2016-2017 Curriculum - 4th Grade, 6th Grade

Tomorrow is our first day of the new school year!    I'm very excited about checking out some of our new programs, while also using some old favorites.  Not everything is going to be done everyday (cause that would be ridiculous!).  We will be using a kind of quirky loop schedule, to go along with my quirky kids. ;-)

Vicki - 9 years old/4th Grade

Math Mammoth - She has a few pages to finish up MM3B and we will be jumping right into 4A

Beast Academy - Vicki is ready to give BA a try!  She likes to read through the Guide books we have from when Squidy started so I thought it was time.  We are starting with 3A since this is such a different, more intense presentation of Math than she's used to.

Evan Moor Skill Sharpeners Math 4 - We will continue using Skill Sharpeners Math as a spiral review of concepts already covered.  We will wait about a month to start the 4th grade book

Mosdos Press Ruby -  This program is new for us and will cover reading comprehension, vocabulary, literature and some writing.

Evan Moor Spell & Write - Vicki is about halfway through the 5th grade book. We will finish through the end of 6th grade and then stop spelling except for watching for mistakes in writing.

Vocabulary from Classical Roots 4th Grade - Another new program.  I think Vicki is ready to learn about Greek and Latin word roots and this program can take us through 11th grade if we like it.

Spectrum Writing 4th Grade - I wanted to go back to a very basics, step-by-step writing program.  I feel they need more explicit instruction than they've been getting.

Scholastic Logic Posters, Problems & Puzzles - one of the many Scholastic books I bought at Dollar Days over the years.  Squidy did these a few years ago and I think Vicki's more than ready to give them a try.

Handwriting - Vicki has about 4 pages to finish up Handwriting Without Tears Cursive.  Once she finishes, I'm going to have her do another Scholastic book - Cursive Practice Jokes & Riddles.   I will also expect her to do small writing assignments in her best cursive handwriting, but longer assignments I will allow her to type.

Reading - In addition to selections for History and Science, I am having the kids work through the Mensa Excellence in Reading Lists.    Vicki is going to work with both the K-3rd list and the 4-6th list.  The K-3rd list has quite a few books rated for 9 year olds that she hasn't read yet.  Some of them she's already read but doesn't remember and some will be super-easy, but there are many books on the 4th-6th grade list that I know she isn't ready for yet.

Squidy - 11 years old/6th Grade

Math Mammoth - Squidy has one Chapter left in MM5B - Intro to Percentages.  He will be doing one page from that chapter each day, as well as one or two pages from 6A.  We are using the "old" version of MM so he is done with it after 6B.

Beast Academy - Squidy really enjoys BA so we will continue using it as a fun supplement.  He wasn't doing it that often the last few years and I don't want to skip any, so he is still working through 4C.

Jousting Armadillos - Another one of our new programs AND a new subject - Pre-Algebra!  It's hard to believe we are at this point.  JA looks to be a fun and quirky introduction to Pre-Algebra and I think Squidy is going to love it.

Zaccaro Challenge Math - Another non-traditional math program that I think Squidy will enjoy.

Mosdos Press Pearl - New program that will cover comprehension, some vocabulary, literature, and some writing

Vocabulary from Classical Roots 6th Grade - Another new program.  George finished Words on the Vine last year so I needed something new for Greek/Latin roots.  I also wanted something that Vicki could do, so we are giving this a try.  After the 6th grade book, books A through E cover 7th through 11th grade so we'll be able to use this for a while if it works well.

Spectrum Writing 6th Grade

Scholastic Logic Posters, Problems & Puzzles - I'm going to pull out some of the harder of these and let Squidy give them a try.  I don't think he did all of them when we last worked on them since some of them required math beyond what he knew (squares, primes, percentages, etc.)

Handwriting - Squidy is also going to use pages from the Scholastic book - Cursive Practice Jokes & Riddles.  

Reading - Squidy will be working through the Mensa Excellence in Reading List for 4th to 6th grade.   He actually read his first book as part of our Science - The Evolution of Calpurnia Tate.  He really liked it but felt the ending didn't wrap things up enough.  I did some research and found out there is a sequel so I have that one on hold from the library.

