Homeschool Year 2012-2013

Alhamdulillah, we are continuing our homeschool journey for year 2012-2013. Here is the link, Our Journal "12/"13. May Allah always bless and increase our knowledge, aameen.

Homeschool Year 2011-2012

Assalamualaikum,

Here is the link for Homeschool Year 2011-2012.

Insha Allah, it will give the benefits.

"Have a Happy Homeschooling."

Homeschooling is to be continued

Insha Allah, our homeschool journey will be continued to this blog, Muslim Homeschool in America '10/'11

Happy Ramadan and Happy Homeschooling.

Summer Learning Activities at Home

Here are some suggestions for learning activities at home during summer vacation:

• Reading Activities
  
  
  • Reading Al Qur'an at least 10-15 minutes a day
    
  • Reading Prophets and Sahabah
    
  • Reading Companion of the Prophet
    
  • Reading newspaper and magazine articles
    
  • Reading recipes and cooking foods
    
  • Learn to read with phonics, The starfall
    
  
  
  
  
• Writing Activities
  
  
  • Sending a card or letter to someone far away
    
  • Writing family shopping lists (for groceries, presents, etc.)
    
  • Writing short stories about the summer vacation
    
  • Guide to Grammar and Writing
    
  
  
  
  
• Memorizing Activities
  
  
  • Memorizing Al Qur'an
    or Explore Al Qur'an
    
  • Story retelling
    
  • Poems
    
  • Plays
    
  • Basic Word List for young Kids
    
  
  
  
  
• Games that Require Reading
  
  
  • Islamic Quizzes
    
    
    • IslamicCity: Select Quiz
      
    • IslamicCan: Quizzes
      
    
    
    
  • Spelling/Vocabulary games
    
  • Board games
    
  • Crossword puzzles
    
  • Word searches
    
  
  
  
  
• Reading and Writing Activities Using the Newspaper
  
  
  • Cut out words that belong to word families you have studied.
    
  • Collect interesting pictures and explain what they are about.
    
  • Learn a new word every day. Tell what section of the newspaper if came from.
    
  • Collect interesting news items.
    
  • Collect interesting cartoons, and draw one of your own.
    
  • If your newspaper has a puzzle page for students, try to work the puzzle.
    
  • Look in the classified ad section. Find a job you would like to have. Try to figure out what the abbreviations in the ad stand for.
    
  • Design a newspaper ad dor your favorite consumer item.
    
  • Pretend you have made an amazing discovery or invention. Write a newspaper article about yourself.
    
  
  
  
  
  
• Other Ideas to try
  
  
  • Play a twenty questions games
    
  • Compare and contrast items at a store.
    
  • Explain all the different things you can do with a variety of objects.
    
  • Dictate a story to a friend or relative.
    
  • Write clues for a treasure hunt.
    
  
  
  
  
• Math and Other Subjects
  
  
  • Kidzone: Fun Facts For Kids
    
  • Edhelper: Math , Reading, etc.
    
  • Internet4classroom: Grade Level Help
    
  • School In Your Home
    
  • Subject K-8 Themes, Printables and Worksheets
    
  • Student Interactive: Read Write Think
    
  • Kids Gov.
    
  • Science for kids
    
  • Science with me
    
  • Fun Activities Ideas for Kids
    
  • Science Activities from PBS kids
    
  
  
  
  
  

Happy Learning at Home with your family.
Have a Happy Summer Vacation!!!

A Homeschool Portfolio

These are copy of papers that I have to sign after the meeting.




This is my cover letter that BOE has to sign after the meeting.




Alhamdulillah, I finished the portfolio meeting for school year 2009-2010 with Board of Education. My oldest son will be dropped for the next year portfolio because he is already taking classes in college. I will still have to do for my youngest son. Insha Allah.

I would like to share my experience about this meeting.
Insha Allah, it will be useful to others.

• What is a Home-school Portfolio?
  
  Some states require an annual assessment of homeschooled students.
  
  The annual assessment can be in form of periodic testing or the presentation of a portfolio.
  
  Basically, a homeschool portfolio is a collection of materials that are used to show what your child has learned during the school year.
  
  
  
  
  
• The Important of Portfolio
  
  Some homeschooling family need a portfolio is because of the law in some state.
  Portfolio can help parents to record their children progress and achievements, especially when the children are homeschooling through high school.
  It is also important to help to make a transcript in their high school program.
  
  If your state requires you to keep records, then you should:
  
  • pay attention to any filing dates and submit paperwork promptly
    
  • remember to submit only the information required by your state law.
    
  • create a portfolio, which show her/his how much she has learned and her/his progress.
    
  
  
  
  
  
• How and What To Present A Homeschool Portfolio
  
  I always create my own way to make this record keeping more informative for others and useful for the future. You can create your own record keeping which is depending on your children activities. My children love reading the books, working on the textbooks, and doing programming on computer. For the meeting, I create a list of reading books, a list of the textbooks for each subject with the explanations, and some sample of their computer works. I also bring some of their Arabic writing, an album of pictures of their activities and the field trips, and the audio of their reading Al Qur'an.
  
  Then I print and collect all the important documents in a binder.
  
