A New Season of Growth

Happy New Year to everyone!  I do hope your holidays were joy-filled and peaceful.  Mine were fabulous!

I am really excited about this post as it is really my official first weekly communication to you.  I hope you find this more effective and pleasant.  PLEASE be interactive with it and make comments and suggestions so it can become an effective and useful blog.  I hope for it to serve as a central resource for all homeschooling families in the area.  So if you have an event or thought to share, please send it along and it may get posted!

FSA's
The first thing I would like to remind you all about are FSAs.  Anyone from HCOS who have student in grades 4 or 7 will be getting a letter in the mail over the next few weeks explaining the process and providing you with any information you may need.  Parents are able to supervise the test and HCOS teachers will be marking them.  What a great opportunity to provide a safe environment for formal assessing!  Please remember that participation in the process could be correlated to government funding, so your participation is expected if your child is enrolled with HCOS.  Please feel free to speak with me directly if you have any concerns or questions about the process.

Events
There is so much happenning this month:

1. Sigmund Brouwer is doing various writing workshops up and down the Island including: Victoria, Nanaimo, Campbell River, and even way out west in Port Alberni! Here is a link to his website: Sigmund Brouwer
2. HCOS Island Spelling Bee on Friday, January 14th @ 9:30 for those who have pre-registered.
3. PE Sports Camp starting Friday, January 14th from 1-2pm for 6 weekly sessions. Here is the flyer: Sports Camp
4. Homeschool Skating starts Monday the 17th in Parksville.
5. Vancouver Island Symphony presents:Peter and the Wolves on Friday, February 18 at teh Port Theatre in Nanaimo. Peter and the Wolves   Please e-mail me if you are interested.  If there are enough interested, I may arrange a group.

Please e-mail me if you would like to share any activities or events happenning in your area.

New Resource!
Our online librarian sent us information about a great new technology that can be used for sharing learning helping with projects.  It is called "glogging".  Similar to blogging but more visual rather than print.  I think it would be a fun and creative outlet for those students who don't like to write!  Please check it out and imagine the possibilities!  EDUglogging