The School Year will run from September 12 to June 8

Christmas vacation will be December 19 to January 1. Daily lessons resume on Jan 2.

Spring vacation will be the first week of April. No daily lessons are posted during vacations, but other lessons are always available.

Begin Daily Lessons – September 13, 2010

Christmas Vacation – December 20-31, 2010

Spring Vacation – April 4-8, 2011

End of Daily Lessons – June 10, 2011

Note About Daily Lessons: Daily lessons are generated by taking the date from your computer. Make sure the date on your computer is set correctly. Since the daily lessons start on Sep 13, you will get an undefined error until then.

Links will usually be to Eazy Draw files and PDF files. Remember you must Control-click on an Eazy Draw file and choose Save Link As. The computer system cannot automatically download these MAC files like it can a PDF file.

The extensions on Eazy Draw files is not 3 characters – it is 5 – .ezdraw

You cannot click on the link like a pdf or doc link and begin a download. For all .ezdraw files you must Control-Click on the link and then choose Save Link As from the dialog box.

You must have the Eazy Draw program installed on your computer to open the file.

To enter the student’s name just keep clicking 4 or 5 times until you have a vertical text cursor. You can ignore the computer number. I use this in my Kinder computer classes.

Remember – Eazy Draw is MAC only.

I anticipate some changes around here in the coming months. Here’s my plan:

Since my oldest grandchild is nearing the age of five, I have decided to concentrate on Kinder and Primary lessons. We have been homeschooling around here, so I hope to provide some enrichment and remediation activities  on NU to supplement my grandchildren’s basic curriculum. I won’t ignore the middle and upper grades during this process, and hope to add lessons for these grades little by little.

Over the last 10 years, online lessons and activities have really gone Hollywood – with Flash and Shockwave programs adding a colorful and interactive dimension to educational activities via the Internet. Though my personal expertise is limited in this area, I will be throwing in a little glitz and glitter, but will most likely bow to the expertise of others and provide links to worthwhile activities I discover on the www. I already have interactive study guides, tests and puzzles, and I promise more of this type of presentation.

Over the years I have used both a PC and a MAC platform, and have settled in with the OS X MAC operating system. To me, it’s not about hardware, but about an operating system that is intuitive and stable. IMO the MAC beats Windows hands down, especially since OS X was introduced and the Intel MAC. In my computer lab I have used Appleworks Draw for creating lessons for my students. Unfortunately, the MAC is no longer supporting the future of Appleworks. So, I am taking a new direction, especially with the primary grade lessons.

Unlike the upper grades, primary students learn easier when they can be more interactive with their lessons. Therefore, most primary activities will be designed and performed with the software – Eazy Draw. I find Eazy Draw to be a lot like Appleworks Draw, but much more sophisticated. You may download a demo version at http://www.eazydraw.com/. The good news is – you don’t have to buy it to use my lessons. The demo version limits the number of graphics you can create in the program, but it does not limit the use of a file that has been created by a registered owner of the software – like me! So, if you are a MAC OS X user you will be able to download the lessons for your child. I will make every effort to provide an alternative pencil/crayon type lesson sheet that may be printed out as a pdf, but it won’t be near as fun as the interactivity of the filename.ezdraw files.

The student should look at the word and try to read it. Then, click on the audio file to hear the word spoken. You may pause after the word is spoken and go on to the next word or,  you may allow the file to finish to listen to a sentence using the word. You might ask your child/children to come up with a sentence of their own.

If your student is in second semester first grade or higher, it would be good practice to make sure he/she knows all of these words.

The student should look at the word and try to read it. Then, click on the audio file to hear the word spoken. You may pause after the word is spoken and go on to the next word or,  you may allow the file to finish to listen to a sentence using the word. You might ask your child/children to come up with a sentence of their own.

If your student is in first grade or higher, it would be good practice to make sure he/she knows all of these words.

Christmas vacation will run from December 21 to January 1.

Spring vacation will be April 5 – 9.

End of the 2009-2010 NU school year will be June 11th.

Basically, the student is given a sentence that needs to be corrected with proper word usage and punctuation. Only one sentence is given each day for a total of 7 sentences for the week. So all you 3rd graders. Get ready for a challenge this Fall.