A few things I LEARNED at the homeschool conference?

Organization Skills:  I need to make a loose daily schedule for chores and assign (delegate) chores for each child.  Amazon sells a timer that has 6 alarms with verbal (recordable) prompts....this can be used for frequent reminders to help keep everyone on task. The kids and I had a planning meeting on this subject and have come up with a few ways to implement this on a daily basis.

Multi-Level Teaching: teaching everyone the same things (on their own levels) will make it easier to remember what we've covered and it will allow me to have more time to enjoy my kids. Letting the kids check each others work and practice skills together will encourage team work and reinforce what they are learning.

Notebooking: Creating a journal or notebook for any or all subjects is a fun and creative way to keep track of what the kids are learning, give them a way to display their work and encourage them to do their best.

Micro-Business: Creating multiple streams of income not only helps the kids to figure out what they want to do when they are grown, it also helps to provide them with spending money and would give us a cushion should we have any unexpected expenses.

Aquaponics: Year round gardening is possible using a green house and live fish to keep the plants healthy.  The fish can also be eaten.  I need to do more research on this one, but it definitely touched a nerve for me.

Physical Fitness: We are not martial arts type people, but EVERYONE loved learning about Krav Maga self defense. With very little equipment this is something that Hubby could do with all the kids as part of our PE time this year.

Survival Skills: This guy was very informative and covered quite a few things that Hubby and I hadn't considered. 

We both have military training, but have never made a disaster plan or even discussed survival skills with the kids.  As a direct result of attending the survival training sessions, we are discussing food storage, planning to take the kids hiking and planning a once per month "survival day".  On Survival day we will practice living without electricity, running water and electronics.  We also plan to teach them basic first aid skills.

Hubby and I thoroughly enjoyed the Home School Conference.  We are already making plans to attend again next year.