Bics
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I just want to encourage you; don't give up! Prima Latina helped my slightly dyslexic 2nd grader over the hump last year. It might end up being a good thing for your second child (though I understand your concern right now). We used the DVDs, but even if you just get the pronunciation cd, you will reap so many benefits.
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We had been using Webster's Speller as our main phonics program. Lately the 6 yo is kind of burned out on it and has been asking for Progressive Phonics. My tired, pregnant self is just happy to do some phonics every day without a fight/grumbling.
Sometimes I just write random things on the whiteboard for him to read and call it good.
I started both my children on Webster's Speller as well, free from Don Potter's website. The dryness of it irritated both of them and I tried other things--modifiying Phonics Pathways, Word Mastery, Blend Phonics. I think any of these will work, but when it comes to multisyllables, I always find myself going back to Webster's to explain why something works the way it does.
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I suggest the two eldest have their own. This is something that takes years to complete and is added to for the entire academic life, if not beyond. There is fancy, and there is plain. I chose plain. Each child (and myself) have a binder. I took alternating pages of hole-punched copy paper and lined notebook paper and stacked them. This way, on each two-page spread (century) you have blank paper for illustrations or clipart and lines for listing.
I started at the back. Each 2-page spread has the dates across the top for that century. I ran mine back to 4000B.C.
When we read something or study anyone, it is put on a list through the week. On Friday, we have a set time to update Books of Centuries. Sometimes my elder daughter has read about someone my younger has not. It is a true record of what she has learned and cares about, so I do not force her to enter anyone or anything she doesn't want in there. If she feels like spending time on it, she draws a picture and I help her write a caption small enough. Otherwise, the entry is made on the lined paper--date and event.
Simply Charlotte Mason has a free download of this nature, and there are lots of resources online of variations. I do have the Homeschool in the Woods clipart this year because I think my children will appreciate the pictures. I encourage you to begin--and keep one for yourself, or if you are anything like me you will be itching to put theirs together:)
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Have you looked at Megawords? It's base level is 4th grade. I am using A&P right now but am hoping to use Megawords at some point. It's focus seems to be polysyllabic words.
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Hope that Helps
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For anyone who's done the notebook style timeline, how do you get a sense of the time between events? Or is that secondary to gaining a feel for the order of events?
We use the "Book of Centuries" timeline books (I use a binder) that Charlotte Mason used in her schools. We add in anyone we study or learn about, not just history studies. Once a week, we get out our Book of Centuries and I ask who they care enough about to add in? I don't make them make entries, because I want it to be something that they care about. One child chose to add in the artist Diego Valesquez, another did not. I just bit my lip and let it go because for whatever reason, that artist didn't make much of an impression on the second child.
As to realizing the passage of time--I see it beginning with my 8-year-old after just one year of entries. It is the fact of having to turn all.those.pages. to get anywhere. For example, she has entries for Diego Velasquez and Bach on her 1600s page--but then flipped a few more to put in Laura Ingalls Wilder as she read Little House in the Big Woods. Not that big of a deal. But, when we are thumbing through several centuries (pages) to get back to Ancient Egyptian studies' entries, suddenly the enormity of the time between started to dawn in her eyes, and frankly, mine too!
So we now have snippets of conversation that sound like this: "Mom, I thought the Laura books were a long time ago, but they are just one and two pages away from when I was born. That's not really that long ago, is it?"
I like the idea of the big timelines, but it isn't feasible for us. I am happy to have found a way for us to enjoy a timeline that works for us in the long-term.
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You and your children are going to be ok! You will find your stride--
1st grade- phonics-I get all my stuff from donpotter.net My children love Word Mastery, and I love Webster's syllabary to teach how multi-syllable words work. You can also download Blend Phonics from his website, which is a good program to run through in first grade to make sure all the phonograms have been taught. Enforce good pencil grip when teaching cursive--historically children were first taught cursive and there is a lot of evidence out there that it makes a big difference-- pick some good little poems that develop "Men with Chests" as C. S. Lewis says, and use those for copywork.
