Headbanger Homeschool: Curriculum Planning

Saturday, August 20, 2011

Hell Hath Frozen Over

It's worth checking if it has because my school plan for this year is now complete. The odds were against me, hell even I bet against myself. But remember I am ever the pessimist so I had to bet against myself, it's in my nature. I was pushing my luck with time, but the choices are finally made. I just need to input them into my schedule in a realistic, non horrifying way. I have spent the better part of the day trying to clean and organize the dining room because it in fact could be described as horrifying. This is the room we use for school. The computer is in there, all my book shelves and we sit at the dining room table with baskets of the books we will need. It's cluttered and messy no matter how hard I try to organize it. What I really want is Expedit computer desk/book shelf combo. I want it in the black-brown wood colour and with the larger size book shelf. Computer on one side, she can sit and do work on the other and all our books and supplies would fit nicely onto the shelves. It's not realistic in this apartment though, because the spot it would have to go has such as slanted floor we can't have book shelves on that wall. I'll keep it on my wish list for the next place. In the meantime baskets and crowded table it is!

This is my plans for this school year, grade 2.

Language Arts

First Language Lessons 2

Writing With Ease 2

All About Spelling 2 and 3

Handwriting Without Tears Cursive

Math

Just call me Miss indecisive, or just plain stupid. Either works in this situation. She started last year with Singapore Math 1A/1B and it seemed to jump topics too quick and I had to keep going back. So we stopped and I got Math Mammoth 1A/1B for her because it has a lot of practice. She completed it by summer so I purchased Mammoth 2A/2B for this year. I decided over the summer to finish our Singapore Math 1B book and noticed that she is doing much better with it and math is less torturous. So I ordered Singapore Math 2A/2B and will use Math Mammoth as a supplement.

Singapore 2A/2B

Math Mammoth 2A/2B - supplement

Life of Fred Elementary series - Apples, Butterflies and Cats. There are 4 of these books out right now and we love them! I can't wait for the others to come out.

History

Story of the World 2 - Middle Ages

Activity Guide for SOTW 2

It's my favorite time period so I am very excited. I also got the Pandia Press wall timeline which I am getting laminated and timeline figures from the Hannah_hs_ helps yahoo group already cut out and laminated.

Science

Elemental Science Earth Science and Astronomy

Geography

Ideas from The Core by Leigh Bortins for learning the world by mapping it.

Expedition Earth done secularly

Foreign Language

Latin for Children A

L'Art de Lire 1 - French

Art and Composer Study

Art - Meet the Masters Online. She is also enrolled in a weekly art class.

Composer
The plan is a composer a month study. Print and post a picture of the composer on the wall, read a biography on the composer, map where they lived and listen to their music. Classicsforkids is a great site for this as well.

*** I forgot Memory Work, so I will add it at the end here. I am still using the same ideas as before using the Charlotte Mason Method for memory work (but not memorizing scripture because we are secular). I will be adding memory work for what we will be doing this year Science, History, Latin, French.

I hope the links to everything I posted work. If they don't, please let me know.

I don't know if I am missing anything, but I feel as if I got everything I wanted to covered. The lack of having 62 hours in everyday is frustrating but I am trying to overcome it and get what I need done a piece at a time. Our school start date is after Labour Day so I still have a couple of weeks to manage. I am also implementing a chore/task sheet this year. Everything from school work to, going and staying in bed, to teeth brushing will be on it (it's a fight to get her to brush her teeth as well as stay in bed). At the end of the week the sheet will be evaluated and she will get an allowance and/or treat based on the completion and the attitude while completing. Wish me luck because I am not holding my breath on this one.

Friday, June 10, 2011

Let's Put it on Facebook!

We had a 4 day week this week because Wednesday we went to Walmart. You know how easy it is to lose a full day in Walmart;) This week Merle started to cut her first tooth. She is a champ, I didn't even know until I felt it when she started to chew on my finger. Roo's top two front teeth are almost ready to come out as well. I am happy that they have finally become loose, since looking at the chipped one has been giving me mommy guilt for the last 4.5 years. When Roo was two she climbed onto a kitchen chair to sit beside her dad while he was on the computer. She began to wiggle in her seat and somehow managed to wiggle right off and land on her face. The result was a chipped front tooth that makes me feel terrible every time I see it.

Last week I had surprise photos from Roo taking pictures of herself and this week I have a funny video she made of her sister. It's not the video that is funny, but the song she is singing during filming after she made me put Merle into a sparkly fairy costume.

Now on to what we finished this week.

Memory Work - I added parts of a flower to the list to coincide with what we are learning in science.

Spelling (All About Spelling) - She finished Level 2 lesson 3 this week. The use of y as a vowel.

First Language Lessons - Daily review

Writing with Ease - Completed week 35 of copy work and narration exercises from The Wind in the Willows. One week left in this and the book is done!

Latin (Song School Latin) - Review

French (Nallenart) - We learned about time, how to ask for time and how to answer.

Math - Using our abacus we did 2 pages of Math Mammoth 1B each day and one exercise from Singapore Math a day too. We continued with math facts online using XtraMath. She is plugging along and each day more go into the mastered list. This only takes about 5 minutes a day.

History (Story of the World) - We completed Ch 35 Caesar Fights the Celts, Caesar Crosses the Rubicon, Caesar and Cleopatra, and The Death of Caesar. We also read about Caesar in the Famous Men of Rome book and have begun Cleopatra by Diane Stanley.

Science (Elemental) - In our plant study this week we looked at Fruit, Why Plants Have Fruit, and Seeds.

Geography - Every day she reviews her Canadian provinces and territories as well as Western Europe via Sheppard Software. I just got my copy of The Core from the Library and am avidly reading the geography chapter so we can begin our five circles and continent blobs.

Merle has mastered the skills of the Old Man face this week. She sucks in her lips and this is the result.

These are my thoughts on curriculum for next year (grade 2). Some of these I already have on my shelves.