 Together

Science - We will be finishing up our Evolution/Prehistory study, then doing units on Microscopes, Botany, Zoology and Habitats.  We will be using REAL Science Odyssey, and lots and lots of books and Pinterest ideas.

We are also continuing with our 4-H STEM Club.

History - We will be finishing up the last two units of US History - Westward Expansion and Civil War, and then starting Ancients.  We will be using History Odyssey Level 2 and Story of the World.

Art - Art is mostly going to be done along with History but we will also do some general exercises using How to Teach Art to Children.  We will also do some drawing using Mark Kistler's Draw Squad.

Foreign Language - We will continue to learn Spanish (I probably shouldn't say "continue" since I doubt they remember anything).  We will use Duolingo, First Step Espanol, and lots of videos

Health  - Harcourt Health & Fitness Grade 5.  I want them to do it together so I split the difference in their grades.  I found the Activity Book online for free and bought a used textbook cheap from Amazon.

Music - in addition to doing choir, I'll be teaching the kids to read music and some keyboarding using a variety of resources.  Vicki will also work on learning guitar as she wants to.

Internet Safety - we will be working through the Internet Responsibility program from Commonsense Education.   My kids spend a lot of time online so I want to make sure we cover this well.

Physical Education - Swimming lessons, Tai Kwan Do and Yoga are our outside classes.  We also plan to do hiking, geocaching, biking and Vicki just got a pair of Heely's.  We are also going to start each day with some Yoga (using the Kid's Yoga Deck) and meditation.

Extras - we may do some BraveWriter activities as we have time.

My students and our curriculum

We’re taking a break from school for a few weeks while I help Steph get prepared for college and do a massive reorganizing of the house.   Since we’re also getting ready to start a new school year, I figured this is also a good time to tell a little bit about my lovely students and what we are using.

Georgie just turned 7 this week.  He is the main reason we started homeschooling.  He is gifted and quirky, with some sensory issues and possible ADHD.   He would definitely not thrive in a typical school classroom but he does great here at home.  Other than a year of Early Intervention for speech delays, from 3 to 4 years old, he has never been to school.  His favorite things are playing Wii, Minecraft and other computer games, and Pokemon.

Georgie would be entering 1st grade if he went to public school.  Due to his late August birthday, he would not have started kindergarten until he turned 6.  In practice, he is working between a 1st and 4th grade level.

For Language Arts, he is currently using:

All About Spelling – we will be starting level 2 when we start up school again next week.  Georgie is very visual so AAS with its cards and tiles works very well for him.  This is also serving as his only phonics program since we finished Explode the Code 5 and I decided ETC was just busywork at this point, at least for him.   We usually do one Step a week.

Spectrum Reading Grade 2 – Georgie tested with a reading comprehension equivalency of 4.9 but other things come up in this workbook so I don’t want to jump him ahead and leave gaps.  He does one lesson a day and they often incorporate rhyming, alphabetical order, homonyms, contractions, etc.

Spectrum Grammar Grade 2 – This is going slow probably because we never completed a Grade 1 grammar curriculum.   We started with capitalization and he’s getting hung up on the difference between a proper noun and a common noun, so we are taking things very slowly and supplementing with extra worksheets from Evan Moor’s Teachers File Box as needed.

For handwriting, he is using Handwriting without Tears – Grade 1.  He actually just finished the Grade 1 book but is definitely not ready for the Grade 2 book yet.  He still tends to use mostly capital letters so I’m going to start back at the beginning of the Grade 1 book and review all the lowercase letter formation.

I’m hoping to add some free writing this year since Georgie always loved to write stories and I feel he doesn’t do it enough anymore.   I will probably just go with a general journaling plan using writing prompts from Pinterest occasionally.

I’m also hoping to add some vocabulary work using Vocabulary Word-A-Day Cards from Scholastic.

Last, but not least, I want to encourage Georgie to spend more time reading this year.

For Math, he is using:

Math Mammoth 3A/3B – he does pages from all different chapters each day.   This helps keep his interest since he gets bored easily.  Math often seems to come almost intuitively to him, yet he’ll still complain that it’s too hard if he doesn’t understand something new the very first time it’s presented.

