Just a general "How is your school year going?" thread...check in

[Halcyon]

I wanted to know how everyone is doing now that we have hit about midway through the semester. Any changes? How's your attitude? How are your students doing?

 

We are doing fine here. I have eased up on my students in the sense that I am less concerned with "getting stuff done". I am trying to focus on the pleasures of homeschooling, while at the same time making sure that the work they DO complete is done well. So that means that instead of getting through X amount of Henle by Thanksgiving, I am giving my student fewer questions but telling him they must be done very well (we had run into an issue where I was having him do many more questions, but he was making errors on half of them, and it just wasnt working). So we aren't getting as much done (which gives me a little agita, to be sure :lol:) but what he is completing is getting done well, and he is retaining more. With science, we are doing a lot more living books and tying them into CPO Life Science. Again with the agita because I am a "by the book" kinda gal but I am trying to relax. Older seems to be happy with the arrangement.

 

With younger, I am also allowing more flexibility in HOW he achieves certain goals. He is my student who loves variety, so I am bringing in lots of different resources for each subject. For math, he is using BA 3B, MM, CWP and some printables from Scholastic. Oh, and Labyrinth. For science, he is using Creek Edge Task Cards, living books, Sassafras Science (not a fan), the Stuff of Life, and I just ordered Evan Moor Daily Science Grade 3 (thanks Hunter for reminding me about this!) For grammar, he is using KISS, Comic Strip Grammar and some online resources. For Latin, he is using Lively Latin and Minimus but also making games up.

 

Our big change is that Fridays are now almost completely devoted to projects of their own initiative. This week, older wanted to bake muffins so he found his favorite three muffins online, got one from Grandma for blueberry muffins, and spent most of the day baking. Younger is building something in Minecraft and he convinced me that it was educational :glare: Last week, younger made beaded necklaces for friends and read a lot.

 

I am also trying to take more time for myself to exercise and cook.

 

In a weird way, I feel like if I overthink what I am doing I might get all stressed out that we are not "doing enough" LOL so I will stop there.

 

:bigear:

[Runningmom80]

:001_huh:

 

We are trying to find our groove. It's seeming like a unit studies approach is what's going to work here, just trying to re arrange some things, and prioritize.

 

 

The one thing that is going great is our switch from SM to MM. We finished 2A in 6 weeks, with no fighting! I just ordered CWP, to add to 2B, and then I'm hoping we can move to BA, and we won't be waiting for 3D.

[Halcyon]

:001_huh:

 

We are trying to find our groove. It's seeming like a unit studies approach is what's going to work here, just trying to re arrange some things, and prioritize.

 

 

The one thing that is going great is our switch from SM to MM. We finished 2A in 6 weeks, with no fighting! I just ordered CWP, to add to 2B, and then I'm hoping we can move to BA, and we won't be waiting for 3D.

 

We made that switch in 4th!!! It was a good call for us, too. Glad it is working out for you. My younger really likes BA, but doesnt like that he cant get all the answers right the first time.

 

 

Unit Studies works for my younger too, particularly for Science, so I am trying to roll with that.

[Mommy22alyns]

I have to admit that I'm dragging a little bit. It might be our current circumstances. I'm looking forward to Thanksgiving week off, but we just had a week off in early October.

[Halcyon]

I have to admit that I'm dragging a little bit. It might be our current circumstances. I'm looking forward to Thanksgiving week off, but we just had a week off in early October.

 

Why are you dragging? :grouphug:

[MrsBanjoClown]

Things are going pretty great here, for our first year. The boys are loving being at home. Ds5 finished ARFH K and will be starting A next week. He will be finishing SM 1A the week after Thanksgiving, and starting 1B. Ds8 is a little "behind" schedule on SM 2A, but he is doing very well. I have just added in a lot of extras, so it is taking him longer. I feel like I need to do some more fact practice with him, too. They are loving SOTW Ancients. We do need to wrap our chicken mummy, as it has been ready for a couple of weeks now! Ds8 is also really enjoying VP self-paced OT/AE. BFSU is going great as well. We are on the lesson on magnetism and magnetic fields, and I actually ordered a kit from Home Science Adventures. We are taking about 3 weeks on this lesson, so it is going to affect how far we get in BFSU this year, but they are enjoying all the projects and activities in the kit. We are taking a few weeks to review our Latin by using headventure, because we are up to the Christmas words and I want to wait until after Thanksgiving to start those.

 

I have let Salsa Spanish slide a little. We haven't been watching the episodes like I planned. Ds8 is still plugging along in PLL, Easy Grammar, and R&S Spelling. He seems to love them. I'm just happy to get them done! Ds5 is doing fine with his reading, but I am at a loss as to what I am going to do with him next year about it.

