Homeschool Memoirs #2

THEME
This week’s theme is about sharing your 2008-09 homeschool agendas and plans. You’ve been preparing your plans for sometime and you’re ready to go. Or you’re still in the planning-stage and need some inspiration or tips on what to use. Because many use different curriculum and methods there is always something new to be gleaned from other homeschoolers. So this week I hope you will share what you’re doing this year for your homeschool agenda. Share the different curriculum you’re using. You can also include what age/grade you’re using it for, how long you’ve been using it, and why you like it.

Okay, I actually have the curriculum we are using posted on the right sidebar of my blog. And this is a post I have been looking forward to because I am really excited about the curricula that I have chosen for our school year....but I wish I hadn't of waited until the last minute to post this before tomorrow's assignment. Ahhhh!!!!

Okay, let me start with Anthony. He is in the 7th grade and all of his books are at that level. Let me add that we have not started bible yet. We will not start until October.

• Learning Language Arts Through Literature (green book)- This is our first year using this program and so far it has been great. I have heard good and bad about it, mainly the bad being that it's not quite enough grammar and spelling to be a complete literature unit. Anthony likes that the lesson's are explained thoroughly to him and are short. I will more than likely supplement his spelling with Bob Jones because LLATL's spelling list's aren't long or hard enough for him

• History- Bob Jones Heritage Studies. This is actually a 6th grade book. I got Anthony's Bob Jone's stuff so far into the year last year, he had been doing one history and we switched to Bob Jone's when someone gave it to us. I didn't want to just waste the last chapter's and start 7th grade. Especially since we are starting this year learning about China. But we will also be using Bob Jone's for 7th grade history too.

• Math- Bob Jones 7th grade math. Love the way Bob Jone's explains math to the student. I am horrible in math and they make it so wasy to teach. I plan on using Bob Jone's for math all the way through high school too.

• Writing- Writing Strands 3- I love love love this book. Anthony hates writing and avoids it at all costs. He doesn't mind doing the assignments in this book. The author makes it fun for the kid's and I will continue the Writing Strands series all the way through high school.

• Science- We are doing Life Science through this science teacher that created it for homeschool students. It is simple, easy and only 3 days long every week. Click on the link on my sidebar to check it out. Oh yeah, the best part...it's free. Completely and totally. Next year we are doing the Earth Science he has created and that is $50.

• Art- How to Teach Art to Children. We have not started Art just yet, but this is the book I will be using for all 3 kid's. It teaches the basic's of lines, color's, shapes and then moves on to techniques.

Now I was going to do Language Art's different for each girl. Emma is in 1st grade and Sara in Kindergarten. But Sara has done very well so far keeping up with Emma and her 1st grade Language Arts, so both girl's are pretty much doing the same thing. The exception is math. They have their own grade level math books.

• History- Evan-Moor History Pockets: Ancient Civilizations. We are only doing history twice a week so I picked the History Pockets to be our guide. We are reading library books and supplementing with lapbooks. I love Evan-Moor products and the history pockets give a lot of good information and the crafts are fun.
• Here is an example of how we are using it...the first people we are studying are the Ancient Egyptians. One of the activities in the history pocket is a trip down the Nile. You pretend to be a crocodile going down the Nile and checking out the different ways the Egyptians used it. So we are branching off a little and doing a lapbook about crocodile's.

• Geography- I'm still fine tuning that. We are using Evan-Moor's Beginning Geography as a guide and we will be studying a different country every month. For now we are learning basic directions and how to read a map and globe. Next month the country studies will pick up with Greece (or is it Rome?)

• Science- Again, Evan-Moor books as guides. We do science two days a week and right now we are studying weather. We are in the middle of doing a really cool lapbook for the book "Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs". I will post pics when we are done. Next month we are learning about our bodies and how to take care of them.

• Math- we are actually using workbooks from Walmart right now. We are catching up on basics and then we will move onto harder books. I haven't decided which ones yet.

• Phonics- Explode the Code books. These are mainly for Sara. Emma breezes right through the lesson. I love them. They really do a good job making it fun to learn the letter sounds.

• Learning Language Arts Through Literature (blue book)- This is perfect for the girl's. The lesson's are short and they are really retaining the information they are learning. There are several book studies (12 or 13 of them), but the set comes with a ton of beginning reader books. The point of the curriculum is to teach reading with some grammar and spelling thrown in. It really is one of those open and go books and I like that.

• Lapbooks- Okay this isn't really a subject, but I am more excited about our lapbooks this year than anything else. Not only are we using them to branch off of history, but we are using them in science and language arts as well. If I can find a lapbook for it, we are doing it!! I am also trying to do them according to what we are doing for field trips. This month we are going apple picking, so I have chosen to do a lapbook on the book The Apple Pie Tree. I just really love lapbook's because you really get to go more in-depth on a subject that is presented in a fun and exciting way. Check out Homeschool Share for tons of lapbook templates!

Here is a basic rundown of our plans for the year.

September
History- Ancient Egypt
Science- weather
Geography- maps & globe
Lapbooks- Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs, 123 to the zoo, The Apple Pie Tree, Honey Bees

October
History- Ancient Greece
Science- My Body
Geography- Greece
Lapbooks- My body, Food Pyarmid/Food Groups

November
History- Ancient Rome
Science- the Earth
Geography- Italy
Lapbooks- Goody O' Grumpity

December
History- no history
Science- water
Geography- no geography
Lapbooks- water cycle

January
History- Ancient China
Science- animal habitats
Geography- China
Lapbooks- China, House for Hermit Crab

February
History- Aztecs
Science- animals
Geography- Mexico
Lapbooks- not sure yet

March
History- Explorers
Science- plants
Geography- Spain
Lapbooks- explorer's, Munch Muncha Muncha

April
History- Life in teh Plymouth Colony
Science- life cycles, butterflies, ladybug's
Geography- Germany
Lapbooks- Grouchy Ladybug

May
History- Colonial America
Science- Exploring Space
Geography- France
Lapbooks- Twinkle Twinkle Little Star