BYL middle school years

[Runningmom80]

Has anyone used grades 6-8?  They look really great, I'd love to know how they worked out for anyone who is willing to share. :)

[SilverMoon]

I have one kiddo using grade 8 this year. He gives it two hearty thumbs up. We've really, really, enjoyed the book choices and he's really covered a lot of ground this year.

 

We added a full science class, but this is a STEM heavy kid. We skipped the narration/dictation/copywork stuff and report style writing entirely. I really liked that art was scheduled in and tied to history. I liked poetry being scheduled at first, but he balked and it wasn't tied to history or anything else, so it felt out of place; we dropped that part.

 

Everything else we've done. He loves the geography assignments, the extra website and movie suggestions, the books, just the way it's all tied together. I can only think of one book dud, and he did get through it in the end (Golden Goblet). A book he considers his all time favorite ever only came into our house because BYL scheduled it. "Readers" are for him to read and "literature" is for me to read aloud; he reads all of it himself and discusses it with me later.

 

My primary complaint is some of the assignments are only listed in the teacher notes. There's already a perfectly good grid schedule with specific page numbers; I would have put the geography, sketching, and such in there too. As it is I write those instructions onto the schedule by hand so he can run the whole thing himself. My only other complaint is the CM composition stuff that seems beneath the average 8th grader. This was clear in the samples though and I knew that going in. DS has worked in Lost Tools of Writing separately this year.

 

I would absolutely use BYL 8 again and I am holding onto all the books for a younger sibling to use eventually. 7 looks great too! We would have enjoyed that one. I think 6 is part 2 of American history. 9 looks like she chased specific rabbit trails for her and her kids and neither DS or I were interested in continuing with that next year.

[kesmom]

Following because I've had my eyes on grade 7 for the future.

 

 

 

[Runningmom80]

I have one kiddo using grade 8 this year. He gives it two hearty thumbs up. We've really, really, enjoyed the book choices and he's really covered a lot of ground this year.

 

We added a full science class, but this is a STEM heavy kid. We skipped the narration/dictation/copywork stuff and report style writing entirely. I really liked that art was scheduled in and tied to history. I liked poetry being scheduled at first, but he balked and it wasn't tied to history or anything else, so it felt out of place; we dropped that part.

 

Everything else we've done. He loves the geography assignments, the extra website and movie suggestions, the books, just the way it's all tied together. I can only think of one book dud, and he did get through it in the end (Golden Goblet). A book he considers his all time favorite ever only came into our house because BYL scheduled it. "Readers" are for him to read and "literature" is for me to read aloud; he reads all of it himself and discusses it with me later.

 

My primary complaint is some of the assignments are only listed in the teacher notes. There's already a perfectly good grid schedule with specific page numbers; I would have put the geography, sketching, and such in there too. As it is I write those instructions onto the schedule by hand so he can run the whole thing himself. My only other complaint is the CM composition stuff that seems beneath the average 8th grader. This was clear in the samples though and I knew that going in. DS has worked in Lost Tools of Writing separately this year.

 

I would absolutely use BYL 8 again and I am holding onto all the books for a younger sibling to use eventually. 7 looks great too! We would have enjoyed that one. I think 6 is part 2 of American history. 9 looks like she chased specific rabbit trails for her and her kids and neither DS or I were interested in continuing with that next year.

 

Thank you!  This is exactly what I'm looking for. I really appreciate you typing that all out!

 

So I have an accelerated learner and we would definitely be tweaking some things. We coincidentally only got through 1/2 of History of US this year, so DS is really pushing me to go with grade 6, and I don't like to fight him on things when he feels strongly!  He's going to do Chemistry online so we would skip her recommended science program like you did.

I'm also a tiny bit worried about the CM style stuff but I have not pushed this kid with writing at all so it might be good for him.  He really wants to take a bravewriter online class so maybe we'll end up skipping that too. I like th poetry and art added in as well because I REALLY want to get to those.

 

I am restarting a photography business and looking to add a little more routine to our days.  We have been fairly classical/charlotte mason/bravewriter up to this point but I've pieced every part together for the past 5 years and I'm a little burnt out. This seems like it's something to build on, a starting point, or even a bare minimum for when I'm feeling overwhelmed. 

