January 9-13
Week 2 of Term 2
All:
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Picture Study: "The Milkmaid" (Vermeer)
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Plutarch: Poplicola, Lesson 2
Dd10:
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QuarterMile Math
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finished Singapore Math 2A
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Reason for Handwriting Level D
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Explode the Code Book 6
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Read from:
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The Bible
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Poetry of Emily Dickinson
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George Washington's World
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Abigail Adams
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It Couldn't Just Happen
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Physics Lab in the Home
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Listened to Mom read from:
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Age of Fable
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For free reading, she chose:
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Fairy Tales
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Childhood of Famous Americans: Martha Washington
Dd8:
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QuarterMile Math
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Singapore Math 1A
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started HWT Printing Power
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Explode the Code Book 3
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Read (aloud to Mom) from:
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The Young Reader's Bible
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Little Runner of the Longhouse
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Listened to Mom read from:
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An Island Story
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Dd5:
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Leapfrog DVDs
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Get Ready for the Code (Book A)
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Reading Reflex
I'm planning to start posting a weekly homeschool journal entry. I don't know if anyone really cares to read this stuff or not, but I know it will be an encouragement to me at least. :-)
We are in our third week of Term 2 so I'm going to post a summary for each week so far.
Our first week back to school we didn't get all the way up to full schedule. The dc did mostly independent work. We didn't do all of the "together" things that I wanted to do.
Week of January 2-6
Week 1 of Term 2
All:
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Plutarch: Poplicola, Lesson 1
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Picture Study: "The Milkmaid" (Vermeer)
Dd10:
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QuarterMile Math
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Singapore Math 2A
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Reason for Handwriting Level D for cursive handwriting practice
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Explode the Code Book 6
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SpongeBob Typing
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Made entries in Book of Centuries
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Read from:
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The Bible
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Poetry of Emily Dickinson
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George Washington's World
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Abigail Adams: Witness to a Revolution
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It Couldn't Just Happen
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Physics Lab in the Home
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Listened to Mom read from:
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Age of Fable
-
-
For free reading, she chose:
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Fairy Tales
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Childhood of Famous Americans: Abigail Adams
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-
She also watched a National Geographic documentary about Lewis and Clark that she had received from Grandma as a Christmas present. She watched it a second time with me when I had time to sit down and watch it. Both times she watched it, dd5 fell asleep on the couch. LOL! But, really, it was very good....dd5 was just extra tired and the narrator's voice was oh, so calm and soothing, and very pleasant to listen to. ;-)
Dd8:
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QuarterMile Math
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Singapore Math 1A
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finished Italic Handwriting Book A
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Explode the Code Book 3
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Read (aloud to Mom) from:
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The Young Reader's Bible
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finished Snowshoe Thompson
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started Little Runner of the Longhouse
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Listened to Mom read from:
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An Island Story
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Dd5:
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LeapFrog Learning Letters and Word Factory DVDs
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Get Ready for the Code (Book A)
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started Reading Reflex
Yes, I'm playing around with my blog template again. LOL! I have saved the old template so I can bring it back if I change my mind about this new look. I will update the sidebar with our current homeschool dailies when I get a chance. I'm not really finished playing around with this new template yet, but for now it will have to do. :-)
We have started "back to school" after our December break. We are still trying to get back into our school routines. It hasn't been easy, but I know things will get smoothed out eventually. I just have to be patient with the process. :-D
I have made some changes to our curriculum for this Term. I will be updating my sidebar listing as soon as I can, but in the meantime here's a little chart I put together to show the changes I've made, along with some of my thoughts on each change. Obviously, the boxes in column three that are blank mean that I have not made any changes in that subject area (yet!). I also bolded the specific items I've changed, just to make it easier to see them at-a-glance.
I hope you enjoy taking this little peek into our Term 2 plans. I've been checking all my friends' blogs to see if anyone else is making changes to her homeschool plans for this term. It's always refreshing to me to start a new term by looking back at the previous term and using that hindsight to make changes that will help us have an even better homeschool this term.
