LWOTW 017: Navigating Homeschool Options Online

Sherri Lund is a Christian, veteran homeschool mom, and life coach. She has found the Enneagram to be particularly helpful in understanding her own healthy and unhealthy tendencies in relationship and how she can take those into consideration. She joined us to talk about how the Enneagram can be useful in our homeschools and families in recognizing that we are all different and might react differently to the same situations.

If you're homeschooling more than one child, and especially if you're homeschooling a crew, changes are good that there will be times when one child - because of learning or behavior struggles, metal or physical health challenges or other reasons - needs a lot more of your attention than the other kids. My dear friend Kendra Fletcher joined me to talk about this challenge - both how to navigate it and how to think about it. If you've ever struggled with balancing attention to multiple children, I think you'll find this episode encouraging!

Before she became a homeschool mom (unexpectedly) Shawna Wingert was a corporate consultant teaching big-league companies how to maximize employee productivity and boost morale by focusing on making the best use of employee strengths rather than trying to correct weaknesses. When Shawna began homeschooling, she wondered if these same science-based, researched-backed approaches could work with her children in her home as well. And now, with two nearly-grown sons of her own and loads of experience coaching other moms, she can confidently say, that yes, it does! Listen in as Shawna describes her experience and encourages us to teach to our children's strengths!

Do you feel overwhelmed teaching writing in your homeschool? Have you tried other methods or programs that left your kids believing they were bad at writing or that they hated writing? Julie Bogart joined us on the LIVE without Training Wheels show to talk about the Brave Writer program, how it's more mindset than method, and how it differs from other writing instruction or curriculum you may have tried!

Homeschooling multiple ages and wondering how to manage writing instruction? Let's chat about using Writer's Workshops from Layers of Learning! Sisters Karen and Michelle - sisters, homeschool moms, and creators of Layers of Learning are here to chat with us about how to teaching writing to multiple ages with their new Writer's Workshop resources!

It was my distinct pleasure to chat with my friend Pam Barnhill about managing life as a work-from-home mom as the creator of the popular Morning Time Plans and Plan Your Year homeschool resources. Pam shared how she manages her time, how she uses social media without getting sucked in to time-wasting and how she and her husband have made their unique set-up work!

We all have a lot to balance (or juggle?) but what about those moms who are working and homeschooling? Some of the best examples of this are those moms who are working to create homeschool resources for the rest of us while they labor in the trenches homeschooling right along side of us, like moms Karen and Michelle, sisters and creators of Layers of Learning!

During the "By Moms, For Moms" series, we're talking with moms who are both experienced in the homeschool trenches and are actively creating resources to bless and benefit homeschool families. What's it like to homeschool and run a business on the side? How do moms make that work? We'll chat with Julie Bogart, creator and owner of Brave Writer, about how her gift grew from hobby to business to household word for a homeschool lifestyle. Listen in to find out what it's like to manage the behind-the-scenes aspect of her work-life balance!

Maybe you've read a lot of books or articles on productivity. But if there really are good ways to be more productive, how come people have so many different ideas about the right way to do it? Join us as we chat with Melanie Wilson about her new book "A Year of Living Productively". She spent a year experimenting with various methods of productivity and sharing what she discovered. She'll share what she tried and what she recommends if you'd like to conduct your own experiments!

Online courses and websites can be a great way to supplement or outsources some of your homeschooling. But how do you evaluate the resources you use? And what about online safety? Screen time? And computer purchasing and sharing? We'll chat with Beth Napoli, the Techie Homeschool Mom, for some of her best tips for navigating online homeschooling options.