Curriculum

So, when I get excited about something I tend to obsess about it.  I apologize to all my family who I'm sure are sick and tired of hearing about my homeschool curriculum choices, but I finally placed my final order on Friday and I think Jovi, Corbin and I are going to have a really fun school year.  I've got some really great stuff and just for those of you who might be considering homeschooling, or preschooling your kids I thought I'd share what we are planning on using.

For my main curriculum I am using a unit study called Five In A Row .  The idea is that you read the same classic storybook five days in a row focusing on a specific subject every day; Social Studies, Language Arts, Art, Science and Applied Math.  Every time you reread the book the kids get a review of what they learned the previous days.  As soon as I heard about this curriculum I knew it would be perfect for me and Jovi.  I wanted something literature based and she doesn't like reading more than a few books a day.  She is much more a doing girl than a listening girl.  There are a lot of literature based programs out there, but most require several books and/or pieces of books to be read each day.  I like this plan much better for our family.  There is also a Before Five In A Row for 2-4 year olds, a lot less focused on academics and more on making memories that I plan on using with Corbin so he can have his own "school" time with mommy.  I also found a wonderful FREE site full of ladies who love this curriculum and put together their own book unit studies and lots of resources for the Five In A Row books as well, called Homeschoolshare (really neat FREE stuff).

We will be using Horizons Math K for Jovi's math program.  I really like the scope and sequence, the hands on approach and the colorful, appealing workbook.

I chose Handwriting Without Tears for her handwriting program.  I previously wrote about my personal handwriting issues and decided that I just couldn't teach her D'Nealian.  This program is supposed to be very developmentally appropriate and has lots of ways for children to avoid letter and number reversals (something Jovi struggles with)

Although science is covered with Five In A Row, I want Jovi to have a very strong science background and found the awesomest book Building Foundations of Scientific Understanding: A Science Curriculum for K-2 .  Instead of giving an overview of science, touching on a topic here and then one there like most elementary science books do, Dr. Nebel takes a foundations approach having each lesson build upon previous ones so that children can see how all science is related. And you can't beat the price anywhere, $23 for 3 years of GOOD science lessons that teach the scientific method. I'm very impressed with what I've read in this books so far.

I agonized over the decision on how to teach Jovi to read, really, just ask Juan.  Reading and a love of reading is THE most important thing I feel you can teach anyone because with that skill you can begin to learn just about anything else, so I wanted to make the right choice.  I searched high and low and read tons of reviews.  I made a decision and then second guessed myself, but I finally choose the very reasonably priced and very classic phonics approach used in Phonics Pathways: Clear Steps to Easy Reading and Perfect Spelling.  It looks like a truly solid program, it is priced right and it includes several game ideas (something I know Jovi will enjoy).

For scripture study, I bought A Real Mom's Guide to Homeschooling with The Book of Mormon.  It actually gives more information and activities than I plan on using. But it has all the things I was looking for; a weekly scripture verse to memorize (shortened for younger children), a children's song and a hymn to learn/sing, gospel art to go with the stories, and a family home evening lesson that goes with the weekly reading. Most of this is just a reference to other church publications, but it is SO helpful to have it already planned out. We should end up reading the Book of Mormon (Stories version) in 36 weeks.

I also have a manners curriculum that I plan on doing twice a week. 

We will (hopefully) be starting school on August 16th.  I hope you guys found something you could possibly use and I will blog about how all of it is working for us as we go along.  Now to read all the teacher manuals and plan our days (am I weird that the thought of planning everything out makes me happy?).

Nocturnal Adventures

A few nights ago we had put the kids to bed and I was downstairs.  I thought Juan was upstairs so when I heard the laundry washer turn on upstairs.  I thought it was Juan putting a load of laundry in.  Fortunately, Juan went to investigate.  Apparently Corbin had once again gotten up (the first time).  This time it was because he was wet and wanted to change his diaper.  He took his pjs and his diaper off and I guess he felt his clothes were dirty and in need of washing because he took them to the laundry room, climbed up and turned the washing machine on (I had NO idea that he could even do that.) and put his clothes in.  Then he started putting other clothes in and a toy as well.  That is when Juan found him.  Corbin has always loved helping with laundry.  He loves carrying dirty clothes in there and having me lift him up so he can put them in,  but this was taking it to a whole new level.  Now one of us stays upstairs after we put the kids to bed till Corbin falls asleep.

Jovi lost her second tooth this past weekend.  It had been loose for a week before, but not ready to come out.  On the 4th of July it popped out .  Jovi was so proud she told everyone she saw.  She got a whole dollar bill from the tooth fairy.

Calendar Time

I found out the importance of teaching calendar time when I was teaching in a special ed. classroom.  My mentor told me it was the best way to cover multiple IEPs (individual education plans) in a short amount of time and she was right.  With the right calendar time, you cover lots of math, some science and social studies and can even introduce new vocabulary.  It like higher level circle time.  Anyway, I thought I'd walk you through what we do for our calendar time.

First of all, Jovi is almost always the "handy dandy helper" (a title she got from apple creek preschool).  Occasionally I get to be the handy dandy helper and she is the teacher telling me what to do, just for variety.  The first thing we do is sing our months of the year song.  (Oh, jovi was a super, cowboy, cop?  in the pictures)



Next she finds what day it is and moves the daily marker to that date. and we work on saying the date in the right order.


Then we sing the days of the week song and fill out our today is..., tomorrow will be..., yesterday was... chart.


Next we graph the weather and I ask her a few graph reading questions.


