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Garethville

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Posts posted by Garethville

  1. I need help figuring out what to do for first grade.  We did alright in kindergarten; it was fairly relaxed and we will be finishing over the summer.  I am not an organized person and while I would do best with a packaged curriculum my son would not. I have never seen one where I liked everything it included. I have quite a few programs/methods I love but I need to figure out how to make them work together without it being too much.  

     

    Here are the things I know I'd like to include; All About Reading 2, All About Spelling 1, Horizons Math, Story of the World and Handwriting Without Tears  I think I'd like to do First Language Lessons and Song School Latin.  I'm thinking the dictation in Story of the World will cover writing.  I have a few different options for Art and Music.  Here's my dilemma though - I really would like to do the timeline and memory work from cycle one of classical conversations and I'd like to compile a read aloud list to work on for the year from a variety of sources; Sonlight and a few others.  Science I am completely undecided on.  This sounds like way too much to me and I'm not sure there is a way to make all of this work. What do you think?

  2. Do you need to have the car with you every day? When we only had one car I would only drive DH back and forth if I needed it. The other days he drove himself and I just stayed home.

     

    You dont need extra curriculas to homeschool. I live in the country...there are no outside activities here. The closet homeschool group is an hour away although we do attend that twice a month. Otherwise my kids are in nothing and are doing just fine.

     

    They dont need extras at K age..they still enjoy being around mum at that age.

     

    Get lots of audiobooks to listen to in the car.

     

    Little ones dont need more then an hour of seatwork a day....surely you can squeeze that in somewhere. It won't be long before you can start affording things to do ...try not to think of your situation as permanent. Everybody has different seasons when homeschooling...hopefully your season will change soon.

     

     

     

     

    Thanks for the encouragement!  I think my post was a reaction to a very bad day.  Both of my sisters do not believe in homeschooling and one of them was on me yesterday about how my son would not get the "socialization" he needs unless he is in school everyday with other kids.  She made it sound like I was keeping him home for purely selfish reasons; that I just wasn't ready to let him grow up and leave the nest.  That's partly true, I do think kindergarten is too young to just let him go off and get on a bus alone and be gone for 8 hours a day.  However lack of socialization has never been a big issue to me.  I've always said they socialize more as homeschoolers and that I like knowing who they are socializing with.  Yesterday the comment hit home though in that I realized he would mostly be home with me as opposed to my other two who were involved in so many things and it worried me. 

     

    As far as the car issue - I would have no problem going without and letting my husband drive himself but I need to transport my oldest son back and forth to a special school program he is in that runs from 9-12 so I will need the car.  I also know we can fit things in and he can do things int he car like audiobooks. My youngest has had lots of behavior issues recently though and I realized that he does much better with a schedule.  It helps him if I follow a similar routine everyday.  That won't be possible right now.  Our schedule will change weekly, sometimes daily.  However while that is a negative for homeschooling (right now), I still think he positives outweigh the negatives and that he will be better off at home.  

     

  3. Why did you homes hook the older ones. Is this still a valid reason. If not what is your reason this time.

     

    I homeschooled my first two for a variety of reasons - all of which are still valid.  I like to choose what they are learning and feel they can learn better and more here at home. I also don't want them to go to school and come home with behaviors and morals that aren't ones we believe in.  I also enjoy being with my children.  For the most part I truly enjoy this time (schooling) with them.  For my youngest there is also the fact that I do not agree with full day kindergarten and the school he would attend is one of the worst in our county.

  4. I have three children.  The two oldest were homeschooled until 4th and 6th grade and they are now in high school.  My youngest is about to start kindergarten.  Our life is drastically different right now then when we were previously homeschooling.  We have one car and my husband has only recently found a job.  Since money is extremely tight  there is nothing in the budget for "extras" this time around.  No gym or other classes, etc.  There is also not an active homeschool group within a reasonable distance to us.  Since we have one car I will be transporting my son and husband and some days my MIL back and forth to school and work. The transportation issue means that I will not be able to work with my little guy on any kind of schedule and he will be spending a decent amount of time in the car each day.  Between the transportation issue and the lack of outside activities I worry that homeschooling isn't in my son's best interest and I'm getting cold feet.  School starts next Monday and I'm driving myself crazy with worry.  :( Any thoughts?

  5. I ordered the Elemental today and it looks great. My son loves books but compared to experiments? He will choose "doing" every time. I do think I will end up getting some of the K sonlight science books - he will enjoy hearing them. I don't know if he will end up liking to do worksheets or not. As far as his kindergarten year though he has enough seat work with phonics, handwriting and math. I need science, history and art to be hands on and fun. Thanks for all the opinions!

  6. I think I am leaning towards wanting a general history approach.  I have so many good history fiction books that I can supplement either program with.  As far as geography, right now all I really want is for him to start to be able to recognize the states on the map.  I have a feeling I'm going to end up getting both and doing a mish-mash of them.

  7. I'm trying to decide between these two programs myself for kindergarten this year.  I like the history/people/topics covered in Elemental - I think it is a better general overview of history and people.  However, I think I like the activities and some of the reading material in Road Trip USA more than the reading and activities in Elemental..  I'm having a hard time deciding which to go with for this year.

     

  8. Ok, thanks! I like the price of Elemental better for sure. I also like how there are supplemental activities/snacks/crafts listed. My main reason for considering Sonlight was because of some of the units on weather and engines, etc. My son is really into both weather and how things (especially vehicles, electronics, and things like that) work. It's interesting to hear that the experiments don't line up with the reading though. I didn't realize that.

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