2023-2024 Hits and Misses

[Momof4sweetkids]

What were your hits and misses this school year?

Hits: Brighter Day Press and RAR monthly picture book lists, Watercolor With Me in the Forest, FLL 1

Misses: Teach Your Child To Read in 100 Easy Lessons was confusing for my kids because I taught them letter sounds instead of names and the book starts with long E instead of short E.

[alysee]

Hits: Bookshark Science but we are switching to Noeo Science.

Misses: CTC Math, probably switching to Mathusee for upcoming 7th grader and 6th grader. Thinking of switching my gifted kid to Singapore Math. I have some thinking to do. 

 

 

[LauraClark]

Hits: ds12 did a geography year and we did a monthly meal for the countries he studied; Philosophy for Kids-ds12 loved it!; R&S A-F series for ds4 (straightforward, some cutting/glueing included, etc); dictation day by day/Analytical Grammar/Figuratively speaking-they got the job done which makes them hits for me

Miss: writing stands 7-maybe I just assigned too much writing to ds12, but we had a very hard time getting to any of the lessons in Ws; I started a comparative religions books with ds12 and realized it seemed too hard half way through the year-turns out it's upper high school level 🤦‍♀️; fll2 for ds7- I enjoyed it with my other kids, so maybe it was my implementation this year? R&S Bible for ds4 (part of the A-F)-my older ds did great with it at that age but it was was over this current ds' head.

[SilverMoon]

Hits

Power to the People from Mint & Bloom, based on the Rad American History book - We all did this once a week and loved it. The stories were all lesser known events that often don't make the history books (occupation of Alcatraz, the protest that earned disabled rights and access, etc), the short videos worked well, and we had loads of great discussions. My only problem is finding something as fabulous for this coming year. 😄 

A newish Holt McDougal literature textbook. For real. It had own voices stories, great writing assignments, some whole works so I didn't have to buy another book, poetry, speeches, etc. I cherry picked sections for my teen to work through and assigned more modern works on the side. He had a great year. I'm definitely getting another one for next year. 

 

Misses

My boys really, really disliked the geography and theater series from Crash Course. They really enjoy those topics, but not those video hosts. We ended up just using Geography Now and a Great Course set instead. 

[hollyhock2]

Hits:

What's that Bird? Science from Memoria Press. I have an older version and DD really liked the whole thing. Didn't get sick of it before it ended!

PAC Integrated Physics and Chemistry - all the boys who have done this course have really enjoyed it.

Math U See Delta - this was our first time using MUS elementary courses and it was a perfect fit for DD.

Dictation Day by Day 

Logic Safari

 

Misses: 

Wordsmith Apprentice - I thought DD would like the creative writing but she actually prefers a git-er-done English so she can do her own creative writing on her own time.

A Child's Geography - we tried Explore the Holy Land and DD found it boring

MUS Algebra 1 - Love this course but it just wasn't a good fit for DS

[Brooke]

Hits for kindergarten 

handwriting without tears

singapore primary 2022

all about reading level 2

units from core knowledge

misses

memoria press enrichment. Not exactly a miss but it wasn’t enough to fill my sons cup

[AnneGG]

This year was a blur. 

Hits:

CLE math with real life math projects sandwiched between units. 

All the vintage books we used for ELA. 

No Sweat Nature Study 

List style planning. I’ve always used the traditional weekly grid, but the list style works much better for me. 

Taking school out of the house. It’s amazing how much my kids can accomplish in two hours at a coffee shop. 

Misses:

co op

poetry tea time, I think we did one all year. Oops. 
 

[countrymum]

Hits

Science in the Atomic Age it wasn't easy, but it got done, he learned something, and even found the last 1/2 or so interesting.

All About Reading....still

Foundational Phonics 1 used before AAR for a 4 yr old. AAR 1 will be easy now.

Copywork 

Memoria Press cursive

RightStart math....still

AAS 1, 3, 4

Misses

HOD Creation to Christ it got done and rescued the big kids history for the year, but they didn't really like it or learn enough. The spine for Rome seemed a bit light. It isn't bad at all we just really need more discussion in history. So we're all together again next year. I'll make it work somehow.

Writing Skills 1 and Writing Skills for today....not super great. I should have guided more.... maybe me more than the curriculum. 

 

Ok, mostly the hits were where I was more involved and the misses were more where I tried to hand it off...how to give enough guidence to 6 children is the question;) 

[LauraClark]

17 hours ago, AnneGG said:

poetry tea time, I think we did one all year. Oops. 

