Homeschooling with Technology ? Cheeky Magpie

I haven?t discussed homeschool in some time. We?ve got a bit of a routine down so it?s a lot more fluid than it was last year or even earlier this year. That?s the funny thing about taking on a task of such magnitude. You end up learning a lot in the process.

I started keeping track of homeschool educational links in an iPad app called Pearltrees. It?s a hyperbolic linking system with an interactive link browser. It?s also available on Mac and PC though I mostly use it on the iPad. One of the things I really like about it is that it gives me the option to browse similar links. In this screen shot, you can see the related links I discovered off of my own subject of homeschool. As a result, I?ve found some great resources posted by other people. If I zoomed out I?d see hundreds more links like mine!

If you have an iPad, there?s a great must-read blog:? Apps in Education. And while I don?t use my iPad as a teacher in a traditional classroom, I find great information that fits our homeschooling lifestyle. I tend to lean more toward the productivity and reference apps over educational subjects, but that?s just how my brain works.

A friend told me about Currclick, a great site for all sorts of curriculum. It?s a must visit place for unit based Studies. I really like Hands of a Child and Intellego Unit Studies. Hands of a Child offers lapbooks for older kids on subjects like Astronomy and Botany and Intellego has in depth studies in subjects like Electricity and Magnetism and the Middle Ages. I really like the mix of reading, interactive content, videos, and hands on experiments. And I love that the content is checked regularly and links are updated. The kids don?t get bored and it?s geared toward their learning level. Curriclick?has saved me a lot of time (and stress). I can?t believe I was creating my own units not that long ago.

We have two android tablets for the boys to use for school. I load curriculum in pdf form on the tablets to save on printing out pages. using an e-reader they can bookmark, highlight, and look-up words as we work through the subject. I have a strict no games on tablets policy though. I think of the tablets as textbooks or a classroom. I want to keep the distractions out.

I don?t think I?d be as successful at homeschooling without the technology. I know some of you must be rolling your eyes, but this is where we are comfortable, in the realm of the geek. We are using these resources as tools to help us learn better. The hardest part is wading through the options to find what you want and need to help you kids learn better. And there?s no shortage of options.

Source: http://www.cheekymagpie.com/?p=6152

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