As Americans, we should be educated about the symbols of our country. Our liberty and freedom are very important, and our children need to be aware of what those concepts actually mean. And since the Pledge of Allegiance is no longer allowed to be recited in public schools, many children (and adults) are not learning about the history and significance of one of the most important symbols in our nation’s history—our flag!

Since Old Glory will be flying all over America and fireworks will bursting overhead, the Fourth of July holiday is perfect for teaching our children a bit about our nation’s history, and more specifically, the background and symbolism of our flag!

Here are a few topics you might want to consider:

1. Read about how the Continental Congress established a resolution to provide for our country’s very first flag on June 14, 1777. That’s why we celebrate Flag Day on this date.

2. Did Betsy Ross really sew the first flag or is this a legend? Who was Mary Pickersgill and how does she fit into the story?

3. Who wrote the Star Spangled Banner? Where and why was it composed?

4. Why is our flag called Old Glory?

5. What did Congress decide to do in 1818 to recognize each state as it was added to the Union?

6. What do the stripes on our flag represent? Why are there thirteen?

7. What do the colors red, white, and blue represent?

8. Why is the bottom stripe red instead of white?

9. Who wrote the Pledge of Allegiance and how many times has it been modified?

How much do we really know about the standards of respect for this symbol and specific flag etiquette? Check out the website http://www.usflag.org/flagetiquette.html to learn more.

Picture books are a great resource to share with children to introduce them to the history, significance, and symbolism of our flag. Two of my favorites are:

Stars and Stripes: The Story of the American Flag by Sarah L. Thompson

The American Flag (True Books: American History) by Elaine Landau

So consider using this patriotic holiday to learn more about a very important patriotic symbol in our nation’s history—the flag of the United States of America. You might just find out things you never knew before!

Visit Amy at www.amyoquinn.com

Reinforcing Mathematical Skills and More: Cooking Single Serving Recipes

by Amy M. O’Quinn

Summertime is often the time when parents can help their children with extra projects or fun-for-kids ideas that are hard to fit in during the school year. One of these ‘extras’ might be working on a life skill—such as cooking. However, why not add in a sprinkle of educational ‘flavor’ while you’re at it?

This summer I plan on working with my eleven-year-old daughter on some basic cooking skills, but I also want to reinforce some mathematical concepts in the process. So I’m going to use a resource called Single Serving Recipes, written by Joyce Herzog, MA (a well-known educator, writer, and creator of a myriad of fine learning products.)

From the description at www.joyceherzog.com, here is more information about Single Serving Recipes:

“What can motivate kids more than food? And if they cook it themselves, they’ll want to eat it. One serving means small mess to clean up—small losses for mistakes. They improve their reading and thinking skills as they have fun and learn to cook and clean up after themselves. Complete meal, dessert, or just a snack—have it all with this Single Serving Cookbook!”

One of my personal favorite things about this cooking resource is that it teaches children about responsibility and how to follow directions. I also like the idea of reinforcing the concept of fractions and measurement. In the first part of the book, the recipes are drawn in pictures and require only a very limited reading vocabulary, so I could also use it with my younger children.

The old maxim of ‘children learn by doing’ is so true—and this is especially applicable in the kitchen. It’s usually easier and faster for parents to do things themselves when preparing a meal, but the time invested teaching children basic skills such as cooking now will reap huge rewards later on. That’s why Single Serving Recipes is such a great idea. Everything is done on a smaller scale with less mess, but the results are exceptional! In addition, children will enjoy the process. And as Joyce Herzog says in the book, “…don’t forget the most important ingredients: love and fun!”

Visit Amy at www.amyoquinn.com.

Teaching Reading – Leveled Readers

by Carol Fraser Boles, Literacy Specialist for the National Writing for Children Center

In the early elementary grades (kindergarten through second), reading lessons in most elementary schools consist of the following sequence and components:

Direct instruction: The teacher models individual vowel and consonant sounds, as well as vowel and consonant sound combinations, of specific phonics rules,

Guided practice: Each student receives a workbook page, which reflects the day’s phonics lesson. At this stage, students are applying and practicing what they’ve just learned—with the guidance of the teacher, or in a peer group setting.

