Well, we've hit our first major snag. Our 3rd grader has been having trouble with the Horizons math. It has something to do with the approach because she excelled at Math last year at public school. I let her do some Teaching Textbook samples and she loved it. The only problem is that they don't have the 3rd grade version released yet. She "passed" the 4th grade placement test but I'm hesitant to buy it and have a similar issue with her. Right now I am having her study her multiplication facts and if the 3rd grade version isn't out when we are done, then we'll take our chances on the fourth grade. I wonder if Sonlight gets them as soon as they have them on the Teaching Textbooks website?
I found a couple of free multiplication games online: multiplication.com
Coolmath4Kids (looks like you can print flash cards here as well)
I'm sure there are more but those are just a couple I came across quickly using ye 'ol search engine.
Ticker
Wednesday, September 23, 2009
Sunday, September 6, 2009
Notebooking the 50 States
I decided to included a study of the US states to supplement the girls' American History unit. I mean they just go together, right? I began searching the web and came across a fantastic lens in Squidoo. Jimmie has really written a a wonderful resource. Check out all her lenes if you want to learn about notebooking or lapbook. Most of my links are from her lens. A few of my favorite links for this study include:
- 50 States Notebooking Lens by Jimmie - Lots of info, freebies, printables, pics. Also instructions for a salt dough map.
- Notebook Nooks State Study pages on Currclick - Individual pages for each state. These cost around $20 depending on if there is a sale running or not.
- Our 50 States Email Newsletter - Sign up to get a weekly newsletter about 2 states. Easy way to organize and lots of info and printables. Sent by date of admittance into the union.
- Printables for each state. Includes map, puzzles, coloring pages. The state bird and flower pages are really beautiful.
- State information - Great, easy to find info from Enchanted Learning.
- Crayola Coloring Pages - Cute pages include state bird, flower, and flag
- Information on Native Americans by state.
I also joined a yahoo group to exchange postcards. This seems like a great group where kids exchange postcards from other states. I can't find postcards anywhere, though. Seriously, if Wal-Mart doesn't have it I just don't know where it is. Visitor's Bureau, perhaps? I really think this would be a fun thing for the kiddos. They could be writing letters and mailing as well as learning about the states. Now if I can only remember to find these while I'm out.
I figured for a 3rd grader it would be fine to simply color the pages from Crayola. She also likes to do a US map floor puzzle. Here she is working on her pages and showing off a couple of her favorites:
Rachel's work is a little tougher for a 6th grader. She does a few pages from Notebook Nooks notebooking pages. She has to find the state on a US map, find a few facts about the state, and color the state bird and flower. Plus, I've included a Native American study. Using this website she prints out the state map of Native American tribes to include on a notebook page. Then she picks one tribe from that state and writes a couple of paragraphs about them. She is also collecting state quarters.
When we are finished I think we will have a cute notebook filled with great information.
Monday, August 17, 2009
Thoughts on Sonlight
Now that I am a seasoned homeschooler with 3 weeks under my belt, I am ready to give an overall impression on the curriculum that we are using. To make things easier for my independent workers I have put sticky notes on each book with their assignments Mon-Fri. This has worked well, especially, for the readers and the history workbooks. I didn't use them for math or language arts as it is easy to keep up with one lesson per day.
This review is for Sonlight's Core only. This includes the History, Geography, Bible, Readers, and Read-alouds.
Overall, I'll give Sonlight an "A". Sonlight's Instruction Guides are invaluable and I don't need to do anything to prepare for a lesson. The daily assignments are all done! I still love the literature. History is fine but I'm hoping it will get more interesting for the girls. Calvin is enjoying Core K. I wish I hadn't felt confused by the number on the core. I really didn't want my 3rd grader doing a Core K. Coming from honors in public school it seemed beneath her grade level. But she is very interested in the Core K that her younger brother is doing. I feel I could have had her do the core along with him. She could have taken more advantage of the internet links provided and I could have used the read alouds as readers for her which would have saved a little $$. I can't say that veteran Sonlighters hadn't told me that because I got lots of input from friendly people on the forums. Sometimes, though, they just ended up confusing me even more because I just couldn't see it.
I have to add that I am suprised by how little the girls learned in public school about American History. Here is the conversation we had about American History:
Me: "Is any of this familiar to you guys? Have you heard of it before"
Them: "Well.....we have heard about Plymouth".
Me: "Thanks goodness you guys learned something at school."
Them: "Oh, we remember that from Charlie Brown Thanksgiving".
I was shocked that they knew so little about Columbus, Jamestown, and Plymouth. Good ol' Charlie Brown came through, though.
The geography seems fine. It makes since to look at the area we are studying on the map. It is pretty natural. Not sure how much is retained, though. Also, we sometimes forget and have to do it the next day or something. Personally, I love geography and fell that, in general, it is neglected.
The bible is adequate. The kids are certainly are more fond of the Bible stories from Core K than the Bible reading/memorization from Core 3+4. I do like Core 3+4 American Indian Prayer Guide with it's snippets of information about different tribes. I have been told that Alpha Omega's Lifepac Bible is very good so I might try them out for next year.
I am really loving the Kindergarten Core and feel it is a perfect fit for my 6 year old.
This review is for Sonlight's Core only. This includes the History, Geography, Bible, Readers, and Read-alouds.
Overall, I'll give Sonlight an "A". Sonlight's Instruction Guides are invaluable and I don't need to do anything to prepare for a lesson. The daily assignments are all done! I still love the literature. History is fine but I'm hoping it will get more interesting for the girls. Calvin is enjoying Core K. I wish I hadn't felt confused by the number on the core. I really didn't want my 3rd grader doing a Core K. Coming from honors in public school it seemed beneath her grade level. But she is very interested in the Core K that her younger brother is doing. I feel I could have had her do the core along with him. She could have taken more advantage of the internet links provided and I could have used the read alouds as readers for her which would have saved a little $$. I can't say that veteran Sonlighters hadn't told me that because I got lots of input from friendly people on the forums. Sometimes, though, they just ended up confusing me even more because I just couldn't see it.
I have to add that I am suprised by how little the girls learned in public school about American History. Here is the conversation we had about American History:
Me: "Is any of this familiar to you guys? Have you heard of it before"
Them: "Well.....we have heard about Plymouth".
Me: "Thanks goodness you guys learned something at school."
Them: "Oh, we remember that from Charlie Brown Thanksgiving".
I was shocked that they knew so little about Columbus, Jamestown, and Plymouth. Good ol' Charlie Brown came through, though.
The geography seems fine. It makes since to look at the area we are studying on the map. It is pretty natural. Not sure how much is retained, though. Also, we sometimes forget and have to do it the next day or something. Personally, I love geography and fell that, in general, it is neglected.
The bible is adequate. The kids are certainly are more fond of the Bible stories from Core K than the Bible reading/memorization from Core 3+4. I do like Core 3+4 American Indian Prayer Guide with it's snippets of information about different tribes. I have been told that Alpha Omega's Lifepac Bible is very good so I might try them out for next year.
I am really loving the Kindergarten Core and feel it is a perfect fit for my 6 year old.
It is a wonderful core. I would certainly recommend Sonlight to a beginning homeschooler. So easy to do and so much help available. I find that the hours needed to complete the study (listed in the Sonlight catalog) is exactly right. They really have that down.
Tuesday, August 11, 2009
Off to a Good Start
We are into our 3rd week and hubby instructed me that it's been about a month since I've blogged and he want to read what we are up too.
I started our first school day on Friday, July 24. I wanted to get a feel how everything would go timewise. It seemed to work out well. I oriented the girls on what they were going to do most days and the things that they could do independently. They worked on reading, history workbook, language arts, and sometimes math while I worked with Calvin.
Calvin and I just finished reading the Boxcar Children, or as he called it "The Box Kids". I had never read the book and really enjoyed reading it to him. It was one of his favorite things to do besides his "fish book" which is his language arts. He told his daddy that he liked school and loved his new teacher. I'm not sure how long that will last but for now I'm eating it up.