After that we play hundred chart games. There are SO many things you can do with a hundred chart. Jovi is working on number recognition above 20 so we play find the number, I give her a number and she has to point to it on the chart. She loves skip counting by ten. I will probably add skip counting by 5s and then 2s in the next few months. Occasionally I have her count all the way to 100. She also practices counting backwards using the board. Once I teach her addition and subtraction using a number line she can do that on a hundreds chart too.



I've already added talking about place value, by using something like this
We use the day of the month so we never get into the hundreds, but I might change how we do that in the future.

Other things I may add in the future are talking about odd and even using the day of the month and introducing daily/weekly vocabulary. I'll be putting up some wall maps in the future and I might add some geography as part of our calendar time, too. I might introduce some word families during calendar time once Jovi is ready for that.  Really, calendar time can be involved and as long as you and your child want. We have fun with our calendar time right now.

Preschool, homeschool, kindergarten, whatever

Jovi and I have been doing "school" at home for a month now.  We've both gotten into it and been having lots of fun.  I was planning on doing a preschool, specifically a pre-k program, in the fall.  But I only had one person who was even interested and as I worked with Jovi I realized that a slow moving, kindergarten level program would be more appropriate for her.  I emailed the person who had expressed interest and told her that I was increasing the level of the program, but they were welcome to join us.

I feel like this is a blessing in disguise.  If Jovi had been only two weeks older she would almost certainly be going into public school Kindergarten.  Since she cannot go to public school yet I get a chance to try out homeschooling with very little risk and a great opportunity for rewards.  I have been interested in homeschooling ever since Jovi was born.  I toyed with the idea, read books and curriculum catalogs, but never felt sure that homeschooling was the choice I should make...till now.  If Jovi and I love this year we will continue.  If she learned a lot, but for any reason we feel like she would do better in public school I can test her into first grade.  If this year just doesn't go well for us or she isn't learning much she can start kindergarten next year just like she is supposed to according to the state.  I feel like I have so many options at the end of the year, that this year has no pressure and can be nothing but positive.

I've been having lots of fun looking for curriculum, but that deserves a post all its own.  Instead, I will share how our upstairs living area has changed.  Everyone, kids and adults, love the new space and use it way more than we used to.












Next time a post about calendar time...

Bailey's Berry Patch

On Tuesday we went to Bailey's Berry Patch.  It is a pick your own blueberry farm.  I had been planning this trip for a month and had to reschedule two times, so even though it was totally overcast and occasionally sprinkling , after a call to them making sure it wasn't muddy, I decide that we were going to go no matter what.  I had read Blueberries for Sal (Viking Kestrel picture books) to the kids several times in the previous week and they were super excited too.  It was an hour drive, and the kids did really well in the car. When we got there they each got their own little pails and we went out to pick some blueberries.


Corbin loved hiding under the blueberry bushes.


As Jovi and I were picking blueberries, Corbin was exploring the stump of an old blueberry bush when we heard him yelling about baby birds. We went to investigate and this is what we found.

There were two brand new baby birds and one unhatched egg. It was so cool. I took some pictures and the we walked far away so that Corbin couldn't touch them, something he desperately wanted to do.

We went and visited the the catfish pond instead and while we were there we were told that there was a free hayride available.



For part of the hayride they took us back down to the catfish pond and let us buy food to feed the catfish. There were some big catfish in that pond and a turtle too.




Then we had some lunch and went back to picking blueberries. Jovi decided to try some of the blueberries in her bucket.


Corbin, on the other hand loved the blueberries. One of his favorite things to do was grab big handfuls of blueberries from my bucket and stuff them in his mouth.


Jovi also enjoyed feeding Corbin blueberries.


And they took the occasional break together.


With Corbin eating large amounts of my berries, it was hard to get a full bucket, but I feel we got enough.


It was such a fun trip. I'm sure we will be going back next year.

Children are funny

Juan and I put the kids to bed and were downstairs when we heard the noise of something falling upstairs.  Juan went up to see what the noise was.  What he found... well, I just have to shake my head and laugh.  Corbin had pulled the box that holds the play doctor kit from the shelf in the upstairs playroom and that was the crash we heard.  Apparently, Corbin had scratched a scab off on his leg while he was in bed and it had started bleeding.  He got out of bed and tried to "clean" the ouchie hurt.  This meant that he took off his shorts and diaper and used every diaper wipe in our 1/3 full box of wipes to try and make it stop.  Why did he have to take off his shorts and diaper?  I don't know.  Then when that wasn't working he decided to try using the doctor's kit in the living room. 

Juan called me up there and I took over "doctoring" Corbin while he cleaned up the room.  I was working on getting the band aid and antibiotic ointment and Corbin was supposed to be sitting in a chair when I heard him in Jovi's room.  "Look Jovi, ouchie hurt." , as he showed off his leg.  Jovi looked down, "Oh, you poor baby." (said with real sympathy).  I came and got Corbin out of Jovi's room, put a diaper and the band aid on him and put him into bed.  I told him he couldn't get out of bed anymore.

Fifteen minutes later I heard noises upstairs.  I went upstairs and checked in Corbin's room.  The closet (that is used for storage and is normally blocked by a child sized couch) door was open.  I looked inside and found Corbin sitting on a shelf four feet off the ground, once again without a diaper.  I went and got Juan and Laura because I had to share.  I wish I had gotten a picture.  I put him back to bed again and was sterner in telling him he couldn't get out of his bed.  I caught him just about to get off one more time, but then he fell asleep.  Crazy night, crazy kids.