  You can choose any variety of materials to reflect what your child has learned, experienced and accomplished throughout the year.
  Some suggestion materials are:
  
  • a journal which contains notes about your child,
    
  • a report card or a progress of your child for all the subjects,
    
  • a list of textbooks or workbooks pages,
    
  • a list of computer software or websites,
    
  • a list of outside classes or online classes,
    
  • a list of activities and achievements of your child,
    
  • samples of the child's work, such as :
    
    • samples of creative writing,
      
    • samples of drawings,
      
    • and sample worksheets of each subjects.
      
  • audio or video tapes of your child,
    
  • pictures of your children activities,
    
  • photos of field trips, artwork, projects and family life,
    
  • brochures and booklets from field trips and other activities,
    
  • a list of books that the child has read including both the title and the author,
    
  • a list of your goals for the year,
  • and a monthly or weekly schedule of your child during the school year.
    
  
  
  
  
  
  
• Who Will You Meet in The Portfolio Meeting
  
  In the meeting, I meet with the Director of Pupil, the Board of Education in my school district. He usually ask some of the questions, such as:
  
  • How are your homeschooled children?
    
  • Where are the sample of worksheets of your children?
    
  • Are you going to continue for next year? or drop?
    
  • How is the social life for your children?
    
  • Do you have any problem in your home-school?
    
  • What is your plan for next year?
    
  
  
  The director will not asking any question at all about our homeschool, if I bring some sample of my children school works. He only ask me that if I am going to continue the homeschooling or not.
  But this year, I didn't bring any sample of my children school works. The director asked me to bring some sample next time because he wanted to see the actual works. You can read his comment in one of the pictures above.
  It's not easy to bring all the materials in 5-6 plastick bags or in a big box in the meeting.
  
  
  
• How Long Is The Meeting?
  
  The meeting is only taking 5-10 minutes for each child.
  
  
  
• When Is The Portfolio Meeting?
  
  You will get a mail from Board of Education. You have to choose and confirm to the date of meeting with the Board of Education.
  Usually the meeting is taking place at the end of school year around June, July, or August.
  
  
  
  
  
• Things To Remember in Portfolio Meeting.
  
  Things that I always have to remember in portfolio meeting are:
  
  
  • never bringing children to the meeting.
    
  • to ask the Board of Education, who is in meeting with us, to sign on my cover letter of portfolio meeting in my bundle of record keeping for my children.
    
  • always remembering that the purpose of portfolio meeting is to overview of the homeschool year that the child is have been done in homeschooling and that progress is being made.
    
  • keeping a portfolio is a great keep sake, a good way to chart progress and keep records.
    
  • not to copy any your child works for Board of Education, except the transcript from the institution where your child attended the classes. With this transcript, your child will be dropped for the next portfolio meeting.
  • to copy the papers which you are signing on for your record.
  • asking any support in your school district, such as textbooks, school facility, and important information regarding the testing or others.
    
  • making a lot of doa to Allah.
    
  
  
  I hope that this article is useful for you.
  
  May Allah make it easy on your homeschooling journey. Ameen.
  
  
  
  
  Useful links:
  
  • Preparing A Homeschool Portfolio
    
  • Article: Portfolio Assessment
    
  • The Portfolio
    
  • Homeschool Portfolio Lesson Planner
    
  • How To Maintain and Organize Homeschool Records
    
  • Maintaining and Presenting A Homeschool Portfolio
    
  
  
  

Summer Is Here

Assalamualaikum warahmatullahi wabarakatuh,

Alhamdulillah, my kids finished the Spring semester. They were doing great on their final exam.
Alhamdulillah, they did very well on the school. I knew that they were working hard to learn and get the good grade. And the same time, they had fun in between.

Summer is here.

In this summer, we plan to go on vacation with the kids and take summer course for my older kids, insha Allah.
Our small halaqah is still going on in this summer. Alhamdulillah. The kids will continue to read Al-Qur'an with tajweed and to learn more about Islamic study.

Please do not forget Islamic activities for your kids in this summer, such as:
memorization Al-Qur'an and Islamic study (story of Prophets and Sahabah).

Some of ideas for the summer that you can do with your kids at home are as following:

• How To Make Hijab
  
  
• How to Make Doll's Hijab
  
  
• Cooking with Kids - Children's Recipes
  
  
• Cooking with Kids Recipes
  
  
• Paper Plate Porthole
  
  
• Children's Sun Hat Craft for Girls
  
  
• Summer Fun Ideas
  
  
• Ikhlas Homeschool: Art Activities
  
  
• Ikhlas Homeschool: Islamic Study
  

Have a Happy Summer Season and Safe Vacation.

Do You Want Some Money?

It was my son final exam.
He was telling me story about one of his classmate asking my son to do something.

"Do you want 20 dollar?", he asked to my son.
"No", said my son.

"Do you want one hundred dollar?", he asked again.
"Yes, of course", my son answered.

"If you want one hundred dollar, you have to give me all the answers in this exam." he explained to my son.
My son answered quickly, "Oh I can not do that, my dad will get mad to me. And this is not good manner in the school."

I was very happy to hear this story. My son can handle this kind of problem with good manner.
I think his classmate was very desperate about this final exam and expecting my son will help him.

Alhamdulillah, my son's score is A in that course.