGuffey’s Eclectic Primer, Revised Edition by William Holmes McGuffey
Uncle Remus, his songs and his sayings by Joel Chandler Harris
A Day With William Shakespeare from gutenberg.org.
for parents
Time for mother. “If mothers could learn to do for themselves what they do for their children when these are overdone, we should have happier households. Let the mother go out to play! If she would have the courage to let everything go when life becomes too tense, and just take a day, or half a day, out in the fields, or with a favourite book, or in a picture gallery looking long and well at just two or three pictures, or in bed, without the children, life would go on far more happily for both children and parents. The mother would then be able to hold herself in “wise passiveness’ and would not fret her children by continual interference even of hand or eye – she would let them be.”
Mother Culture: What it is and what it is not from Higher Up and Further In – a good encouragement for Moms to keep improving our own minds by reading
nature study resources (field guides)
Nature Study “We are all meant to be naturalists, each in his own degree, and it is inexcusable to live in a world so full of the marvels of plant and animal life and to care for none of these things.”
“There is no part of a child’s education more important than that he should lay – by his own observation – a wide basis of facts towards scientific knowledge in the future.”
“Let them once get in touch with nature and a habit is formed which will be a source of delight and habit through life.”
Is your nature study living or an educational activity? (This is a must-read article!)
Taking regular nature walks and recording observations in a nature journal were very important to Charlotte Mason. Find out much more at Charlotte Mason Nature Study.
Wild Animals I Have Known from gutenberg.org. This book is full of short nature stories and great illustrations that would work well with a notebook or sketchbook project. Everything from birds and butterflies to plants and seasons are discussed in lively “fairy” stories to keep the interest of young listeners.
From Nature Study Readers:
Parents or teachers who know comparatively little about science can successfully lead the children in Nature study, provided they are willing to see with the child. Such often make the best leaders, as their own desire to find out will have a contagious effect.
It is not necessary to answer all the questions that children may ask. Even the wisest scientist would not dare to answer them all. To do that would not be Nature study. True teaching is to lead the child to discover as far as possible answers to his own and to the teacher’s questions.
Experienced teachers will find ways and means of their own, but a few hints to beginners may not be out of place here.
1. Encourage the children to bring you seed pods, flowers, leaves, butterflies, and other objects, and if you show your appreciation of their efforts and take care of the specimens as though they amounted to something, they will hunt far and wide and bring many good things.
2. Better still, take walks with the children or ask questions, the answers to which they can find on their way to and from school.
3. Provide vases and wide-mouthed bottles for flowers; boxes for seeds and rocks and nuts; cards for mounting pods and insects; a few plant pots in which to set some interesting wild flowers about to blossom and that have been dug up with the soil so as to watch their growth. Flowers, leaves, and the like brought by children should not be bunched together, but arranged and put into several vases so as to show off best the harmony of color and form. Tinted autumn leaves can be grouped on cards or made into borders, etc.
4. Live animals can be brought into the school, made comfortable, and their ways and habits observed with interest and profit. Good order can be maintained by a few wise remarks on the part of the teacher.
5. No one sees objects in all or even their most interesting aspects at first. Therefore the order should be observation, expression, and more observation.
6. Little time should be given to that which every one knows, but even very common objects may present interesting questions. Every one knows that an apple is round, but few have observed facts that will aid in answering the question why it is round.
7. With those who are beginning to read careful preparation should be made. The child should observe the objects and become familiar by means of blackboard drill with the sentences in the lessons before attempting to read them in the book. This preparation must be full of life and interest to the child. The basis of every lesson should be personal observation by the child. The observation may have been made some time previous to the lesson, but if not, the object should be before the child for examination.
8. Lead the child to distinguish between what it actually observes and what it infers, and to reason step by step to correct conclusions.
9. The lessons in the book follow the seasons and call for materials which may easily be obtained, but the teacher should take up each subject at the time when it is most convenient to make the necessary observations.
Resources for Second Grade and Beyond . . .
We aren’t doing the following subjects at all right now, but I want to keep these resources organized for later – so these are things that others have recommended, or that look good, but I haven’t actually used.
older kids handicrafts
math
CM on math (quotes)
A Better Way to Multiply: The Partial Products Method on YouTube
geography
“The peculiar value of geography lies in its fitness to nourish the mind with ideas and furnish the imagination with pictures.”
great post with geography quotes from Charlotte Mason as well as a geography booklist
science
The World of Chemistry – FREE video on demand
YouTube video Bill Nye, the Science Guy (Atoms) (C3, W13-W18)
Learn Our History: Election Day DVD from Mike Huckabee
Free Anatomy coloring book on Google
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