I know you’re enthusiastic to start homeschooling your children. That’s amazing! Maybe you’ve read “all” the books, picked out a curriculum and you feel prepared. But before you launch into home education, I want to share some mistakes that homeschoolers make…so you won’t make them too!
This season of the Raising Mums, is dedicated to the parents who want to know know “How to Start Homeschooling.”
In episode 24, I spell out 5 mistakes that I see homeschoolers make. Honestly, I should know – I’ve made them myself!
So if you want to know how to start homeschooling, this episode is a great place to start.
👉 Spending too long searching for the “perfect” curriculum
👉 Under-estimate the importance of a happy mum
👉 Pay too much attention to the opinions of others
👉Buying all their curriculum for the year at once
👉 Referring back to school as their “go-to” model
But let’s be real here! These are only a few of the mistakes that homeschoolers can make.
In my new course, “Launch your Homeschool“, I dive deep into the common pitfalls homeschoolers make. In fact, almost every lesson highlights mistakes that other home educators fall into, and gives you solutions to avoid them.
Launch your Homeschool, our online Homeschooling course, is coming on 11th July! Insha’Allah.
If you want to find our more about “Launch Your Homeschool”, and get access to Early-bird Prices,
When thinking about how to start homeschooling, the first thing most of us will consider about is “What books do I need?” But before you start buying any homeschooling books, there are some other things you need to work on first ...3 other things in fact!
Homeschooling children can present its own unique problems that only other homeschoolers get! Although the rewards are great, we home-educating families often hit “bumps in the road” that we need advice to rise above.
In Episode 20 of Raising Mums, I answer questions some of the questions that other mothers and homeschooling families submitted on my Facebook and Instagram pages.
This includes:
👉What to do when you Feel like a Homeschool Failure
👉Do you need to be Rich to Homeschool?
👉How to Schedule your Homeschool Day
👉 What to do when your Children are Bored
👉How to Homeschool Younger Siblings
👉 Do Unit Studies really work?
And MORE!
To hear the answers to these questions, and more like them,
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Thank you to Our Sponsor!
A big thank you to WordUnited for sponsoring today’s episode!
Be sure to check out their Write & Wipe flashcard kits to practice writing time after time. Their cards are thick, strong, oversized and double-sided! They come complete with pens, instructions and stickers, all in a durable box. With cards your children can learn the alphabet, colours, shapes, numbers and verbs in English, Arabic, French, Spanish and German.
WordUnited’s titles are on a SPECIAL OFF of up to 40% off for a limited time. Home educators can receive an additional 10% off using the DISCOUNT CODE: wu4homeed.
I’ll be taking a short break from these weekly LIVE broadcasts to work on creating an online course for you! If you’re interested in hearing more about it, JOIN OUR MAILING LIST!
Peace and Love,
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When it comes to screen time for children, parents are confused! What is the best thing to do?
On the one-hand, we hear about the negative impact of technology on our children; on the other, we hear praise for the many educational resources online.
What is the right thing to do?
This blog-post contains affiliate links. For more information, see Disclaimer.
In Episode 19 of Raising Mums, I present both the positive and negative arguements for children using screens, so that you can make an informed decision.
I also share 8 ways that you can encourage your children to have a healthy relationship with technology.
As screen usage becomes more widespread amongst children. With it, we also see a widespread reduction in reading for pleasure, an increase in mental health issues, a reduction in time spent in physical activities, and less time talking to family members.
However, if used intentionally, technology can can enrich you child’s learning experience.
So how do we find the balance? How can our children benefit from screens, whilst also being protected from the negative? Here are 8 ways to encourage a your children to have a healthy relationship with screens.
8 Ways to Reduce Screen Time for Children
1 –Talk to your kids
Simply telling them that they can’t have screen time because, “It’s bad for you,’ or worse, “Because I said so!” will only make children resentful towards you. Instead, explain to them your concerns and why you feel that they need to spend less time online or watching TV. If you involve them in the discussion and the decision making, and they will take ownership for these changes, making any transition easier for everyone.
2 – Set Boundaries
As I mentioned in this week’s episode of Raising Mums, it is so hard for adults to have self-control with their technology; and so expecting a child to exercise this kind of self-discipline is ridiculous. Instead, make it easier for them, by establishing boundaries around screen time.
This might mean only allowing screens on certain days, or at certain times of the day. Look at your family’s weekly schedule and mindfully think through – which are the best times for your children to use their technology?
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3 – Use Technology
There are now apps available that will help you and your children to develop a healthier relationship with screens.
