Homeschooling 6 kids at all different grade and ability levels can often feel a bit like chaos but I have to say that if their is one thing I have gotten good at in recent years, it's organizing that chaos. *Grin*
This year we have 2 kids beginning their high school adventures! It feels surreal that we have reached this point already. This means that I have been burying my head into as much reading and research on homeschooling high school as possible this summer. I've been asking a lot of questions of those that have gone ahead of us. I have found a huge amount of information online, especially from
The Homeschooler. I have a huge amount of support through my FIAR sisters. Our local church covering for our homeschool has given me plenty of information on keeping transcripts. I've been reading through everything
The Homeschooler has to say about keeping transcripts which has been my main source.
You can click on the above picture to view it better. It is a sample from our covering- not one of ours personally. A college prep transcript for both Houston and Emmy will require a minimum of 26 credits over the course of these next 4 years.
Here is another example of a high school transcript from our covering. Again, not ours, but just an example. Things like this have greatly helped me in my vision for Houston and Emmy's high school transcripts and our plans for the next 4 years. Reading Transcript information from
Lee Binz at The Homeschooler has greatly helped me in understanding how I can log certain subjects onto the transcripts and what colleges look for. Even if one of the kids decides to do a vocational school or something along those lines instead of college, we still feel it important to do the college prep work during the high school years, as much as possible at least, because if they chose to go another route that will mean their only "formal" education will be the one they receive here at home. For that reason, it needs to be the best it can be! We view these years as time to specialize…an opportunity to hone in on a child’s skills and interests that may carry them into a vocation and calling down the road. At this point Houston is seriously considering going to police academy after graduation. The other interest he has is in computers like his dad. Emmy has a possible interest in becoming a make-up artist.
Sooo.........back to curriculum.......here is an overview of the main curriculum's that we are currently using in our homeschool.
MATH:
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Math Mammoth - Right now Math Mammoth is the main math program that each of the kids except Camden are working through at their own levels. It is a detailed math program that promotes a lot of critical thinking. Each of the kids are required to complete 4 pages a day in their level math book.
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IXL Math Website- Natalie, Ally, and Camden are using alongside Math Mammoth for extra math practice
* FIAR math lessons are done during our FIAR lessons/rowings. The FIAR math lessons are primarily applied math.
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Math Facts Now is a computer program we use to help the kids get down the addition- division math facts.
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Family Math. I use this book full of hands on ideas to increase understanding in math concepts.
* Living Math Books. I have a bin full of math books that I pull from to read randomly as the kids are learning and practicing various concepts.
We have a wide range of math board and card games that we use to help increase understanding of certain math concepts too. I typically pull one board game out each week to play in addition to our other math studies.
ENGLISH:
*Rod and Staff is the big English curriculum in our home with everyone right now. I like it because it is very thorough and intense with a lot of review from year to year.
SPELLING:
*Spelling Power is the big spelling curriculum that we are currently using. Houston, Emmy, and Annie are all using Spelling Power in their daily lessons. Natalie will start using it this next year.
WRITING:
*Emmy is taking an 8 week course online from
Time4Writing. Her course is on Advanced Essay writing. She submits work online and it is graded and sent back with suggestions from her teacher. She normally does
Institute in Excellence for Writing courses but we have put those on hold for 8 weeks right now while she works through this course for Time4Writing.
*Houston is working on expanding his narration skills by narrating in written form the books he reads. Not sure if this is true with all boys but I have found that boys struggle to narrate in detail while my girls always seem to give plenty of details. I do believe it's a guy/girl thing. We are working on improving that skill.
GRAMMAR:
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Fix-It Grammar is the main grammar the older kids are using right now. It is from Institute in Excellence for writing and I really like it. The kids have to "fix" the grammar in the stories as they re-write them. The program uses classical literature. In the end the kids will have transcribed all of the stories with correct grammar into notebooks.
Our Rod and Staff English books also cover grammar.
*Natalie is using
Rainbow Sentences- an app for the ipad to work on her grammar. I reviewed reading sentences, HERE.
HANDWRITING:
Emmy is currently doing copywork from the following book…..
Natalie has been working through some workbooks which we were sent in the Spring for a TOS review and she uses the Draw Write Now lessons when they tie into our FIAR rowings.
