It has been a long, long, long school year. Last summer was less than relaxing with Husband’s bad bout with Mono and subsequent month off of work. Then, after Christian’s first seizure in October, this past winter became a blur of MRI’s, blood draws, doctor visits, ER runs, a 12 day hospital stay, a jet transport to a larger regional hospital, pill pushing, and meals filled with canola oil, butter, mayonnaise, and whipping cream. Those two major events were sprinkled with other very personal struggles that no one but us will ever know.
Despite it all, my cup overflows. I get to live my days in my beautiful home with my beautiful family. I am able to put three square meals a day on the table without any worries. I can receive my Lord every Sunday and am fed through His Word every day.
Through it all, I’ve remained convinced of our family’s homeschool calling and become even more aware of the immense blessings God has poured out on us for following that path.
Right now, we are in the midst of our last two “official” school weeks. I’m filing away old curriculum and pouring over the new.
The end to this school year has been fairly anti-climatic. We very much in the midst of several curriculums after making switches and additions in the middle of the school year. We also plan on continuing with several subjects through summer (Lowell with be doing math, Latin, spelling, and writing; Christian and Lilla will work on handwriting, reading/phonics, arithmetic, and religion).
I find it important that I step back every May and reflect on the past year. I ask myself what worked and what didn’t in our schedules, routines, curriculums, and other areas. Here are my thoughts on this year.
Lowell (4th grade):
Math
Worked: Saxon
We still very much enjoy Saxon. We began homeschooling with Singapore, but I found it did not have enough built in review for my liking (I will still be using Singapore for 1st and 2nd grade). We had been warned again and again about Saxon, but, in the end, we have been very pleased with the program.
- nearly self taught
- lots of practice
- lots of built in review
- built in testing
- no preparation
English
Didn’t work: Intermediate Language Lessons
We started the year following the Mother of Divine Grace course of study. I thoroughly enjoyed the Charlotte Mason type approach in Primary Language Lessons last year, but Lowell needed more of a challenge for his grammar and writing skills this year.
- teacher dependent
- very little practice
- no built in review
- no testing
Worked: Seton English
I’m a big Seton grouch, but they have a solid reputation when it comes to their language art’s curriculum. Though Lowell is finishing up 4th grade, I started him on the 4th grade book in early April. I taped $5 at the end of his workbook to encourage him to finish as quickly as possible. He is making quick progress and should be done with it by the end of the month, putting us back “on track” for next year.
- nearly self taught
- lots of practice
- lots of built in review
- no preparation
Latin
Didn’t work: Beginning Latin I
This was another Mother of Divine Grace curriculum. I felt it wasn’t organized very well and was very teacher dependent. I knew immediately that it wasn’t going to work, but we continued with it for 8 weeks before finally switching to Latina Christiana.
-
- badly organized
- teacher dependent
- moved too quickly
- not enough review
We made the switch the Latina Christiana in October, and I wish we would have done it sooner. The program is organized well and comes with a DVD teacher – which is perfect for a mom with no Latin experience. The one aspect of this curriculum that I dislike is that the DVD instructor speaks WAY too quickly. She does not allow time for the student to respond. We’ve had to train Lowell to pause the DVD so he has a chance to respond before moving on.
(NOTE: I have since purchased First Form Latin, the next step in this series, for the 2017-18 year. However, the program seems to be more “mom intensive.” I have not completely ruled it out, but plan on taking some time discussing the program and a viable alternative (Latin for Children by Classical Academic Press) with Husband before setting the Latin course in stone for 2017-2018. I’ll let you know the outcome! If any of you have suggestions or advice about either First Form Latin or Latin for Children, send me your thoughts via comment or email (elizabethclareblog (at) gmail (dot) com)
- no prep
- lots of practice
- built in review
- easily testable
- nearly self-taught
Typing
Worked: Typing.com
You can’t beat the price here- free! Lowell is slowly building his typing skills
- not teacher dependent (though I do watch him closely to make sure his typing form is correct)
- free!
- easy to follow
Spelling
Didn’t Work: Writing Road to Reading
After 2 years of implementing this program, I was completely fed up. Lowell’s spelling did improve over that period, but I credit his natural development for that growth, not the WRTR. It totally complicates what should be a very simple and straightforward subject.
