We’re back from our week-long vacation with Officer Daddyman’s family. We fell in love with the Asheville area and were sorry to leave it.
Now we’re home, however, and the frenzy of school year prep and buying has begun. Shortly before we left for our trip, we ordered a subscription to the PLATO Life Science and Earth/Space Science courses for Captain Science. I’m glad to have science taken care of, as that is the one area where I worry about finding comprehensive materials that are secular/scientific enough for our needs. I ordered these courses at Patchfire’s recommendations, so Captain Science and Eclectic Girl will still be right about apace with their science, which means we could still get together to do a little work occasionally.
Another area I’ve stressed over is that of extracurricular activities, especially art. Daddyman really wanted to start doing some computer programming with Captain Science this year, too. We really lucked out by making it home just in time to take advantage of the last minute deal on the KidCoder computer programming curriculum through the Homeschool Buyers Co-op. We’re also picking up the Meet the Masters series for both boys. We’re probably getting bundle 4, which includes Tracks A, B, and C for ages 5-7. Even though Captain Science is well above that age level, he has had almost no formal art instruction, so I think he’d be best served by starting with something very simple. If he enjoys it and needs a higher level, we’ll pick up the bundle for his age group, too. We’ll have access to the course for three full years, since each track is supposed to take about a school year.
We still have to place our order for Life of Fred: Beginning Algebra and Fred’s Home Companion, as well as Captain Science’s Michael Clay Thompson materials for the year and Tank’s Ordinary Parent’s Guide to Teaching Reading materials. We’re also starting a new organization system to help us stay on top of our materials, using a folder system similar to the one Daddyman uses for organizing his own paperwork.
I’m starting to get so excited about the next school year! How’s your planning/prep going?
I’m going to jump in and pretend I’m doing stuff I wouldn’t if LP were going to public school… just ’cause I wanna share. XD
I’m very excited! We’re planning to have a 36 week year, with a couple weeks off here and there for fun, vacation and holidays. We’re looking at a Very Intense Year, you see. We’re going to learn the basic eight colors (plus a few for good measure). We’re going to talk about ABCs and 1-2-3s. We’re going to learn to cut and fold, and maybe even use glue. We’re going to color and play with stickers, and even try to follow directions while we do it.
We’re playing games and singing songs, and we’re learning new words all over the place! It’s a very exciting time!
Yes, it’s probably stupid to be this excited. But my Big Boy is getting to be old enough to handle scissors without lopping off his tongue, so I’m *thrilled!*
Sounds like fun!
What day are y’all starting? I’ve tried to start on the same day as Cobb the last few years but that just doesn’t fly this year, since they’re starting on EG’s birthday. No school on birthdays!
We’re starting early this year, probably August 2nd. We’re changing our schedule this year, with more frequent, but shorter, breaks. We’re taking the week at the end of September and will likely do a full week for Thanksgiving, but only a week for winter holidays this year.
We’re looking at starting the week before… then if we take birthday & the day after, and the three days for the beach around Labor Day, my weeks/days are still even. OCD, thy name is Kash.
I haven’t done the exact day count yet, but ours should work out pretty even.
Oh Lord! I feel like I just quit for the summer! We worked until June 25, so we’ll pick it back up when my husband’s university starts up again, which is… Umm, I don’t know. Sometime mid-August I think.
We finished in mid May here, so we’ve already had almost two months of break!
I’m getting ready to lay out everything this week. I LOVE planning for school – looking at all the shiny new pages and petting the school supplies. We are going to do Real Science 4 Kids for science this year, and I am very excited about it. When Big saw the books, he wanted to get started right away, so that’s a good sign. What I really need to do is organize the Pre-schooly stuff for Little, so she feels more like she is doing schoolwork right alongside us and less like mama chucked a used coloring book at her so she’d be quiet…
I freaked out when I saw all the school supplies coming out at Target! Is it that time already?
I was thrown into homeschooling last semester and had to put something together quickly just to get us through the rest of the school year (thank you Time4Learning!)
However, now that I have the time to put something together, I have settled on MCT Town for LA, Tools of the Ancient Romans (+ supplements) for history or SS–whatever I’m supposed to call it, Life of Fred fractions, and R.E.A.L. Science Odyssey chemistry for science, PowerSpeak for Spanish …. and now you’ve got me thinking about adding computer programming since he LOVES working on the computer. Hmmmm ….
I do NOT have a 36-week, color-coded lesson plan filing system–how do people do that! I’m really not sure what his “pace” will be on the new material until we start, so I’m just trying to get the first month of lessons planned to use as a starting point. This probably means that I will spend a weekend in September frantically planning out the rest of the semester.
If you want to see some stellar color-coded schedules, you should ask Patchfire to show you hers. They’re magnificent!