Ally and Camden are practicing their handwriting using an app in the ipad and random sheets I have printed out from the Internet as well as a white board with lines that I found at Walmart.
PHONICS/ EARLY READING SKILLS:
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Reading Eggs Online (includes some spelling). Natalie, Ally, and Camden are using Reading Eggs to either learn to read or increase their reading skills. It involves early phonics up to elementary reading skills and involves some spelling and vocabulary for older readers.
KEYBOARDING SKILLS:
*A few of the kids are working on their typing skills this summer by using a program we were sent to review for TOS called
Christian Keyboarding.
POETRY:
I have a poetry basket in our homeschool room with resource books and books of poetry to read in it. I pull from the basket weekly so that we are always reading some sort of poetry.
Emmy is working her way through Shakespeare's plays for her handwriting as mentioned above. Annie and Houston are also working through a poet each for their copywork as mentioned above.
LITERATURE:
Lots and lots of reading on a wide range of subjects from our home library. Each of the kids always have one book going for school and one of their choosing for pleasure reading.
WORLD HISTORY:
This year, Natalie, Ally, and Camden will be covering various parts of World History as well as some American History in their
FIAR studies. They will also be doing unit studies on Pilgrims, Thanksgiving, Explorers, and Native Americans. The Pilgrims and Native American studies are ones we are currently working on for TOS Reviews.
The Pilgrim study is from DaySpring Academy and we are loving it! It goes much deeper than most studies. I look forward to sharing about it. We are learning a lot about the history of England and the church during that time. The Native American Study is one I will be sharing about in just a couple of weeks.
For the older kids, I recently shared here on the blog about our current history plan and readings for the Middle Ages. You can read that post,
HERE.
I shared recently in,
THIS, post about the book
King Alfred's English that we have been reading through. We love this book! It has tied in well with our middle ages study.
I also shared in,
THIS, post what Annie is using this summer for her history on the Middle Ages. She just finished it and will soon begin reading through Mystery of History on her own. It is a study that she has gone through before but it was us doing it as a group together. This time she will be reading through it independently and placing the timeline figures on our timeline as she goes.
This fall we will be completing a unit study on Pearl Harbor, The Mayans, and an Election Unit Study. This is in addition to our Middle Ages study. We decided to do a Mayan study this fall since the Mayan calendar ends in December. It was Bryan's idea actually. :) This will primarily be for Houston, Emmy, and Annie though the younger kids will be sitting in on some parts of those units. The Pearl Harbor study is a review for TOS and it will cover the history of Hawaii, Pearl Harbor, and then go into the attack itself. It concludes with a study of the years following the war. We are in the midst of it right now and loving it!
GOVERNMENT:
I am putting together my own unit study on the elections and government (with Bryan's help) which we will begin next month and will include parts of
Amanda Bennett's Election study. This study will be deep enough that it will apply to one credit for government for Houston and Emmy for their freshman year.
SCIENCE:
The younger kids will have a lot of science through their FIAR studies. We will also be covering a human body study this semester. *Note that we break our year down into 2 semesters so this first semester will run through the end of February.
Houston and Emmy will be doing some review this first year on subjects they covered in previous years before diving into Biology 1. Some of this review will contain a heavy focus on Earth/Physical Science. Right now we are using multiple resources from online. If we start using a specific book or study I will share about it.
FIAR/UNIT STUDIES:
Natalie, Ally, and Camden are currently rowing through Volumes 1-4. Within our FIAR lessons are lessons on art, history, social studies, science, geography, language arts, and applied math. I love the FIAR language arts lesson because it allows the kids to see the lessons in action in a book rather than random meaningless sentences from a workbook.
Our FIAR bookshelf with go-alongs.
I typically have a list of FIAR books on hand that I am "ready" to row- meaning that I have gone over what lessons I want to do from the manual for those books and I have go-along books, crafts, etc. ready for those books. We pick and choose from that list as we go along. What we row when- often depends on my mood, the kids interests and desires, field trip opportunities, and other factors. I try to keep at least 10 books "planned and ready" to row at all times. That's not hard to do since Jane Claire has already written out the lessons for me in the manual. All I have to do is make sure I know where our go-along books are and that I have my list ready of any extras, videos to show, or hands on projects for the lessons that I might want to do with the story. I keep those things organized on my
FIAR pinterest page. My current list of titles that I am ready to row and pulling from are;
1) A New Coat for Anna
2) Wee Gillis
3) The Glorious Flight
4) Grandfathers Journey (completed recently)
5) Warm As Wool
6) Katy No Pocket/ Australia study
7) Mike Mulligan
8) Follow the Drinking Gourd
9) Katy and the Big Snow
10) The Bee Tree
11) Lentil
12) Maria's Comet (A HSS Unit)
13) Papa Piccolo
14) Mirette on a Highwire (completed)
Of course this list is always subject to change depending on interests of the kids or field trip opportunities that come up.