| Our Curriculum in Term 1 | Changes Made (so far) in Term 2 | |
| Devotional | God's Story and Me, NKJV Bible | |
| Hymn | Alas! and Did My Savior Bleed | |
| Recitation | Ten Commandments in Verse | |
| Phonics | Reading Made Easy, Explode the Code | Decided to use Reading Reflex and Explode the Code with dd5. After taking two dd's through RME, I'm ready for something different. I had narrowed my choices down to Reading Reflex, The Ordinary Parent's Guide to Teaching Reading, and Learning Language Arts Through Literature Blue (the old version). LLATL got knocked out of the running because it isn't as easy to "just pick up and do." OPG is easy to pick up and do, but the book is so huge! It is overwhelming! It's also hard to jump around in it and I've found that I need to be able to jump around in a phonics program so I can just fill in the gaps my dc have rather than make them go over stuff they already know. RR is both easy to pick up and do and easy to jump around in. Yesterday I was able to use RR to take dd5 from just knowing the letter sounds (she learned them from the Leap Frog Letter Factory DVD) to being able to sound out and read stories with 3-letter, short-a words (like "Fat cat sat on mat."). I was also able to use RR to fill in some gaps with dd8. I didn't cut out any of the manipulatives either. I just picked up the book, sat in my favorite chair with dd5 on one leg and dd8 on the other, and pointed to the words I wanted them to sound out. I know that is not the way the authors' intended for RR to be used, but it works for us. I like the OPTION of being able to do the games and activities on those days when I'm up to all that, but there are many days where all I can do is open up a phonics book and point to the words I want the dc to sound out. I didn't think I could do that with RR, but it turns out that I can so that clinched the decision for me. |
| Handwriting | Reason for Handwriting (dd10), Italic (dd8) | Switched dd8 back to Handwriting Without Tears. I don't know why I keep on trying to use Italic handwriting, but maybe this time I have learned my lesson and will stick with HWT for the rest of my dc. Part of the reason why I keep trying Italic is that dd10 learned Italic first and her printing is very nice. However, when it came time to learn cursive she did NOT like the Italic cursive. She wanted to learn traditional cursive so I used HWT Cursive with her and then A Reason for Handwriting for practicing her cursive skills. She loves RFH so my plan for the younger dc is to use HWT all the way through the Cursive book and then switch them to RFH for additional cursive practice. The HWT teaching methodology just makes so much sense and has been a lot easier for me to implement than the Italic methodology. (I didn't actually "teach" Italic to dd10; she learned it through tracing over the Italic letters in the Simply Phonics and Simply English books but that tracing method didn't work with dd8 who needs more explicit one-on-one guidance from me.) |
| Math | Saxon 65 (dd10) | Switched dd10 back to Singapore and Math-U-See. Again, I hope this is one area where I've learned my lesson and will just stick with what has been working. There was no need for me to switch dd10 to Saxon other than my own insecurities about "grade level." She was working "below grade level" in the Singapore and MUS books and it made me feel better to be able to switch her into a 6th grade math book (Saxon 65). She was doing well with the Saxon, but she was losing her enthusiasm for math and that enthusiasm is more important to me than arbitrary "grade level" designations so I decided to let her choose which math program she wanted to use. She actually chose Singapore, not MUS or Saxon. But I decided to keep my MUS materials and use them as a supplement to Singapore. I love the MUS blocks and I like some of Mr. Demme's methods so I will use the TM's to pull ideas from whenever dd hits a stumbling block in her Singapore books. By the way, dd has been slowly regaining her enthusiasm for math since we switched back to Singapore. I don't blame her. Those Singapore workbooks are FUN! I even want to do one on my own (and probably will when we get into the NEM levels). |
| Spelling / Grammar | Higher Lessons in Grammar, dictation (dd10) | Decided to use Rod and Staff English and dictation with dd10. I am using the R&S English in a non-traditional way. I already owned the R&S English 2 student book and the old version of the R&S English 3 student book. Since the R&S 3 is an old version, it follows a different scope and sequence than the new R&S 2. Not to worry though. I just picked out the sections from both books that I want dd10 to read and arranged them in a reading order that makes sense to me. She will be flipping back and forth between both books until she has completed my reading plan. I am not having her read every unit. I'm just filling in her gaps. She already knew some grammar from when we did part of First Language Lessons and some Mad Libs, so I'm just having her read certain sections that cover "new" (to her) material. I'm not having her do many of the written exercises either. After she reads a section and reaches a "review" exercise, I do have her do a few (very few) of the written exercises. If she aces them, then she gets to move on to reading the next scheduled section. If she doesn't do well, then I have her do more of the written work until I feel that she has achieved a sufficient mastery of the concept to be able to move on. |
| Logic | Building Thinking Skills Book 2 (dd10) | |
| History / Literature / Poetry | Ambleside Online Year 2 | Decided to bump dd10 up to doing Year 4 independently; dd8 will still be doing Year 2 with me. This has been a difficult transition because dd10 has already read some of the Year 4 books but I didn't really want to reinvent the wheel where AO is concerned. I want to benefit from all the hard work that the Advisory has put into coming up with the AO curriculum. I'm tired of doing so much planning and tweaking. I know I will still need to keep adapting the materials for my younger dc, but dd10 is so RIPE for doing an AO Year on her own. I could have placed her in Year 5, but I had more of the Year 4 books already so that is where she got placed. LOL! Anyway, she still listens in on the Year 2 readings with the younger dc, but now I feel better knowing that I'm not short-changing her. The girl was getting desperate for reading material because every time she would pull a book off the shelf and ask if she could read it I would have to say, "No, honey, that is an AO book for later on and I don't want you to read those books ahead of schedule." Now, she can branch off and have her own AO schedule and not be held back to the level of the younger dc. |
| Science | Exploring Creation with Astronomy | |
| Bible History | Greenleaf Guide to the Old Testament, NKJV Bible |
This is the first year that I have given myself permission to take all of December off from schooling and it has been wonderful!
