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Which of these approaches do you take for K?


snickelfritz
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I have phonics, math, handwriting set and bought. We spend about 30 minutes total on these subjects now. Since we're making good progress, I don't think we'll increase that much next year. I also have a dd who will be 3 and tagging along whenever appropriate. We do informal nature studies when weather allows.

 

I haven't bought, and have thus waffled, on the extras. I'm thinking of 2 perspectives. Someone more organized could probably do both, but I'm not interested in attempting that.

 

1. Buying art, music, & Spanish resources. Primary Art, Discoveries in Music, and Berlitz Spanish. I've previously asked about all of them and got positive feedback for the age I'm looking at. Literature would just be from a few different lists I've gathered for that age.

 

2. Doing FIAR/BFIAR or WP RTL or something similar. Kind of a theme based thing and tying in art, music, extra literature as they fit or as we think of them.

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We are doing FIAR this year, along with phonics, math and handwriting for my Ker. I am so glad we chose this. It has been wonderful and so easy to implement. It allows us to do some literary elements, some science, some geography/history and art without me having to plan those subjects. I would definitely make the same choice again.

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They are wonderful and incorporate a good variety of stories and activities. They are also easy to implement. It also doesn't have to be for 5 days. I did a FIAR class at our co-op. We read the story and did two or three activities. It took an hour and was fun. I followed up by reading the book once or twice more to my dc. The kids all loved it and it was simpler for me than trying to make it the center of our home school.

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We love FIAR. If you have access to a good library, there is so much you can do with this curriculum. Even if you don't have a good library, kids learn an amazing amount just from rereading the books and talking about them. It also helps me to learn to guide discussions and take learning opportunities that I might have missed before.

 

Your other plan sounds like fun too, but FIAR has been the highlight of hsing for us this year.

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I think reading aloud a lot is the most important thing for that age, so I would go with FIAR as a way to ensure that reading time was allocated each day. The other things are nice but you can easily fit in a little art appreciation and art projects once a week, and that's plenty for that age group, and you can play classical music while you play. I personally don't like RTL.

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If you've investigated so many curricula options, you clearly like something a bit structured. The FIAR books are awesome even if you do very few of the activities. I'd do your option #1, since you clearly want to cover those things, and also get the FIAR books to read and dabble in as you want. You'll have plenty of time to do both, or at least we did.

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You don't have to use BFIAR or FIAR, you can cherry-pick the books you want from their list and read them. I think any art, music, foreign language at this age is beneficial and fun for your young one.

 

When I looked at BFIAR and FIAR, it's nice but not for me. There are too many other books I want to read that are not listed, and I prefer having the freedom to read whatever floats our boat.

 

"You're creating childhood memories for your kids each day." This thought has been prevalent in my mind regarding our children's education and what we're doing and why.

 

hope this helps

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First, I have looked at FIAR, and I think it's a fine program. Like Jessica, though, I prefer to have more freedom in choosing books and activities. I love choosing music and art activities for us to enjoy. I like finding the things I feel are just right for us. I know, I'm weird, and it takes a lot of time...

 

The question is, do you want a program? If you really want something laid-out for you and do not really want the additional work of researching, selecting, and implementing other curricula, just go ahead and enjoy FIAR.

 

That's the beauty of homeschooling...we get to make these kinds of choices ourselves.

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And the rest is just books I have on hand that I am familiar with and that I pull out as needed. I have lots of good classical CDs and I mention the name of the composer, and sometimes the artist (like Domingo). Kiddo loves classical music and I'm not about to muddy this with book work of any kind. If he's crazy about the Pastoral, that's what we listen to in the car for a week or two or three, and we bellow along and discuss the harmony, etc.

 

Art books get pulled out at quiet times and I tend to move towards what is appealing to him...animals, children, dancing. Since I've looked at these and read up on them, I point out the more subtle things here and there, again with an eye to NOT turn this into a labour for him.

 

Science is fun little things like a flashlight to the palm to see the bones, etc. I use a lot of scientific words. History is picture books at bed time. If I were doing Spanish, I would learn it and start calling things by the Spanish name, and using hola and buenas noches, etc.

 

I fear, at 5, bogging them down, turning them off. If you read the "if I had one thing to do differently" thread from last week or so, several people said they'd be more laid back for K and 1st at least.

JMO.

