Tools and Tie-Ins for the National Parks Documentary

(copied from SecularHomeschool.com)
I’ve been waiting with bated breath for the documentary “The National Parks: America’s Best Idea” that began airing last night on PBS.  Mostly, because I am always incredibly impressed by anything Ken Burns produces, but also because I am a HUGE supporter of National and State Parks!  And the first two segments of [...]

Friday’s Hardwired Homeschool Hints: Virtual Field Trips

So, you might have noticed that I’ve been a slight bit field-trip obsessed on my blog lately.  Nothing like a little competition to get those writing juices flowing, eh?
So I figured the field trip fetish might as well spill over into this week’s HHH post, where we will look at some of the best [...]

Field Trip Wars – Round Three…or the One Where H-T Nearly Bought It

Did I mention in my last post that we were on vacation for TWO days?  Well, that means that there was still one entire blog post to be squeezed out of that little excursion. 
On our second day of rest and relaxation (ha!), we headed into the edges of the Great Smoky Mountains National Park, [...]

Field Trip Wars – Round Two

Firefly Mom really pulled out all the guns for her last homeschool field trip, and even got a picture of a big old pile of bear poo.  I threw up the white flag on that one.
But I wasn’t daunted for long.  I secretly knew that I had a two day mini-vacay coming up that included [...]

Has Anyone Been Wanting to Try Out Netflix?

If so, now’s the time!
Netflix sent me a promotion code that I am allowed to email to friends and family.  The code is good for one free month of Netflix subscription.
If you’ve been wondering whether Netflix is for you and your family (how good the movie selection is/how easy it is to rent/how quickly the [...]

Learning and Lollygagging

My buddy, Firefly Mom, who blogs over at Pack of Hungry Snails is BIG on field trips.  If you ever had feelings of inadequacy about not doing enough homeschool field trips, then I BEG OF YOU not to frequent her blog, because you’ll basically want to hang up your homeschool uniform, take your bat and [...]

Friday’s Hardwired Homeschool Hints: Literature Helps

It’s back to school for the Topsies (or not-back-to-school as I know some of you prefer)!
That means time to dig deep into my resource bookmarks and find more great Hardwired Homeschool Hints to add to my Friday blog posts!
Today’s subject: Literature Helps
Whether you’re kids are fans of Dr. Seuss or Dostoevski, you want to [...]

I’m Ok, You’re Ok. Right?? Right????

I was sitting there, at the dentist office, waiting for Uber to get a cavity filled (his first cavity – – yikes!), and I realized I had already used my mini-container of hand sanitizer three times since we arrived.
Once – after using the pen that you sign in with
Again – after sitting down and [...]

Giveaway on SecularHomeschool.com

Ok, so if you are a Topsy-Techie reader, and you have been meaning to join my other site: SecularHomeschool.com, now is a terrific time, because we are having a site giveaway this month!!
The fine print, however, is that you must be a site member to enter, so get your cute little hineys over there and [...]

Something Weird This Way Comes

So something eerie has happened to my two sons this week.  This whole interest-led, unstructured approach to learning has had an incredibly strange backlash-effect.
My sons started SETTING THEIR ALARM CLOCKS.  And even weirder, Uber got up three mornings this week BEFORE his alarm clock went off.  Do you know why??
He said he wanted to go…wait [...]