Anyway, that's why I've been so quiet lately. We have been enjoying lots of family time this month. I think a month-long break is just what we needed! We have played games, eaten pizza, looked at Christmas lights, listened to Christmas music, burned scented candles, tried new recipes, enjoyed family get-togethers, gone shopping (both IRL and online), watched the birds, made Christmas ornaments, and lounged around in our PJ's and slippers as much as possible. :-D
Life has been so laid-back and relaxed that I don't know how we'll ever get back on track come January, but I'm not going to think about that right now. I'll cross that bridge when I come to it. For now, I'm enjoying making memories with my family and letting all the worries and stresses roll right off my back. They'll be there for another day. But for today I'm going to get my Love Bank filled back up with kisses and hugs and quiet conversations (while making those same kinds of deposits into each of my loved one's Love Banks) and regain the strength to face all those worries and stresses that will still be waiting for me come January. I think that by then they won't seem so big anymore anyway. ;-)
It's been a whole year since my ds' cranioplasty surgery. He was just six months old when they cut open his head, removed some bone to create a soft spot, and reshaped his skull. See, when he was born, he had no soft spot and his head was slightly misshapen. The surgery was necessary to ensure that his little brain would have room to grow properly. It was the scariest thing I've ever been through.
But now here we are, a year later, with a happy, healthy little boy who seemingly knows no fear. He's an active toddler, which means he falls and bumps his head more times than I would like. Just a week ago he bumped his head right on his zig-zag scar and it bled. Don't you know I was scared? I have become so jumpy and nervous about every little bump and fall. His uncle got him to watch a football game last Sunday. Little ds was studying the game intently and I, of course, told him in no uncertain terms not to get too interested because that was one game he wasn't ever going to play if I had anything to say about it. LOL!
But God has been so good and that's what I really wanted to say in this post. I can't praise Him enough for what He's done for our family since He brought this little hard-headed little boy into our life. I'm crying now so I'll just leave you with the hymn that is in my heart this morning. Please click on the link below and praise God with me today.
Praise God, From Whom All Blessings Flow
My 8-yo did the last lesson of Reading Made Easy today! I have now taken two dd's all the way through RME. It feels like quite an accomplishment. My 10-yo dd is making some chocolate candy for the 8-yo, to celebrate. 
I cried when we read the last chapter of Gideon's Gift and dd8 just looked at me like "What?" It's just so touching when Gideon remembers what Mama said about "all the glory belonging to the Lord." That's what it's all about. 
My AO/SOTW History Outline takes you from AO Year 1 through AO Year 3 -- Greco-Roman, Middle Ages, and Renaissance/Reformation -- all in one document. Weekly break-downs are purposely not included. This outline will be forgiving if you "get behind." :-) You can use the outline to make up your own weekly plans. Or you can just play it by ear, like I do. :-D Just start where you need to and keep going, checking the readings off (or dating them) as you go along.
Each "Year" starts up on a new page so that you can easily print out just the pages for the Year you need. Eventually, I will have all six AO Years in this one document in its final revision. That way you only have to download the document once and can print out the relevant pages as needed for your current school year.
This revised document does not include the timeline info that was in the Middle Ages outline. I will be making up a separate document with that info plus any explanatory notes that I think need to be added.
