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www.teachingtextbooks.com has a great teaching style for math. Everything is done on cd rom (lectures, questions, grading) and these cds make teaching hands free. They do it all and the way it is explained is phenomenal. However, we found that the grades are not categorized as they should be. 4th grade would probably need 6th grade or above. Even then, you wouldn't be learning everything you needed to (in comparison to state standards in Florida). I do love the teaching style, just wish they had the grade levels equivalent with most standards. Looks like we'll be going back to Bob Jones Math this year. Handwriting Without Tears- we are still loving it! It has been such a blessing for our family and I could not recommend it enough. If you have a struggling writer, one who cries at the mere thought of picking up their pencil, this may be your solution. I would love to hear about a hands on History curriculum if anyone has used/heard of one! |
Took a leap from our usual BJU Science in search of something even more hands on for our visual learner. We ultimately decided to go with Apologia Science by Jeannie Fullbright in hopes it would offer us a that new level. One week into it I'm yelling "hooray" from the rooftops. Love, love,loving it. From first glance I was a bit nervous as the whole purpose is to immerse your student deeply into a specific subject. This isn't the light touch on this and that offered by most schools. I hoped it would not be too much for her to ingest. Her strong point has never been memorization of large words. The curriculum was SO in depth. Worries flooded my brain that it may be too much for her. I was so wrong! The explanations of the lessons are A+ and the wholesome science experiments back it up. Apologia would work well in group settings. It proves to be such an affordable book as well because there are not student books you need to purchase. www.creationsensation.com is a great site where you can purchase complete sets of all the materials you will need for experiments in each book. They even bag them by lesson! They really do include everything except the kitchen sink! So instead of the reading, worksheets, testing method we were accustomed to in science. We now learn a few pages and then notebook what we have learned (notebook pages can be printed for free at the Jeannie Fullbright site). Each book comes with a link and password. Throughout the book if it mentions a specific scientist or place (just an example) it will refer you to this site where they already have an info sheet and pictures waiting for you on the topic so that you may delve deeper. There are many choices for Aplogia including, Botany, Zoology I, Zoology II, Zoology, III, Astronomy, etc. I am seeing that my daughter is retaining so much more than she ever has in Science before. Better yet, she's not memorizing. She is UNDERSTANDING. |
I hear the school bells ringing already. Hard to believe it's already that time again. So soon! Now I don't want to sound like I dread our upcoming homeschool year, but going on our 4th year I've lost some of my zing. It's not that I don't enjoy or appreciate the opportunity to give my children a great education. There are so many benefits to homeschooling. Watching my oldest daugher, Trinity grow from having to sound out the word cat to reading through a chapter book in two days was such a special thing to witness. We struggled so much that first year with what she couldn't pick up in public school and many days I was left with doubt but we just had to perservere (no other choice, right?). And later seeing her blossom into such an avid reader was deeply rewarding in itself. Looking back we've had so much fun over the past few years. Field trips and science experiments ring out clearest in my memory. The part that makes me drag my feet is the time factor. With work, I find it SO hard to get homeschooling complete each day. Every day is a crazy race and I find myself exhausted at the end of it (with no housework done or even a nice dinner cooked). It's go go go and that makes it hard to really sit and enjoy things as much as I'd like to. You can schedule all you want and manange your time appropriately, but what about when their just aren't enough hours in the day? I can't manage time I don't have. It's a constant rush and THAT is the part that I despise. I've tried and tried to come up with a solution to better time managment but I'm coming to the realization that when there is too much work and not enough time...you just can't create more hours. So this year I'm hoping to have some sort of breakthrough where I magically find some comfortable routine that I can cope with. One that doesn't leave me exhausted and hopeless at the end of each day. So for the past few weeks I've been trying to come up with ways during the time I do have (weekends) to prepare things for the week which will make things go smoother. If you find yourself frazzled and there seems like no solution is around....it could very well be that you have 40 hours of work lined up to do in only 24. |
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Some days I feel like ripping the last strand of hair from my head. Despite a couple years of flash cards, fact families, and multiple approaches to memorizing them.....somewhere....I failed. I failed to recognize that maybe this classic approach wasn't for everyone. But, in hindsight I guess realizing this now is better than never. Still, I can't help but feel that I wasted a couple years and caused my dd alot of frustration (not to mention myself). I was sifting through a TOS magazine my best friend bought me a subscription to when my eyes fell across a small advertisement for math. The cartoon visuals popped out of the page. Memorize your facts (addition, subtraction, multiplication, and division) with visual! What a great concept. I hopped onto the net and visited www.citycreek.com to check out their samples and invited my 8 year old (Trinity) in for a looksie. I had her watch one of the visuals and for the past 2 weeks she has been able to recall the entire problem instantaniously. AMAZING! I knew I had to buy it. Our Times Alive (multiplication/division) set came today. I am very impressed. So much though, I went back on and ordered the addition/subtraction set along with magnetized character board to help concrete those basics in her before we move on to their Times Alive. If you have a visual learner, I highly recommend this kit. The student book sports large words with lots of illustrations. The CD-ROM program provides this as well. She actually ENJOYS learning math! Incredible. The only downfall.....they don't have Calculus made simple! :)
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First blog....I know..awwww how sweet. Since I'm on here checking out my buddy momto4beauties updates I figured why not start one of my own so I will no longer have to leave little anonymous comments on posts. I despise that..normally because I mean to leave my name at the bottom of my note but then a few hours later when I am far from the computer realize that I failed to do so. Doh. Big ty to buckeyeblog for the great facewash recipe and momto4beauties for letting me know about it. This stuff is great if you've not tried it yet. Great for acne prone skin and leaves you feeling oh so soft.
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Just ended an awesome visit with momto4beauties yesterday. We've been online friends for about 3 years now and she flew down to see me so we could finally meet in person. It was such a special time and one that I will never forget....we all just hated that it ended so soon. Yep, she's definetely my long lost twin and best friend. Oh how we miss her here!