I want to start a list of good links that will be intertwined in the posts.
I need to begin my days with prayer, so here are the first links I will list:
http://www.catholic.org/newsletters/content/dailyreadings.php
http://www.americancatholic.org/Features/SaintofDay/default.aspx
June 15, 2010
Well, our school year is almost complete. My oldest is finishing her 9th grade year. My oldest son is finishing his 7th grade year. My 6 year old is finishing his Kindergarten year. My 3 year old is happily doing his "Preschool" each day. The baby is happy just hanging around the school tables.
We went to the Florida Home school Convention in Orlando again this year and purchased many books for next year. I still have several more books to order. That will happen once this year is finished. I just can't focus on too much at once because mistakes are made that way. I want to sit down, take a deep breath and plan the new year with a clear head knowing this past school year is completed!
I will post our plans for the new year soon. Hopefully I can find all of the awesome links I wanted to share also.
More to come......
July 2010
Lazy days of summer are here!! This actually is the first summer we have taken off of homeschooling. We usually take off in the fall and winter months when the weather is beautiful here in Florida. Summer is just too hot. But, because our oldest is in her high school years, we have to keep more of a traditional school schedule.
During the summer Madison will be studying her driving book and also taking a test on-line on drugs and alcohol and driving. She is not thrilled. I don't think she is in any way excited to drive. She just does not want to grow up, it is precious. She also will continue taking practice tests for the SAT and the PSAT. In the fall she will sit during an actual PSAT for practice and also a SAT. We want her to take as many practice tests as possible, preparing for the "real" ones. I really can't wrap my brain around her going off to college. I just am not ready for that. I have to trust in the Lord and know that He will be by her side!
We went to the Florida Home school Convention in May. I started buying some of our books for the new school year. I still have many more books to order and some lab supplies for Madison's science course.
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| Only 1/8 of what we need |
I am not looking forward to writing out all of my lesson plans, but it is something that I need to get busy doing very soon. I don't want to wait till the last minute, then I start freaking out and get all stressed. Next year is going to be all about no stress and no worries. I just want to enjoy my time teaching these incredible and very smart children that we have.
More to come....
August 28, 2010
Well, our first full week back to school went really well considering I wasn't even ready to start. I was putting things off a bit because I was enjoying the summer break so much. This past week books were arriving, I was busy on the phone planning field trips, and we all were trying to settle into some type of routine. Once all of our books arrive I am going to post what we are using this year and a little bit about our goals for this school year.
The older two already had science experiments this week. Nothing like jumping right in with two feet.
Mitchell did a cool one involving atoms and molecules.
Here are the five shining stars at the beginning of the 2010-2011 home school year:
More to come once all of the books arrive. I also want to add some great homeschooling links.
Peace.
10/14/2010
Our school year is coming along great. We have gone on a few field trips already. Since I am our group's field trip coordinator we get to go on all of them. We have been to the Landfill and had a recycling presentation. We went to the fire station and EMS facility. All of the kids who attended loved going through each of the trucks and taking a tour of the fire station. Next week we go to Rookery Bay for some labs on oysters and plankton. For the month of November I have arranged a private kayak fossilising trip for our older home schoolers in our group. Then in December we head out to a hydroponic heirloom farm to learn about organic gardening and hydroponics. We also are trying to plan a field trip to a solar power company. So many other trips are in the works for the remainder of the school year; it is very exciting.
It has been so much fun watching our 6 year old improve his reading and learn his math skills. He is so into his school work and it is a joy teaching him. The two younger ones sit along side us and work intently on their "school work". Our 2 year old even decided to do an art project on our wall with a blue crayon. Yes we will be repainting. The older two are doing so good on all of their tough subjects and extra curricular activities. Both of them are on bowling league again and they are beginning archery with 4-H. Our daughter also has a high school home school art class that she goes to at our group's meeting center. She is really impressing me with her artistic abilities. For her volunteer hours she is on Teen Court. It is a correctional program where volunteer teens judge their peers that have committed misdemeanor crimes. Her current position is on the jury. She is toying with the idea of being a Teen Court Lawyer. She'll have to shadow a Teen Court Lawyer for two cases and then she can do it on her own. All in all we are doing great this year. I look forward to the exciting months ahead.
01/03/2011
We started back to our homeschooling today after a much needed winter break. We enjoyed Advent and now are enjoying the last week of the Christmas season. Our decorations won't come down until January 9th, The Baptism of the Lord. I look forward to finally organizing the decorations this year as I pack them away so it will be a breeze pulling them out next season.
The older two slept in a little but still sat down after breakfast and jumped right in.
I did school with our six year at the dining room table next to the lit up tree. It is overcast today so we decided to plug in the trees and brighten up the house. Mason is studying Saxon 1 math this year and is slamming it! He is doing so well. Today he learned how to order containers by volume and how to identify one-cup liquid measure. He had a ball doing his hands on activity.
