Dolphin Tale Giveaway

Its time for those giveaways again. They are so fun and you just never know if you might win something cool.

Dolphin Tales is opening up September 23 Nation wide and the mission is for everyone to get out and watch a good wholesome movie.
The neat part is that the two main characters are homeschooled. Finally, a movie about children who are homeschooled.

So check out the I Take Joy blog and enter for a cool giveaway package and get out, see a family oriented movie without violence, junk or twaddle.

Back to school

I think sometimes my best laid plans don't always go as planned.
Even though I planned on having all of the girls at home this year it didn't quite happen that way.
At the last moment we were offered a 'good deal' at the school. So Katie and Hannah went back on Wednesday to St. Thomas. I'm not sure if I'm happy with this set up quite yet. But we're going to give it a try and see what happens with it.

A picture of Hannah and Katie on the first day of school ( August 24,2011). It was a really windy day that day.

So for now its Marilyn and Maggie at home. Marilyn is nursing a growth plate fracture that happened when she was walking Belle, her cousin's dog, at Grammy's house. It couldn't have happened at the most worst time because she signed up for cheerleading. The nice part is she's still able to participate by sitting and doing the arm motions to the cheers. Tim took her to get a boot so that it will help her be able to get around better. I'll post a picture of the broken ankle girl later on when she gets home.

As for Maggie. Maggie isn't quite understanding why she can't go to school like Katie and Hannah can. Its hard to explain to a 5yr old why. I really try to tell her that its because mommy wants to spend more time with her. I don't want or need to remind her that the real reason is because the school isn't equipt for Maggie. She doesn't need to be reminded she isn't like all the kids. So I'm trying to make our lemonade with the lemons we have and make this fun for her.

I will say next year though we just won't be going through all this hassle. The girls do fine no matter where I put them and honestly home is better for them anyways. It doesn't seem natural to me to send my kids away. It never felt natural to me when I worked in daycare all those many years ago when Marilyn and Katie were little. I used to take them with me but it just didn't feel right to me. It still doesn't.
Sometimes I wonder how I'll be when the girls are all grown up and gone off to college. Really, what will I do with myself? I've tried things like going out , doing stuff. But I have a very difficult time feeling good about it when I enjoy being around and being with my girls.

Anyways, thought I would end this blog with a picture of Maggie and her little spot I'm setting up. I'm not done with it. But its a start. Don't mind the table. Its old and needs to be sanded down and refinished again. I think this will be my next project before the snow flies around here.
We spent yesterday decorating a file box for her to stack her Christian Light Light Units (workbooks) in. She really loves her reading and Math. Amazingly enough even though she just turned 5 she is doing really well with the 1st grade (100) level work. Right now she is working on her Learning to Read, which she already knows how to read, so we kind of quickly work through that part But it has lots of other stuff in the workbooks that is very age appropriate for her. Like visual discrimination, making patterns on a dot grid, the phonics practice, and handwriting. So we just are going to work through it quickly and I'll let her lead the way as to what she is capable of. Maggie is a smart little peanut for sure.
If you'd like to share pictures of your school room. Leave a link in our comments. I love seeing other school room pictures. I'm always looking for good ideas.

The Grace Card Giveaway

As you all know I enjoy a great giveaway. I'll admit though that I hadn't heard of this movie.
I read the review and it sounds like a really good movie. I always enjoy a good movie with a good message too.It reminds me of when I watched Fireproof with Kirk Cameron. The message was astounding in that movie. I'm sure its the same in this movie, the Grace Card.

You can hop on over to Day by Day in our World Blog and enter the giveaway that is being held from August 18th to the 30th.

Poor Man's Canvas and more art

So what do you do when your low on cash and need a canvas to paint on? You create one yourself. It was mighty simple and I learned a few things along the way while creating one.

First, you need cardboard, or wood, an old white sheet or even a pillowcase will do. And a staple gun.


Next, either cut the sheet or slide the cardboard or wood into the pillowcase. I chose to use an old pillow cover that had a broken zipper on it. So no loss there.

Last, staple the sheet. Make sure you get it as straight as you possibly can. And Viola' a poor man's canvas.

