I can hardly believe that one year of homeschool has already passed, and I am getting ready for next school year. First of all, I am truly blessed to educate my own children. After all, our children will be with us only for a short time. So, I want to take this time to teach them basic Biblical truth, God’s love and our love for them.
Before selecting curriculums, I recommend reading my previous article on “How to Start Homeschooling: What You Need to Know Before.”
To be honest, in my previous school, I haven’t actually worked as a teacher. My work was mostly on curriculum development and book selections as well as other administrative works. So homeschooling was like being a teacher and having to learn everything from scratch. You need good classroom management skills and positive reinforcements that can help your child focus and love learning.
Our Story
It is a long story, but I learned things the hard way. My mango sorbet is a reluctant learner, trying to achieve his goal to not study. For your understanding, he has ADHD behaviors only at home; please do not ask me why. Anyways, after many months of struggles, I learned to set homeschool rules and remind them everyday. I set boundaries and expectations. I made a checklist for my kids to make sure they finished their work before getting any privileges of the day. More than others, I try to encourage them with positive reinforcements instead of penalizing them with consequences.
After learning these skills, miracles that seemed not possible happened. Thanks God! Kids were able to focus and learn more than losing time trying to managing them.
Charlotte Mason's Motto
Through spending time and building relationship with your children, you can be your child’s best teacher. We can teach our kids foundations of faith, learning from Charlotte Mason. What is their identity in Christ? “I am a child of God” who is dearly loved. Can I achieve what seems insurmountable? “I can do all things through Christ who gives me strength.” What is our responsibility? “I ought to love God with all my heart, soul, strength, and mind.” As dearly loved, we should also love God and others. What kind of choices will I make in homeschooling? “I will choose to honor God and put His will above my own.” I will choose to honor God and do the works with best of my ability.
Here is one poster that I made for my family so that they can be reminded of it frequently. If you would like to get a copy of the free printable, you can scroll down this post to access them.
I AM a child of God.
I CAN do all things through Christ who gives me strength. I OUGHT to love God with all my heart, soul, strength, and mind. I WILL choose to honor God and put His will above my own.
We are doing year-round homeschooling with a four-day a week schedule. We do take several weeks to one month breaks when needed. Also, we are following a routine, not an exact timed schedule to give me peace of mind.
I am an eclectic homeschooler with a touch of charlotte mason. I love recitations/memorizations incorporated with songs, living books, narration and notebook journaling. My kids learn well through songs, and we keep track of the morning meeting materials in binders.
In this article, I listed the curriculums that worked for our family last year and what we want to keep, and curriculums that I am going to try.
Our Homeschool Routines and Rhythms
Before continuing, I want to give an overview of our homeschool routines and rhythms.
Morning Time
Prayer, Praise, Bible Study, Bible memorization, poetry, and history/geography recitation
We also watch 10-minute news from Worldwatch.news, news written by Christian journalists. Kids can get exposed to up-to-date news without having to filter each news. Get your first month charge free with our coupon: inspiringhomeschooler.
BREAK
English and Math
After the break, our kids work on their English and Math. I teach a lesson and they work on their independent work.
lunch
Outside Time
Read aloud
Social studies or science
2022-2023 Curriculum Choices for the Whole Family
Bible – Who is God? by Apologia
We have used S.O.A.P.(Scripture, Observation, Application, and Prayer) method to do Bible verse study with Our Daily Bread devotionals but wanted to teach our children the ability to discern the truth from what the world believes as they grow older. I am excited to try “What We Believe” Curriculum by Apologia, partnered with Summit Ministries.
Literature – five in a row & center for lit
Literature selections and lesson plan from Five in a Row and Socratic method questions from Center for Lit with narration, notebook journal works & 20 minutes of assigned reading each day
poetry – institute for excellence in writing (IEW)
We were not really consistent with poetry and trying different methods to engage my kids until I tried Poetry by IEW. After trying IEW, my kids love to recite poetry, and they think it is fun to memorize and recite them. We will be continuing Poetry by IEW next school year.
picture study & Music Study by Simply charlotte mason
We have not used this before but are excited to try it next school year. I will try one picture study and one music study per quarter, one lesson per week and see how it will go for our family.
