Journey to Excellence

It's time for the 4th Annual Not Back-to-School Blog Hop hosted by iHomeschool Network! This week's topic is Curriculum . Last week I eluded to our 3rd grade curriculum for the 2012/2013 school year. But this week I thought I would go into more detail about what we will be using. Although Eli is 8 1/2 and Brynne will be 7 on Wednesday, we are schooling both of them at the same grade level because of their cognitive skill levels. Bible: We will start each morning "stick figuring" through the Bible with Grapevine Studies "Level 3-4 Old Testament Overview". Each of the kids will keep a notebook to stick figure our Bible lessons. Grammar: We will continue where we left off last year with our Easy Grammar Daily Guided Teaching and Review for 2nd Grade . Spelling: We will use All About Spelling Level 1 , but will likely blast right through to Level 2 quickly. Copywork: We will do weekly copywork based on our current unit study. We ...

One week from today, we will be on Summer Break! Yippee!!! And, of course, I am already Looking Ahead to next year. That's because our "next year" will be starting earlier than normal. We have decided to go to school 6 days a week and begin on July 23rd. That's what the little kids will be doing anyway. Dawson has chosen to continue his schooling on the public school schedule. This makes sense because he likes to be out of school at the same time as his friends for maximum hang-out time. Our start date will be upon us quickly because I have four trips scheduled in the months of June and July, and my sister will be having a baby around that time. I will be getting home from one of those trips two days before we start school. So, Looking Ahead and being prepared is a necessity! And, remember. We will be bringing Eli home starting next year, which will bring a whole new component to our schooling. Schedule. I mentioned that we would be doing school 6 days a...

If you have followed Journey to Excellence for any length of time, it is no secret that our year has been permeated with our American History studies. Over a year ago, many of us home educators received a complimentary DVD series from The History Channel called "America: The Story of Us" . Since we typically shy away from textbooks when it comes to Dawson, I knew that I wanted to use this series as the spine for our American History studies this year. So, I got to work. I spent ALL SUMMER last year watching each video and planning Dawson's lessons for the year. I have never been more in love with American History as I am right now, and it is ALL because of the prompting of that amazing dvd series! There are twelve episodes, each 45 minutes long. The graphics and sound effects are AWESOME! They are lively, interesting, and so easy to watch! What I really love about them is that they touch on some aspects of history that I have NEVER learned about, instead of j...

Yeah, I've been doing that ... planning for next year. There are going to be some significant changes in our homeschool next year, so I am trying to figure some things out. We have decided to bring Eli home from public school to begin homeschooling next year. We feel like he has probably gained everything he can from public school and is now ready for our kind of learning. I am also talking with a good friend of mine (who happens to be Eli's speech pathologist at his school) about a partnership whereby I will help in the schooling of her 15 year old son while she helps with speech needs for Eli. Her dad is also a science and math whiz who loves to teach, which would come in very handy! Generally speaking, I am thinking of going to schooling SIX days a week, with five of those days being what we do now and adding time on either Saturday or Sunday for in depth science study. This would allow us to take some big breaks in the year. I am thinking of starting the first Monday in...

Fred showed back up at our house on Monday. And we were so happy! Dawson did three texts of Life of Fred   last year: Decimals and Percents, Fractions, and Pre-Algebra with Biology . He started Beginning Algebra with the Home Companion yesterday. I love the way it is set up. The text has long(er) chapters than the previous texts. At the end of each chapter there are about 20 questions. Then there are about 5 or 6 "cities" to visit with more practice problems. Each day you do a lesson out of the Home Companion . It tells you how many pages of the chapter to read in the text and then gives you some practice problems to do. Eventually it will tell you to do the 20 questions at the end of the chapter in the text. Then it will assign you a certain number of cities to visit with practice questions to answer. There are 108 Lessons. Gone is the argument that there are not enough practice problems. Once Beginning Algebra is completed, we will move on to Advanced Algebra . He s...

That is the name of the main "text" we will be using for Biology. I checked it out from the library today (to make sure it's what I want before I purchase it), and at first glance it looks excellent! The book is a collaboration of Mahlon Hoagland, M.D., a molecular biologist, and Bert Dodson, a freelance illustrator. In the Author's Notes they say, "The scientist wants to leave the reader with a feeling of awe and pride in the achievements of scientific exploration, in the human potential or ever deeper understanding. The artist, on the other hand, sees the possibility that an appreciation for our oneness with the living world can guide our individual actions as we shape our collective future. We hope our readers will be moved by both." This is the essence of a Living Book! One of the first illustrations is of Russian nesting dolls being used to demonstrate that atoms (the smallest doll) fit into simple molecules (the next size doll) that fit into c...

