HCECF - Homeschool Cooperative

HCECF does lots of things, but one thing I've figured out over the past three years of having the HCECF kids enter the balsa wood bridge event at the SECME competition, is that they build bridges well. They've placed both previous years and added another medal yesterday (2nd place) in the bridge category.

However, that's not the bridge building that counts the most. I'm definetly proud of those achievements, but what I was most impressed with was the kids willingness to help out other teams when they could.

One example stands out - at the SECME competition, one of the public schools water rocket teams had a bottle that sprung a leak and wouldn't pressurise to launch. The HCECF team was doing everything it could to help them find a solution. The HCECF crash cart was accessed for duct tape, scissors and other supplies to help a team they were competing against. At one point, caniblising one of the HCECF rockets that had already launched was suggested. The HCECF's kids goal wasn't to win, but to make sure all the other kids had a chance to get their rocket airborne also. When asked what school they were from, the reply was a proud "We're the HOMESCHOOLERS".

It's hard to believe that we're now up to our tenth homeschool faire.  The concept is a simple and effective one, all participating homeschoolers welcome. Take a science fair concept and swap science for our current theme.  Do a project, activity, skit or something to share AND something for the potluck. Period garb / costumes encouraged, but not mandatory.

So far HCECF has hosted a faire on Vikings, Egypt, Pirates, Native American Indians, Colonial / Pioneer America, Robin Hood / Sherwood Forest, Spanish Armada, Out of Africa, Star Wars and now are taking a literary book adventure with the choice of any book.

http://groups.yahoo.com/group/homeschoolfaires/

Our Faires have been so popular that the format and themes are copied by other homeschool groups, we are flattered!

I've been using TOS for a few years now, and every issue has something useful for my family. We've been homeschooling for awhile now, and often we see repeats of the same old information. TOS is a refreshing change from that.

I wanted to tell you about a special promotion the magazine for homeschool families is running right now. If you subscribe for just a year, you actually (while supplies last) will receive 25 curriculum-type gifts from various vendors. The value is huge ? hundreds of dollars? worth of freebies to you. No strings attached ? except that TOS only has about 2000 of these ?gift baskets? left in their inventory. First come, first served. Here?s the link which explains more, below. You can even view all the gifts and find out how they?ll arrive. Hurry, though, they go really fast. Last time the magazine did this they sold out about two months early. Keep in mind too, the Schoolhouse Store has over 2000 homeschool products now, and it?s free shipping on everything always. No minimum buys.

 http://www.theoldschoolhousestore.com/index.php?main_page=product_info&cPath=66_60&products_id=1542

 The above link will show you the pictures of your free gifts plus give you all the details.

With all those free gifts, it's definitely worth checking out to see if it's right for your family.

If you've seen the show, you know why all the homeschoolers love them. If you've read this site, you know about Faireschooling! Education, fun and funny clothes; it doesn't get better than that except when you add their music!

Empty Hats has some of their songs available for online purchase for when you can't see them at the faire.

Recently Added Tracks

One way we do this is with a Usborne Book show - free or cheap books with the hostess points.

Here's the link to the Usborne Books e-show....
http://www.ubah.com/HOS91651

for the "HCECF Fundraiser"

You can order NOW!!!! and have books shipped directly to you.

Our goal is to get enough in hostess bonus to get the "Survive Middle
School Set" as a reference library for HCECF coops. We need around
500 in sales I believe. Please pass along the eshow link to
friends and family and get their orders also!

One thing we're still working on perfecting is what is the best (meaning least time consuming way) to manage a homeschool groups lending library. Would love to hear how others manage this.

Legos and homeschooling are a perfect match. There are several different homeschool friendly competitions, numerous teaching aids and websites that can be used.

FIRST Lego League seems to be perfectly geared to homeschoolers - it's almost a complete unit study in itself! Robotics competition, programming, teamwork, research. HCECF kids have competed in this before and are again this year. Eight kids ranging in age from 7 to 12 will be competing in this years Power Puzzle challenge.

There are yahoo groups in a couple of states designed to meet the unique needs of homeschoolers competing in the various lego programs and serving as a match making service of sorts for homeschooling families in their respective states looking for groups or teams with lego programs.

Florida - began 2007
LEGO-HomeschoolFL · LEGO - Homeschool Florida
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/LEGO-HomeschoolFL/

Georgia - began Aug 2007
GAFLL_HS · GAFLL Homeschool Support
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/GAFLL_HS/

Play well.

 Sadly, it's occuring among homeschool group leaders.

