Blog
3 Reasons Students Should Travel
Research shows that educators consider travel a priority to raise students’ cultural awareness, and they believe that it has a positive impact on students’ lives. As an educator, but also as one who has traveled, I bring you my first-hand perspective of the benefits....
The Merit of Your Library
In some of my high school level classes, I require the use of outside sources during paper composition, and students often seem baffled when I require at least one source to be a book source. They ask, “Can’t we just use the internet? Where will we find a book to...
Dual Credit for Free: Why That Might Not be the Best Idea
Now that I am approaching my mid-50s, I find myself in a strange situation. I have become an experienced homeschooler and an experienced educator. In a blink of an eye, I have become a homeschool parent who has graduated three students as well as a teacher of hundreds...
Why Should We Embrace Learning Together?
Isolation limits accomplishment. Most people would agree that it would be silly to learn how to use a turn signal on your vehicle without learning how to drive-- just as it would be silly to learn every comma rule but miss out on how to put words together to form...
How Much Help Should I Give My Online Learning Student?
How Much Help Should I Give My Online Student? You have signed your child up for an online class. You’re both excited. Visions of outsourcing and having less items on your ever-growing “to do” list begin to dance in your head. But wait! How much help is your...
3 Reasons Why Your Child Should Study Geography
You’ve probably all seen videos like this one where a reporter stops people on the street and asks them geography questions. Often the person responding shows a sad lack of even basic knowledge about the world. Granted, in this particular video, these National...
How to Have Success in Online Classes
After more than seven years of teaching live online Spanish classes, I have come up with a list of good habits that students should employ in order to optimize their chances of success in a live online environment. Come to class every week. If it is not...
How to Practice Language Immersion in the Target Language Around Town
Bonjour à tous! In my last blog, we talked about all the fun ways that technology can be used to immerse yourself in the target language without ever traveling to a foreign country. Did you know that there are also many ways to practice the target language in your...
Defining our Roles: Teacher, Student, Parent
It is easy to define our roles when we are teaching our children at home. My role, as parent and home educator, is to disseminate information in a creative and interesting way while my child is to learn the information in the best way for him. But things can get a...
I Used To Think That Online Education Was The Enemy—But I Was Wrong
I Used To Think That Online Education Was The Enemy—But I Was Wrong: A public school enthusiast turned online homeschooling devotee Confession: I am a former public school teacher, and I loved it. Back in my days of teaching in the public school system, we had...
Using History to Teach Critical Thinking Skills
One of the most important tools we can give our students is the ability to think critically. In this age of unlimited social media sharing, fake news, and hidden agendas, it has never been more important to be able to look at information and its source and determine...
Public Schools Not Keeping Up
Way back in 1979-1980, I earned one year of college credit at March Air Force Base in California by watching videos. This was even before VHS; the tapes were bigger than VHS. We called them U-matic. I was in the Air Force, married with two kids, and needed to get...
