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2015-2016 Curriculum Choices
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We started our first week of the 2015-2016 school year this week. I posted our curricula choices here….
http://reflectionsfromdrywoodcreek.blogspot.com/2015/08/back-to-school-2015-2016-curriculum.html
I love Tristan’s week end posts, but would also like to see the big picture. Does anyone else care to share either their curriculum for the year or current term?
Thanks,
MelissaOoo, I would love to do that! (I miss blogging a wee bit…. having places to share these homeschool chats…. which is why I love starting posts on this forum!) I’ll come back and share mine later, I need to get a few things done here at home first.
Here is our curricula line-up:
History: SCM Middle Ages guide
Geography: Visits to Europe, The Geography Book
Science: SCM’s Learning About Birds guide
Scheduled living science books (for the year): Bird Watchers & Bird Feeders, Trees & Shrubs (Arabella Buckley), Woods Walk, Chipmunks on the Doorstep, The Sandman: His Ship Stories
Math: MUS for oldest 3 DC, SCM Mathematics ideas for my K’er
Language Arts: ELTL (3 different levels), Spelling Wisdom (in place of ELTL’s dictation passages), Print to Cursive Proverbs (in place of ELTL copywork passages), regular copywork once they finish their cursive books
Bible: Penny Gardner’s Bible readings, Hymns, SCM Scripture Memory
Paper Sloyd: Handbook for Primary Grades
Lessons in Experimental and Practical Geometry
Picture Study, Literature & Poetry as included in ELTL
Composer: Handel for term 1
Foreign Language: Rosetta Stone Spanish, Memoria Press Latin
My K/1st grader (DD turns 6 in October) has some different materials: McGuffey Readers, Starfall readers & workbook, R&S preschool books, & Wee Folk Art’s Simple Seasons program. She does these as my older DC are doing LA or math. The Wee Folk Art books and activities are usually done in the afternoon. We do her reading lessons while the other DC are reading their ELTL literature book or independent history books.
–I think that’s everything (but I’m probably missing something)! I don’t have much planned for handicrafts at the moment…we’ll probably just work on projects as we think of them!
I like hearing what everyone else is using for their curriculum. We are taking a year off from the SCM History guides and doing an “Around the World Tour” of geography with books and some activities of my own making.
Composer: Chopin and Grieg for this term
Artist: Renoir and Grandma Moses
Poetry: We will memorize the poem High Flight and read select poems for Morning Time.
Hymn Study: I picked three hymns from Christian Worship, our church hymnal to learn also.
Character Building: Character Building For Families and the Young Peacemaker.
Math: My oldest (7th gr) and youngest (2nd gr) are using Christian Light Education. My oldest asked to go back to it after we switched to Teaching Textbooks about a year and a half ago. She has trouble with math, it doesn’t come as easy for her, and she thinks CLE will help her more than TT. My other two (5th and 6th gr) are still using TT.
Grammar: the 5th grader is using Jr. Analytical Grammar and my 6th and 7th grader will be starting Analytical Grammar next week.
English for the THoughtful Child for my 2nd grader and a few lessons with Writing With Ease also.
Science is AIG mammals for all.
I have Write With the Best for the oldest three.
They all wanted to try learning German this year so for now I am finding some free lessons online to use until I can purchase something.
My 5th and 6th grader will be doing Catechism with us and my 7th grader will be starting once a week lessons with our Pastor.
Music: 5th grader just started violin lessons. 7th grader will continue with piano and 2nd grader is starting piano this year (I teach them) and our 6th grader will be starting lessons on guitar with help from my sister.
And starting next week we will meet with a local homeschool co-op for some park days for 8 weeks. Handicrafts we will do as I find something fun to do AND they don’t know it yet but they will be helping me sew blocks for a four patch quilt that I have been trying to get done for years. 🙂
Family:
Finishing Early Modern and going into Modern history. Loosely using SCM guide with a few other books thrown in.
Geography: United States. Pulled together a bunch of stuff.
Language Arts loop: I have several resources we’ll be working through to hit grammar, spelling, and copywork.
Morning time: scripture memorization, a religion book, a magazine from our church, and a few other short things.
Read-alouds: Benjamin West and His Gat Grimalkin (doubling as artist study), The Wizard of Oz, Laddie, Wind in the Willows
No Tea Tea Time – this is when we’ll do composer, artist, poetry, and fairy tale (one per day). Squilt Volume 1 with added resources. Music of the Hemispheres, Poetry for Young Children, selections from Favorite Poems Old and New, and the entire Song of Hiawatha because they want to. We’re slowly reading through the Andrew Lang collection for Fairy Tales. For Artist study we’re starting with Benjamin West and I’m not sure who else we want to study yet.
