First 12 Weeks of Weekly Schedules Done!

Semester 1 Grade 1, 2010-2011 School Year

It feels good to have completed some of them. I know I have a lot more to do, but I can go at a more leisurely pace now that I have finished the first 12. Some of the cells changed a bit when I changed it into pdf format, so some words have been cut off. I know what it says though, so it's no big deal. I am trying to get the dining room/school room set up and organized. Currently I have my new, large world  map poster off being laminated. I hope that they get it done soon, because I would really like to get the room looking more complete. It doesn't help that it is hot as he!! in here and I break into a sweat just by typing on the computer. I wish I could say that Fall was in the air. We went to see ABBAmania (Abba cover band) last night at the outdoor festival we have here during the summer. Roo loved it! She is a complete Abba fan and danced and jumped around throughout the whole thing. It made putting her to bed an easy job last night.

Weekly Schedule Template

I was playing around with excel and Word and finally came up with a template that will work for us. I hope, if not that was a lot of wasted time. Anyway here it is. I do have this in both Excel and Word, so if your are interested in having a copy I will email one to you. Excel is easier to use and more practical since you can can manipulate the cells into the sizes you want to use. Let me know if you would like a copy.



Grade_1_Weekly_Schedule

New School Year Weekly Schedule........Hopefully

I made a tentative weekly schedule for our new school year. My goal was to plot what subjects would be covered on what days and approximately how long each subject will take us. So this is my rough outline of what I hope our days will look like in order to accomplish all that I hope we are going to. I am going to make detailed weekly schedules of what we will be covering in each subject daily as well. I hope to start these and get them posted very soon. Maybe I will do them in six week increments so I am not biting off more than I can chew at the moment. These darn things are time consuming.


Schedule Layout Gr. 1

Year at a Glance Spreadsheet is Finally Finished!

Call me the queen of procrastination, but I finally finished our year at a glance for the Grade 1, 2010-2011 school year. I have 42 weeks as the listed amount of school weeks, because we are going to be schooling year round for a bit (I don't want her young brain to completely forget things if we take too much time off). I was having some upload issues but I think it has been resolved. So below is the link to our schedule.

Gr. 1 Year at a Glance 2010-2011

Weekly Report for Two Weeks Since I Missed Last Week. Oops

Welcome back to myself. I haven't posted anything in over a week, when I promised myself I would post at least weekly. I am blaming it on the heat. Since our central air is broken, we only have an a/c in one room and it is not the computer room. I have pretty much been camping out in the living room and avoiding all other rooms. That's my excuse.

Taken in front of the newly bloomed flowers on our walk through town.

As for what we have been up to, we have reached lesson 140 in The Ordinary Parents Guide. I have decided I would stop new lessons at this point and just do review for the next little while. I have been checking out a lot of I Read, You Read books from the library and they have become a large part of our phonics lessons.

In Spelling Workout we have finished lesson 21 this week. My goal is to finish book A by the end of summer so that she may start book B when our Gr.1 officially begins. We may have to do 2 lessons a few of the weeks to be able to accomplish this goal though.

Math focused on basic addition, skip counting and telling time to the half hour on an analog clock this week. She is getting better at trying to tell what time it is, and I find that she periodically will announce the time throughout the day. She tries especially hard if a commercial tells her that one of her favorite shows will be on a certain time.

It was supposed to rain that day, but chose to be incredibly hot instead. The umbrella became a handy sun blocker.

For Geography we worked on Europe and Africa. Where they are located, some important facts and how to find them on a globe. She knows Italy is shaped like a boot and uses that as her reference for finding it's location. In French we have been working on colours and review of past lessons. I am finding that we are spending 2 weeks to cover a new concept. I do not move onto anything new until she is quite familiar with what has been taught. She is really enjoying it though which makes me happy because I would like her to reach fluency in a second language as an end goal.

Art class was cancelled this week, but last week she made a painting. Next week is the last class, so she is going to be sad over the summer because she really enjoys it. For September she falls into the next age group, so classes are longer and more independent of parents.

She is still working on a name for this painting. 

