“Next Year’s” Plan

Since we do school year around our new “school year” will begin in January. I am becoming more and more eclectic in my curriculum choices. I am very draw to Charlotte Mason and Classical ideas. Next years plan is like this:

For our family subjects

History & Geography–

The Story of the World Vol. 1 by Susan Wise Bauer w/ some of the activity guide

The books we will use along with this are these from Sonlight’s Core 1 :

The Usborne book of World History

The Usborne Time Traveler

Archaeologist Dig for Clues

The Great Wall of China

(And some library books thrown in.)

Science– All of SL Science 1 ( I might stretch this into 2 years), and Nature Journals

Read-alouds– (from SL Core 1)

Charlotte’s Web

Henry Huggins

The Wheels on the School

The Year of Miss Agnes

Homer Price

Greek Myths for Young Children

Mr. Popper’s Penguins

Mountain Born

Understood Betsy

Detectives in Togas

A Grain of Rice (Core K)

(I might stick to these. I might choose others at times. This is just a rough idea of what we’ll be reading.)

Poetry– (read from once a week & memorize one a month)

When We Were Very Young

Favorite Poems of Childhood

Composers– (listen to in the car at least once a week, and discuss)

Strauss

Vivaldi

Beethoven

Handel

Rossini

Picture Study– (once a week)

Mary Cassatt

Monet

Van Gogh

Homer

Da Vinci

Bible– (during breakfast)

Read one week from the O.T. The next week from the N.T.

The Scripture Memory System from SCM

http://simplycharlottemason.com/timesavers/memorysys/ 

with their list of Scriptures

 http://simplycharlottemason.com/timesavers/memorysys/verseslist/

Singing/Drama-

Choral Group

Spanish– (once or twice a week)

Rosetta Stone & Teach Them Spanish workbooks

Literature– books that they will both read separately (connected to our history study)

Tut’s Mummy Lost & Found

Pompeii : Buried Alive

The Trojan Horse: How the Greeks Won the War

The Librarian Who Measured the Earth

Fa Mulan: the Story of a Woman Warrior 

Ms. Frizzle’s Adventures: Ancient Egypt

P’s Core Subjects

Math– Math-u-see (Beta), & math games

English-Rod & Staff English 3

Copywork/Spelling- Simply Spelling

Cursive– A Reason For Handwriting C

Literature– (look above and whatever else they wish to read from the library or home .)

Handy Craft– crocheting

R’s Core Subjects

Math– Math-u-see (Alpha), & math games

Copywork/Handwriting– Draw Write Now

Phonics/English– finish Phonics Pathways, then start Language Smarts Level B ( Critical Thinking Co.)

Literature– (look above, and whatever else they wish to read from the library or home )

Handy Craft– loop and loom weaving

I used SCM’s “Planning Your Charlotte Mason Education”

http://simplycharlottemason.com/books/planning-your-charlotte-mason-education/ to plan this all out. I think it is going to be a great “year”.

“Simply Spelling”- Will this be it?

Ok so my idea of using P’s creative writing stories as a place to get her spelling list from, was a flop. Sometimes I would pick words that turned out to be just plain too hard for her. So she still does a cw story ever so often, but I do not use it for spelling purposes. I tried Rod & Staff’s 2^nd grade spelling (since we love their English), for a few weeks. P found it to be too easy, and boring. I finally decided that I don’t like spelling LISTS! So after much searching; I found this book that uses the copywork/dictation method for spelling:

http://www.ecrater.com/product.php?pid=1490908

P copies  the  selection 3–4 days a week (along with the assignments and recommendation in the book for each day),then on the 4^th or 5^th day I dictate the passage to her. We have used it for 6 weeks now and P hasn’t gotten a single word wrong! Plus she is getting all the capitalization, and punctuation (including commas) correct! She likes doing things this way because it combines her copywork and spelling into one, making less work for her (and me). It is building her confidence in spelling since there are always words that she knows along with the words she doesn’t. Seeing the words in context of writing also helps a lot. Now, I am not going to say we will do things this way forever, but for now it’s working. However, we’ll see what happens over the next few weeks  .

Benjamin Franklin

This was the next person in the Value Tales series that we are doing for history. I decided to do them chronologically. Christopher Columbus lived from 1451–1506, Ben Franklin lived from 1706–1790 ect… I just simply looked in the back of the book to find these dates.

Here’s what we did:

Day 1– Pg.7–21      

Day 2– Pg.22–31

Day 3–Pg.40–62

Day 4– (You can read whatever you didn’t get to) Make a piggy bank http://www.daniellesplace.com/html/benjamin%20crafts.html at the bottom of this link  

a lightning experiment  http://weathereye.kgan.com/cadet/lightning/experiment.html

or my girls asked if they could earn, and save money like Ben. So they did a few chores around the house that were not their usual chores, and I payed them. They also planned a lemonade stand, but we didn’t get to that.

Each day P did copy work from Ben’s famous quotes:

“A penny saved is a penny earned.”

“Early to bed and early to rise, make a man healthy, wealthy and wise.”

“He that cannot obey, cannot command.”

“Never leave till tomorrow that which you can do today.”

