Overwhelmed with choices

[Immi]

I *thought* I had an idea as to what curriculum I wanted to use next year for K, but the more I research, the less I seem to know! There are just so many options and seeing a sample page here and there isn't that helpful. I don't know any IRL friends who've been there done that, so I'm at a loss.

 

Could some seasoned parents here give me some tried and true options? Here are some factors that may influence what programs to use.

 

- My school-aged DC isn't the type who asks for school. In fact, just playing with mom all day would be fine and dandy. We've done a little bit of worksheet based work this year and it's seen as a drudgery. I don't want homeschool to be a bore or a chore!

- I have a newborn, so I'd like to use curriculum that doesn't require a ton of preparation. I am getting very little sleep as it is. :)

- Other asides: I'm open to whole programs or mixing and matching. And faith based or secular are both fine by me.

 

Really and truly... thank you!

[ladyinthegarden]

Ditto to what Sadie said. If you do reading lessons from a guide, teach them how to write their letters and numbers 0-9, count, play around with numbers with small addition and subtraction numbers, and read a lot of books you will be doing well. If you don't want to use a math curriculum, I am using a book called Kitchen Table Math Level 1 as a guide. I have The Ordinary Parent's Guide to Teaching Reading (it's like someone at IEW named that book..haha), the lessons are already written for you, it's very open and go.

[freeindeed]

I agree with the Five in a Row suggestion. I loved it and so did my children.

[desertflower]

You can go to www.dltk-teach.com for free letters and numbers printables.

 

Kindergarten is generally a relaxed year.  Phonics and math are usually whats covered.  i agree in that I would make it a fun year.  It sounds like your dc is not the workbooky type right now.  So a more hands on approach may be what is needed for your curriculums.  Logic of English and All about reading are both phonics programs for kinesthetic learners.  LOE (I think) has handwriting as well.

 

It'll be spring soon, so some nature walks would be great.  Here's my thread on what to do on a nature walk.  http://forums.welltrainedmind.com/topic/532224-nature-walks/?p=6006676

 

Reading lots of books/story time at the library, trips to the children's museum/zoo are always fun.

 

Here's soror's thread on some ideas for a relaxed math year http://forums.welltrainedmind.com/topic/499692-looking-to-do-some-relaxed-math-here-want-to-share-ideas/. 

 

In the beginning, it's a lot of work to determine what's a good fit for your family.  Good luck and enjoy!  :)

[Rosie_0801]

MEP R and CSMP K would be good choices for a small person who isn't big on worksheets. Both are available free online. :)

 

http://stern.buffalostate.edu/CSMPProgram/Primary%20Disk/Start.html

http://www.cimt.plymouth.ac.uk/projects/mepres/primary/#reception

[Jackie]

Agreeing that all you need for K is reading/phonics, math, and handwriting.

 

We used Bob Books for reading, with me teaching the phonics rules as we went along. My daughter is a natural reader and some kids need more intensive instruction, but this is a good place to start to try for relaxed phonics teaching. And we did it while cuddling on the couch.

 

RightStart Math uses manipulatives and games. When we did Level A, my daughter didn't even know there was a book or that she was "doing math". I would skim the teachers manual ahead of time to see what should be covered and then we would just "play with the math toys". As long as you spend a bit of time organizing the huge box of manipulatives up front so you can easily grab what you want, this is pretty open and go.

 

Just about any handwriting book will do. Just decide if you want to start with print or cursive and pick whatever you like. We practice writing the letters in shaving cream until she has the shape down, then we move on to pencil and paper.

 

FIAR is popular and we loved their book lists. For me, the amount of prep time and work I had to put in was far too much for the amount DD was getting out of it, so it just didn't get done here.

[Staceyshoe]

I would start with free/inexpensive and see if it meets your needs.  If not, you'll have a better idea of what you need in a curriculum before spending $$ on it.  We checked out some phonics books from the library (OPGTR, 100 EZ, Phonics Pathways) to see which worked.  All were great for my older son.  None worked for my younger son who needed color and interactive/play based lessons so I spent the money to get AAR for him.  We used Education Unboxed for math in K and gradually transitioned into Singapore when *I* needed something a little more traditional than the play-based learning.  (Education Unboxed was very effective with him though, and it's free.)  I printed some handwriting worksheets off the internet so he could trace, practice letters, and eventually start writing sentences including capital letter and a period.  What works beautifully for one family---or even one child within a family--isn't always a fit for someone else.  Sometimes you just have to dive right in and see what works or doesn't work and then go from there.

