Amy and Leah are back for a special episode about habits for moms. Why and how do our habits make a difference when it comes to helping our children with their habits? How can we go about developing good habits?

We are excited to share our new workbook, Habits for a Mother's Heart, Mind, Soul, and Strength. Now available in print and as a downloadable PDF. Find out more!

How do we guide our families through the holiday season in a way that is meaningful and restful? And how do we navigate all of the opportunities and good ideas that we have before us? Leah and Amy come back to Charlotte Mason's idea of habit and (its longer ranging cousin, tradition).

View the show notes: https://thinkinglove.education/2023/12/07/christmas-traditions/

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Just because you do school at home doesn't mean you have to do it all yourself! Co-ops, enrichment programs, private and charter schools offer ways to compliment your child's education. Amy and Leah talk about their experiences joining and even starting home ed groups, detailing the highs and lows, and offer ideas to help you figure out whether a group is right for you.

Read the show notes: https://thinkinglove.education/2023/11/23/homeschooling-outside-the-home-co-ops-charter-schools-enrichment-programs-and-more/ 

Subscribe to our newsletter: https://thinkinglove.education/newsletter 

With countless courses, videos, tutorials, and books available for immediate download, how do we steward all the online resources available to us and our children? Charlotte Mason encourages us to spread a feast but is there a limit? In this episode, Amy and Leah talk about how they incorporate digital content in their homeschools, how they choose what to include, bad choices they've made, and basic principles for making the most of what we have.

Find show notes at: https://thinkinglove.education/2023/11/09/spreading-the-digital-feast/

Subscribe to our newsletter: https://thinkinglove.education/newsletter 

In the last episode of the podcast, Amy and Leah explored the ins and outs of Charlotte Mason nature study. While nature study is the foundation for the study of science, there is plenty more to this broad discipline, and so we decided to take an episode to deep dive into Charlotte Mason science. We talk about how to use living books, why we need to make science hands on, and how science is inspiring our own kids.

View full show notes on our website: https://thinkinglove.education/2023/10/26/inspiring-living-science/ 

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Nature study is a quintessential part of a Charlotte Mason education, but that doesn't mean that it looks the same for every family. In this episode, Amy and Leah talk about how they do nature study with their kids as well as why we do it at all. What are the principles behind observing the natural world and, once we're committed to nature study, how can we make it happen consistently?

View full show notes on our website: https://thinkinglove.education/2023/10/12/time-for-nature-study/ 

Mentioned in this Episode:

Exploring Nature with Children School Education (affiliate link) Why I love Non-photo blue pencils from John Muir Laws The Armitt Museum Diary of an Edwardian Lady Getting Kids Outside episode

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Even with the best of intentions, most of us look around at some point in the day and wonder how we ended up so busy. In today's episode, Leah and Amy chat about how to manage our time: how can we avoid procrastination, apply the discipline of habit, keep ourselves from dawdling, and just avoid finding ourselves in a tizzy? We definitely don't have perfect time management skills ourselves, but we share plenty of tips and ideas that might just make things a little bit calmer.

View the full show notes at our website: https://thinkinglove.education/2023/09/28/time-management-for-homeschool-moms/ 

Mentioned in this episode:

Google Keep for list making (digital option) Passionate Penny Pincher Planner (paper option) Freedom App for limiting access to distracting websites and apps (affiliate link) Mother Culture by Karen Andreola Humble Roots by Hannah Anderson

Do you have a way that you build margin into your days and weeks that allow space for the unexpected? Write into amy (at) thinkinglove (dot) education and we will send the answers out to our email list! Subscribe here: https://thinkinglove.education/newsletter 

Charlotte Mason died one hundred years ago this year and left behind a legacy that continues to impact countless people today. Amy and Leah launch the latest season of the Thinking Love podcast with a conversation about exactly how Charlotte Mason shared her ideas in a lasting and meaningful way, and consider how we might do the same. 

You can find notes for the show on our website: https://thinkinglove.education/2023/09/14/continuing-charlotte-masons-legacy/

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Join Amy and Leah as they wrap up this podcast season with a discussion on manners. How can we teach our kids to be polite? And while we're at it, how can we help them learn to be the kind of people who are thoughtful and considerate toward others?

As Charlotte Mason homeschoolers, our first inclination is to reach for a book - but with manners, that's not always the best option. We chat about making abstract manners tangible for our kids, doing the work of parenting, and helping our kids learn to live well with others - and when to pull in the books!

Read the full show notes: https://thinkinglove.education/2022/12/01/teaching-manners/

Learn more about our habit training workshop:  https://thinkinglove.education/habits

As our children learn to read and write, their first attempts at spelling are endearing. But at a certain point, we may start to wonder when and how to teach spelling. 

With Charlotte Mason, learning to spell is integrated into many parts of the curriculum, including reading lessons, copywork, and dictation. Together, these lessons help our children learn how to spell by engaging with words in context and encouraging them to study the words closely. Join Amy and Leah as they untangle this multifaceted approach to teaching spelling.

Full show notes available at: https://thinkinglove.education/2022/11/10/spelling-copywork-dictation/

Charlotte Mason hoped that children, educated upon many, beautiful ideas and supported in good habits, would grow up to continue learning their whole lives. With that in mind, educating our children is a dynamic process that moves toward this big picture. We choose books, plan lessons, and teach our kids, but as they get bigger, we start working on habits of independent learning, too.

In this episode, Amy and Leah chat about why Year 4 gets a lot of attention in Charlotte Mason circles, why this doesn't mean we need to panic, and how we are helping our children grow as independent learners through reading their own school books and starting written narration. Leah also informs Amy about a slightly contentious topic in the Charlotte Mason world!

Full Show Notes available at https://thinkinglove.education/2022/10/27/raising-independent-learners/