“Haste makes waste.”

“If you would be loved, love and be lovable.”

“The early bird gets the worm.”

Benjamin Franklin, thanks for the fun!

Creative Writing and Spelling

I’m stepping back into my childhood. As a 2^nd grader, I went to a great little Lutheran school. We moved, so I only went there for one year. However, a great memory I have is the Creative Writing assignments that Mrs. Gutter gave us. As a child I had a very active imagination, and it was a perfect outlet for me. So I decided to do the same thing with P (she also has an active imagination).

I take a plain lined spiral notebook. On one page I draw a shape of some kind. Using this shape as a starting point, P draws a picture. Example: (The S is the shape I drew.)

On the following page she writes a story, to go with her picture. I don’t require her to have good spelling or grammar in these. I just want her to concentrate on her thoughts, and getting them down on paper. I also don’t assign her any other Language Arts stuff on story day. I want her to have all the time she needs, without thinking about other work that needs to be done. She only writes a Creative Writing story, every other week on Mondays (I don’t want to overwhelm her). 

Later on I do go through her story and see what words she misspelled. I use these, along with words she has missed in other school work, as her Spelling list for that week and the next. The first week she writes these  words 3 times each, and writes a sentence for each. The next week she looks them up in the Dictionary. This helps a lot with spelling; since she has to concentrate on every letter of the word. We have a great Children’s Dictionary that she uses.

Macmillan Dictionary for Children

I enjoy seeing the improved spelling and grammar, in her stories. Along with Rod & Staff English 2, and some Copy Work (Scriptures or poems); we have a very nice Language Arts program. I’m glad I remembered Mrs. Gutter’s wonderful idea.

My Own Curriculum!

I am stepping out on a limb this next school term ! When we finish Sonlight Core K/Science K, we will take a brake from it. We will continue with Sonlight, after R turns 6 yrs.old. I really do LOVE Sonlight. However, I believe that I goofed when I started with Core K/Sci. K instead of Core P4/5 -Sc. P4/5, (it would still have been plenty challenging for P). R has done fine with listening in on Core K/Sci. K; but after looking at Core 1/Sci. 1, I think it will be too much for her right now. I really want to try and keep the girls together in History and Science.

So here is where the limb comes in.  For the time being; I am piecing together my own His./Sci. curriculum for this next term (I say term because we do year-around-school).  Mainly it’s just my own History curr.

Here’s the plan:

I will be using these Value Tales books for History

These were mine when I was a child. Each book covers one very important person in history (Abraham Lincoln, Christopher Columbus, Harriet Tubman etc..) I have 30 of these. We will read about, and do activities on one person a week (two weeks for some of them).

For each person I made a folder like this (this one is Christopher Columbus):

The “supplies needed” list is the supplies that I don’t have (or need to check and see if I have enough of ) for crafts. For Christopher Columbus(CC) we will be making an egg carton boat http://crafts.kaboose.com/egg-cup-ships.html ,and a map of his journey to the New World http://crafts.kaboose.com/new-world-map.html. Inside the folder are all the craft instructions and coloring pages, that I printed out.

The pink Post-it notes are the call #’s of books and videos at the library that are about CC. Our libraries online look-up system makes this very easy.

I look at each Value Tales book, then decide how I will break it up into 3 Days of reading. I write the page #’s under the Days. The 4^th Day we will do a craft and/or some other activity, to bring it all together. For CC we will make the Map and watch a Nest family video. We only do school four days a week, so this works out well. Here is what it looks like:

The “go exploring” on Day 3 will probably be moved to Day 4 also. I plan on  taking them on an expedition in the back yard. I don’t know what this will  look like exactly, but it seems like a fun idea .

With some of the people in the Value Tales, I will have a Bible lesson to coincide with it that week. For CC’s week we will do Noah’s Ark, using the common theme of “Boats”. I am not quite sure what all we will do for this. However, I did find the whole story of Noah, in coloring pages http://www.coloring.ws/noah.htm.

I’ll read the library books here and there when time allows, or just let P read them in her free time.

For Science:

I bought this Christian Liberty Nature Reader: Book 1.

I also purchased Grade 2 Science “Patterns of Nature” Set from Rod & Staff.

Along with a butterfly habitat

and maybe a few other projects this will be our Science.

I am definitely not brave enough to do this again, and again (for now, at least). I already went ahead and purchased (used) all of Sonlight Core 1/ Science 1,  it is just waiting for us to be ready, for it. The only reason I am doing this is because- I already had the Value Tales books (saves money), and I don’t want to overwhelm my R; she so wants to be a part of our school experience.

Anyone out there wanting to take a break for a year (from their curr.), might want to use this Value Tales idea also . Leave me comments if you are interested in seeing the rest of my lesson plans for these.

Changing from Sonlight LA to English for the Thoughtful Child and Phonics Pathways

Homeschooling is quite the adventure. I thought I was going to make changes in our History/Geography from Sonlight. Turns out changes happened else where. I love Sonlight Cores, & Read -Alouds. My prior idea of stretching it out over two years did not fly with my girls. R (the one I was worried about it being to much for her to handle) would ask, “Can we please do the other page?” After trying to shorten things at least 4 times, and being met with the same response, we went back to the regular schedule. I believe we just needed to get into the groove. It has been smooth sailing since.

