Back to Homeschool 2014

Yeah, yeah. I know it's only July, but I'm anxious to get started on another year. I thought I'd start out this year's school blogging with a series of posts on how I get everything ready and what plans I have in mind for the upcoming year. I'm calling it ...

This year I'll be full-time homeschooling a 5th and 2nd grader and part-time homeschooling a preschooler along with caring for an infant, so having a plan in place is CRUCIAL to a successful homeschool year. :)

B2HS Day 1: Curriculum - How I Select It
B2HS Day 2: Curriculum - 2014-2015 Choices
B2HS Day 3: Scheduling - Yearly, Weekly, & Daily
B2HS Day 4: Planners - Teacher & Student
B2HS Day 5: Classroom Set Up Organization

Check back here, as I will be adding links to each post!

Wrapping Up Our First 9 Weeks

Wow! What a ride!

Our first 9 weeks is coming to an end, and it has been such a learning experience for me. Adjusting to a new curriculum and homeschool two kids full-time while caring for a baby has taken more out of me than I ever expected, but it has also blessed me beyond what I expected.

Princess has been so absorbed in learning everything she can about creation and the Egyptian and Jewish cultures. In our study of these cultures, she's read Genesis through Dueteronomy in her children's Bible. Plus, I've been able to feed into her creative side with crafts and various projects (salt maps, paddle dolls, cereal box structures, pottery, etc.) without breaking the bank or pulling my hair out. In math, she's blown through 50+ lessons and still going strong. She's grasping concepts and a crazy rate and acing all of her tests. I'm so proud of her! Science is by far one of her favorite subjects. So far this year, we've studied what botany is, seeds and the process of germination, and flowers both "regular" and carvivorous. We've been able to fit in so many experiments this year to really solidify the concepts she's learned!

Warrior has been eating school up as well. So far, he's learned letters A-O with very basic writing practice on them and numbers 0-9 also with writing practice. I'm having to work on some speech issues with him - nothing major, just normal things for his age like saying L sounds as a W (i.e. yellow is pronounced "yewwoh"). Arts and crafts abound in preschool as with most, but I really struggle with getting him to color. He does not like it at all but is getting better at trying. Somedays it just doesn't happen.

Sign language is something both kids are learning, and as important as I think it is for my children to be bilingual, it often gets put to the back burner. So far this year only two chapters plus fingerspelling have been learning, which as been about 40 signs. I had hoped we'd be a little closer to 5 chapters completed but somedays I have to cut something out to "get it all done".

In the last week, I was notified to one big change in our homeschool set up. Our wonderful piano teacher Miss S will no longer be teaching. She just had her second baby and feels very overwhelmed adjusting to it all and still maintaining a teaching schedule. Fortunately, I know a bit of piano; the kids' grandma knows piano; and their uncle is a music teacher. This helps with my stress of losing such a wonderful element to our school!

Thoughts for 2011-2012 School Year

I feel like I need to get all my ideas, thoughts, gameplan, etc down in one spot.

2nd grade
We are dropping phonics this year! I know a lot of schools and homeschooling parents continue phonics through this year, but with as well as DD is reading, I just don't see it as a neccessity for this year. I never really used the Saxon literature supplements that went along with the program. The spelling in the Saxon program I loved, but I think I may have found something to replace it!

Math: Saxon 2
Science: Apologia Botany
All other academics/Bible: Tapestry of Grace
P.E.: YMCA combo dance class
Music: Piano lessons

Preschool (Year 2)
I looked over what we accomplished this year and took into consideration DS's age and desire for school before deciding that putting off Kindergarten another year was our best option. Many preschool curriculums, though, are LESS advanced than what we did this year. :-( I did find something that looks like a good bridge between what I've done with him this year and what Saxon K (phonics and math) will cover.

Preschool: Horizons by Alpha Omega Publishers

General Thoughts
Now, I just need to get a game plan going on how to purchase these items and from where. I usually pick up things from eBay, Craigslist, or Christian Book Distributors. I know that I cannot get the Tapestry of Grace curriculum from anywhere except the publisher, so that means a much higher price for those items and much more work on my part on raising money to purchase needed items.

