Time to get Passports?

This is the volcano we visited while in El Salvador. It was an awesome sight!

We had our El Salvador mission's trip debriefing last night at the Wahba's home. It was so nice to be with the whole team again! We had lots of food and some good ideas for the next team going. Another one going in March, maybe. Hopefully, it all works out to go. Curtis wants to go ahead and take our teens this time. 16yo son and 15 yo daughter. Hmm...wonder if there is enough time to get their passports?

By the way, we did our fund-raising as a group instead of as individuals. It was such a blessing and we had a surplus! The surplus will help send the March team to help Lorraine and Hannah's Hands. Praise the Lord!

This Friday, Curtis and I will start facilitating a Love Dare group. We are really looking forward to it! Our kids get to go with us and hang out, do Bible study, play games, and snack while we have the group discussion.

El Salvador - First Time on Foreign Missions

Funny things I saw on my trip:
1. Our surgeon friend, his wife, and my husband with pig hats on oinking and going after the prodigal son. The children LOVED this one! (This funny drama brought many to Christ.)
2. Our driver trying to make us smile while taking our group photo... Say "Queso." "Record." We all obediently said "record" and smiled. Then he told us..."No, I'm recording you now!" We all started laughing from embarassment. Loved it!
3. Parking the van in spaces that no human could fit...let alone an entire van. >>l<< Everybody squeeze!

As I think of more, I'll write them here. Maybe I should get "Fish in My Hair" to do the writing. Then you could really get the gist of the fun!

(As you can see, this is not my main blog. I used Xanga for a long time, then went back to my own pen and paper journal. Hmm...let's see how this goes.)

Spelling Curriculum Recommendations

(Please excuse any grammar errors on this post, it was just a friend to friend e-mail.) Question: I have a student who seems to have a terrible problem with spelling. He may be right-brained, I am not sure. He has been labeled by the school system O.D.D. oppositional defiance disorder...however i don't think he is O.D.D. ...he may be A.D.D. ......either way, he is one of the worst spellers i have ever seen...he is 14 years old, and most 6-year-olds have a better grasp on spelling... can you help?? any suggestions? curriculums you like?? Thanks! Answer: I strongly recommend "How to Teach Any Child to Spell" by Gayle Graham for this situation. ($8ish) She has also put out a student notebook to go with her tiny book. The student notebook is called "Tricks of the Trade." ($17) The notebook has all the sounds and their spellings broken down onto different pages and can be used as a spelling dictionary for words the student routinely uses. (We didn't have this notebook when Marchelle was learning, we just used notebook paper and put it into her 3-ring-binder.) That was around the age that Marchelle decided she wanted to know how to spell. It took about 6 months using Gayle Grahams method and she was flying! Of course, Marchelle is a fast learner. I also noted that once Andrew decided he wanted to know how to spell he got better quickly. (Sometimes, they just have to "want to.") That said, Gayle Graham's method uses words from their writing, so if the child is not writing - you won't have any words to pull from. This year I'm using Spelling Power ($69)...I like the organized method she has, but it has some drawbacks that you will need to overcome. The first one is: covering too many spelling rules in one sitting. I've had to break the Spelling Power down into Gayle Graham's "How to Teach Any Child to Spell" method. The Second one is: On the Delayed Recall Tests, for each word that they misspell you need to go back over that group to practice that rule again. However, my kids didn't always misspell the word due to the group rule. Eg. excite. The rule was for the long "i" sound. My son forgot the "c." Obviously, I didn't make him go over the whole group for the long "i" sound. So, for my struggling spellers, I'm really using two programs. Spelling Power, because it only takes 10 to 15 minutes a day and provides consistency...but I break it down even further into Gayle Graham's method of teaching the sound and the spelling together. (Eg. The "ai" sound - in rain) Also, you'll need "The ABC's and All Their Tricks" ($23ish) to go with the "Tricks of the Trade"/"How to Teach Any Child".... This book was the crux for Marchelle. If she didn't spell "bread" right because of the "ea", I would go to The ABC's and find the "ea" with the bread sound and tell her how many words in the English language utilize that spelling for that sound and show her some of the words. This comes in extremely handy for things like "er," "ir," and "ur." I can tell my kids...if you hear the "ER" sound... • using the letters *ER* - 329 words have it in the stressed syllable, 1737 have it in the unstressed syllable • Only, 114 words use the spelling *ir* for that sound, • and only 247 words use the spelling *ur* for that sound. So, do your best to remember which spelling is in the word you want, but if all else fails...use the *ER* spelling because there are many more words spelled that way than the other ways. See? (Of course, if they are near a dictionary, they can look it up. I did keep a spelling dictionary handy for my struggling spellers.) Does this help?

Homeschool Sing-a-long!

Ramblings, Rants & Remedies: I Will Survive (the first year of homeschooling)

Hubby and I just listened to this one! Enjoy!

Kids eating veggies!

I think I heard about this blog in my RSS feed for "Happy News." This mom decided to got through the alphabet with her 7yo son and the vegetables. It worked!

Here's her blog: http://greatbigvegchallenge.blogspot.com/

She's printed the recipes in a book! So far though, it's only available in the UK. Hope it comes here soon!

Chores

Here is Sam and Rachel's blog site:
http://samandrachelmiller.blogspot.com/2008/03/chores.html

Web Browser for Autistic Children

I was reading through my Happy News on my Google Reader today and came across this neat article. It was about a grandfather who created a web browser for his grandson, Zac. Zac is autistic and would get very frustrated trying to use the internet. So, Granddad set about making a browser just for him!

Here is the article I read in happynews.com:
http://www.happynews.com/news/642008/grandfather-builds-web-browser-autistic-boy.htm

And here is the site for the browser:
http://www.zacbrowser.com/

Best of all, the browser is free to use! I just played on it for a couple of minutes. It's simple and fun. The website also has a place for parents. Give it a try... Enjoy!