3rd grade-we switched from RightStart because of the same reasons you mentioned. Don't let anyone talk you into settling for less than mastery of math facts. The whole point of the arithmetic years is to build a firm foundation for higher math. Understanding is important, yes, but so is practice. So is getting to automaticity so when they get to higher math, they have free working memory for the process instead of being stuck using a calculator or getting bogged down in computation. I started my struggling second grader (just last year) on Prima Latina, had her memorizing poetry, and then using those pieces for copywork. When that became easy for her, I started the CM approach to studied dictation. That worked wonders. I am not advocating a full CM reading/spelling philosophy, but in conjunction with what we were systematically doing, it helped cement writing mechanics and made her start putting spelling into practice. She flourished without the pressure of having to come up with her own words. This year I am using Memoria Press's core curriculum. I needed a year of orderliness, without scrounging around for a hodgepodge of curricula, and I have seen the benefit of Latin already. You can call MP and actually talk to people who will help you place your children; they are amazingly flexible with putting together packages, and my daughter is bursting at the seams to begin. She needed some orderliness in her life, too. It is very late and I apologize if I came off too strong. I better go to bed.:)
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And as a former math teacher, I respectfully disagree with posters who say memorization isn't important. Working memory can only handle so much. For a student to do higher math that also has to process math facts or relationships between decimals/fractions/percents, s/he has to have a calculator. Can you imagine anyone saying understanding the sounds of the alphabet is sufficient for reading fluently? The student may have the concept of alphabet, but not the practice to automaticity--and math facts are the same way. Working memory must be free to process the higher math--either the person has to KNOW the computations quickly or use a calculator, or gets lost. That is my honest observation from seven years of teaching math to many children from 4th grade through 7th grade.
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I have a different take on Common Core than many of the previous posters. As background, my eldest is a rising 3rd grader. I started researching homeschool options from the time the child was 3 1/2, and learned so much about phonics from Donpotter.net. Then it was time to decide on math. I was a public-school teacher by trade. I have experience with Saxon, Everyday Mathematics, and Pearson. I was drawn in by claims by RightStart Math. I loved the idea of the Asian way of naming numbers. I knew children I had taught didn't really grasp place value, didn't know their math facts well, and didn't understand fractions, decimals, and percentages. However, it is easy in elementary to get tunnel vision and say concepts matter more than learning the facts. I liked teaching Saxon 5/4, but I thought the K-3 options were too fussy. I didn't like Earlybird Kindergarten math that I tried. About this time RightStart published their 2nd edition, which aligned with Common Core. I wore the poor lady out at Rainbow Resource! People were grabbing up all the first editions they could, and I didn't know which to buy. She read through level A Table of Contents with me and basically the main differences at that level were minimal. CC-aligned added a few things in that were not there previously. So, I chose 2nd edition.
If I had one child, it probably would have worked. We would have played those games "for fun." It didn't happen, however. I was trying to keep my head above water with the other skills, and all I could manage was to get through the minimum. Fast-forward to level B and my child was still having to think hard about her math facts that equal 10--and this is not a slow child; she does math going down the road looking out the window.
Additionally, RightStart is teacher-intensive. You have to sit right there, leading the child through it. There is very little chance for the child to practice anything alone. I knew I needed something different. We worked flashcards. I tried Ray's Arithmetic, which really would be great, but the print was tiny and therefore I felt she was going to need me to read it to her all the time.
By that time it was summer and I had decided we were going to use Memoria Press, leaning heavily toward Rod & Staff math for mastery that has good, scripted lessons AND chances for them to work independently. But, to try to get her caught up, I bought Math Mammoth 2A & 2B Addition and Subtraction. Oh. My. Word.
I trusted the book and made that poor child do all these "strategies" for simple addition facts--she hated it, I hated it, I was bewildered but made her do it anyway because all the reviews were so high on it! Last week, talking to a friend whose son has worked through RightStart A-C, I mentioned all these strategies. She asked if it was Common Core. Duh!
That was the problem! She said when all that came up in RightStart she just skipped it and taught her son the common sense way--he totally loves math and is excelling--but the key to his success in RightStart is the fact that his parents use the curriculum as a tool, not their authority. I, however, cringe at the thought of not doing what the directions say and my daughter suffered for it. I came home and told my daughter she could just add--she didn't have to work through all these strategies when the answer is quite simple, and she hugged me!
Since you use MP already, read the article "Why Johnny Can't Add" from their website. It made so much sense to me after my experience, and I hope it helps you, too. We will be using Rod & Staff math, which is NOT just "kill and drill" as so many reviews through the years had led me to believe. The teacher manuals are goldmines for someone unsure about math. The materials are uncluttered. AND they actually promote the same famous idea as RightStart-that instead of counting, one should practice seeing sets of numbers. RightStart calls it subsidizing; Rod and Staff didn't call it anything, but I recognized it from the directions in the first few lessons. HTH
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I would add the Shoe books by Noel Steatfeild (no, that's not a typo.)lol
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So I can't hyperlink for some reason, but check this out:
kidzone.ws/cursive
I have used these to teach two children cursive first. I printed each page. Lower-case is first, based on how the letters are formed, not in alphabetical order. It makes so much sense. My kindergarteners both would give out about halfway through a page, and I didn't push it. We would do the first half one day, second half the second day, and then after awhile, the third day I would flip it over to the blank side and write with a highlighter. Then they could trace with their pencil over my highlighter. I was just making up words using words consisting of review letters. It took almost the entire year to get comfortable with lowercase, and then we began on uppercase. I started with A, O, C because they are nearly the same formation as the lowercase.
