Discovering the world through the art of letter writing - with a free Penpal guide to get your first letter started

Having a penpal gives you much more than just friendship. It's an opportunity to learn about different places, different people, different cultures, and a fun natural way for our children to develop their writing skills. 

If you have ever thought of finding a penpal for your children, read on and download a free Penpal guide for kids, to help write their first letter. 

The end of our Surah Ikhlas study - free printable included!

Helping our children learn and understand the Qur'an so they can act upon it inshaAllah, is important to every Muslim parent. We've been learning about Surah Ikhlas and to conclude our study, I created a small quiz printable as our finale, and you can download it too.

I don't typically test the children, however they are getting older and believe it or not, are asking for tests and grades.

Although I designed our Surah-Ikhlas printable worksheet to be used as a blind test, I aloud the girls to use their books to help them when they got stuck (you can see more of how we're studying the Qur'an as part of our Morning Basket time here).

Dear homeschool Mama, we're all just like you

The purpose of this blog, like my Instagram and Facebook pages, is to help my sisters with ideas, support and advice.

Not because I have all the answers...
Because I don't.

I'm like you.
With the same struggles.
The same problems.
The same worries.
The same doubts.
The same questions.
The same dirty dishes, piled up laundry and burnt food.

Using copywork to develop penmanship, grammar & punctuation...and having fun whilst doing it!

I was introduced to the practice of copywork maybe three or four years ago when I stumbled upon the World of Bravewriter, and I've been hooked ever since. 

It really is such a simple activity which packs a powerful learning punch, yet is often so undervalued or misunderstood.

Copywork is so much more than just the art of copying text....it offers a multitude of important writing skills, helping budding writers work on not only their penmanship, but also gives opportunity to analyse some one else's writing, work on spelling, punctuation and go through the inner-mechanics of grammar.

The 5 Pillars of Islam activity with guided instructions for kids

We've started chapter 2 of the book "The Correct Creed for Children" which covers the 5 Pillars of Islam, the 6 Pillars of Iman and Ihsan.

The first part of the new chapter lists the 5 Pillars of Islam, and so last week we came up with this craft activity to show what they are before copying the text into our Islamic Studies books (see video below)

Creating a Morning Basket routine in a Muslim homeschool

We've added a new practice to our homeschool this week: a Morning Time Basket ...our interpretation of one anyway.

I wanted to find something that would bring new energy to our new homeschool year, which typically begins after Ramadan.
However this season has been a little slow to get started. More than slow actually, Ramadan ended more than 2 months ago.

Perhaps we needed that time to help us make things different.

I've seen our homeschool efforts have been a little stale for some time, and I knew we needed to make quite a few changes to bring back a sense of excitement and zeal we've lost.

One of our changes, is the introduction of a "Morning Time Basket".

As I contemplated starting this, I wasn't sure if my children would be a little old. When I've seen other home-schooling families online who implement something like this, they seem to be younger, so I thought perhaps I'd missed the boat on this little home-school practice.

However, I decided to give it a try with my version of one, and I'm so glad that I did alhamdulillah.

My child is behind

As the summer holidays begin to draw to a close, many of us are getting ready for the start of a new school year.

Whether that means buying new school uniforms or new pyjamas homeschool books, we're looking ahead with anticipation of a fresh start in mind. 

We're standing on a new day, and have another year in front of us, if Allah permits us to live. 

Whatever has happened in the past, whatever we feel our children have missed or we have neglected to teach, let it go; we can't change what has been and gone. 

Helping our children develop a positive growth mindset

As cliché as they may be, inspirational quotes can go a long way in helping to change mind set when heard often enough. 

They are the little reminders which cheer you on to keep going, when everything else inside of yourself is trying to tear you down and make you stop.

Right now, the internet is flooded with a wave of information set to help children develop a positive growth mind set. And I can see the value in this.

How our children see their own capabilities can have a huge impact on what they actually go out and achieve. And so it is important to help them develop an inner self belief, which tells them that they can reach sucess, if they don't give up inshaAllah.

So many kids write themselves off as failures, because they don't understand something straight away, or they made mistakes, or something they are working on isn't perfect. 

They see the mountainous challenge in front of them, and don't believe they can ever climb over it.  

Its that little niggling inner voice of self sabotage that we want to silence inshaAllah. 

They need to know, sucess doesn't occur by random chance to some people. Rather, those who are successful in their game have worked hard, made mistakes, and kept going to get to the top.

Tawheed project for kids...with parents lesson guide!

Calling all home schoolers, parents and teachers....here is an easy mini project you can work on this summer with the kids.....learning all about the three categories of Tawheed (and did I tell you, it includes a suggested lesson guide).

30 days of Ramadan ahadith to read aloud with your family!

I wanted something simple to use through-out Ramadan, that will help my family to pay attention to some of the benefits and practices of this month, whilst spending time together. 

...And so from that thought, I've put together some simple little cards; one for each day of the month.
Each card shares a hadith relating to Ramadan that can be read as a family, pondered and discussed together, providing a nice short 5 minute daily activity inshaAllah.