Planning for Next Year's Homeschool Curriculum

This week is the final week of our next-to-last term for the year. After a quick break (hurray!), we'll be back in for a final six weeks before summer. (Though it may be a bit more this year, to make up for some time lost when our little one was born.) Time is getting close!

Our 2015 school year will start in May - and thus, it's time for some hardcore curriculum planning!

(Actually, I've been in planning mode for at least four or five months, but now it's time to kick it up a notch.)

And thus, to give you a glimpse into the (usually often sometimes sane) mind of a homeschooling mama, here are the ideas, issues, and questions that are currently bouncing around in my head.

For the coming year, we will have one student in third grade, one preschooler, and two babies (one by age and one by special needs).


Math

We found it, we loved it, we're sticking with it. (Christian Light math rocks!)

Handwriting

We love Handwriting Without Tears (review here). However, their third-grade book goes into cursive. And to be quite honest, our son's printing leaves much to be desired (and that's being quite complimentary). He is in no way ready for cursive when the world of printing is still so foreign to him. Thus, we'll be using a copywork book that I picked up for him at a curriculum exchange, and hopefully that will help his penmanship. Also, the English curriculum we have selected also includes some penmanship.

Maps

We love the Maps series by Modern Curriculum Press (review here)- we'll definitely be sticking with that.

English (a.k.a. Language Arts)

English (including grammar, spelling, and composition) is a new subject this year, and figuring out a curriculum choice has been quite a challenge.

One lesson that I have learned is how helpful it is to sit under my husband's leadership when it comes to curriculum choices (as well as all other life choices!). When I sat down with him today to go over our curriculum choices, his opinion was definite and decided - and sent me in the direct opposite way of that which I had tentatively planned. However, I am completely at peace with his decision, and I think it's a good one. It will also save us money!

Which English curriculum did we select? You'll have to wait till our 2015 Curriculum Round-Up post to find out! (Oh, the suspense!)

The English curriculum we have picked includes grammar and spelling, but not composition. To cover composition, we are going to try a "notebook" technique that I discovered while reading "Homeschooling for Excellence." We'll see how that goes - I'm pretty excited about it!

History and Science

As I mentioned a few days ago, our country studies this year have not been a great success. We're really not sure where we want to go next for history and science. Two things we do know: (1) We want to continue learning about history and science with as many real books as we can, and (2) We want to get back into doing weekly science experiments.

Literature

Our history/science read-aloud time has, over the past half-year, morphed into more of a literature read-aloud time. We have read lots of books this year! We definitely want to keep that up.

While we encourage the children to read as much as possible, and keep up a steady supply of library books (while developing our own library), we have not yet added any required reading to the schedule. Will we? That's another good question.

Bible

We already do morning devotions with mama and evening devotions with daddy. To that we are going to add required personal Scripture reading for the 8yo. We will use one of the many available through-the-Bible-in-a-year schedules (not sure which yet) and ask him to read the New Testament section only, and then to take any questions to mama or daddy.

Music Appreciation

A friend gave me a great idea for music appreciation - easy, fast, effective. Basically - choose a well-known piece each week, play it once a day, and have the children memorize the name and composer. That's it! I'm hoping to use this idea.

We also sing hymns in the mornings (most of the time), which is a great way to learn to appreciate classical and historical music.

Art Appreciation

We will continue to use Ambleside Online's Art Study. Easy, fast, painless!

Arts and Crafts

We hope to incorporate occasional crafts. However, I may leave this mostly for our breaks, when we have more time (and time that needs to be filled!).

Typing

I had originally planned to start typing in third grade. However, with our son's penmanship needing so much help (ditto with spelling), this is no longer the plan. We will wait to try typing until his writing and spelling skills are more well-developed, which may not be for several more years.

Piano

Maybe. Maybe not. Then again, maybe. (Another question that has to be answered!).

Foreign Language

Nope. I'll be satisfied to see him get English down, let alone foreign languages.


Areas of focus this year will be on our son's weak skills, As you can probably guess, his strong areas are reading and math (he reads voraciously and picks up math lessons effortlessly), while his weak areas include anything to do with writing (either composition or the mechanical skills of putting pencil to paper). He is also weak in areas of responsibility, so we're working hard on that as well.

In another month or two, I'll publish our final curriculum decisions.

