Homeschooling Changes

So, after hours and days of planning before buying last spring, here I sit. You know what I did? I changed it....a lot of it.

On a whim, I decided to purchaseTapestry of Grace Year 4. Even though it was a late night, weary, spur of the moment purchase, it was a good one. I'm a bit more settled now. I've even started using my Homeschool Tracker again this year. Now for 36 hours of uninterrupted time to finish planning and typing and printing and copying...oh, wait, that won't happen. Well, as I squeeze in an hour here and and hour there, hopefully it will get together. It is moving up on the priority list, to be sure. I have the college purchases done. I have the auto purchase done. I spent all day yesterday pulling weeds, picking produce, and watering plants (yes, then we were the happy recipients of four inches of rain last night....it always works that way!) Now if I can knock out the home interior and the processing of garden items, the homeschool planning will again be priority #1 on the to do list.

The TOG Year 4 is all recent history. I had hoped to go through most of it over the summer (when will I learn????) and start ancient history this fall, but now I will take all this year to go over history from the turn of the century to now. That is exciting to me. I looove that time in history. And, next year's core is already purchased.....so, it's not really a waste. (Whew!)

Now to figure out Homeschool Tracker....not sure about it just yet.

Manhunt

On our recent trip to South Carolina, I tucked into my bag an audio book, Manhunt: The 12 Day Chase for Lincoln's Killer. I had actually purchased it for my dad for Father's Day last year for a trip he was taking. He knew the kids and I were studying the Civil War in homeschool and brought it so we could listen.

It is very long, 9 hours, to be exact. I'm glad I saved it for a long drive. We listened to about half of it going, and everyone was excited to pop it back in to hear the rest on the return trip.

It is a riveting account of the events surrounding the assassination of President Lincoln, and the events that followed. It is all very factual, and based on extensive research by the author, but presented in the fashion of the best sort of page-turner. The characters literally come to life as the author explores their motives, backgrounds, and personalities. Richard Thomas is a fabulous storyteller, so the excitement is maintained in the telling. There are a few spots that are a bit gory, so use care before listening with small children.

I highly recommend the book. It is exciting, and in the process, I learned much about an event on which I already felt relatively well-versed.

Done. Whew!

The quest for next year's curriculum is over. I'm not sure that I did it all the best way, but if I didn't, it wasn't because I didn't obsess over it all enough. However, I've pulled the proverbial trigger, and it is all on order, and on its way.

First, we evaluated foundational curriculum. The spine of it all, if you will. I looked at Tapestry of Grace, Sonlight, and Veritas Press. I am convinced I could not have gone wrong with any of them. They are all wonderful and thorough curriculums. We settled on Sonlight for a few reasons. First of all, unlike Veritas Press, our times/needs were in sync. We will be ready to begin world history over again, starting with the ancients. I would have been able to do that if I jumped Nathan up a year, but I wasn't sure if it would work with Annie. Tapestry allows you to do any of it any time, which is wonderful. I seriously contemplated using Tapestry. I made lists of the books used for each curriculum and compared them. I really like a lot of the features of Tapestry, and one of my best friends uses it and it works well for her. The bottom line, however, is that I'm familiar with Sonlight and how it works. I've gathered that Tapestry is a bit more work and because I don't have children widely spaced in age, I'm not sure it is necessary. So, in all, comfortable won, and I ordered Core 6 from Sonlight. Because Nathan is a quick and avid reader, I looked at "The Well-Trained Mind" by Susan Wise Bauer and compared it to Tapestry of Grace books and ordered a few more books to supplement Sonlight's books. I found some used and was able to get them for just a bit more than a song.

After several years of grammar trials, last year we tried Rod and Staff and we loved it. It is absolutely wonderful and I'll thank Staci for a very long time for recommending it to us. So, Annie will use the 5th grade one from this year, and I ordered a 6th grade grammar set for Nathan. This will be supplemented by Sonlight's LA program.

For science, I read board after board, review after review, and narrowed it down to four programs: Science 4 Kids, Rainbow Science, Apologia, and Noeo. Then, because I felt they need a really general, all encompassing program at this point, I was able to select two of those: Rainbow and Apologia. We looked at them and evaluated them. I asked Nathan what he thought and his answer was to get the one with the most experiments. Ha! I would like to finish it this year, so we ordered Apologia General Science from Sonlight. It is 7th grade, but I think it is completely doable for them.

On to math....ugh! Annie was easy...she will do what Nathan did this year, Horizons 5 via Sonlight. Done. Nathan, however, is another story. I looked and looked and AGONIZED over it. I talked Clay's ear off, poor guy, until his eyes glazed over and I think he was about to run away. Nathan is pre-algebra/algebra, depending on the program. Chalk Dust is an amazing program, but a bit pricy. Not knowing how taxes would turn out, I was not sure about the cost, and not confident I could put it together well enough from used sources. I evaluated Teaching Textbooks, which looks great, but their Algebra I was essentially the same as some of the others' PreAlgebra. That's fine as long as I know what I've got, but I'm not sure where that leaves me later on. I'd like to stick with the same curriculum for awhile to prevent concepts from slipping through the cracks. So, I ended up ordering Life of Fred Decimals and Beginning Algebra, and also Jacobs Algebra, which I was able to procure from Amazon at a fantastic used price. Jacobs is recommended for 7th grade in Veritas Press, therefore, I'm thinking I'm going to be thrilled. He wasn't too keen on having a video instructor (I've still got him thinking I can do it....yikes!) so that pretty much settled the decision.

Now, orders have been placed with Life of Fred, Amazon, Sonlight, and Rod and Staff, and I'm ready to focus on wrapping up the current year.

Oh, My Heart Be Still.....

They're coming!!!!! According to Luke Holzmann, and he should know, the Sonlight catalogs are in the mail. It seems when I am just about to the end of my homeschool rope, all the new catalogs come and hope springs eternal.

Lovin' this Homeschooler

Thank goodness I was never sent to school; it would have rubbed off some of the originality.

--Beatrix Potter





Thank goodness, indeed.

The Homeschool Song

This is good entertainment today.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=obUHm1RxVJ8

Hat tip to Amy for the link. Check out her story about getting along with her neighbors for another belly laugh.