Please note that the readings from Fifty Famous Stories and This Country of Ours have a few sections where they are chunked together. I simply couldn't spend any more time trying to figure out exactly where each reading ought to go so I chunked them and added a note that you could spread them out as desired or read them in a chunk just as you would for something like The Little Duke or Robin Hood, etc. I plan to read them in a chunk as I think that will be better than breaking up the continuity of those sections. TCOO is written in such a way that if you skip around too much in order to go in strictly chrono order, you are likely to become very confused....more confused than if you just read through each regional section as is. I hope this makes sense. :-)
Remember, this is just a history outline. You will still need to add in all the other AO subjects/books (or appropriate substitutions) for the Year you are currently doing.
A Judicious Selection of Books from AO Years 1 and 2,
or Pre-Year 3 for an Older Student
( a condensed version of Years 1 and 2 that can be completed by an older student in one school year )
I created this schedule for those who want to do AO Years 1 and 2 in one school year with an older child (say, age 9 or older) and do not want that dc to miss out on the earlier history material. Some people have shared schedules that condense AO Year 1 into 18 weeks, but how can the books be savored at such a pace? Rather than try to cram all of Year 1 into half a year and all of Year 2 into the second half of that year, why not use the Advisory's Pre-Year Seven suggestions to pick out fewer books from both years and then work through those -- *fewer* -- books in one year?
Remember, I am only suggesting this bare minimum schedule for those beginning AO with an older student (say, age 9 or older). And please be aware that this is not the same as doing "all of Year 1 and all of Year 2" in one school year. This is a judicious selection of the not-to-be-missed books from both years; a lot has been left out so that what is left can be savored. :-)
I promise I'm not going to bore you regularly with all the nitty-gritty, mundane details of our daily homeschooling journal, but I thought I'd share it just this once so you can see how my loose Daily List works out in real life.
This was a good day; we got most everything accomplished. There are a few subjects we did not get to (Latin and logic for my 10-yo dd) and there are some subjects that we have not yet been successful at incorporating regularly (composer/artist/nature study). I guess we "unschool" those subjects; my dc never lack for free-time nature study and they listen to classical music and peruse art books from our home library. We do handicrafts (crochet, cross-stitch, beading), as desired, during Family free time.
My day is divided up into "time boxes" with meals being the "anchors." In general, it works out like this:
After Breakfast: General School Meeting, Read-alouds, Academics
After Lunch: Academics, Read-alouds, Field Trips (if any)
After Supper: Read-alouds
This was the only way I could schedule in, without overloading us with too much at one time, the recommended (see note below) two hours per day of read-alouds. We basically have three read-aloud sessions of 30-45 minutes each.
NOTE: You can read more about "time boxes" in Educating the Wholehearted Child (Clarkson) and "anchors" in The Successful Homeschool Family Handbook (Moore) and "two-hours-of-read-alouds-daily" in Teaching the Trivium (Bluedorn).
On days when we get a late start, we still start at the beginning of this list and work our way through it. We may skip a few things, but we generally get the most important things done first. On days like that, we usually shorten our read-aloud sessions so that we can still get our devotions, household tasks, and academics done.
Tuesday, November 15
Rise & Shine routines; Breakfast
General School Meeting
- Devotional: God's Story and Me, Week 8 (Solomon)
- Hymn: "Alas! and Did My Savior Bleed?"
- Recitation: "Ten Commandments in Verse"
Read-alouds and narrations
- History Spine: Child's History of the World, ch. 50 (Castles)
- Science: Exploring Creation with Astronomy, ch. 2 (the Sun)
Academics
- Phonics: dd8 did Lesson 104 in Reading Made Easy; dd5 did Lesson 1 in Get Ready for the Code (ETC-A)
- Copywork: dd10 copied a riddle; dd8 did a lesson in Italic Book C; dd5 did lowercase "f" in ETC-A
Lunch; clean house
Naps; Academics (for ages 10 and up)
- Math: dd10 did 20 minutes of Saxon 65, Lesson 12
- Spelling/Grammar: dd10 did studied dictation of three sentences and diagramming of one sentence (from RK Higher Lessons, Lesson 12); and one Funny Fill-in (like Mad Libs)
Read-alouds and narrations
- Poetry: Walter de la Mare, 2 poems
- Literature: Little House in the Big Woods, last chapter
- History Tales: Howard Pyles Robin Hood, episode 3
Errands; library; field trips --OR-- free play; outside time
Supper; clean house
Daddy Read-alouds
- Bible: Greenleaf Guide to the Old Testament, Lesson 1, and NKJV Bible
Family free time
Before Bed routines; lights out.
