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If you are a parent wondering why you are not seeing Easter educational activities coming home with your child, you are not alone. When school systems head to spring, particularly after a long snowy winter, they tend to snub Easter and sweet much stick to spring themes. Teachers are feeling the crunch and will claim they do not have time to make Easter themed activities. Parents are left to search for feature Easter games that can be used at home. They will start to search for free games on line, but you may find better feature if they were to hold printable Easter games that can be stored on their computers to use now and in the prospect.

Here is a guide to some kinds of Easter educational activities that kids take pleasure in:

Mazes- Easter mazes might weave in some math problems to solve, or include chances to pick up letters or words as they go through the maze that will end up becoming a mystery word or phrase, Game Boards- A board game with an Easter theme gives a different choice of a family game to play. If you can get printable Easter games that use math, vocabulary, or problems solving, you can sneak in extra practice while having some fun. Word Puzzles- Kids always like these. They can be printed off and stapled together to use in the car, or while waiting for a siblings baseball practice to get over or on a rainy day. There are a variety of different kinds of word puzzles. Some favorites are word searches, word scrambles, or mix and match sentences Writing Prompts- These will give parents some thoughts for getting their children to do some journal writing in over the long Easter weekend. Math Worksheets -You can by no means get enough math fact reinforcement so a fun Easter math worksheets will give lots of choices for Easter educational activities with feature, fun exercises that motivate students These worksheets might include riddles, or a Sudoku puzzle using current math skills to be effective.

Parents who are looking for educational Easter activities should focus on result a few feature Easter games spanning several grade levels. That way all the children in one family will be able to use the same resource. You will always have new and different Easter educational activities to use. Previous to buying any materials you find online, double try out and see if there are several activities available at different grade levels so they can be used more than once during the weeks leading up to Easter and over the long Easter weekend.

If your local school system ignores Easter, and you want to celebrate Easter in a variety of ways, then result fun feature Easter games to use at home will be a perfect thing for your family. Printable Easter games also make fantastic Easter basket gifts. Print them out in color and laminate them and you have a professional looking Easter game to share with others. It is not hard to figure out ways to use Easter educational activities to make some family fun.

If you want to keep Easter alive and provide ways to practice current skills while providing a break in your routine, here are two places to go where you can find more information on ways to make Easter fun challenging and educational! Educational Easter Activities will give you some insight on on using feature games for homework and in your day after day education.

My Make Math Fun website has a separate page with information on a fantastic educational Easter activities and resources. http://www.thesue-teaching-tips.info/fun_easter_games.html.

Sue Gnagy Fegan is recently retired after teaching for 34 years in a school for children with language learning issues. She is pleased to share her tips and tricks with other teachers!

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Our family hasn’t been blessed with acres of property off in the country for our children to frolic to their hearts content. But a small city lot and many local parks have offered us tremendous opportunities for outdoor learning activities.

PARKS

To make up for the lack of open natural space in our neighborhood, we go to various local parks at least two to three times per week. We don’t go to the parks for the play equipment but for the exposure to a more natural setting. We are about half-an-hour driving time from Puget Sound so we often frequent parks with direct beach access.

When the tide’s out, the kids explore tidepools, find crabs and take pleasure in the fresh salt air. Digging in the sand and making castles and roadways is always fun, too!

There’s a “wilderness” park in our town which has access to a river bank, several walking trails through undisturbed woods, and a huge open field for frolic and running.

OBSERVATIONS

Last year, we started bringing the children’s Nature Notebooks whenever we went to the wilderness park (Nature Notebooks are essentially just artist sketchbooks where the children can draw whatever natural bits and pieces strike their fancy).

Throughout the Fall, we revisited the wilderness park once each week and kept track of the changes we experimental as the season progressed. Everything was green and full of leaves, at first. Then we saw the gradual change of colors, until finally, after an early snow storm, the trees were bare and the ground covered with leaves.

