new at CC this year, any suggestions?

[moriah]

Hi, I am doing CC this year for the first time. We are doing foundations. My son is 4th grade. I have just joined the group and I am relieved it is a structured homeschool group (until now I have belonged to parent led groups which is very time intensive). I have not read much about how you implement the program. I would like any input on how teacher moms are implementing CC. What books out of the suggested titles do you think are best with the history, what is your strategy for teaching and review. Do you study the countries that the curriculum goes over ? how long on average does it take you in your day to do? Is there one reference book that describes CC the best? I won't be able to go to a conference until they offer one sometime in the Spring.

 

Thanks,

Moriah

[dsmama]

Hi! I am new to CC, too, but have had a chance to go to training and also read L Bortins' The Core, which outlines her plan at the end of the book.

 

I have made a schedule using SOTW2 and God's Design for Science to go somewhat along with the CC schedule, and I've shared it with many here. Feel free to PM me with your e-mail.

 

As for planning, I hope you get a lot of ideas. Here's my plan:

--CC is Mondays. No other school work, as we are there until 3:00 (I tutor Essentials)

-- Each day Tues-Friday -- CC review, math, language arts, read-alouds

-- 2 days each -- science and history

 

Hope this helps!

[dsmama]

:lurk5:

[Adrianne in TX]

We are new to CC this year also. This is our 4th yr homeschooling so the way I am integrating it is:

 

M-W LA (ETC, WWE, FFL, Reading comprehension and Wordly Wise//OPGTR(for my 7yr old-WW for 8yr old) Math U See, Sing Song Latin/Minimus Latin (we started SSL last yr and got lazy) Religion, SOTW-we are ahead, Science basket of topics and CC review

 

Thur-CC (foundations) then at afternoon program Legos, games and SOTW story and crafts ( I am allowing CC to do the SOTW crafts as reinforcement and the science project every week with home reinforcement from library/home books, and art-but will also add art free from the National Institute of Art (you can mail away for art prints and DVD for free and composer cds we have)

 

Friday- see above but lighter then park day or field trips or a monthly science program from our Nature and Science center

 

Yeah with TKD, American Heritage Girls, Cub Scouts and Choir, plus above --we are very busy

 

Join the CCC if you arent already--bunches of info on it to take and use

Edited September 3, 2010 by Adrianne in TX
added last comment

[Goldilocks]

My biggest frustration before starting CC was that the history sentences and science questions were not going to line up with what I already had planned for our homeschool. One of the mothers in our group reminded me that at the grammar stage, we want our children to be exposed to the "grammar" of history and the "grammar" of science, and geography, etc. So reading about Charlemagne at home one week, memorizing a history sentence about him three months later, and finally having the requested library book show up one month after that was actually preferable to all those things lining up in the same week. It gives the child more and more information to hang on the Charlemagne "peg" in their minds.

 

I know that wasn't really what you were asking, but I know that it can be stressful trying to make everything coordinate. This advice really helped me last year and I hope it helps you too.

[Hedgehogs4]

i wrote a lengthy blog post about CC not long ago. I have gone through various stages of thinking about this, and have come to some conclusions about how i plan to use it this year. (see coming full circle with CC) i also have a 4th grader in the program. we are going to be using CC as our spine for history and science. i intend to coach him to try for memory master--i want him to make a serious attempt at it. i am of the opinion that the system is helpful for building in not only facts and "pegs" into the memory of children, but also for teaching self-discipline and mastery, for taking responsibility for things. my dd 5 will learn much through osmosis. she already knows many of the history songs from this cycle (it was the first cycle we did) and she was only 2 at the time. go figure.

[Beth in SW WA]

We are starting CC this year also (dd 6 & 7). I am using this as a supplement only -- and will not attempt to 'line-up' CC memorization with our other studies.

 

We start next Wed. Excited!!:001_smile:

 

Our curriculum is listed in siggy.

[SBP]

We're no longer in CC, but we were for five years, and I never made any attempt to correlate what we were studying at CC with what we were learning at home. I just added CC like it was it's own subject, 'Memory Work', and had my children spend 20 or so minutes a day reviewing. On the weekends, I would make them a CD of their memory work, repeating each thing 3-4 times and instructing them to repeat after me, say it with me, etc. (I started this in the early days when the CD's that CC puts out were either awful or nonexistent. Later, they remade the history songs so that they were kind of catchy, and I did use those, but I still just recorded my voice for most of the other subjects.) Once that was done, I added it to their daily schedule, and they would put on the headphones and listen to their memory work for that week. It was a great thing for them to do on their own, while I was working with the sibling, and sometimes I'd add in other memory work I wanted them to do, or poetry, which CC doesn't cover.

 

For geography, we used Sheppard Software a lot.

 

Hope you enjoy your CC experience :).

 

SBP