Independent practice: Time devoted for students to work individually. Independent practice can consist of each student completing a workbook page or reading a leveled reader—again reflecting the day’s phonics lesson.

Most parents know what a workbook page is, but many are unfamiliar with the term “Leveled Readers.” Leveled Readers are short books, often written by well-know authors, created in series. The books usually start at level “A” and end at “O” level. Illustrated, with carefully chosen words, each storybook gives students a chance to practice reading while simultaneously applying the letter-sound and letter-sound combinations learned that day. Specifically, each story reinforces specific phonics rules—additionally providing students with sight word practice.*

In today’s classrooms, teachers have an abundance of leveled readers available for students to select from. Leveled readers are not only stories, but are also available in non-fiction form.

Leveled Readers are not just for the classroom. These books are available for parents as well and are affordable—perfect for reading practice times at home. Here are two examples of leveled reading products:

To master reading, children must practice. Leveled readers provide a variety of topics to choose from to practice reading. I encourage parents to purchase a set of leveled readers to keep their children in a reading routine, this summer.

*Sight words are words student should recognize automatically, such as: the, then, it, was, who, can, where, et, cetera.

Click here to read another article from Carol Fraser Boles about using Leveled Readers in the Classroom!

Phonics – My Top Five Resources for Parents

from Carol Fraser Boles, Literacy Specialist for the National Writing for Children Center

Every reading teacher will tell you, the key to reading success is a firm understanding of phonics rules. This is why all public schools teach some approach to phonics. Parents can support and extend phonics instruction to their early elementary children by scheduling fifteen minutes out of their day for an additional phonics lesson. There are variety of publishers and curriculums available to parents to help their children master phonics.

Here are my Top Five Picks:

Hooked on Phonics – Lessons consist of learning letter names and sounds (a DVD is included to introduce each sound), vowel/consonant sound combinations, site word practice, and leveled readers.

ClickN Read Phonics – An interactive, web-bases phonics program is for pre-school through third grade. Animated lessons cover letter name, sounds, and blending—a total of 61 phonics lessons and more than 100 lessons that children complete to apply what they have learned—can only be purchased online.

HeadSprout – A software program, of interactive lesson from fifteen to thirty minutes long on phonics; parents can also purchase printed leveled readers which reflect each lesson—available online.

Steck-Vaughn Phonics – Simple graduated lessons on phonics, in the form of workbook pages. Theses workbooks can be purchased online at Rainbow Resource Center.

Teacher Created Resources – Offers a variety approaches to learning and applying phonics rules, such as, poetry and word families to teach and reinforce individual phonics lessons.

Every Child needs to have word attack skills to read fluently. Phonics is a word attack skill. When children successfully learn phonics (letter sounds and letters sound combinations) they are capable of sounding out unknown words and they can read for meaning with success.

For more information about phonics instruction and phonics programs, visit www.carolfraserboles.com.

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Using Fun Fiction to Teach Science

May 2, 2011 by admin  
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by Amy M. O’Quinn, Home School Specialist for the National Writing for Children Center

Teaching scientific concepts to children can be done in a variety of ways—through the use of textbooks, classroom lectures, worksheets, activities, media, experiments, etc. But trade books often lend themselves to the task as well. In fact, many authors develop books to specifically introduce or reinforce standard science concepts, and quite a few of these choices are fictional. Moreover, when students become familiar with vocabulary, skills, and concepts in ‘story’ form, they will recognize the same information in a non-fictional source/setting as well. This is just another way to build an educational knowledge base, yet enjoy a fun story at the same time. And certainly, exposure is so important in the process!

Renee Hand is an author (and homeschool parent) who has chosen to write fun fiction to introduce scientific concepts to children. With a degree in Zoology and a minor in Chemistry, Renee certainly knows her stuff, but she has also developed an engaging mystery story that will have readers trying to figure out what will happen next.