I need to sit down and figure out some sort of schedule for fitting in two full school schedules. I feel like I failed miserably at this last school year. I do know I want to do a 4 day school week with Fridays as "catch up" days in the even we need to take some extra time on a subject or have something come up earlier in the week.

Also a change from last year is that I won't fill out the entire plan book for the year. I'll go back to doing it weekly. I still plan on pulling all worksheets and sorting then into daily folders like I did this year, which I think greatly helped with preparations for daily tasks. It was so easy just to grab a single folder and be ready with all of DDs schoolwork for that day. I'll definitely use this method for DS's schooling. I'm torn about it for DD's, though. On a homeschooling blog I follow, she uses a workbox system. Each night she puts all her kids' (4 or 5 of them) work in an organizer with multiple drawers, arranging them one subject per drawer. When the child sits down, they merely start at the top drawer and work their way down. DD is a very independent little girl, but I don't know if she's ready for something quite like this yet. Obviously I'd be right there able to provide assistance should she need any help with her work, but this way she wouldn't have to wait on me to finish something up with her brother. She could just move on at her own pace.

Then to figure in to any scheduling and planning is the baby. Come end of Aug/beginning of Sept, he'll be 3 months old. During the school year, he'll still be nursing and hitting all those phases of wanting to play more, learning to crawl, possibly working on walking, etc. There's always the question of what to do to keep him busy but not leaving him feeling ignored while I'm focused on the two older kids.

*Sigh* I'm thinking a call to Michelle Duggar is needed -- STAT! LOL!

Curriculum Review - Bendon Books

Let me preface this by saying that these books were actually meant to be supplement materials, not a full curriculum.

The Bendon Pusblishing activity boks made a wonderful advanced preschool option for us! Plus, since they are available in a variety of characters, the motivation for school is built in. Characters available include:
 - Sesame Street
 - Disney: Princess, Fairies, Little Einsteins, Cars, Tigger and Pooh
 - Mickey Mouse Club
 - Handy Manny
 - Hello Kitty
 - Word World
 - Littlest Pet Shop
 - Marvel Heroes
 - NASCAR
 - Veggietales

This is no where near a complete list of what they have!

The particular book I used was the Disney Princess Alphabet. By the time we got to this book, we had worked our way through 4 Step Ahead books (see previous entry). This is NOT a book you want to start with, as it just jumps right in with the writing of letters on actual lines.

The book actually starts out with blank lined pages. The first thing I did was skip those and came back to them once she learned all the letters. The rest of the pages look a little something like this one.

I had her practice the uppercase and lowercase simultaneously. I know most curriculums and teachers prefer to do them separately starting with lowercase, but I find doing them together helps with letter recognition and lessens confusion when it's time to use the uppercase letters. Plus, I love that each page gives the student a word with that letter they've just practiced. The main thing I loved was that my daughter ask for "Princess School" every morning!

Curriculum Review - Step Ahead

Preschool can be tricky for some to figure out. Few companies provide preschool curriculums, especially those that are appropriate for very young learners.

My daughter was 2 when I started preschool with her. Many preschool activities were too advance for her physical development (i.e. dexterity). My goal for preschool was to help her develop better muscle control for writing while challenging her mentally.

What I found was the Step Ahead series by Little Golden Books. I used the 4 titles in the series that were available at my local ALCO/Duckwalls and was instantly impressed.

I'm Ready for School

This book taught such concepts as left & right, matching, colors, and drawing. The book also taught some basic reading skills by identifying pictures. Much of the book is sticker based and what wasn't, she was able to complete with a crayon.

Before I Do Math and Counting 1 to 10

These two books were great for introducing number concepts and for number identification. They are both set up in a similar presentation style as I'm Ready for School. The first title here teaches comparisons and number identification. The latter title helps with counting and number identification. I also used it to help with some basic writing skills by having her trace the numbers on the sticker pages.

Before I Write

This was probably my favorite book of the bunch! The work starts out with straight mazes about 1" wide getting narrower over the next few pages. It then adds curves and sharp turns before working to staying on a dotted line. A few letters are introduce on the last few pages written two way - maze and dotted line - with space to write on the child's own.

These are what I started my daughter using. It took us a couple of months to get through the four books before moving on to more advance books in this series and other companies' materials. This series though was my absolute favorite and one that I recommend to everyone who asks what to do with their preschoolers who are ready for school.