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Have you started your new year? How is it going?
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Ready to chat? Share if you’ve started back to school (or if you’re busy planning right now) and how things are going!
We’re in week 3 of the school year and so far it is going pretty well. Each child is settling into the routine, though the high schooler is still trying to figure out how to fit things a bit. My head has yet to explode with the teaching of so many different levels – though the Algebra 2 is really pushing it to the edge. Ha!
We are really enjoying our book club title – Tuesdays at the Castle. If you ask the kids each one has their own favorite subject right now.
One thing we’ve not gotten rolling yet is a consistent ‘morning basket’ which we won’t be doing in the morning so I need a different name for it. I think we have nearly gotten the daily routine in place so now I just need to look for where it will naturally fit.
We are in week 2 of our school year. So far things are going well, although we havent added in all our subjects. We add in history tomorrow and science next week. This week we have been studying the eclipse in anticipation of Mondays big event, then we start regular science.
We have changed a lot this year and so far I think it is all good. We switched from My Fathers World to nearly all SCM recommendations. Hopefully I am doing things right, my 3rd grader is finished with independent work in less than 30 minutes right now…
I also decided to use Life of Fred exclusively with all three kids which is quite different. My 8th grader had a bit of a tizzy with his whopping 4 problems this morning (he really hates math). But he is doing surprisingly well with the critical thinking book I got him (hoping this will spill over into math). His oral narrations have also surprised me, normally I get a lot of “I dont remember”and “that guy”. So far this year I am getting some more enthusiastic responses, still not what I would like, but grateful for the improvement. This year he asked to read Lord of the Rings, but after starting it he requested it on Audible. This will be our first experience with his literature on audio. I figured the 8th grade Middle Ages history reads are challenging enough that he can listen to his lit selection.
My 6th grader has changed her “free read” 3 times already. She started with On the Banks of Plum Creek, decided she wasnt into it (sadly since I love Little House) and wanted animal stories. We scoured our shelves to no avail, she picked 21 Ballons instead. Decided she wasnt into that either so I let her peruse the Animal Lovers list in Honey for a Childs Heart. She chose Call of the Wild, which I ordered. In the meantime she decided to read Old Yeller. Sheesh, picky girl.
Tristan we call it Family Time rather than morning basket.
We are 5 days into our new year……which started Aug. 1! 🤔 When we’re not doing school, we’ve been freezing corn and canning tomatoes, so that’s schoolish. Needless to say, our days haven’t found the routine yet, so we’re just going to limp along until food preservation season is over.
Some things that ARE working for us: I put the little things we used to do as part of our “Together Time” on their checklists. So flashcards are on their own now. (Math, music, and roots)
We were never able to get a Record of Time (or Book of Centuries) to happen, so this year, that’s an individual thing on their checklists. And, so far, 2 of the 4 girls have actually done it.
Bible memory I also moved to on their own, but I might move that back to a family activity…..But it’s really sweet to hear them practicing their verses with each other.
We have finished day 28 of our school year. It has been, without a doubt, the best beginning we’ve ever had to a school year. I have a 10 yo, 8 yo, and 6 yo. Our increased success is due to purchasing, watching, and implementing SCM’s Learning and Living DVDs.
The kids (and myself) have been putting a lot of time and effort into developing good habits. The 8 yo (almost 9) even requested to just do a morning meeting like his big sis and then not have me sit with him for any of his independent subjects. I wasn’t very hopeful,but I told him we’d give it a trial run. It has worked out great! He has given a better effort at all his work. Apparently my boy hates for me to hover😉
Thanks to the SCM L&L dvds, every time I start to stress over whether I have THE best book or THE best curriculum, I remind myself the magic is in the method not in one particular sequence of books. Whenever I start stressing that my younger two aren’t progressing at the same rate as my older, I remind myself that I am here to teach THE CHILD not teach a curriculum.
I’m not saying we are perfect, but this year is such an improvement and has been truly enjoyable. I highly recommend the Learning and Living DVDs and am so grateful for all the work done by the SCM team.
We have finished day 28 of our school year. It has been, without a doubt, the best beginning we’ve ever had to a school year. I have a 10 yo, 8 yo, and 6 yo. Our increased success is due to purchasing, watching, and implementing SCM’s Learning and Living DVDs.
