It has been a while since I have written a homeschooling post. We basically took the whole month of December off. What I mean by that is while we didn’t do any actual “book” work, we did more of a living learning during the month. The kids helped me clean and decorate for Christmas. They helped me bake all kinds of goodies. We had dad home a lot, so we had a lot of quality time with him. We also got a lot of snow for the month of December. We took learning outside with sledding and building snowmen. We also learned about the different types of snow and what works best with making snowballs and snowmen. We also learned that fluffy snow is not good to sled in!
January has been very similar, as in we have had a lot of snow. However, we have also added back in the school books. We have had some changes to curriculum than what we started with back in August. I think they changes have been for the best too. The kids actually look forward to school now.
My oldest daughter is now using Teaching Textbooks in math. She now looks forward to doing math, which is truly a blessing. Before hand, it was always a struggle. For History, English and Bible, she is still using America the Beautiful by the Notgrass Family. For science, she is using the General Science by Apologia. I am adding a Spelling curriculum call SpellQuizzer for her. I will be doing a review and a giveaway with it in a few weeks. My daughter also takes musical theater and dance lessons. They are currently rehearsing for their Alice in Wonderland musical. She was very excited to have gotten the part of the Cheshire Cat. The dance recital will take place in May. Sarah is also involved in 4-H and is currently the secretary of the club. I also can’t for get that she attends every youth class that our church has. I am so proud of how much she loves to go to church to learn about Jesus and sing of His love. As you can tell, she is very busy!
My youngest two children are 5 and 6. I am using the History and Science part of Sonlight Core K for them. However, we aren’t following their instructions, we are just reading the books on our own that they have suggested and doing our own experiments and projects. I was originally going to use Saxon Phonics, but we just could not get a good flow out of it. I found a Spectrum Phonics book that I am using with them. I also have been using a Spectrum workbook for math. Then when I need extra worksheets for reinforcements, I use www.homeschoolmath.net/worksheets, www.superkids.com/aweb/tools/math, www.mathfactcafe.com, themathworksheetsite.com. We use the handwriting worksheets from www.learningpage.com as well. They also love the themed units that Learning Pages offer. They have read about the ocean, space, insects, reptiles and amphibians. They enjoy reading as many books as they can get their hands on. We love to sit down on the couch together and read before bedtime. They are just soaking up as much information as they can.
My oldest son is 18 and will be graduating high school this year. He will also be graduating with his A.S. degree in Electrical Engineering Technology from the local Community College. He has been taking dual enrollment classes for a couple of years now and has enjoyed it a lot. Once he graduates he plans to go on to a university to finish up his Bachelors degree. He will also be just a few classes shy of having his A.A. degree as well. Michael is very active in our church praise and worship band with his dad. He has been involved with the Civil Air Patrol unit. Michael also has a part time job at a local fast food place as well. His dad and I are very proud of what he has accomplished the last few years. Michael is an awesome big brother and will take time to do things with the younger kids.
It has definitely been a busy year for us, but one that I would not change for anything. We just take each day as it comes and ask God to bless us as we teach our children every day.
I am going to do my best to update more often of our projects that we do in our homeschooling journey. I am also going to do my best to highlight different websites that assist me in homeschooling the kids. I just know we are going to have an awesome year!
