Originally published in a 1992 Timberdoodle catalog. How does a home teaching mom also find time to participate in a home business? More importantly, why?! Let me answer the why first. We do it not only to give our children real life skills, and to bolster confidence, but also to develop character. Our experience has shown that if our children are spending 2-3 hours a day in required schoolwork and 1-3 hours a day in required household chores, then apart from meals and other family times, our children would have anywhere from 5-8 hours of free time. While I won’t...

(Originally published in a 1992 Timberdoodle catalog.) How do you teach your children and maintain the rest of your responsibilities? It is not as hard as some might think. First of all, we are very content with being homebodies, so we do not spend huge amounts of time on field trips or on other activities that pull us in too many directions. Second of all, as soon as our children can read, they assume a large measure of the responsibility of getting their school work done. So our first priority is to develop adequate reading skills in each of our youngsters. Some...

Catering to the Learning Style of Your Baby PART 2 OF 2 ORIGINALLY WRITTEN IN 1993, SHORTLY AFTER THE ADDITION OF PEARL, BABY #5. As a teaching mom, my first assignment is to study my baby and learn how he learns best. Keep in mind that many babies are a blend of styles, but all babies will have a decided preference. When you are the parent of a visual baby, the road ahead of you will be fairly smooth. For whatever reason, nearly all canned curriculum is geared to the visual learner. Moreover, visual children who attend school have the greatest opportunity...

Learning Styles PART 1 OF 2 ORIGINALLY WRITTEN IN 1993, SHORTLY AFTER THE ADDITION OF PEARL, BABY #5. Having a newborn has reminded us again of why we teach our children at home. Teaching your child does not begin with kindergarten curriculum, nor does it begin with a preschool program, or even with your baby’s first step. Home education begins shortly after birth; it can begin with a cuddle. Doesn’t it seem that after you have your baby, friends and foes alike will rush to hold her? Our baby Pearl is no exception. She loves all the attention and seems...

One of Our Family Christmas Traditions One of the Christmas traditions our family has done for over 20 years now is reenacting the Nativity story.  Our reenactments have taken many different twists over the years. Beginning in the early years we toddled door-to-door amongst homes of relatives asking for lodging and of course being turned away, "No room. Sorry." As we grew older we used puppets which we took to the homes of older relatives and retold the Story again. But when Pearl was almost a year old we began reenacting the Story ourselves "authentically" arrayed in various sheets, oversized...