Author Archive

Mechanics & Literature: November 2022

Brave Writer

November’s Dart, Arrow, and Boomerang selections feature unexpected heroes who, against all odds, use their special talents to rise and save the day!

And this month’s Quill invites you to explore the wild world of animals from the cozy comfort of your home while nurturing your child’s early reading, handwriting, and math skills.

[This post contains Amazon affiliate links. When you click on those links to make purchases, Brave Writer receives compensation at no extra cost to you. Thank you!]

Brave Writer
Quill (ages 5-7)

Great ready to ROAR and GROWLLLL your way into fall with November’s Quill: Wild Animals.

In this Quill we’ll dig into fantastic facts found in nonfiction books as we explore boxes, glossaries, and more; play with awesome adjectives as we craft a creature and name it; Hissssss. . . Caw. Grrrrrowl. ROAR! with onomatopoeia; put numbers in their places and hunt for them in the wild; stare at staggering statistics and make up some of our own; and pull out our rulers to make critter comparisons from the largest to the smallest and everything in between! 

NOTE: You can use any animal-themed picture books you have in your stacks or find at your library.

Some Suggestions:

  • A Nest Is Noisy by Dianna Hutts Aston, illustrated by Sylvia Long
  • Born to Be Wild: How Baby Animals Survive and Thrive by DK Publishing
  • Eye Spy: Wild Ways Animals See the World by Guillaume Duprat
  • Crowbar: The Smartest Bird in the World by Jean Craighead George, illustrated by Wendell Minor
  • Dear Wandering Wildebeest and Other Poems from the Watering Hole by Irene Latham, Illustrated by Anna Wadham 
  • The Mitten: A Ukrainian Folktale by Jan Brett (and other Jan Brett books) 

Get the Quill.

Brave Writer
Dart (ages 8-10)

Solimar: The Sword of the Monarchs by Pam Muñoz Ryan 

Find out if Solimar can save her kingdom and the future of the monarchs from a greedy king! This page turner weaves themes of family, courage, and perseverance in ways your children won’t soon forget!

Your child will feel as bright as a button this month when they explore similes as a literary device.

We’ll also: 

  • make noise with onomatopoeia,
  • meet the handy-dandy hyphen,
  • dig into dialogue,
  • admire alliteration,
  • ponder a powerful symbol,
  • link phrases with conjunctions, and so much more!

Purchase the book.

Get the Dart.

Brave Writer
Arrow (ages 11-12)

Sisters of the Neversea by Cynthia Leitich Smith

You’ll see Peter Pan like you’ve never seen him before when you read this imaginative twist on a beloved classic.

The Literary Device is breaking the fourth wall. Find out what happens when writers use this technique to transport readers into the story. 

We’ll also: 

  • hoot and howl over onomatopoeia;
  • realize what retellings reveal; 
  • discover the power of descriptive details; 
  • boldly behold adverbs;
  • chat about dialogue punctuation;
  • ponder personification, and so much more! 

Purchase the book.

Get the Arrow.

Brave Writer
Boomerang (ages 13-14)

Code Talker: A Novel About the Navajo Marines of World War Two by Joseph Bruchac

This novel is the story of a sixteen-year-old Navajo code talker who played an important role in facilitating vital US military communications during World War II.

In this Boomerang we’ll:

  • sink deep into symbolism;
  • crack the code and appreciate anecdotes;
  • enlighten with analogies;
  • note names and nicknames galore;
  • connect with conditional statements;
  • play on words with puns, and so much more!

Purchase the book.

Get the Boomerang.

For ages 15-18, check out the Slingshot.

Brave Writer

Posted in Arrow, Boomerang, BW products, Language Arts | Comments Off on Mechanics & Literature: November 2022

It’s Okay to Stop

Brave Writer

It’s okay not to finish the program that doesn’t work.

When you adopt a curriculum or start tutoring with a paid professional service or person, or join a sports team or take up ballet or participate in a co-op, the rule of thumb to discover if it’s a good fit goes like this:

  • Read the directions, understand the requirements, get to know the plan and objectives. Thoroughly. Give all your attention to understanding how it should work.
  • Implement for six weeks.
  • Listen to your child—their reactions, notice their energy, pay attention to what they retain or what they forget.
  • Adapt the method to suit your child. Make adjustments in pace, time devoted to execution, add enchantment, provide help. See if you can fix what isn’t working before you quit.
  • If everyone is miserable after 6 weeks…STOP the madness! QUIT.

It doesn’t matter what it cost you, it doesn’t matter that you don’t have a replacement, it doesn’t matter that you are disappointing other people (btw: sports for kids aren’t “real”—they are play, you can quit).

ALL that matters is that you not persist in a program that deadens the life and learning capacity of your child. If either of you aren’t happy and energized…it’s over.

To Review

Give a good college try to a new program of any kind.

QUIT, if in six weeks, you’re miserable.

It doesn’t matter how much everyone else loves the program or tells you it’s the best one.

The only metric you need is how you and your child discover more life, more joy, more learning.

This post is originally from Instagram and @juliebravewriter is my account there so come follow along for more conversations like this one!

Brave Learner Home

Posted in Homeschool Advice | Comments Off on It’s Okay to Stop

Podcast: How Emily and Liam Wound Up on LEGO Masters

Brave Writer Podcast

Our guest on the podcast today is a Brave Writer mom, Emily Mohajeri Norris. She homeschooled her kids, using our Brave Writer program extensively. She and her children have taken online classes and used our writing manuals to boost their skills. She’s also read my books and applied what she learned there to her teaching and parenting while personalizing it to the needs of her and her family.

