Gather ideas from our online journal for nature studies, outdoor activities, arts and crafts, homeschooling curriculum, projects, and spending quality time with the children.
O you who believe! Ward off from yourselves and your families a Fire (Hell) whose fuel is men and stones, over which are (appointed) angels stern (and) severe, who disobey not, (from executing) the Commands they receive from Allâh, but do that which they are commanded. Qur'an (At-Tahrim 66:6)
Who are we?
As salaam alaikum,
Welcome to River City Homeschoolers. We are an Islamic homeschooling family in Richmond, VA with five lovely girls(8, 7,5, 3, and 1) and one energetic boy(10). Our children have always been homeschooled.
My husband and I were born and raised in Virginia. We both accepted Islam on the same day about 8 years ago, masha Allah.
Learning to outline has only been slightly painful for my ten yr. old son. He tends to resist anything new at first though, but as he puts this new skill into practice, he is also agreeing that it is helping him to organize information he is reading. I have to admit this is one of the skills that I learned when I was younger which I still use on a regular basis to this day.
We are using the brochures that I brought home from the field trip last week at Tredegar Iron Works (Richmond National Battlefield Park) as a practical exercise for putting his new skill into practice.
Brochures for outlining
Another subject that I am excited to relearn is Islamic History. We have reached the point in our chronological study of history where we will focus on Islamic History for several weeks. Honestly, as I am reviewing and organizing this information in advance, I don’t recall learning anything of this nature in school.
As I was searching for resources on this topic, I remember that we indeed owned this book called Islam and Muslim Civilization. It is the sixth grade level in a series by Susan Douglass. This series is meant to be a supplemental unit to any history curriculum. So far, it seems like it is just the thing for which I had been searching all over the Internet, subhannallah.
Another book which I rediscovered right on our bookshelves that will accompany this study is called Tell Me About Islamic History by Luqman Nagy.This children’s book highlights some of the major figures and events of the Islamic Era from 628 CE to the fall of Granada in 1492 CE. Again this is not a complete curriculum but a starting point to instill interest for further study into Islamic History.
This Saturday kicked off the first art session at the Visual Arts Center in artsy uptown area of Richmond where my three eldest daughters opted to make a portrait collage and fabric birds.
Muslimah collage
It was my five-year old daughter’s first experience with the workshop as she just turned five last month and now meets the age requirement, masha Allah. I think that she enjoyed the time alone with me more than the actual collage making. We were both ectastic to find images of covered Muslimahs (female Muslims) in National Geographic magazines which we could cut out and arrange into a collage together.
Fabric birds
My father-in-law accompanied my eldest daughters (8 and 7) to a fabric bird making class where they learned to hand sew for the first time. I was pleased that they were exposed to this skill in the workshop as sewing is an important skill to learn and master, insha Allah.
While reading over my emails this morning, I came across a notification about homeschool day at Tredegar Iron Works in the cit of Richmond. It was a bit of short notice, but the price was right, we homeschoolers are flexible, and the hands-on living history events sounded fun and educational for the children. So after slapping together a quick-lunch, we were off to study some state and national history, insha Allah.
Some of the workshops that were planned for the children included learning about a common confederate soldier, a woman’s role in the Civil War, a Cannon’s Roar, and interactive stations. In these workshops they enjoying marching in formation, learning about quilting, and working together to “fire” a cannon.
Admittedly, my little children weren’t very interested in the program as it was best suited for ages 7 and up, in my opinion, but I found other ways to make the outing beneficial for them as well. There was an enormous open field with outside exhibits, look outs, and flora and fauna to discover. We even found sand in which to dig near the picnic tables. The train running high above the river also fascinated them.
Here is a video of some of the activities in which we participated along with views of the city.
After we returned home, my ten yr. old son had a ton of questions and I was grateful to have my husband available to listen and answer his inquiries, alhamdulillah. My husband has done much historical research in his spare time; therefore, he is in a better position to explain historical events than I am able.
I was feeling a little adventurous as a result of making the corn husk dolls over the weekend, so we decided to try yarn dolls too. There were a little easier, masha Allah. It also helped that my 8 yr. old daughter picked up on it quickly and helped her sisters with theirs. She is actually much better at these artsy things than me, alhamdulillah. They ended up making a whole family after catching on to how to make them.