Pretty simple huh? Marilyn decided to give her water color picture a try on this. She used masking tape to make the design.



What did we learn about the poor man's canvas we created? That using water color paints is pretty touch and go. It has a tendency to bleed under the tape. Something like tempra or acrylic would work even better on a sheet. But I will admit the bleeding did give it a little character.


Next we turned to more collage work. Marilyn really enjoyed making a collage so she tried a couple ideas that I found online.
The first was the 3D snow man. This was used by making snow paint. With a can of shaving cream and some glue its amazing what you can create. I used a couple cups of shaving cream to one cup of glue and the result was really cool and amazing. I will give you a hint that after stirring it , let it sit for a few minutes before using. Otherwise its really gooey and messy. To make our snow man we used measuring cups. We tried to gloop it on but it wasn't working. So we used a 1/2 cup for the bottom, a 1/3 cup for the middle and a 1/4 cup for the head. We did not fill the cups up all the way either. Filling half of them was plenty. We learned if you used to much it just ran down the paper and off it. Once it dries though its really neat to touch. Almost reminds you of the leather in new cars. At least that was the description my husband used.
Marilyn used some felt for the hat, eyes, mouth and scarf and then went outside and found a couple of sticks. She finished the bottom with some cotton balls that she spread out to make it look like snow. Brilliant!


After she was done with that she worked on her next collage. This one turned out pretty neat to. The night before we looked for an old book, and tore out a few pages. Granted it tore me in two to tear up a book, but it was for the sake of art so it had to happen. She pained the pictures all the colors we had except for black, and then let them dry overnight. In the morning she painted another sheet of white paper with a blue background and let that dry. Once the background was dry her mission was to cut the pages from the book she painted the night before into a landscape. It had to contain buildings, trees, grass sun, clouds, etc. And this was her end result after gluing it all on:

In the meantime we had a really nice surprise come to our doorstep. Once a year or so Cole's Foundation sends Maggie a really nice care package for her birthday. The last package we had gotten it was of a beautiful crocheted blanket and we've had it ever since. This time Maggie received a bunch of wonderful girl goodies like hair bands, and coloring books and crayons and a beautiful, beautiful blanket. Maggie carries it around with her wherever we go.

It was so nice to receive a package for Maggie that wasn't medically related.
Also that day the UPS man graced our doorstep with wonderful school supplies. I can't wait to get officially started with Marilyn and Maggie. There was a slight change of plans for Katie and Hannah at the moment. They will attend school this year. I'm not sure how this all is going to work out. But we'll give it a try. In the meantime I'm keeping their school stuff in the even this arrangement doesn't work out, or they can work on it when they have no homework , or on the weekends.
But it was like Christmas, well , at least for me. To see all this new stuff.



Maggie decided she wanted to get started right away. So we pulled out the Learning to Read. Most of this has been lots of review. But I think there is plenty she can glean from and learn from. Such as writing her letters, and the listening skills and so on. But she's doing really, really well with it and I think we'll be going through this program extremely quick. She is doing 2 lessons a day right now and just flying through it. Reading wise she's beyond the first two readers that I have right now. But it will help with fluency, and will be light for her at the moment. I'm hoping with that it will make her feel more comfortable with doing the school work and not so much pressure. Maggie just turned 5 so she's a young 5.
Marilyn on the other hand is trying to see how long we can push all this off before starting school. Isn't it like a 13 yr old to not want anything to do with school. Humph.

Water Colors,Oil Pastels, and Collages

Okay, I hope that you all have something tasty to sip and drink while you read this post. It will be a long but fun post to read. Especially if your looking for some fun crafty ideas to do with your kiddos before school starts.

I'll admit it was a bit of a topsy turvy art day. I had four kids going doing different art mediums at different times since we would start and wait for some to dry. Or they were able to be done in a single setting. Once one person was done with an art project they wanted to jump to the next. It was a bit crazy but very nice to see the girls so gung ho with their art projects.

The first they tacked on was their collages. I'll just go ahead and post them all together even though they got them done at different times of the day. Hannah's collage was the sandwich collage which was posted in my last post.