How are your plans coming for the following year? I can't wait to read about them!

This Year's Country Unit Studies (How They Went!)

For this year and last year, we used "Galloping the Globe," (a set of country unit studies) for history, science, and literature. Galloping the Globe is primarily a booklist (hurray!), and it also provides recipes, games, crafts, activities, websites, and some basic worksheets for each country.

The success of Galloping the Globe depends on having a large amount of real books available to one's family. This means that either (1) you buy a lot of books!, or (2) your local library has a good selection available to you.

Last year, we did the Introductory unit and then England and China. To say that these unit studies were a success would be a huge understatement! We had a wonderful time. Each study lasted about four months, and we read hundreds of books, made tens of recipes, and completed lots of crafts. We have nothing but good to say about Galloping the Globe.

Crafts from our unit study on China.

However, this year's unit studies were unfortunately not nearly so successful. As a matter of fact, they were rather dismal.

Why?

Several reasons.

First of all, morning sickness. That does tend to take away one's enthusiasm for extras.

Secondly, minor burnout from really overdoing it on the previous year's awesomeness. It's taken most of the year to get over that.

Thirdly, as opposed to the previous year (when our library was overflowing with books on our chosen countries), this year the library's selections were... pathetic. Absolutely pathetic. As in, "Ack! There's nothing here!!"

The countries we studied (or tried to study) were Germany, Israel, and France. Here's how they went:

For Germany, the only available real books were German fairy tales. And more fairy tales. Endless fairy tales. In other words, I never want to see another fairy tale again.

In all honesty, they were interesting. And fun. And we read many fairy tales that I had never heard of. But in terms of learning about Germany, it was rather limited.

For Israel, the only available books were collections of books on Jewish holidays. Interesting at first, deadly dull by the end. Besides one Jewish fairy tale, that was all that the library had.

For France, out of an entire page-long book list, the library had two books - Babar and Madeline. I gave up in disgust before we even tried.

I was actually surprised by the paucity of books available. We do not have a tiny library - we have an enormous library, with four separate locations - I'm guessing it's probably one of the larger library systems in our state.

So where were the books?

Of course, there were plenty of dry, factual books about the different countries. The type that read, "The imports or Country X are such-and-such. The exports of Country X are thus-and-thus." You know, the type that cause any normal child (or adult) to dive for cover, and with good reason.

But the good, real books that we treasure?

They weren't there. At least not for this year's countries.

Are libraries clearing out real books and relying more on electronic resources? I certainly hope not, though I wouldn't be surprised. One way or the other, though, the library was not very helpful this year in helping to create our unit studies.

For the remainder of the year, we just checked out books on many different subjects (World War II, spies, Antarctica, aircraft, special forces, snakes, the Amish, space and space exploration, etc.) as well as reading from a wide variety of fiction. (I'll publish our read-aloud booklist for the year in another couple of months.)

One fun (and amazing) thing that I am learning about children is that they actually self-educate. If I get enough good books and have them available, the children just gravitate normally toward them and read-read-read. Soon I'm getting lectures on various historical subjects that I haven't taught - the children picked it up on their own!

That's a dangerous discovery.

And of course, the fact that children do indeed self-educate when placed in a learning-rich environment is one of the underpinning philosophies of the unschooling movement. I totally get that (and support that!). But while I do love incorporating aspects of unschooling into our home education program, I am primarily a more traditionally-minded mama, and I do want some sort of formal curriculum to cover the bases.

Where do we go from here? I have no idea. While I'm a huge fan of Galloping the Globe, I don't know if things will improve (in terms of book availability at our library) if we try to use it again next year. It depends on what the library has to offer on whatever countries we would choose, and that is something we won't find out unless we try it. I'm really in limbo at the moment.

This is a subject that we are currently discussing and praying about, and I don't have any answers yet. But God is faithful, and He always provides the answers that we need in His perfect timing. I will keep plugging away at this issue, and we will eventually find what works for our family, with the Lord's help.

Home education is a never-ending adventure!

