Feb. 28, 2008 - Time for Curriculum
Well, it has been another busy week! We had a rush trip to San Diego earlier to pick up a bus for another ministry down here. That was a loooong day! Then my husband was away for a couple of days as well as his sister and the 6 leadership students that are living here and a few other people. They went up in the mountains looking for a community up there that my husband had heard about. The people still live in mud huts and are really struggling to just exist. He was hoping to find them and see what they could do to help them out a bit, but they didn't end up finding the place. They found a few abandoned communities, but that was all. They had great time though exploring, hiking and camping so the trip wasn't completely unsuccessful.
The weather here has been beautiful the past few days! Yesterday was so sunny that the boys' faces turned a little pink despite the SPF 50 sunscreen they were wearing! We spent most of the day outside practicing their "futbal" (soccer) moves since they have a playdate with the neighbor kids on Saturday and are planning on playing futbal at the park. Caleb is getting pretty good, but the kids here are Amazing!! He will have to work hard to keep up! It should be lots of fun though. I'm looking forward to visiting with Angelina. She's going to help me with my Spanish.
So I'm finding myself in a new place again with the homeschooling and I'm starting to look at curriculums again. Sigh. I enjoy not having a curriculum to have to follow, but the past couple of months I've been struggling at keeping it all together, covering everything I want to cover and still having fun with it. I think I'm just getting to a point where I need a curriculum to just tell me what to do. I think the boys would benefit from something a little more constant too. As much as I have loved being curriculum free, I don't think I can do it an longer at this point. I'm sure we will head back this way again after a while, but for now, I just need some help!
Last year, when Caleb was starting out, we used Sonlight. I really loved it, but I don't know if I'm going to go that route this time around for a number of reasons. So I'm back to trying to pick my way through hundreds of curriculums online! I'm sure many of you have been at this place before. My mind feels like it's going to explode and I'm still just starting to look!! We still love Math-U-See so we won't be changing that, but I'm looking for Language Arts for both boys as well as a good Bible curriculum and Science for Caleb. I think we're doing fine with History / Geography on our own. I'm still concerned about spending money on something we don't end up enjoying. Since money is tight, that's something I have to be careful about.
I'm looking at Alpha Omega right now. I love the selection they have! I think Caleb would find some of the Switched-On Schoolhouse stuff really fun as he Loves anything media! It looks like he's at a grade 3 level now, according to the curriculums I've looked at so far. I keep thinking that can't be right (he's only 5), but it seems that he's mastered all of the grade 2 concepts that most of the curriculums are covering. So I'm faced with the challenge of finding something that will be stimulating and interesting, but that's not going to be "too much" for him, if that makes any sense. I'm looking at Kindergarten stuff for Christian (who is turning 4 on Monday!!). He is doing quite well with reading short words right now and he Loves to write. We've been doing a lot of copywork as this is one of his favorite things to do right now. His printing, although all uppercase at this point, is even neater than Caleb's! He's probably even capable of doing grade 1 language arts, but I think I'm going to hold back a bit. It's hard to make the "right" choices when it comes to this. I feel judged if I let them move on and learn what they're capable of because it's putting them "ahead" of other children their age and I'm told they're going to be "geeks" when they grow up. "Just let them be kids!" I've heard several times, but I really don't think I'm stopping them from that in any way! On the other hand, I don't feel right about letting them wait until they are an "appropriate" age to learn the things they're interested in right now! Anyway, I'm not going to get into that again right now. I'm just going to keep searching. Any suggestions from others in this type of situation would certainly be appreciated!
Do any of you use an art curriculum for the earlier years? I've looked at a few, but really have no idea what I'm looking for! Caleb is especially interested in art, but I have limited experience. I've been teaching him photography and am letting him use my old camera (with some assistance), but he loves to paint and draw and I really have no experience in either so I've just been encouraging him to go ahead and do it. He discovered the "Learn to draw" on his VeggieTales DVDs (most of them have a tutorial in how to draw one or two of the characters in the movie) so he sits down with the DVD remote (so he can pause when he needs to) and will spend 1-2 hours sometimes trying to draw the characters the way the artist does. His drawings are actually turning out quite well! I'm impressed! I'll have to take pictures and post them sometime.
Oh, and Caleb wants me to mention that his tooth (finally) came out! This was the first lost tooth in the family so everyone was very excited!! It fell out when he was sleeping. He noticed about an hour after waking and came running back into the trailer to search his bed where (luckily!) he found the tooth waiting for him. We're going to start a lapbook on healthy teeth next week (if I can get everything in order by then).
Caleb's Missing Tooth:
Charlie thinks he has a "loof toof" too:
In other news, both Caleb and Christian have taken their training wheels off of their bikes in the past couple of weeks and are doing an amazing job of riding without them! I was prepared to spend hours chasing them around, holding them up (like I remember my Dad doing with me!), but as it turned out, they were completely ready for them to come off and didn't require any help or steadying at all! Both of them started by riding from one end of the courtyard at the house here to the other. They were both able to do it without falling on the first try. After they mastered that, they started riding in a circle around the courtyard. When that was mastered, we took them to the campground so they could ride on the nice, flat road there! They had a great day racing each other back and forth and trying out new tricks. Christian had a couple of good wipeouts (I managed to catch them all on video so they've been watching them over and over and laughing like crazy at them), but no injuries.
Caleb:
Christian's Trick:
Charlie wishing he could be like his brothers:
Charlie and his bike:
We found 2 dead baby snakes on the road the boys were biking on. It looks like one of the vultures in the nearby "vulture tree" must have dropped them out of it's mouth as it was flying by. I don't know how to tell what kind of snakes they are, but to be honest, I was glad they were dead and not alive as those really aren't the kind of pets I'm looking to have in our trailer!!
I will do my best to keep you updated on the curriculum issue. Hope you're all enjoying your homeschooling journeys! Until next time, Happy Homeschooling!!
Comments
Mar. 3, 2008 - Untitled Comment
Posted by fourlittlepenguins.blogspot.com
Hi! I've been enjoying reading your blog. :) I always get a lot of inspiration reading/hearing about how other moms handle lots of little ones! I'm new to the blogging sphere, but having lots of fun blog-surfing! I'm glad I found yours. :)
I also sympathize with your plight of deciding what to do with kids' and school. My kids love doing school so much! We do "regular" school even though everyone fusses at me to just let them have "fun" while they are little. But school IS fun for them, lol and they enjoy learning!
I hope you find the curriculum you are looking for. A site that I have found most helpful is http://www.homeschoolreviews.com/ It's real parents talking about their experiences with specific curriculums.
Mar. 16, 2008 - Untitled Comment
Posted by 4sweetums
We are using Five in A Row for the little ones. This has been great and we love it. I have a little one who is really into art and he loves the Draw Write Now program. He also loves Meet the Masters online program but it is intense and requires about 3 to 4 hours per artist. This particular child can sit and do art or science for 1 to 2 hours at a stretch which is long for a 5 year old. I will say a prayer for your sister in law's dd.
Blessings,
Dawn
