Success with teaching Spanish to kids at home comes from a commitment to making language learning a part of your life, not just a part of your school day. Fluency and communication skills—which are important goals for language learning—come through regular use and practice. If you want to help your kids learn Spanish in your homeschool and you’re not fluent yourself, these tips will help you be successful.
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Math came from the mind of God, and He gave it to us for a specific purpose. We are responsible to teach our students and children math from a biblical worldview so they can use it the way God intended. But finding God in math is not always simple. We tend to think of math as a neutral subject safe for discussion. It’s tempting to look at math as amoral or as nothing more than facts and numbers. We assume that all people no matter their religion or background can agree on math. But that’s only true to a point. When it comes to the origin and function of math, Christians need to know and defend what they believe. We need to equip ourselves and our children to answer questions like, “Did God create math?” or “What does the Bible say about math?”
The spiral learning model, first described by Jerome Bruner, promises that by revisiting topics again and again, students can retain more information and build upon what they already know as they seek deeper knowledge. Homeschool parents and teachers alike often struggle with how to make new knowledge stick in young minds. Can students really be expected to retain information from one year to the next? From one month to the next? Spiral learning aims to solve the “forgetting curve” dilemma. So, what is a spiral learning curriculum and how can it help homeschooling families?
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If you have shopped around for homeschool curriculum, you have probably encountered the term mastery learning. Some homeschool parents are very passionate about teaching for mastery, and homeschooling provides an ideal environment to do so. But is mastery-based learning best for your homeschool? How can you take advantage of some of its strengths? Here are some things to consider before making the switch to mastery learning.
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What is your favorite book of the Bible? Perhaps you are like me and often find yourself gravitating toward the book of Psalms when opening your Bible. Maybe you and I are drawn to it because we can often see ourselves in the varied emotions of the Psalmists. We find comfort knowing that the writers experienced and felt some of the same things that we do.
The Psalms give us words for expressing our own emotions of fear, joy, loneliness, confusion, anger, and more. But they also do more than that. They teach us how to rightly respond to the different circumstances that led to those emotions in the first place. Psalm 25 is no exception. It is a guide to all of us who find ourselves in times of trouble.