 

I REALLY love the looks of grade 8, I wanted to skip grade 6 and do 7 this year and 8 next year but like I said, DS had strong feelings about liking the books in grade 6.

 

Edited April 21, 2017 by Runningmom80

[SilverMoon]

We didn't actually skip any science in history of science. In grade 8 it's just read and discuss scientists and concepts as they come up chronologically in history rather than a separate science course like the lower grades. Though the one experiment kit it schedules is now OOP and I didn't bother to track one down (it's not a primary spine). The astronomy project book was used heavily! He loved that one. Overall BYL 8 just wasn't as much gnitty gritty science as DS was used to immersing himself in. He did a full size bio course for the first 2/3 of the year or so and he's been knee deep in various physics books since then, in addition to doing all of BYL 8.

[Runningmom80]

We didn't actually skip any science in history of science. In grade 8 it's just read and discuss scientists and concepts as they come up chronologically in history rather than a separate science course like the lower grades. Though the one experiment kit it schedules is now OOP and I didn't bother to track one down (it's not a primary spine). The astronomy project book was used heavily! He loved that one. Overall BYL 8 just wasn't as much gnitty gritty science as DS was used to immersing himself in. He did a full size bio course for the first 2/3 of the year or so and he's been knee deep in various physics books since then, in addition to doing all of BYL 8.

I was thinking of grade 7 and not grade 8 when I commented on that. I stand corrected! :)

[Soror]

 

We added a full science class, but this is a STEM heavy kid. We skipped the narration/dictation/copywork stuff and report style writing entirely. I really liked that art was scheduled in and tied to history. I liked poetry being scheduled at first, but he balked and it wasn't tied to history or anything else, so it felt out of place; we dropped that part.

 

 

My primary complaint is some of the assignments are only listed in the teacher notes. There's already a perfectly good grid schedule with specific page numbers; I would have put the geography, sketching, and such in there too. As it is I write those instructions onto the schedule by hand so he can run the whole thing himself. My only other complaint is the CM composition stuff that seems beneath the average 8th grader. This was clear in the samples though and I knew that going in. DS has worked in Lost Tools of Writing separately this year.

 

 

I used 7 last year and this is how it worked for me as well. The assignments weren't worth our time and I had to re-work the schedule which was a huge pain in the butt. Ds did enjoy the books, we read nearly all of them I believe, there were some I couldn't find or were super expensive that I ended up leaving off. We love poetry but there was no connection and we dropped that. I never scheduled art in the first place I knew ds would hate it. At level 7 it has a separate science program, which we didn't like so we didn't buy. My big complaint is how the schedule is made, I didn't care for the things we might read a page or two a day and we do school 4 days a week, I finally went through and printed out all the grid schedules and then reworked the reading. An editable PDF file would have saved me so many hours!

 

I'm torn on it, in most ways it just ended up being a booklist for us. BUT it was a good booklist and the ordering and coordination of books and topics worked well for us. Ds thrives with lots of lots of books and this gave me a great starting point, even when I did have to tweak the schedule. I have a hard time scheduling him enough books as it always seems like too much too me but the more the better for him. 

[Melissa B]

We are doing level 7 this year. I really like it. We dropped the science since she takes an online science class and we dropped the CM English assignments - dictation, narration, etc. The books were great and we added in two of the suggested books - Women in a Material World and Man Eating Bugs. My dd is more of a non-fiction reader and is getting more into geography than she has ever been. The map drills have really solidified her knowledge of where all of the countries are located and the world religions readings have rounded out the subject. She writes one page papers every other week which have improved throughout the year and does any art projects that strike her fancy. She uses the schedule as-is, but we simply work through it one day at a time so she isn't necessarily doing each week's work in one week or doing the assignment on the day of the week listed.

[historically accurate]

I haven't used level 6. 

 

7 is my favorite level of BYL - I've done 3, 4, 7, & 8 and a few unit studies (Harry Potter and WWII) with various children. There really weren't any books in level 7 that didn't hit with my child. She loved the year. 

 

Same child is doing 8 this year (as a 9th grader). I added Hewitt's Conceptual Physics and Writing With Skill. There have been a few books that she hasn't liked - The Golden Goblet, Carry On, Mr. Bowditch (she'd read it years ago), and The Canterbury Tales (a retelling), mostly these are younger books than her reading level. I've had to scope out the adult section of the library to see if I can up the reading level on some of these. I think she ended up reading something by Verne instead of Mr. Bowditch, iirc.

