![[The River Houses]](https://riverhouses.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/12/arms-icon-100x100.png "The River Houses"){kind=icon}
![[Cygnus Constellation Chart (1822)]](https://riverhouses.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/02/cygnus-jamieson-1822-150x124.jpg)
We divide the homeschool year into four three-month terms in the River Houses. Today is the first day of Cygnus Term, our fall term, named for the Great Swan of the Heavens. Cygnus Term runs from September through November.
🏡 🎉 A NEW HOMESCHOOL YEAR BEGINS: Let the River Run!
Welcome to a beautiful brand new homeschool year in the River Houses! Let all the dreamers wake the nation.
🌬️ THE RIVER and the World
As the homeschool year comes to an end, we offer one final toast to students all around the world who are embarking on new voyages: “Fair winds and following seas.” 🥂
A new River Houses homeschool year begins tomorrow, September 1st, the first day of Cygnus Term 2025–2026.
🗓️ QUICK FRESHES for Homeschool Families – Week of 31 August 2025 (To Close the Year)
![[Weekly Homeschool Almanac]](https://riverhouses.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/08/calendar-generic-150x88.png)
Great homeschool teaching tips and wonderful little lessons for the week ahead, including: Old years, new years, labor days, Horatian poems, bird guides, peace treaties, celebrated circumnavigations, world rivers, a toast to homeschooling, and more!
🐦 HOMESCHOOL NATURE NOTES: Getting Started with Bird Study and eBird
![[eBird]](https://riverhouses.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/ebird-logo-e1561917163517-150x91.jpg){kind=logo}
Bird study is one of the best subjects you can take up in a homeschool environment. Here’s a great way for you and your young naturalists to get started.
🇺🇸 WEEKLY AMERICAN HERITAGE: War in the Pacific National Historical Park
![[Homeschool American Heritage]](https://riverhouses.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/09/america-250-150x120.jpg)
For America’s 250th anniversary, discover the history and landscape of the United States with your homeschool students. This week (to wrap up the current homeschool year): War in the Pacific National Historical Park in Guam.
🌋 HOMESCHOOL HISTORY: The Last Days of Pompeii
![[Pompeii Stamp]](https://riverhouses.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/08/pompeii-stamp-1989-150x122.jpg)
The ancient Roman city of Pompeii, now one of the most famous archaeological sites in the world, was destroyed in an eruption of Mount Vesuvius on this day in the year 79.
🗓️ QUICK FRESHES for Homeschool Families – Week of 24 August 2025
Great homeschool teaching tips and wonderful little lessons for the week ahead, including: Old terms, old years, new terms, new years, earth-shattering kabooms, notable naturalists, splendid sluggers, starry streams, a toast to fair winds, and more!
🌎 🌌 SUNDAY STATES BONUS: The Earth, Solar System, and Universe
![[Flags of the World]](https://riverhouses.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/08/world-flags-148x150.png)
Thank you for taking a homeschool tour of the U.S. states and the countries of the world with us over the past year! We conclude today with one extra bonus: the Earth itself and the amazing Universe beyond. A new world tour for the upcoming homeschool year will begin next month!
🖊️ 🏡 ENVOY: A Living River by the Door (To Close the Homeschool Year)
![[A Child's Garden of Verses]](https://riverhouses.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/08/stevenson-dorothy-oreilley-detail-150x144.jpg)
“Go, little book, and wish to all / Flowers in the garden, meat in the hall, / A living river by the door, / A nightingale in the sycamore.” (Our farewell poem-of-the-week, from Robert Louis Stevenson, for the end of the River Houses year.)
🦅 NATURE NOTES: The Beginning of Fall Bird Migration
![[Homeschool Science & Nature Study]](https://riverhouses.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/08/birds-nighthawks-150x105.png)
It still feels like summer, but the first signs of fall are beginning to appear all around us. Have your homeschool naturalists seen them?
🇺🇸 WEEKLY AMERICAN HERITAGE: The Washington Monument
For America’s 250th anniversary, discover the history and landscape of the United States with your homeschool students. This week: the Washington Monument in the District of Columbia.
🔎 HOMESCHOOL RESEARCH & NEWS for August
![[Homeschool Research Icon]](https://riverhouses.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/08/research-150x80.jpg)
Our August roundup of some recent academic research and news about home education in the United States and around the world, with links to sources. We have three items this month: on homeschool academic achievement; homeschooling and music; and homeschooling in Nigeria.
🗓️ QUICK FRESHES for Homeschool Families – Week of 17 August 2025
Great homeschool teaching tips and wonderful little lessons for the week ahead, including: Open rebellions, sturdy ships, Martian landers, extraordinary eruptions, farewell poems, the father of all rivers, a toast to happy homes, and more!