-
- dependent on mom
- complicated program (there are courses to take to help you implement it!)
- no built in review
- no built in practice
- no built in testing
Worked: Seton Spelling
Don’t try to fix what isn’t broken! We have turned back to the traditional way of learning spelling and are finding the list a week with built in workbook exercises to be an easier to follow and implement format.
- no prep
- lots of practice
- built in review
- easily testable
- nearly self-taught (I go over the new spelling rule on Monday and give the Friday quizzes)
Religion
Worked: Baltimore Catechism
It is no secret that I love the Baltimore Catechism. Even so, we are looking into some new materials next year. I’m eager to share them with you after implementing them for a time.
You may also like to read: Using the Baltimore Catechism in Your Homeschool
History
Worked: Literature and Story of the World audiobooks
No formal history here. We have all 4 volumes of the Story of the World audiobooks and we listen through the whole set at least once a year. The kids love them and so do we.
Coupled with our carefully chosen booklist, our children are getting a solid overview of history. This is my only aim for elementary history.
We followed the Mother of Divine Grace curriculum for history our first semester, but when life got hectic we fell back into our more relaxed history study.
Science
Worked: The New Way Things Work, literature, and unschooling
I’m not an unschooler, but I think that elementary science is a subject that can be totally delight-led. There is nothing children learn in elementary science that cannot be learned in a year’s time in high school. In our homeschool, we would rather focus on other subjects during the elementary years. (For those of you wondering, I have a degree in biology and Husband is an engineer so it isn’t like science is some foreign concept to us!)
That said, there are still things we use in our home that educate our children about the world of science. Husband loves to read through The New Way Things Work with the kids one evening a week. The kids are always left begging for more of this humorous read. After reading a page or two, Husband usually takes them out to the garage to experience what they’ve just read. I love that he does this with them as that is just not my way of teaching or learning.
I also intentionally include some science literature in their reading list, and we allow them to explore freely.
Despite our unschooling approach, Lowell understands electrical circuits, magnetism, and basic mechanics better than I do!
Christian
It has been a tough year for this little fella! I’m amazed at how he has still been able to grow academically despite all the rough patches. School has been very hit or miss, especially from November through March.
I do not spend a lot of time doing formal school with my 1st graders on down. A half hours time provides ample opportunity to focus on the 3 R’s.
Math
Worked: Old workbooks
I have lots of old kindergarten type workbooks that we have been able to pull worksheets from. Using those workbooks and counting objects in books has given Christian the basic math concepts I expect my kindergarteners to grasp. I did purchase this one workbook for him this year, but could have gotten by on what we had on hand.
Reading
Worked: 100 Easy Lessons, Bob Books, Sight word flashcards
I used 100 Easy Lessons to get Christian reading this year. Reading is still a lot of work for him, but he can easily sound out words and is well on his way to becoming a fluent reader. The program does a nice job of teaching children how to blend the phonetic sounds to make words, introducing sight words, and moving slowly and incrementally.
To practice his reading skills, we have been using our set of Bob Books. I can’t say enough good things about these easy readers. They are slow moving and do not include a lot of sight words like other early readers. The stories are humorous and my kids always love being able to read a whole book on their own! Both of my boys have enjoyed these while learning to read.
We’ve been using these sight word flashcards the past year. If you are considering purchasing them, I would stick with the first few sets. There is an enormous amount of words in each pack and the later packs are unnecessary. We have been working on just 30 or so sight words this year. I was amazed that after working on these this fall, Christian could still recognize the sight words in February after all he had been through. The brain is an amazing thing!
Writing
Worked: Seton Handwriting and other workbooks
With the effects of all his medications, handwriting has by far been the most difficult subject. We went months doing every school subject orally because he simply could not write. He is much less shaky now and in the past few months we have been working through the Seton K Handwriting. It does a nice job of moving slowly from basic strokes to letter formation and there is plenty of practice.
I purchased the same workbook for Lilla who just turned 4 because she was ready for it. If your child is holding their pencil well and writing well, you may want to look into the next grade level.