[HS Mom in NC]

Here's an old post I wrote about this and now use as an article in my homeschooling packet for new homeschoolers.  This is the kind of thing I think you need to focus on right now.

 

Preschool and Early Elementary Decisions

 The way to reduce insecurity is to know what your choices are and why you chose one over the others. That means homework up front and taking an active rather than passive role but it spares you the endless shifting sands of blindly accepting recommendations, experimenting with them, and then repeating the process over and over until you finally find something that works.  It saves time, money and energy in the long run and creates a more satisfying, cohesive homeschooling experience for you, your spouse and your children.

 

 It also gives you something intelligent to say when people question your decision to homeschool.  If you're not able to articulate what you're doing and why you're doing it the way you are, you're going to be very insecure when someone brings up the subject. 

 Since you're beginning at the beginning, you can take a deep breath and rest easy.  These are the early elementary issues that come up.  Focus on those first THEN look at curriculum. 

I would consider people pushing academics for any child under the age 6 in the same category (assuming their children didn't beg daily to learn academics.)

 There are 2 uses of the word preschool:

 

1) the time in a child's life BEFORE a child learns reading, writing, and arithmetic-usually under the age of 6 in our culture

 

2) a time when a child under 6 is learning reading, writing and arithmetic

 

There are different schools of thought on which is best for children in general and for individual children.  I suggest any parent starting out familiarize herself with the arguments for and against both and decide for herself what she thinks is best for her family and each of her individual children.

How much academics does she want for her kids? What kind of academics? How much exploring their interests? How much creative play?  How much free play? How much group play?  How much exploring nature? How much physical play?

 

Whether you choose academic preschool or not, I strongly suggest any parent (regardless of how they plan on having their child educated) start a read aloud routine.  There are plenty of excellent resources out there for finding quality books at the library and at book sellers.  Here are good books to help you find good books:

 

1) Honey for A Child's Heart

 

2) Books the Build Character

 

3) A Thomas Jefferson Education (the book lists for different age groups in the back is excellent)

 

You can also google award winning children's books for book lists. Start with the American Library Association’s website.

 

My husband and I read aloud to our kids from preschool-high school about 2 hours a day (not all in one sitting.)   Search this website [The Well Trained Mind Forums] for read aloud information, suggestions, and book recordings. It's one of the most important and neglected aspects of education in America-even among many homeschoolers. There are book recordings for parents who want someone else to help read aloud to their kids and for kids who aren't reading fluently yet but want to be read to constantly.

 

There are a couple of categories for teaching reading.

 

1) Look Say (often mislabeled whole language) which is memorizing each word by how it looks.

 

2) Phonics which is memorizing the sound each letter and each letter combination so each word is sounded out enough times until a child memorizes it by sight.

 

Familiarize yourself with both schools of thought and decide for yourself which you want to do and why. The vast majority of homeschoolers choose Phonics. Different Phonics curricula vary to some degree.  The most immediate difference is whether the letter names are taught first or only the letter sounds (and the names aren't mentioned.) Ruth Beechick explains why letter sounds first are preferable (both in the short and long term) in her book A Homestart in Reading.  Most other phonics approaches choose to do the letter names first. The other huge difference is how many sight words are taught in the Phonics program.

 

Having a good solid grasp of the two approaches will make you a more savvy shopper.

The other big difference is that some phonics programs include spelling along with phonics instruction.  Decide if this is important to you or if you’d rather start spelling later after a child reading fluently.

 

 

Different children are ready to learn to read at different ages.  My oldest (17 and in college now) learned to read fluently between the ages of 4 and 5. By her 5th birthday she could read any of the books in the house like an adult.  My middle child (15 and in college now) wasn't ready to learn to read until she was almost 8.  We got out the phonics when she was 6, did 2 short 10 minute sessions per day for a couple of weeks.  Nothing stuck.  We put it away for 2-3 months and repeated the process until it did stick. By the time she was 11 she could read fluently like an adult.  My youngest (now 8) was ready when she was 6.  She is a very strong reader, but not fluent like an adult yet. She'll get there when she gets there because we're voracious readers around here.

