There has been a lot of change since we started our “back to homeschooling” journey, and we are at the 5 month mark, so I would like to take this time to look back at where we started and where we are now in terms of academics.
So, we ordered the BJU Press curriculum (Math, Reading, Science, Social Studies, English, Handwriting, and Bible). And, we hit the ground running, with a 5 day school week. We started in October, and the curriculum was for 180 days, so my kids are actually “schooling” year round this year, since they were in public school since August. Since we will not have your traditional long summer break, we dropped to a 4 day school week.
The 4 day school week works perfectly, because they girls do their school work at the grandparent’s once a week, at my office once a week and I am home at the beginning of the school week to get things started on the right foot, and back at home on our last day of the school week (Thursday) so we can finish any loose ends.
As the weeks progressed, it didn’t take long for us to realize that the academic load was too much. So, the first thing we dropped was the formal Bible curriculum, because we often read the Bible as a family anyway.
The next to go was Handwriting, because they write so much in their core subjects already.
Then, though we love Mrs. Walker and History, it was taking too much of our time, and the kids still had questions with the content, so we switched to Notgrass History, and do it as a family. We began by doing it 3x per week, with the activity on the 4th day.
Math – In January, Iz switched to Mr. D Math, but she is switching in April to Teaching Textbooks. Mr. D Math is a great curriculum. She was taking Pre-Algebra and she is only in 5th grade (She previously completed Saxon 6). However, if she wouldn’t understand a concept, it wouldn’t show her what she did wrong, and either I would have to teach her, or it would redirect her back to her notes. She isn’t quite there yet. But, we really like Mr. D, and will probably return to him at some point. But for now, I wanted a curriculum that would explain to her where she went wrong when she got something wrong. So, since Roo had already switched to Teaching Textbooks in February, with great success, and both girls had previously completed Teaching Textbooks before returning back to public school, it seemed like the right direction to go.
Roo is in Teaching Textbooks 6 and Iz is will be in Teaching Textbooks 7. They both may have been able to go a level up, but we are firm believers in knowing a concept well and building confidence as you go. They are only in 4th and 5th grade right now. Why rush them?
We really love the Reading and English classes through BJU, so both girls are still in these classes.
As far as Science, we are continuing to do BJU Science and Kiwi crates that were in storage that go along with the topics. We have cut the tests and quizzes out for the most part (or we let the girls do them open book). We feel if they can explain what a simple machine is in real life, or explain what light is out of the blue- they are learning… and they are having fun doing so.
Reading Intervention for Roo: Nessy, but soon we will be also doing Toe by Toe to see if it is a better fit for us. She loves Nessy, so we may continue both. Stay tuned for more info as this progresses…
Current Extra Curricular Activities:
Beyond the Elm 
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