Cooperative Learning
This seemed to be a totally failure this year! We were very much in survival mode most of the academic year, and the first thing to get pushed to the side are the “extras.” Instead of focusing on all these subjects at once, I’m considering assigning 6 week terms to each for the 2017-18 school year.
Art
This subject just didn’t happen this year except for a handful of times when we worked through the Drawing Textbook (we maybe completed 10 lessons!). I liked that there was zero prep and that my oldest could complete the lesson without any guidance if needed (although I didn’t push or supervise this so it didn’t happen). Christian and Lilla liked to copy the lessons too.
- no prep
- easy to follow
- could be done independently
- great for a variety of ages
Art Appreciation
At the beginning of the year we memorized about 10 different pieces of art as well as the names of the artists who painted them. We primarily used art postcards for this. We would review every morning and then display them on our art/lego table.
Hymn Study
We learned 3 hymns at the beginning of the year. This is something I really enjoy doing with the children. Unfortunately, I’m not crazy about a lot of the music we sing at church. Our hymn study is a way I can expose them to beautiful music that lifts their minds to God. I love singing and I love to hear their sweet voices raised to Jesus. We just used an old hymnal for this.
Reading Aloud
This has been a practice in our home since we brought our first little one home from the hospital. I love, love, love to cuddle with my clan on the couch and read the day away. I used to read for hours and hours and hours to our first child, but now our read aloud time is for an hour between lunch and quiet hour. I enjoy acting out the voices of the characters and trying to make the stories come alive for my little ones. Reading expressively has allowed me to read literature well above my children’s level without losing their interest. We’ve enjoyed lots of great books this year!
What were your total homeschool bombs this year? What were the gems?
You’ll also enjoy:
10 Must Do’s in Your (Catholic) Preschool
A Required Reading List for your (Catholic) Child
Oh my goodness!! Someone who homeschools as I do! Yes, a love/ dislike with Seton! Love some of the workbooks, despise the overload of excess work. Definitely a “design your own curriculum” girl here! I will be returning to Seton English Grammar next year (along with handwriting, phonics and possibly spelling). I found a book on Amazon https://www.amazon.com/dp/188920904X/_encoding=UTF8?coliid=I39WBFRGSDXP2V&colid=1ZS6QZ2017YWW Story Starter, that I pray will help with writing! Thank you for the art postcard link, and the drawing book. I really need some help in that area. We have Draw Write Now, but we definitely need to move ahead. I will pray for Christian! I’ll pray to St. Anthony for answers, O.L. of Lourdes and O.L. of Sorrows! Look into more audio/video for some subjects. The Story of Civilization from TAN is worth every penny…non mom intensive and beyond amazing! We did Song School Latin, but I’ll move on to Lingua Christiana, per your good review! Can’t recall how I found your lovely blog? CC? I went there for a year, but can’t remember if you did…God bless you!
I wish I were better about art instruction around here, but it always seems to be the first thing dropped. Is the Story of Civilization the Catholic version of “Story of the World” I’ve been hearing about? I’ll definitely be looking into that! I will give you a heads up that First Form Latin (the book following Latina Christiana) seems to be more “mom intensive.” I purchased the material, and am now reconsidering. It is a fine program, but just want to make sure I use my time wisely as educator.
Thanks for all your prayers. We are certainly doing better and hope that God continues to heal our little guy!
I can’t compare the two audio history courses. However, I can’t say enough about the Story of Civilization! The children know more than I ever did about ancient times! One word of advice though, wait for a good sale. I bought the first volume Thanksgiving weekend at 40% off. The second volume, I bought on pre-order, also for 40% off. I’ve started coming around to the idea, that not all subjects need to be studied for the entire year. During what “should” be the quieter winter months, sitting around listening to History is ideal! Art might fall into that category too…such as one quarter of it or one semester. Just something I’m thinking about. That approach wouldn’t work for much, but a few things wouldn’t hurt! I completely appreciate the note on the next level of First Form Latin! We went through the two volumes of Song School Latin, but I think we need more. I see the creator of Song School has something for older children, but even though it’s audio/video, it sounds like it might need more of my time that I have. I do think I’ll try Latina Christiana. I hope you can send the other level back, if you think it’s not going to work. The question I always ask myself is…will this still be working in February?! If not, then I have to find something else. By way of mom helps, if you need “flash cards” for your children, the little hand held devices called Math Trekkers have been great! Amazon has them. To save money, I’m considering getting a Spelling book that has word lists for grades 1-6. My plan is to have the children write the list, define a specified number of the words (or all), use them in a sentence and then be tested (a little something every day). I like the Seton Spelling workbooks, but that’s basically what they do, and for the cost, I’m hoping this idea would work…I wonder if we’d stick with it or if I had better just get individual books.
