planning Archives - Page 2 of 3

Tag Archives | planning

Gathering Resources & Gearing Up

By Dawn on December 28, 2010 Comments { 3 }

It’s starting again. Our homeschool, that is! We’ve had a month off, and as of this Monday the 3rd, we are beginning again. I love taking an entire month off. It gives me such a great time to recharge just by NOT thinking about school! Doing school in trimesters with a month between each is the ideal for us. Long enough terms to be productive, and long enough breaks for a breather but not SO long that the kids are dying of boredom. I take a few weeks to “break” and a week to get ready for our next term.

This year we are studying the Middle Ages, and as I mentioned in one of my last school posts in November, we changed gears just a little, to begin using History Odyssey by Pandia Press. It is a secular curriculum, but really it is just a framework. The body of the information and activities comes from other books and resources, and I can make it what I want it to be. Tying in the Bible is not difficult! This time period is literally FULL of church history.

We also are trying out Pandia Press’ RealScience for Kids. I wanted to go with Life Science, but with the eclipse that happened last week, it revived my son’s interest in Earth science, so that’s what we are studying. We will actually not cover the solar system this time around though… we did that in depth last year, and that is the last unit in this program. There are plenty of great activities under the topics of weather, water cycle, rock cycle, crystals, etc that it will keep us busy. The boys are fascinated with all of this stuff so it should be fun. Science is an area I have been seriously SLACKING in, so we need this.

I bought the downloadable ebook editions of both of these books. RealScience is over 340 pages! Thank goodness I have a laser printer. It has saved my budget a least $1000 this year alone. This is no exaggeration. I use ebooks all the time, and by printing them out with my laser printer at home, a 300 page books costs me around $1.50 including toner and paper. If I take it down to have it bound at the office supply, it adds about $3 to the cost. STILL worthwhile! I do have most books bound, but not these ones. There are worksheets, lab sheets and other things that both boys will need to write on, so I just three-hole punched them (around 400 sheets, ugh) and put them in binders last night. That way I can run copies for the boys.

The boys will continue with A Reason for Handwriting, Math U See, Easy Grammar, The WISE Guide for Spelling, and a chapter a day in the New Testament. We will begin the Book of Acts this coming week.

I feel refreshed and ready to take on the new term of school. Hopefully my Jan 7th Homeschool Weekly Wrap-Up will still reflect that feeling! Smile

For His glory.

Disclosure: This post contains one or more affiliate links. A purchase through one of these links will contribute a small amount to support this site, and you will have my sincere thanks!

categories: Homeschooling

Tags: history curriculum, homeschool curriculum, planning, science curriculum

Comments { 3 } :

Phonics and Spelling and Reading Oh My

By Dawn on September 10, 2010 Comments { 2 }

We started school on Wednesday. I planned to start back up on Tuesday, but it just… didn’t …. happen. We were no where NEAR ready! Wednesday wasn’t a whole lot better, but we did do math (both) and phonics (D2).

Thursday, I had the boys read aloud to me. I forced them to each pick out a chapter book, and read. That doesn’t SOUND like a big deal but I have to be honest here and tell you that… well, you know how libraries have summer reading programs, and everyone knows reading should be pushed in the summer, and all that? Yeah. Well, to be perfectly frank with you, my kids didn’t read this summer. Not a single book. Okay, Lego Magazine came and they did both read that, but does that really count? I don’t think so.

For half an hour they read. And I went back and forth between them, having them alternate reading out loud to me. D1 chose My Only May Amelia by Jennifer L. Holm. D2 chose Frog and Toad All Year. I was actually surprised that D2 jumped in and read! And read, and read and read! His reading has definitely improved, which is really weird considering he hasn’t actually read anything in 6 weeks! I am determined to get him past phonics this year. He is the only one of our kids who has ever struggled with reading, and I am hoping to get him through it this year.