Ha-it's good to know I'm not alone in those. Every year I plan some kind of Charlotte Mason ish type thing: composer study, nature journal, poetry tea; and every year we start out great and then fizzle. I guess I need to be more realistic about my time...

[LauraClark]

11 hours ago, countrymum said:

Science in the Atomic Age it wasn't easy, but it got done, he learned something, and even found the last 1/2 or so interesting

Same here. That book was a huge jump from the elementary years. I had a struggle understanding and explaining the first five chapters to ds-things that I had never learned. But the last half was fascinating (for me too)!

[Soror]

On 5/24/2024 at 3:34 PM, SilverMoon said:

Hits

Power to the People from Mint & Bloom, based on the Rad American History book - We all did this once a week and loved it. The stories were all lesser known events that often don't make the history books (occupation of Alcatraz, the protest that earned disabled rights and access, etc), the short videos worked well, and we had loads of great discussions. My only problem is finding something as fabulous for this coming year. 😄 

Was this your history for the year or did you use something else with it? It looks like it might be a good fit. I've got an upcoming 9th grader that is quirky and artistic and is interested in more modern history. Due to some health issues we want something on the lighter side.

[SilverMoon]

1 hour ago, Soror said:

Was this your history for the year or did you use something else with it? It looks like it might be a good fit. I've got an upcoming 9th grader that is quirky and artistic and is interested in more modern history. Due to some health issues we want something on the lighter side.

We only spent about one day a week on it but it could have been so much more. It was the one thing the 7th, 8th, and 10th graders all did, and they already had their own history courses going when we discovered it. 

There are 26 lessons and each one has a short reading in the Rad book, a variety of links to articles and short videos, a couple/few art projects, a worksheet with vocab and questions, and a critical thinking page that could quite easily be an essay assignment with extra research (links to get research started are often included). And a coloring page. The 10th grader did use those for shading practice. 

It would be light as a main history but super easy to flesh out with extra reading and research. 

[Soror]

2 hours ago, SilverMoon said:

We only spent about one day a week on it but it could have been so much more. It was the one thing the 7th, 8th, and 10th graders all did, and they already had their own history courses going when we discovered it. 

There are 26 lessons and each one has a short reading in the Rad book, a variety of links to articles and short videos, a couple/few art projects, a worksheet with vocab and questions, and a critical thinking page that could quite easily be an essay assignment with extra research (links to get research started are often included). And a coloring page. The 10th grader did use those for shading practice. 

It would be light as a main history but super easy to flesh out with extra reading and research. 

Thank you for the information. It sounds like a good fit for one younger kid and an older one that needs a lighter year. It sounds like we could easily add in extra reading and writing to beef it up.

[A.M.]

I love the hits&misses threads. Thank you for starting this one.

Our hits so far this year are Math Mammoth and Writing and Rhetoric. These two are enjoyable for me, as the parent, too.

For one dc who doesn't love grammar yet, IEW's Fix It! really made grammar more fun, and it is getting done too. No diagramming, but she is learning and applying the rules better. We use this in conjunction with W&R.

We used Life of Fred Beginning Algebra during the first semester as preparation for the UK IGCSE curriculum, and my dc loved it. The same topics are being studied again in the IGCSE curriculum, but it is nice to have such an enjoyable introduction to algebra. Lots of laughing during maths that semester.

Story of the World volume 4 was also great as an independent read for the 8-grader.

Misses so far are FFL; my youngest really disliked this curriculum although it has worked for us before. It has also taught me how to explain grammar better. Fix It! helped here.

We also bought Physical Science (Apologia) and ended up opting for a UK curriculum instead, because UK exam specifications  for science are quite particular...

Edited May 28 by A.M.
correction

[seemesew]

On 5/25/2024 at 10:00 AM, AnneGG said:

This year was a blur. 

Hits:

CLE math with real life math projects sandwiched between units. 

All the vintage books we used for ELA. 

No Sweat Nature Study 

List style planning. I’ve always used the traditional weekly grid, but the list style works much better for me. 

Taking school out of the house. It’s amazing how much my kids can accomplish in two hours at a coffee shop. 

Misses:

co op

poetry tea time, I think we did one all year. Oops. 
 

I curious about the No Sweat Nature Study and the ages you used it for!

[Clarita]

Hits:

Beast Academy (for DS as usual)

Singapore Math (for DD, she hated Beast Academy)

Writing with Ease but with our own books. We don't follow the day to day schedule, just the progression of word count/length since my children love to narrate to me what they've read every time.  

Writing Skills Book A by Diana Hanbury King for DS, it looked so dry and boring. Somehow he really likes it and is excited for it.

Mystery Science in the 2nd grade level they added more written work it's been easy and fantastic. Everyone loves it. 