[mama25angels]

I have to admit that I'm dragging a little bit. It might be our current circumstances. I'm looking forward to Thanksgiving week off, but we just had a week off in early October.

 

 

:grouphug: we are dragging too. I'm really frustrated with school right now and I think we're going to have to make the switch to unit studies as well. We did switch from SM to Mastering Mathematics, because we already owned it.

[suzielou]

 

Glad I am not the only one! Right now all 4 of mine are playing that game. Last week they discovered that if you put two of the same kind of animal together and then feed them some wheat, hearts appear and a baby spawns. I did let them know that it was just a game and it didn't work like that in real life. LOL They have designed elaborate houses on graph paper and then built said houses. I guess that is somewhat educational.

[AmyontheFarm]

I told hubby I felt like we were dragging a bit. I told him I was exhausted trying to keep the older ones on track, the younger ones were no problem, but they were standing around at times waiting for the older two and I to stop our "discussion". How on earth did I raise to politician/debaters?

 

Anyway, he told me to make a list of what I needed this weekend. I told him, a clean house and some chores had to be reassigned for my sanity. I was tired of being the chore police to an adult.

 

He stepped in and did it. My house hasn't been this clean in a year. It wasn't terrible, I would have allowed any of you in to visit (who wants a visit to Ontario??) I just wouldn't have allowed you past the main living areas.

 

I feel so much better now!

 

When we started homeschooling I slowly added another subject a few days/weeks at a time. So, this past week we have finished our SOS Science 4 and SOTW 1. So, I'm looking forward to a new curriculum come Tuesday. Hubby is done his major farming so I'm delegating the older two to him. Whenever they start up, I'll send them to Daddy. That will teach them! :lol: Maybe they will start to realize that I'm the softer one of the two parents when they want permission for things they want to do! LOL

[edeemarie]

We are having a good year so far- really looking forward to our break in December so that I can spend some time just being a mom. We have some special things planned for our break (mostly Christmas-y things) and I can't wait!

 

I have found out this year that I absolutely can not do a boxed curricula (I think we have tried them all anyway!). I spend some time planning some homemade history and science that we will start in January. I am hoping for good things since I was able to plan around what the kids like and how I like to teach.

 

Most of what we chose for this year (minus the boxed curricula for Bible, science, and history) is working well- thankfully!

[Χά�ων]

Meh. Just not feeling the love this year. DS is in 3rd grade but cannot read due to severe visual and auditory processing problems. The goal this year was to address these areas for reading. Which is great except the vision therapists do not get why he can't read and comment every.single.session about how his not being able to read makes it hard for him to do the activities. :banghead:

 

I have had some health issues and science and history have become very very dry. Read this answer these questions. Repeat. We both hate it but I detest every history curriculum aimed at his level and I am not at a point where I can continue to pull together everything from scratch like I have in years past.

 

Math is a struggle. DS understands the concepts but is not as fluent as I want so we are back tracking to focus on fluency of math facts. He is convinced that he is not in 1st grade again.

[texasmama]

In a weird way, I feel like if I overthink what I am doing I might get all stressed out that we are not "doing enough" LOL so I will stop there.

 

This is me.:tongue_smilie: I've already been through one round of freak out so far this year. I expect one of these about quarterly. I should schedule them in along with everything else.:lol:

 

Mostly, we are doing well. We all are mostly enjoying our history study of ancients, and our language arts programs seem to be working well.

 

Singapore 6A has convinced me that I need to find another math program for my kids after SM level 6, which was a very valuable nugget to learn.;)

 

I am relearning grammar through Rod and Staff level 5 right along with my oldest ds.

 

Co op classes (science and Latin) are going well. I am amazed at what my kids retain from Latin.

 

If anyone is neglected, it is my youngest student, but she is still progressing well.

 

I have most of my materials collected for next year. (Do I get extra points for this?) :D

 

I wish we had a bit more flexibility in our schedule, but my two days a week of work don't allow that. Not going to complain, though, because our current schedule is light years ahead of our previous one when I was working full time.

[lorisuewho]

 

We are doing fine here. I have eased up on my students in the sense that I am less concerned with "getting stuff done". I am trying to focus on the pleasures of homeschooling, while at the same time making sure that the work they DO complete is done well.

 

 

 

With younger, I am also allowing more flexibility in HOW he achieves certain goals. He is my student who loves variety, so I am bringing in lots of different resources for each subject. For math, he is using BA 3B, MM, CWP and some printables from Scholastic.

