Looking to skip ahead, need advice!

[Cakes]

I am bringing my 7th grader home to school and plan to accelerate her.

I need to come up a homeschool curriculum that will 1) blend 7th and 8th grade this year so that we can begin to dive into 9th grade work next year. 2) satisfy my husband that we have a plan that is well thought out.

I hope to find some curriculum that is engaging and mostly self lead. 

I have been reading this forum for months and have made lots of note about potential curric, but never dig in too deep as I did not want to jinx the future ;-) now I am armed with only some notes and I could really use some guidence!
I am thinking of starting with:

Math - so many choices, feeling lost here. AoPS, Teaching Textbooks, Think-well, Algebra w/Pizzaz, Foerster's Algebra?
Literature (Lighting Lit or Kolbe Jr high lit?)
Writing - (Lively Art of Writting or Jump In or Rod and Staff, Thinking in Threes
Grammar (4Practice?)
Vocab- (Word within the Word or Wordly Wise)
Science ( I need something broad to cover z7-8th grades, then probably anatomy next year)
Geography ?
History ?
Critical thinking ( Socratic Logic or The Thinking Tool Box)

Any adivce or warnings, or curricula suggestions are needed and wanted!

 

[EndOfOrdinary]

Seventh and eighth are a time to really develop maturity of skills and learn about your own learning process. They are a time to explore the fundamentals of the various subjects or delve deeply into places of passion and thus begin high school solidly. For me, compacting middle school would not be my first choice. If you are looking to shorten all around school time for future years, I would have foreign language and math begin counting toward high school credit. In that way you can eliminate anywhere from one to four credits without sacrificing the valuable time needed for writing literature, critical thinking and personal maturity.

 

By compacting these years you are only going to get one year out of the process, but you also lose a year your student can find a passion without penalty, get geeked out on an esoteric subject, and really get to know how to study so that future high school years can be richer.

[JennW in SoCal]

Condensing middle school can be a very good thing.  My youngest went straight from 7th to 9th grade, then starting in 11th did mostly community college courses. 

 

I have few suggestions for specific curricula as so much has been introduced in the few years since I last homeschooled full time.  But I do want to give you a heads up about starting homeschooling.  It isn't going to be as simple as switching schools -- it is a whole new dynamic in the family, and it will never be exactly what you expect its going to be.  You certainly must have good reasons to be doing this, so write those reasons down NOW so you can refer to them during the inevitable bad days that will happen!  And write down what goals you have for your dd, and since she is older, what goals she has.  Are you planning on her starting at a brick and mortar high school next year or are you thinking you will homeschool through high school?  Is she homeschooling to have time to devote to a particular passion?  Your curriculum and schooling choices will be different depending on your goals.

 

I would suggest you focus on skills -- math and language arts, specifically grammar, vocabulary and writing, if she is weak in those areas, then fill the rest of her day with reading.  For literature, read aloud, listen to audio books together, and of course have her read independently.  Yes read aloud -- I read aloud to my kids til they left home!   Choose books you think she would like, books you loved at that age.  Choose classics and good but not so great literature.   Watch movie adaptations and compare them with the novel.  For history read some historical fiction and assign some readings from history "spines".  Susan Wise Bauer's world history tomes are popular with many here.  For science start with Robert Hazen's Science Matters or Bill Bryson's A Short History of Nearly Everything.  Then have her read biographies of great scientists or other popular books (Stephen Hawking, Neil deGrasse Tyson) on what ever branch of science most interests her.  

 

The lectures, whether audio or video, from the Teaching Company (or Great Courses as I guess it is now known) are your best friend.  They have courses on every conceivable (it seems) subject.  Check with your library to see what they carry.  Audible.com carries them now, and if you have a membership there you can use your credit for a monthly free book on a course.  

 

Go to the zoo, go to museums, go to plays. More importantly look for lectures and behind the scenes tours where your daughter can meet people who do interesting things for a living.  These activities make science and history far more interesting than any curriculum.  

 

Then talk together about all you do.  She does NOT have to produce a piece of writing or a worksheet or take a test covering every thing she reads, sees or hears.  The luxury of homeschooling is that are kids can immerse themselves in a subject, think about things, drop what isn't interesting.   If you feel you need some form of output, then have her keep a journal, or write an essay each week -- one week on the literature she is reading, the next on science, then on history.  Have her write short research papers (one page) on a topic she researches on the internet.  

 

That's my advice.  I've graduated two now, both successful young adults.

 

 

[Cakes]

Thank you so much for the replies!

Jennifer I printed out your thoughtful reply, thank you very much for taking the time to share such great info! It is very much appreciated!