Collage : French word for glue.


This first picture is of Maggie with her Stop signal collage. It was super easy to make. Paper cut into a thin background and three circles. Then she sat and ripped up the stop signal colors : Red for stop, Yellow for slow down, and Green for Go. She had tons of fun gluing on the construction paper and we talked about the colors.


This is Marilyn's collage. This is her landscape collage. We scoured the magazines we had for landscaping pictures, cut them out and laid them all on the table. Marilyn picked and chosed what she wanted to use and voila'. Of course Marilyn is going to try another collage tomorrow and she will pick which one she wants to enter into the fair.


Next, is Katie's collage. This is her water color collage. The background was painted in a solid water color. On another sheet of paper Katie drew shapes and lines and dots and then once it dried she ripped them (not cut them) out and placed them where she wanted them , then added some yarn to complete her picture.

Speaking of water colors. I decided to make my own. I had found an awesome recipe online for it. It was simple to make.With just 3 Tablespoons of Baking Soda, 3 Tbsp of Corn starch, 3 Tbsp of Vinegar and 1 1/2 tsp of light corn syrup. You too can create your own water colors and trust me its less expensive and the colors are just amazingly better then those cheapo water colors you get at the store. You mix the ingredients, then use food coloring to make your colors. I can say that if you use the pasty gel food coloring you will get brighter colors. I just poured the water color solution in my saline water bottle caps ( they were nice and round and big enough) and added the colors and mixed them there. You can use them as is when your done or let them sit for 24 hrs and then wet them and use.



The supplies you need.

The caps I used with the water color solution. You can use any type of cap. But these saline bottle caps that we get for Maggie were perfect.

Add your food coloring. You can use the regular or gel type food coloring. Regular food coloring will give you more of a pastel look and the gel will give you a thicker brighter look. Just a few drops in each cap will do you. The more you use the brighter the color. I just wouldn't go past 6 to 8 drops though. Anymore than that is to much (trust me).


This is the messy part of creating your water colors. I suggest wearing some rubber gloves while doing this. Unless you don't mind having your hands stained. You know, kind of like mine are now. Don't worry if you slop the color a little on the lid. Doing this let me know what some colors where. When they are wet some of the colors like the copper , orange and red look kind of the same. By slopping a little on the lid showed me what color each was. Sometimes the purple, and black looked the same while wet. So its kid of like a color code for grown ups and kids.

This is what they looked like dried 24 hours later.

After this adventure it was time to move on to our Oil Pastel portraits. These turned out really nice. The girls had lots of fun doing these.



This photo is of Marilyn's "Klee Portrait". This portrait is inspired from the artist Paul Klee who was into using geometric shapes in his drawings. Marilyn did a super job and she entitled it " The depressed guy".


Next up was Katie's abstract version of the"" Figure 5 in Gold. Except her picture is the "Figure 7 in Purple".


Hannah was the next in line to create an oil pastel. I wasn't sure if I would be able to find something easy enough for her to do that would be different than what her sisters were doing. But as luck found it I did find something that was different and simple enough for her to do all on her own. She did a super job on it too. This is Hannah's version of Kadinsky's abstract of " Abstract of Squares"

Last but not least was Maggie. I knew I had to find something simple enough for her to do too. So we decided on a Hands oil pastel. Now of course the hands are supposed to touch each other and meet but her little hands weren't big enough, but we made due. Plus I love how her four fingered hand added such power to her picture.One only Maggie can do. We entitle it : Diversity

The picture was tough for her to do as there was lots of coloring and Maggie's hands get tired quickly. So we broke the project up through out the day so she could start and stop when she wanted to. The finished product though was fantastic for a 5 year old.

Well there you go folks. We had a super day of art and I couldn't have done it all without the awesome website I found the other day: Art Projects for Kids
I'll admit when I first found the site I wasn't sure what it was. If it was an instructional website or a website that sold stuff. Well, its both. If you scroll down a little bit and look to the left you will see a bar that says " Labels". There you can click links by grade level, artist, or topic, and pictures and descriptions will pop up. This website is spectacular in teaching art by the Masters. Also giving children the opportunity to make their own "Master" paintings. I'm not sure how well they will go over at the fair , we'll see. But they are all 1st place creations to me.

