Another year and a full set of fresh books and pages. I just love the smell of new curriculum, don’t you? Check out our Homeschool Curriculum Choices 2018-2019!
Add in all those shiny new school supplies and it is heaven on earth for homeschool moms and teachers everywhere. With a new year, new plans, and all this new curriculum I thought I would put out there what our homeschool curriculum choices are this coming year!
In the coming school year, I will have 2 fifth graders, a second-grader, and a kindergartner.
Each with their own learning styles and personalities I find that each year I must reevaluate how they did with the curriculum choices of last year. Then I make any necessary tweaks that will help each child achieve success on their level.
HOMESCHOOL CURRICULUM CHOICES
Academics are valued in our home, but not quite as much as their character. One of our family values is hard work and “Doing it all to the Glory of God”. Sometimes this requires us to go slower in some areas. Evaluating the stage of learning so that it can be learned well is critical to me when choosing curriculum and grade levels for my children.
I can get caught up in where I think my child “should be”, but this is often based on comparison or looking at public school expectations. However, I need to do a quick check and remember a key “why” we choose homeshcool – to allow my children to thrive in their God given gifts. Setting them up for success in this goal reminds me not to compare them to anyone but themselves and their own progress.
5th Grade – 11 Year Old Daughter with Special Needs
This year I have made the decision to have my oldest daughter, who has Down syndrome, repeat the 5th grade.
Being a June baby she is on the younger side of her grade age and after evaluating her learning progress, it definitely seemed that she would benefit from the grade repeat year to catch up more closely. My girl requires lots of repetition and review, which can cause her learning to take longer. Staying in 5th grade will give her additional time to grow into the new concepts of learning. Not to mention all of the new pre-teen changes that we are just beginning to navigate! UGH!
These are the independent subjects and curriculum that she will be using:
- Language Arts/Spelling – The Good and the Beautiful, Level 2 & 3 — When we discovered this “good” and “beautiful” curriculum, I knew that this would be a perfect fit for my sweetie. She had learned a great foundation of phonics and basic grammar with her Logic of English program in the earlier years. The next level of that program did not work for her so when we stumbled upon The Good & The Beautiful I was excited. This curriculum groups all of the Language Arts pieces into one program – spelling, grammar, poetry, writing, art, and even some geography!!! There is continued building upon the phonics foundation she has and I am able to break up the lessons as they best fit her needs. This program also contains plenty of repetition IF you need it. We do go at a slower pace and in her binder, I split the grammar/poetry and the spelling pieces so it is not as overwhelming. This enables her to be able to work more independently with little check boxes for each section on a page.
- Handwriting – The Good & The Beautiful Handwriting, Level 4 – Since she needs the regular practice of her handwriting skills, she will be continuing this handwriting program from G&B. This level introduces some cursive and I think that she will finally be able to develop this skill. (We had tried learning cursive before but her brain couldn’t shift gears from manuscript in 3rd grade)
- Math – Math-U-See, Beta Level – This math curriculum continues to serve my girls’ needs for repeating concepts and reviewing concepts in each lesson. By having the first three days be strictly one new concept, she is able to better master it at least a little. Then the following days continue the new concept while also reviewing the most recent ones learned. It also has a great way of reviewing math concepts that were previously learned, with a bigger gap in time, when an upcoming concept will be building on these former concepts. We also add in review of money by using our coins most days – this is an ongoing skill that she works on to count money. Plus, she completes a daily calendar to maintain date & time skill reviews.
- Typing – The Good & The Beautiful Typing 1 — Continuing with the simple goodness of this curriculum, G&B does not disappoint with the beauty and ease of this typing program. This is the first time that my girl will be doing some formal typing program. She will go slow, maybe 1 – 2 times per week, as she gets comfortable with the keyboard. Her fingers are short and the movements will be new but I foresee this as becoming a staple to her academics going forward
- Character Training & Life Skills – Regular reading of her devotionals is key in character training. My girl, like each of my children, will continue learning to cook, serve, and clean for meals on her assigned day of the week. She will also continue to assist with laundry (which she loves! YAY!) and help with other chores around the house. Her key character words are Respectful, Responsible, and Teachable. Reflective of her growth areas, these keywords help her evaluate her attitude. She loves passionately but is very stubborn. Keeping her on track for character growth is a fundamental life skill.
5th Grade – 10 Year Old Son
This young man is growing and achieving academically on a record track. He is continuing to learn new concepts quickly and apply them to the upcoming challenges. He tends to be more of a perfectionist, which can slow him down a bit — everything must be just right! While also gaining great confidence in the finished product of his written projects and artistic growth. There is pre-teen going on here too, but my boy is learning to navigate his own sensitivity and beginning to find his personality.
These are his independent subjects and curriculum for this year:
- Language Arts – This guy will begin the Essentials Program at our Classical Conversations (CC) co-op this year. Due to this, he will use a few curriculums that will challenge him to really grow this year.
- Essentials Program – This program will review and introduce classic sentence structure, parts of speech, and lots of diagramming.
- The Good & The Beautiful Language Arts, Level 4 – Even though my big guy will be participating in the CC Essentials Program this year, he will continue the periodic lessons in level 4 of this great curriculum. This level contains excellent books to read right within the lessons, poetry, grammar review, and spelling of challenging words. It is the perfect supplement to the Essentials program. He will likely do 2-3 lessons per week during our co-op weeks.