For today's spelling and grammar lesson we followed the same basic format as yesterday, only I used sentences from the RK Higher Lessons book instead of my dd's original sentences. I wrote out the sentences and had dd underline the words she would need to study for spelling. I then wrote those words into syllables for her to study. She studied them and then wrote the sentences from memory. She only misspelled three words: Armada, destroyed, should. We did the first part of the grammar assignments together. She correctly diagrammed sentence two on her own.
Sentences for analysis and dictation:
- The cold November rain is falling.
- The great Spanish Armada was destroyed.
- A free people should be educated.
Words to study for spelling:
- November
- Spanish
- Armada
- destroyed
- educated
Grammar assignments:
- Divide each sentence into its subject and predicate parts, and label the nouns, verbs, and adjectives.
- Diagram one of the sentences.
I've been trying to figure out a way to integrate our LA lessons in a natural way that utilizes my dd's own writing and doesn't require a lot of advance planning on my part. I think I may have found a way! We haven't been doing this long, but I'm already seeing positive improvements in my dd's writing skills.
I call this method "narrated, studied dictation" because first she narrates
to me while I write, then she studies the passage for grammar and spelling,
and finally she writes it from dictation (or from memory, if possible). This
way we are incorporating many LA skills (spelling, mechanics, grammar, and composition) into one focused writing session. It's simple, inexpensive, doesn't require a lot of advance planning, and best of all, it's working! :-)
Today's narrated, studied dictation lesson:
I read Lesson 8 from RK Higher Lessons (nouns & pronouns) aloud to her. I
had her make up three simple sentences from her history reading
(Pocahontas). I wrote the sentences. I had her divide each sentence into its
complete subject and complete predicate. I then had her label all nouns and
pronouns. I had her underline the words that she knew she needed to study
for spelling. I then wrote those words, breaking them into syllables, for
her to study. She studied the words till she thought she had them down and
then she wrote out her original three sentences from memory. (If her
sentences were much longer, I would have dictated them to her, but these
were short enough that she could write them from memory which accomplishes
the same thing as the dictation would have.)
Her sentences were:
Pocahontas was taken prisoner by the settlers. They took her to England. She
married and had a little boy.
The words she studied for spelling were:
Pocahontas, prisoner, married
Grammatical and mechanical concepts covered:
subject, predicate, noun, pronoun, begin sentence with capital letter, end sentence with correct punctuation.
I threw this AO Year 1 chart together this morning so be forewarned that there may be errors. Please let me know if you find any.
Here is just page two (the history spines) for those who have the 1st edition of CHOW.
Now I need to get to work on an AO Year 3 chart for us to use next year. :-)
For those of you who've been asking me about my daily and weekly routines -- here they are!
I don't list times beside the items on my daily list. I just work through the list in order, no matter how late of start I get on the day. If I goof off too much in the AM (an all-too-frequent occurrence, I'm afraid!), then I will skip a few items, if necessary. Academics get higher priority than read-alouds, but even if I've skipped the morning and afternoon read-alouds, we usually still get in one or two read-alouds in the evenings.
I know that a simple list like this will not work for everyone. I'm probably falling off my pedestal as you read this...LOL! Nope, there's nothing special here. Just one Mom's daily checklist and basic weekly plan. :-)
Daily Routines:
- Rise & Shine routines; Breakfast.
- Bible, narrations, singing; General School Meeting (memory work, reading practice).
- Read-alouds (history, science) and narrations.
- Academics (phonics, copywork, notebooking).
- Lunch; clean house.
- Naps; finish Academics (for ages 10 and up).
- Read-alouds (poetry, literature, history tales/bios) and narrations.
- Errands; library; field trips --OR-- free play; outside time.
- Supper; clean house.
- Daddy Read-alouds (Bible, fun reading).
- Family free time.
- Before Bed routines; lights out.
Weekly Routines:
- Monday: Restore Order Day! (get back into "school day" routines; tidy up house after the weekend)
- Tuesday: nothing special...LOL!
- Wednesday: Get out of the House Day! (library, errands, etc.)