 

Things I love about BYL: it's fairly easy to make small changes. I love, love, love most of the books! I like that poetry gets read (even if it seems that it should be a little more than "just read this poem".) and art gets done. 

 

Things I don't like about BYL: I don't like the writing - only one kid is a natural writer, the other two need a formal program. My oldest likes to do her BYL independently, but as mentioned above she'll miss the small assignments (because she doesn't read closely) like sketching, etc. since they're not on the grid. I would prefer a 4 day schedule, but it is pretty easy to squish items into 4 days.

[Runningmom80]

Thank you for all of these thoughtful reviews! 

 

We have now attempted 2 BYL unit studies, and I think I hate the idea of a schedule. lol.  The books have been awesome though!  I keep getting behind on the schedule and it stresses me out to try to figure out how to move things around. Maybe I need to re work it all ahead of time and see how that goes.

[Runningmom80]

Ok, for all of you who have done grades 7 & 8, what did you do for science? 

[Aurelia]

Nothing extra for science. DD's fine with just reading, though. Some kids have to have experiments. 

 

 

We did BYL 8, though. I'd have done something else if we had done 6 or 7.

 

Edited April 28, 2017 by Aurelia

[historically accurate]

Ok, for all of you who have done grades 7 & 8, what did you do for science? 

 

BYL Level 7: year 1 of Rainbow Science (somewhat. Science was kind of a bust for her during 7th grade.)

Non BYL (we did modern history using K12's text) 8th grade year: Quirks and Quarks Biology

BYL Level 8 (done as a 9th grader): Hewitt's Conceptual Physics textbook instead of Milestones of Science which is what is scheduled.

[SJ.]

We plan to do BYL 7 next year and to use Elemental Science Chemistry as is scheduled in the BYL schedule.  Currently we are doing the BYL evolution unit study.  It has been a little difficult to keep on track but that has more to do with distractions and issues with attitude.  I hope to have these smoothed out before next school year.

 

We will not do the writing component of BYL 7.  Instead the plan is Analytical Grammar and Writing With Skill 2. 

 

Additionally, I plan to have dc do WTMA AOPS Prealgebra, WTMA German, a local computer class, ancient history, and maybe Latin. 

 

That sounds like a lot.  I hope I can find a way to make it work!

Edited April 29, 2017 by SJ.

[SJ.]

Thank you for all of these thoughtful reviews! 

 

We have now attempted 2 BYL unit studies, and I think I hate the idea of a schedule. lol.  The books have been awesome though!  I keep getting behind on the schedule and it stresses me out to try to figure out how to move things around. Maybe I need to re work it all ahead of time and see how that goes.

 

Which unit studies have you tried? 

We are doing the evolution unit study and haven't stayed on track as I would have liked.  Since it is just a unit study I just pick up where we left off and I don't think there will be any problems from that.  I can see how that would be a problem when doing an entire school year as the missed days would continue to pile up.  I am hoping this won't be a problem for us next year!

Edited April 29, 2017 by SJ.

[Runningmom80]

Which unit studies have you tried?

We are doing the evolution unit study and haven't stayed on track as I would have liked. Since it is just a unit study I just pick up where we left off and I don't think there will be any problems from that. I can see how that would be a problem when doing an entire school year as the missed days would continue to pile up. I am hoping this won't be a problem for us next year!

We tried the evolution study first. DS loved the books but we didn't hardly any of the activities because we had so much other stuff going on. We finished the books 2 weeks ago and he's still working on the timeline. I think they are more than we had time for this year because I wasn't willing to drop our other stuff to make room for all of it. We didn't do the copywork or anything.

 

I'm now trying the pre-history unit with my twins and decided to start over next week and try to implement it fully to see if I can make the schedule work. They have way less other stuff going on so I don't have to worry about fitting it in. I tried to start it last week and we just kept forgetting to get it out.

 

I kind of sound like a spaz, but we are more relaxed homeschoolers, so I'm not used to a schedule. That said, the reason why I really want it to work is because my older son could really use more structure, and is kind of asking for it for next year.