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What are you doing for 7th grade?


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For 7th grade this year we will be doing a lot of unschooling.  DD is difficult to instruct and does much better on her own.

 

 

Social Science- Psychology- Not sure what resources we'll use other then a Coursera type course and library books that she picks out.  We'll discuss things she's learned and occasionally she'll write an essay.

 

Science: Anatomy and Physiology- because I insist she learns about something other then brain structures and function. We have the body book and coloring book.  I'll be getting the brain book and a model of the brain..... not sure what else to do to help her.  

 

Math- this is the only topic I'll do any direct instruction.  We'll go day by day through Lial's BCM with me reading it, then explaining it to her before we do problems on the board.  She has a "phobia" of math textbooks (I've only recently gotten over the same phobia :glare: ) so hopefully this way will work better.

 

Language Arts- I picked up Eats, Shoots and Leaves for her to read.  She's about 1/2 way through The Logic of English (the book not the curriculum).  We're going to do Adventures in Fantasy with about 10 books.  This is where I expect the most problems.  She already reads Fantasy Lit (and writes it) so she's going to fuss when I assign particular books and particular writing assignments.  She's very good at arguing so she may end up convincing me to let her do it her own way. Either way 10 books with discussion and a short story or two, or the first couple chapters of a book.

 

ASL- she'll actually be teaching her brother and I some vocabulary and grammar, while I save up the money to get her a real ASL class online.

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Pretty sure on most. We are going to attempt a weekly assignment schedule instead of daily. Hoping to work toward some independence and self direction. Monday mtg to go over his plan for the week until he is competent in organizing his time.

 

English: Oak Meadow 8,WWS,Analytical grammar season two. Lots of creative writing for fun. Hopefully a writing club to share his work with.

Math: Firming up prealgebra skills with MM and Zacarro. Moving to Algebra when ready, undecided on program.

Spanish: outsourced class

Science: Oak Meadow 8 physical science and interest led reading

History: interest led reading

Civics OM 8 with lots of field trips and volunteer work.

Speech outsourced class possible competition if desired

Introductory logic with Fallacy Detectives as an outsources class

Extras: dog training, baseball, sailing, fencing, soccer

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I figured I would chime in with what we did for my son this year in 7th...and what worked and what didn't...

 

Saxon 8/7- HATED it, huge colossal fail.  

Saxon Alg 1/2- LOVED it and doing fantastically.

AOPS with tutor- also loves it but we could not have done it on our own.

 

JUMP IN Writing- HATED it, decided to make up my own writing assignments using WriteSource handbook and really the whole year just wasn't very rigorous or challenging.  

 

Lifepac 7th grade - a lot better than expected.  My son definitely had some review, some new information, some food for thought and some interesting subjects such as sociology and anthropology touched on. However, the format of the course makes it less than rigorous, as it does not lend itself well to discussion or depth.

 

PAC Grammar- I don't think he learned much but it was great review, easy to use, easy to grade, and had some great moral stories that really sparked discussion and sharing.

 

ETA Science was Apologia Physical Science with Apologia Academy.  The academy made the course very challenging not so much in a good way.  Extreme attention to detail, requirements of literally 7 page formal lab reports as well as all labs in the whole book were required as well as regular lab repots for each one.  Tests were not too hard, and teacher graded fairly other than the formal lab report.  But the lessons were absolutely long and extremely mind numbing and teacher only covered stuff in the book, nothing else also she had terrible terrible voice quality.  It was a learning experience to deal with teacher, take an F and figure out how to do better on the first lab report, and follow a syllabus.  My son also greatly disliked Apologia textbook and is so glad to be back to Pearson.  

 

It wasn't such a hallmark year for us as far as school.  He did finish the HarvardX compsci course and a lot of other programming stuff.  

 

All in all, I would say that I recommend more complete grammar, writing, and literature courses. He will be doing Calvert this year.

 

 

 

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I figured I would chime in with what we did for my son this year in 7th...and what worked and what didn't...

 

Saxon 8/7- HATED it, huge colossal fail.  

