I am going to try and find time to get back into blogging. It's hard! I wish I could add a few more hours to each day so that I could accomplish more things. I feel like I have been running in circles since returning from vacation at the end of June! I am pretty sure I accomplished nothing the entire month of July.
Oh wait! I just remembered that I did accomplish something in July. I made up binders containing the girls' schoolwork for the the 2009/2010 school year. That's something, right? At least now, if the homeschooling police decide to show up on my doorstep, I am covered!
I have been homeschooling off and on all summer. I decided it worked better for our family just to homeschool year round. Now we can take time off when it suits us through the course of the year. I often find that I want to do nothing between Thanksgiving and Christmas, so we may try that this year. We are also taking our Fall break in September because my Mom will be visiting us then. It just works better for us. That's the beauty of homeschooling...you can do whatever works best for your family! I love it!
I took more of an ecclectic approach to our curriculum this year. Last year, since it was my first year of homeschooling, I went with a more traditional approach. I simply bought all of our curriculum from the same place and followed the lesson plans. This year I investigated different curriculum that interested me and did a bit of picking and choosing. For anyone who is interested, this is what we are using:
Annie (3rd grade):
Math - Abeka
History - The Story of the World
Science - Apologia Exploring Creation with Astronomy
Bible - Beginnings II
Writing - Handwriting without tears
Grammar - Easy Grammar
Spellilng - All About Spelling
Megan (1st grade):
Math - Singapore
History - The Story of the World
Science - Apologia Exploring Creation with Astronomy
Bible - Beginnings II
Writing - Handwriting without tears
Reading - Teach Your Child to Read in 100 Easy Lessons
Phonics - Explode the Code
Spelling - All About Spelling
I am still trying to decide what to do in regards to Reading for Annie. Anyone have any brilliant suggestions?
So, we will be diving back into school on a daily basis with a bit more structure than we had all summer. I am looking forward to getting back into the routine of things around here. I find if I follow a set schedule I accomplish more than if I just float through each day with no agenda.
I am hoping to blog more as well.
I have missed reading about your family's going-ons. I wish I was better at structure.
ReplyDeleteI thought about scheduling our year so that we could have the month of December off too, but decided against it. Since I'll have to be taking Audrey to preschool in December anyway, it's not like it would feel like a vacation to me. Should be interesting to see how you like doing it that way, though!
ReplyDeleteAs for reading for Annie, I'm very impressed with the Christian Light Education reader that I ordered for Bailey, and with the Light Units (language arts workbooks) that come with it. Of course, we haven't used it yet, but I'm loving the content and the layout of both the reader and the workbooks. I ordered them through Rainbow Resource catalog/website.
Another thought, if you have a Sonlight catalog, you could use their reading lists (which are arranged by grade level) to compile your own list for Annie. You know you'd be getting excellent quality literature without anything offensive in it.
Just a couple of thoughts from someone who has NO experience homeschooling yet. :-)
And I'll definitely be in touch with you about a park playdate, like you said, when the weather gets cooler. I was actually thinking we would have done that already this summer, but who in the world would want to be at a park in heat like we've had?? I'm counting on some relief this fall, that's for sure!