BIBLE:
We use the FIAR Bible Supplement and Character Study alongside our FIAR rowings (for Natalie, Ally, and Cam).
Normally I email a memory bible verse to the older kids each Monday and they have until Friday to memorize it. Their daily bible readings go along with our church bible readings that we are given every Sunday in our bulletin and those readings tie into our Sunday sermon. Our pastor is currently taking us through the book of Revelation in the bible.
Natalie, Ally, and Camden are currently working on memorizing the books of the bible. They have bible memory verses from their Wednesday evening classes each week and we are doing various bible stories and crafts here at home each week. I try to do at least one story and craft a week. If I can tie it into what they have learned on Wednesday nights then I do.
Here is a game we played recently to help the kids remember the books of the bible. I drew a big book on the floor in the school room. One side was Old Testament and one was New. I would call out a book of the bible and they would have to jump to the right side. For fun I threw in names that the Bible doesn't include like Duke, Randy, Lewis, etc. They loved playing!
ART/ARTIST STUDY:
Our focus most recently has been on The Impressionists. I have an art wall in our homeschool room where I have various paintings by some Impressionists hanging. We switch those out with new ones as we study each one. We use quite a few resources for our art study but of course the main thing we use is the art itself.
These are the current paintings we have been studying.
Our FIAR rowings cover art techniques that we get to try out. We also do a lot of drawing lessons during our FIAR rowings.
FOREIGN LANGUAGE:
Emmy is continuing her Latin Studies with
Visual Latin this year. This will apply to her foreign language credit this year. This was her choice of foreign language. She loves learning Latin!
LOGIC:
The older kids (Houston, Emmy, and Annie) are working through this book with Bryan and I in the evenings. We are moving very slowly through it. It will probably take us all year to complete the lessons and accompanying videos. This will apply as 1 credit of logic on Houston and Emmy's transcripts for the year.
MUSIC:
The older kids do not currently have any music on their agenda though they do have a desire to learn the guitar and it is on my radar for 2nd semester of this year.
P.E. / EXTRA CURRICULARS:
The girls will be taking ball room dance classes again this year. Classes begin this Friday, on September 14th, and will run for the full year, until next May. We are very excited about a new year of classes. This will be our first full year of classes since we started mid year this past year. Houston and Emmy will receive credit on their transcripts for these classes.
CURRENT EVENTS:
Houston, Emmy, and Annie watch the
CNN Student News Video each day. After they have watched the video I email them comprehension test questions to answer and they email me back. We have come recently to really love the CNN Student News. It gives students a great overall view of some world affairs that are in the mainstream news without being too descriptive or gory. It throws in some fun stuff to each segment too- like "on this date in history" for example. These videos and test questions will apply to credit for current events on the older kids highschool transcripts.
OTHER:
We have so many other random resources that we pull from at times during our studies. I feel like I could never mention every resource. I know you other homeschool moms understand that. For instance Natalie uses an app on the ipad to help with her speech articulation. We have quite a few other apps that the kids use that are educational in nature. Listed above are the main things we are currently using though.
Since we review for the TOS Homeschool Crew other things that are not listed above will come into play during this first semester too. Anytime you see a TOS Review here on a blog- we have USED that product. It is part of our contract with the crew that we have to use the products we are sent. We do have some say in what we are sent to review which is nice.
So far everything above seems to be working out good for us. The only thing that might change is what Houston is using for grammar. Not many tweaks this semester but it helps that we school year round and were schooling this summer as I was able to tweak some things then. As a homeschool mom I am constantly in planning mode and working with each of the kids right where they are academically in each subject. As you can see from above, this semester is a busy one for us. Some tend to be busier than others. It just depends on what everyone is needing to work on.