- Thursday: about once or twice a month, we participate in co-op activities
- Friday: Clean up the House Day! (clean house to get ready for the weekend)
- Saturday: Family activities; catch up on laundry, if needed; outside chores, if needed
- Sunday: Church and Family activities
Lots of people have been asking me about how to take the Year Plan and translate it into appropriate Weekly assignments. I am including some forms below that you can download and fill in throughout the year. I would not recommend planning more than one week in advance. That way, you can easily carry things that didn't get done over to the next week without having to re-do several weeks' worth of lesson plans.
My how-to notes are in the PDF file so I won't repeat them here. I'll post answers to any questions, either in this post or in a new post, when I have time.
Download the PDF first because it contains the notes. The Excel file is available for you download and edit to suit your needs, but it does not have any of my explanatory notes in it.
Let me just add one final note: I do not use these weekly sheets anymore. I'm simply providing them here for those who need them and will use them.
I finally gave up on making detailed weekly plans. Instead, I have a daily routine which is really just a list of daily home and school tasks, listed in the order I want them done. I work from my Year Plan and my Daily Routine -- no more weekly sheets for me. The best part is that I never have to feel behind and yet we are accomplishing so much more this year than we ever did when I tried to make weekly lesson plans! :-)
My dc don't do anything like the "scrapbooking" concept of notebooking. They don't use glue, scissors, stickers, colored paper, etc. on school assignments. They don't even do very many coloring pages. We let the subject matter dictate the type of notebooking we do and we always try to keep it as simple as possible. That's not to say that we don't put out effort to make them look nice. We do. It's just that we don't make little minit books (a lapbook term) and we don't do lots of cutting, pasting, and matting of photos, drawings, maps, etc.
Now, they DO like to use glue, scissors, stickers, etc., but they do that on their own time just because they want to and not because Mom assigned them to make a "page for their notebooks." These kinds of creations are things like: pictures they want to put up on the fridge, decorate their room with, mail to Grandma, or give to someone as a birthday present. Never schoolish things like a history scrapbook page or whatever.
But back to the school assignments. Most of my dc's school work is done in either workbooks or composition books. They have workbooks for math, handwriting, and phonics. They write in the workbooks. I don't tear the pages out and put them in a binder. The workbook itself stays intact and gets stored away when completed.
Things like spelling/dictation, copywork, narrations, etc. get done directly in composition books in chronological order. They just turn to the next blank page and do whatever written assignments I've given them for day. I don't have them make special sections for different types of work (ie., a section for copywork, a section for dictation, a section for vocabulary, etc.). So, for example, a page of spelling words might be followed by a page of dictation and then a narration page and then another page of spelling words. Just whatever the next written assignment was.
Things that I print out or copy from a reproducible book (like sheets from the SOTW AG, coloring pages, map work, pages from a reproducible book like Building Thinking Skills, etc.) get put into a binder or a 3-prong folder. Usually, a 3-prong folder, because binders are so bulky and because we don't do a whole lot of these separately printed/copied sheets anyway. I don't sort them into sections. They go into the binder/folder in chronological order. So you might have a history coloring page, followed by a map, followed by a thinking skills worksheet, followed by a timed math drill sheet, etc.
Basically, I choose the easiest, simplest way I can think of to collect and maintain their written work. I also keep a journal (in a composition book) where I write down what we did, notes to myself, things to buy, etc or paste in forms and print-outs that I refer to often. Right now my composition book has an attendance chart, a curriculum overview for each child for this year, reading logs for each child, a read-aloud log where I jot down the titles of chapters we've read in our science and history spines (I use this later on to see what we ve covered so far in the year and to make up exam questions for the dc...it is basically a topic list for the various content subjects), a page with beginning-of-the-school-year pictures of each child, and, of course, my hand-written journal entries. The page of school pictures is my only scrapbook-like item, but it was easy to make. I printed it out from my computer using my HP photo album software. It's just a nice touch, but one I wouldn't have added if I had to actually make a physical scrapbook-type page with actual cutting-and-pasting. I'm just not into doing that much extra work for schoolish things. I do enjoy actual scrapbooking, but that's for my family photo albums, not our school records.
Oh, for Nature Notebooks, my dc each have a composition book that they draw/write directly in, again in chronological order. I don't tell them what to draw or write, but I do help them look up information. For example, when we found a garden spider and her egg sacs, we looked her up online. I read about her and her mate, the over-wintering process that she was currently going through, etc., and the dc made whatever notes they wanted to in their notebooks. I found some pictures to print out for those dc who didn't want to draw her. They cut and pasted these pictures in and wrote their captions/info underneath. That's the most scrapbook-y we ever get, for schoolish things.
