Creating your own curriculum...

HAVE YOU EVER CONSIDERED putting together your own curriculum? I know many shy away from it because of the uncertainty of providing enough information at the right level for your student. But I say that you are totally cable of creating your own curriculum. I think we are all accustom to beautiful texts and lots of "meaty" books to fill out our work for the year to ensure that we are truly educating our students. However, when you focus on text books are your students really learning? Or enjoying what they are learning. Don't get me wrong there is a place for a boxed curriculum such as Sonlight, Konos, Calvert and the like. I have used them myself when I have been expecting a baby or just plain didn't want to think to hard about planning my school year.

If you'd like to save some money, as we all need to these days, creating your own curriculum can be a great way to go about it. I do always purchase a math and grammer, but depending on the age of the students history, science, geography and just about anything else you'd like to study can be created from your interests, libraries and the web. Before I give you a check list, especially if you're new to homeschooling, I always suggest checking out your states laws regarding homeschooling. Depending on what they require, they may give you a frame work to get started. You can check out your state at Homeschool Legal Defense. They offer a plethora of information if you're just getting started or need more information as your children get older.

1. First I begin with a time-line or some sort of map as to where we want to go with our study. A great time-line  is Adams's Chart of History. What makes this such a wonderful resource is that it has a parallel time line for modern, biblical, etc. Lots of references!! A great place to begin.
2. Once I have my time-line or section of study then I search the library and web for resources. Often times I start at Amazon for their wide selection even if I don't purchase from there.
3. I also look through boxed curriculum catalogs to see what they offer for the age range I'm schooling. I particularly like Sonlight for reading lists. I'm not always good at choosing reading level appropriate novels. They have wonderful, well rounded reading lists.
4. Next I get out my calendar and plot out approxamatley we will spend on each area of study. I say approxamatley because sometimes we get really into what we are studying and maybe get lost down a bunny trail or two and get off our schedule. For me that's the beauty of homeschooling and when we do our best learning during these times.
5. Last don't worry if you are getting enough in!!! I know lots of families that hesitate to create their own learning plan because they are not sure their children are learning enough. Well, as someone who has been homeschooling for 10+ years. Don't worry! You are probably doing more learning on your worst days then they'd get in school and they are probably retaining WAY more!!!!

Have confidence in your ability to teach or share a LOVE OF LEARNING and the rest will follow. I believe feeding curiosity is more important than busy work and "things accomplished". Learning is what stays in your brain, not always what you spit out onto a page. I passed many exams in school, with good grades even. But I don't always remember today what I was supposed to have learned.

Library day...

DON'T YOU JUST love the library? I do, and I love the wonder of my children when they discover a new book. We visit the library each week, but today I discovered a new area in the children's section. There were all sorts of fairy tale books from all over the world. My son, who love knights, found several books to delight his fancy!!

This evening at bedtime we read a story from China. It was a wonderful story with a great moral. It's from the book Mightier Than the Sword: World Folktales for Strong Boys. I love a good story and it's even better when it has a lesson. I also feel blessed to find this treasure. So refreshing to find good literature.

We also checked out an activity box about Knights and Dragons. So over the next few days we will probably stick with this theme and see what we can learn. The box included dress up clothes, toy dragons, small swords, and books about knights and dragons. We will be able to cover some history, possibly an art project or two. I'll probably go online to find more stuff to flesh out a "unit study". This is my favorite way do teach. Hands on and discovering things together. What a blessing!

What a Week!

HAVE YOU EVER just had one of those weeks where there just wasn't enough time. Maybe that's every week for you. I've definitely gone through my fits and spurts of the that for sure!! This week we just had so many appointments and outings that I'm kind of looking forward to a slower Saturday.

This was the week to prepare for the Washington Homeschoolers Conference. I especially love attending because it's such a fun time and so encouraging. Going to the conference I get so inspired by new things and seeing faces I've not seen for a while. I hoped to have lots of photos to share, but my phone died. Sorry about that! I need a new battery!!

My hubby and my oldest are coordinating a booth for the FRC Robot they had for this year's competitions. Great fun for them and a wonderful way to spread the word about FRC.

There were lots of fabulous vendors and I saw some new curriculum out there I need to pick up. Starting over with my little ones will be a new adventure. I am really looking forward to it. I think I'm going to go with The Elegant Essay Writing Lessons: Building Blocks for Analytical Writing for my oldest. I have to say I LOVE Institute for Excellence in Writing! Their programs are wonderful and have worked WONDERS for my son!!! Then for my younger guys I think I'm going to try PAL Writing Package from IEW. Maybe if I get these guys on the right track from the start we can get writing in hand before high school!! I have my reading stuff for my younger ones that I purchased through Learning Technologies. I am excited to get going on that. Then I'll have to dig out some old stuff to do again with little guys. Love recycling that curriculum! I have almost everything we need for our next school year, so then we can just enjoy our summer!! Over all it was a wonderful conference. Another boost to get me through until next year!! Enjoy your weekend.