Friday—today—we hit the spelling review—HARD. I gave the boys spelling diagnostic tests, and then we started reviewing our WISE Guide spelling lists, beginning with List A. I plan to go all the way through reviewing up to where they each were at the end of last year. We also hit the math flash cards, reviewing Addition and most of the Subtraction cards we have. I plan to take most of next week too and just focus on reviewing math, phonics and spelling with them. We may or may not begin history and science next week.

Today I also made another trip up to The Homeschool Bookshop! Life of Fred didn’t work out so well with J, and thankfully I had purchased it new and was able to return it. I got her a subscription to ALEKS Math instead, and that is working out VERY well. She likes it too, which is a nice bonus. While I was at the Bookshop, I picked up a couple old favorites: Shurley Grammar (white cover!) Level 4, and Science in the Creation Week. I can’t tell you HOW MANY memories I have of doing SCW with my kids when we first began homeschooling. We used it our first year and had so much fun with it. Now I get to re-do it with my boys! I also picked up Biology for Every Kid by Janice VanCleave, which I have heard great things about, and it is loaded with experiments to keep my sons *VERY* happy.

All in all, I think it was a decent first week back! I look forward to picking up at least another subject (maybe two!) next week. I want to work into a nice easy pace, so I am not hitting it all full force right away.

How did your homeschool week go?

Disclaimer: This post contains affiliate links. If you click through and make a purchase, a very small amount goes to support 5 Kids and a Dog, and you have my sincere thanks!

categories: Homeschooling

Tags: homeschool curriculum, Homeschool Weekly Wrap-Up, planning

Comments { 2 } :

Homeschool Summer Wrap-Up: Curriculum Planning

By Dawn on July 24, 2010 Comments { 14 }

Always a couple of months before we finish school, my mind begins to wander… into the next school year. I don’t know WHY I do it so early, but I always do. Late spring finds me perusing curriculum catalogs and doing online research. It’s a weird hobby, I know, but it’s one that always kicks in at the same time each year.

My plans aren’t set in stone yet, but I do have a pretty good idea of what we’re using.

Math-U-See: D1 (5th in the fall) is finishing Gamma and will begin Delta. D2 (3rd in the fall) is finishing Beta and will begin Gamma. We also use The Quartermile Math software for skill practice. We bought a 3 year subscription, and we really love it!

Shurley English 4 OR Easy Grammar 3 & 5: I have used both over the years with the big kids. We used Shurley 2 this year with both boys together. We did everything on a white board and while that was OKAY, I would prefer to have a book for them to write in. And I really DON’T like a the writing portion of Shurley so I feel like if we stick with it and buy books we’ll be wasting some money. I want to use Easy Grammar for both of them. D1 is insistent that he must use Shurley. Not sure what to do there yet.

Spelling: D1 uses Sequential Spelling and D2 has been using The WISE Guide for Spelling. His phonics skills aren’t totally up there yet, or I would let him use Sequential Spelling too. For now, we will stick with the WISE Guide.

Excellence in Writing: We began working on keyword outlines about two months ago. They are picking it up, and I can see that the skills it IEW will come to benefit them later on. I have to DVDs now and syllabus, so we are going to continue working through the writing units monthly.

Handwriting Without Tears: If it isn’t broke, don’t fix it. This program is simple for my boys with their fine motor and spatial issues, and while it’s not my favorite style of penmanship, at least they can write and it’s legible. We’re sticking with it. D1 is in the middle of the second Cursive book and doing well, and D2 is still struggling with keeping his letter in the vicinity of the lines, in the second manuscript book. Slowly but surely they are overcoming the fine motor struggles.

Diana Waring’s Romans, Reformers, and Revolutionaries: I cannot WAIT to use this! I’ve been a History Alive! wanna-be for as many years as I have homeschooled. That would be 12. Yes. 12. And I am finally getting to use her history programs!! I’m very excited about this. That being said, we are adding in a lot of public domain books to our history studies, because I have already got them on my computer, already formatted them for easy reading and printing, so why not? Later on I will share these books with you, too! Another place I located a few books for this study is The Paperback Swap. I was able to request 3 titles that we will be able to use.