Tidbits for February 10th

Vertigo? Now You Can Treat It at Home - I can't count how many people I know who have dealt with this (including my own husband). This is exciting stuff! (Deep Roots at Home)

Reasons We Fail as Homemakers - "Finding out what our pitfalls are is the first step to defeating them." (Growing In His Grace)

How Many Children Do You Have? - "How to answer the question of how many children you have honestly, without garnering sympathy you don't want, without dredging up emotions at a vulnerable time, or feeling like you are denying/excluding the children no longer living is a challenge." (Contentment Acres)

Why Methylation Matters and How You Can Improve It - While this show is geared toward hyperemesis mothers, the content of this particular podcast applies to anyone who suffers from health problems. I have been amazed at what I've learned so far (halfway through). Definitely worth a listen. (HyperG Pregnancy)

When My Baby Stopped Breathing - "What I discovered is that fear originates from Satan and is a result of lack of trust. Jesus wants me to walk in victory, not cower to the enemy." (Treasures from a Shoebox)


Have a wonderful week, dear readers!

Around Here, February 2015

Just a few notes of what's been going on around here...

My husband attended a local conference for family-integrated churches! - It was wonderful! He got to hear Voddie Baucham speak four or five times, plus other local pastors. This is an awesome annual conference, and we hope he'll be able to attend every year.

This year the 8yo went with him, which was wonderful! I can't say that the 8yo was thrilled to listen to session after session of speakers, but he was delighted to have so many children to play with between sessions. I'm dying of envy that I wasn't able to go, but maybe sometime!

We had rain! Really! - And not typical "Arizona rain," in which the sky is clearing up even while the clouds desperately try to give us a few minutes of drizzle before dispersing, but real rain. It actually stayed cloudy for two days!

And not only that, but the day afterwards we had.... FOG! Real fog! We get fog about once every other year, and this was the best I've seen yet in this area. We even had to stop to take pictures - that's how excited we were.

The 3yo insisted on dressing up for the occasion - a period hat, ear muffs, and gardening gloves. Proper Sunday attire, for sure.

Now, if we could only have this two or three hundred days out of the year, I'd be set.

Our final Christmas decorations came down! - Really! My husband and I were so proud of ourselves. Like I said, it's usually at least April or May before we achieve this miracle. We felt much better. 

Next we're we're thinking of getting a real tree just to save all the hassle of tying up the artificial one and stuffing it back in its box every year. 

Helping Daddy. 

I'm still off of Facebook! No plans to go back, but it's a waiting game. I'm now at the point (six weeks in) when I caved last time, so we'll see where this adventure goes from here. I had my husband change my password and then deactivate my account, so at least I've got a few safeguards against temptation.

And finally... baby smiles! - Baby has been delighting us these past few weeks with the most charming smiles. She is such a darling! She is also getting quite mobile and is showing sides of wanting to turn on her side. Toddlerhood is not far away!

Have a wonderful Sabbath, dear readers!

Homeschool Edition: Character Curriculum Books

I had read for years about using character curriculum as part of school time, but until this past year I rather ignored it. I was busy enough, we already did Bible time, and to be honest it sounded a bit dull.

This year, however, I had a character-based book sitting around and figured - hey, might as well use it. Why not?

To my surprise, the children loved it! Loved it as in LOVED IT. It was a huge hit. They were begging for more! Who would have guessed?

Honestly, this was a big surprise to me. I always thought that children would hate character curriculum because of the obviously taught morals and lessons. But I was mistaken. They adored it, and I believe that it was a very positive part of our homeschool year.

Character curriculum is a keeper. 

Here is the book with which we started - Character Trails by Marilyn Boyer.

This book lists a number of character traits (generosity, etc.). Each trait has three short chapters illustrating the trait - one from the Bible, one from history, and one from the life of a modern family.

As I said, it was a huge hit!

After we finished "Character Trails," we moved on to Storytime with the Millers by Mildred Martin. Each chapter illustrates a particular lesson or character trait. It is is well-written and beautifully illustrated, and we loved it.

The Miller books are actually a series - we hope to collect more of these!

I should note that I've been trying to read this book to the family for years - this year is the first time that the 8yo has been mature enough to appreciate it. I'm so thankful he's finally able to enjoy chapter books!

After we finish this book (tomorrow), we'll be on the lookout for our next character curriculum book. I'm considering using the Amish series, "Ellie's People" (which I love!) or the Grandma's Attic series until something else turns up.

Readers, any suggestions? I'd love to hear them!


Shared at:
Modest Monday Link-up

Tidbits for February 4th

To Begin With...