Birthdays and Art

Okay, so your thinking to yourself what does art have to do with birthdays? Well, actually quite a bit.
Monday (August 8th) was my youngest daughter's birthday. She just turned 5. How time flies I'll tell ya. I wanted to do something special for Maggie's birthday so I decided instead of buying or slapping some frosting on a cake that I would actually tackle on making a cake myself. I'll admit the only cake making training I've ever had was watching my own mother make them. She was a pro. I would sit and watch her in the kitchen whenever she would painstakingly work on a cake for a client. My mom created cakes with such ease that she made it look easy. Well, its not exactly easy when you don't have much in the way of cake decorating materials. I just had the bags, the tips and one couplet(mental note, purchase more to make switching colors MUCH easier on yourself).
But what I did manage to do and create was short of a miracle. Granted we live about 45 miles away from any nearest craft store. I did manage to come up short with the brown color after asking Marilyn to grab the colors , Copper and Brown. According to her she thought the color was copper brown. Ugh, 13 yr olds. Anyways I substituted with some chocolate and a can of dark chocolate frosting for the hair.

Well, I think you'll be mighty impressed. Granted, once again I underestimated how much confectioner's sugar I needed for the butter cream frosting. But the Dora cake I created, turned out pretty darned good I should say.

I frosted the end with whatever frosting I had left and it gave the edge a tied died look.

Of course without art, or some semblance of artistic ability I don't think I would have been able to create the Dora cake. Strike that. I think my mother's cake making gene kicked in at the very last moment. Or maybe summoning the cake gods helped too. I don't know , either way Dora turned out to be a hit and it was so good the cake was gone by the very next day.


I will admit I do enjoy doing a little bit of food art. So last night when I was super bored I decided to go ahead and create some jello oranges. Yes, you read that right. The outsides were oranges and the insides were made of jello. So I went into the kitchen scoured through the cupboards because not to long ago I had so much jello in my cupboard I actually had to tell Tim to stop buying it. To find that we didn't have many left and the color I wanted was gone!! So I settled for some blue , yellow and green Jello. Mixed it all together in a jiggler recipe ( you need 4 3 oz boxes mind you) and had the joy of scooping out the oranges. I cut them in half, scooped them out ( all the while having the juice burn the cuts I had gotten the day before by trying to pull a glass that got sucked down our garbage disposal) and put all the insides of the orange inside a bowl. Once I did that I poured my jello concoction inside the orange and set them in the fridge overnight. What I woke up to was some jello inside an orange. So I cut them like I would any orange wedge and , Voila'. Jello Oranges.

The girls loved them and they had some for breakfast and ate the rest for lunch.

So that's all for the food art for now. Next we've been working on art for the Spartansburg fair. We've been quite creative lately and its been a great way to pass what little time of summer we have left. So here are some of our art projects we've done so far. First you'll be thinking I am the most creative person in the world for coming up with some of these ideas. Well, I'm not. I'll give the website Pinterest all of the credit. Its where I've gotten my ideas and we've spawned them off and made them our very own. I'll admit it took me a little while to figure out even what Pinterest was and its purpose. But I finally figured it out it was a place where I can find ideas, and pin them on my own board for future reference. Simple yet so convenient.

This 3D collage was created by Hannah. It turned out super cute and she had oodles of fun making it. We didn't have the wrinkly cardboard that comes from boxes, so we created our own with a cereal box cardboard, and just bending it so it was wrinkly for the bun. The plate was created with some scrapbook paper I had laying around and we used different types of medium. Construction paper, noodles, oatmeal, paper bags and whatever else we could find to make the sandwich.

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So while Hannah was working on her sandwich I gave Maggie a job to do. I printed out a fishbowl template and had her paint it so it could dry while we were gone to the Art Show down town. Every year the Art Guild holds an Art show at the park. It was super fun this year. We saw an Elvis impersonator , I mean who says the King is dead?