 

Misses:

Bravewriter, which is disappointing, because I really love Julie Bogart's philosophy. Both in The Writer's Jungle and in The Brave Learner, everytime I try to use one of the premade Bravewriter products I feel like we are dragging through it. This time it was DART (since I flopped on Quill and Jot It Down). My children did not like sitting with the same copy work for a week and I felt stressed out trying to pace our reading of the book accordingly. Love the reading selection. It is theoretically what I'm looking for but I guess I just have to stick with piecing it together myself.

SOTW and Curiousity Chronicles Activity guides. I don't know I guess my children don't like doing history hands-on activities. DS liked the text so it wasn't a complete miss and I used the activity guide to guide my Writing Revolution sentences and for me to make the maps for the kids to look at. DD dislikes stories with conflict and history has a lot of conflicts. 

Exploratorium field trip (https://www.exploratorium.edu/visit?gad_source=1&gclid=CjwKCAjwgdayBhBQEiwAXhMxtjRaeJI8l3nzYb3i8CTlxn-yghkcJTBSJWFidwJZhXtvyqInh-xIAxoCllgQAvD_BwE) was a big miss even though we'd been looking forward to it. The kids just preferred the smaller science museum we always go to. I think they didn't feel like they could explore like they wanted to because of the other schools that were there. The part they really enjoyed was seeing the sea lions from the patio. 

 

[AnneGG]

2 hours ago, seemesew said:

I curious about the No Sweat Nature Study and the ages you used it for!

I used it primarily with my 3rd & 4th grader, but even my 7th grader enjoyed it. 
 

I’m not “outdoorsy.” I like to take walks around the block, but that’s about it. NSNS takes it beyond the basic backyard style nature study. I think Cindy does a great job engaging the students in biology/nature topics and it always leads to lots of excitement and interest after the videos. There’s a good amount of depth in the lessons, I’ve been really impressed. We’ve done it two and half years. 

[Tanager]

Hits:

Athenas in-depth marine bio class - it’s the first thing she wants to do everyday (after math cuz that’s always first - moms rule)

MCT - it just clicks for her, speaks her language, she loves poetry and writing

Aops geometry - was hard, but good hard, until we realized it was for after alg 2. Oops, my biggest mistake of the year.

Misses -

Jacobs geometry 3rd addition - did it in half a year, made us like aops even more, at one point we were confused so we tried the video and I kid you not, he said, “this formula isn’t in the book” no wonder it was confusing! After that she watched the videos begrudgingly.
 

[Penderwink]

Hits: All About Reading, Singapore Math 2022, HWT

Misses: trying to do more than one program with lots of parts at the same time. I’m curious to try All About Spelling, but I think I will wait until we are done with AAR because I don’t think I can properly use (or be motivated to use) all the little cards, tiles, paper game pieces on more than one program at a time. The long practice sheets in AAR were also a miss for my beginner reader, although he loved all other aspects of the program.

[Clarita]

3 hours ago, Penderwink said:

The long practice sheets in AAR were also a miss for my beginner reader, although he loved all other aspects of the program.

My eldest prefers to do find the word. I say a few of the words and he has to find them. I've never had any success reading through the lists. We even edited the sentence reading to be I asked a question and he has to answer using the fluency sentences. 

For my friend it worked out better that she made smaller fluency sheets out of the large fluency sheet list. Her son would just break down at the sight of the fluency sheet. 

[countrymum]

On 5/15/2024 at 8:47 PM, dauntless dandelion said:

 😅

Not sure how to unquote something I accidentally quoted....

12 hours ago, Penderwink said:

I’m curious to try All About Spelling, but I think I will wait until we are done with AAR because I don’t think I can properly use (or be motivated to use) all the little cards, tiles, paper game pieces on more than one program at a time. The long practice sheets in AAR were also a miss for my beginner reader, although he loved all other aspects of the program.

That's why I love the old AAS...no extra pieces from a practice book. It just had cards, a few pieces of cardstock and the teacher book;) My kids get plenty of practice with just that.

For my kids who struggle, we need the whole fluency sheet in AAR. We sometimes set a timer and play see how many you can read in 5-10 minutes. We split a lesson over several days.lockquote widget

[Penderwink]

@Clarita and @countrymum - thanks for the ideas on the fluency sheets. I think he will like playing "Find the Word" and trying to race how many he can read with a timer. We do split a lesson over several days, but there is something about the fluency sheets that makes him shut down. What we have been doing is reading other early phonics readers on level to practice the same concepts in different words (Collins Big Cat, Oxford Reading Tree, some Bob books).