 

 

Our big change is that Fridays are now almost completely devoted to projects of their own initiative. This week, older wanted to bake muffins so he found his favorite three muffins online, got one from Grandma for blueberry muffins, and spent most of the day baking. Younger is building something in Minecraft and he convinced me that it was educational :glare: Last week, younger made beaded necklaces for friends and read a lot.

 

I am also trying to take more time for myself to exercise and cook.

 

In a weird way, I feel like if I overthink what I am doing I might get all stressed out that we are not "doing enough" LOL so I will stop there.

 

:bigear:

 

 

I loved your post.

I feel the same.

My main readjustment so far this year is to RELAX!!! Stop freaking out, stop pushing, and enjoy homeschooling. And like you, I'm learning to go with the flow and add in variety and not feel tied into one curriculum.

 

I love your project Friday idea. I already am dedicated to exercising, but I think if I could just ease up on homeschooling I would have time to enjoy cooking and baking again. :001_smile:

[AnnaM]

We are doing ok. I have had to change a few things up that I really thought I would love, but it's ok because we like the new stuff better. We are a bit burnt out on Ancients since we started it last year, and are also over Astronomy, but we will finish the Astronomy this week.

 

My younger one INSISTED on being involved this year so I purchased him some pre-k stuff and as much as I fighted starting formal school with him, he is really enjoying it. He only does it for about 15 minutes so it hasn't been too much extra for me.

 

The biggest deal is that my oldest was not thriving on the computer based math we were using so I had to swap to a more teacher intensive program. Math takes us at least an hour now, BUT she is thriving on it and that is what matters.

[Paula in MS]

We are a tad bit behind where I wanted to be because of some health issues, but I feel like we are catching up.

 

There are several things that are working for us this year (5th grade). After agonizing all summer about what spine to use for logic state ancient history and which resources to pull together, I decided to not coordinate anything which is working wonderfully. I had the CC timeline cards, veritas press cards, SOTW 1, and Usborne Encyclopedia. Trying to coordinate all that was a huge headache. She is retaining so much more by just working through each resource separately. We might cover something in CC a couple of weeks before we hit it in the Encyclopedia. SOTW comes when it comes. It is like continuous review. We have talked about the Indus River Valley Civilization, for example, three times instead of just one week. She retains more each time she hears about it. I love how this has worked. Simplicity at its finest. Nothing to coordinate. (It also allows me to go in order with SOTW and use the tests which is working out well.)

 

We are also using IEW Ancient theme workbook which is more reinforcement for history. It has been a definite hit. Her writing has improved dramatically. We are actually on schedule here.

 

My dd is a very reluctant/late reader. Things have picked up in that regard because I am requiring a lot more reading....science reading (Apologia), history reading, independent reading. Everything is in small manageable chunks but adds up to a lot. This is one reason we are using SOTW again in 5th grade, because the reading level is so manageable.

 

We are behind in Math. I just can't settle on a curriculum. :glare: Seems like I switch every year.

 

We are using Abeka for Grammar. It is getting the job done but is not exciting at all. (We are not doing the writing assignments.)

 

We are behind on our read-alouds. We can't seem to finish the Golden Goblet. I need to get on that.

 

Paula

[acablue]

We've taken a massive step up this year from what we'd been doing (which was really just math and reading) and all three of my kids are loving it and asking for more. It's kind of crazy to me, but I'm rolling with it! I suppose I'm coming at this from the opposite side as you, because I'm naturally pretty relaxed about, well, everything. :tongue_smilie:

 

Our outside science class was a flop, but we've found our groove with Elemental Science. Story of the World activities and extra reading aren't getting done, so I've decided to give Sonlight a try after Thanksgiving. If that goes smoothly, Song School Latin might be the next addition.

 

But the biggest change this year has been in James. Last year, he was a total jumping bean and had no interest in learning to read. The only thing that got done consistently was math. This summer, he realized he was the only kid in his group at camp who couldn't really read (he was also the youngest) and decided that he absolutely has to know how by next summer. Peer pressure at its best. :D

[Aurelia]

We're doing pretty well, I think. We're behind in history and art, but Ariel is clipping along through math without much trouble, and we're finally getting Our Island Story done again. At the rate we're going, we should actually finish before she graduates! (It's been over a year and we're just now up to Henry II. We wouldn't even be that far if I hadn't bought the audio book.) We just finished the book we were using for geography (A Child's Introduction to the World), so that will free up a little time during the day, until we add The Complete Book back in, but that will be after Christmas, most likely. DD is experiencing holiday brain fallout, which makes me :banghead:, but it happens every year between Halloween and Christmas, and she should (pleasepleaseplease) be back to normal by early January. For now, to preserve my sanity, we've dropped Latin and I've pulled out her old Dancing Bears book, until she can remember to LOOK CAREFULLY :cursing: at the words she's reading and remembers what a noun is. At least this year she hasn't forgotten how to spell her own name. Again. :001_huh: :lol:

[WIS0320]

Pretty much everything I planned is going well but we are not getting to as many "extra" fun hands on projects that *I'd* like to do because we are busy with extracurricular activities. But all the core stuff is being completed and progress is being made.

