Saturday, February 21, 2009

Curriculum Choices

It is that time of year again for homeschoolers. We are all asking ourselves, "What are we doing next year?" Things are pretty much set for us. I made some changes in
Isaac's curriculum this past year with good results so we are sticking with it. He will more than likely do:

Math U See This was new this year. He has done much better. Math has gone from tears and frustration to one of his better subjects.
VP Grammar & Writing Online (Shurley Grammar and IEW)
VP Literature Online as an auditing student. -I went back and forth on this one. I did not want him as a full student. We tend to pick and choose between the Lit books and the Historical Lit books. I am afraid he would struggle to keep up and we would have to give up a lot of the Historical Lit. I do however like the idea of him benefiting from the teaching of a Literature teacher while going through these classics.
VP Latin Online (Latin for Children)
VP Explorers to 1815 Online
Sylvan Spelling- This was new for us this year and we LOVED it. WE will continue with it and I think VP will even be putting in the catalog.
VP Handwriting

I am still struggling with Sarah. She does great with Saxon, but I am wondering if it would be easier for me to have them in the same curriculum. The same is true for spelling. She does fine with Phonetic Zoo and is a great speller. But would it be easier on me to put her in what Isaac is in? I am thinking we will stick with what is good for her. They are not on the same level so, I would be working with them separately anyway. For now her curriculum looks like this:

Math-Saxon
VP 3rd Grade LitShurley Grammar with a small amount of IEWPhonetic Zoo A/B
Song School Latin
VP Handwriting

Zachary will be doing:

Phonics Museum
Saxon Math
We will read through the Child's Story Bible in our family devotions.(I am also working on a project for this.)

All three children will be doing Memory Work, Poetry, Art, and Music. I am working on a Memory Work project. More on that later. I usually do Art in the summer when we have more time to makes messes.:) I am looking at Atelier Art. For Poetry we work through Writing Poetry and I also have different poems and verses they memorize and spend weeks copying for copy work. Music comes in the form of instrument lessons, studies on different composers from different genres, and possibly choir.

That is how things are looking to shape up here. What is on your mind for your children?

2 comments:

Malia said...

Would you be willing to talk some more about the curriculum that you are going to use for your 3rd grader? I have one that is the same age- and have been comfortably using Covenant Home with her for the past 2 years. I think it's adequate- but am interested in seeing if we would both do better with something else. My e-mail is beaumaliapowers@yahoo.com Thank you!

Julie said...

Sure. I will email you today or tomorrow.