Michelle My Bell
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Posts posted by Michelle My Bell
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I am thinking of starting a co-op next year that is Charlotte Mason inspired. We participated in a classical co-op this year and it was wonderful for the kids but it was financially straining for me because it is quite a distance from my home. It has also been exhausting for me because it is every week, all day, I had been teaching 2 classes and there is considerable homework involved. My vision is to have a co-op at our local nature preserve twice a month. Some class ideas I have are:
Latin (younger kids and an older kids class)
Nature Study / Journaling (http://handbookofnaturestudy.blogspot.com/)
Art / Picture Study
Poetry
Handicraft
Book Studies
Family Math – Learning with Games
Memory Work
IEW
Soccer
I am looking for inspiration to see how other groups have done a CM inspired co-op. If you have been in one could you share your experiences, or if you know of one could you tell me about it or even share a link to the groups website? I would be so appreciative.
I would also just love ideas if anyone has any. :)
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we utilize youtube daily. I have info about it on my blog. i made a bunch of skip counting videos also.
http://homeschool-chalkboard.blogspot.com/2011/11/learning-through-memory-work.html
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Thanks Coastal Academy for sharing. :laugh:
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I just discovered IEW has writing lessons based on the Geography books. hmmm
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I changed the days because I realized the Geography guide has fewer lessons. Although, if I wanted it to be more Charlotte Mason like, I could spread one Geography lesson out over a few days. I think they have you reading more than one chapter a day.
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I am interested in purchasing the Early American Primary pack with the Geography Pack for my 7 and 10 year olds next year. I was thinking of a schedule like this...
Monday : Geography (39 lessons)
Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday : American History (107 lessons)
Any thoughts?
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Pamela,
My first reaction was really not pretty. I was ranting and raving inside. Then I read what she wrote and felt a little better but I am still unhappy about it. Even more than the fact that it is a textbook is the fact that it cost around $135.00 just for this one componant. I am going to have to try to find it used and piece together the whole package. Not fun... This years package was so expensive I paid on it for 4 months before I had it paid off. I appreciate HOD, I really do but she doesn't have to pick the most expensive items out there. A Charlotte Mason education doesn't have to be expensive. I am only sticking with it because my daughter really likes it and is familiar with the activities and format.
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I was disappointed to see them choose the BJU textbook but I suppose I should reserve judgement until I see how Carrie is going to incorporate it. I've got plenty of time before I would use it with my 11yods.
Unfortunately my daughter will be using his program this coming year.
I already tweak a lot of HOD to fit our family so I'm not sure exactly why this one is bothering me. I guess I was hoping that I would be able to use their high school as planned.
This is exactly what I was hoping for. I don't want to tweak at all.
I may just stick with MFW high school . . . though I really don't like their third and fourth year history for the same reason . . the BJU textbooks. Why do CM-based companies depart from that model when they hit the high school years? I know that MFW says that the reason is that students need to prepare for college by reading textbooks but really all it did for my dd who used that program was make history dull and dry for her.
yup.
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i didn't enjoy it or find it that effective.
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I am glad we can talk freely here. Seems like its all peaches and cream over at HOD message boards.
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We have been using HOD since the CTC guide for one of my daughters and it has been very successful here. I have to say that as a Charlotte Mason devotee and textbook hater, I am NOT happy about Carries plans to use BJU's Fundamentals of Literature. How can HOD call themselves a Charlotte Mason program with a dry textbook scheduled in? Oh, I read her reasons but I still feel like it leaves me with two options... use it as is and hope that this extremely expensive textbook designed for classroom use is worthwhile or completely plan something else and add a huge load to my already packed lesson plans.
As far as the other sneak peaks go...
Science - happy
Bible - unsure
Devotional Study - happy
Composition/Grammar - happy
Logic - happy
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I have read that Rod and Staff's Spelling by Sound and Structure is the workbook equivalent to AAS but super cheap. Why couldn't you just make your own letter tiles on cardstock, laminate them and magnetize them? You could use them with Spelling by Sound and Structure. Another option would be to purchase the letters from AAS only or these letters from Rainbow.
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Add me to this. I would like to try the push ups as well.
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I also love the idea of covering cork with burlap or pretty fabric and hanging it on the wall ready to hang the kids art from. I think she used canvases but I think cork would work better. I am going to keep an eye out this summer at garage sales for old cork boards, frames and random chairs that I can spray paint.
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http://5foot12creations.blogspot.com/2013/01/it-was-definitely-time-to-get-girls.html
I was thinking I would add a book rack on one of the walls to hold all our library books and/or school books. I actually have a nice room I haven't used this year that I think I will repaint to look like this for next school year. I have also seen those turquoise carts at Ikea and I want one!!!
