July 16, 2009

Dioramas Help Home School Children Learn

Staff2 Homeschool
Your homeschool student is completing a study topic and you need a finishing project. A diorama can be an effective means to conclude or demonstrate a study topic. Have your child determine an important aspect of his learning and display that learning for others. It can be a book report, a science exhibit, or an illustration of an historic event. As the child works on creating her diorama, she is reinforcing her learning and putting to use her imagination and problem-solving skills.  
 
What size would you like it to be? Dollhouse or action-figure size may allow ready-made furniture, people or accessories for the diorama. You can make a smaller one, such as the plastic army men size. I have covered the plastic figures with damp facial tissue paper and once dry, they hold the new shape very well. For example, I clipped the gun off a standing soldier and fashioned a hat and skirt out of the wet facial tissue. Once painted, it transformed into a peasant woman holding feed for her chickens! Acrylic paint is easy to use on these figures. There are many small plastic characters available, such as police, firemen, astronauts and various warriors as well as many varieties of animals, like zoo, farm, ocean or endangered animals.

 

You can use any box that provides a floor and a back, and for most scenes two sides and a ceiling. Be imaginative in your search for a diorama home. You do not have to limit yourself to the standard shoe box! Maybe you have a wine crate or a file folder box, or one of your children is learning wood crafting and would like to build a display box. Cover the exposed surfaces with colored paper, paint or fabric. There may be room on the box sides for the child’s science or history report, poem, book review or description of the diorama’s scene. The title of the piece can be displayed across the box top or on the floor at the edge of the scene, or as a piece of cardstock inserted up top.

 


For an outdoor scene the floor can be coated with a wash of glue that is covered with sand or aquarium gravel, or a piece of sandpaper can be used for a beach or a path through the woods. Vegetation can be represented by Spanish moss covering the ground or glued to a small form such as a green-painted piece of styrofoam or a bottle cap for shrubs. Twigs glued upright on the back or sides, decorated with pieces of Spanish moss or torn bits of a green kitchen sponge, become trees. Cotton balls pulled apart are popular to use as clouds. A walkway can be created using paper cut into shapes representing paving stones or bricks and glued to the floor. Ice cream sticks make effective fences and sign posts. A campfire can feature tiny twigs for the logs and paper or wisps of a cotton ball colored orange for flames.

 

The scrapbook pages available today can provide a wealth of visual effects. For example, a house’s floor can be a page designed to look like wood or a rag rug. The smaller print papers can be used for wallpaper. A small nature scene cut to size can make an effective window, especially if you use a piece of lace or tulle for curtains. Cut-outs from old magazines work well for this also. A rectangle cut from an old sweater looks like an area rug. Fabric placed on a small, flat box becomes a bed. A little square of fleece makes a good blanket.

 

Clay is a useful resource for your diorama. Modeling clay, polymer clay or salt dough can be used to form animals or nearly any little thing your scene needs. Various toys, besides the ones we have already discussed, can also work, such as matchbox cars, building sets, wooden blocks or bean bag animals.  A hunt through your crafting supplies should also provide some possibilities. You may find yarn, pom poms, wood shapes, sequins, ice cream sticks or beads.

 

Set your children loose and see what they come up with to create their dioramas, just make sure you okay their items before they are used in case they find something you don’t want glued down! 

 *****

Michelle B. is a full-time homeschooling mom and has been so for more than 18 years. She has a degree in Elementary Education. Follow us at Twitter @homeschoolart

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March 9, 2009

Encourage Reading in Your Homeschool Child

admin Lanuage Arts, PreSchool

by Michelle B.

Reading is probably the most important academic skill to teach our homeschool children. Once they have the ability to read and understand what they are reading, they will be able to use that skill not just to complete assignments but to explore the world through print, satisfy their curiosity and expand upon their learning.

How do I begin to teach my preschool or kindergarten child the importance of reading?


Here are a few homeschool reading tips to help encourage our students to embrace the skill of reading, regardless of the style of homeschooling one chooses. Begin with these well before your kids can read, and make them a part of your regular routine.

*To understand the value of reading our children need to see the important people in their lives using the tool of reading on a regular basis. Do your kids see you read? We have many opportunities to read each day: recipes for dinner, shopping lists, weather and news reports in the paper or online, email, game instructions, newsletters, appliance manuals, posters, street signs, even the cereal box! Read for pleasure, such as the comics, a novel or book of short stories, blogs, websites, poetry. The more your child sees you in the act of reading, whether you are reading aloud or to yourself, the more the act of reading becomes an expected part of life.

*Print should be readily available for the kids to see and touch and explore. Children’s picture books, books with only print, magazines, newspapers, how-to books, ABC books, computer print-outs, coffee-table books, workbooks, textbooks, letters, notes, signs, lists of words, etc. Try hanging a small dry-erase board at child level, maybe on their bedroom door, and write a new note everyday. You can write the names of items in your family room or schoolroom on index cards and attach them to the respective piece, such as “chair,” “computer,” or “cabinet.” Print a short note or a joke on a piece of paper and leave it at their lunch or dinner plate. Find a real mailbox or make one and take turns leaving letters or notes to each other. Let your kids play a computer game that involves some reading.

*Writing materials should also be available. Set up a writing space for your family that your homeschool students can use whenever they would like to. It can be a corner of the room with a small table or a desk, a reading lamp, shelves of various papers and notepads, a box holding markers, pens and pencils, even a typewriter. Or simply fill a basket with notepads and pens that can be carried to the desired space. Keep refilling the supplies with whatever you find, such as envelopes, stamps, order forms, shopping list pads, index cards, etc. And of course there are the famous magnetic ABC’s for your fridge!

*The library needs to be a regular destination for the family, such as every week or two. Each family member needs their own library card and to be taught how to use it. Every library system has its own age requirements, so find out what yours is and obtain those cards as soon as you can. Have your children choose their own books to check out on each library trip. Establish a system for your family that includes a special place, such as a shelf or basket, to keep those books separate from your own, and a place to keep track of the books to be returned. My family parks books we are done with in a square basket on the work table to keep them together until the next library outing.

*Children should have a shelf of their own to hold their special books. Many homeschool groups use book clubs, such as Scholastic, to provide their members access to inexpensive books. Thrift shops, discount stores, bargain shelves in the big bookstores, and library book sales are also good sources of inexpensive books. For example, we make good use of the discard shelf at our library.

*Read together. Read aloud to your children everyday. Look up an informational website together. Pretend you are toy shopping: read the toy catalog and write wish lists. Read a recipe book with your child and choose a dish to make.

The more that reading happens in your house, the more it becomes an ordinary part of life, and your kids will begin to see reading as an essential skill that hopefully they will want to be able to do themselves.

***
The Author, Michelle B., is a full-time homeschooling mother of four who, as of this writing, has been homeschooling for 18 years. She is a former elementary school teacher in the private-school system.

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