The youngest two were just enjoying life and playing with their toys all morning. Wow, I can't believe it they didn't even interrupt us once today during school, that is a first!!
Over our winter break I had to do my home school reporting and log grades. It went smoother than I had anticipated, so that is nice. I look forward to a great second half of the school year. I know that working on patience will help me a great deal. I am pleased with how the day went today, no real blow ups or melt downs. It is going to be good, I am confident! It will be so much easier teaching and learning with our six year old now that the baby is no longer breastfeeding and can entertain himself for long periods of time with toys or activities. Plus the fact that our four year old really enjoys helping his younger brother now with tasks is a great help.
The next three months we have field trips to Barnes and Noble that I planned for all of the various grade levels. I am our group's field trip coordinator this year. I have planned some really fun trips thus far and we have many more to come.
The older two will start back at bowling in their league now that break is over and their 4-H Archery will also resume. Our oldest daughter will be back to her drama class and continuing to get ready for their play production. She also is busy working on a stop motion animation movie. She hopes to showcase it next year at our home school group's talent production.
Our six year old will be back at Little League Baseball in the spring and has been patiently waiting for that. He has been trying to practice in the yard with Daddy as much as possible.
Loads of activity and learning going on here. Truly a blessing that I am thankful for, educating my own children and raising them to be soldiers for Christ.
Happy New Year!
August 15, 2011
The Assumption of The Blessed Virgin Mary
I have been busy preparing, planning and organizing for the new home school year. I began by taking a complete inventory of all our books. I simply went through all of our book shelves and wrote down the titles and authors of all the books we own. This helps me with lesson planning. I can see exactly what I have and what I need. This way I won't over buy materials that we don't really need. I am trying to utilize what we have to minimize the cost of new school books. I will be formally teaching all five kids this next school year so I really need to be creative and use what we have. Of course each year we always need to purchase the consumable work books but I am going to try and keep the overall cost down. Then I went through some of the school cupboards and organized and cleaned. I still have a lot to do but I feel like I have accomplished a great deal already. I am grateful for that!
One of the big decisions that needed to be made for the upcoming school year was foreign languages to take. Our oldest child has already completed two years of High School Latin and needed to decide what language she wants to study for her Junior and Senior years. I am requiring all of the children to take four years of foreign language. She is choosing between Chinese and Japanese. Our second oldest will be starting his Freshman year. He has decided to continue with Greek. He took one full year of Greek during his 7th grade year and really enjoyed it. He plans on doing four years of Greek during his high school years. The youngest three children will formally begin their study of Greek and Latin roots. We use a great program titled, "English from the Roots Up". I also have a program titled, "Roots and Fruits" that I will incorporate. It has fun games and activities to help make the roots stick in their memory.
Another difficult decision for me this year was whether or not to continue as Field Trip Coordinator for our local home school group. I really enjoyed planning all of the field trips for our group last school year and learned a great deal. But it took so much time and now that I'll be formally teaching all five kiddos I know it is not possible to continue with this position. I know my limits and only will take on a project if I know I can give it 100%. If I am going to do something I want to give it my all and right now I need to give 100% to home schooling the five children. Their education is my number one priority. I am at peace with my decision although I will miss coordinating the field trips :(
We took a break from the planning and organizing today to celebrate the Feast Day of Mary's Assumption. We began by renewing our consecration to Our Lady and then had some fun coloring some beautiful new book marks for the upcoming school year. Here are the three youngest boys having a great time coloring together and learning about The Blessed Mother.
Aidan Joseph (2) and Mason Anthony (7)
Eric James Junior (5)
Sept. 22, 2011
We formally started back to school on the 14th of this month. Books and supplies arrive almost daily and we are getting settled into our new routine. I am happy with all of the books this year and have been busy developing lesson plans for our three youngest. For the most part I order lesson plans for the highschoolers from a Catholic satelite school. They are extremely rigorous, but that is what I need for these smartie pants!!
As far as the foreign language decisions, our oldest decided to stick with Latin and will do two more years of that. So she will have a total of 4 years high school Latin. Our second oldest decided to do 4 years of Greek.
Here are the youngest three using some math manipulatives. They just love messing around with these, little do they know they are actually developing their math skills.
Our 3 year old with Linking Cubes
Our five year old so proud of his tanagram people.
EJ's People
Our 7 year old learning attributes.
November 1st and November 2nd, 2011
ALL SAINTS DAY was a beautiful day here in SW FL. We went to morning Mass and then came home for lunch and the Litany of the Saints. The remainder of the afternoon was spent outside, we take most Feast Days off from school and just enjoy God's gifts.
Today we celebrate ALL SOULS DAY. We worked on our project for the month of November, which is dedicated to the souls in Purgatory. Each day we will offer up prayers and sacrifices for someone on our poster and pray the prayer given to St. Gertrude for the souls in purgatory.