Okay, Vieve, we think scarely alike. I too am thinking about alternating “extras” during different terms (like art and music, etc.). As for you spelling suggestion, I am all about that, and tried it using the lists in Spelling Power (which is not how the program was really intended, but what worked for us). I like the idea of having curriculum to use with multiple children and avoid repurchasing disposable workbooks every year, but I’ve found the extra exercises in the Seton workbooks are helping my son retain his spelling lists much better. He is also picking up other skills like alphabetical order, syllable counting, and dictionary skills that I do not like to take the time to teach.
I believe Song School Latin is put out by CAP (Classical Academic Press), if so, it is their program Latin for Children that I am looking into. My friend uses it and says it can be self taught. The whole Latin thing is a project for Husband and me to discuss some rainy spring day!
I’m planning on looking into the Story of Civilization – thanks for your discount advice!
(I think you might have meant the 2016-2017 school year rather than 2018?)
In any case – I love this detailed explanation of each source. This is tremendously helpful for me to consider as this will be my first year homeschooling my kids and there is *so* much out there! For months now I’ve been reading all about curriculum choices and I find myself considering whether or not some materials are going to work for our family in practice. I don’t think I can know everything ahead of time but asking the question about what is “needful” at my children’s ages – they are 4 and 6 years old – is becoming a good starting place for starting to put together ideas of materials to cover with them. Seeing your experience of using these materials with your family is oh so helpful🙂.
I am also Anglican but agree with the theology of the Catholic Church, and my husband has agreed that we can use catholic curricula to homeschool our girls. It’s exciting for me that they will be exposed to this wonderful teaching daily. My husband isn’t willing to join the Catholic Church just yet but we are both reading and studying together as we consider this option. It’s a real blessing that he is in agreement that we can use a catholic curriculum with our girls.
I will remember your son in prayer – it sounds like he has been an absolute trooper through it all.
Yep, 2016-2017 is exactly what I mean! Since I’ve been making planners so much recently, I tend to get a year ahead of myself – ha!
It sounds like you are on the right track as you plan your homeschool year. If it puts you at ease, I did VERY, VERY, VERY little school with my first child at those ages, and now he is an excellent student with great test scores.
You are asking the right questions too! What is NEEDFUL? and what is PRACTICAL? (You may be interested in thinking over what makes a good, workable curriculum for you. Husband helped me with this and the resulting 10 rules have helped me weed out the “good” in favor of the best and most likely to succeed: https://www.elizabethclareblog.com/10-criteria-for-choosing-homeschool-curriculum/)
I’m very intrigued by your religious journey. I am a convert to the Catholic faith myself from Presbyterianism (although anything but Catholicism was fine- ha!). In fact, I used to be a Catholic-hater, but the Lord really worked a number on my heart. For 5 years Husband and I lived in a divided marriage and we had a real struggle disagreeing on theology/religious practice. I’m so grateful that you are reading and learning about the faith as this is truly the first step in discovering the Truth as given to us by Our Lord. My reading and learning (and of course, the silent working of the Holy Spirit) were what eventually led me home to the Catholic Church. I’m sure the Lord has good things in store for you and your family. This mustard seed of holy hunger will surely be filled! I’ll be praying for you, your family, and your journey, Marci!
Thank you too for your prayers for Christian. He is a trooper alright and we are grateful for his close relationship with the Lord.
