Curriculum
What curriculum do you use? Where do you buy it? Have you found a “gem” that you must share with others? Was something in particular a complete failure for you and your kids?

We were out and about all day yesterday but I didn’t want to miss out on the last day of the week of homeschooling!

I love that Randi posted the curriculum list for her daughter’s first grade year. Alice is starting first grade as well…and I have to say we have probably three times as many books as Randi! But that’s the worksheet/’playing school’ person in me that picked those. Sure Alice wanted one here or there, and most are a continuation of the kindergarten version of the book, but I realize we probably won’t get to all of them – and that’s okay.

I think of my neighbors when I think of how long school ‘should’ last. I know the oldest daughter follows a curriculum and has work to do for three to four hours a day. Last year I think we only spent about an hour a day really doing stuff – sure we cooked, crafted, did flash cards, played with a Barbie computer (said Christmas gift that still rocks the house) and more – but only about an hour was spent on worksheets and structured sitting down and working together time. I remember trying to stretch that to two hours but Alice just wasn’t having it. I agree with the thinking that kids will get it, work with them, don’t force, and they’ll just catch on. Sure they need to keep learning and moving forward, but it’ll happen. I like to think I don’t stress about stuff, but I’m sure my Mom would remind me of times that I have. 😉

I remember when Alice learned a concept with addition – she was counting on her fingers but say it was 4 + 5, she would count four on one hand, then five on the other, then count them all together. Then one day it hit her – she had five fingers already so bam start counting at five, eliminating a step. Seeing her so excited to realize that was awesome.

And so far I’ve bought the curriculum online or at Barnes & Noble (where I should buy stock, I’m so not kidding!). Every time we are in there I’m looking for a new workbook or a new book for the kids area in the house. I like the Evan Moor workbooks. I did venture into at least looking for a full on curriculum from a publisher but got overwhelmed very fast.

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If I had only known…

I wonder if we have been schooling long enough to have an ‘if only I knew’ moment? If my kids had it their way we would ‘do school’ every day, all day long. They are my kids after all and I’m the one who went home with all the extra worksheets once school ended and forced my brothers to play school at any chance I could get.

It is funny to have Chris come home, ask how the day went, and have Alice say “we didn’t do any school work all day!”

I am glad I haven’t bought a huge set of curriculum, I’m glad that what we have done all along has continued to work and I’m glad we have neighbors who also homeschool. I’m glad Chris agrees this is the right thing to do.

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I think I love figuring stuff out. Our dryer died a few months ago and I took the top part apart, trying to figure out what was wrong with it. I thought I knew and after ordering a part, taking the old one out, and installing the new one – it didn’t work. But I tried! And then I bought our new dryer, moved the old one to the garage and set up the new one.

I also fixed a hole in a wall – it was a big hole and I did have to make a few phone calls to my Dad and Uncle, but in the end I did it. That was great, figuring out what was wrong and fixing it. Of course that wall does need to be painted still, I need to work on my follow through.

Chris was amazed when I fixed the screen in our screen door. The kids constant pushing and leaning on it caused it to pop out. Fixing it was easy and took just a couple of minutes. But the amazement that Chris showed, you would think it took all afternoon!

D is also for Dad – mine who I talk to a lot and Chris who is getting another baby so does that make him more of a Dad? Haha.

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Getting out there…

Socialization is the biggest thing my family is concerned about. It is legitimate since though we’ve lived here for about a year and a half, we aren’t all that involved in the community nor have we become close with many other families. We joined gymnastics last fall and that was a lot of fun. I never felt like I fit in with the other moms, but that was okay because the kids had a blast in each class. Alice was moved to another age group after the first class and that only threw us off because that meant two trips instead of one.

We took the summer off and plan on going back next month, even if we go to the Y gymnastics vs the private gym we were attending. The kids are also interested in soccer and I think that would be a lot of fun. I do wonder how many activities are too many? I like the Y because of just being able to play with other kids in the daycare area (in addition to all the activities we have available to us).

The kids play with the neighbors at least a couple of times a week, more if they can. And we get together with other friends a couple of times a month. It can be hard to get together just because Chris’ and my friends husbands schedule are different. It’s the neighbors we plan on doing some sort of activity with this year which I think will be very fun. I tried to get involved in a homeschool group locally but it just didn’t work out. I’m always open to new ideas so I’ve been looking around for what else is out there.

Of course when I think of socialization I think of this cartoon over at Hathor the Cow Goddess – click the link, you won’t be sorry, it’s hilarious! It reminds me of my kids – always talking to people, waving at people, saying hi, etc. I’ve been lucky, people don’t ask me if we homeschool, they ask Alice if she is in school. And she always says “yes, we homeschool, that’s doing school at home!” and they think she’s a cute little girl and smile and most of the time continue asking questions.

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