- Writing – Institute for Excellence in Writing (IEW), Ancient History — This is part of the CC coop program and introduces amazing foundations for writing well. This life skill is critical no matter what line of work one goes into, so I really want to see my children be equipped with the skills to write. (Plus, this momma is a writer!) This writing curriculum chooses source texts that are consistent with the time period that we are learning in history for our CC Cycle 1 Foundations coop group. Students learn how to write descriptive paragraphs using sources texts and citing – yup, bibliographies. There are some creative writing assignments too using pictures and creating their own story. You can totally use this program without being part of a CC Community and there is a time period for the different times in history.
- Handwriting – The Good & The Beautiful Handwriting, Level 5 + 6 — Since my big guy writes most other subjects in manuscript, this will give him continued cursive writing practice. He has been doing cursive for 2 years and enjoys practicing in script. One key item to this curriculum is they use grammar and spelling rules as text to copy. Additionally, there are bible verses and other good character qualities stated within to copy.
- Math – Teaching Textbooks, Level 5 – Continuing in our TT has been terrific for this guy. He has grown in his confidence and, even though last year he wanted to try something different, returning to this curriculum will be a better fit for the coming year.
- Typing – The Good & The Beautiful Typing 1 — We previously tried a CD typing curriculum that no longer jives with my pc version, so I decided to try something different. This is completely different and more simply helps kids learn the basic keyboard. Since this guy has been typing a bit more than the other kids, he should be able to excel with this program and quickly move to upper levels. Either way, this will equip him to type his writing projects on his own.
2nd Grade – 7 Year Old Son
This guy is all about the motion. As an auditory learner, he truly learns from hearing and moving around. His biggest challenge is not being completely disruptive to those who need to focus – momma included! Since he is such a wiggler, I really modify what he is learning so that he can enjoy it. I will often have him do parts of his work orally – math & spelling for instance, rather than making him sit and write the answers down. This helps him both learn and retain the information.
He has terrific handwriting so since he follows a regular handwriting curriculum, I feel that by skipping the writing step in other subjects, he better achieves success for him.
His subjects and curriculum for the coming year are:
- Language Arts/Spelling – The Good & The Beautiful Language Arts, Level 1 — Since completing his Logic of English Foundations level B last year, I had switched this little guy over to our G&B program to see how it went. He did great at the end of the year so we will be continuing. This goes at a good pace for him and, with the phonetic foundation he has, he can keep up or pass some lessons. Being a mover, it did take him long to go through the LOE programs and I really wanted to introduce more grammar concepts and more challenging reading for him. He is ready so I am hopeful that he will have success growing in these areas.
- Handwriting – The Good & The Beautiful Handwriting, Level 3 –This kid has great penmanship so he will be moving from his previous Handwriting Without Tears curriculum to G&B. He will also have some cursive introduced so that he can continue to develop his handwriting skills. Not sure how he will like the drawing portions of this program, most lessons have one, but I am ok with him skipping that to get the regular practice.
- Math – ABeka, Level 2 – This math curriculum is a great fit for my little guy! It is bright, colorful, and changes concepts quickly. If I don’t have the time to do the entire lesson plan with him, he is able to complete the pages mostly independently. We regularly use additional manipulatives and cover different concepts outside of the curriculum.
- Character Training – Lessons in Responsibility for Young Boys – this is a great book that I plan to read with my little guy once a week. It covers many basic and essential life skills about begin responsible with his body, property, and many key areas. There is a little hands on and review of how he does each week to help measure growth, but it is just enough to keep both of us accountable. I am looking forward to this character growth with my little guy before we have to jump into bigger, more sensitive subjects.
Kindergarten – 5 Year Old Daughter
This little girl loves to sit in and participate in school with her older siblings! Strong, motivated, and crafty are just a few adjectives that would describe her at this stage. Since she is only in kindergarten my academic expectations for her are to really just enjoy her days and learn along the way.
Reading and basic math skills that are fun fill her day with more than enough “school” work. I am the one that needs to be intentional about doing the fun crafts and reading to her the fun books in our home library.
One-on-one time is also key for her — if she does not get she will not be happy if others do. Managing the task of filling up her love tank must be first. She will not do school work every day, but I will be gauging when she is ready to sit for a full or partial lesson.
The “3 R’s” as subjects cover her curriculum for this year:
- Reading – Logic of English, Foundations A + B — This program is gold to me and I used it with all of my other children. Since I do not teach them sight words, this phonics program sets the perfect foundation for them to read and spell most words. She will be doing her workbook pages for level A with me 2-3 times a week. She will be learning the individual phonetic sounds of each letter of the alphabet in Foundations A, along with vowels/consonants, and begin spelling and reading with the letter combinations she learns. If we move to Foundations B, then it will include 2 and 3 letter phonograms while building on the concepts of the first level.
- wRiting –
Abeka Number Skills K5 Arithmetic Teacher Key
This teacher’s key accompanies the sold-separately Number Skills K Arithmetic Student Book and contains a copy of the student text with answers. Kindergarten/K5. Spiral Binding.To see how we learn together, you can head on over to this post about our Circle Time – How We Start our Day.
What are your choices for the coming year? Are you trying anything new? Let me know in the comments!
Best,
Homeschool Curriculum Choices
Check out some of our favorite resources to learn in these posts.
9th Grade ~ 8th Grade ~6th Grade ~ 4th Grade
8th Grade ~ 7th Grade ~ 5th Grade ~ 3rd Grade
7th Grade ~ 7th Grade ~ 4th Grade ~ 2nd Grade
6th Grade – 6th Grade – 3rd Grade – 1st Grade
5th Grade – 5th Grade – 2nd Grade – Kindergarten