One downfall in choosing to not use textbooks at the high school level is that the concepts of logic and critical thinking get missed. And that happens to be a real area of weakness for Dawson. We don't like to use textbooks to learn our topics because they do not cater to Dawson's natural method of learning. However, textbook learning is inevitable in his future should he take the ACT or decide to go to college. He is going to have to learn how to read a textbook, analyze the text, answer questions, and study for tests. He won't always have the benefit(s) of homeschooled students. So here's my question. Have you used a Critical Thinking curriculum that you really like? Keep in mind, I am not as interested in a general logic curriculum as I am in one that helps Dawson learn how to critically analyze information and present arguments. And I would love to find a series that increases in difficulty level, as I plan for it to be an ongoing subject that we work into our ...

I can't even believe the following words are getting ready to come out of my mouth be written in this post. I feel like a traitor, like I have no business homeschooling with this attitude. I know that many will just not even believe I feel this way. Ok. Are you ready. Here goes. Dawson and I hate Apologia! I know! The shame! I have heard nothing but good things about it, so we purchased Exploring Creation with Biology , with the companion cd and slide set. I poured over other blogs, read suggestions, came up with a doable schedule. We started with Module 14 so that we would actually have leaves to do the leaf study. Dawson trudged through the reading and assignments and experiments. He even attempted to have a good attitude about it. Then I had him do the Study Guide to prepare for the test. And I told him he could take this first test as an open-book so that he could see how the Study Guide related to the test. And then when I looked at the test this morning a...

Everybody's talking curriculum these days! Why? Because it's about time to start using some curriculum! I've been pretty settled on what we were going to use for several months now. I have tweaked it a bit here and there. But, for the most part I am still satisfied with what I have chosen. This tells me that my choices must be good ones for us because I haven't felt the urge to change them even when I read all the fun things other schools will be doing! Here's a breakdown of what Dawson and Brynne will be studying this year. (Remember, Kyndal and Eli still go to public school.) Dawson ~ 9th Grade Language Arts: Easy Grammar Ultimate Series 9. Science: Apologia Biology. Math: Teaching Textbooks ~ Algebra I. Social Studies: American History by using "America: The Story of Us" video series from The History Channel , www.history.com/america, America's Heritage: An Adventure in Liberty by The American Heritage Education Foundation, Inc. ...

We are planning to use some of Amanda Bennett's Download N Go Unit Studies for our Science studies for Brynne this year. Several unit studies are on sale TODAY ONLY!! I purchased Autumn Treasures, Veteran's Day, Winter Wonders, Seashells, and Dogs. Go right now if you would like to purchase some of these fantastic unit studies. I saved about $15.00 on these studies by purchasing today. You can also click on the link to the right to go straight to the website. Hurry!!!

FINAL UPDATE (JUNE 2012): We completed our entire U.S. History course last month using the America: The Story of Us video series and the resources I had planned. We officially covered Episodes 1-9 which got us through the 1920's. We plan to use the remaining three videos when we study the World Wars in a couple of years. I just want to go on record as saying that I believe whole-heartedly that the use of this series with my resources would more than qualify your child for a full credit of U.S. History. And, it was exciting and enriching. Feel free to follow all of my lesson plans. You can see them all at this link: http://journey2excellence.blogspot.com/search/label/America%3A%20The%20Story%20of%20Us Update: America: The Story of Us is now available as an InstaStream through Netflix! We also had it available at our local library. If you didn't receive a complimentary copy, you won't have to pay the $30 for it! Many of us received a complimentary copy of "...

I love laid-back summer learning. We just take something we come upon that interests us and go with it! It's been so great! I've also enjoyed taking Eli along for the ride with us! At the same time I am working diligently on the U.S. History curriculum for both Dawson (9th grade) and Brynne (2nd grade) for next year. I feel like I am taking a super-fun trip through history right now and I am enjoying preparing for it more than they will probably enjoy learning about it! I am hoping my enthusiasm rubs off on them! So far I have completed three, 3-week units and am most of the way through the fourth. That has us at 12 weeks of lessons. I am feeling much-accomplished! I will be doing a post soon about exactly how I am creating this curriculum using America: The Story of Us from The History Channel. I received this dvd set for free last year and it is the cornerstone of our curriculum! It is awesome! I also just saw that it is available through our local library, so may...