I ended up making the changes needed in Language Arts, however. SL Language Arts was too much work and did not suit the girls, very well. P’s reading level is way above the Readers 1 for SL LA 1. She was bored with the reading assignments, but the LA assignment were still at her level. I switched her to the Readers 2 (which we already had), and we still use some of the SL LA 1; such as the spelling lists, Explode the Code, and every once in awhile some of the activities and games. However for P’s LA we have switched to “English For the Thoughtful Child”. For R we have switched to “Phonics Pathways” with a little copy work added on, . Both of these are working great! I love their simplicity.

With ETC I love it’s artistic creative feel.The works of art to observe and discuss, the poems to memorize, the stories to narrate are all right up my ally. P catches on pretty quickly and loves to think through thing, so this book is great for her (I have a feeling it might not work for R, we shall see). The lessons are different lengths so sometimes a lesson take 1 day sometimes 4 days. It also depend on P’s understanding of the concepts,to determine how long we take. If you want or need a script this is not for you. You need to know or recall your early LA skills (no teachers manual). I did skip the lesson on the new moon, because I didn’t know the answers and couldn’t find them . Anyway I have been able to make this one really work for us. It brings in more of the Charlotte Mason methods I have been so interested in.

As I have said before, R has been begging to learn to read, just like Sister. SL LA K was good, but too slow for her liking. So I purchased PP. We skipped the Letter sounds; since she knew these; and started with the consonant short vowel blends such as- Ba, Be, Bi, Bo, Bu. We are finished with these and are now on the short 3 letter word as in -Bad, Bed… It is amazing how the consonant short vowel blends help her to easily and quickly identify these words. The program is super easy (just a few minute a day). I love it! P reads very well. However I believe this program would have made it much easier and less confusing, than all my trial and error, ways of trying to teach her.

I’ll let you know if I change anything else .  All this can be frustrating, but part of it is fun because it means I am learning more about my girls and how they learn best. I do realize that I need to put more prayer into my curriculum decisions from now on. He knows better than I do, what they need. If I can hand this over to Him I  will fare much better in coming years.

More Adjustment To Be Made

I  have decided to take our History/Geography, Language Arts K & 1, and Science K (from Sonlight) and slow them down. It was just proving to be too much for us to finish in a day. Plus my 4 year old was not able to give me enough of her attention to complete the assigned reading for History/Geography, and Science (she really wants to participate with us though). I probably should have started with P4/5. If I would have used the Sonlight forums before ordering I would have figured this out.

 I plan on stretching 1 week into 1 1/2 or 2 weeks for all these subjects. In  H/G, and Sc. I will read only 1 out of the 2 pages required each day. I don’t think that slowing down will be holding P back any. I’m hoping that by covering 1 day in 2 it will give more review helping her to really remember what we are learning. In Language Arts 1 P is very capable of the work, however some days just have too much for her to complete. LA K is actually just fine for R, but there is no harm in slowing down some, she’s only 4. We’ll be doing “Teach Your Child To Read In A 100 Easy Lessons”, because she’s begging to read (we’ll take this slow also).

Our Read Alouds we will continue with as scheduled because the girls love them and do not loose interest. We have only substituted one of the books, “The Family Under the Bridge” for another one. In Math we will keep on track also. I have chosen to change our math program from Saxon to Math-U-See. I haven’t received it yet, but I will let you know how I like it. We recently got back from the Homeschool Convention and were able to see and touch the Math-U-See curriculum. We were really impressed with their workshop demo. If you know me, you know that I HATE math and am AWFUL at it. I was amazed that I understood their teaching methods as explained in the demo. The teaching DVD’s that come with it sound so great to me, especially as the girls get older and I become dumber. Hopefully this program will really work. It says a lot when I’m excited about learning Math again or maybe for the first time .

Again God is teaching me to let go of any unrealistic expectation I may set for myself or others. Not just homeschooling but life is full of adjustments and changes that need to be made. I pray that God will give me more wisdom with each learning opportunity so that there are less and less of these as time goes by. We’ll see what happens next year .

Dancing to God’s Word

The girls love the way Sonlight has them memorize Scripture. We play the CD called “Sing the Word From A to Z”. I love knowing His word is being hidden in their hearts,and they enjoy it! It has the verses word for word in song. They dance, they sing, they remember. Sometimes I hear them singing the songs to themselves.

Spelling Becomes Fun

For our spelling words we like to “Mix It Up”, (another suggestion from Sonlight). It really makes spelling enjoyable . Two of P’s favorite ways; that are easy for Mom:

On the white board and with water colors–   

This really appeals to my artistic side. We still write them on regular paper with a pencil at least once a week, even though it is boring.

Mommy’s A Fan of Sorting

In week 11  under “Developmental Activity” Sonlight suggested that you have your children sort socks. This whole time I didn’t know that I was doing school with the girls every week at laundry time . Ok, so my reasons for having them do it were not so honorable, (I hate sorting socks). However I’m glad to find out it’s actually good for them .

The socks quickly become puppets: