New Homeschool Year
here are our curricula purchases for the upcoming school year (which we start on May 1st, don't ask), by category:
Math:
Foerster's Algebra I (Student book and Solutions Manual)
Math Without Borders (video lessons) to accompany Algebra I
Westcott Metal Compass (I have no idea if Primo will need a compass this year, but he could have used one a few weeks ago while doing 'test prep' for his CAT-E, so I'm picking one up. It's $1.25, not a big deal if we don't need it this school year)
Singapore 1A/1B workbooks (for Snorzy in four years, I'm worried they will stop selling these before he gets around to starting math)
(nothing for Radish, I jumped the gun last year buying 5th grade Singapore, which we didn't need until this coming May. I also have Life of Fred Fractions, and Decimals & Percents ready for him, if he wants to start those this year)
Science:
Tarbuck Earth Science (college textbook, it looks intimidating but everyone in the online reviews I read swore this was the best thing to use for middle school/high school level Earth Science, we'll see)
Prentice Hall Science Explorer Earth Science
Earth Science Success: 50 Lesson Plans for grades 6-9 (for labwork etc to go with above)
Investigating Rocks: The Rock Cycle (from the Do It Yourself series, supposedly good hands-on experiments and activities that kids can do with little to no adult help)
Detective Science: 40 Crime Case Activities
History:
History Odyssey Modern Times (Level 1)
History Odyssey Modern Times (Level 2)- I'm so excited about having both boys use this curriculum this year, each at an appropriate level! I still haven't gotten around to writing a whole blog post about how much I love this history curriculum, but I will one of these days.
English:
Daily Grams Jr/Sr High (sad that this is the last in the series! these have been so great for my guys, they never mind doing them, it's a nice little bit of work to get them going in the morning, and their basic writing skills have grown so much since they each started doing these)
Daybook of Critical Reading and Writing, Grade 6
Daybook of Critical Reading and Writing, Grade 9
Reading Comprehension Book 4, plus Teacher Key
More Reading Comprehension Level 2, plus Teacher Key- I'm nervous and unsure about these four (above) pieces, I haven't made the guys do much in the way of reading or even writing instruction for the past few years and I don't know if they're going to be overwhelmed, or enjoy a little challenge in these areas. My thinking is that it's time (for Primo, anyway) to go back to having 'English' as a subject, aside from the reading and writing he does in science and history. In the past few years I've been acting as if he has 'tested out' of English by reading above his grade level and testing high on the CAT E at the end of each year, in both reading and writing. Now I'm starting to think in terms of transcripts and college entrance requirements, he's going to need English and I'm too lazy to want to tease out what he's doing organically and write it up.
Comedy of Errors (No Fear Shakespeare)- a young friend showed this book to me the other day, and since that young friend and her brother are going to be in a production of this play in the summer which we will certainly want to attend, I thought my guys should become familiar with the story. I love the format of these 'No Fear Shakespeare' books, wish I had had them when I first tried to read these plays!
Getting Started With Latin- I lump Latin in with English for our purposes. We finished Minimus Secundus a while ago, and I didn't know where to go next with this. I want to continue to expose them to some Latin, it can't hurt anything, but I don't want to spend a lot of time or energy on it either.
Practical Arts:
Start it Up: a Complete Teen Business Guide for Turning Your Passions Into Pay
Better Than a Lemonade Stand!: Small Business Ideas for Kids
Growing Money: A Complete Investing Guide for Kids
Let's Cut Paper (for Snorzy, to practice cutting)
Betty Crocker's Cookbook For Boys and Girls
Health:
Healthy Eating: Diet and Nutrition (another of those DIY books like the one I bought for science, this one sounds more like 'health ed' to me so I'm putting it in its own category)
Pandemic! Board Game (maybe this one is a bit of a stretch, but I usually throw in a new board game with our huge curricula buy, and tell myself it has educational value. That's how Settlers of Catan came into our lives, a few years ago)
Physical Education:
Cozy Coupe (Snorzy)
Mashoonga! Warrior Pair (we're calling these 'whack-y sticks', and I hope they'll encourage a certain Primo to want to go outside to play a bit more often)
Showing posts with label History Odyssey. Show all posts
Showing posts with label History Odyssey. Show all posts
Monday, April 20, 2015
Thursday, August 14, 2014
The Merciful Edit
Well, we've been back to lessons for almost two weeks now, and it feels like we never stopped. The boys and I fell right back into our groove, and I have to keep reminding myself that no one else we know is in the midst of their school year. I actually assigned the boys watching CNN student news on our first day, and we were all briefly confused when the newest video on the website was from early June. Then, "Oh, yeah-! There's no student news when all the students are on summer break!" I hope we'll remember to pick back up on that resource when the 'school year' begins for everyone else. Although Sweet Hubby is a bit of a news hound, I tend not to follow current events very closely (too cynical, I don't believe much of anything that's reported), and as a consequence my boys are growing up a bit ignorant of the world around them.
I guess I still have to get around to writing a post about History Odyssey and why I love it so much. I'll add to that my newfound affection for Microscope Adventure!, a unit study on the use and history of the microscope (this is going to comprise much of Radish's science curriculum for 4th grade, and Primo will do it along with his Holt Life Science textbook, to round things out for his 7th grade science). What's on my mind today, though, is a tiny moment in our homeschool related to History Odyssey, and the quality of mercy.
A window into my methods as a homeschooling mama: when Primo was small, I used to write out his lessons daily, the night before. After a year or two of this, I realized that I found it stressful to have to do this each day, and I sometimes had a hard time making the work over the course of the week add up to a satisfying whole. At some point, I came around to a better way-- I sit down every Sunday and write out lessons for the week, in a little yellow notebook:
I make a section on the page for each day, and divide that into 'Radish', 'Both', and 'Primo'. Then I list their work, using the textbooks and curricula that they're working from, and figuring out which lesson they need to work next, and also trying to make my best guesses about how much work they can reasonably complete in one day. That's where the finesse comes in. It's not unusual for me to under-plan, and have both boys turn up 'finished' after just an hour or two of work. This is especially frustrating at those times when we've had a bunch of days in a row in which we have had to spend a lot of time out of the house, and then we finally have a good, solid day 'in'. If the boys finish all their assigned work for the day, they get understandably salty when I say, "Huh, it looks like I didn't give you enough work. Let's look in the yellow notebook and have you do some lessons listed under tomorrow."
So, sometimes I go too far the other way and load up my planning book with lessons, to make sure they'll have enough to do. I was starting to do that this past Sunday, I had actually written in my planning book three separate History Odyssey lessons for Primo (we do three days of history each week), when I happened to look closely at the lessons I was assigning. I noticed that the second one was pretty involved, and included a particular piece (a Record of War or Conflict) that Primo has had a hard time with in the past. I thought about it for a moment, considering leaving things the way they were, and just letting him stretch things out during the week if he really needed to. I even called him over to the table and pointed out to him that I was giving him a lot of history work, but that we could cut it down later. He just said, "Ok," and wandered off to go back to whatever he had been doing. Then, I chose mercy. On him, and on myself-- I crossed that third history lesson out. Drew a pen line right through it. And breathed. Nothing broken, just a little extra space in our week.
This is one of the things I continually struggle with in homeschooling my boys. With my tiny class of one seventh grader, one fourth grader, it can be hard to figure out exactly how much each boy is capable of doing. I have no basis of comparison, I just have to make it up as I go along, and pay attention to each boy to see if he is bored or stressed by the amount and level of work that I give him. It can be really difficult to see, though, because neither boy will complain about too much work, nor will they ever ask for more challenge in their lessons. I used to think that at some point I would notice that the boys needed more, and we would start grade skipping and then they might even outgrow homeschooling early and move on to college work. Instead, I think that we adjust as we go along, so what I call '4th grade' might not look like '4th grade' level work in school.
I just read a somewhat ridiculous book called The Brainy Bunch, a memoir written by a homeschooling mom and dad who have sent each of their children to college at around the age of 11 or 12. They have 10 kids, and I can empathize a little with wanting to hurry the older ones out of the nest, with so many coming up behind. What struck me, though, was that these weren't really success stories, nor did it sound like these were kids who needed more of a challenge. Instead, the parents had embarked upon a program of rushing their average IQ kids through boxed curricula, and then having them take college entrance exams and start community college when they had reached some minimum level of competence. One of the oldest daughters had always wanted to be a doctor, but after graduating college at the age of 17 or so, was unable to pass her MCATs to get into medical school. Instead she ended up pursuing a D.O. degree, and entering the navy as a medical trainee. Her parents were pleased and proud as could be, but I was left wondering, "what if?" What if she had been allowed to stay home through her high school years, pursuing biology and doing some kind of medical internship or job? What if she had entered college, maybe even a four year college, at 17 or 18 and graduated with other kids her own age? Might she have done better on her MCATs, been able to go to medical school the way she wanted? How do these kids feel, knowing that their parents expect them to be 'done' with homeschooling at the age when their peers are in middle school?
I was glad this book came to my attention now, as my oldest is just beginning what I think of as the 'transcript years', when he's old enough to conceivably do things that might be interesting or high-level enough to show up on a transcript for college entrance. Reading what these parents had done, and the results, gave me a push in the other direction. I don't need my guys to enter college early in order to give my homeschooling legitimacy. They can take their time and be 'ordinary', I can refuse to step on the crazy train of college expectations that so often is a part of modern parenting. I want to help my kids find opportunities to do neat things, especially the kinds of things they wouldn't have the time for if they were in school and bogged down with homework. But the last thing I need them to be, for my sake, is impressive.
I guess I still have to get around to writing a post about History Odyssey and why I love it so much. I'll add to that my newfound affection for Microscope Adventure!, a unit study on the use and history of the microscope (this is going to comprise much of Radish's science curriculum for 4th grade, and Primo will do it along with his Holt Life Science textbook, to round things out for his 7th grade science). What's on my mind today, though, is a tiny moment in our homeschool related to History Odyssey, and the quality of mercy.
A window into my methods as a homeschooling mama: when Primo was small, I used to write out his lessons daily, the night before. After a year or two of this, I realized that I found it stressful to have to do this each day, and I sometimes had a hard time making the work over the course of the week add up to a satisfying whole. At some point, I came around to a better way-- I sit down every Sunday and write out lessons for the week, in a little yellow notebook:
I make a section on the page for each day, and divide that into 'Radish', 'Both', and 'Primo'. Then I list their work, using the textbooks and curricula that they're working from, and figuring out which lesson they need to work next, and also trying to make my best guesses about how much work they can reasonably complete in one day. That's where the finesse comes in. It's not unusual for me to under-plan, and have both boys turn up 'finished' after just an hour or two of work. This is especially frustrating at those times when we've had a bunch of days in a row in which we have had to spend a lot of time out of the house, and then we finally have a good, solid day 'in'. If the boys finish all their assigned work for the day, they get understandably salty when I say, "Huh, it looks like I didn't give you enough work. Let's look in the yellow notebook and have you do some lessons listed under tomorrow."
So, sometimes I go too far the other way and load up my planning book with lessons, to make sure they'll have enough to do. I was starting to do that this past Sunday, I had actually written in my planning book three separate History Odyssey lessons for Primo (we do three days of history each week), when I happened to look closely at the lessons I was assigning. I noticed that the second one was pretty involved, and included a particular piece (a Record of War or Conflict) that Primo has had a hard time with in the past. I thought about it for a moment, considering leaving things the way they were, and just letting him stretch things out during the week if he really needed to. I even called him over to the table and pointed out to him that I was giving him a lot of history work, but that we could cut it down later. He just said, "Ok," and wandered off to go back to whatever he had been doing. Then, I chose mercy. On him, and on myself-- I crossed that third history lesson out. Drew a pen line right through it. And breathed. Nothing broken, just a little extra space in our week.
This is one of the things I continually struggle with in homeschooling my boys. With my tiny class of one seventh grader, one fourth grader, it can be hard to figure out exactly how much each boy is capable of doing. I have no basis of comparison, I just have to make it up as I go along, and pay attention to each boy to see if he is bored or stressed by the amount and level of work that I give him. It can be really difficult to see, though, because neither boy will complain about too much work, nor will they ever ask for more challenge in their lessons. I used to think that at some point I would notice that the boys needed more, and we would start grade skipping and then they might even outgrow homeschooling early and move on to college work. Instead, I think that we adjust as we go along, so what I call '4th grade' might not look like '4th grade' level work in school.
I just read a somewhat ridiculous book called The Brainy Bunch, a memoir written by a homeschooling mom and dad who have sent each of their children to college at around the age of 11 or 12. They have 10 kids, and I can empathize a little with wanting to hurry the older ones out of the nest, with so many coming up behind. What struck me, though, was that these weren't really success stories, nor did it sound like these were kids who needed more of a challenge. Instead, the parents had embarked upon a program of rushing their average IQ kids through boxed curricula, and then having them take college entrance exams and start community college when they had reached some minimum level of competence. One of the oldest daughters had always wanted to be a doctor, but after graduating college at the age of 17 or so, was unable to pass her MCATs to get into medical school. Instead she ended up pursuing a D.O. degree, and entering the navy as a medical trainee. Her parents were pleased and proud as could be, but I was left wondering, "what if?" What if she had been allowed to stay home through her high school years, pursuing biology and doing some kind of medical internship or job? What if she had entered college, maybe even a four year college, at 17 or 18 and graduated with other kids her own age? Might she have done better on her MCATs, been able to go to medical school the way she wanted? How do these kids feel, knowing that their parents expect them to be 'done' with homeschooling at the age when their peers are in middle school?
I was glad this book came to my attention now, as my oldest is just beginning what I think of as the 'transcript years', when he's old enough to conceivably do things that might be interesting or high-level enough to show up on a transcript for college entrance. Reading what these parents had done, and the results, gave me a push in the other direction. I don't need my guys to enter college early in order to give my homeschooling legitimacy. They can take their time and be 'ordinary', I can refuse to step on the crazy train of college expectations that so often is a part of modern parenting. I want to help my kids find opportunities to do neat things, especially the kinds of things they wouldn't have the time for if they were in school and bogged down with homework. But the last thing I need them to be, for my sake, is impressive.
Tuesday, July 22, 2014
Rooting
Our month off from lessons is half over. When I mentioned that fact to the boys yesterday they groaned but I'm looking forward to getting back to it soon. Due to our weird homeschooling year, they've already completed one 10-week 'quarter', before we took our July break. I have yet to do my paperwork for the coming year, but that's par for the course-- I always send it in sometime in August. I don't know why I'm so looking forward to going back to lessons-- because we started back in May, there is nothing new to the work they'll be doing. For now, I'm happy with all the materials we're using (and beyond happy with History Odyssey, but that's a separate blog entry, or will be soon). Next year I'm going to look into Discovery K-12, a free online comprehensive curriculum that I just heard about from Ariel, homeschooling mama extraordinaire.
Homeschooling and staying home with babies is like living on a glacier. Everything is slow, out of step with the rest of the world and their hurry, but at the same time there is constant change and we never return to where we were before. It's funny to look at my last post from a month ago and see that I was concerned with not giving Snorzy enough enrichment on a daily basis unless I planned for it. The weeks between then and now have been a kind of a renaissance for him, his language has grown exponentially and he's gotten more clear and firm in his will too-- I could never go a day without reading to him now, when he brings his favorite "boo" to me over & over throughout the day (the favorites evolve every few days, he isn't loyal to one the way Primo was to Dinosaur's Binkit or Radish to both The Pudgy Where is Your Nose? Book and Quack Quack by Claire Henley). I can't make it through a day without taking him " 'side" either-- he insists on being taken out on the front porch or into the backyard many times each day, aside from any outings we might go on in the car to shop or swim or whatever the day holds.
I drove myself crazy for a week at the beginning of the month, the way I do periodically-- I get too much time on my hands and end up somehow thinking that I can single-handedly solve the whole 'work-life balance' thing that has plagued mothers since the dawn of time. I nearly convinced myself that it made sense to spend an enormous amount of time and money taking a graduate class that would throw the whole family's schedule into chaos twice a week for the fall semester, and then lead nowhere (it is the only evening class available in that department, so I wouldn't have been able to follow up with any more classes in that field without quitting homeschooling). Out of the blue, one evening, inspiration hit and by the next day I was over at a local community college, jumping through hoops to register to take an (inexpensive, conveniently placed in the week) night class in writing fiction this fall. I literally had not written a word of fiction since I was ten years old (a poignant, one-page tale about a bunny, if I remember correctly), so this is scary good fun to look forward to. In preparation, I've been working through a free online mini course from Open University's OpenLearn portal, called Start Writing Fiction.
I've been spending more time on GoodReads this month than on any other social media, and getting almost depressed by the exposure to all the things that I don't have time to read. My appetite for books, like my appetite for sweets, makes me feel like life is too short. If I did nothing each day but read novels and eat cake & cookies, there still wouldn't be time to consume everything that I want. What's the answer to this? Is it to have a taste of something exquisite each day, and try not to think about all the rest?
Homeschooling and staying home with babies is like living on a glacier. Everything is slow, out of step with the rest of the world and their hurry, but at the same time there is constant change and we never return to where we were before. It's funny to look at my last post from a month ago and see that I was concerned with not giving Snorzy enough enrichment on a daily basis unless I planned for it. The weeks between then and now have been a kind of a renaissance for him, his language has grown exponentially and he's gotten more clear and firm in his will too-- I could never go a day without reading to him now, when he brings his favorite "boo" to me over & over throughout the day (the favorites evolve every few days, he isn't loyal to one the way Primo was to Dinosaur's Binkit or Radish to both The Pudgy Where is Your Nose? Book and Quack Quack by Claire Henley). I can't make it through a day without taking him " 'side" either-- he insists on being taken out on the front porch or into the backyard many times each day, aside from any outings we might go on in the car to shop or swim or whatever the day holds.
I drove myself crazy for a week at the beginning of the month, the way I do periodically-- I get too much time on my hands and end up somehow thinking that I can single-handedly solve the whole 'work-life balance' thing that has plagued mothers since the dawn of time. I nearly convinced myself that it made sense to spend an enormous amount of time and money taking a graduate class that would throw the whole family's schedule into chaos twice a week for the fall semester, and then lead nowhere (it is the only evening class available in that department, so I wouldn't have been able to follow up with any more classes in that field without quitting homeschooling). Out of the blue, one evening, inspiration hit and by the next day I was over at a local community college, jumping through hoops to register to take an (inexpensive, conveniently placed in the week) night class in writing fiction this fall. I literally had not written a word of fiction since I was ten years old (a poignant, one-page tale about a bunny, if I remember correctly), so this is scary good fun to look forward to. In preparation, I've been working through a free online mini course from Open University's OpenLearn portal, called Start Writing Fiction.
I've been spending more time on GoodReads this month than on any other social media, and getting almost depressed by the exposure to all the things that I don't have time to read. My appetite for books, like my appetite for sweets, makes me feel like life is too short. If I did nothing each day but read novels and eat cake & cookies, there still wouldn't be time to consume everything that I want. What's the answer to this? Is it to have a taste of something exquisite each day, and try not to think about all the rest?
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