Curriculum Choices 2014-2015

 As I sit here typing this I realize I have gone through a lot of Curriculum over the years, a lot.Some of it has stuck around and is continued to be used.  Some has been passed along to other families in hopes that it will benefit them more than it did us.  So what’s this year looking like?  Completely different from any other year.  Why?  Well one big factor is the fact that I have a high schooler this year.  Did you just here a loud thud?  That’s me falling over again at the thought of entering the high school years.  Also as is kinda par for course around here I will be officially adding in another student.  Those 2 factors, along with just taking a long, hard look at where everyone is has lead to my choices.

The Highschooler:

• Mystery of History Vol 2 and 3
• Life of Fred Pre-algebra 2 and Beginning Algebra
• Skills for Rhetoric
• For You They Signed
• Family Time Fitness
• Exploring Creation with Physical Science
• French?

He claims that he is excited about this year.  Here’s hoping that will continue.

6th Grader

• Learning Language Arts through Literature orange and purple
• Making math Meaningful
• Classical Conversations
• Family Time Fitness

4th grader

• Learning Language Arts through literature yellow and orange
• Math Mammoth
• Classical Conversations
• Family Time Fitness

2nd grader

• Reading Made Easy
• Math Mammoth
• Life of Fred
• Classical Conversations
• Family Time Fitness

And then there are the littles.  They are rather eager to do school work but I’m not really sure what I want to do with them yet.  When I have that figured out, I’ll share.

Now you may be questioning the Classical Conversations up there.  Here’s the short story.  We are not attending CC.  However, I was blessed with a copy of their foundations program and time line cards and plan to do CC at home.  I’ll share how that works out too.

1st quarter bust

So I really feel like our first quarter has been a bust.  Here’s a little run down of what worked and what didn’t.

Working well:

Science!  Who knew, the subject that in the past has been inconsistent at best is becoming the easiest and best subject this year.  Bam-Bam is doing Apologia’s Exploring Creation through General Science (the first edition).  I am so glad I snagged the Knowledge Box Lapbook Journal to go with it.  It has been a big help.  Also Donna Young’s schedule, huge blessing!  Pebbles is doing Beautiful Feet’s History of Science.  I plan on sharing some of her work in future post.  Slingshot is doing Beautiful Feet’s History of the Horse.  Again, I plan to share her work in a future post.

Math:

Math Mammoth and Life of Fred work for us.  I have Bam-Bam just doing Life of Fred but Pebbles and Slingshot are doing both.

Language Arts:

Learning Language Arts through Literature also works well for us.

So you may say, how is your first quarter a bust, you have a lot of things working for you.  Because my history/bible course is not working for us.  In a big way.  I was very excited about it, but after only 3 weeks I just can’t continue with it.  The first book is a mile over Bam-Bam’s head and it certainly is not reaching his sisters.  Now in theory I shouldn’t be scrambling for anything, in fact the opposite is true.  I have about 3-5 choice hanging around that could be used and I”m just not sure what direction to take.  One of the reasons I liked it was because it was going to do a quick overview of history.  I thought this would be great for Bam-Bam being that he is in 8th grade.  We could do an overview of history this year and then break it down into “four year cycle” for high school.  Nothing that I have hanging around does that and other programs that do cost more than I want to spend right now.  So then I need to decide, do I start the four year cycle this year, or just do “random” history.  Also what do I do with Pebbles and Slingshot.  I have seen some suggest keeping your children in the same time period and just gearing assignments towards abilities but I just don’t know.  It’s almost time for a three week break so I figure I have 4 weeks to get it figured out.

School Plans for 2013-2014

So it’s almost time to start another school year.  I’m mostly ready for it.  I have littles that are very ready to do school but logistical I’m not sure how to do it yet.  This year I am taking a step of faith so to speak with my choices. My original plan was to use Beautiful Feet.  Bam-Bam was going to do Medival History,

Some of the books for Beautiful Feet Medieval History

Pebbles was going to do Early American History, 

they were both going to use History of Science 

and Slingshot was going to use History of the Horse. 

I set about to acquiring the necessary books and was feeling pretty good about things.  Then I felt a tug in a different direction.  One that I wasn’t ready to head but knew it was a God thing and I had better listen.

So I tucked all the Beautiful Feet stuff on to a shelf and started downloading Teaching With God’s Heart for the World. 

 From their website:  “A one-year unit study curriculum, especially designed for homeschoolers, incorporating God’s heart for world missions into nearly every subject!”

The first week almost made me want to turn and run.  Not because it conflicts with my beliefs, but because it pushes me out of my comfort zone.  It shouldn’t but it does.  Family prayer and worship is not something I am use to, I certainly didn’t grow up with and while we have tried to incorporate it into our family, but are not consistent.   Still I proceed to get the books I needed for this journey.  I’m still seeking God on how this will work with a very independent learner and a very dependent learner.  That will be our core curriculum.

However, there is still the need for basics that can be harder to fully cover with unit studies so we will also be using LLATL

• Bam-Bam will be finishing Green and going into Gray
• Pebbles will be finishing Yellow and going into Orange
• Slingshot will be starting with Yellow

For Math, we will be using Life of Fred and Math Mammoth.  I’m leaning towards Life of Fred being the primary math for Bam-Bam with only using Math Mammoth for additional practice.  Pebbles and Slingshot will use both regularly.

For Science, I decided since Bam-Bam was going into 8th grade we needed something beyond nature studies for science and got an excellent deal from CBD on the 1st edition of Exploring Creation through General Science.  For Pebbles, I have decided to stick to the Beautiful Feet History of Science.

I’m not sure what exactly Slingshot will be doing for science, quite possibly the History of Science with Pebbles.

I still need to work in History of the Horse for Slingshot as she is very excited about doing it.

Those are the general plans.  I hope to post regular updates on things as we go through them.  Another goal for this year is to seriously put things into the portfolio as we go.  This year I will need to do 3 and if I wait until the end of the year to do all three, I will have some very long days come summer break next year.