After browsing through the book, Kids’ Easy Knitting Projects, my 10 yr. old son decided to attempt the cozy toe slippers project. These were a little more advanced than anything he had ever done before, but he went ahead and gave it a shot, masha Allah.
Cozy Toe Slippers/Muslim Mocs
In addition, he also recently completed another kufi for his father, alhamdulillah.
Kufi
Can you tell it has been raining here lately? We have been spending more time indoors due to the rainy weather; thus, there is more time for artsy/crafty projects, masha Allah.
He also knitted this little lamb for his baby sister in a couple of hours on a rainy Sunday, masha Allah.
For our first experience making corn husks dolls, it was very helpful to have had a teacher show us step- by- step how to make them at a workshop at Meadow Farm. They weren’t too terribly difficult to make, but it did require the use of fine motor skills to tie the string, so the little girls did need a lot of assistance in making them, masha Allah.Here are some instructions that are similar to the method we used to make them.
In an attempt to organize more activities for my five year old and three year old, I printed out some activities from a CD that came from a math mastermind kit I had stored away and recently pulled out again, masha Allah. The kit consists of a workbook, activity guide, CD ROM, and many math manipulatives. I do use the manipulatives quite often without the actual program.
Good ole goobleck
Another kit that I had stored away that I thought would be fun and educational for the younger children was the SciTT kit, a science kit that includes all the materials for each project/experiment. (I couldn’t find a working link to their site, masha Allah.) Activities with magnetism, light and rainbows, sound, plants, and phases of matter were included in the kit, masha Allah.
For the grand finale, we made goobleck, alhamdulillah! What a mess, but of course they loved it.
Recently, homeschooling has been going pretty smoothly here, alhamdulillah. My husband and I have been allotting time to help each one of our children with their individual needs during the week as well as on the weekends if need be. I truly do appreciate his help with their tutoring, masha Allah.
History has been a bit of a challenge lately though as I am planning on skipping the Islamic history portion of the textbook we are using because there is some incorrect information in those chapters, subhannallah. In place of that, we plan on reading the article Prophet Muhammad, Knowing the “Mercy to Mankind.”
In addition to reading the biography or seerah of the Prophet Muhammad, we have also been spending some time reviewing lessons about the Jinn, creatures created by Allah from smokeless fire, masha Allah.
In addition to the book learning, my 10 yrs. old son just finished another knitting project. He knitted a wheelchair blanket for his great-grandfather who will turn 100 yrs. old next month, insha Allah.
We have been looking at this view from our kitchen table for several days now, so I decided to go take a walk with the intention of admiring the beautiful fall foliage. Insha Allah, it will soon peak in this part of Virginia.
All I could ponder as we walked around the block was the ayat that has so much meaning to me especially when I first became Muslim about eight years ago.
Al-An’am – 6:59
And with Him are the keys of the Ghaib (all that is hidden), none knows them but He. And He knows whatever there is in (or on) the earth and in the sea; not a leaf falls, but he knows it. There is not a grain in the darkness of the earth nor anything fresh or dry, but is written in a Clear Record. (Al-An’am 6:59)
Our most recent outing was to the Humpback Rocks (milepost 5.8) area of the Blue Ridge Parkway. Here, we observed and explored exhibits in the vistor center of moutain life in the late 19 century to the mid 20 century, a mountain farm trail which consisted of a cabin with several outbuildings, and a hiking trail that detailed some of the geology of the Blue Ridge Mountains.
Learning to outline has only been slightly painful for my ten yr. old son. He tends to resist anything new at first though, but as he puts this new skill into practice, he is also agreeing that it is helping him to organize information he is reading. I have to admit this is one of the skills that I learned when I was younger which I still use on a regular basis to this day. 
As I was searching for resources on this topic, I remember that we indeed owned this book called Islam and Muslim Civilization. It is the sixth grade level in a series by Susan Douglass. This series is meant to be a supplemental unit to any history curriculum. So far, it seems like it is just the thing for which I had been searching all over the Internet, subhannallah. 
will accompany this study is called Tell Me About Islamic History by Luqman Nagy. This children’s book highlights some of the major figures and events of the Islamic Era from 628 CE to the fall of Granada in 1492 CE. Again this is not a complete curriculum but a starting point to instill interest for further study into Islamic History.