I'd have to think twice about belonging to a homeschool group where our leader had such little courtesy for others. You see, HCECF's, intro letter that I penned many years ago is being used by another local group, almost verbatem. There have been minor changes - obviously, there is now a different groups name. Greetings, became Hello. However, the majority of it is a word for word lift, right down to the puncuation.

All HCECF has asked for is a note indicating that our intellectual property was used in error, and will now cease to be used and all copies in any form destroyed, otherwise we will be forced to protect our past and future rights to our intellectual property. Basically, admit you made a mistake, stop using it, remove it from wherever you have it, and tell us you have done so. This stops any action from HCECF proceding with a copyright infringement case. We will gladly forgive the past indiscretion IF the simple letter we have requested with the contents indicated is recieved. 

Instead, of taking this simple step, it has been claimed that this is not plagerism,  because no coryright symbol appears. Sorry, please check current copyright law as this is incorrect. Trying to be helpful, I sent a weblink to it, so the group owner in question could inform themselves. The next response, was unbelievable to me, it was that it was basically a coincidence as all groups are the same and the messages will be similar to a degree based on that. It also seems that she is claiming not to have known of our groups message when she penned hers.

The group owner has described her group as " insignificant, very small and not active", and as such seems to imply that we shouldn't be upset. We'll, we ARE upset - very much so. I take pride in my writting, get paid for same, and do not appreciate injustice no matter how small and insignificant in your own mind you believe your group to be. Your thoughts about your group doesn't mean we don't have a right to retain our intellectual property or be compensated if we CHOSE to give up that right. That's not a choice we have made in this case. Our intellectual property should not be used without our consent. That's an interesting thought though, if you're self described as unimportant  we should excuse any of your behaviour.

Envision the impact on our legal system. "Gee, Judge, I did shoot up that class room full of school kids, but I don't think of myself as very important, so just let me get away with it ok?" That's not a country I'd like to live in. I'm glad we have laws and enforce them.

We have made a reasonable request and given you a reasonable out. Please take it. It's really going to be difficult to claim that identical sections of writing likely approaching 75% or greater of yours, and another large portion containing only minor paraphrasing  was really created independantly - pretty sure the infinite monkey theorem would not be a viable defence. HCECF can easily prove that our version has the earlier date.

To everyone who may be using intellectual property belonging to myself or HCECF, please stop now. And think before you insist on making claims that go beyond any accepted degree of reasonablness. Swallow your pride, admit your mistake, fix it and move on.

I heard a mom, not too long ago, talking about unschoolers and how they don't "teach" their children anything. "They don't use books.".  I could have croaked! It can be HARDER to be an unschooler; no, we don't use TEXT books per say...UNLESS the child wants to use them. If my child wants to learn about something, say...a butterfly we saw when we were outside. We would take a picture of it ( if we can). Then come home or..run in the house to the computer and start looking it up. We then read, read, read about that butterfly and many others along the way. We draw it...paint it, whatever. My one daughter would either print a picture of it out and draw one, then put it in her nature book and then she would write something about it. Next, she would like to head to the library to get more books on butterfly's, ...so along the way of seeing this one butterfly we would spend hours, days, sometimes months learning about that one butterfly and whatever else that has caught my daughters eye while learning about it.

 So, for people to say that we don't teach our children.....well.....no,..... we don't.... we "help" our children learn. We are like a guide, we do anything that we can to help them learn about whatever they choose to learn about. I have heard through the years so many, many times "well my kid would never learn to read if I didn't make him"  .............ummmm, yes he would 'cause I am SURE that sooner or later that child would have come to its momma and said..."Momma, I want to learn to read"! and then that momma would do whatever she has to inorder to help her child to read, if that means that that child would like to use workbooks then so be it we go buy workbooks. .What an unschooler won't do is FORCE that child to learn..

People/children don't want to be dumb, they do want to learn, but they want to learn what's important to them not someone else. If you MADE me sit and learn about...how electricity works, how it runs through the wires from house to house...I would want to RUN... no kidding I am NOT into that, it blows my mind how it does work, but it also boggles my mind on how it works and I choose to stay ignorant about it ! LOL, now I know you will think I am nuts!, but really if someone MADE you sit and learn something that you have no interest in would you really, really soak it all up? or would you soak up just enough to pass the test??

What Unschooling isn't, is NOT learning, what it is, it is finding out what interests your child has and then going from there and along the way they will learn way beyond  that one butterfly they saw in the yard.:~))

Peace always,
Heidi
( Unschooler ~ facilitator of child led learning to 3 kids ages 16,14,8 )