The girls read a couple of books by themselves: "Pedro's Journal" about a boy about Columbus' ship, and "Om-Kas-Toe" about a Blackfeet boy before they had horses. They liked both of these books well enough. I read "Walk the World's Rim" to the girls as our read aloud. I thought it was slow starting but ended up getting hooked on the adventures of Esteban as he traveled with de Vaca. The girls, however, found it very dry and long. I wish that the core had started with something a little more interesting so that we would have a better start. We are just beginning "The Witch of Blackbird Pond" which, I'm told, is an awesome book.
My only thoughts right now, curriculum wise, are with the science and language arts. While I really love the LA workbook, I wish that the girls had more writing to do. I may try and find some journal starters or something. I do, however, LOVE Becky's cursive book. She is copying sentences that relate to works of art. Her book is absolutely gorgeous. Science has been pretty good and Calvin did love the experiments so I hope it will end up being fun. We just haven't got the hang of it yet.
Our second week was pretty good except two of the three kids got sick and it hit me on the weekend, too. Luckily, it was just a 24 hour thing and they (we) were able to catch back up. We even finished "Walk the World's Rim" and were thrilled. Later while doing her history workbook Rachel realized that Esteban was a real person. Although, I told her that when we read the story it just sank in her brain at that moment. Maybe even though it wasn't her favorite book she still learned something.
So far the kids are enjoying homeschool. Becky likes it because it is shorter and she can take snack breaks. Well actually, I think we all enjoy the shorter process. Rachel likes being a little more in control of her studies. She has been waking up early and getting started right away. I have been finding that it isn't as hard as I thought it would be. Sonlight makes the core so easy to do by laying out a daily schedule. I've made similar spreadsheets for math, language arts, and science so I know exactly what I'm doing everyday. The whole year is already planned! We have learned so much already. We've read 4 books, studied 5 different Native American tribes, discovered new lands with Spanish explorers, learned about scientific classification of animals, and reviewed math. Not bad for 2 weeks! I can't wait to see what happens next!
I started our first school day on Friday, July 24. I wanted to get a feel how everything would go timewise. It seemed to work out well. I oriented the girls on what they were going to do most days and the things that they could do independently. They worked on reading, history workbook, language arts, and sometimes math while I worked with Calvin.
Calvin and I just finished reading the Boxcar Children, or as he called it "The Box Kids". I had never read the book and really enjoyed reading it to him. It was one of his favorite things to do besides his "fish book" which is his language arts. He told his daddy that he liked school and loved his new teacher. I'm not sure how long that will last but for now I'm eating it up.
The girls read a couple of books by themselves: "Pedro's Journal" about a boy about Columbus' ship, and "Om-Kas-Toe" about a Blackfeet boy before they had horses. They liked both of these books well enough. I read "Walk the World's Rim" to the girls as our read aloud. I thought it was slow starting but ended up getting hooked on the adventures of Esteban as he traveled with de Vaca. The girls, however, found it very dry and long. I wish that the core had started with something a little more interesting so that we would have a better start. We are just beginning "The Witch of Blackbird Pond" which, I'm told, is an awesome book.
My only thoughts right now, curriculum wise, are with the science and language arts. While I really love the LA workbook, I wish that the girls had more writing to do. I may try and find some journal starters or something. I do, however, LOVE Becky's cursive book. She is copying sentences that relate to works of art. Her book is absolutely gorgeous. Science has been pretty good and Calvin did love the experiments so I hope it will end up being fun. We just haven't got the hang of it yet.
Our second week was pretty good except two of the three kids got sick and it hit me on the weekend, too. Luckily, it was just a 24 hour thing and they (we) were able to catch back up. We even finished "Walk the World's Rim" and were thrilled. Later while doing her history workbook Rachel realized that Esteban was a real person. Although, I told her that when we read the story it just sank in her brain at that moment. Maybe even though it wasn't her favorite book she still learned something.