We also have a timeline notebook -- a Book of Centuries -- for the whole family. It is in a composition book. I just went through it and wrote the centuries at the tops of each two-page spread and we just list people and events where they fit. We haven't used any timeline figures yet, but hope to eventually.
To Katie and others: Please feel free to print out the schedule. Glad I could help!
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To Soloschool: I will try to post soon about how we do "notebooks." In the meantime, you can do a search of the AO email group archives and find out more.
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Q: How did you know on your history readings which chapters fit in with the other books in history?
A: I used a few resources (like TruthQuest History guides and All Through the Ages) to help me place the books in the timeline. Some books were not listed in these guides and I had to figure out for myself where they fit. That was the most time-consuming part.
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Q: You wouldn't happen to have year 1 done this way would you?
A: Well, no, I don't have Year 1 done this way, but I will eventually. I'm working on Year 3 right now (getting it ready for us to use next year) and then maybe I can work out Year 1. I'll post an update when I have them ready to share.
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About the pdfFactory: This is a shareware program that allows you to convert your documents into PDFs to make file-sharing easier. The documents that I have converted into PDFs may be viewed by others, but not edited. If you would like to have my original source document -- so that you can edit it to fit your needs -- email me and I will send it to you in a private email. My original document was created in Microsoft Excel. You would need to have Excel to be able to edit my document. If you don't have Excel, then use whatever spreadsheet program you have (or use a word processing program that allows you to add tables) to create a chart that fits your needs. You can print mine out to look at and get ideas from and then create your own using whatever software programs you have and are comfortable with. Or you could simply hand-write a basic listing of the subjects and readings that you want to do this year. Sometimes, when I don't want to fiddle with making a computer-generated chart, I just use plain ol' graph paper and make a hand-written chart. I use a ruler and a black ink pen to make my grid lines and then I hand-write in my headings and list my info under those headings. There's nothing sacred about my charts. They are basically just lists....several lists combined onto one page so that I could see them at-a-glance.
There have been some recent threads on the Ambleside Online email group about scheduling and weekly planning. I haven't joined in but I've been reading all the interesting posts. I'm not sure if my laid-back way of planning AO would be helpful to share or not. I know that many folks actually like to do all that detailed weekly and/or daily planning.
Actually, I like detailed planning, too, but -- after trying to do AO for three years now by doing the daily/weekly planning and finally realizing that the reason I burn-out on it every year is precisely because of all the time spent planning and then the disappointment when life happens and my plans get totally messed up -- I've finally learned that the only way I can keep up with AO is to do the Big Picture yearly and term planning and leave the daily/weekly details to resolve themselves.
Before I share my year plan, let me give a few details. My school-aged dc (ages 10 and 8) are both doing a modified AO Year 2 plan. My 10-yo could be placed in AO Year 4, but I just don't like separating them. I like to keep my family all on the same historical time period. So I add in extra books for my 10-yo dd's independent reading (which are not listed in the chart I'm going to share...maybe I'll list her extra books in another post).
There are some notes on my chart that explain my laid-back method. Basically, we just read through the books in the order they are listed on my chart. I don't try to figure out how much to read each week or each day. We just read what we can and keep moving forward. We rotate the subjects so that certain subjects are done on certain days. Some are done daily (Bible and poetry). On history days, we usually read from one of the chronological spine books as well as an episode from one of the "tales" or biographies. On literature days, we may read from a "term" book and from a "year" book (such as Understood Betsy and Pilgrim's Progress). This all works together to keep us moving forward at a steady pace without the need to write out or type up specific, detailed weekly/daily plans.
I spend some time (usually in the summer) planning out our year. I try to get my entire year plan to fit on one or two pages. In the past, I've tried printing out 36 weekly schedule sheets and putting them into a binder. Inevitably, we fall behind in book or get ahead in another and my nice little weekly charts are all messed up. I've tried only printing a week or two in advance. But, then, I don't like having to spend so much time at the computer, tweaking my sheets before printing them each week. I've also tried doing the "subject" lists method that Wendi often talks about on the AO group. I don't like that way, either. Too many pages to keep up with and I hate using binders anyway. Too bulky. Anyway, what I've done with my little chart is that I've taken the "subject checklist" idea and condensed it into one or two pages. You will see that I listed out all of the readings for our history spines, Tales from Shakespeare, and Parables of Nature. I did not need to list out the "readings" for most of the other books because they are books that we will read through in their entirety. I only listed the specific readings for books that are historical overviews or from which we will only read certain selections. This greatly simplified and condensed the "subject checklists" idea and gave my brain something it could wrap itself around. I love seeing my whole year at-a-glance like this!
