Tuesday, February 23, 2010

Kids and Chores


Sharing some links that help me in this area..again...and again....

Serving others as a gift

It is in the giving and serving and the listening that I grow. That the family, too, grows.

Chores with gratitude

Really, I think it’s better to have a dirty house and minimally prepared food than to have filth in the air from guilt, manipulation, and griping

Cleaning in bursts

Unschooling chores by working in service, with a positive attitude, in spurts and with others. Creating a new unschooling landscape. Doing cleaning while being with family..A two -for- one.

Creating an unschooling landscape

The answer for my family is that Unschooling impacts and changes our entire landscape: no schoolroom at home, but a rich, full, exuberant landscape that ranges from room to room and spills out into our yard and the woods beyond.

Helping Little Children With Lent

A very helpful article.

HT ~ Beate.

The first and most important help for little children is that we as adults understand Lent and enter into it ourselves with real devotion and joy. If Lent makes its way into our home and into our conversations and practices that children can see, they will naturally grow up in a culture that embraces Lent as a season of grace.

Saturday, February 20, 2010

Lenten ideas 2010

Lenten ideas to strew, in a Catholic unschooling home.

Strewing, in unschooling terminology, means leaving material of interest around for our children to discover.

Do Catholic Unschoolers force Lenten penances and practices onto our children?

I doubt it.

Unschoolers tend to use a less didactic model of education and of homechooling and of life.














Unschooling is trusting the learner to be in charge of his or her own learning.This is also known as interest driven, child-led, natural, organic, eclectic, or self-directed learning. Lately, the term "unschooling" has come to be associated with the type of homeschooling that doesn't use a fixed curriculum. When pressed, I define unschooling as allowing children as much freedom to learn in the world, as their parents can comfortably bear. Pat Farenga

We try to inspire, to be role models .We aim to create a family culture of Catholic practices - so that living the liturgical year is like breathing. It is part of what we do and part of who we are.

We are unschooling strewing these things for Lent..

*A salt dough crown of thorns for the table

*A basket of Lenten books and spiritual reading

*A home made Lenten calendar – we have adapted ideas from here to suit our family, including memorising some prayers and have put the dates in for 2010.
But this calendar might be more suitable for younger kids.

What are you strewing for Lent?