We relaxed discussed the difference between deciduous and evergreen trees and the kids really saw first-hand what that means. At first, the evergreens were barely visible amongst the heavy foliage. After the Autumn leaves were gone, the evergreens were the only observable green in the woods.

The kids also noticed on their own that the level of the river had gradually gone down over the several months we’d been observing it.

We watched a large group of mushrooms spring up and practically overrun a section of the park’s grass. The kids had fantastic fun sketching the odd-looking mushrooms with their pun small caps. “They’re like small umbrellas, Mom!”

One day, my oldest daughter sat entranced by a Black-Capped Chickadee darting between the branches of an Autumn-clad maple. Although she had her Nature Pad with her, the busy small bird just wasn’t cooperating and holding still for his portrait.

When we arrived home, my daughter ran to the bookcase and grabbed a bird identification book. After looking up Chickadees, she used the illustration in the book as the model for the sketch she then added to her Nature Pad. She also drew in a social class of various trees we had seen at the park. It was so gratifying to see her natural interest take over and inspire her to record her observations in creative ways.

So whether you live in the country or have a large yard, there are plenty of outdoor learning activities and nature study opportunities all around you.

Deborah Taylor-Hough (free-lance writer and mother of three) is the author of several standard books including Frozen Assets: Cook for a Day and Eat for a Month, A Unadorned Choice: A Practical Guide for Saving Your Time, Money and Sanity and her newest book, The Unadorned Mom’s Thought Book. To subscribe to her free send by e-mail newsletter, Unadorned Times, send an send by e-mail to: subscribe-unadorned-times@hub.thedollarstretcher.com Visit Debi online and read more articles dealing with unadorned living, frugality, parenting and much more: http://www.simplemom.com/

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Charlotte Mason (a British educator from the previous century) was a huge thinker who had a very high view of children. So let me start out by saying that I don’t believe anyone could ever fit Charlotte Mason’s thoughts, methods and philosophies into an actual nutshell (I just thought it made a excellent title for this article). Miss Mason’s thoughts were so broad and far reaching, it took six large volumes to control her writings on just the topic of culture. With that said, here’s a very brief overview of a handful of Charlotte Mason’s most familiar thoughts.

Balderdash:

Balderdash is what parents and educators today might call “dumbed down” journalism. It is serving your children intellectual pleased meals, rather than healthy, substantive mind- and soul-building foods. Charlotte Mason advocated avoiding balderdash and feasting children’s hearts and minds on the best literary works available.

LIVING BOOKS:

Living books are the contrary of dull, dry textbooks. The people, places and events come alive as you read a living book. The tales touch your mind and heart. They are timeless.

WHOLE BOOKS:

Whole books are the entirety of the books the author really wrote. If the author wrote a book, read the whole book. The contrary of this would be anthologies that include only snippets from other works-maybe a chapter from Dickens, a couple of paragraphs from Tolstoy, etc.

NARRATION:

Narration is the process of telling back what has been learned or read. Narrations are usually done orally, but as the child grows older (around age 12) and his writing skills increase, the narrations can be written as well. Narration can also be accomplished creatively: painting, drawing, sculpting, play-acting, etc.

Small Education:

Charlotte Mason recommended spending small, all ears periods of time on a wide variety of subjects. Education in the early years are only 10-15 minutes in length, but get progressively longer as the children mature. (Education increase closer to an hour per subject for high school students.)

NATURE WALKS:

In spite of often rainy, inclement weather, Charlotte Mason insisted on going out once-a-week for an official Nature Walk, allowing the children to experience and observe the natural environment firsthand. These excursions should be nature walks, not nature talks.

Day after day WALKS:

In addition to the weekly Nature Walks, Mason also recommended children spend large quantities of time outside each day, no matter what the weather. Take a day after day walk for fun and fresh air.

