Today was 80 degrees, but in a few day it’ll be officially fall. The temperatures will fall and the leaves will follow. Until the leaves are gone families are busy going on field trips to pick apples and pumpkins … This year Mi Families (“my families”) has added some fun-fall-farm-field-trips to our schedule! Our schedule is already packed with provider trainings, parent workshops, and youth classes!
This semester we’ll continue providing individual tutor-time/developmental classes for tots to tweens, as well as large group classes for infants thru adults. Some of our classrooms are over in Interlochen on Wednesdays. On Wednesdays homeschoolers meet up to take all sorts of music classes, Spanish, gym, art … Mi Families is teaching “My World” which is a seasonal study program that that uses art projects to teach social-science. Our ABC&123 smART class also uses art to teach core subjects
Both smART & My World classes can be modified for preschoolers thru elementary stage students. For tweens and teens we also facilitate a self defense class and ” Hero Training / 1st aid ” lessons. Older students also love our illustration course, learning computer programming / Pixar animation, and a roll playing club.
Although Mi Families has a team across Michigan, Christi and Jeff Morgan facilitate most of the northern Michigan programs using their decades of experiences and education in diverse fields. Jeff Morgan is an award winning professional film maker who lets elementary & jr-high students learn movie-making skills on Wednesdays (besides sharing other hidden talents – encouraging students to find their own talents and strengths).
Elementary / Jr-high (or middle school) students also enjoy “Game On” where they learn to play and make games – indoors and outside. All our classes use indoor and outside environments for “education through recreation.” Recreation is what we do for fun – and in our classes we have fun learning! In our classes we have fun learning to love learning! This week we were learning back-to-school concepts at the homeschool co-op since our programs started later then the traditional school schedule. This week we did “Back 2 School” themes along side of “All about me and you” projects to get to know each other.
Since our semester is shortened this year we also squeezed in some lessons on Johnny Appleseed, the letter A, letter 0, the number zero, circles vs ovals … We talked about how shapes, numbers, and letters are made from lines and curves. Little learners dived right into such core topics through theme based exploration. Older students worked on individual and team projects and were encouraged to be a part of our school team – and find ways to be a team and conquer goals with their families.
One goal encouraged this semester is staying healthy and safe. In schools we pick up a lot of germs and sadly safety is a always a concern … Even if we never need to use a fire drill, have a tornado, or experience a lock down – it’s good to talk with kids about what to do at school (or in other locations) during an emergency. It’s also a good idea to talk about general safety and health lessons – because we stay calmer when we’ve prepared for emergencies AND we stay healthier when we learn to wash our hands and eat our veggies.
If we stay healthy and safe we can help others stay healthy and safe and become a team of happy-healthy-heroes! Apparently “an apple a day keeps the doctor away,” so that’s a smart start to staying healthy this fall. If you’d like ideas how on how to turn apples and other fall themes into fun learning activities, or would like more information about our programs email Christi@MiFamilies.com
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