So far the kids are enjoying homeschool. Becky likes it because it is shorter and she can take snack breaks. Well actually, I think we all enjoy the shorter process. Rachel likes being a little more in control of her studies. She has been waking up early and getting started right away. I have been finding that it isn't as hard as I thought it would be. Sonlight makes the core so easy to do by laying out a daily schedule. I've made similar spreadsheets for math, language arts, and science so I know exactly what I'm doing everyday. The whole year is already planned! We have learned so much already. We've read 4 books, studied 5 different Native American tribes, discovered new lands with Spanish explorers, learned about scientific classification of animals, and reviewed math. Not bad for 2 weeks! I can't wait to see what happens next!
Monday, July 20, 2009
Organizing Calendars
If you are like me you are juggling lots of activities and numerous calendars. I came across an idea from microsoft for creating a backdoor bulletin board for handling all the calendars.
I use the side of my fridge so the area was smaller and it didn't quite work like I had hoped. I did find these pockets at Lillian Vernon. They are a good size and will hold a standard size file folder vertically. You get two in a pack and they are on sale! It's a great deal and has helped me keep some of my clutter down.
I use the side of my fridge so the area was smaller and it didn't quite work like I had hoped. I did find these pockets at Lillian Vernon. They are a good size and will hold a standard size file folder vertically. You get two in a pack and they are on sale! It's a great deal and has helped me keep some of my clutter down.
Monday, July 13, 2009
Getting Ready
Since I've been studying homeschool curriculum for the past year, I've amassed quite a collection of information. No one can accuse me of not doing my research. Bad spelling, maybe, but I am a research-aholic.
Some of my favorite catalogs that I've enjoyed:
Sonlight-obviously for it's awesome books
Winter Promise-gorgeous catalog, nice curriculum, was a serious contender for us
Veritas Press-just has some nice books/supplies
Love to Learn-again just some great books
My favorite curriculum guide:
100 Top Picks for Homeschool Curriculum by Cathy Duffy
This was, and is, indispensable to me. I like the website as well. You can get some good feedback from people who have tried different things but you can also find much that just doesn't apply to you.
A couple of my favorite websites for supplements:
http://www.currclick.com/index.php
http://www.roadstoeverywhere.com/sonlight3.htm
I'm tryi
ng to get everything organized and ready to go. If you are like me you are juggling lots of activities and numerous calendars. I came across an idea from Microsoft for creating a backdoor bulletin board for handling all the calendars. I never really used the templates before but I ended up making one for monthly dinners, one for grocery list, and one for a school calendar.
I have been getting my front room prepared. We have always called it a reading room. It is really a formal dining room but I just will never use anything like that so it has been a sitting room with a book shelf.
This area houses our curriculum for the year. All the Sonlight books, math, language arts, science, etc. I covered a bulletin board with fabric and added our daily/weekly general schedules. The presidents are from a $1
place mat from Wal-mart. A great buy! I also got US and World maps. These are awesome because they are covered in plastic and so can be written with white board markers and erased. Easier to carry around than Sonlight's markable map and markers.
A friend gave me the cart which I thought was perfect to hold all our basic supplies: pens, pencils, crayons, scissors, tape, etc.
A small garage sale table holds our music and CD player inside. I also pulled some movies from our collection which I think supplement our learning.
On top we have our maps and globe.
The painting above is one of my father-in-law.
The shelf to the left of the couch holds all of our art and science supplies.
Our bookshelf hold what else, books! Yes, I know, clever, right? Basically, it shelves all our supplemental or just plain fun books, puzzles, and a few games. The bins on the left house math manipulatives. I'm not sure how much I'm going to use them, but I am prepared. The crates on the right hold stuff for lap books (if we ever do them) plus all kinds of paper, cardstock, and stickers.
So, we are all set to go. Some of you know we have actually already started. I will let you know how our adventure is going soon.
This was, and is, indispensable to me. I like the website as well. You can get some good feedback from people who have tried different things but you can also find much that just doesn't apply to you.