NATURE NOTEBOOKS:

Nature Notebooks are artist sketchbooks containing cinema the children have personally drawn of plants, wildlife or any other natural object found in its natural setting. These nature journals can also include nature-related poetry, prose, detailed similes, weather clarification, Latin names, etc.

ART APPRECIATION/PICTURE STUDY:

Bring the child into direct contact with the best art. Choose one artist at a time; six paintings per artist; study one painting per week (maybe 15 minutes per week). Allow the child to look at the work of art intently for a period of time (maybe five minutes). Have him take in every detail. Then take the picture away and have him narrate (tell back) what he’s seen in the picture. Brilliant prints can be found inexpensively at bookstores that feature fine art calendars.

JOURNALING:

There’s fantastic value in keeping a personal journal, encouraging reflection and descriptive writing. Record activities, thoughts and feelings, favorite sayings, personal mottoes, favorite poems, etc.

COPYWORK:

Day after day copywork provides on-going practice for handwriting, spelling, grammar, etc. Keep a pad specifically
for copying noteworthy poems, prose, quotes, etc.

DICTATION:

Each day choose a paragraph, or sentence, or page (depending on the age of child). Have the child practice writing it perfectly during his copywork time. Have them look sensibly at all punctuation, capital letters, etc. When the child knows the passage well, dictate the passage to the child for him to recreate the passage.

BOOK OF THE CENTURIES:

A Book of the Centuries is a glorified homemade timeline; usually a pad containing one or two pages per century. As children learn historical facts, they make clarification in their book on the appropriate century’s page about well-known people, vital events, inventions, wars, battles, etc.

FREE-TIME HANDICRAFTS:

Charlotte Mason’s schools finished day after day academics in the morning, allowing the day hours for free time to pursue crafts and other leisure activities or areas of personal interest.

HABITS:

Charlotte Mason had much to say on establishing excellent habits in children. Habits (excellent or terrible) are like the ruts in a path from a wheelbarrow going down the same trail again and again. As time goes on, it becomes increasingly hard to run the wheelbarrow outside the rut, but the wheel will always run smoothly down the well-worn rut in the path. By training children in excellent habits, the school day (and home life in general) goes more smoothly. Focus on one problem at a time for 4-6 weeks rather than attempting to implement a long list of new habits all at once.

Deborah Taylor-Hough (free-lance writer and long-time homeschooling mother of three) is the author of several standard books including Frozen Assets: Cook for a Day and Eat for a Month, A Unadorned Choice: A Practical Guide for Saving Your Time, Money and Sanity and her newest book, The Unadorned Mom’s Thought Book. To subscribe to her free send by e-mail newsletter, Unadorned Times, send an send by e-mail to: subscribe-unadorned-times@hub.thedollarstretcher.com Visit Debi online and read more articles dealing with unadorned living, frugality, parenting and much more: http://www.simplemom.com/

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The time and feature time spent on culture really makes a difference in making a person successful in life. The level of knowledge gained from culture is directly proportional to the feature time spent during one’s school days. It is really vital that the time spent on learning should be productive by making the students know things in the right perspective.

The process of culture consist of learning and unlearning things over a period of time. The student who learns a particular subject know things with the help of theory and visual aids. The more visual aids employed in culture could make things more clearer especially in studying science and maths. It is not right to assume that a bright student learn all things at the first instance. There may be doubts and clarification he or she is seeking which will be cleared only in later session that makes the learning complete.

A excellent student during the learning process questions questions himself and tries to clear the doubts by spending time on research and self learning. Self learning things requires a trigger from the thought process that should be initiated by an inquisitive mind incisive for more knowledge.

A child should introduced to real life objects for learning things at an early stage in life. With this interaction comes the real joy of learning that makes a basic foundation towards the better culture. Home is the first place where culture naturally starts. There should be a excellent ambiance at home for the self learning and parents should spend feature time with their children that really contributes to a child’s culture in the later years to come.

Butterfly and Walden is a Play school in Kalamassery.

Gijo George

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