Since Georgie is also not a kid that likes flash cards or drill, we use a lot of fun games and resources to cover facts.   His current favorites are Solve the Riddle Math Practice: Addition and Subtraction from Scholastic, and Algebra Readiness Made Easy – Grade 2 also from Scholastic.  I have a ton of other resources for when he finishes these thanks to the regularly scheduled Scholastic Dollar Deals.

Beast Academy – we are using this as a fun supplement.   We didn’t get to it too often the past few months so I’m hoping to start using it at least once a week, maybe instead of Math Mammoth.

Vicki just turned 5 in July.  She has never been to any school and has been doing kindergarten for a few months already.   Her favorite things are playing outside, painting and other crafts, and playing Wii.

For Language Arts we are pretty much just doing phonics and very occasional handwriting.

For Vicki’s phonics, I am using Ordinary Parents Guide to Teaching Reading but not directly out of the book.  I usually set up the lessons on the white board using extra AAS tiles, on large foam puzzle pieces on the floor, or on index cards.  She pretty much has short /a/ words down and we will be reviewing and starting short /e/ words when we start back up.

I have the Handwriting without Tears Pre-K book for her.  She strongly resists doing handwriting, never colors beyond scribbles.  I don’t think it’s a lack of ability or coordination.  It seems to be more impatience with having to take the time to do it.  We use the wooden letter pieces from HWT and I’m trying to encourage more using the white board or a chalkboard.

For Math we are using Mathematics Enhancement Programme (MEP) Year 1.   I usually demonstrate using a magnetic white board rather than just using the workbook pages.

Since Math isn’t nearly as intuitive for her as it is for Georgie, I’ve started gathering more manipulatives.  So far we have Judy Clocks, Base 10 blocks, Cuisenaire rods, magnetic foam shapes (tangrams).

Things we do together:

We play lots of games to work on math and reading concepts.  Some of our favorites are:

printables from Kelly’s Kindergarten
Money Bags
Very Silly Sentences
Scrabble Jr.

For Science, we are using REAL Science Odyssey with lots of supplementation from Magic School Bus, encyclopedias/books and field guides.  We are currently working on rocks & minerals in RSO, but we also do nature studies, and various topics together with our 4-H Cloverbud group.

For History and Geography, we are getting ready to start a US History and Geography study.  We will be using the Complete Book of US History, History Pockets, Road Trip USA (from Confessions of a Homeschooler) and lots of books and encyclopedias.

We are also participating in a Flat Stanley exchange and a State Cultural Exchange.

My Goals for this year:

Do formal school at least 4 days a week consistently.

Take less than 4 months to complete a science or history unit.

Start Spanish utilizing The Complete Book of Spanish and free videos and lesson plans from Instant Replay.

Do more art study using Come Look with Me books and various What Your x Grader Needs to Know books (that I already have).  Encourage more use of our Draw Write Now books.

Do more art and craft projects in addition to the ones we do at 4-H.

Start music instruction on electric keyboards using Kid’s Keyboard Course Book #1.

Start typing instruction for Georgie using Dance Mat Typing.

General Social Studies, Health and Character education using Studies Weekly.

Less computer, less television and more PE for everyone.

Every End is a New Beginning

Steph had her last dance recital yesterday.  It’s been 14 years of friends and laughter and fun.  In some ways I’ll probably miss it almost as much as she does (although not the $$$$).  She’s made some wonderful friends and had some amazing teachers that were both mentors and confidantes.  It has helped keep her sane in a world that I’m sure often seemed crazy.   It has given her confidence and poise and helped her grow into the talented young woman she is now. 

I figured out that she has done 118 dance routines in that time – tap, jazz, lyrical, musical theatre, ballet, contemporary and even some acro.   This stage is over but a new one is beginning.  She is going on to college where she will be minoring in dance.

“Beginnings are usually scary and endings are always sad, but it’s everything in between that makes it all worth living for.”  Sandra Bullock

 

And here is one of my absolute favorite routines of the past 14 years.  It really shows how far she’s come.  It was choreographed by the amazingly talented Michelle Paradise-Rosolen and won top awards at all our competitions this year.  Sorry for the shaky video, this is Steph and Robert P. tapping to Mercy.