The kids (and myself) have been putting a lot of time and effort into developing good habits. The 8 yo (almost 9) even requested to just do a morning meeting like his big sis and then not have me sit with him for any of his independent subjects. I wasn’t very hopeful,but I told him we’d give it a trial run. It has worked out great! He has given a better effort at all his work. Apparently my boy hates for me to hover😉
Thanks to the SCM L&L dvds, every time I start to stress over whether I have THE best book or THE best curriculum, I remind myself the magic is in the method not in one particular sequence of books. Whenever I start stressing that my younger two aren’t progressing at the same rate as my older, I remind myself that I am here to teach THE CHILD not teach a curriculum.
I’m not saying we are perfect, but this year is such an improvement and has been truly enjoyable. I highly recommend the Learning and Living DVDs and am so grateful for all the work done by the SCM team.
Crystal,
You mentioned leaving MFW. I have been wondering wanting to speak with someone who can compare scm and mfw. Would you be willing? If so my email is foreternity3 at gmail dot com
Thanks
We’re easing into things. I have 12, 10, 2 and newborn 5wks. We resumed a lit read aloud Bible and verses a few weeks ago. This week pulled out all the books and sorted them, put Ind studies into a box for each, threw together a few busy bags. Had an accidental first day by just doing the next thing. I started off doing things together because of bad attitudes, kids being restless. By the end of the morning we were enjoying one another again. That’s a God thing right there. A few days of doing things 20-30 min at a time thru the day is about all I can manage at this point. I figured out I have a few windows of time that may work: breakfast, late morning, tea time and a bedtime read aloud. Planning to cycle thru subjects for each chunk of time.
We started this past week. So 1 week in. This is our first year with Charlotte Mason Method and we are using SCM Guides and also a little of the resources from Ambleside. I may have over scheduled a bit, but I am learning as well. I spent hours and hours in July putting together our school year. I started with a paper planner from Amazon, then went to a Pages document that I created, then saw the on-line scheduler at SCM and thought it may save me lots of time, so I signed up for it, hoping it would be worth the cost. I found myself flipping between 3-4 schedulers, costing me time. The SCM on-line scheduler has had some glitches this week, we lost all our math… : ( I spent hours trying to recover / re-scheudle that in the system. Only to find it would not save.
Stress is what I have experience this week. I have 2 kids 10 (almost 11) and a 9 y/o. They have enjoyed some of the stories, but narration is a challenge. We are all on a learning curve here. I am trying to give myself a lot of grace, as well as the kids. I have to teach myself not to teach the program and not to stress over not checking things off the list. By the end of the week we were a little more adjusted to being back in school and a routine of sorts. I had to rearrange the schedule and it now seems to have a little better flow. 2 things I have learned, The 15 minute / 20 minute lessons do not work for me. I can read a story in 15 min but narration will take another 15- 20 min. I think this is ok for now till we all learn and get adjusted. Also Math and Lang Arts … 45 min is better for us. It usually takes 10-15 min to just get in the flow. 45 min allows for a good 30 min lesson. We may get better as we go, but for now this works. We definitely are not done by noon. We do work till about 1:30 or 2:00 then we spend the rest of the afternoon doing P.E. and getting outside. It is a work in progress. I think the kids and I will love it once we get the hang of it all.
Yesterday was our first official day of school. It was hectic! My son just purchased his first home and moved out last week while the rest of us were on vacation. We had a great time-went to Kennedy Space Center where my daughter was able to meet an astronaut which she was over the moon about! 😀 We also went to Saint Augustine, which is the oldest city in the U.S. so lots of history there.
We came home and my daughter was in a big hurry to paint her brother’s old room so that she could move in so we spent all weekend doing that and moved her in yesterday. Then we ended up with two dr. appointments and an orthodontist appointment this week! It’s not exactly the calm, organized beginning to our homeschool year that I had envisioned. 🙂
We were able to get some math, science, literature, and history done so that is a start at least! I am looking forward to things calming down next week so we can settle into a routine with some breathing room.
It’s so good to hear how all of you are doing! We will all have to check in regularly to share how things continue to go throughout the year.
Blessings,
Melanie
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