That’s a relief to know it’s possible to do much less schooling when the children are young and still have kiddos that grow up to do well academically. I want my children to get a good education but also have a balanced childhood where they can dig in dirt, climb trees, do nature walks, and enjoy blooming in the context of our family. I pray that it all comes together – and as we read and learn about the Catholic church I am praying to learn more of its truth and beauty. Reading your conversion story was encouraging to me – that if we ask God to show us the truth, and confirm it to us he really will guide us.
I’m glad you found my conversion encouraging and I absolutely believe that God can be found by those who seek Him with an open heart.
I totally agree with you on balancing education and childhood. My oldest will be a 5th grader this year and this is where I am really seeing the rubber meeting the homeschooling road. There are a lot of things they need to understand and learn at this age. That being said, I am totally happy to focus on Reading, wRiting, aRithmetic, and Religion in those younger grades. God bless your homeschool and faith journey.
Goodness; I was surprised to see that you switched to some Seton materials! I understand the ‘ease’ of them and needing that in your situation.
I don’t, though, see how Seton English replaces PLL or ILL though. Seton English (which I have taught from) is more mechanics and PLL and ILL have imitation, copywork, oral retelling, composition, word usage, and some mechanics. PLL and ILL seem so much ‘richer’ and and thought provoking. I understand it’s not a grammar textbook; it’s not supposed to be but grammar can be taught through Latin or through something as simple as diagramming one sentence a day. Also, IEW has some composition materials that might be more thought provoking than Seton materials but less ‘mama hands on’ than PLL and ILL.
Cecilia, I am not a big fan of Seton. Even though Husband was enrolled in Seton from 2nd on, I have never felt drawn to their materials. However, I’m very grateful that we made the switch.
1. When Christian was in the hospital in January, I was unable to do ILL with Lowell. If we had been doing the Seton workbook, he could have easily have completed the work independently while he stayed with relatives. God willing, we will never have another extended hospital stay or several months of life upheaval, but there are always situations that arise in which we need an easy-peasy-pudding-and-pie method. I’ve come to the realization as I homeschool, that the best curriculum is not always the best, but, rather, what gets done on a daily basis. We are able to get our Seton done on a daily basis, and that puts a gold star in my book:).
2.Lowell was/is still struggling with the basic mechanics of writing (capitalization, punctuation, etc.). I know these things can be picked up with copywork, but it was not happening for this student. While I do not put a lot of stock in testing, we still have our students test every year just for the exposure/experience with that form of assessment. Lowell’s scores came back excellent except for the mechanics of writing. The amount of copywork and mechanic practice in ILL was not enough to reinforce these concepts for him. He continues to struggle with mechanics with the Seton workbook, but at least there is more practice. We will be focusing on this during our summer school to help him catch up. Obviously, this point does not apply to all learners.
3. I do agree that PLL and ILL are more enjoyable than Seton (remember, I’m not a Seton fan). Seton teaches a child to write clear, concisely, and in an orderly fashion; however, it lacks instruction in writing richly and in a beautiful and stylish way (I’m struggling to put into words what I mean here!). Husband agrees with me on this point. To supplement this area, we are using Classical Academic Press’s Writing and Rhetoric. It is well organized and involves copywork, narration, composition, and imitation. With WandR, Lowell is making more tangible progress than with Seton alone or ILL alone. Seton is bolstering his mechanics and WandR is helping with the style of writing. Another child could do just WandR and do just fine.
4.You are correct that grammar can be taught through Latin, but this is my first time around that homeschooling bend, and I don’t quite trust the Latin only method yet. This is why we are choosing to focus on grammar outside of our Latin studies as well as in our Latin studies. This may change for future children.
To each his own on homeschool curriculum. Right now this is what is working for us. He is learning and school is accomplished every.single.day.
That makes sense! I haven’t used Classic Academic press materials but I am familiar with the company that makes them and they are great. I bet their products do work well. I just figured that ONLY doing seton was not going to teach much creativity/ thoughtfulness in writing. But I see that you agree. 🙂
Absolutely agree! Husband (the Seton grad) agrees with us here too. He is great at writing a term paper, etc. but definitely weak on the creative writing side. We really are liking our CAP writing course with Seton.