Fall Evaluation

It is that time of the school year.  The time when we are far enough into the year to really take a good, hard look at what is working and what needs to be tweaked.  So far, I have to say, I am really happy with the way this year is going.  There are, however, a few areas where we are making some changes.  One is with Jonathan.... we had planned to use Learning Language Arts Through Literature - Red book.  Why?  Because I had it on my shelf - that’s why!  :)  Jackson had used that and liked it pretty well, but Jonathan just never could get into it.  So we pulled out some Explode the Code books and while they are working “okay”, I don’t feel like Jonathan is getting enough of the “nitty gritty” instruction with them.  So, I remembered back to what Jackson and I did several years ago and decided to pull it out and give it a try with Jonathan.  And “voila!” It is working out very well!  It is Spalding’s The Writing Road to Reading.  As with everything I do, I am “tweaking” this to fit our needs.  :)  Basically, we are using the phonogram cards to introduce the 70 phonograms and to drill and review - plus we are learning the 29 rules for using the phonograms.  Then we will be creating the spelling notebook of words from the Ayres word list.  Jonathan is really taking to this method - learning and retaining the phonograms really quickly.

We are finishing up all of our “loose ends” from last year.  We should complete Story of theWorld in the next month.  That will allow us to do some in depth Christmas units during the month of December.  The 2 that we are planning to do are “A Blessed Christmas: A UnitStudy Approach to Studying the Symbols of Christmas” and “The Names of Jesus” unit study.  In January, we will begin My Father’s World Exploring Countries and Cultures. Jackson did ECC when he was in 3rd grade and loved it.  This time around he will be doing all of the advanced work that he was too young for in 3rd grade.  Jonathan is really looking forward to ECC, too.  I am glad that we decided to wait until January to begin it, though.  It gave us a chance to finish up SOTW and Exploring Creation - Zoology 1.  It also allowed us to add in the first book of A Child’s Geography, which we have loved!  Come January, we should be completely done with all of these and ready to begin a fresh new year with ECC.

I had really been fretting about not having our work cycle from August to May each year.  I felt we needed to begin a new curriculum in August and complete it by May.  When that never worked out, it really bothered me and I felt “behind”.  I finally realized that we have naturally been on a January to December schedule for many years now - so I should just relax and go with it!  We began ECC in January of Jackson’s 3rd grade year, as well.  I think this is just our schedule.  Isn’t it funny how smoothly things go once we give ourselves “permission” to do what works best for us? :)


2 Comments
Kristine
Great post! I love reading about curriculum. My dd learned WRTR in ps; we switched over to Sanseris' Spell to Write and Read at home. My dd pretty much taught it to me, lol.
We JUST finished SOTW Vol. 1 (second time through) a few weeks ago. Ds has moved into Vol. 2; dd has moved onto Beautiful Feet.
Kristine/SHS
Thursday, November 1, 2007 - 10:40 PM

Laura
Hi Kristine -
If I had known about Spell to Write and Read at Home several years ago, we would have gone with that instead of WRTR. I have looked at SWR and know it would have been easier to follow and implement - but we figured out our "own" way to do WRTR so I guess it works fine. :)
We have done Beautiful Feet Geography and loved it. I look forward to hearing your
thoughts on the history program from them.
Laura
Friday, November 2, 2007 - 08:05 AM