 

I have opened things up a bit this year (it's only 2nd grade...) and I'm using Main Lesson books a la Waldorf for my daughter to choose what she thinks is important or interesting that we've learned and to choose her own artwork and copy work from her materials. We are also doing more student led arts and crafts. Sometimes these projects just look like a big fat mess to me but I'm trying to embrace the process and not the end product. It's hard!

[Farrar]

The project idea is nice. We're just so overscheduled right now that I can't implement anything. Ugh. That's the big negative for us this fall.

 

Mostly things are good otherwise. Math is sort of stuck a bit because one of my boys knows his times tables, but not well enough to move into division fully and he's finished all the other 3rd grade material I had. We've been doing some geometry projects and some drills and spinning our wheels a little. Language arts is mostly good (Go Bravewriter!) and my crazy bad speller just started AAS to try and remediate the spelling that his brother is picking up and he's just not and that's going well. History is fun, science is always excellent. So overall, we're doing okay.

[3Blessings]

First year of full homeschooling is what I expected: start with some ideas, change, and then change again.

 

But I think we're finding our groove. One thing that was completely unexpected was how much my dc love Greek! And it is fun for me, too! I am hoping to introduce Latin in February.

 

One thing I am still working on is making TOG work for us. I love it, but I feel like I paid so much for it that we MUST use it every day. I need to start a different thread to ask others with more experience about it.

 

Thanks for this thread- it has been fun to see how others are doing.

[Mommy22alyns]

Why are you dragging? :grouphug:

 

Thanks. It's probably because we've been in a very dire financial situation since about mid-September. It's really wearing on me in a major way (I already have anxiety/depression). I'm questioning DH about our ability to buy Christmas presents. :(

[mytwomonkeys]

our year is going really well so far:D. for the first time, i'm actually not using a writing curriculum with either of my children. this approach is very new for me, but it is working so much better for us. i do use comprehensive composition by kathryn stout as a guideline, and i like it a lot. i'm considering doing the same thing with science and history (i own those by kathryn stout too)...but i'm not quite there just yet. too chicken still. i feel like things are going really well though & we've found our groove overall.

[napualani]

Dd (5th grade) and I got off to a slow start this year due to a two-week trip to take care of a friend in need. When we returned home we both needed a few more weeks to recover! We are in good shape with Easy Grammar and Math U See, and she has gotten a good start with Writing with Skill and is starting week 9, I believe. I never quite solidified her history curriculum. During the summer I thought I would start History Odyssey Ancients, but then decided to finish reading the SOTW series, and that was as far as I got. For science she has ScienceFusion as her spine, but she's not crazy about it. She attends a science club once a week, which gets her doing experiments and fun activities with a group of kids. Her math is supplemented with IXL and a once-a-week math club where she learns some mental math tricks and practices Math League word problems.

 

We've only been homeschooling for a year, and she misses school and being around kids all day. She shadowed at her brother's middle school a couple weeks ago and enjoyed it tremendously. So, I feel I have to beef up history and language arts so she will be prepared to go back next year. I wasn't prepared for that decision, and aside from test scores I need to provide a narrative of what we've been doing to the admissions committees for the schools she'll apply to, since I don't keep grades. The rest of this school will be interesting!

 

Darlene

[mytwomonkeys]

Our big change is that Fridays are now almost completely devoted to projects of their own initiative.

 

this has been a change for us as well! i feel like we never have enough time in the week for the really fun stuff & i'm trying to cram it all in. so i switched friday to be that designated fun day! we have music, art, family sports, sewing, home economics, etc. they still have to do their math lesson, but apart from that, it is designated for all of the other fun stuff!:)

[ladydusk]

Thanks. It's probably because we've been in a very dire financial situation since about mid-September. It's really wearing on me in a major way (I already have anxiety/depression). I'm questioning DH about our ability to buy Christmas presents. :(

 

:grouphug::grouphug:

[ladydusk]

This is our last week before break! We've had a very good year, I think. (We run on a calendar year from January to Thanksgiving.)

 

I am planning on changing things up a *lot* for next year. I'm a bit dissatisfied with the choppiness of our days and our disconnectedness from one another. We've been doing Circle Time together, then switching into a schedule where I assign work to two children and work with one at a time for an hour or so apiece. It's worked OK. I want something better.