In her second book in the award-winning Joe-Joe Nut and Biscuit Bill series, Mineral Mischief, Renee has her characters on the case to solve what has happened to Maple Moo’s missing rare mineral. Following leads and suspects over all of Acorn Valley, Joe-Joe and Biscuit learn all about various rocks and minerals—so, of course, the reader learns right along with these detectives.

I was surprised by how much information was included in this mystery, and I found myself wanting to pull my geology book off the shelf to learn more about the rocks and minerals that Maple Moo, Brutus and Betty Blue Beaver, Candy Cardinal, Liam Llama, and Huckleberry Moose shared with Joe-Joe and Biscuit. But of course, I had to first find out WHO took Maple Moo’s rare benitoite and neptunite mineral!

In the resource section at the back of the book, Renee also included a picture of the rock cycle, terminology, a ‘Did You Know’ section, experiments, and charts. In addition, Mineral Mischief helps satisfy the requirement of the National Science Education Standards for Earth and Space Science.

Renee has written an ‘edu-taining’ book, and both classroom teachers/homeschool parents will find it to be a wonderful resource to introduce rocks and minerals and geology in general.

You can find out more about Renee Hand, this series, and her other books/information at www.reneeahand.com.

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Visit Amy at www.amyoquinn.com.

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Making Subjects Come Alive With ‘Living’ Books

April 9, 2011 by admin  
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by Amy M. O’Quinn, Home School Specialist for the National Writing for Children Center

We are a very literature based homeschooling family, so we try to incorporate ‘living’ books into our schedule at every possible occasion. In fact, even though I might use a table of contents in a textbook for a guideline, I mostly utilize trade books for my children’s reading lists, especially in the areas of literature, history, science (for my younger children), and geography. I do use textbooks for Math and my older son’s science, but even in that, there are many great books that can be used to complement these subjects as well.

Here is an example of how I have rounded out my youngest daughter’s current history study. She has been learning about the Great Depression and World War II in the last three months, so there have been countless resources and books to choose from that have really sparked her interest in the topics at hand. She has been reading Volumes 9-10 (War, Peace, and All That Jazz and All the People) of Joy Hakim’s A History of US series. Those particular books have been the ‘spine’ or main content books for her study, and I have pulled together other books to ‘go along’ with the chapters she is reading.

Although she is eleven years old, I still include great picture books on her list as well, as I have found that they often give a great overview of the subject and provide a beginning knowledge base that can be added to with progressively more in-depth books. In fact, when I begin researching a topic to write about, I will often head to the picture book or easy reader section at the library to find books that can give me a simple introduction. It really works!

As I’ve mentioned in other articles, I also have several reference books on my shelf such as All Through the Ages: History Through Literature Guide by Christine Miller, that match up time periods or locations in history with novels and trade books. This makes planning so much easier, as the research and legwork have already been done for me.

Therefore, I have been easily able to find non-fiction books and novels on the Great Depression, Dust Bowl, The New Deal, Japanese-American Internment Camps, Tuskegee Airmen, Navajo Code Breakers, Pearl Harbor, D-Day, etc. I have also located biographies of Babe Ruth, Amelia Earhart, Franklin D. Roosevelt, Dwight D. Eisenhower, etc.

One particular book that my daughter has read and enjoyed was Suzanne Lieurance’s wonderful novel, The Lucky Baseball, about a young boy in a Japanese-American Internment Camp. I assigned the book on a Monday, but Ellie enjoyed it so much, that instead of following the assigned page numbers that spread the reading over the whole week, she finished the book in two days!

I found her reading the book after ‘school hours’ were officially over, and that is the joy of using trade books as opposed to textbooks all the time. Combined with the non-fiction spine book from A Story of US series, The Lucky Baseball provided my daughter with a picture of what Japanese-Americans went through during World War II and how they dealt with the difficulties they faced. It is a slice of history she won’t soon forget!

‘Living’ books are so much more interesting for both students and teachers alike, and they can provide a huge spark in the educational process, which can quickly turn into a roaring fire and enthusiasm for learning!

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Visit Amy O’Quinn at www.amyoquinn.com.

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