Saxon Alg 1/2- LOVED it and doing fantastically.

 

 

What made the difference between 8/7 being a fail and Alg 1/2 being a success? Was 8/7 too easy? The steps to take before Alg 1 in Saxon confuse me. (8/7 vs the Alg 1/2)

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The books are absolutely different.  Saxon 8/7 had gobs and gobs of stuff added to it by the publisher.  Additionally I think Hake wrote it, not Saxon...

 

8/7 is:

Absolutely colossal.  It must weigh in at 7 pounds.  

Extremely slow.  Starts with 2nd grade math and reviews, with no additonal new topics all the way through past lesson 80.  So, your logic stage 7th grade hormonal student will be doing 2nd then 3rd then 4th then 5th then 6th grade math through something like January.

 

Also, it has too many problems per page, and when you add to that the mental math, it can easily take an hour and a half...which is particularly mind numbing since, remember it's all review for half the year!

 

Alg 1/2 reviews for just 20 lessons or so then goes right into new material, while reviewing all lower grade math the Saxon way.  The problem sets are shorter, there is more critical thinking, more logic, more geometry, more problem solving.  But, it's gentle and easy.  

 

 

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DD #1 turned 12 yesterday and will be in 7th in the fall. Woah.

She is exceptionally gifted with handcrafting skills, less so with math and analytical skills.

 

Bible: CLE Bible 700, Sunday School verses and papers, PBS

Language Arts: CLE LA 700, CLE Reading 700 and Teaching Students to Read Nonfiction, Rod and Staff Spelling 7 (I can't wait, it's a word roots study in the context of spelling.)

Math: CLE 500/600

History: Notgrass Adam to Us along with our 4th grade DD

Science: Still a bit undecided. Maybe The Rainbow (will they ship to Canada?). Or a very different approach, Master Books Concepts of Biogeography and Astronomy. This may I along very well with our history and 4th grade DD may tag along as well.

Scrap that, we are going with Abeka 7, life science. We will do that Scholastic book on reading non-fiction before we start.

Writing: We just bought Write On to help us do some writing across the curriculum.

Logic: Fallacy Detective

Art: She is working through Art Pacs, 4/5 maybe.

Well. It was a tough year. We only covered 40-50% of what we wanted to (depending on subject area). DD studied a bit and still passed up to the next level of her core subjects. Whew. As much as I want to teach her writing this year, I've decided that might not be realistic. Art has become very self directed, she's been very inspired. A Beka's too many parts scared me off, back to what I know works.

 

Bible: CLE Bible finish 600 then 700, Sunday School verses and papers, PBS

Language Arts: CLE LA 700, CLE Reading 700, Rod and Staff Spelling finish 6, then start 7 (I can't wait, it's a word roots study in the context of spelling.)

Math: CLE 500/600

History: Finish Geography: Province to Province, then Notgrass Adam to Us (if that flops ACE Career Studies 7)

Science: ACE 7

Writing: Essentials in Writing 7

Logic: Fallacy Detective

Art: Self-directed

Xtramath

Typing

 

And our beefed up morning time where I plan to hit...at least once in a while...all of the goodies like art and music appreciation etc.

 

Still editing! Dropping spelling after we finish 6th and starting Getting Started With Latin!

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  • 3 weeks later...

Here goes:

 

Co-Op Classes:

Apologia Physical Science

 

Writing; no curriculum as of yet because teacher is putting it together herself

 

GA History and Music Appreciation; enrichment, probably no curriculum

 

Home Subjects:

Biblioplan Year 2 (Middle Ages); will do some of the recommended fiction reading but will mainly focus on the Companion and maps

 

Positive Action's Winning the Race; bible for 6th grade but I like the format and topics

 

Science Fusion Module Intro to Science and Technology

 

CLE LA; taking some breaks to do IEW's Fix-It

 

IEW's Phonetic Zoo Level B; he needs some work on spelling rules

 

 

CLE Reading

 

Continue Figuratively Speaking and MP Poetry

 

CLE Math with some LOF for fun

 

Novels for Book Club to be determined

 

Still Considering:

First Form Latin

 

I attended a meeting for our co-op and found out the writing class plan. It will be sentence structure and paragraphs at first, moving to 3 paragraph essays and then 5 paragraph essays. By next semester, the class will have some in-class, timed essays. Ds might not respond well to that, so I want to make sure he is going to be comfortable.