Friday – Logic (finishing Thinking Toolbox then Fallacy Detective). Shakespeare (Twelfth Night, As You Like It, and we haven’t voted on the 3rd one). Nature study. Art lesson. Groups or family hike.
9th graders:
the new chemistry book by Dr. Wile + living books/videos
Literary Lessons from Lord of the Rings
finishing Cover Story and moving into Power in Your Hands
one is taking Spanish (mom taught) and the other Japanese (Landry Academy)
they each have one elective at Landry – mythology and Photoshop
Teaching Textbooks
6th grader:
Teaching Textbooks
Jump In (starting in January)
typing and cursive writing (HWOT)
4th grader:
Teaching Textbooks
All About Spelling (finish Level 1 and move to L2)
Spelling You See (finish Jake and Jill and maybe do the next level)
Typing and cursive (HWOT)
4th and 6th together with mom:
Chemistry – a selection of living books with AIG, Real Science 4 Kids, and Apologia thrown in
Spanish (Getting Started with Spanish and Duolingo, then Cherrydale Press)
Life of Fred
Read-alouds: Marvelous Land of the Snergs, James Herriot’s Treasury, My Father’s Dragon, Story of Dr. Dolittle. And then who knows!
It’s so interesting to read about what everyone is using. Thanks to everyone for sharing!
I have a 6yo daughter who is starting her first year of structured schoolwork. I also have two daughters who have graduated (21yo is married, 16yo graduated this summer) and with whom I did not use CM methods, though I have always had a CM philosophy overall. So my goal is to work more with CM methodology and not chicken out! Hee hee. So thankful for SCM.
Bible: various vintage Bible story books
Reading: Phonics Pathways
Penmanship: Delightful Handwriting/Print to Cursive Proverbs if we need it
Math: SCM Living Math and Miquon
Music: Listen to the Birds (wonderful book and CD), Story of the Orchestra, constant listening of lots of musical variety (around here, music is a life)
Art: Artistic Pursuits K-3 book 1
Poetry: included in other subjects, plus Poetry for Young People series (probably RL Stevenson for first term)
Science/Nature: Outdoor Secrets, nature walks and journal, aquarium membership and ocean visits, lots of living books
Literature: Lots of read-alouds (we’re voracious about this)
PE: Neighborhood walks, park visits, gymnastics lessons
History: interest-led, some American through living books about Thanksgiving, etc.Lots of field trips and possible involvement in American Heritage Girls group
I love seeing what everyone else is using! 🙂
We are about to finish our first term of the year. Here’s what we have planned for our second term:
Continuing with Math U See Pre Algebra
SCM’s picture portfolio for Turner
We will be learning about Chopin for our composer study.
Easy Grammar Plus
Written Narrations2-3 times a week for composition.
We choose our hymn studies as we go along and continue with each hymn until we have all the verses memorized. I’ve been tying our hymn study in with whichever hymn dd is learning to play on the piano. Right now we are working on Standing On the Promises of God.
SCM’s scripture memory system.
A Midsummer Night’s Dream from Lamb’s Tales from Shakespeare
We will be using the Truthquest guide to the Renaissance and Reformation for history. I am really looking forward to using Truthquest again. 🙂
We will continue with The Fallacy Detective for logic and Whatever Happened to Penny Candy for Economics.
I haven’t chosen my daughter’s literature selection yet. She is required to read from a classic for 25 minutes each day.
I am reading 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea for our read aloud. I will also choose a book from our history studies to read aloud. I try to read a chapter each per day from a classic and a book that goes along with our history studies.
Duolingo for Spanish
A free online typing program. I can’t remember the name off the top of my head.
SCM’s Romans Bible Study
My daughter is still reading through Penny Gardner’s Bible reading schedule.
We will also be continuing with Apologia’s General Science.
Our themes for poetry study right now are historical poems and nature-focused poems.
Dd will continue with piano lessons and daily practice.
We will also begin a weekly Bible study on the book of Ephesians with some friends of ours.
SCM’s Visits to Europe for geography.
The Story of Painting by Jansen for art history.
Simply Spelling for copywork, dictation and spelling exercises.
We will be doing lots of nature study this Fall and Winter. I am so looking forward to the cooler weather and plan on heading to some local nature parks as much as possible while the weather is nice.