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I wouldn't consider Veritas, Sonlight, or TOG to be Charlotte Mason'ish. Maybe sort of, but TOG and Veritas lean far more classical all the way across than CM. Sonlight is really just a huge list of books compiled in no particular order, well, not particularly chronological, anyway. Also, CM wouldn't have scheduled nearly the *quantity* of books to get through in a week's time that SL schedules. If you end up reading a lot of books, that's one thing, but the structured part of a CM school day wouldn't look like SL.
CM is definitely classical by the time you hit high school, but much more gentle in the beginning years than a curriculum otherwise labeled as "classical".
Heart of Dakota and My Father's World both mix elements of classical and CM. They use different resources, but follow a similar path chronologically speaking. Neither one is truly classical OR truly CM, but these two are probably the most "balanced" of all the prepared curriculum packages out there. I would also put Linda Faye's free curriculum in this category. There's a ton of CM information on her website: www.charlottemasonhelp.com
Simply Charlotte Mason is nice, but tends to schedule some pretty light (IMO) books along the way. Ambleside leans the other direction, scheduling "heavier" books from the very beginning.
I agree with your thoughts here. what would you think is CM? Anything?
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Heart of Dakota & Ambleside Online. I plan to mix Ambleside Year 1 with Memoria Press 1st grade next year.
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Thanks. I love using the Kindle as well, as it is easy to take on the go. I also use my ipod quite a bit in the car with audio books.
If you use the Kindle quite a bit, I would recommend Yesterday's Classics Kindle bundle, which includes 225 books for 49.95. You can see which books in the package are used in AO here. It includes most of the public domain books used in AO in years 1-6, and the Treadwell readers which AO recommends, so it was a good deal for me. The package also includes quite a few of the free reads, such as f Pinocchio and Peter Pan, though the list of AO books on their site only includes the books that are in the main curriculum. They also just added The Little Duke, though it isn't on the list either. I had several of the free books from amazon and project gutenburg, but I liked the table of contents and formatting on the YC books, and they have beautiful illustrations, unlike some of the other epub files I had downloaded.
I admit, it was hard to bring myself to spend the money on books I could get online for free, but it has been worth it.
I will be getting this. it is an extra good deal for me because we also use Heart of Dakota for my older kids.
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We actually live on the Great Lakes, so we were able to do some neat field trips and see some cool exhibits at local museums along with the book. This mom has some neat ideas for younger kids::
http://www.jessicaly...1-5-activities/
We also used the beautiful feet maps for our mapwork.
http://bfbooks.com/Geography-Map-Set
We used other maps as well as an atlas to identify the great lakes, but the Beautiful feet maps are beautiful, we used them for marking Paddle's journey and labeling various places. I know some of the moms also use the Beautiful Feet study guide for the Holling books to help get ideas for activities.
I know some other AO moms have used this google lit trip, we didn't since we had the opportunity to actually visit the lakes.
http://www.googlelit...cy_Holling.html
There is also a movie that some people watch at the end of the unit, we just didn't get to it.
I think that MP and AO mesh really well together in the early years. We do all of our MP work in the morning, but of course we skip the science and other optional activities and instead we do one or two AO subjects in the afternoon.
I do love the way MP has the poetry and music and picture books laid out, but I was already doing AO so I stuck with that. We do use the MP literature guides, but we use the AO literature selections as well, we simply narrate them. With the AO books, we just talk a bit about the last reading from the book, go over any vocab or concepts that I think we should cover before we read, then we read it together. My son orally narrates most of the books, sometimes I write down his narration and he illustrates it. This site has some links to free printables such as narration starters or a narration cube, it also has some fun ideas to help you with narrations:
http://www.squidoo.com/narration
Our AO schedule looks like this:
Monday: History readings (OIS, Fifty Famous Stories, and you could read Trial and Triumph)
Tuesday: Literature selections
Wednesday: History Biography (D'Ãulaire books) and Geography
Thursday: 2nd Aesop story, Natural history and science
Friday: finish any readings we didn't get to, nature study, we would also read any Shakespeare tales that were scheduled on Fridays
We read our poetry during snacks and during lunch. I just use the AO anthology for the Kindle, but they have a free pdf of the poetry anthology on their site to download as well, and the notebook groups I mentioned have the poetry selections divided up by week, which is nice.
I think that AO and MP work really well together for the first few years. I don't know if it will become too difficult to combine them next year, which will be 3rd grade for us. I think both MP and AO will have a bigger work load, and I may have to start tweaking more.