Small Victories...

TODAY WE WERE celebrating small victories. The other day I posted about learning challenges and and the webinar that I watched. Learning and learning challenges are all brain driven. I'm sure you're thinking, "yeah, no kidding!" But if the brain isn't firing quite right things don't get through and children don't always "see" the same things that you're seeing. Case in point, while my oldest was going through occupational therapy there was a day that he was presented with a simple activity. What happened was fascinating to me. He was asked to recreate parallelograms and other shapes with stirring straws. What was created by the therapist was to be copied by my son. There were several examples that he could just not recreate. Not only wasn't he able to copy them, he argued that what he created was in fact the same as what the therapist had made with the straws. He was visualizing something completely different from what was in front of him. I was amazed. It never occurred to me that when I was asking him to do something what was "going in" wasn't always what I meant or intended.

I think that many parents of children with learning challenges don't even consider what it's like on the other end of the learning spectrum. As parents and teachers, we put forth the curriculum and it makes sense to us and we expect that through our explanation it makes sense to them. At least I did. I would go over and over things and only to be frustrated because, "He's just not paying attention" among other things that I thought. When you, yourself don't have a learning challenge or maybe you do, but instead of getting the help you needed you just chalked it up to "I'm just not good at ______" (you fill in the blank). You don't even consider that they may just not be comprehending what you're asking. This was all BREAKING NEWS to me. I felt terrible about what I thought and even, how at times, I behaved when faced with challenging moments.

There are so many developmental things that go into learning. Physical things that most first time parents don't know. I also don't think that parents are educated well on how important these things are. Like crawling for example, it is so important for a child to crawl as a baby. It works both hemispheres of the brain and helps with learning things like reading when the child gets older. Playing in general is so important! Physical activity. Using the big muscles. All these things help build pathways in the brain and help the learning process.

So getting back to small victories... Today my seven year old mastered the monkey bars. You may not think that's a big deal, but let me tell you why it is. Being able to swing and control your body is a BIG brain builder. When I was doing occupational therapy with my oldest some of the activities he had to master was swinging and controlling his swinging. Some times he had to swing on a platform and swing in a clockwise motion. Controlled and steady. Then other days he had to do it counter clockwise. On other days he had to sit on a seat on a rope swing and swing in a circular motion and while tossing bean bags at a target. All these activities required control of ones body and they are all brain building activities. Often times I would take "school" outside and do it on the trampoline or on the swings in our backyard. I would read-a-loud or he would recite math facts, etc. while he was able to move. Amazingly enough he was able to concentrate and accomplish lots while doing these things and having the freedom of motion. Sitting on an exercise ball while doing school work can work wonders too!

So the next time you feel frustrated or like your not good at teaching, get curious. Maybe there's more going on than you think. And celebrate those victories!! They are important!!

As an FYI, I am now an Amazon Associate, which means if you link to Amazon through any of my links and make purchases you are supporting me. If you have a blog you can do it too! Who doesn't need more money for books and curriculum?? Thanks and enjoy your day!

Curriculum Choices...

NOW THAT THE SCHOOL year is coming to a close, I'm hitting the web and talking with other mom's about curriculum. What worked? What didn't and why? Since I have one student that is getting close to end of his homeschooling career and students just beginning, I'm spending time focusing on what worked and what's a good match for my current students learning styles. What I want to do again and what I want to ditch.

Over the years I've used lots of Sonlight curriculum and have been satisfied with the history and literature portion of their curriculum. I have not however, been as pleased with the Language Arts portion. I LOVE Institute for Excellence in Writing (IEW). I've spoke about them before in a previous post. They have such a wonderful concrete approach to the mechanics of an essay and later papers.

I will probably stay with some IEW for all my kids at some point. I just can't say enough about how great their program works. As for history however, a dear friend of mine and fellow blogger just reviewed Heritage History and it sounds absolutely wonderful!! You can read her review at Circling Through This Life. I for one will be checking this out at the Washington Homeschool Conference coming up Father's Day weekend (June 15-16).

For my little guys, we are just focusing on the 3R's at the moment. I find it challenging to much with out reading and writing. At this stage of the game we do lots of "read-a-louds" and mom taking dictation, so at least they can learn the process. But a wonderful FREE resource I've found (I LOVE FREE, don't you?) are the activity boxes at the library. As homeschoolers we all value the abundance of material the library offers, but the activity boxes are kind of a fun "unit study" if you will. Since I've got this younger age group to cater to these are perfect and quite frankly, I tend to forget about them.

They come with different themes and everything is in this tidy little box. All the activities are included and everything is one box! Genius!
So what curriculum are you in love with? Give a shout out for your favorite subject, curriculum, or resource. I'd love to hear about your successes!!

Just as an FYI to those Washington State readers, Did you know that our Governor, Christine Gregoire has proclaimed June 10-16 Washington Homeschool Week? I thought it was kinda cool! Go Washington!!