 

I'm hoping to integrate grammar and writing more into our history, science, and geography (using the wonderful skeletons from WWE and FLL) and work together a whole lot more next year. We'll still need to do math on a more one on one basis, but I'm hoping to consolidate and shorten so we get to content more consistently and enjoy being together and building relationships better. I think this will work because all three can now read (hooray!) and they're stairsteps in age: no one is hugely ahead of the others in most of these areas.

 

I've a lot of planning to do over our Yuletide Session, though!

[Jpoy85]

The Friday Fun day sounds neat!

 

Our year is going. Its going up and down. Sometimes we dont get everything done and sometimes we get everything done.

[PentecostalMom]

Feeling behind because we moved twice in the past six months, and that doesn't include a two-week period of us living with my MIL for three weeks.

 

Kind of just getting into a groove and starting full force tomorrow adding things in. That reminds me, I need to get off of here and make a list for dd. She has been asking for three weeks for a checklist. I really need to get my workboxes organized again and that would take care of this list request!

[mom31257]

I'm enjoying this year with ds. The main focus has been on math, grammar, writing, and reading novels. I'm leading a co-op class using IEW's SWI-A as well as a monthly book club for his age group in our homeschool group. He has a friend come one day a week for fun projects in history, science, and art. We're also doing world geography and health that day.

 

My goals for science and history have been more about enjoying it than retaining lots of information. I'm just not sure how or when to switch that over because ds has the potential to be a strong math/science student. Being a somewhat typical boy, he doesn't "love" school work and would love it if he could play all day.

[liamtaylorsmom]

Well, this is a tough one to answer. Overall, okay, I think. We have several factors playing into that answer right now. This is our first year HSing. DH is on his 4th deployment. We are supposed to move at some point this year overseas. Right now, I'm staying with my parents for a few months and doing a ton of travel so that adds into some of the stress. Looking forward to heading back home after Christmas.

 

I have two big challenges right now. DS1 is struggling with Math a bit. He'll have a good day and then a horrid day, so it's inconsistent. We are currently using Singapore 2A but I ordered the first two light units from CLE to try with him. They should get here any day. Our other big issue is that I feel like some of the love of learning is lost. Not sure if that's just the age, though. He's in 2nd grade and I may just be missing some of the more fun Kindergarteny type things that I loved to teach (I was a Kinder teacher). We're using Sonlight and I feel like it may be a bit too "heavy" for us....just a bit graphic and I'm not sure how I feel about it. I miss doing projects with him and feel like I"m not doing great about doing a lot of the hands-on things (art, science experiments, projects, etc). I've actually been looking at other curriculums like Oak Meadow and HOD to help maybe "lighten" it up a bit. Not sure what to think about all that.

 

That being said, we're getting it done and doing well overall. It's just not as "fun" as I would like it to be for him (not sure if that makes sense).

[TengoFive]

We are really just getting started with our year. I have a hard time schooling through the first trimester. Luckily we do school up through the end of July, so we aren't too far behind. It's going well now though, and we have found our groove. We have some new things we're trying this year, and they seem to be working. I'm a happy camper!

[FairProspects]

Tough year. Tough.

 

Remediating LDs takes much, much more time than I ever could have anticipated and we are overscheduled this fall. Neither kid is even remotely independent and no one can read fluently. I pretty much hate teaching reading and I'm terrified my 2nd might be dyslexic too, even though I know it is too early to lose sleep over it yet.

 

We are killing it in science and history, which are about the only bright spots. Oh, and maybe grammar too.

 

I wake up stressed, and I go to bed exhausted. Many days I just want to give up but there is no solution to this problem except time and more work, and patience. Sorry, wish I could be more positive, but that's all I've got right now. :tongue_smilie:

[Mukmuk]

We're doing well, the best in years actually, as I s-l-o-w-l-y get the hang of understanding and working with DS, and as the various therapies he's had come together. For him, it's always been his way or the highway, and although I accommodated as much as I could in the past, I had residual hangups that I had to let go (someone pry my fingers from the door).

 

The past week, we stopped our daily routine and started math practice for AMC 8. It was a lot more grueling than we both thought, but he's enjoying himself. He now wants to only do math after the contest. I'm thinking through how we can swing this, to both sate his appetite and to cover the basics for language and science (yes, he wants to drop science :glare:). Loads to think about ...

[amyrobynne]

We've made a lot of changes (first year homeschoolers) and all of those seem to have been for the best (math, science, 1st grade writing, music, handwriting). For the last couple weeks, I've felt this nagging feeling that I have to get through all the scheduled everything while the rest of me says, "It's Halloween/All Saints/All Souls" or "It's Election Week". It's okay to skip science and learn about elections for a week! Or skip catechism to learn about All Saints and All Souls Days! I always hope we get to more things than we really do and I need to stop planning so much so I can stop feeling guilty about it.