After he was finished singing , we went around the gazebo and they had a fun puppet show. The title was Aesop's fables. Maggie really enjoyed this because many of the stories she's read with the Brillkids Aesop's fables books.


While that was going on the art was being judged. Marilyn had entered a picture of hers that she drew this year. It turned out pretty good. In the end she received 2nd place for it. We're very proud of her. My girls really are very artistic.




At the end of the art show we had the pleasure of watching the Airforce Band of Flights, and all I can say is , "Wow!" It was better than watching any celebrity singer any day. Great singers and music plus our country's super heroes make awesome entertainment.

( Girls pictured with Senior Airman Kelly Perry. One of the singers of Systems Go Airforce Band of Flights)

(Maggie grooving to the music)

Once we came home Maggie's 'fish' bowl was all dried out and we were able to do the finishing touches by using mixed beans for the fish rocks , her hand for the fish and some Cheerios for the bubbles.

Isn't it amazing what you can do with food? But it sure did turn out pretty cute that's for sure.
The girls have been working really hard on the rest of their art work. My girls really enjoy working on different types of art. I will continue to record more of their art that they've been working on this week for the fair. So stay tuned!

Online Curriculum Sale

After sifting throug all of my curriculum and reading about the Online Curriculum Sale that is being hosted by a blog I follow. I thought I'd jump at the chance to purge our shelves of items I am no longer using and are taking up space in our apartment to make way for the new stuff that should be coming in the next few weeks.


So here we go everyone. Shipping is extra and I will try and ship the least expensive way I can. Just email me at reedfamilypa@yahoo.com if your interested in anything. I do have Paypal and prefer it. But I will also take check and money orders as well. I will ship as soon as Paypal or check clears.
Also I'm sure I'll find more stuff but I'll post what I have pictures of right now.



Algebra 1/2 2nd edition with answer key. May have a little shelf wear with the answer key but otherwise in good condition. I'm asking $15 or Best Offer



Saxon Algebra 1/2 3rd edtion answer key. I had gotten the wrong answer key. This has a little bend in the cover of the book. Otherwise good to go. Asking $5



Saxon 6/5 2nd edition , textbook and tests.. asking $15 , has some shelf wear. Otherwise in useable condition.




Saxon 6/5 1st edition Answer Key. This does not go with the 2nd edition I have. Asking $2.50


Saxon 5/4 2nd edition. Textbook and answer key. Answer key cover is a bit bent and has a small chunk out the back. Inside in good condition,. Text in good condition. Asking $10


Saxon 1 teacher manual. Current. BIG Manual. I can see if I can ship it flat rate to save on expense. In good condition. It may possibly have some stray pencil marks but not sure, but still in very usable condition. Asking $15


Saxon K Teacher's Manual. Has one page from the back that was cut out for manipulatives. I still have it and will slide it in with the manual. Otherwise in good conditon. May possibly have some stray marks. Can ship flat rate to save on expense, big manual... asking $10



The Reading Lessons. the cover has some shelf wear and I had to tape a side. I've had it for 7yrs and now its time to pass it on. Asking $13 for the book



K12 Phonics Works Advanced Program. This program is sold for $249 on Christian books.com I barely used this at all. Most of it is still in shrink wrap. There were a couple of books that got bent. I think it happened when I put one of the tile folders in and didn't realize it. This kid comes with two tile kits, 30 readers, training DVD, dry erase pens, and board, and small dry erase board. Asking $180


How to Teach Your Child To Read in 100 Easy Lessons. This book too has been well loved. This was the very first book I used with my oldest daughter when we first started homeschooling. The cover has been taped on but the inside is still in excellent condition. Asking $8



Your Baby Can Read. Are you wondering if you can teach babies and young children to read. Well look no further because it actually works! I wished I had known about it when my girls were actually babies. I didn't learn about Your Baby Can Read until my 4th child was 3 yrs old. I had never talked to anyone that had an early reader that used the program. I figured early readers were little geniuses and those weren't my girls. They never just one day woke up and started reading. So we purchased this program with little hopes and boy was I wrong. My 4yr old by far is my best reader out of my girls. This set has the Volumes 1-5 DVDs. Chunky Flashcards for Volumes 1-5. Books for Volumes 1-4. We had to purchase the Volume 5 seperately. It also has a Your Baby Can Learn ( which is now Your Baby Can Discover) book,,, everything is in good condition, Asking $100 for the entire set.