I keep trying to copy and paste mine in and it won’t go. Sorry ladies, no time to type it all out for me!
I love to hear all the different ways people do CM. It is so neat.
Family: (8 yr old girl with 4 yr old girl joining in)
Scripture Memory using ABCs for Godly Girls.
Character/Bible: focusing right now on Honesty using Children’s Book of Virtues, Child’s Book of Character Building (I think that’s what it’s called), and Bible stories and verses. My 8 year old was reading through Mark using Allinonehomeschool’s bible reading plan, but sometimes we take a break from that and focus on other scripture or something more specific as needed.
Science/Nature Study: Finishing up Outdoor Secrets, about to start Burgess Bird Book and have them either color in the bird or draw their own while listening to the story and looking at the book illustration or photo of the bird. We’re still gardening too here, so lots of nature study opportunity there as well. When I have the baby next month, I’ll just let 8 year old read Christian Liberty Nature Readers independently or whatever she wants. She loves to read and she’ll probably read to her sister too.
History: This will probably be more with the 8 year old. We’re planning on starting SCM’s early modern in a of couple weeks once I get some books in. Of course we’ll take a break when baby #4 comes, maybe read Pedro’s Journal as a read aloud for history and literature.
Literature: Some read alouds I have in mind are more of the Narnia books (which I was getting tired of after reading aloud the first 3 in a row, but my daughter loves them), Heidi, Mr. Popper’s Penguins, so many other options… I’m going to try librivox with some because I get tired of reading aloud sometimes especially with reading picture books with the little ones as well, and just talking in general (I’m not one who can talk a lot, lol, but I can type apparently)
Picture Study: Audubon to kind of go along with the Science.
Handicrafts: I like sewing and needlepoint and embroidery and my daughter has enjoyed doing that. Probably do more of that in the winter though she is working on a needlepoint with me right now. I have a bead loom from when I was a kid, and I’ll probably show her how to do that too. My dad is a painter and sometimes he’ll do watercolors with them.
Music/Hymns: no set schedule. We listen to hymns sometimes in the morning and we’ll use them as copywork sometimes. My husband is an audiophile so he plays jazz, classical, electronic, even the good Disney songs with them.
8 year old:
CLE math
spelling wisdom with ULW
print to cursive proverbs
12 year old:
MUS Pre-Algebra
R&S English
English from the Roots Up
Beautiful Feet Early American and World History with Book of Centuries and narration in addition to selected assignments from guide.
Tiner’s Exploring Planet Earth and Exploring the World of Physics with related videos and biographies. Also, It Couldn’t Just Happen.
Africa map drills and drawing
Fallacy Detective
Duolingo French, waiting to find another resource
Long list of literature to be read independently.
Homemade writing class using CM, TWTM and Write On!
Family studies with morning basket materials (listed in morning basket thread)
Piano, flute (band) and ballet
10 year old:
CLE math
R&S English
Written narrations and occasional lesson from Write On!
Dictation Day by Day for spelling.
Ancient history using Child’s History of the World, What in the World CD, Draw and Write through History and related literature.
Life science with living books: Galen, Exploring the History of Medicine….and others to be determined.
Emily Dickinson poetry study.
Africa map drills.
Literature list being planned.
Piano, trumpet, soccer
AWANA
family studies as listed for 12 year old.
7 year old:
CLE Math
R&S Spelling for phonics review
R&S English (orally)
Pentime handwriting
SOTW 1 audio cd
Family studies, lots of books
Homeschool music class, soccer
AWANA
5 year old:
Abeka phonics
Abeka math
Pentime handwriting
Lots of books!
Homeschool music class
AWANA
I might have missed something, but this is getting long! 🙂 (yet our days have been pretty short and pleasant with this line-up)
I’ll share! I bet it will look like a jumbled mess for anyone besides me, but I always like to read what other people are choosing. My kids are 13, 9, 7, and 6.
Core: Classically Catholic Memory (this is our weekly co-op that I started three years ago. We are starting Delta Year with this program)
Religion: Asides from weekly scripture memory, we are continuing to read The Bible Tells Me So. In addition, I have a few books for First Communion Prep for my 7YO. My oldest is doing his Ad Alteri Dei emblem with Boy Scouts.
Math: Teaching Textbooks for the older two, Math Mammoth for the younger two. Also, my 13YO will be doing Dave Ramsey’s Foundations in Personal Finance. We use http://www.xtramath.com for math drills.