[Mommy22alyns]

Well, this is a tough one to answer. Overall, okay, I think. We have several factors playing into that answer right now. This is our first year HSing. DH is on his 4th deployment. We are supposed to move at some point this year overseas. Right now, I'm staying with my parents for a few months and doing a ton of travel so that adds into some of the stress. Looking forward to heading back home after Christmas.

 

I have two big challenges right now. DS1 is struggling with Math a bit. He'll have a good day and then a horrid day, so it's inconsistent. We are currently using Singapore 2A but I ordered the first two light units from CLE to try with him. They should get here any day. Our other big issue is that I feel like some of the love of learning is lost. Not sure if that's just the age, though. He's in 2nd grade and I may just be missing some of the more fun Kindergarteny type things that I loved to teach (I was a Kinder teacher). We're using Sonlight and I feel like it may be a bit too "heavy" for us....just a bit graphic and I'm not sure how I feel about it. I miss doing projects with him and feel like I"m not doing great about doing a lot of the hands-on things (art, science experiments, projects, etc). I've actually been looking at other curriculums like Oak Meadow and HOD to help maybe "lighten" it up a bit. Not sure what to think about all that.

 

That being said, we're getting it done and doing well overall. It's just not as "fun" as I would like it to be for him (not sure if that makes sense).

 

:grouphug: CLE was a lifesaver for me. We tried Singapore, but it was a crashing failure. Math was a battleground and I was convinced that Becca just wasn't good at math. We started out using CLE as a supplement and it made things so much more better that I switched altogether. And Becca is grasping concepts, transferring them outside the curriculum, and acing her tests.

 

What year of SL are you doing? Kids thrive on different things, but the hands on activities, crafts, etc. are a huge deal here. SL also didn't work for us. Don't be afraid to switch things up if you need to; that's what the first year is for!

[FairProspects]

The past week, we stopped our daily routine and started math practice for AMC 8. It was a lot more grueling than we both thought, but he's enjoying himself. He now wants to only do math after the contest. I'm thinking through how we can swing this, to both sate his appetite and to cover the basics for language and science (yes, he wants to drop science :glare:). Loads to think about ...

 

And ds wants to drop everything but science!:lol:

[Tanikit]

Here we school January to December so we are coming to the end of our year and will take a good break over Christmas which is our summer time. My DD5 will then enter what is the equivalent of kindergarten, but she has been doing kindergarten this year - her reading has come along very well and she is almost finished Horizons K - we should finish before we break. Handwriting will need some work next year but she does know how to form all the letters. I am happy with what we will be using next year, however I know that things can change fast at this age and I will also need to adjust for wherever my youngest is (she will be 2 early next year) and how we can fit both school and toddler in together - especially one who will probably be dropping naps very early like her sister. I still want to find the eldest a sport to do for next year.

[Mukmuk]

And ds wants to drop everything but science!:lol:

 

:lol:

 

It must mean we're both doing something right! Just different things!

[Incognito]

I feel like we don't do nearly as much as we could/I want to, but we do somehow keep moving forward in our cirricula and the kids are learning lots. We have a few too many activities (I knew that when I planned it, though), and my baby isn't as easy-going as I expected her to be (funny how that can happen :) ), so I think that is why I don't feel "in the groove".

SOTW is a big hit, especially with my DD. My DS LOVES LOF.

[queenie]

So far so good! Our school days are much better than last year! My 2nd graders attitude is so much better this year! My only complaint is not being able to fit in some of the fun extras because I overscheduled our outside activities.

[Annabel Lee]

Bad. Horrible. SO SO SO far behind. As in the kind of behind in the thread titled "How far behind is really 'behind?'" Is the light at the end of the tunnel maybe just a train coming at me? I just have to keep putting one foot in front of the other. I have dealt with serious health issues over the years, and on top of that, we've been sick with what the Dr. says is a milder form of pertussis since mid-September despite being vac'd for that. The major health issues were not flaring up as much by September, but then we got sick. There are many subjects for which we haven't even touched our main curriculum yet this year.

 

Sorry to be such a downer. Hopefully after a month or so I can give better news that we've made good, solid progress.

[TheApprentice]

It's going pretty well this year. I've had to make some changes with science. Middle ds is using PLATO Life Science, which is working out well. Our days were just too long with "checking the box", so I slowed the pace down on some things, ie. Latin and Vocabulary.

 

We have our good days, when the boys are so on focus that they get their work done with no drama and in a timely fashion. And then we still have days when they complain about their work and those days drag on. But we are having fewer of those.

