Our First Week!

We have officially completed the first week of homeschooling! It was fantastic! I'll break it down by kiddo, though it was great to see how much Firecracker paid attention to Sunshine's lessons and vice versa.

Pre-Kindergarten

We successfully completed the first week of the BookShark Pre-K curriculum. We loved all of the stories and poetry that we read this week. Instead of breaking the poetry out into different days, we did a "poetry tea party" on Wednesday. The girls baked something fun in their Easy-Bake Oven (which tasted much better than I expected), we set the table with flowers and made some fruity tea. While they were enjoying their tea we read poetry. We started with Mother Goose and ended with Shel Silverstein! They had a marvelous time.

The only part of the curriculum that we did not end up completing were the Developing the Early Learner books that are suggested. My daughter took an instant dislike to these. I attempted to make it light, but she was so frustrated by the one where you have to trace a line exactly that I didn't bother to come back to it. I will wait a few weeks and try again. I believe we have a perfectionist in the family!

We also finished capital letters A-E in the All About Reading program. She thinks that Ziggy the Zebra puppet is the best thing in the world and she loves the games that they suggest in the book. I'm a big fan of this program. They tell the parent exactly what to say and do so there is absolutely no prep work or thinking required. It also seems to be fairly effective, the first few lessons focus on rhyming words and I will say that Firecracker seems to be much improved in just five lessons.

Firecracker's current fine-motor fascination are these little gems called Beados. Have you seen them? Think perler beads that roll better. She's done five of the little patterns this week. The last one she did was larger so she got a little bored with it and asked for help. I was completely unable to help, my huge fingers cannot grip the little beads and place them without knocking about fifteen on the floor (and once they hit the floor...good luck).

First Grade

The first week of first grade went surprisingly well. We completed the first week of the BookShark curriculum here too, though I will say that I scheduled things in chunks instead of by day. For example, if there were two pages of the Animal Atlas assigned on three consecutive days and two pages of the Peoples of the World assigned on three consecutive days as well, I would do the Animal Atlas all on one day and the Peoples of the World on the next day. Changing books so much seems a little frenetic to me. I will continue to work my schedule so that we can really focus on one topic at a time.

Sunshine's favorite activity is language arts and the readers that are assigned with it. Again, we are doing the Grade 2 readers. The first one is Owl at Home, and she buzzed through it in two days (out loud...I'm pretty sure she's already read them all to herself). Surprisingly, she loved the copywork that came with the language arts package as well, but when asked to take her descriptive words and come up with a paragraph, she balked. I'm guessing it's because she didn't really understand the assignment. I did my best to explain it but once she had decided it was difficult, she really wasn't going to try. I finally talked her into just writing how she felt about her animal (Moose). "I love Moosey and Moosey loves me" is what we ended up with. I am just going to go slow with the writing because the actual act of writing seems tiring for her right now. I may have her dictate to me so I can write it for her next time, just to get the words on paper.

The science videos were a fun break for mom, and both girls went around the house playing with their magnets for the better part of two hours. They also built a giant tower with their magnatiles.

Math is a bit of a slog right now. We've completed most of the fun things in the Singapore Math 1 set, so we are down to practicing our addition and subtraction. She understands the concepts, but get bored practicing. I need to figure out a way to spice up her math life. She still loves Life of Fred. We introduced the Montessori stamp game this week as well. She took to it quickly and I'm hoping that this will be more entertaining for her.

Bookshark Box Day Pre-Kindergarten

It's BookShark box day for Firecracker! We were so excited to hear the FedEx man driving up the hill! I feel slightly guilty that he had to carry a forty pound box of books all the way up our steep, long driveway, for some reason they won't drive up to the house!

The BookShark Pre-Kindergarten curriculum looks fantastic. It comes in a book instead of a binder, which i didn't realize.

Look at all of these fabulous books!  I can't wait to get started!

We also ordered the Kindergarten Language Arts for Firecracker. She's not quite ready for it yet, but I hope to start it in a month or two when we finish the pre-reading level for All About Reading.

BookShark gets -1 point for the condition of the box though...geez! I can't believe all of the materials were still in the box with this massive rip!

Can't wait to get started! I'll give you a review after the first week!

Curriculum Choices First Grade

I am so excited to begin working more with Sunshine! She was not quite six when we decided to pull her from the Montessori classroom and begin homeschooling. I debated between ordering a kindergarten or a first grade curriculum for her and eventually decided on a first grade curriculum because I thought that she would enjoy it more. Here's a run down on our first grade choices.

