Silver_Kitten Posted January 12, 2013 Share Posted January 12, 2013 I've been looking at prepackaged curricula for seventh grade. All laid out and just ready for me to buy it. Oakmeadow 7 minus the math. or Sonlight core D+E adding in science and already have math. Versus me pulling everything together again. The past two years I've tried piecing together our curriculum and it's never really worked out. My daughter seemed to enjoy the five years we were using a prepackaged curriculum, but it moved to slow and the science wasn't very good. So I'm really trying to figure out if want to use all in one, or something close to it, or piecing together again. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dana Posted January 12, 2013 Share Posted January 12, 2013 If you use prepackage but throw out parts, you're still piecing together. Is it possible to buy parts of prepackaged? Exclude science & parts you don't want? Will it be more expensive to get prepackaged & additional? (Trying to talk you out of it! :) ) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lang Syne Boardie Posted January 13, 2013 Share Posted January 13, 2013 Well, you did something that worked (although not ideally) for five years, and then for two years you did something else that never really worked out. I think you should go back to the thing that worked. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Murphy101 Posted January 13, 2013 Share Posted January 13, 2013 Hmmm. Those are really different curriculums! I have no idea what you should do. What prepackaged program did you use before? Could you use it again, only go faster in it and change the science? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Silver_Kitten Posted January 13, 2013 Author Share Posted January 13, 2013 Hmmm. Those are really different curriculums! I have no idea what you should do. What prepackaged program did you use before? Could you use it again, only go faster in it and change the science? Curriculum Services is what I used before, it was great for k-2nd, 3rd grade was okay and 4th grade was getting redone and I never got the rest of science for the program and the program was starting to go really slow. I look at the samples of the program and I'm like why do I want to bore my daughter with that. She is very hands on and the only hands on it has are maps. So now I'm always looking for curricula that is hands on and creative, add in that she has now found reading fun. I'm looking for a reading curriculum that has hands on components. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Murphy101 Posted January 13, 2013 Share Posted January 13, 2013 If that's the case, I'd go with Oak Meadow over SL. SL is not very hands on at all, IMO. Especially the reading component. Somewhere around here, I have OM7... Hmmm. If I ever only use what I have, I could probably go years without buying anything other than math. :/ Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Matryoshka Posted January 13, 2013 Share Posted January 13, 2013 Hmmm. If I ever only use what I have, I could probably go years without buying anything other than math. :/ :lol: I wouldn't even need to buy math... :lol: Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Silver_Kitten Posted January 13, 2013 Author Share Posted January 13, 2013 Maybe OM 6/7 Adding Irasshai Japanese and Lial's PreAlgebra.... Oh I don't know if I want to go back to an all in one, but it seemed so much easier. If I didn't do OM. I'd be putting together America The Beautiful Vocabu-lit Real Science 4 Kids + added kitchen chemistry Essentials in Writing Easy Grammar with Daily Grams 7 Lightning Lit 7 Perplexors Irasshai Japanese Lial's PreAlgebra Artistic Pursuits Typing Plus reading aloud to her brother Trying to plan it all out is making my head spin. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Murphy101 Posted January 13, 2013 Share Posted January 13, 2013 I don't see an issue with that plan. Those materials aren't hard at all to plan out. Just get a planner and fill it in. I bet it comes together easier than you're thinking it will. The lightening lit and daily grams are self assigned daily. I'd ditch the vocab. A good reading and writing program and foreign language makes a seperate vocabulary redundant, IMO. RS4K is approx a chaper a week. (the level 2? This might not be enough for an entire 7th grade science...) I made a print out of lials daily assignments so I wouldn't have to keep figuring it out for each kid. I'd suggest doing that for approx one chapter at a time. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Silver_Kitten Posted January 13, 2013 Author Share Posted January 13, 2013 I don't see an issue with that plan. Those materials aren't hard at all to plan out. Just get a planner and fill it in. I bet it comes together easier than you're thinking it will. The lightening lit and daily grams are self assigned daily. I'd ditch the vocab. A good reading and writing program and foreign language makes a seperate vocabulary redundant, IMO. RS4K is approx a chaper a week. (the level 2? This might not be enough for an entire 7th grade science...) I made a print out of lials daily assignments so I wouldn't have to keep figuring it out for each kid. I'd suggest doing that for approx one chapter at a time. RS4K has Focus on Middle School Science I was going to use biology for the rest of this year. Chemistry and physics 7th grade adding in kitchen science. Astronomy and geology 8th grade year adding weather and sky mapping. With my plan for Lial's it was easier to plan out then I thought it would have been. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AimeeM Posted January 13, 2013 Share Posted January 13, 2013 I'm no good to you. I look at the pretty packaged deals all year, wistfully, thinking how nice it would be to have everything laid out for me. I go to the MP website... daily... lol. I could never do it; my dd is too all over the place (a year behind in language arts, one-two years ahead in math depending on the curriculum, several years ahead for science)... but it would make my life so much easier. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Murphy101 Posted January 13, 2013 Share Posted January 13, 2013 Nm. No point leading someone down the curriculum path. ;) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Silver_Kitten Posted January 13, 2013 Author Share Posted January 13, 2013 Nm. No point leading someone down the curriculum path. ;) I love looking at curriculum, I can only buy it once a year though. I am starting to rethink going with OM7, it looks like a wonderful easy and fun year, but what I have picked out could be just as fun. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Silver_Kitten Posted January 14, 2013 Author Share Posted January 14, 2013 Well, talking with my daughter we are going to tweak Sonlight to fit us. She likes the selection of books, and I've found arts and crafts to go along with it. She finally told me that America the Beautiful would have been too much like a text book for her. So Sonlight Core E with Trail Guide to US Geography and Experience US History. Adding Essentials in Writing 7 and Daily Grams 7 to finish language arts. Science is going to be Real Science 4 Kids, with added activities. Logic Perplexors since she enjoys them. Japanese since she wants to learn it. She looked at Oakmeadow, said yes, then looked at the sample then said no. So we will never be only pre packaged again, add and subtract to make it work for us. Now that it's figured out I'm DONE looking! I'm not sure if that will actually happen, but since we know what we want, I'm done looking for 7th grade. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
swimmermom3 Posted January 14, 2013 Share Posted January 14, 2013 Well, talking with my daughter we are going to tweak Sonlight to fit us. She likes the selection of books, and I've found arts and crafts to go along with it. She finally told me that America the Beautiful would have been too much like a text book for her. So Sonlight Core E with Trail Guide to US Geography and Experience US History. Adding Essentials in Writing 7 and Daily Grams 7 to finish language arts. Science is going to be Real Science 4 Kids, with added activities. Logic Perplexors since she enjoys them. Japanese since she wants to learn it. She looked at Oakmeadow, said yes, then looked at the sample then said no. So we will never be only pre packaged again, add and subtract to make it work for us. Now that it's figured out I'm DONE looking! I'm not sure if that will actually happen, but since we know what we want, I'm done looking for 7th grade. May I make a couple of suggestions? We used Core D+E for fourth grade and enjoyed it, but even at that age, the "spine" (The Story of the USA - 4 volumes) was too simple. The Landmark Book of American History is excellent and you could round it out by reading volumes 5-10, or 6-10 in Joy Hakim's A History of US series, which would be more appropriate for a seventh grade student and definitely more interesting to read. The Trail Guide to US Geography is an excellent resource and you can use the student pages for additional hands-on-work. It is a good place to teach research skills. If your daughter is into crafts and likes to color, cut, and cook, add one of the Time Travelers units from Homeschool in the Woods and ditch the workbook. There are four units for 1850 and after. Be sure to look at the sample weeks. If Amy Pak, who creates the Time Traveler units, has made these four along the same lines as her earlier ones, much of her text comes from Hakim's books, so you could probably replace vol. 6 on the Civil War with the Civil War Time Travelers unit. Core E is a good core, but your daughter is at the higher end of the recommended ages. Tweak it a tiny bit and you both will have a lot of fun. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Silver_Kitten Posted January 14, 2013 Author Share Posted January 14, 2013 May I make a couple of suggestions? We used Core D+E for fourth grade and enjoyed it, but even at that age, the "spine" (The Story of the USA - 4 volumes) was too simple. The Landmark Book of American History is excellent and you could round it out by reading volumes 5-10, or 6-10 in Joy Hakim's A History of US series, which would be more appropriate for a seventh grade student and definitely more interesting to read. The Trail Guide to US Geography is an excellent resource and you can use the student pages for additional hands-on-work. It is a good place to teach research skills. If your daughter is into crafts and likes to color, cut, and cook, add one of the Time Travelers units from Homeschool in the Woods and ditch the workbook. There are four units for 1850 and after. Be sure to look at the sample weeks. If Amy Pak, who creates the Time Traveler units, has made these four along the same lines as her earlier ones, much of her text comes from Hakim's books, so you could probably replace vol. 6 on the Civil War with the Civil War Time Travelers unit. Core E is a good core, but your daughter is at the higher end of the recommended ages. Tweak it a tiny bit and you both will have a lot of fun. I had forgotten about the Time Traveler units! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Recommended Posts
Join the conversation
You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.