Online Learning Resources

Committed to providing quality educational choices, HCOS subscribes to a number of online learning resources. Below is a short description of the many educational resources available to our students this year.

United Streaming

Heritage Christian Online School is offering students a subscription to United Streaming at no cost.  This online video library contains more than 5,000 full length educational videos.  It has Animal Planet, Discovery Channel, Magic Schoolbus, Bill Nye, and much, much more.  You can search through the library easily to find what you’re looking for.  This is a great supplement to every student’s education.  There are videos covering a huge variety of topics in arts and music, science, language arts, health, and social studies from grades K through 12.   Check out www.unitedstreaming.com for more information.  If you would like a subscription please email your teacher for sign-up information.

Encyclopedia Britannica

http://newsletter.onlineschool.ca/archive/images/eb.gifWe have now subscribed all of our students and families with the Encyclopedia Britannica- Online. Please contact your support teacher for your login and password.

Enchanted Learning

All HCOS students and families have access to Enchanted Learning, a safe, family friendly educational site with over 20,000 pages of resources! Please contact your support teacher for your login and password.

netTrekker

A safe educational search engine is now available from HCOS through netTrekker. This trusted search engine provides peace of mind to families as their child searches the net for online resources. The search engine is organized by readability and grade level and is even aligned to the provincial outcomes. Contact your support teacher for a username and password.

Town-to-Town Canada

HCOS’ subscription with “Town-to-Town Canada” provides middle and high school students with information on Canadian civic and public affairs. It link students to web sites “relating to government, law, education, social economics, current events, public policy, and living and culture.”  Please contact your support teacher for a username and password.

WHAT IN THE WORLD?

WHAT IN THE WORLD? is a Canadian current events resource covering events and issues with geography. It is designed for students in the intermediate grades and is available in English and French. Contact your support teacher to request monthly links and passwords which will connect you to each new issue. 

TeachingBooks

Explore award winning youth books and their authors. HCOS provides you with access to thousands of resources and multimedia programs through its online subscription with TeachingBooks. Short movies, audio book readings, and book discussion guides are some of the rich learning resources available through this subscription. Contact your support teacher for a username and password.

YourTeacher

YourTeacher.com is an online multimedia math resource for Middle and High school students. Each lesson includes video examples, interactive practice, and self tests. Through HCOS school subscription you will receive a year’s access to Pre-Algebra, Algebra 1, Geometry, or Algebra 2 for only $25. Please contact your support teacher to receive a personal username and password, and arrange payment from your curriculum budget.

“Reading A to Z” and “Writing A to Z”

Finding reading and writing learning resources is now just a click away! HCOS is offering access to “Reading A to Z” and “Writing A to Z” resources at a discounted price. “Reading A to Z” has thousands of printable learning resources that support guided reading, phonemic awareness, reading comprehension, reading fluency, and alphabet and vocabulary learning. These professionally developed resources included downloadable ‘levelled’ books, lesson plans, worksheets, and reading assessment material. The “Writing A to Z” site provides hundreds of downloadable writing resources which include “core writing lessons grouped by genre and text type; mini-lessons targeting key writing skills; and writing tools for organizing and improving writing.” The resources are designed for K-6 learning level. These resources will save you time and money as you search for a resource specific to your child’s reading and writing ability. Through HCOS school subscription you will receive a year’s access to these excellent resources for only $25 each. Please contact your support teacher to arrange payment from your curriculum budget and to receive a username and password.

Volume 4 - Edition 8 - June 2008

Christian Worldview

Greg Bitgoodby Greg Bitgood

Hello fellow educators, 

Welcome to podcast #15. It is convention week for those of us involved in the Home Education movement. We hope to have over 800 people gather at our facilities here in Kelowna and participate in the Christian Home Educators Convention. I hope to get some good interviews for our podcast. Thank you for your many comments about our last two podcasts and the issue of Consumerism. It generated a lot of good decision and we will need to get Professor Rauser back some time soon.  I want to remind you that we are still sending out free copies of my book, Disciplining this Generation for a Digital World, to anyone that sends us an email. I will have the details at the end of the podcast.

...read more

Professional Development for Parents

Sarah Bennettby Sarah Bennett

I know that many of us homeschool through at least part of the summer, but that’s not what my article is about.  This is about us – homeschool parents.  Summer is a great time to spend some time doing homeschool professional development.  It’s hard to find time during the year for this, so summer is an opportunity for us to refocus and equip ourselves for the year ahead. 

...read more

Summer Reading

by Shandra Wiebe

The HCOS library will be closed from June 27 to August 11/08.  But don’t despair!
If you have re-enrolled, you are able to take out books in June which will be due back August 15th.  New families enrolled for the 2008/2009 school year can access the library in August once they have their passwords.

...read more

Year-End Thoughts

Sarah Bennettby Sarah Bennett

In the last few weeks I’ve spent a lot of time listening.  Listening to Mp3s from the BC Christian Home Educators’ Convention,  listening to Greg Bitgood’s podcasts and listening to the last few sermons at church and I’ve been inundated with the importance of discipleship.  Homeschooling has been revolutionary for me.  I grew up attending a public school and going to church for Christmas and Easter.  I know that my parents’ lack of faith was an influence, but even more than that was the influence of my teachers and the curriculum through all of my hours and weeks and years in school.  I remember in grade 5 when we all received our little New Testaments.  My best friend, Liz, and I read ours faithfully for about a week.  We got down on our knees together and prayed and then one night we were talking “rationally” and decided that Christianity was created to soothe the fear of death.  It was a “creation story” and nothing more.  In fact, we even talked about writing a novel from the perspective of two young men who wrote the Bible as a lark and then watched as everyone fell for it.  That was the night I became an atheist.

...read more

The Joy of Storybooking

Sarah Bennettby Sarah Bennett

Spelling is a tricky subject.  I have been hesitant to write a review on a spelling program in the past because there are so many different programs on the market and none of them have come close to being a solution for a great number of families.  Don’t get me wrong; many of them are fantastic programs.  Take Spell to Write and Read, for example.  It’s a solid program with really thorough teaching.  Anyone who can diligently use it with their kids is going to see the results.  However, it’s a rather parent intensive program.  I don’t normally shy away from parent intensive curriculum – some of the very best in curriculum is also very parent intensive (in fact I find that’s usually the case) but, after two years of lugging SWR around with me and trying to get my head around it I finally gave myself permission to drop it. 

...read more

Visit Our Forums!!

We have great forums on the website where you can post questions, share ideas, make prayer requests or just chat.  Grab a coffee and sit down for a visit.  Our question of the month is:

How Do You Schedule Your Year?

This year was rather chaotic as we had to sell our house, move, unpack, and renovate. Ugh. Let's just say we ended up with an extended Christmas break that will result in more schooling during the summer than usual.

For next year I am going to try (again) to do a 6 week on, one week off schedule. We'll take three weeks over Christmas and an extra couple of weeks at some point during the summer. We had been doing the 6on/1off schedule in the fall before the move and I was really enjoying it. The kids like it, too.

So, do you follow the school schedule or do something completely different?

ABC/ James Challenge: The Final Hurtles!

It is amazing to think we are on the homeward stretch for the ABC/James challenge – what a rich experience it has been! Here are a few reminders as we reach the grand finale of this memorization Challenge:

...read more