• History - BookShark First Grade Package. I am as excited about this as she is. The book selections are wonderful! I'll probably read Story of the World aloud too, but not because I feel that the curriculum is lacking, we just really like to read.  I know that some people cringe at the idea of a boxed curriculum, but it really appeals to me. I feel that it will give me the confidence to know that the girls are meeting all of the basic requirements for each grade level and also the free time to add in exciting extras as I see fit. 
• Reading and Language Arts - We will be using BookShark for this too, but I've chosen the second grade regular readers with language arts. The first grade readers would have been way too easy for Sunshine, she takes to reading like a fish to water. I gave her the placement test from the BookShark website and she actually placed into the second grade advanced readers. For anyone else considering BookShark, I think that the child's age comes into play when choosing a level just as much as their reading ability. The second grade intermediate and advanced readers are significantly longer and more challenging and the language arts requires more writing and focus. Even though Sunshine has the ability to do the work, I don't think that she would enjoy the more advanced work. Her little fingers would fatigue with so much writing! The second grade regular language arts is absolutely jam-packed with wonderful things, so we won't be missing out by not going to a higher level.
• Math 
• Singapore Math - We started working through 1A and 1B last year and will finish up with those before moving onto the level 2 books. I really love Singapore Math and add Montessori materials as necessary. I am hoping to document some of the ways in which I use Montessori materials to support the Singapore Mathematics program in a future post. 
• Life of Fred - We are about to finish Apples and will move onto Butterflies soon!
• Science 
• BookShark Science - This is the only area where I'm not sure I'm going to like BookShark. She loves the videos, but I'm not sure it's quite enough science in this era. I would prefer a more rigorous project-based science. I've chosen a few other science options to keep us occupied.
• REAL Science Odyssey by Pandia Press - She chose Earth and Space Science level 1. I received this in the mail last week. We haven't started it, but it looks absolutely fantastic. It's incredibly meaty and we are so excited to get started! The experiments and the detail are great!
• Kiwi Crates 
• Nature Study - We will continue to do nature studies throughout the spring and summer. I've found some great living books to support us and we are lucky to live in a location where resources abound. I will post more on our nature journeys as I have time. 
• Phonics - We will be continuing with Book 4 of Explode the Code! It is scheduled in the BookShark second grade language arts.
• Handwriting - Zaner-Bloser 2C handwriting, Sunshine has always really wanted to learn cursive so I figured we'd forge ahead with the cursive book. I'm a little concerned with this choice, as a general rule she thinks handwriting is torture. I'll let you know how it goes!

Curriculum Choices Pre-Kindergarten

Firecracker is four and I wanted to choose a curriculum that would challenge her, but would also allow her to simply be four and spend most of her time playing! Our main curriculum for her will be BookShark Pre-K. I love the reading selections! It is scheduled to be less than an hour a day and the best part is that both girls will love the stories.

Math is included in the BookShark package, but as a long-time Montessori adherent, I will be adding Montessori materials to our home and gently introducing Firecracker to numbers and math this year.

Science and nature study are just part of life in this family. Both girls will continue to get Kiwi Crates every month and we will also continue to do Fun Friday Hikes as a family to encourage nature study. BookShark also has a science component, one of the books is the Berenstain Bears, so you know that will be a huge hit with the girls!

The final curriculum piece for Firecracker is the pre-reading package from All About Reading. BookShark does have a reading component, but I just really like the way All About Reading is structured for this particular child (zebra puppet = automatic win).

Here We Go!

We've been debating homeschooling our children (Firecracker - 4 and Sunshine - 6) for the past three years. I have done countless hours of research trying to figure out what curriculum to use, how to schedule my time and how to schedule their time. I've set up homeschool areas in my house about three times...and then promptly put everything away.

To give you some background, from the time that Sunshine was 2.5, we had her in an absolutely wonderful Montessori (AMS) preschool. When Firecracker was old enough to attend we decided to change to a Montessori (AMI) preschool that was both closer to our home and significantly less expensive. I was not able to observe at the school, but we loved our former preschool so much that we figured it would be OK.

It was not OK. Sunshine was going into her third primary year. This should have been her capstone year. She is not a super-gifted child, but she is bright. The school was unable to meet her needs. Their reading area not only didn't have any books to read that were not the easy BoB-type books, but the works that they had were, in a word, dull! The directress at the school was extremely rigid. Sunshine is a kid who grasps concepts quickly and doesn't need to perfect steps 1, 2 and 3. She will often jump to step 3 and be ready to move on. This directress was unable to "follow the child". She required students to show perfect mastery of all steps before being allowed to learn anything new. The problem with requiring that of a child who is gifted is that, often, they simply won't do it. Not cannot, will not...big difference. Take handwriting. Sunshine knows how to write all of her letters and composes lengthy stories at home, complete with illustrations. When she focuses, she is able to produce perfect letters....but she is not interested in perfect letters, she's interested in getting her thoughts on the paper. This teacher could not understand that and made my child do metal insets every. single. day.  How boring! Especially for a bright child!

Firecracker was a completely different story. She is a child who is very interested in pleasing others. After 7 months at the school she had not managed to pick up a single letter sound. Now, in my opinion, she should have gotten these from circle time even if she wasn't choosing the work. She came home a few weeks ago and I asked her what she worked on. She said "I washed more turtles...I tried to find work that was not practical life but they told me to go back to practical life". I confirmed this with some other people. The three year olds were expected to stay in the practical life area. I had heard about this phenomenon, but had never seen it in practice. It seems to me to run entirely counter to Maria Montessori's philosophy.

We are moving on. The homeschool room is complete, the curriculum is ordered and I am so very excited to finally begin this journey with my children.