And the customizable tracer pages could be where you reinforce his reading practice.
There are fancier things out there, but I liked cheap and do-able.
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If your library has a decent website, they should display the list checked out (including history) under your account.
For privacy reasons, they should not. I didn't even know it was an option, because I assumed they did keep track once and asked for help remembering a title I wanted again. The librarian told me it was against the law for them to keep that information. Once the book was checked in, it is off my record. I just took her word for it! I wonder if it is a federal law or changes by state, or as a previous poster said, you have to give permission first.
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This is why I've moved to recording them. I seriously couldn't take it anymore. It was stressing everyone out. When we do dictation, I record it on the iPad. They use headphones. I know part of the purpose is to build up to getting better at not repeating it and this allows them to repeat it as much as they need, but they've gotten faster and faster at it since we started that.
1. This is a great idea and I will be using that IMMEDIATELY.
2. Your quotation about the 5-act tragedy in blank verse had me cackling. :)
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I can't speak to how Catholicism or Protestantism is handled in the later books, but the Guerber books (newly edited and revised by Christine Miller of Nothing New Press) are wonderful so far. We enjoyed The Story of the Ancient World and I am about to read The Story of the Greeks this year. Memoria Press uses The Story of the Thirteen Colonies in their 7th grade curriculum, and they have many happy Protestant and Catholic users.
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Thank you for the Penny Gardner lists. My daughter admitted sheepishly that she was bored with Genesis because she gets so much of it, from everywhere, and as she begins having private Bible reading time she wanted to read from Acts. This was perfect. I just copied that part of the list over to Excel, made a quick column for her to check off as she reads daily (she feeds off that kind of thing). She can keep it in her Bible--so simple, so do-able. I am hoping that I can read the same excerpt aloud to my 1st grader and we can discuss it altogether. We will see:)
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Hi. I am working on putting together my long range plans for the school year. I want to be more organized in my approach to reviewing materials with my elementary students. I am planning to review things like lists from grammar, geography, Bible verses, foreign language grammar forms, math facts, history time lines, science information, etc...
Have any of you found online or developed any of your own plans for this type of thing?
I am thinking of making a table with alternating the information to make sure I get to the things that need review.
Have you seen the Bible memory verse method proposed at Simply Charlotte Mason website? Many people adapt this for anything and everything. It is a box system, so it works well with index cards or flashcards.
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What is BSGFAA?
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My daughter started in Prima Latina in 2nd grade last year (using the DVDs because I was intimidated), and loved it. Hands down favorite part of her day. As I began to research the path to take from there, I found that there is more to the different programs than just presentation. There is a whole philosophy behind what they do. For example, Memoria Press's Latin programs focus on memorizing the grammar forms and such, keeping the vocabulary small so the learner can focus on what was historically considered of first importance. Vocabulary and translation come later, when the student is comfortable with the forms. It is based on Henle.
CAP bases their program on Wheelock, which was a text written to serve a lot of men coming back from war and getting to go to college on the GI Bill--several of whom had not studied Latin previously, not thinking they could afford to go to college. So, it pushes translation quicker and has a larger vocabulary sooner. So, students in this path are mentally having to do more things simultaneously with the language.
Some argue for Henle--that it leads to longer-lasting success and students can feel a certain rest in climbing that mountain and seeing attainable goals being met. Some argue for Wheelock--that working that long without being able to actually read something in Latin is defeating.
I looked at many of the other programs online, but really honed in on these two, and got copies and looked through them. We chose Memoria Press. Their support staff is outstanding (not to say the others' aren't, because I don't know), and there is a forum on their website where many homeschoolers post--and even support staff monitor those and respond on a regular basis! So helpful. Plus, because the Latin grammar is easier to understand than English, my children are learning about parts of speech in Latin-killing two birds with one stone--. I can lighten up on abstract English grammar for awhile and just focus on capitalization and punctuation and things like that.
I hope that helps you as you continue to look and figure out what will serve your children best.