Building Thinking Skills, Book 2: I picked up the TM and a student workbook at a used curriculum sale, and purchased another student workbook online. Thinking Skills is an area where they need some sharpening, and we started using this together this year. We’ll continue with it next year.

Science: I’m not sure yet. Science is the subject that we always co-op’ed with another family on. I have struggled with pulling it together with just the boys and I. We do have Flying Creatures of the Fifth Day, which we didn’t end up using this year, so we could use that. I’m just not sure yet!

Lapbooks: We have done a few lapbooks. I’m not so great at getting to them or finishing them. I am sure we will do a few more lapbooks this coming year. They are a great way to pull a subject together to display what they’ve learned!

Keyboarding: I need D1 to do a typing course this year. We have Typing Tutor 10, but it was for XP and they don’t make it any more. I need to locate another good typing program that isn’t all about cartoon characters but appeals to kids. Do you know of any??

Disclosure: This post contains affiliate links.

categories: Homeschooling

Tags: curriculum, homeschool curriculum, planning

Comments { 14 } :

Back to school!

By Dawn on April 28, 2009 Comments { 7 }

As we are wrapping up our Spring Break month off, I have been working my way through our final trimester’s worth of lesson plans. We will finish up OFE’s Year 2 lessons and books. No major changes for us this last term, except that as of Wednesday, D1 is DONE going to the school for resource every day!! His IEP expires on Wednesday, and when the teacher asked me if I want to schedule a study team meeting, I very happily said, “No thank you. Let it expire.” YAY!!

I have a few plans to finalize, but in a nutshell we will:

Finish our math (Alpha & Beta, and begin Gamma for D1)
Continue with Handwriting Without Tears
Finish Stories of Great Americans for Little Americans
Read Among the Farm-Yard People
Finish James Herriott’s Treasury for Children
Finish A Child’s Garden of Verses, and probably get to a couple Jack Prelutsky poem books we have
Continue with The Aesop for Children
Continue Considering God’s Creation, covering Plants, Insects/Spiders, and Animals
Memorize at least 12 more Scripture verses (they already have around 20 since Jan.!)
Read The Seven Little Sisters Who Live on the Round Ball That Floats in the Air
Begin using Learning Logs for spelling, and also alphabetize their spelling words

My most invaluable tool for all of this planning is Donna Young’s fantastic website! She has the best forms around (and she made me one!!) and I have used them faithfully for as long as we have been homeschooling. No, not since January. I’m talking 11 years here folks! Her site is by far the BEST!! Check it out!
And this week, we are going to a park day with a homeschool co-op we are joining for next year (First Class Homeschool Ministries). I met one of the coordinators at church, and she’s very nice. We still have to join First Class, and then the local one, but we are going to meet the families which will be nice. I’m looking forward to having a co-op!
Our homeschool group is also having a Krispy Kreme field trip on Wednesday, but I forgot to sign up and I’m afraid we are too late. Oops! Shhh! I didn’t tell the boys about it. They’ll never know. I will call Tuesday to see, though.
————————-(Edit: 8:51am)
Applie commented that it sounds like we will be busy between now & summer. Yes, and no. Our “Summer” consists of the month of August. We school basically year round, three months on, one month off. Even after just this one month off my boys are quite bored now, the last week, with lack of a routine and the structure it brings. Summer is always the same, but months longer with moaning and complaining (the kids get pretty bored too.) We decided that the kids would benefit more from having a whole month leading up the Christmas, a whole month when spring fever hits, and just one month in the hottest part of summer, when it’s too hot to think anyway. So yes, we’ll be busy, but no busier than we were before and we’re spending 13 weeks to get it all done, rather than six!