So, I know I've been pretty absent for these past two months. The reason why was a lot of big changes going on in our house and in our homeschooling that kept me from blogging. I've been pretty busy, busy, busy.
These changes are going to be reflected on this blog pretty soon.
Optimus Prime & Bumblebee are at the point in their homeschooling that they are ready to move on and do different things. Even though they are in the same grade they are at different levels in some subjects and they have different interests in general. I've been trying to keep them on the same schedule, but that is starting to hold them back in areas where they are ready and eager to excel. It's time to let them move on into new territories on their own. This has effectively doubled my workload as I now have to write up two different curriculum's for them in some subjects!
Scooby-Doo is going to be preschool age in August. He still goes to therapy, and the school district is willing to let him sit in at preschool for an hour a couple of days a week, so his schedule is going to be VERY busy outside of our home. Likewise, he'll be officially starting pre-k here at home, so my workload just doubled! I wanted him to t-ball this year, but he is STILL too young according to the slip. They probably would have made an exception if I had asked them too, but with us packing and getting ready to move I had to make the tough choice to not sign him up.
So, changes in the blog and curriculum. What are they? I'm beginning to combine subjects for Optimus Prime & Bumblebee. Geography will be combined with History, Mythology, and Religion. These subjects really overlap so much already, and there was some overlap in our curriculum as it was, so now these subjects will be completely combined. Likewise, Reading will be combined with English, and after our summer quarter so will Spelling. This will help me to make Spelling and English units based on books we are reading.
Optimus Prime will be moving ahead in English/Spelling/Reading. I've been holding him back for too long waiting for his brother to catch up. He needs to start moving on to chapter books. Likewise, Bumblebee will be moving ahead in Math. He's been held back too long waiting for his brother to catch up. He needs to start multiplication.
Concept Weeks are going to be retired for Optimus Prime & Bumblebee. Or, I guess, it would be more accurate to say that they are going to be assimilated into History/Geography/Mythology/Religion and Science. All of our previous Concept Weeks have been based on these subjects, so from now on units in these subjects will be weekly, biweekly, monthly, quarterly, etc. For example, this summer in Science we'll be covering weather and the earth for a month and a half, followed by birds, fish, and water mammals for a month and a half. In History we'll cover ancient Egypt for a month, followed by ancient Greece and ancient Rome for a month each. When we cover these History units we will also go over the geography of the region as well as the religious beliefs and myths of those regions.
Another big change is retiring our workbooks for Optimus Prime & Bumblebee. This isn't to say we'll never do workbooks any more, but for most subjects they are going to disappear. Math will still be largely workbook based, but Science and History will largely be reading and lapbook based and English will be based entirely around books we are reading.
Everything is getting combined and shaken up.
Scooby-Doo's workload is going to change too. We'll start covering more things than the basics. Counting, the alphabet, colors, shapes, same or different, mazes, dot-to-dots, picture finds, etc are all important but it's time to start expanding his horizon in his schoolwork. Yes, I do read to him a lot (when he's in the mood for it, which is NOT everyday) but he really loves worksheets, so I'm going to take advantage of that and start introducing other subjects into our curriculum. I haven't planned out all the details yet, but I've begun playing with some ideas (like giving him Concept Weeks) and should know what I'm looking to do by the end of next week.
Lastly, our Two Week Review post is getting retired. I'm still going to give updates on how they are doing, but it'll be a monthly post instead of every two weeks. