Heart of the Matter Online presents their main
conference in the summer and a refresher conference in February. If you've been following along, I attended the virtual conference last February and reviewed it
here. I decided to go ahead and attend the conference because the speakers were particularly interesting this time around. Also, when I paid my $20 to attend the conference I received a pretty handsome down loadable swag bag. I wasn't sure what to expect from a virtual swag bag but I was pleasantly surprised. I got several ebooks, some downloadable lapbooks, a ton of free downloads from
CurrClick. I haven't even had time to look through at all of it yet. And I was entered to win over $2000 worth of prizes. So, all of that cool stuff alone was worth the $20. And now on to the speakers.
Susan Wise Bauer did a session called
Literary Analysis: When, Why, and How Should I Teach It? She has some fantastic talks that I had purchased last year from
Peace Hill Press. I have decided to use many of her curriculum materials this year so it was great to hear her speak again. Her talks are always very concise and organized and she just has a lovey speaking voice. This particular session was about when and how to introduce literary works to your kids. She had some great information. She went through the three stages of classical learning and presented approaches to take during each of those stages in teaching our kids about literature. Good stuff.
Dr. Stephen Guffanti did two sessions on ADHD and Kinesthetic learning. I gleaned a few nuggets from these two talks. I have done a lot of reading on these subjects but I still manage to pick up a little something from new sources. The interesting part was Dr. Guffanti is, himself, ADHD and dyslexic, so he was able to pull from his own experience. He even talked abut methods his wife uses when interacting with him. That was pretty funny. And he has created a phonics program, Rocket Phonics, that uses a multi sensory approach. I already have so much reading and phonics material but if I ever feel like Shannon, or any of my other kiddos, isn't getting it I would definitely give this a shot.
Melinda Boring's session,
Adapting Curriculum for Struggling Learners, was another one I gained quite a bit of knowledge from. She has a great
website that I will probably buy a few products from to help Shannon focus and keep him comfortable. For example, we've only been doing school for a week and he has chewed the erasers off at least three pencils. Then he goes to erase, forgetting he has destroyed his eraser, and tears his paper. I am either going to get him something to chew on while he works or maybe a pencil topper would do the trick. Once he started doing this, I had a total flashback of when I was elementary school and did the same thing. And even as an adult I have an oral fixation. Especially while driving my car I need to be eating something, chewing gum, or drinking something through a straw or I feel very unfocused. So, I feel for the little guy. I also think I am finally going to order an inflatable seat cushion. I've been thinking of this for a year now because Shannon can not help but shift in his seat or slump over his desk. He always looks so jittery. It can be pretty distracting . . . for all of us. I think the cushion will help to satisfy his need to move while still sitting in one spot.
Oh, my life would be so boring without Shannon in it.
Lee Binz presented
Christian Homeschool Success in High School. She gave a lot of the ins and outs of high school record keeping and other options parents have when it comes to teaching their teens. Like online courses, tutoring, college courses, etc. This seems light years away for me but Lord knows it does go by quickly. I didn't think this session would interest me because my kids are still so small but I found it actually quite fascinating. She has a great
website too full of useful information for your high school homeschool.
There were some other sessions that I will probably go back and listen to once I get the link to the MP3s. Also, at that time the MP3s will be available for purchase at their website. Oh, I also should mention that when I was logged into the sessions, I was able to chat with other participants. That was nice for passing around ideas and such. Also, we could ask the speaker a question if we wanted to. It seemed like no matter what the speaker topic was, someone inevitably wanted to talk about whether or not we let our kids read/watch Harry Potter. So, there was that. All in all a good experience that I will probably take part in next year.