But that’s not the most amazing thing about her. Both Emily and her son, Liam, are contestants in the third season of LEGO Masters! Season 3 of LEGO Masters features 24 contestants competing in pairs against the show’s most ambitious challenges to date, with the hopes of winning a $100,000 dollar cash prize.

In this podcast episode, we go into the story of how Emily built a family culture that allowed her son to dive deeply into his passion for LEGO building—and how investing deeply in any subject allows you to:

  • grow a rich vocabulary,
  • develop cross-disciplinary skills,
  • and create a rich, meaningful life.

Show Notes

When passion seems like distraction

While Emily was always supportive of Liam’s LEGO interests, there was a time when his love and passion were so strong that he wouldn’t want to do anything else. At first, Emily was forced to limit the LEGO to one room and lock the door when it was off-limits to get Liam to do the things she thought he ought to do. Eventually, Emily’s perspective changed when she realized that integrating his passions into their homeschooling efforts was the quickest route to teaching everything he needed to learn.

The value in hardship

Following your passion isn’t always easy, however. There were plenty of setbacks along the way. Liam had set himself a personal project to build a mythical lion—a massive, five thousand-plus pieces build—that he decided to enter into a LEGO fan exhibition. On the night before the exhibition, as he brought his original LEGO creation into the living room, it toppled, breaking into many pieces. He and Emily spent hours frantically reattaching pieces before the exhibition, but they managed to rebuild it in time.

At the LEGO fan exhibition, they found out LEGO Masters season one was being cast. They had never heard of it before, but a casting director reached out to them. You may have already put together that since they are now on season three, Liam did not get into season one of the show, as they decided not to include minors. While the story does have a happy ending, it goes to show that there was plenty of hardship along the way—much of it necessary for teaching Liam valuable lessons. But being passionate about something gives kids the necessary motivation to push through those setbacks.

The opportunities a passion provides

Not only has his passion for LEGO taught Liam about engineering, design, art, history, and more—it has opened up new opportunities for his future. Liam is currently at university on scholarship and may seek (or apply) to do an internship with LEGO in Denmark. All of that came to be because he went all-in on his interests and because Emily was there to support, encourage, and lead him.

Pay attention to those early passions in your child’s life. Lean in with curiosity and see where they take you.

Resources

Connect with Julie

Brave Writer Podcast

Posted in Podcasts | Comments Off on Podcast: How Emily and Liam Wound Up on LEGO Masters

Podcast: The Peril of Trusting Your Child

Brave Writer Podcast

I am recording some of my Tea with Julie emails for the podcast for those of you who prefer to listen. These are brief messages of support for parents and educators. If you’d like to receive the weekly emails, they are free. Sign up at bravewriter.com/tea

As parents and caretakers, we are often torn between the trust we feel for our children and the worry that something will go wrong. These two are intrinsically opposed: Trust is the act of letting go of worry. That’s difficult to do when so much of parenting is wrapped up in worry—it gives us value.

On today’s podcast, we discuss:

  • the risks of trusting your child,
  • the dangers of worrying too much,
  • and some tips on how you can let go of a little more worry.

Show Notes

Complete Tea with Julie notes can be found HERE.

Resources

Connect with Julie

Brave Writer Podcast

Tags:
Posted in Podcasts | Comments Off on Podcast: The Peril of Trusting Your Child

Theory of Knowledge Webinar: How to Develop Critical Thinkers

Theory of Knowledge

Guess what? Brave Writer is heading into the world of the International Baccalaureate!

I’ve been invited to be on a prestigious panel to discuss the power of critical thinking in education around the world.

YOU are invited to join us! It’s a FREE webinar featuring powerful thinkers. I am honored to participate!

I hope you’ll join us! Read more for details.

  • How to Develop Critical Thinkers: A Special Panel Discussion
  • Wednesday, November 9, 2022
  • 10:00 AM (EST), 3:00 PM (GMT)
  • Register

From the Theory of Knowledge website:

Children are natural-born critical thinkers, with an insatiable curiosity about the world, and a scientist’s desire to explain the way things work.

But many education systems end up suppressing rather than encouraging these instincts, turning sophisticated young critical thinkers into reluctant participants in the classroom. On 9th November, we’ll discuss this problem, and offer strategies to help you channel rather than curtail your children’s in-born abilities as epistemologists.

We’ll consider how we can help children at every stage of development to grow in their ability to explore the world around them, examine how their loyalties and biases affect their beliefs, and generate fresh insight rather than simply recycling what they’ve been taught.

We’ll discuss:

  • What is critical thinking?
  • Why is critical thinking so important?
  • Whose responsibility is it to hone critical thinking – schools, parents, both?
  • How do we measure our success in developing critical thinking?
  • How do educational systems help or hinder critical thinking?
  • Is it ever too early or late to develop critical thinking?
  • How do we avoid making people feel we’re attacking their worldviews when we advocate critical thinking?
  • What can we do to support the development of critical thinking skills?

Register now for the FREE webinar discussing how to channel – not curtail – children’s natural critical acumen about the world.

Sign Up

Posted in Raising Critical Thinkers, Webinars | Comments Off on Theory of Knowledge Webinar: How to Develop Critical Thinkers