Let's start at the beginning, folks - with an apology! A sweet reader wrote to remind me that in my last Tidbits edition, I had posted a link to a blog entry that contained several obscenities. That link has been removed, and I offer to you, my dear readers, an apology - to everyone in general, and especially to those of you who clicked on the link. I will keep a closer eye on articles from here on out!


Tidbits

A Day in the Life of a Preschooler - Yes. Oh, yes. (Smockity Frocks)

Birth Control Pills: Men Get Free Sex, Women Get Cancer - "They inject synthetic hormones in cows, and everyone freaks out. They prescribe it to perfectly healthy women, and we scream “liberation!” Something is wrong here." (The Matt Walsh Blog)

Should Wives Be Teaching Their Husbands? - I have spent many years learning this hard lesson. (Always Learning)

Destruction-Proofing Your Family - This was an absolutely awesome series. If you missed it the first time, don't miss it now! My favorite is Part 5. (Like Mother, Like Daughter)

• Part 1 - Introduction
• Part 2 - The First Secret, Part I
• Part 3 - The First Secret, Part II
• Part 4 - The Second Secret
• Part 5 - The Third Secret
• Part 6 - The Final Secret

From the Bookshelf

The Nesting Place: It Doesn't Have to Be Perfect to Be Beautiful 

I have no idea why I'm reading this book. I vaguely think it was recommended by another book... or a blogger... or some random force of the universe. And I can already tell you - folks, it's no use. You can't improve decorating techniques in a woman who was born without a trace of fashion sense (that person being Yours Truly). But I intend to enjoy this darling little book anyway - it's so fun and delightful, even if my walls will be just as bare after as before.

The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People: Powerful Lessons in Personal Change 

I know, I know. This book has been out forever (like, since before I was born). What took me so long to read it? But now that I've finally gotten around to it, it is just as amazing as I've always heard. So far, this is a real winner!

Homeschooling for Excellence

A married couple shares their experiences of homeschooling their four sons while homesteading in rural northern California. A fun and easy read - I always love to hear others' experiences in home education.














The Recipe Corner

3-Minute Skillet Granola - Easy, fast, versatile, and child-friendly. I used this as a "teach the 8yo to cook" project, and it was a big success!

What happened when the 3yo got ahold of it is another story, but I'll spare you the pictures. Too painful.

The outcome? Delicious, and highly recommended! We used coconut oil, honey, and cinnamon. (The Common Room)

Have a wonderful weekend, dear readers! 

Learning to Love Mismatched Dishes

Many years ago, I read a homeschooling mama-of-many saying that her family's dishes were all mismatched items from Goodwill. The family would wait until they had broken enough dishes, and then off to Goodwill they would go to collect more. Each dish was unique, and they loved the variety.

I thought that was sweet, but I didn't consider it an option for our family.

Don't get me wrong. I love Goodwill. To be truthful, I shop nowhere else. I already love buying mismatched coffee cups there. In fact, one of the great joys of my life is heading to Goodwill to pick out new coffee cups when we've finally broken enough to have room for more.

But actual dishes? No, no, no - those need to be matching. Perfectly matching. It's just an unbreakable law of nature, don't you know?

Only one thing stood in the way of my perfectly matched dish sets - that thing being my family. It's a rare day that goes by around here without the sound of glass breaking, despite my best efforts. (They can even break Corelle!)

And finally, I had to admit the sad truth. Either we spend time and energy (that I don't have) and a lot of money (that I don't have) tracking down matching replacements, or... we head to Goodwill.

And so we did!

And once again... I'm in love. I absolutely adored going through the dishes to pick out lovely mismatched pieces to make up our collection.

I can't wait to do it again.

Obviously, a miracle has occurred. Another obsessive-compulsive-perfection-seeking barrier broken... CHECK!

Perhaps if I live in this crazy family long enough, they'll succeed in breaking me of all (most?) of my unhealthy perfectionist tendencies. That would take a work of God, but if I can learn to live (happily!) with mismatched dishes, anything is possible.

And so, local friends, if you want to do me a big favor, come over and break a dish! That puts me one dish closer to a lovely trip to Goodwill to buy more mismatched pieces.

Another find of the day - a book holder for the boys' room! 

Have a wonderful evening, dear readers!