Tag Archives: Life Skills

Life Skills: Cooking

The kitchen provides a wonderful opportunity for learning.  A child can see first hand how to divide, add fractions, and cut something in half.  Science in the kitchen is always a highlight of a homeschool day.  The kitchen often serves as a lab for homeschoolers.  Yet, there are times a kitchen needs to be a kitchen.  Sometimes cooking for the sake of learning to cook is valuable. As parents it is our duty to teach our children life skills.  One such life skill is cooking, safety in the kitchen, and safe food handling and food prep.  Often these skills are … Continue reading →

Getting Them Ready for Independent Living

I strongly believe that all children (all people really), whether they are male or female, need to be prepared for living independently. Even if we hope our children will partner or marry and we LOVE to do housework, take care of them, and take care of all of the domestic duties, we are short-changing our children if we do not guide them and teach them those every day living skills and get them ready to live independently. Doing a few chores a week until they graduate from high school is probably not enough for an independent future. Children do need … Continue reading →

Opportunities for Skill Development

As parents, most of us know the basics–we know that we teach our children to read and dress themselves, we may even know that we need to work with them on things like social development, teaching them how to throw a baseball or kick a soccer ball, or even help them learn how to clean and organize their rooms. There are so many other “life skills,” however, that parents can have a hand in teaching their children. We just have to be aware and look for those natural opportunities to help our children develop important life skills. Who knew that … Continue reading →

Family Home Evening: 4 Ideas for Teaching Life Skills to Your Children

One fund idea for a family home evening night is to have a time when you focus on teaching specific home making skills to your entire family. You should open with a short spiritual thought and scripture at the beginning of the night. You could plan to do this as “Missionary Prep” series or “Family Helper” series once a month. Here are four ideas of skills you may want to teach your family. 1) You can have a family home evening that teaches your family to cook. Some families have a system already implemented in which they have each child … Continue reading →

Kids With Single Parents Learn Life Skills

I truly believe that my kids are more independent, capable and have more general life skills than they would if they didn’t come from a single parent family. I realize that is a fairly bold statement, but I think my kids have had to learn to do more daily living things than they would have in another family situation. And this, I think, is a good thing. It’s not to say that they wouldn’t have eventually learned how to sort and do laundry, cook, clean up, do grocery shopping, ride the bus, etc. I was raised in the country by … Continue reading →

What do Children’s Pageants and Homeschooling Have in Common?

You may have noticed I have not been blogging as much as usual, but I have been distracted. That distraction will end this weekend. Right now, I am at a pageant competition with my daughter who is competing in several areas including photogenic, talent, and overall queen crown. She did excellent playing piano yesterday and people have been complementing us all day on her performance. She also completed her interview this morning, and I am waiting to hear the preliminary results. So what does this have to do with homeschooling? Lots! By finding an interesting hobby or activity for our … Continue reading →

“Will I Ever Play Like That?”

This past holiday week I’ve been enjoying my oldest son Garrett’s piano playing. He has become quite accomplished, and it’s a delight for me to listen to him. I remember when he was just a little kid starting his piano lessons. He had a big clunky book with huge notes and his feet swung from the bench. We attended his first piano recital together and he plunked out a simple little tune, his wobbly fingers tapping on each key. At the end of the recital, a young adolescent girl with long flowing hair sat down to the piano. She began … Continue reading →

Teaching Your Kids Resourcefulness

Teaching your kids to be resourceful will give them the life skills they need in order to weather any storms that may bubble up in life. According to the authors of 365 Ways To Help Your Children Grow, being resourceful mean taking on challenges, taking time to think through the challenge and then using any available resources to solve the challenge. There are many ways to teach resourcefulness. One way is to teach everyday skills. Household tasks, like doing laundry or grocery shopping, are ideal ways to teach your kids how to be resourceful. Not only that, you also teach … Continue reading →

Get Busy Living! How Occupational Therapy Can Help Your Child

The job of “living” can be complicated. We have a lot of things to accomplish on our to-do lists each day. But imagine if even the simplest tasks were causing us trouble. What if we struggled with manipulating a toothbrush, buttoning a shirt, zipping a zipper, tying a shoelace, dialing numbers on a phone, writing with a pencil, or pouring juice into a glass? We take these simple tasks for granted, but a child who becomes disabled or is born with a developmental delay must struggle to master them. These kids want to “get busy living,” just like the rest … Continue reading →

Classes to Prepare Your Children for Life

As a parent you may consider having your child enroll in a life skills course in school or after school. These classes can be beneficial, as your child becomes more independent. The types of courses that fit in these categories can vary widely. It may be a class that you can take with your child to have some extra time together. It may be a class that you have her take by herself, so that she can stretch herself. Here are five possible classes. 1) You may consider having your child taking a basic cooking class. This is especially true … Continue reading →