On your next library visit, show your homeschool students the many wonderful kinds of dictionaries that are available to themย โ aย lot more than they may realize!
๐ Homeschool Holidays & History: Little Lessons for the Whole Year
Great homeschool teaching tips and wonderful little lessons on history, holidays, anniversaries, and notable events from the River Houses Homeschool Network. Use these regular posts to enrich your homeschool history curriculum all through the year. Print your own homeschool calendars and planners on our main River Houses calendar page, and add your name to our free homeschool mailing list to get posts like these delivered right to your mailbox every week!ย ๐
๐บ๐ธ ๐ THE U.S. NATIONAL ARCHIVES and Constitution Day
The National Archives in Washington has a wealth of free teaching materials available that are ideal for homeschoolers. Why not pay them a visit this week to celebrate the signing of the U.S. Constitution on 17 September 1787.
โ๏ธ HOMESCHOOL HISTORY: Marathon, 490 B.C.
The Battle of Marathon in 490 B.C. was one of the most consequential battles in the history of the Western world. It’s an event every homeschool student should know.
๐บ๐ธ HOMESCHOOL HISTORY: Remembering 9/11
On this anniversary of the September 11th terrorist attacks, why not invite your homeschool students to contemplate the Star-Spangled Banner, in Baltimore, New York, and London.
๐บ๐ธ HAPPY BIRTHDAY to General Nathanael Greene, โThe Fighting Quakerโ
Offer a homeschool toast to “The Fighting Quaker,” General Nathanael Greene of Rhode Island, George Washington’s right-hand man and one of the great military strategists of the American Revolution. He was born on this day in 1742.
๐ฐ HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO THE LINCOLN CENT, โBornโ This Day in 1909
The familiar Lincoln pennyย โ you may have one in your pocket right nowย โ first went into circulation on this day in 1909. It was struck to commemorate the 100th anniversary of Abraham Lincoln’s birth.
๐ ๐ป WONDERFUL WORDS: To the Meteor Rolling Home
“Of thee we think, in a ring we link; / To the shearer of ocean’s fleece we drink, / And the Meteor rolling home.” (Our homeschool poem-of-the-week, from Herman Melville, for his birthday and for this month’s Perseid meteor shower.)
๐ ๐ WONDERFUL WORDS: As Kingfishers Catch Fire
“Like each tucked string tells, each hung bell’sย / Bow swung finds tongue to fling out broad its name.” (Our homeschool poem-of-the-week, from Gerard Manley Hopkins, for his birthday and for the halcyon days of summer.)
๐ ๐ HOMESCHOOL SCIENCE: Apollo 11 Moon Landing Resources
Share some great educational resources with your homeschool students this month for the July 20th anniversary of the Apollo 11 moon landing in 1969.
๐ ๐ THOREAU’S BIRTHDAY and Homeschool Journaling
“How vain it is to sit down to write when you have not stood up to live.” (Happy birthday to the great American writer Henry David Thoreau, born on this day in 1817. Check him out at your local library this week.)
๐ ๐บ๐ธ HOMESCHOOL HISTORY: Independence Day and the Declaration
Be sure to add a visit to the National Archives and the Declaration of Independence itself (in person or online) to your homeschool Fourth of July calendar!
๐บ๐ธ ๐ฅ HOMESCHOOL TOASTING TRADITIONS the Whole Year Round
Why not begin the delightful tradition of offering a toast around your family table each week. This classic Independence Day toast is a perfect way to get started.
๐ ๐บ๐ธ WONDERFUL WORDS: William Emerson on โAย Nationโs Strengthโ
“Not gold but only men can makeย / Aย people great and strong.” (Our patriotic homeschool poem-of-the-week, from William Ralph Emerson, for Independence Day.)
๐ JOIN A HOMESCHOOL SCIENCE PROJECT for International Asteroid Day!
You and your students can help astronomers study the shapes and orbits of real asteroids in space, right from the comfort of your little home academy. How cool is that?
๐ญ โ๏ธ HOMESCHOOL ASTRONOMY: The Most Beautiful Objects in the Universe
Happy birthday to the great French astronomer Charles Messier (1730โ1817), who cataloged some of the most beautiful nebulae, star clusters, and galaxies in the universeย โ so he could ignore them.
๐ ๐ฐ HAPPY FATHER’S DAY WEEK from Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
“A whisper, and then a silence:ย / Yet I know by their merry eyesย / They are plotting and planning togetherย / To take me by surprise.” (Our paternal homeschool poem-of-the-week, from Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, for Father’s Day, the third Sunday in June.)
๐บ๐ธ HOMESCHOOL HOLIDAYS: Happy Flag Day!
Flag Day (June 14th every year) celebrates the date in 1777 when Congress established the Stars & Stripes as the national flag of the new United States.
๐บ HISTORICAL DOCUMENTARIES for Your Homeschool Summer
Ten multi-part masterpieces of the documentarian’s art that you and your homeschool students can watch together and discuss over the summer. (Or at any other time of year!)
๐ ๐บ๐ธ WONDERFUL WORDS (and Music!): โO!ย say can you see?โ
“Now it catches the gleam of the morning’s first beam, / In full glory reflected now shines on the streamย โย / ‘Tis the star-spangled banner, O! long may it wave / O’er the land of the free, and the home of the brave.” (Our American homeschool poem-of-the-week, from Francis Scott Key, for Flag Day, the 14th of June.)
๐ซ๐ท HOMESCHOOL HISTORY: Learning About D-Day 1944
Learn about the World War II Allied invasion of Normandy, France, on 6 June 1944, using live news broadcasts from that day.
๐ ๐ WONDERFUL WORDS: Happy Birthday to Walt Whitman
“Strong, ample, fair, enduring, capable, rich,ย / Perennial with the Earth, with Freedom, Law and Love,ย / Aย grand, sane, towering, seated Mother,ย / Chairโd in the adamant of Time.” (Happy birthday to the great American poet Walt Whitman, born on this day in 1819.)
๐บ๐ธ ๐ โAFTER A HUNDRED YEARS / Nobody knows the Placeโ
“Weeds triumphant ranged / Strangers strolled and spelled / At the lone Orthography / Of the Elder Dead.” (An extra homeschool poem-of-the-week, from Emily Dickinson, for Memorial Day.)
๐บ๐ธ ๐ HOMESCHOOL HISTORY: Memorial Day
“Rest, comrades, rest and sleep!ย / The thoughts of men shall beย / As sentinels to keepย / Your rest from danger free.” (Little homeschool lessons in literature, history, geography, and music, for the Memorial Day weekend.)
๐ ๐ HOMESCHOOL MUSIC: Let Us Rejoice!
Invite your homeschoolers to learn a few lines this week from the most famous of all medieval student songsย โ it’s an inheritance they can carry with them around the world.
๐ HOMESCHOOL HOLIDAYS: Happy Birthday, Ralph! (Emerson, that is)
Invite your homeschool students to discover the work of the great American essayist, poet, and philosopher Ralph Waldo Emerson, born this day in 1803.
๐ ๐ GRADUATION SEASON: โSet me free to find my callingโ
“Bind me not to the pasture, chain me not to the plow,ย / Set me free to find my calling and Iโll return to you somehow.” (Our homeschool poem-of-the-week, from Marta Keen, for graduation season and the coming summer.)
๐โโฑโ๐ก HAPPY WORLD METROLOGY DAY!
On this day in 1875, the meter was adopted as an international standard of measurement. That makes today World Metrology Day! Why not invite your students to take a few scientific measurements this week in your homeschool.