So my solution has been to make up a one- or two-page chart that lists out our readings for the year under their various subject categories. Then, I just check off the readings as we do them. I do have a general plan for the week (which subjects to do on which days) and a general daily routine (which subjects to do in which order and what approximate time of the day). If I add those two "charts" to my year plan, then I have a total of about 3-4 pages with my plans for the whole school year. I don't have to do weekly planning anymore, other than the normal family planning -- noting appointments, errands, outside activities, etc. on my family calendar. And I don't have to do daily planning anymore. The dc have their "routines" so they know what needs to be done each day. They know which subjects are priorities and which ones can be skipped if we have other activities or if something else comes up. They get their 3 R's work done first, and we do as much of our AO work as we comfortably can each day. And I don't feel behind anymore!
I set Yearly goals and Term goals. I do evaluate our progress and make adjustments as needed in order to hit our Term goals, but this is so much easier than trying to hit specific, detailed Weekly or Daily goals.
I love this way of planning! I feel like I have the best of both world nows -- plans and flexibility. I like to call it "Structured Flexibility."
I hope that this is helpful to others who are like me -- wanting the benefits of advance planning but still needing the freedom to work the academics in around the daily life of the family. Actually, I guess most of us want that. It's just that some people are able to get all of that from their detailed weekly/daily planning and some are not. I may be the only NUT out there who needs to focus more on the long-term plans and less on the short-term plans, but maybe this post will bring a few other nuts out of the woodwork. LOL!
So without further ado....
My 2005-06 Year Plan and Template (Includes my AO Year 2 Plan, customizable template, and template instructions.)
Feel free to post questions and I'll answer them -- if I can. :-)
Just a little something I thought was worthy of committing to memory...
Teach me to feel another's woe,
To hide the fault I see;
That mercy I to others show,
That mercy show to me.
--Alexander Pope
Age-Appropriate Prompts for Daily Narrations and/or End-of-Term Examinations
These narration prompts were taken from the examination samples given in the CM Series. The subjects listed after each prompt indicate the subjects that naturally "go with" the different types of prompts. Questions from preceding levels can still be used with older children; in other words, each level simply adds to the list of available sample questions. Use these samples to make up your own exam questions using material from the books your dc are reading. Don't forget that these can be prompts for *written* narrations as well. :-)
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age 6
- Tell the story of (History, Tales, Literature)
- What have you noticed about (Nature Study)
- Gather specimens and tell about them. (Nature Study)
- Tell about
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ages 7-9
- Tell what you know about
- What is a (hero)? What (heroes) have you heard about? Tell about one. (History; Tales)
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ages 9-12
- " (famous quote) ." Who said this? Tell the story. (History)
- Tell the history of
- What did you see in (geography book)?
- What (places) & (things) would see traveling about in (specific place)? (Geography)
- Tell about the kinds of (animals, insects, etc.) and the special work that they each do. (Nature Study)
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ages 12-15
- Describe What are the (laws of) (Science)
- Explain (an event the cause) and give an account of the (related event the effect). (History)
- What do you know of the (committee; govt. body)? (History; Govt.)
- Show fully how (famous person) acquired the title of (nickname, title). (Why was it a strange title for a man in those days?) (History)
- Describe a journey in (place)? (Geography)
- How are the following seeds dispersed: (list of seeds)? Give diagrams and observations. (Botany)
- Describe the (part) of a (plant) and a piece of (plant). (Botany)
- Give a diagram of the (body part) and explain how it functions. (Physiology)
- Describe your favorite scene in (literature book). (Literature)
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ages 15-17
- For what purpose were (priests) instituted? (Bible)
- " (Quote) ." Write a short sketch of (person quoted), discussing the above statement. (History)
- What do you know of the (people)? (History)
- Distinguish between (vocab word) and (vocab word), using each word in a sentence. (seven sets of words are listed) (Vocabulary; word study)
- Give shortly (author of history book)s estimation of (famous person), showing what he did for (country) and what was the cause of his personal (failure or success) in life. (History)
- Give some account, as far as you can, in the style of (author), of the (event). (History)