A Day in Our Homeschool

I’ve almost written a Day in the Life post a bunch of times over the past couple of years but whenever I start to record our activities in detail things usually take a turn toward the insane.  But today we had a great productive day and, luckily, I had decided to give it a shot and started keeping notes first thing this morning.

I think part of our productivity came from setting up some new guidelines for computer play for Georgie.   He doesn’t get to play until after his morning schoolwork (math and language arts) is done and then only during lunch break before we get back to our afternoon schoolwork (science, history, geography, art, etc.).

I also spent the weekend re-organizing (yes, again) and setting up a new plan that makes it easier to add games and fun activities to our day.

We started school at 9:30am.  By this time, we had all finished breakfast and had a chance to wake-up a little.  Vicki is a morning person and wakes up ready to go.  Georgie and I are definitely NOT, so it takes us some time to be ready.

Georgie started with his Handwriting without Tears.  Today’s activity was only one page so it didn’t take very long. 

Vicki wasn’t interested in doing school at first but came in after about 5 minutes and did some alphabet activities I had from Confessions of a Homeschooler.  She didn’t do them for very long before switching to some pictures with spaces for bottle cap letters.   She wasn’t really into either activity.



Georgie started in his binder with a math riddle, where he found the answers to addition problems that were adding 10 to 2 digit numbers.  Each answer matched up to a letter that was placed on lines to give the answer to a riddle.   He likes to try and guess what the answer may be before solving the problems while I keep telling him to get the answers first.



After his math riddle, he had both sides of a page from a Kumon numbers book to trace or write.  We had these last year before I bought HWT but I pulled them out because I feel like HWT isn’t giving him enough practice with writing numbers.  The page had the numbers written inside robots so Georgie had to jump up and act like a robot for a few minutes.  Once he got back to it, he did his usual non-stop mumbling “almost there, almost done, just one more, boy that was hard work”.

It was now 9:40 am.  Yes, all that happened in 10 minutes. 

Vicki switched to her wipe-off books while Georgie did his Explode the Code.  He just started Book 4 which covers dividing into syllables.  So far, he thinks it’s very easy and completed the 8 pages he had to do.  For right now, I’m having him do an entire lesson in one day.  We may slow down if he starts struggling.
Georgie then decided that he wanted to change into his t-shirt from the Insect museum but he didn’t want to walk on the floor in barefeet because it feels cold.



While I was arguing suggesting he just go and change if that’s what he wanted to do, I had my back turned since I was switching laundry around, and Vicki decided to give herself “whiskers” with a dry-erase marker.



At this point, since Georgie was still working on his independent work, I pulled out some paint chip word cards to do with Vicki.  The long strips had consonants on them, while the short cards with the hole in them had word endings.  I started with just the –at word family since that’s what we were working on in The Reading Lesson.  Either she was not feeling cooperative or she’s still not ready for blending since she decided that b –at was ass.

 

She didn’t want to do her Handwriting without Tears (“not that letter stuff again”) or Get Set for the Code.  She did an alphabet dot-to-dot puzzle and we did a Lesson from MEP – Reception, while Georgie finished up his ETC.
   
I told the kids we would go to the museum once we finished school since I have to check some things to set up for future lessons.  Vicki decided she needed to draw a map to the museum treasure while Georgie worked on his puzzle from Scholastic Algebra Readiness Made Easy.

She drew her pirate map and talked non-stop about it…”Let’s say Argh, you say Argh, My Matey, you’re not saying Argh!  You cannot look at the treasure map.   Okay you can take a peek at the treasure map.  I made it, so we have to look all over the museum to find the glow-in-the-dark treasure rocks.  Only I can power up the ship.  Vroom Vroom.”  Georgie’s reply to all this was “We can’t go until I get past this challenge”.  (his Algebra Readiness puzzle). 



At this point it was 10:17 am.  47 minutes of school done.

Vicki ate a granola bar and took off to play Reading Eggs on the computer while Georgie did his Spectrum Language Arts and Spectrum Reading (one lesson which is a two page spread for each).    All the while, he was complaining about having to do math since “I already know math”.  

After a short break for something to eat and despite his extensive knowledge, we went ahead and did math anyway.  He did 4 pages from Math Mammoth which took about 15 minutes and we moved on to All About Spelling.  This lesson was on compound words.  He didn’t have any trouble with the concept of compound words but he missed the spelling of some he should have been able to do by this point.  I think we will review all of AAS Level 1 before we move on to Level 2.