🌎 🇺🇸 SUNDAY STATES: U.S. Territories and World Oceans (To Close the Year)
![[District of Columbia Stamp]](https://riverhouses.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/08/dc-stamp-2003-150x150.jpg)
Take a homeschool tour of the U.S. states and the countries of the world with the River Houses. This week, to wrap up the homeschool year: U.S. Territories & Possessions and the Oceans of the World.
🔭 OUR HOMESCHOOL ASTRONOMY YEAR is Complete!
![[Homeschool Astronomy]](https://riverhouses.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/07/emoji-telescope.png)
Our explorations of stars and planets, comets and meteors, galaxies and more, are now complete for the homeschool year! What astronomical apparitions will you and your students be examining in the new homeschool year that begins in September?
🖊️ 🌞 WONDERFUL WORDS: “Poor, middle-agèd summer!”
![[Goldenrod Stamp 2017]](https://riverhouses.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/08/goldenrod-monarch-2017-stamp-150x96.jpg)
“Whole fields of golden-rod cannot offset / One meadow with a single violet.” (Our vainglorious homeschool poem-of-the-week, from Helen Hunt Jackson, for late summer.)
🦅 FRIDAY BIRD FAMILIES: Our Annual Tour is Complete!
![[Birds of North America]](https://riverhouses.org/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/ng-birds-7-101x150.jpg)
Our annual homeschool tour of all the birds of North America is complete! Take a look back this week at all the wonderful feathered friends we made, and be sure to tune in next month for a new round of avian explorations for the new homeschool year that begins in September.
🇺🇸 WEEKLY AMERICAN HERITAGE: Hawaii Volcanoes National Park
For America’s 250th anniversary, discover the history and landscape of the United States with your homeschool students. This week: Hawaii Volcanoes National Park in Hawaii.
📚 SIX REFERENCE BOOKS for the Upcoming Homeschool Year
![[Horace's Homeschool Reference Library]](https://riverhouses.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/08/horace-homeschool-books-150x100.jpg)
The beginning of a new homeschool year is a good time to build up your homeschool reference library. We recommend six standard reference books for every homeschool.
🗓️ QUICK FRESHES for Homeschool Families – Week of 10 August 2025
Great homeschool teaching tips and wonderful little lessons for the week ahead, including: Strange signals, momentous amendments, phamous physicists, medieval kings, folk heroes, August poems, frozen rivers, a toast to new worlds, and more!
🌎 🇺🇸 SUNDAY STATES: Hawaii and Antarctica
![[Hawaii State Bird & Flower]](https://riverhouses.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/08/hawaii-stamp-1982a-98x150.jpg)
Take a homeschool tour of the U.S. states and the countries of the world with the River Houses. This week, as the year approaches its end, we visit Hawaii and Antarctica. Open up your atlas and almanac and follow along with us!
🌕 HOMESCHOOL CITIZEN-SCIENCE PROJECTS for August
![[Full Moon]](https://riverhouses.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/full-moon-square-150x147.jpeg)
Our August full-moon report on the many “citizen-science” projects around the world that you and your students can participate in from the comfort of your little home academy. Pick one and get started today!
🌟 STAR BRIGHT: Vega for August and the End of the Homeschool Year
![[Lyra Star Chart]](https://riverhouses.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/08/lyra-chart-150x138.png)
Make one last homeschool friend for the summer: our blue-white neighbor-star Vega in the constellation Lyra the Lyre, one of the brightest stars in the northern hemisphere night sky.
🖊️ 🌠 WONDERFUL WORDS: A Star in a Stoneboat
![[Robert Frost Stamp]](https://riverhouses.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/08/frost-stamp-1974-200-96x150.jpg)
“From following walls I never lift my eye, / Except at night to places in the sky / Where showers of charted meteors let fly.” (Our clever homeschool poem-of-the-week, from Robert Frost, for this month’s Perseid meteor shower.)
🦅 FRIDAY BIRD FAMILIES: Accidental and Extinct Species (To Close the Year)
![[Homeschool Science & Nature Study]](https://riverhouses.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/08/birds-accidentals-150x89.png)
Come along on our homeschool tour of North American birds and pick up some great science and natural history lessons along the way. This week we wrap up the year with a look at a number of accidental and extinct North American birds from your bird guide’s appendix.
🇺🇸 HAPPY BIRTHDAY to General Nathanael Greene, “The Fighting Quaker”
![[Washington-Greene Stamp 1936]](https://riverhouses.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/08/washington-greene-stamp-1936-150x97.jpg)
Offer a homeschool toast this week 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.