Abeka 3 Math Teacher's Manual. I had gotten this in hopes to actually buy the program, but it never happened. The book has some shelf wear but totally usable. Not sure if this is current or not. Asking $8 for it.


I know I have more stuff. I just need to go through it all. But I figured that this was a good start.

Curriculum Choice for 2011-2012 school year

I think after wallowing through tons of catalogs, and spending time trying out samples of curriculum. We've boiled down our curriculum choices for this year.

Drum roll please.......

Marilyn

Christian Light 700 level Math , this is the start of their prealgebra level and I think she is really ready for it this year. I will do a little remedial work with the workbooks 601 and 701 before going full throttle into the 700 to make sure she is caught up with her math. She struggled with Saxon 7/6 last year but it mostly had to do with her not knowing her math facts very well, and not having as much geometry with the other math programs we used in the past.

Christian Light 700 Level Language Arts. We have some major remedial work ahead of us before she actually gets to this level. I learned recently that last year they didn't have grammar at school. More like vocabulary work. Which is not grammar. Needless to say my 13 yr old didn't know what an adverb was. So with that said I purchased the Christian Light Extra Practice Sheets for Grammar. We will be working on these until she gets caught up. I purchased 400-700 level workbooks. Depending on how motivated she is going to be this year will determine if we will actually start at the 700 level this year.

Spelling- I plan on purchasing the ACE Word Building for her for spelling. But for now I have a book from the library and I'm going to compile spelling lists for her to work on until then.


Handwriting - Pentime 3. This is a handwriting program sold by Christian Light and Rainbow Resource. It is in the style of cursive writing I am the most familiar with and grew up learning. I am not sure at the moment which style this is, but I've been looking for it for ages and I'm sure its existed all along. I'm starting her with the 3rd book , which is beginning cursive because Marilyn's handwriting is left to be desired.

Literature and Writing- Good books from lists from Sonlight, Veritas, Memoria Press, Ambleside Online... For Reading she'll be reading Stories of the Saints Volumes 1&2. I'm hoping there is enough writing assignments in the book to keep from having to purchase a seperate writing program. But if I must I will most likely get Writing Strands for her.

Science- Apologia Physical Science. Yes, she's a 7th grader but I think she can tackle this on just fine. We've used the Apologia Elementary series and so another year of general science she just can't take. She actually has her own goal to do Physical Science and Biology both this year. If she can accomplished both I'll be very proud of her. I'm not sure if we can manage 2 yrs of science in one year. Its sure worth a try though.

History- the jury is still out on this one. We've studied so much world history that I want to move on to American History now. Currently I have the Homeschool in the Woods CD's. We used the first one and had fun with it. I think if we continue on that it will work well. They are currently up to the Industrial Revolution, and I've heard word that their World War 2 series will be out eventually.
I've been looking at some other history programs but like I said in my first sentence The jury is still out at the moment.

Latin - Latina Christina 1

Art- we plan on reading about art, and plan to get together with another family for hands on drawing, and craft art.

Music- Marilyn is interested in learning how to play an instrument. She hasn't chosen yet.

Phys Ed- this will be a tough one because Marilyn is 13. Yes, you know the age where they don't want to do anything. So I will have to thrust upon her activities she doesn't want to do.


Katie

Christian Light Math 400. I feel comfortable starting her at this level. Generally this is the equivalent of Saxon 6/5 , and I think she'll do just fine.

Christian Light Grammar 400. I don't have to add spelling it will be right in the Grammar book.

Writing , I'm hoping there is enough writing for Katie with the CLE Grammar. If not I'll be purchasing Writing Strands.