 

I am dropping the Latin consideration as well as the Science Fusion module so that I have more time to focus on writing. I need to check on it and see how long I have access to the online materials. I haven't activated it yet, so I hope it won't expire or I can get my money back. I'll reassess if I can't.

 

For bible, I am going to go with Positive Action's newly revised The God Man because it looks fabulous. I plan to spread it out over 2 years to take our time and study in-depth without being rushed.

 

Ds isn't a schoolwork loving kid, but he knows it's important. I think he sees it as a necessary evil right now. Dh did too at that age, so I'm hoping he will become more scholarly as he ages as dh did. I hope I can keep this year simple and focused, yet engaging. My main goals are developing an interest in in-depth bible study, improving his writing, getting him ready for Algebra 1 by the next year, and establishing good study skills.

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  • 1 month later...

We are joining a co-op this year for the first time. We started this week and the kids loved it! So some of our subjects are at home and at co-op.

Math- Saxon 7/6 with VHSG

LA- Fix It Grammar, IEW Continuation Course B(1/2 of it...save 2nd half for 8th 1st semester), Phonetic Zoo, using Lit from Geography this year....MBTP for Animal Farm, A Wrinkle in Time, Esperanza Rising, Secret of the Andes, The Wanderer, Short Stories....LL7 for All Creatures Great & Small.   Variety is key for this child!

Science- Elemental Science Logic Earth

World Geography- Build Your Library grade 7 with mapping, cultures, activities, cooking, and literature

YMCA PE

Fiddle/Voice
Volunteer: Farm and Ronald McDonald House

Co-op Classes:
NC History (I'm teaching this)
Spanish
Cooking 1st semester.....3D Art 2nd semester
Speech

 

 

 

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AoPS

 

Discovery of Deduction

 

Brave Writer Lifestyle, IEW U.S. History-Based Writing Lessons & TWSS across the curriculum, Analytical Grammar, WTM style vocabulary notebook, interest led literature/select Boomerang guides

 

Latin Prep, Spanish tutor

 

Comparative U.S. History (Patriot's/People's History) with art, music, poetry, literature, and handicrafts; Texas History for Kids

 

Oak Meadow Geography

 

Conceptual Integrated Science, Nature Study

 

Art with thevirtualistructor.com

 

Current Events

 

DIY.org, clubhouse building, programming

 

Guitar

 

Swimming and Baseball

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Art - Online graphics art class, online animation class, art history

 

Math - Pre-Algebra 1 online 

 

LAs - Various Bravewriter classes, Mosdos Press 8th grade

 

Science/History - Build Your LIbrary's History of Science - I am adjusting this for my son. We will be covering it over 2 years. 

 

Other - Stop motion animation, voice lessons, German, online book club through SEA 

 

 

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We are joining a co-op this year for the first time. We started this week and the kids loved it! So some of our subjects are at home and at co-op.

 

Math- Saxon 7/6 with VHSG

 

LA- Fix It Grammar, IEW Continuation Course B(1/2 of it...save 2nd half for 8th 1st semester), Phonetic Zoo, using Lit from Geography this year....MBTP for Animal Farm, A Wrinkle in Time, Esperanza Rising, Secret of the Andes, The Wanderer, Short Stories....LL7 for All Creatures Great & Small.   Variety is key for this child!

 

Science- Elemental Science Logic Earth

 

World Geography- Build Your Library grade 7 with mapping, cultures, activities, cooking, and literature

 

YMCA PE

 

Fiddle/Voice

Volunteer: Farm and Ronald McDonald House

 

Co-op Classes:

NC History (I'm teaching this)

Spanish

Cooking 1st semester.....3D Art 2nd semester

Speech

Figured out a few things in Literature & Writing today!

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