I have been trying to figure out next years game plan for the last few months. When I think I may be onto something I find myself over thinking and changing things yet again. I have the curriculum that I want, I just find myself leaning more towards the Latin Centered Curriculum concept vs. The Well Trained Mind. I don't know though, because for me personally history is a huge part of my life and so very important for education. So if I do go more LCC I will still have to try to integrate a larger focus on history than once a week. I hate stress:( These pictures made me laugh though. Yet again some pictures she took of herself that I found on my camera when I uploaded pictures. She's obviously not very camera shy:)

Miss Cranky Pants, Questions and Science

The two new bookshelves I got have now become four, no complaints coming from me though. My husband liked the price of these units so much that he picked up two more after work the next night after our first purchase. We spread them across the living room wall, now I just need more books to fill them;) I always tell him that one day I would like a library in my home. Floor to ceiling shelves, a rolling ladder, leather furniture and dark wood (and a fireplace if I am really lucky). This would be haven for me and my husband knows it. He bought the shelves for me to start my library. Although we don't have enough space to dedicate a whole room to it, it is a start.
Roo wouldn't fall asleep last night. We had to get up early to go to art class and I knew she was going to be a cranky pants this morning. I was correct in my assumption, although she put on a happy face during the class. When she came home, she got into cozy clothes, grabbed a stuffed animal and crawled into bed without saying anything. I let her sleep, I would rather her be rested and do less school than be fighting with her because she is too tired to learn anything.
I've been trying to find my groove with the whole "homeschooling" thing. What curriculum to use? Am I doing enough? Too much? I am sure you know the drill. I waste so much time asking myself these questions, I needed to stop and focus. How will I see the successes if I am constantly looking for the negative. Breathe. On a lighter note, I did get my new print copy of the Elemental Science Biology For The Grammar Stage today. I am so psyched about this, the book is awesome, and saves me a lot of planning time. First off I want to say that I got this REALLY FAST. Seriously, it was shipped to Canada and it arrived today even though I ordered it only a few days ago. I plan on taking the 5 day schedule and combining it into 2 days a week which is an option that is stated in the beginning.  I've written myself a rough copy of my schedule for next year that I can fit this into nicely. I have based my schedule on both WTM and LCC, and I noticed that it seems way more doable that when I was trying to stick strictly to The Well Trained Mind schedules. I know what I want to cover and what books I need, I just need to get a more concrete vision of what the days/weeks will look like. How many hours do I spend searching the WTM forums looking for schedules? The answer is....way too much. I think for some reason that I am going to find a masterpiece schedule that will fit our lives perfectly. Does that even exist?

Saxon, schedules and a letter to Disney

We currently use Saxon 1 for math and it takes so much time that I am contemplating doing Singapore next year instead. It just seems that after the meeting book and lesson it is really hard to get her to do the fact drills, worksheet and then the homework later. Even if I break it into segments it still takes a huge portion of our daily lesson times. I find that we can never complete it all and it is pushed to the weekends in an endless cycle of catch up. She is learning and retaining but she cringes when I pull out the math stuff and so do I. I have heard a lot of positive things about Singapore and I think it may be a good decision for us. I am holding onto  hope.

So Roo really wants to go to Disney Land. I'm not so eager but dh seems excited to take her. The obvious problem is money. We aren't the type of people that can vacation every year. We have to plan well and save over an extended period of time (think years). I really want my next vacation to be European though, filled with history and culture. I figure we can hit two birds with one stone to go to Euro Disney if we get the opportunity to travel to Europe. I know that Euro Disney isn't comparable to Florida Disney, but I think that would satisfy her. Plus we would get do do so much more than just see a theme park. I just need to convince the other two. Friday a Disney advertisement came in the mail and my dd assumed it was mail sent to her. She decided to send Disney a letter back which I took a photo of. On one hand I find it funny, the other hand it makes me feel guilty.

The letter says "Help,

Yes Us

Tom, Sara, Roo

Disney Land"

Now onward to schedules. I have read WTM 4 times and skim it quite frequently for reference, but I recently read LCC as well (2 times) and find it very, very appealing. What to do? I have been spending endless amounts of time trying to figure out what I am going to do schedule wise next year for Grade 1. This year being K, I can dip my toes in various ponds and take it as learning. Next year I really want something more schedule based. I really do well with a schedule laid out for me and gain immense satisfaction when I can cross stuff off as I go. I also like the illusion that I am somewhat organized;) I know you can combine WTM and LCC but my question is how. I wish there was a schedule generator that I could input information and it will provide me with the most time efficient and beneficial schedule to follow. I don't want to tackle too much but I also am scared of not enough stuff. Now I am off to look at LCC once again to see if all becomes clear. (wishful thinking)