That would normally finish our morning work but I had put together a game to work on math facts over the weekend.  Georgie is definitely not a flash-card or drill kind of kid.  I bought two sets of flash cards over the weekend – addition and subtraction.  I mixed them together, divided the deck in half, then stuck each half into a sock since they were printed on both sides.  We then played War where who ever had the card with the higher answer, kept the cards.  Georgie had a great time with this, especially when he was winning, and didn’t even care that he was drilling math facts.

   

We took about an hour break for lunch and started science shortly after noon.  Our current science topic is Rocks and Minerals and we started it today by studying what’s inside the earth.  Among other things (a more detailed post of this is here), we made a play-doh model of the layers of the earth.

 

After we finished our science, I realized that the museum is not open on Tuesdays so we decided to do some Nature Study instead  (see post here).    We returned to the house around 2:30pm and Georgie and Vicki played on the computer until Daddy came home.

I’m hoping we will continue to have productive days like this one.

Georgie is 5!!

My one and only baby boy is 5 years old!!  He's such a big kid now - playing soccer, reading, playing games. 

Redrum

Vicki has been getting very into the pretend play lately.  Tinkerbell and all her Fairy friends talking about having tea while the stuffed turtle, fish and frog listen closely.  But instead of her cute, high pitched, little girl voice her friends all speak in a deep, rough voice that reminds me of the little kid from The Shining.  

Redrum anyone?

Totally creepy.

Almost Ready for School

While I've been busy preparing to start school, the kids have been finding ways to keep themselves amused.

Georgie has been enjoying drawing on the chalkboard.  I had just cleaned it off with a wet sponge and he really liked the way the colors looked brighter on the wet board.  He's getting to be quite a good draw-er.

Meanwhile, Vicki was playing on my I-Touch since it's the only way for me to brush her hair without a big fight.  Of course, it's not that easy to get it away from her once her hair is done.  Want to know how long that ponytail actually stayed in her hair??

Baby Girl Turns 3!

Last week Vicki turned 3 years old.  It's amazing how quickly the time goes by.  Happy Birthday Baby Girl!!

Traveling to Myrtle Beach

We spent the weekend traveling down to Myrtle Beach for Stephanie's Dance Nationals.  Saturday wasn't so bad since we only went as far as Maryland (about 4 hours) and spent the night at an old friend's house.  I didn't fall asleep until about 4am and was up by 6am.  Since Daddy is always an early riser we decided to get a jump on Sunday's drive and carry the kids out so they could continue sleeping.

This picture makes me realize why so many people ask me if these guys are twins.  They really do look alike.

The drive wasn't too bad until we were about half way through North Carolina.  It was a beautiful, sunny, 95 degree day.....and the air conditioning on the truck stopped working. :-(   We ended up making the rest of the drive with the windows open to at least keep the hot air moving a little bit.   But, we all made it and tomorrow is a new day.

Working Together

It's always nice when you see your children work together toward a common goal. 

There are many things that we are not ready for Vicki and George to use without supervision.  Many of these things are kept up on shelves out of their reach.  Due to the habit of climbing on anything and everything they can carry, push or drag where they need it I have removed all plastic bins, drawers and crates, all toys that can be used to stand on, and I make sure no folding tables are left up, no laundry baskets left lying around, etc.   And, it seems to be working.  It's probably been a whole week since I last had to take away something they had managed to get down on their own. 

Then I walked into the living room to see this:

I could hear Vicki saying, "Can you reach it yet?  Can you reach it, Gorgie?"

Now what do I do?

Vicki tells a story

Georgie has loved to tell stories for a long time.  They are often extremely entertaining if a little off-beat.  He especially loves when we drive some of Stephanie's friends home from school and he has a new, captive audience.   A couple of them still laugh about the time he started his story with, "This is a story about a dog and an alligator.....Once there was a donkey...."

Today Vicki told her first story.  We were driving Steph's friend Alyssa home and George decided we needed to all take turns telling stories. 

Vicki's story..."There was a horse on a rainbow.  She slid down the rainbow and stood on the ground.  THE END"  Not bad for an almost 3 year old.