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We are about to use the Memoria Press set mentioned above for 3rd grade, as well. I plan to supplement that with good old-fashioned tracing. Reading The Core by Leigh Bortins, I was struck by how simple and enjoyable memorizing a map could be. I also have been blessed to have seen an older homeschool mother use a technique from Charlotte Mason that worked really well, and jives with classical education.
She handed out labeled maps and we were supposed to study it as she read, letting our eyes find the places she was mentioning, tracing the path as it was described (she was reading an excerpt from a travel writer). Then she let us discuss it. "What did you notice?", etc. Then she took our labeled maps from us and gave us unlabeled maps. We were asked to fill in as much as we could. I was astounded at what I could remember, and I could tell I was not the only one who was surprised!
Then she gave us back our labeled maps and let us compare, then fill in what we wanted to add. She said she did this for any new region, nation, whatever. In the workshop we were studying South Africa, which I promise I had never looked at in-depth before!
All that to say, if you want your child to memorize the states and capitols by region, Memoria Press.
If you want them to be able to map it, The Core will line out a cheap and simple solution for you.
If you want to add the dimension of experience and can't take them, you might like the third technique.
Hope that helps,
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I am not ahead of you; I am right with you in the trenches, but my plan for this upcoming year is to use Phonics Pathways, starting at the final blends (milk, belt,) and have my 8-year-old write it until it is easy. Not moving on based on a M-F week, not a test of Friday, new list on Monday-none of that. Just, "Copy and read this page until it is easy." Then we will move on. I am trying mastery approach for her. I saw her labor to sound out "Jun 17 ded-line" today and was just happy "line" had an ​e.
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So it's absolutely not something that can be done in the home? The closest group to my new house is 75 miles away, that's barely doable during summer, I can't see even attempting it in the winter :-(
I was part of a CC Community for one year.
The second year I tutored my daughter's class.
The third year I had a new baby and along with it being a difficult drive for us I just didn't want to make the time commitment to a group. You absolutely can use the materials at home. K-6 (Foundations and Essentials level on the CC website) have the same memory work, so it is easy on a family. Download the songs or whatever you are planning to use, or go through the curriculum guide suggestions and print out whatever you are going to use to reinforce the memory work through the week, and enjoy yourself.
Now, the website portion that you join is expensive (I think $50ish-per-month) if you are not a part of a community group, (that price drops to less than 10 if you are part of one) but still, if you get your ducks in order and refill your printer ink, you could join for one month and go through all the files members have uploaded for community use. Download the memory songs you want to use, print off the copywork, or mapwork, or whatever--and then quit the site. You get all your materials for the cost of one month.
I never used the app, so I don't know what all is on that.
They sell audio cds that set most everything to music. Some things are just chanted, but my kids still learn it.
We keep it in the car. They ASK for it.
We have been out of group now for two years, and my children still ask for CC materials. We have the timeline cards and timeline song that are their favorites.
HOW to encourage independent play with an extrovert? Help!
in General Education Discussion Board
Posted
Laughing because I typed desperately "introvert mother homeschool" a few months ago and found a slew of pages of mothers like me . . . and you! My eldest will complain that her little sister (2years younger) won't leave her alone and I just have to bite my lip to keep from saying, "That's how I feel about you!" lol. But seriously, two years ago, when she was 6 and the 2nd one 4, I used that to build a bridge. I realized that when I felt my boundaries pushed and needed time alone and couldn't get it, I was getting strung out and unnecessarily cranky--especially in the afternoons. I just told her, "I feel my boundaries being crossed. I need quiet time." And she could accept that for a bit without perceiving it as a rejection of her personally. Because before, when I would tell my daughters to go play, they perceived it as rejection and it hurt their feelings.
I have noticed that mine bicker when they have too much time together. For us, it has come to needing more to do. At the first hint of bickering, I find a job for the one that most needs to be removed. Mine are folding and putting up laundry, their rooms have never been cleaner, I have them trolling the house for the toddler's toys, vacuuming with our little hand-held vacuum cleaner, scrubbing grout lines in the tile with a toothbrush (just a small, manageable spot), helping with meal prep, setting the table, and now that school has started again--flashcards!
I am also carrying extra weight and need to exercise, so I have been trying to be proactive and seek them out when I want to exercise, or dance around the house, or fold laundry, or whatever, so that they aren't always seeking me out when I actually need quiet time. It seems to help satisfy some need in my daughters for me to ask them--and they usually happily run off afterwards for a little while. (a whole ten minutes! lol)