 

When it comes to math there are different approaches out there:

 

1) Most people learned to do math in a very symbolic way (counting pictures or on their fingers and adding written out numbers.) This approach emphasizes rote memorization more.

 

2) Others incorporate a concrete representation of what's written on the paper with what are called "manipulatives."  Read about why and how they're used and decide if it's for you or not.  There are variations in curricula that use manipulatives and some also add in drawing some sort of representation of the thought process going on (putting groups of things together, taking a larger group and making them smaller groups, etc.) First they emphasize the concrete representation until it's mastered, then they focus on memorizing math facts for speed.

 

Decide for yourself which you prefer and why then you won't have to waste your time looking into curriculum that is clearly not a good fit. You can look into the different curricula that do things the way you know you prefer. 

 

Writing has different schools of thought, styles and priorities when it comes to the mechanics of writing.  Some start earlier and some later because of their views on brain development and the development of fine motor skills.  Then you have to decide which style of handwriting you want.  What is your goal?  Beauty?  Legibility?  Speed? Easier transitions between print and cursive/italic script?

 

When it comes to writing in the sense of putting ideas on paper in understandable ways, there are two approaches:

 

1) Narration based writing.  Children listen to something read, then they put into their own spoken words what they remember.  In the early stages a parent writes down what the child said out loud and the child copies it on paper.  Later the child does all of it on their own.

 

2) Not narration based. There are lots of different approaches with different techniques and priorities.  Some are more formulated than others.  Consider the arguments for and against teaching writing according to formulas before you invest a lot of time and money into an approach.

Narration is a skill developed over time with practice. Generally speaking, there are two different approaches, Parts to whole and whole to parts.  Decide if it's something you want to do.  Decide if you want to do it exclusively or in combination other approaches.

 

School at home or not?

 

There are roughly to two big categories of homeschoolers:

 

1) People who mimic school with pre-packaged curriculum like institutional schools use.  All subjects are segregated, they use grade levels, they use workbooks/textbooks that require the child to fill in the blanks, write short answers to questions at the back of the chapter, answer multiple choice questions, do a test at the end of the week, etc.  They tend to have their children doing seat work several hours a day, etc. They usually follow a schedule like the local schools do during the day and throughout the year. This type of person is usually doing a grading system of percentages and letter grades.

 

2) People who don't do school at home.  They use other types of materials, they often avoid any sort of grade level mindset at all (most consider it a way to slow children down) and assign different kinds of assignments that require different levels of thinking.  They have a tendency to look for approaches and materials that are more customizable and that are more flexible in nature. They tend to prefer what they call "living" or "real" books over workbook/textbooks.  They sometimes integrate subjects together.  Sometimes they do subjects, like formal logic, not done in most packaged curriculum. They often have multiple children at different developmental levels studying the same core content at the same time, but doing different levels of study and assignments. Some focus more than others on their children's individual interests and build an education around it.

 

What do you think of the typical education in America? (Or wherever you live.) Are you interested in doing the same at home or do you want to do something different?  Do you want to do a mix of the two? If you're interested in different, what kinds of different do you want and what kinds don't you want?

 

General Questions

 

What are your priorities for your children's education?  What are your goals for them by the time they're done with High School?  How structured do you want to be?  How hands on?  How much flexibility do you want built in?  How much of your child's interests do you want to include? How much of their childhood do want them sitting in a seat?  How much in the field? What does your spouse say about these things?

 

Having a general idea about these kinds of things makes choosing what to buy and what to do much easier to decide. It also helps you ask better questions when looking into your options.

 

[StartingOver]

For K we got Bob Books, Ordinary Parents Guide to Teaching Reading, Hand Writing Without Tears PK book, Miquon math with Cuisenaire Rods ( The wooden ones are best ). And read tons to them. Make it fun, keep it short. Playdoh, blocks, chalks, shapes, colors, just play ! 

[Hkpiano]

I agree with the Right Start math recommendation. It doesn't take a ton of prep and feels much more like playing. Very few worksheets involved and tons of fun manipulatives!