History (Modern Times): We are using Notgrass’ America the Beautiful for American, and SCM’s Stories of the Nations for World. Also, we’ll listen to Story of the World on audio. I used the list from SCM to build a booklist of living books to round out our history studies.
Geography: We’re reading Halliburton’s Book of Marvels, one chapter each week. After we read the book we are marking our map with clear dots. (We’re using the clear dots for history, too).
Language Arts: The younger three are doing English Lessons Through Literature (levels 1 and 3), which has accompanying literature reading. The younger two are also using Explode the Code for phonics/reading. We have a literature series going both in morning readings (Charlotte’s Web) and at bedtime (Little Britches series). The older two are both doing Phonetic Zoo and they’ll both do IEW at our co-op.
Science/Nature: We are using Sassafras Anatomy this year, filling in with living books from the library. I’m going to try to build in lots of hands-on activities, too. Very fun. We’ll also finish up SCM’s Pond and Stream Companion, which we started in the spring.
Foreign Language: my oldest is taking a college-level American Sign Language class this fall, and he’s enrolled in Latin II with an online charter school. He completed Latin I last spring and wanted to continue.
Other: Squilt Music Appreciation for composer, Favorite Poems Old and New for poetry, a Shakespeare play in the spring (still deciding), and music lessons (piano for the younger two, the older two are still deciding)
I tried to think about the easiest way to share ours and so I’m going to cover group things first, then smaller groups, then individuals. I think. So for those who don’t know, my kids are 9th, 5th, 4th, 2nd, 1st, PreK4, PreK3, Toddler, with baby #9 due in 8 weeks or less.
Whole family:
Morning basket includes picture study (Edmund Dulac right now), composer study (The Story of the Orchestra book/cd right now), poet study (Emily Dickenson now), hymns (we learn a new one when we finish and old one, so always changing), scripture memory (learn a new one every week or two), reading Hans Christian Anderson’s Fairy Tales to go with Dulac’s illustrations, one article from a magazine (religious and aimed at kids or teens).
1 chapter of our family read aloud (currently Peter Pan).
History Revealed: Ancient Civilizations and the Bible. We are halfway through this because we used it during the summer. We’ll be combining modules 5 (Babylon and Assyria) and 6 (Medes and Persians) into a shorter time because we want to spend a lot more time in module 7 (ancient Greece).
Art is done both as a group and individually according to interests.
Also, everyone age 6 or up narrates in various subjects daily. 4th, 5th, and 9th grader also do written narrations according to age.
PE is varied. We’re going to caverns Monday (hiking), play various indoor and outdoor games, etc.
Everyone but the 9th grader:
God’s Design for Science – we’re using the green life science books this year with lots of library books to flesh it out. Currently in The World of Plants.
Individual subjects that remain by child:
1st grader:
All About Reading level 1 (over halfway done) and then level 2. Math U See Alpha. Copywork and calendar work daily.
2nd grader:
Gifted reader so he’s working from a literature list instead of needing reading lessons (taught himself to read chapter books at age 3.5, has finished multiple series already, the goal this year is to broaden his genre choice). Currently reading The Boxcar Children for a mystery genre. Math U See Beta (almost finished) and moving into Gamma (multiplication) in a few weeks. Brave Writer projects. Copywork daily and calendar work.
4th grader:
Reading from a literature list, currently the first Nancy Drew for mystery genre. Learning cursive so daily copywork. Brave Writer projects. Doing Math U See Epsilon (fractions) with 5th grader. Will pick Spelling Wisdom back up after cursive is grasped.
5th grader:
Reading from a literature list, currently the first Hardy Boys for mystery. Learning cursive do daily copywork. Brave Writer Projects. Doing MUS Epsilon with 4th grader (he’s on target for typical math schedule, 4th grader is ahead. They’ve just always worked together in math.) Will pick Spelling Wisdom back up after cursive is grasped.
9th grader:
Reading and socratic discussion from a literature list, currently reading The Body in the Library by Agatha Christie for mystery genre. Math U See Algebra 1. One Year Adventure Novel. Spelling Wisdom. Apologia Biology. Will take Graphic Art from Landry Academy, already completed Mythology from Landry Academy. Taking and Old Testament class with other teens at 6am each school morning all year (Seminary).
I probably missed something in there, but that’s the big picture!
It is fun to see all the ways families implement a CM education. I posted our list on my blog. 2015-2016 Curriculum Choices
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