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Im planning on starting K this fall and I am going to be doing option 1. Like Jessica and some others stated, I want to choose my own books to read versus having to follow a curriculum in something like FIAR. If you are more into structure, then FIAR would be great for you. I like structure, but when I looked at the FIAR books, I didnt jump up and down with excitement. That is one reason why I am implementing option 1 with my own child. Also, I believe that option 1 will offer more creativity options in the end.

Good luck with your decision, and just know that whatever you choose, it will work. :)

Kimmi

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If I had to choose only one....I like option 2. B4FIar books are wonderful and there is a lot you can do with them. They are a great jumping point for art and music and spanish can be added in easily, too. For instance, the Jesse Bear book in B4Fiar has artwork with shapes and colors. You could learn the spanish names for those things....have it all....but use B4Fiar and Fiar as your jumping point. :)

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My oldest daughter will turn five this summer and we'll start Kindergarten in the fall. I've never homeschooled before, so I might fall on my face and run crying to the public school, but I'm planning on doing "both", that is 3R's, FIAR, and separate art, music, and foreign language.

 

For FIAR, I plan on mostly just reading the books with some discussion, to provide exposure to a wider variety of topics than I would come up with on my own. Cuddle, read, talk, repeat.

 

For art and music I picked separate resources to provide age appropriate guidance for creating her own art and music. The art and music in FIAR is really more about appreciation than creation. We'll just do art and music whenever my daughter wants to, on no set schedule.

 

For foreign language, if you don't speak it yourself, I don't think there is a way to provide exposure without getting resources for that language.

 

We've actually already started implementing several parts of my kindergarten plan a few days of the week, and I hope that by the fall we'll be ready for a full load.

 

-Kuovonne

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The FIAR books are fun even if you just use them in an unstructured way, on occasion. I kept them for rainy days, and when it was "one of those days" we would pull out a FIAR book. If we wanted to do some of the activities, we did. If we didn't, we didn't.

 

FIAR is not inherently structured but would require planning on your part to fully implement, unlike a box curriculum for art or music where you just pick it up and do the next thing. Gotta know what YOU will do best with.

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I personally like FIAR. I also use a website www.homeschoolshare.com it is structured like FIAR, but it has a lot of additional books. My ds5 chooses a book he is intrested in, and I pick and choose what we do in the week. I have a math program I really like so I usually skip the math stuff, and add more of this or that. I usually take the time to pick out additional go along books, music or art for the week.

A book we did recently is Nico's Octopus. We talked about Greece, Greek mythology, greek food, greek music, and how the buildings in the book differ from ours, plurals, the prefix -oct, octopus anatomy and life cycle all in one week. It sounds like a lot, but most of what we do with FIAR type stuff is done with a book reading in about 30 min.

It teaches my ds to take time to look at a book, and think about what the author and illustrator put into the book.

 

The website I mentioned is free, so you could always try it out and see what you think before purchasing FIAR.

 

HTH,

Kim

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I started trying to organize the books into loose groupings last night and I got overwhelmed and gave up. That site already has the work done for me. :)

 

OhElizabeth is right that I've got to just figure out what *I* will be able to make work. My kiddos are easy going enough that they seem to like everything I throw at them.

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FIAR is an awesome resource to use when fancy strikes you. At other times, use your world as a classroom! I'm all for mixing and matching and continuing to surprise them!

 

We used FIAR for the art and geography ideas, Instead of "rowing" a book, I added in other related titles. It's very flexible.

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We use FIAR for K. Next year I will have my last K'er (sigh) and we will do FiAR plus HomeschoolShare. I love that site. There are so many books to choose from. With FIAR, you don't have to do it the way that they suggest in the manual. I never read the book 5 times. I just read it once then kind of did our own thing. I didn't always do it every day. It was very casual for us. I have great memories of K due to FIAR.

 

 

Julia

mom of 3 (8,7,5)

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Olive here LOL.

 

I couldn't make BFIAR work for my oldest ds. I ended up selling it unused. It was too free form for me, to the point that it felt optional and therefore I didn't do it at all.

 

I'm going to try the WP RTL program for my littlest this year. We'll see if I do better with that. I'm thinking I will because it is more structured, thus I'm more likely to stick with it.

 

I wouldn't do option 1 simply because my youngest benefits from his older brothers' curric in supplemental areas.

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