Lunch at Cracker Barrel

Stephanie was on Spring Break last week so we were able to meet Grandpa Charlie for lunch at Cracker Barrel.  While we were waiting for them I was able to get some pictures of the kids.  It's a rare occasion when I can get all three kids together for a picture so I had to take full advantage of it.   It was a beautiful warm day so we waited outside.

Vicki had to bring all the drinks for her baby dolls.

the kids playing Checkers while we waited outside.

My charming children.

It's hard to believe my baby is going to be 16!

There were a group of women at the Cracker Barrel that day who worked as clowns and came every six weeks or so to practice their balloon animals. We were lucky enough to be there on that day. Georgie was given a fishing pole complete with fish and Vicki was given a mermaid. Of course, they both fought over them and they were a little bit in the way while eating but very cool still.

Vicki's mermaid.

Georgie playing with his fish outside after lunch.

Little Miss Chatterbox

Vicki has been surprising me lately with how clear she speaks and some of the things she comes up with.

We were driving Stephanie to dance one evening and we saw a sign "This Exit M" (large McDonald's M). Vicki points and says "Mommy, that says 'this is FRENCH FRIES!!!"   I promise we don't really visit McDonald's THAT much.

Stephanie loves musicals and her two favorites right now are Rent and Wicked.  She was listening to the song "Popular" from Wicked in the car and, of course, singing along.  When the song ended, all of a sudden Vicki pipes up from the back seat, "Wow, that was really great Steph".  Steph told her thank you and Vicki responded with "I really like that song".

When Vicki saw her new Easter dress she asked, "Is that for ME?  THANK YOU Mommy!  It's BeaUtiful".

Funny Moments

Daddy was taking Georgie and Vicki to the park today.  It was a beautiful, sunny day so he had some of the windows in the car down.  Vicki started saying something that Daddy couldn't understand so he asked her what she needed.  Georgie told Daddy "she's saying abajo which means down, she wants her window down".  So, Vicki is starting to speak Spanish and Georgie is translating.  Thank you Dora the Explorer.

Dance Competition Begins

Stephanie had her first dance competition with the new studio over the weekend.  They had a lot of fun and did really well.   They received two special "Most Entertaining" Awards (one for tap and one for jazz), one special "Spirit" Award (to the studio for showing good sportsmanship).  In addition, her tap team was 5th place overall and her lyrical team was 2nd place overall.   I'm glad we ended up at this studio when the old one closed down.  Everyone there has been very accepting of our girls and they've made some wonderful new friends.

Greece

George and I just returned from Greece.  He had to go on business and I was able to accompany him.  This meant that for two days he was at work during the day and for two days we were able to explore together.

Our flight out had a lay-over in Milan Italy so we flew over the Alps.  We also had a decent view from the airport terminal.  I have never seen Mountains like that so it was very neat.

The first day George was working I went to the Archeological Museum.  I found it very interesting looking at statues, jewelry and stoneware that was over 2,000 years old.  Other than the museum visit, I mainly looked around at shops and explored.  It was a lot like being in Manhattan, if you ignored the funny-looking letters on the signs.  Although, many things were also written in English and many people spoke at least some English, making it much easier to get around.

A couple of the items seen at the Archeological Museum.

We stayed at the Hilton Athens.  It was nice but very expensive.  If we weren't there on a business trip, we probably would not have stayed there. 

We had a nice view of the Acropolis from our balcony.

We did climb to the top of the Acropolis while we were there.  You do have to walk all the way up there.  It wasn't too bad and the view was absolutely amazing. 

The Parthenon.  It was interesting to hear the history of the temple.  It's in poor shape but not mainly from the passage of time.  Over the years it was burned by the Persians in 480 BC, blown up in 1687 and looted many, many times.

the Erechtheion

The Theatre of

Dionysus

The Odeum of Herodes Atticus

We also went and visited the Temple of Olympian Zeus which was one of the largest ancient temples......

and saw ruins, including Roman baths.

The trip was a lot of fun and I'd love to go back sometime.  Because we went in Winter and the weather was a little iffy, we didn't get a chance to visit any of the Islands and more time to explore would be wonderful.