I would recommend Mobicip. It works for multiple children, across all your devices, allowing parents to set times for when screen is allowed, and censor certain websites and apps. You can even censor keywords (such as Xmas or Minecraft!) If your child goes to a website or app with this content, Mobicip will prevent them from gaining access.
Apps like Mobicip are ideal for parents who may not be able to monitor what a child is viewing at all times, or families with more than one child.
4 – Use a Reward system
Rather than screen time being an expectation, make screen use a reward.
Children can use tokens or stars to earn screen time. For example 5 starts could earn a child 15 minutes of screen time.
Tokens could be given out for good behaviour, doing chores, saying all his daily prayers.
Get creative with this idea and have some fun!
5 – Reduce Number of Devices
Instead of having a TV in every room or each child having a device of their own, create a space in your home just for screen time.
For example, we have one TV, and a few tablets which are all used, charged and stored in one area of our home. Screens do not leave that part of the house. That means that the majority of our home is screen free!
This reduces the temptation children may feel to pick up a device or watch TV during the day.
6 – Encourage hobbies
Encourage your children to develop interests outside of their screens. This will take time, but remember it is often our children hood interests that develop into lifelong passions.
You can help your children with a new art set, or football or take them to new kid’s class. Perhaps you could introduce them to one of your interests and open their eyes to the world around them
7 – Be more Sociable
Instead of filling their weekends with gaming and YouTube, invite family and friends over.
Not only will this distract children from wanting to use their devices, but it will also help them to form friendship and closer ties with relatives.
8 – Use Audiobooks
To relax in the evenings, instead of switching on the TV, or scrolling through your phone, put on an Audiobook!
Likewise, instead of handing out devices on those long car trips, put on an audiobook, and enjoy a story together as a family.
Audible have the world’s largest selection of audiobooks.
They offer a 30-day FREE TRIAL, allowing you to chose a FREE BOOK (2 Free Books if you’re a prime member!). You can cancel anytime, and you still get to keep the audiobook!
Thank you WordUnited for Sponsoring today’s episode.
The bestselling “Let’s Read” series: helps children learn and practice reading virtually all the sounds in English, step-by-step. It’s colourful with real-life photos and designed for easily distracted children. You can buy the books individually or as a series.
Let’s Read series is also in Arabic, covering every single sound in the Arabic language with 100s of words to practice.
Let’s Read series are on a special offer of up to 40% off for a limited time. Home educators can receive an Additional 10% off using the DISCOUNT CODEwu4homeed.
👉🏽 Why poetry should be a part of every child’s education! 👉🏽 Easy ways to make poetry a part of your homeschool. 👉🏽 Why you shouldn’t be intimidated by it!
The fact that I am asked these questions regularly reflects the way the modern world thinks today. Our utilitarian view of life believes that if something is valuable it must first be useful or practical, rather than beautiful. Basically, if something is beautiful… well, that’s nice, but its not important!
It supposes that if poetry doesn’t have a practical purpose, its not worthwhile. How wrong that is!
Will poetry increase you children’s vocabulary? Yes.
Will it help them with grammar and spelling? Probably.
Will it give them a greater mastery of the English language? Most certainly.
But that is not why we do it!
Poetry moves the heart. Words have the power to affect us deeply. That is the way we have been created.
When the Quran was sent down, and the Quraysh heard it, what did they accuse the Prophet (saw) of? Of being a poet!
That is because the Quran has the sound and feel of poetry.
That is how Allah (swt) chose to communicate with us; through poetry-like words.
Why? Because beautiful words touch our hearts. Because they can penetrate deep into our souls and have the ability to change the listener.
It is through these words that we remember God.
Poetry, has a similar effect. It can help you and your children remember God. In the same way that looking upon a flower blooming or spectactular sunset can remind us of our creator; so too can hearing beautiful words.
Poetry can also teach us great morals.
“Poetry is, perhaps, the most searching and intimate of our teachers…Poetry supplies us with tools for the modelling of our lives, and the use of these we must get at ourselves.”
Charlotte Mason (Vol. 4, p. 71)
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If, like me, your experience of poetry at school was next to none, starting poetry readings in your homeschool can be intimidating.
Here are a 4 Easy Ways you can Begin including poetry into your child’s education.
For further explanation, please watch the video or listen to the podcast above.
4 Ways to Begin with Poetry in Your Homeschool
❤ Start Collecting Poetry Books (see Book Recommendations below)
❤ Read a poem every day
❤ Give children a choice
❤ Encourage delight before ever beginning to analyse a poem (Remember the Cake analogy from the Video!)
So this week, dust off those old poetry books and start reading from them to your children. Just read one poem each day to begin with. There is no need to analyse or discuss them poems in any depth; rather allow the poem itself to be the teacher.
