Website: Ted-Ed

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Use engaging videos to create customized lessons

This is such a valuable tool for homeschoolers! 

The TED-Ed website offers terrific educational video content in many different fields from many talented educators. You can use, tweak, or completely redo any lesson featured on TED-Ed, or create lessons from scratch based on any video from YouTube.

Watch the video to learn how.

Go to Ted-Ed

Website: Sell Your Handmade Items on Etsy

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Sell your handmade items on Etsy

Etsy is an website focused on handmade or vintage items as well as art and craft supplies. These items cover a wide range including art, photography, clothing, jewelry, food, bath and beauty products, quilts, knick-knacks, and toys. Many individuals also sell craft supplies such as beads, wire, and jewelry-making tools.  

The site follows in the tradition of open craft fairs, giving sellers personal storefronts where they list their goods for a fee of $0.20. 

I know many unschoolers, including my daughter, who sell their handmade items on Etsy. 

Go to Etsy

Craft Website: The Crafting Chicks

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Make Really Cool, Professional Crafts!

The Crafting Chicks is a website maintained by five women who share tons of cool crafts, recipes, and other fun tips and ideas.

The categories on their website include: Home Projects, Recipes, Holidays & Parties, Photoshop, Kids & Family, Sewing, and Printables. 

Go to http://thecraftingchicks.com/

Books: Author Keri Smith

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Books That Stretch the Creativity & Imagination 

We can't get enough of Keri Smith's books, and once you discover them, you won't either. Her books are fun, innovative and super creative. They certainly veer off, in a wonderful way, from what you expect from a book. A great addition to a homeschoolers/unschoolers library.

           

Full Listing of Keri Smith's books

Adventure: Find a Mentor For Ages 6-18

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Find a Mentor for Ages 6-18!

"MENTOR works closely with Mentoring Partnerships and more than 5,000 mentoring programs and volunteer centers throughout the country, serving more than three million children in all 50 states. There are currently 18 million children in the United States who want and need a mentor, but only three million have one. MENTOR's mission is to close that gap so that every one of those 15 million children has a caring adult in their life. 

MENTOR serves young people between the ages of 6 and 18, and its work over the last two decades has helped millions of young people find the support and guidance they need to build productive and meaningful lives."

Go to Mentor

Website: Earthsky

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Day to day what's going on in the sky!

At the website Earthsky you can follow along with what's going on in the sky every single day. From full moons to visible planets, Earthsky has a detailed daily account of what you will see in the sky on that certain day. 

A very useful website for all, but especially for those homeschoolers who are intrigued with the sky.

Go to Earthsky

Book: Anno's Math Games

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Math is fun with Mitsumasa!

Mitsumasa Anno is brilliant at portraying math in a fun, imaginative way with many visuals! I highly recommend all the books in this series. My daughter and I love reading all Mitsumasa's books. We have found many of them at the library. They make math concepts very enjoyable unlike math workbooks.

A great way to stretch the brain!

About Mitsumasa Anno
See Anno's Math Games on Amazon

Website: Living Math!

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A Site Dedicated to Learning Math Naturally!

This site is dedicated to sharing resources for learning, exploring and enjoying math in a dynamic and holistic manner, for all ages. Highly recommended site for unschoolers or for those who want more for their children out of math than what the conventional offers.

Go to Living Math!

Website: National Geographic Blogs for Kids

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Read blogs from kids all over the world

"This blog pulls in the most recent posts from all of our AMAZING blogs. The bloggers, who are selected and monitored by National Geographic Kids staff, share their unique thoughts and experiences online, through words, pictures, and videos. If you register, your thoughts and opinions can be heard too—through comments. So, start reading!"

Go to NGkidsblogs

Website: Figment

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Share your writing with a community!

Figment is a community where you can share your writing, connect with other readers, and discover new stories and authors. 

Whatever you're into, from sonnets to mysteries, from sci-fi stories to cell phone novels, you can find it all here. Figment makes writing fun and creative! 

Go to Figment 

Website: Scratch

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Create and Share Your Own Animations & More!

Scratch is a program that makes it easy to create your own interactive stories, animations, games, music, and art -- and share your creations on the web. 

As young people create and share Scratch projects, they learn important mathematical and computational ideas, while also learning to think creatively, reason systematically, and work collaboratively.

Go to Scratch

Craft: Make Your Own Paper

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Beautiful handmade paper recipe

Below you will find a simple papermaking recipe to get you started. If this is the first time you are making paper, don't be afraid to experiment with different fibers, you don't have to stick with paper related products. Add whole flower heads to the pulp mixture after it has been through the blender. You can add scraps of yarn, tin foil, even seeds. Its all comes down to what you want. 

Experiment with different textures and colors after all Ts'ai Lun, the inventor of paper, did! Remember, some of your ideas will turn out while others may not. Have fun with it, express your creativity.

Click on read more for the simple recipe!

Adventure: Help Exchange

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Farm Work For Food and Accommodations

HelpX is an online listing of host organic farms, non-organic farms, farmstays, homestays, ranches, lodges, B&Bs, backpackers hostels and even sailing boats who invite volunteer helpers to stay with them short-term in exchange for food and accommodation. Parent must accompany a child under 18.

HelpX is provided primarily as a cultural exchange for working holiday makers who would like the opportunity during their travels abroad, to stay with local people and gain practical experience. In the typical arrangement, the helper works an average of 4 hours per day and receives free accommodation and meals for their efforts. 

Go to helpx.net