Reading/Literature- Katie will be doing CLE's 5th grade reading since I already have it. After she is finished with that she will either go into the 6th grade Reading or Stories with the Saints (once her older sister is finished with it). Plus great literature from the Sonlight, Veritas Press, Ambleside, Mater Amabalis lists

Handwriting - Pentime 4. Katie has better handwriting than her older sister. So I feel very comfortable starting her with this level

Science - We'll be starting with the Apologia Astronomy and work her way through the series. That way next year she can start the Apologia General Science. Unless they come out with another Elementary Book. Somewhere I swore I read they were coming out with an elementary chemistry and physics. But I'm not sure.

History- I'll combine Katie and Marilyn with Homeschool in the Woods.

Latin - Latina Christiana 1

Art- reading about different types of art from our Come Look with Me series and our little group art class once a month. I'm looking at maybe the Thomas Kincade drawing program that Alpha Omega sells for drawing.

Music- Katie wants to start up an instrument , she think she might want to play a guitar but is thinking violin. Wants to check out her options first.

Phys Ed. - plans on joining the gymnastics team at the YMCA




Hannah 2/3rd grade.
I'm combining these two grades because Hannah was held back to first last year. Which really didn't do her any service. Granted she improved with her writing a bit. other then that she struggled with nothing and it ended up being a blow off year for her. Currently she is working through her 2nd grade stuff and wants to get into 3rd. I have faith she'll do it because Hannah is very independent and when she sets a goal for herself , she does it.

CLE Math finishing up the 200 level and wants to get into 300. I think she'll do fine since she blew through the first 4 workbooks since June.

Christian Light Grammar 200

Christian Light Reading , she is working on the 200 level. Plus books she wants to read from the library.

Writing - I plan on using Writing With Ease for with her, and will see how this goes.

Science, will do the Apologia Science with Katie

History, will sit and listen and or participate with the Homeschool in the Woods with her older sister. I might find something different for her if it proves to be to difficult. Or I may just start world history with her and do some lapbooking.

Latin- Prima Latina

Music - Hannah did start piano but she found it wasn't her forte right now. So wants to try something else.

Art- will read the Come Look with Me for art history and the once a month class with our friends.

Phys Ed - she to wants to be on the gymnastics team.



Maggie

Christian Light Math 100 , we've been slowly working through it. Some times she speeds up and some times we slow down. She's only 4, she'll be 5 in 5 more days,and its a 1st grade program. So I'm letting her lead the way.

Christian Light Learning to Read. well she already knows how to read. But I think that the work at this level is more manageable for her. I'll let her lead the way with this as well. LTR is a 1st grade program. She also reads her Bob Books, books from the library etc.

Christian Light Language arts 100. To practice her phonics skills. Sight reading is a good skill to have but phonics is as well. Again we'll slowly go through it as its a 1st grade program

I'll have to see how much practice there is with handwriting at this level. I think there maybe plenty but I want to make sure. If not I'll print out some handwriting sheets for her off the computer.

We'll cuddle up and read stories, play games, do some hands on things like playing with playdough and so on. Most people would think this is crazy doing this level of work with an almost 5yr old. But she wants to do it, she can do it, and if she couldn't we wouldn't be doing it. Maggie seems to be an accelerated learner. Which is good for her because she's spent most of her life with health problems. Something good has got to come out of it for her.

As for history and science she can sit in and listen if she wants. No pressure there. I think at her stage the only important things for her are Reading, Writing and Math.

Phys ed , she likes to swim, run, and go to tumbling toddlers class.


Final Thoughts: Well there you go everyone. Those are our curriculum choices this year. I chose to go with Christian Light because 1. Its academically sound, and 2 my daughters love workbooks. Well at least my youngest three. Another reason is that its a very independent curriculum. My older girls won't have to wait for me to get the teachers manual out and lecture them as to what they need to do if they just want to get started with things. Of course I'm not going to throw the workbooks at them. I always go over material to make sure they understand what it is they are doing. But if they can read the instruction in their workbook and understand it , and do it on their own while I am working with a younger one then that will definitely make my life so much easier. Plus my 3rd and 4ths are extremely independent so this will fit them just perfectly. My 2nd usually requires some kind of hand holding and my oldest, well, she doesn't like anything. After all she's 13.

So here's to a good school year. We'll see what works for us this year and what we've had to tweak. Over all I feel pretty confident about it all.