A couple of my favorite websites for supplements:
http://www.currclick.com/index.php
http://www.roadstoeverywhere.com/sonlight3.htm
I'm tryi
ng to get everything organized and ready to go. If you are like me you are juggling lots of activities and numerous calendars. I came across an idea from Microsoft for creating a backdoor bulletin board for handling all the calendars. I never really used the templates before but I ended up making one for monthly dinners, one for grocery list, and one for a school calendar.I have been getting my front room prepared. We have always called it a reading room. It is really a formal dining room but I just will never use anything like that so it has been a sitting room with a book shelf.
This area houses our curriculum for the year. All the Sonlight books, math, language arts, science, etc. I covered a bulletin board with fabric and added our daily/weekly general schedules. The presidents are from a $1
place mat from Wal-mart. A great buy! I also got US and World maps. These are awesome because they are covered in plastic and so can be written with white board markers and erased. Easier to carry around than Sonlight's markable map and markers.A friend gave me the cart which I thought was perfect to hold all our basic supplies: pens, pencils, crayons, scissors, tape, etc.
A small garage sale table holds our music and CD player inside. I also pulled some movies from our collection which I think supplement our learning.On top we have our maps and globe.
The painting above is one of my father-in-law.
The shelf to the left of the couch holds all of our art and science supplies.
Our bookshelf hold what else, books! Yes, I know, clever, right? Basically, it shelves all our supplemental or just plain fun books, puzzles, and a few games. The bins on the left house math manipulatives. I'm not sure how much I'm going to use them, but I am prepared. The crates on the right hold stuff for lap books (if we ever do them) plus all kinds of paper, cardstock, and stickers.
So, we are all set to go. Some of you know we have actually already started. I will let you know how our adventure is going soon.
Wednesday, May 13, 2009
Ready, set, go!
Hello to friends and family!
I've been struggling with the decision to homeschool for about 6 years when my oldest started kindergarten. Although I thought it was a nice idea it just wasn't for us at the time. R has an outgoing personality and really needed to make some friends. Plus, I had just given birth to C-man and needed some rest:)
Fast forward to 2008...B had a stressful year in first grade and came home crying quite often. After much praying we decided to go ahead and let R and B go to school one final year and I would explore homeschooling in that year. I have researched, and read, a plethora of material before deciding on Sonlight. It just so happens to also be the curriculum that both my sister and friend use. Go figure! I guess I should have trusted them in the first place:) So many curricula caught my eye but I kept coming back to Sonlight. I love their literature rich program.
I have finally decided on the following (click on the links to find out more):
I've been struggling with the decision to homeschool for about 6 years when my oldest started kindergarten. Although I thought it was a nice idea it just wasn't for us at the time. R has an outgoing personality and really needed to make some friends. Plus, I had just given birth to C-man and needed some rest:)
Fast forward to 2008...B had a stressful year in first grade and came home crying quite often. After much praying we decided to go ahead and let R and B go to school one final year and I would explore homeschooling in that year. I have researched, and read, a plethora of material before deciding on Sonlight. It just so happens to also be the curriculum that both my sister and friend use. Go figure! I guess I should have trusted them in the first place:) So many curricula caught my eye but I kept coming back to Sonlight. I love their literature rich program.
I have finally decided on the following (click on the links to find out more):
- History/Geography/Literature/Bible for the girls--Sonlight Core 3+4, American History
- History/Geography/Literature/Bible for C-man--Sonlight's Kindergarten Core
- Language Arts from Sandi Queen's Language Lessons
- Math for C-man and B--Horizons
- Math for R--Teaching Textbooks
- Science for everyone--Apologia Zoology
I guess I should say "we" chose the curriculum. But, frankly, Hubby listened to everything I said and trusted me with the decision.
I should probably say a little about the socialization thing as this is a concern of most people. I admit it is a concern of ours, too. After experiencing public school for a number of years I can say that there is very little socialization in school. It is a lot of being quiet and listening. The bulk of socialization comes after school and those things won't change. The girls are very active in Girl Scouts and C-man has soccer. I also plan on joining a local homeschool group in order take advantage of their activities.
Please pray for us as we embark on our new adventure together!
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