Delight in those carefully crafted words and enjoy these precious moments together.
Thank you to our Sponsor
A huge thank you to WordUnited for sponsoring today’s episode of Raising Mums!
Make sure you check out their Early Years learning resources, including sensory toys, wooden toys and eco toys that promote learning through play! Children from birth to 5 can develop skills including communication, pre-writing and fine motor skills, numeracy, imaginative play, sensory and messy play, construction and more!
Many women struggle through motherhood, consumed with feeling overwhelmed and stressed. Mum stress stops us enjoying motherhood to its fullest, and may even lead us to mistreat our loved ones.
This blog-post contains affiliate links. For more information see Disclaimer.
As new mums, we were filled with aspirations of creating a beautiful, peaceful and loved-filled atmosphere for our family; but instead, it is us, mums, who have become the biggest barrier to this dream. Stressed and overwhelmed, these emotions spill out onto our spouse and children too.
We know that we can be better mums, but it’s not working out that way in our lives.
In reality, there will always be cause to be stressed. Whether it’s a messy house, unruly children or family disputes, there is always something that could trigger negative emotions in you. Instead of wishing for a different life, a life free from diffulties and struggles, you could be happier if you learnt to cope better with stress.
In episode 17 of Raising Mums, I give you the 3-steps you need to know to Deal with Mum Stress! If you feel overwhelmed or frazzled, these steps will help you to turn the situation around in the heat of the moment.
To find out how to manage your stress as a stay-at-home mum,
You are not your thoughts! Distance yourself from your thoughts and recognise that your true essence is your soul, not the chatter that goes on in your mind. This will stop your negative emotions escalating.
Practice gratitude. List at least 3 things you are grateful for. This will help you to turn the negative emotions into positive ones.
Renew your intention. Remember your “why.” This will help you to move forward, free from stress and renewed.
These three steps will help you to gain “mental space.” If this is not enough, try to create “physical space” too. This means leaving the situation that is causing you stress. Perhaps you need to leave the room, make some tea, or go into the garden.
Use these techniques to manage your stress. It will help you to enjoy your children again, and thrive as a mother!
Resources Mentioned in this Episode
Thank you to our Sponsor!
Thank you to WordUnited for sponsoring today’s episode!
Make sure you check out their website, where home-educating parents can browse and filter resources by subjects and learning areas! Explore their resources for children with special needs, including autism and dyslexia. Their website is super easy to navigate, allowing you to browse the specific area of learning for each subject, e.g. under numeracy, you can browse for resources in multiplication, fractions, telling the time, money etc. And check out their Free Resources Hub while you’re there!
Home educators can receive 10% off every time they shop using the DISCOUNT CODE wu4homeed. Isn’t that incredible?!
In Next Week’s Episode, on Sunday 2nd February 2020, we’ll be talking about:
How to Add Poetry and Song into your Homeschool!
I’m so excited to talk about this topic! Adding poetry and song to your homeschool truly brings so much joy and heart to your children’s learning experience, and I can’t wait to talk to you more about it!
Thank you for stopping by today.
Wishing you a beautiful and blessed week ahead.
Peace and Love,
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I’ve just had a baby, so I know how hard it can be to homeschool during pregnancy!
As if homeschooling wasn’t challenging enough; and then add in nausea, exhaustion and the mood swings (oh boy those mood swings!) and it can seem almost impossible.
This blog-post contains affiliate links. For more information, please see Disclaimer.
But my experience with four pregnancies has taught me some “hacks” that can sustain your homeschool during pregnancy, ensuring that your children’s education doesn’t suffer and neither do you!
In Episode 16 of the Raising Mums, I share some amazing ideas will maintain the momentum in your children’s learning experience, whilst being easy and gentle on mum (that’s you!); and isn’t that what every pregnant mum needs?!
Whether you’re pregnant now, or worried about how having more children will impact on your homeschool, I’m speaking to you in this episode…
Remember, there is no homeschool without a homeschool mum!
If you don’t take care of yourself during this time, there may be no homeschool to come back to after the pregnancy is over. It may be necessary to rest during pregnancy, or take some time off from homeschooling, to maintain your own health and wellness…and that’s ok!
Get more Homeschool bang for your buck!
Incorporate different subjects into one lesson. What does that mean? Let me explain!
For example after reading a work of literature, have your child:
Write out a passage for hand-writing
Practice spelling some of the words
Learn new vocabulary from the passage
Narrate what they just heard for English composition
Writing down their narration will also teach spelling and grammar too
Have them read the next page for reading practice
Choose a book that is set in a historical time period to include History
Perhaps there is a way to involve Science or Maths into the lesson too!