SCIENCE – exploring creation with zoology 2: swimming creatures of the fifth day
As we live so close to the beach, I am excited to try Exploring Creation with Zoology 2: Swimming Creatures of the Fifth Day by Apologia. Apologia has good quality textbooks that are written in a conversational way that engages students and has hands-on activities to support their learning as well as notebook journaling that will check their understanding of the material.
History – our star-spangled story by notgrass
We are going to continue Our Star-Spangled Story by Notgrass. Since setting discipline in homeschool took so long, we skipped many history classes but as time passed, it has gotten a lot better for our family to be able to cover Science and History regularly. I am very happy that we started to embark on the journey of learning instead of battling our way through homeschool.
I like Our Star-Spangled Story by Notgrass. Each lesson has a story to tell from that period of time, but I do supplement with other books or activities that align with their learning as well.
(Story of the World II: History curriculum that we tried and will continue after studying American History as our kids love to listen to the Story of the World via audio.)
Music/art/handicraft – homeschool co-op
Two of my kids are really thrive drawing and expressing themselves through art. They are really creative and full of ideas and are happy to see them express themselves through art. For my first son, he has a goal to get it done but I am sure he will learn just being exposed to art and doing handicraft. I anticipate guiding him to see his potential. He is good at Math and dealings with money and has good eyes seeing bigger picture, planning what he needs to finish in order to spend more time playing. For example, when we are in an airport, he would ask the attendant, how much the airplane would cost and how much the airport would cost. ^^
2022-2023 Curriculum Choices for 4th and 5th Grades
ENGLISH LANGUAGE ARTS
Grammar: Fix It! Grammar | Nose Tree by IEW
Writing: All Things Fun & Fascinating | Writing Lesson in Structure & Style by IEW
Spelling: Spelling You See Level D
Handwriting: A Reason for Writing Level 3
We have switched from the Good and the Beautiful Language Arts program to Institute for Excellence in Writing program for our language arts. I felt that our kids especially older kids need clear objective and need more practice in each lesson. Though our second is a good reader, she does need more practice in grammar, writing, spelling and handwriting. Vocabulary is incorporated in grammar and writing program, so we will be covering vocabulary as well.
One reason we switched to IEW is that my son really need to practice more grammar, writing and especially spelling AND handwriting. With TGTB, he chooses to get by, but we were not sure if he understood what he had done.
MATH – math in focus: singapore math
– Level 3B for 4th Grader and 5A for 5th Grader
Our kids have been using Math in Focus even in the school that they were in before. It was a math curriculum that we have reviewed extensively in school and just love all the materials it provides. My youngest thrives while our second struggles. It took more than a month to cover one unit, the infamous unit on bar modeling. She is happy to go back to multiplication, but I can see other math curriculum like Math U See would benefit her but we are still sticking to Math in Focus for her as there would be a learning curve for me.
2022-2023 Curriculum Choices for 2nd Grade
ENGLISH LANGUAGE ARTS
Language Arts: The Good and the Beautiful (TGTB) English Level 2
My daughter enjoys each lesson with creative activities that reinforce the material. She is finishing Level One and will continue on Level Two. The Good and the Beautiful is an open-and-go language arts program that includes spelling, writing, grammar and vocabulary and writing. For my youngest, this is perfect as she is on top of her materials and enjoys learning.
Writing: Bible Heroes | Writing Lessons in Structure and Style by IEW
Though TGTB covers writing, it covers it minimally, so we are trying Bible Heroes Writing Lessons by IEW to enable her to be a good writer in a long term.
Spelling: Spelling You See Level C
I’ve noticed that our kids would need more practice in spelling even though our youngest is a strong reader, so we are trying Spelling You See next school year.
Handwriting: TGTB Handwriting 3
TGTB also has a beautiful handwriting workbook that kids can open and continue daily.
MATH – Math in focus: singapore math
Free Charlotte Mason Motto Printable
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