I feel like this is exactly what I am supposed to do. My son will be 7 next year and the general consensus is that this is the perfect age for AO1. Strangely enough, we actually live by the Great Lakes as well. I am very excited about exploring the links and learning more about what others do. I am now anxious to be admitted to the forums. I registered yesterday and am waiting for the moderators! Thank you so much for all your comments. It is EXTREMELY helpful. Feel free to start a blog so I can follow you! lol
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We used Year One last year. My son loved it. This year we are doing Memoria Press along with the AO selections, and a few other things, so we are not strictly AO. I use a formal spelling curriculum, and we are also going to start a formal grammar curriculum next year.
For Year One, I skipped Trial and Triumph and Parables of Nature. We are Catholic, so we used some Catholic selections instead. My son LOVED Aesop, Fifty Famous stories retold, and Just So Stories, so those were must reads for us. He also really enjoyed James Herriott's Treasury for Children, and the Burgess book. All of the Burgess books and Holling C. Holling books are must reads in my book. My son also loved several of the free reads, including Pinnochio and Peter Pan. I used the free reads as read alouds after lunch, bedtime, and we also listened to some of the librivox recordings of the free reads in the car.
The AO site has a primer for getting ready for year one:
http://www.ambleside...Yr1Primer.shtml
Here are some bookmarks i made for Years One and Two:
https://docs.google....PZkk/edit?pli=1
There are also a new AO forum that has a ton of links to the schedules and things that are also located in the Yahoo groups in the file sections.
www.amblesideonline.org/forum
This yahoo group has some nice copywork pages and info:
http://groups.yahoo....mbleSide_Year1/
This group has schedules posted by users for every year in many different formats:
http://groups.yahoo....chedules/files/
Here is another one that is worth a look:
http://groups.yahoo...._HEO_Schedules/
Here is a group that has the public domain readings for each week formatted in MS word. I printed these out and made a notebook for our AO readings, it was nice to have most of the weeks readings in one place, it made it easy for me to read ahead. It also has some nice schedules and other files. There is a group like this for years 1-6, but they haven't been updated yet with the changes that were made last year, though I'm sure Year 1 was not changed.
http://groups.yahoo....yguid=155399373
Here is a copywork group that has copywork selections for each year and by book:
http://groups.yahoo....oup/AOCopywork/
The advisory board has also compiled some nice books for the Kindle for year 1:
http://www.amazon.co...mbleside online
http://www.amazon.co...mbleside online
For the Burgess Bird book, make sure to check out the Satori smiles resources:
http://satorismiles....book-companion/
I also used the Burges Bird book montessori cards form this site, scroll down for the free download:
http://thatresources...p?cid=30&lid=87
Here is a list of the AO books that are available on librivox.org, but the list needs to be updated, Parables of Nature is available now.
http://wiki.librivox..._Ambleside_List
I find this blog really helpful, and this mom is also a moderator on the AO forum. She has great tips for organizing and homeschooling multiple children.
http://fisheracademy.blogspot.com/
This website has helpful advice and tips for implementing a CM style education, not AO but helpful:
http://www.charlotte...emasonhelp.com/w
HTH!
Wow ! Thank you so much! I will investigate all of this. Since you are combining MP and AO, I would love to hear about that as well. It is my plan to do the same. Thank you for the recommendations. Did you do activities with the books or just read and discuss? (Holling specifically)
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I use the Ambleside prints as well, I have them printed as an 8x10 on cardstock from officemax, but I also convert them into jpegs using a free online converter and then I upload and print them as 4x6 photos on www.clarkcolor.com. They usually have coupon codes, I get mine for $.04 a print plus delivery ($5.00). They look great, very high quality. My son has a photo album where we keep the smaller prints, I have him write down the artist and the name of the piece and the year it was done. We use the larger print for picture study.
I have done this. I find art prints online and have them printed as photos at my local Walgreens. We keep them in a photo album with the name and artist written on a 3x5 card inserted into the opposite pocket. He reviews them daily. Big hit here!
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Just a quick list of some of the extras at AO:
Copy work
Artist and art study
Composer study
Poetry
Memorization is suggested per CM
Some extras post in the files at the loop:
Kings and Queens cards to go with history
Paddle to the Sea activity guide
There are Pinterest sites linked in the forum.
I don't know if the Burgess Bird Book cards are posted at the loop or the forum but a quick google for Burgess Bird Book cards (also Burgess Animal Book cards linked on this WTM forum) will bring them up if you are interested.
I know I am forgetting somethings, but I have to head back to work. The forum and AO site will help you a lot if you are truly considering AO.
How do I get to this "loop" you speak of?
Programs that are similar to Sonlight, MFW, etc ?
in High School and Self-Education Board
Posted
There is Heart of Dakota's new guide coming out next year, but it is a geography based program. Here is their projected scope and sequence for High School:
AGES 13-15
(*extending to grades 10-11)
(extending to grades 11-12)
(extending to grade 12)