Maybe you can find a way to bring maths into a science lesson, or maybe even English or History!
This doesn’t mean creating complicated unit-studies, but just using what you already have planned and see if your children can learn anything more from it!
Simplify homeschooling when pregnant!
Unless it brings you joy, cut back on complicated art projects, hands-on activities or field trips.
Instead, use resources that give you “more bang for your buck!” (see explanation above).
Use Open and Go Homeschool Curricula
Open-and-go curricula are generally not something I would use. They do not fit well with the Charlotte Mason philosophy of education, however for those really hard days (or weeks) during pregnancy, open-and-go curricula are a life-saver!
All that is required is to open the book or login into the online programme, and work through the next lesson.
Reading Eggs – Online reading programme for children aged 2-11. 30-Day FREE Trial!
Don’t forget AUDIOBOOKS!
Pregnancy is a great time to catch up on reading, and let you kids feast on the plethora of excellent quality audiobooks that are out there. We get our audiobooks from:
Audible – Choose from the world’s largest selection of audiobooks including best sellers, new releases, sci-fi, romances, mysteries, classics, and more. 30-Day FREE TRIAL! Get One free audiobook of your choice – yours to keep, even if you cancel! Prime customers receive two audiobooks in your trial.
Quantum Chronicles – a collection of Islamic audio series including the Life of the Prophet (saw) and Maryam, the mother of Eesa (AS). Use DISCOUNT CODE: OMHomeschool 15 for 15% OFF!
You might also like:
You might also like these episodes of Raising Mums all about Time Management!
A big thank you to WordUnited for sponsoring this episode. Check out their Free Resources Hub with 100s of free resources to download, print and share, and their Blogthat includes many videos with lots of ideas and links to free printables to make learning fun. Explore free resources for maths, English, languages including Arabic and French, science, history, geography, arts and crafts, fine motor skills and resources for children with special needs.
I’ll be back again next week, Sunday 26th January, at 10 am GMT, LIVE on Facebook and Instagram for the next episode of Raising Mums!
Peace and Love,
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Signup to our mailing list and the NEXT EPISODE of RAISING MUMS will be sent straight to your inbox!
Schole Sisters with Misty Winkler, Pam Barnhill and Brandy Vencel
Thank you to our Sponsor
A BIG THANK YOU to our sponsor, WordUnited! The one-stop destination for 1000s of fun learning resources, including hard-to-find resources, books and educational toys for children from birth to 11 years old. WordUnited is the fastest growing educational toys and books supplier in the UK. Delivery is fast and customers can receive free delivery over ÂŁ40, free gift wrapping and even free batteries if requested.
I’ll be back LIVE again next week, Sunday 19th January 2020 at 10am GMT, with another episode of Raising Mums on my Facebook and Instagram accounts insha’Allah.
Next week we’ll be discussing…
Homeschooling during Pregnancy!
I hope I’ll see you there!
Peace and Love,
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It can be disappointing, maybe even heart-breaking, when your child won’t read. Many families have at least one reluctant reader who just doesn’t enjoy reading. But don’t worry, there are many ways you can encourage your child to read at home, and enjoy it!
This blog-post contains affiliate links. Please see the Disclaimer for more information.
Children who read do better at school , opens up world of opportunities There are many little ways to enlarge your world. Love of books is the best of all.”
– Jacqueline Kennedy
In Episode fourteen of the Raising Mums podcast, I discuss a variety of different ways you can encourage your reluctant reader to start reading!
“If you are going to get anywhere in life you have to read a lot of books.”
– Roald Dahl
You don’t need to try all of these ideas or buy all of these books! Just pick one of two that you think might work for your children and give it a go!
Next week’s episode of Raising Mums, on 12th January 2020, I’ll be sharing My Favourite Homeschool Finds of 2019.
As we’re going on a family holiday, that episode will be pre-recorded and published on my Youtube channel and as Podcast. There will be no LIVE broadcast that week.
But I’ll be back LIVE again the following week, Sunday 19th January 2020 at 10am GMT, with another episode of Raising Mums on my Facebook and Instagram accounts insha’Allah.
I look forward to seeing you there!
Peace and Love,
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Signup to our mailing list and these LIVE broadcasts will be sent straight to your inbox!
Using a morning basket can simplify your homeschool, whilst at the same time adding an abundance of riches to your children’s education.
Morning baskets, filled with living books, add depth and meaning to your homeschool days in a way that is easy for you to implement. There are no faddish curriculum or clever gimmicks here! Just a basket filled with beautiful books to nourish your children.
This blog-post includes affiliate links. Please see the Disclaimer for more information.