 

My high schooler has found his groove with his work, although he feels it's too much, but he's doing a great job.

 

None of them are those "lover's of learning" and I don't know how to get that back considering there are things we just have to do. But we are on schedule and I haven't had a revolt yet.;)

[2_girls_mommy]

I am very happy with the way things are going here, with maybe the minor exceptions of art and music. More on those at the end.

 

We are doing science and Latin through co-op, and I have also outsourced for art a bit, and dd10 had a 6 wk robotics course. I am teaching the latin classes at co-op for both, so they get the fun of the class and the good peer pressure, and then we work all week at home. Plus we started a "latin club" one hour a week to work on things not covered in MP's latin. We do projects and games there.

 

I am loving our science this year too. Both take a class at co-op. DD10 is doing a P.S. 6th grade text which actually goes way deeper than anything we have done so far. They do all of the hands on and equipment stuff there, and the reading and writing is assigned for home during the week. Then she uses the living books I bought as supplements instead of as our main curriculum as originally planned. Works out well.

 

Little dd's class is more classical in nature and I attend the class with her. She is using Apologia's zoology, though we don't use the text, just the notebook. The teacher does some projects in class, talks about the subject, reads books and show videos. Then dd8 and I pick up library books and read during the week and notebook about what we learned. It is going great, and I have no science planning to do! It is a welcome break.

 

Art, well dd10 is taking a class at co-op, though it is really more fun than anything else. It isn't continuing the skills we had been working on with DWC for the last few years. But I can't fit it in right now. Plus both are taking a short term after school program art class right now.

 

We have been doing a few projects at home, but not a lot. DD8 in fact just last night pulled out supplies and worked on a really good project and needed some help remembering some of the skills we learned in the past, to enter something in a contest she read about. So for now I will just keep that up when I can. Hopefully it will be more and more. And we still read about art in context with history and learn about it that way. I just have always scheduled more hands on art time at home in the past.

 

Music: piano has actually been dropped this semester. I took on 2 babysitting children this semester after a brief attempt at an outside part time job. Something had to give. I want to get back into it during the holidays and then get practice on the schedule for the new year. We have still been singing together, and both will perform in the Christmas pageant at church soon. So it isn't like there is no music...

 

Academics, everything at home is moving forward. No complaints.

[Karen in CO]

My year is different and tough, but I'll smile and say it is good.

After younger dd perfectly read the first few chapters of Trumpet of the Swan, I was convinced that her vision problems were gone and she was on her way to being truly fluent. Instead, I found out she has an amazing memory and terrible visual processing. I did a full-stop on homeschooling to focus on getting her eyes to focus together while she moves them across a page. She's improving, slowly. It is important to have priorities that make sense even if they don't match with your original plans.

[sassenach]

I changed nearly everything this year. I dumped Phonics Road, which I am realizing did a great job with foundational spelling and grammar, mostly because level 3 was soul killing to ds. LA was a little haphazard for the first quarter. I wasn't quite sure how to balance all of the approaches I've read over the summer (Writer's Jungle, Charlotte Mason, Classical, oh my).

 

Ds was getting frustrated with the WJ freewheeling feeling of writing, so we just switched to Writing Tales, which I successfully used with my oldest years back. So far, so good. We're also using MCT and using the odd PLL/ILL lesson. I think we've struck a good balance.

 

On the other hand, dd is my creative LA lover and is thriving on the WJ approach. I decided to use PLL as is with her, along with lots of WJ style projects.

 

The biggest LA change has been the move away from history centric reading to more classic lit. I can really see my kids finding joy in the beauty of language. I also watched Teaching the Classics over the summer. While I'm not doing any hardcore lit analysis with the kids, it has built an awareness of lit elements that have created a natural flow if discussion. Our read aloud time is so much richer than in years past.

 

Science has also been on the loose end. A little BFSU, a little Science in a Nutshell. I think living books are actually what's missing for us. I MUST start scheduling those in.

 

History is Mystery of History, which is meh, but I refuse to get sucked into a history centric mindset this year. Something has to take the back seat and I've decided it needs to be history this year.

 

Math is going great. Singapore really works for my kids right now.

 

We do art at co-op. Zero foreign language is happening, latin or otherwise. I just can't get us there. It's something I'll need to revisit at some point.

 

Overall, I'd say we're having a good year.

[Luckymama]

I think the year is going quite well :001_smile:

 

We're relaxed yet rigorous at the same time :D If dd spends four hours on math but doesn't touch English or science one day, that's fine. If she spends hours rereading the entire LOTR trilogy and doesn't do any geography, that's fine as well. It all evens out during the week or month.