Do you like notebooking? Wait ... Hold that Thought! Yes, that's the notebooking resource we will be using next year. We have tried lapbooking, and I know lots of people use it and love it. But we always felt like we spent so much time cutting and pasting and it required tons of work on my part to get the pieces prepared. We didn't like it. Instead we found ourselves taking our units and making copies of all of our worksheets, etc., that we planned to use and binding them together in a manila folder with yarn. Brynne seemed to enjoy them, they were organized by topic, and she could look at them anytime she wanted. It also gave her more room for free writing and drawing. Both Dawson (9th grade) and Brynne (2nd grade) will be doing a full year study of U.S. History next year. I have purchased them each a 3-ring binder and we are going to notebook our study of America. While searching for notebooking pages for the themes we will cover, I came across a notebooking publish...

Because Brynne came home from kindergarten after school started, I didn't purchase any formal curriculum for her. I already knew she was advanced in many areas, so I really just used this year to let her teach me! I wanted to get a good feel for what she already knew, what she was interested in and what style of teaching worked best with her. I already had an interest in the Charlotte Mason method, which worked especially great since I didn't have any formal curriculum to use. We stuck with the 3 R's and did science and social studies units based on her interest, doing lots and lots of reading! And with all of the reading we did she learned to, well, read! In math we used a 1st grade book that the school gave us, but it was boring to her so we incorporated as much hands-on math as we could. We tried to work off of our social studies and science units and do math activities related to them. She liked that! In public school she would be in 1st grade next year, maybe e...

You would think that with the end of the year approaching, and my energy and enthusiasm waning, that I would be thinking of anything but not thinking of curriculum. However, with payment from my most recent contracted job I was able to order some of next year's curriculum. And, it's started arriving. It gets me so excited because, although we will be following the same basic structure in our homeschooling, the subjects will be so much meatier. Plus our main focus will be American History and I can't wait to dig deeper into it (since I snoozed through most history classes in my life.) Even Brynne's 2nd grade curriculum will be American History based. I can't wait to have my 9th grader and 2nd grader studying the same topics (at their own levels, of course.) Those two minds working tandem ought to make for an interesting year! I'm also pumped up about Dawson switching to Teaching Textbooks for Algebra. He has been doing Life of Fred , and it was totally nece...

Wow. This school year is all but over! I can't believe it! Between now and the end of the school year, we will be doing the following: Dawson ~ 8th Grade Exploration Period, focusing on Swiss Family Robinson (for 17 days of school) Renaissance and Restoration periods, until the last day of school, with an end-of-school trip to The Renaissance Festival . Lots of pre-algebra, language arts reviews, typing, spanish and science units going along with the above-units. Brynne ~ 1st Grade Our last week of For the Birds , with focus book The Perfect Nest . Three week of Easter studies. Since Earth Day falls the Friday before Easter, we will study Earth Day the last week of April with some really fun books and activities. We will spend April 30th making May Baskets to deliver to Brynne's friends, in cognito, on May 1st. The Month of May ~ a study on the Milly-Molly-Mandy series. We will be doing a couple of weeks of study on both Time and Money and will also be focusing...

This was one of those weeks where it was busy and ordinary all at the same time. Dawson ~ 8th Grade Dawson's week was one of mostly mechanics .. getting through the lessons so that Spring Break could begin. He did well all week, worked hard and did thorough work. But, he didn't really do too much exciting work. Probably the highlight of his week was an accident. We were studying the Battle of Hastings and read about the Bayeux Tapestry . We decided to look it up, and when we did we stumbled upon a "Bayeux" Tapestry generator . Dawson sat down and started playing with it and generated a few scenes out of the book we are reading, Adam of the Road by Elizabeth Janet Gray. Additionally in history we learned about the establishment of the middle class in Middle Ages and the Magna Carta. In science we studied biomes and how herbs were used for medicines. We also received our greenhouse from the CSN giveaway I won so we moved our herb seeds into it and put it i...