 

We're doing a combo of The Reading Lesson, Bob Books, Explode the Code, and Handwriting Without Tears for my K DD. We keep it short but her reading is progressing and she is enjoying herself, so I'd say it's working so far! :)

[sewingmama]

Here I am again to promote my favourite K program LOL.

 

We are using Moving Beyond the Page 4-5 level. Very age appropriate...not a ton of worksheets. My boy who is not keen on lessons at all will willingly do most of it. The books are awesome and it doesn't require much planning beyond gathering resources. You can also buy the activity box that comes with it and then you don't even have to do that...it comes with every last thing you need.

 

It doesn't include a phonics program so you can choose your own to use.

 

I just made a fresh post on my blog of our Unit for this week...I didn't list ALL the activities we did...just the ones I remembered to take photos of.

 

www.movingbeyondthepage.com

 

It doesn't have to be that costly. I can borrow all the books from our library. I skipped the activity box as I have most of the supplies on hand already or decent substitutions. I use the online version so all up the program cost me $50... well worth it.

[PeterPan]

Well I'm just gonna come in and voice a little dissent on something.  With the new Common Core standards you're distinctly unwise to do *nothing* for K5, unless your "nothing* happens to be a lot of living math, enriched environment, and learning to read.  Our area (not a swanky school district either) tests all INCOMING K5ers the first couple days and they're immediately put in remediation if they can't already read.  

 

Seriously.

 

Don't jump on some bandwagon of old standards.

 

As for what to use, that's totally personal.  Almost any of the popular options on this board would work for you.  If it hasn't been mentioned, MFW (My Father's World) K5 is charming, easy to implement, complete, and FUN.  

 

Just for your trivia, my dd, who is anti-workbook and not one to love school overall, has funny definitions of school. Turned out she really LIKED certain things (history, art, history!) and had sectioned them off in her mind as not school, even though to me they were.  So with her the trick has been making sure she does the things she needs to and still has time and energy to get to do some things that turn her on.  So that might mean making extra effort to bring in some history or science to spark him, and that effort can carry over and make the rest of the day seem more pleasant.  It wasn't so much that she minded doing what I needed done as she regretted not getting to do the other stuff.  So add that stuff in every day, very consciously, even if it's just for 15 minutes, and see what happens.   :)

 

Fun things I add with my ds who's K5 age?  K'nex kits (the new red tub of 52 models lets you do one a week!), FIAR books (not daily, just as desired), more K'nex kits (science like bridges), science videos on amazon prime and from the library (lots). I just got him the BJU online science and history gr 2 and he's liking them.  This is the stuff that turns him on.  Dyslexia remediation, not so much, lol.  Have you seen the Djeco art kits Timberdoodle sells?  They're a little pricy, but they're fabulously easy to implement and make good memories.  He still enjoys fingerpaint.  I have lots of puzzles.  I have the Sonlight early core read alouds and we look the places up on the beautiful eeBoo maps.  They're so pretty, he'll just stand there and study them.  

 

So not necessarily all that every day, but SOMETHING fun each day for just a few minutes.  :)

[Syllieann]

I agree with OhE about it being unwise to do nothing, unless you are actively unschooling in a way that has the child learning a lot. Aside from standards, all learning is based on what has already been learned. However, what you do should ideally involve a lot of hands on and active learning. For kindy level, I like right start math and all about reading. Both are scripted and open and go, so easy to do if you are in a sleep-deprived zombie-like state.

 

The magic school bus videos could be kept on hand for times when you need a quiet self-led educational activity for the older while you take care of the baby or catch some shut eye. I like the read and find out series of science books too. My favorite science curriculum is bfsu but it will require some proplan ing so you might not be up to that. Nancy larson is open and go, scripted, with everything in the box. It is expensive, but you could consider it if you don't have frequent library access or the inclination to search out good books.

[pehp]

My advice is not to overthink this!  I would just implement a tiny routine after breakfast and chores and dressing.  Do some basic reading/phonics if ready for that (lots of options there; in kindy my son wasn't really ready for really reading, so we read the Cat in the Hat and One Fish Two Fish many, many times, and reinforced letter sounds), play store with pennies or play with c-rods, and *maybe* a little copying of a letter here or there, on a dry erase board even, to get the idea of the letters. Half an hour or so.

 

Otherwise, read engaging books at different times throughout the day!