 

It seems like dd has taken another leap forward with math and science. She has flown through AoPS Counting and Probability (we stopped at Ch 10 and will resume after more algebra). I have to order Geometry and Number Theory soon. And in science, we're almost done with Middle School Chemistry greatly supplemented with a high school chem book. She's reading a college non-major earth science text and a college non-major astronomy text.

 

She has not done much writing. Private flute lessons were scrapped because of her ballet (4x a week) and Lego League (2x a week) schedule. We will handle art with museum field trips in the winter and spring.

 

Right now we're investigating high school options-----the math/science charter school, her sister's high school, or homeschooling the whole shebang. She'd love to attend the charter but being out of district puts her into a lottery. :tongue_smilie: She would run out of advanced math offerings at her sister's school :tongue_smilie: I could handle homeschooling math and science and social science, could outsource foreign language reasonably easily, but have no idea what to do for English :tongue_smilie: Thank goodness she's in seventh grade!

[Dolphin]

I told hubby I felt like we were dragging a bit. I told him I was exhausted trying to keep the older ones on track, the younger ones were no problem, but they were standing around at times waiting for the older two and I to stop our "discussion". How on earth did I raise to politician/debaters?

 

Anyway, he told me to make a list of what I needed this weekend. I told him, a clean house and some chores had to be reassigned for my sanity. I was tired of being the chore police to an adult.

 

He stepped in and did it. My house hasn't been this clean in a year. It wasn't terrible, I would have allowed any of you in to visit (who wants a visit to Ontario??) I just wouldn't have allowed you past the main living areas.

 

I feel so much better now!

 

When we started homeschooling I slowly added another subject a few days/weeks at a time. So, this past week we have finished our SOS Science 4 and SOTW 1. So, I'm looking forward to a new curriculum come Tuesday. Hubby is done his major farming so I'm delegating the older two to him. Whenever they start up, I'll send them to Daddy. That will teach them! :lol: Maybe they will start to realize that I'm the softer one of the two parents when they want permission for things they want to do! LOL

 

Sweet Hubby!

 

Mine caught up on all the laundry, cooked dinner last night and did the prep for today's dinner.

 

We are doing well. I am sure we are technically ahead or behind in some subjects, but I am chillin and going with the flow this year. We are doing year round school, so we will get where we need to be eventually as long as we keep at it.

 

Soccer is over, so our schedule's are a little easier. We have had a little of the fall blah's, but we seem to get them every fall and I am not worrying over it this year (hence, it doesn't seem as bad this year)

 

My kids are also minecraft ones:D

[Peregrine]

This is our first year of calling what we do homeschooling (DS just turned 5) and it is going so well that I keep thinking I must be forgetting about something. We're falling into a good weekly routine. He's plugging through OPGTR, phonics, Math Essentials K, handwriting, etc. He finally got a point where reading seems like fun and spends his free time making lists of things and using post-it notes to label everything in the house. We're doing a sweep of American history via read alouds and crafts, and we're in the middle of the first Thanksgiving for now. Elemental Science is great. The theme this month is the properties of water, which even the toddler loves. Although we don't stick to the weekly lessons very strictly, we're enjoying the science play activities and just doing lots of read-alouds and hands-on experiments.

[mhaddon]

I went with K12 to make things easier on me. In many ways it is and I love some parts, but I hate the I have K and 1st graders that are working on different science, history, art, and LA. I feel I could combine those (literature) so my days are longer than they should be :( I'm not sure what I'm going to do after Christmas break, I need to decide. I do love that they days are planned and roll over and I can check off easily enough. The accountability is really what's kept me around.

[sixpence1978]

It really depends on the day :001_smile:

 

I would say overall it is going better than the past couple of years, but still lots of room for improvement. We have also switched up quite a few things, some of which I am still unsure of.

 

We began the year with Saxon 5/4. It was going okay, but I knew there was something off with the fit. So we picked up where we left off with in CLE last year and things are going smoother. Grammar has changed from BJU to Winston, back to BJU, and back to Winston. We just can't seem to settle in here. A&P isn't a liked part of our day, but definitely is a helpful part.

 

We began the year with BJU science, but switched to Sassafras. My DD enjoys it, but I'm not as impressed. This after not being able to afford NL, which is what we really wanted to do. We are going through the 50 states (too) slowly. But DD is enjoying that part too.

 

Spanish has happened once and art just a handful of times. We have only done 2 music lessons, but DD does take weekly piano lessons, so I'm easier on myself here.

 

Writing is still a huge thorn in my side. But overall, DD has really been picking up on things that previously stumped her. I've been proud of most of her work so far, which I definitely couldn't say last year.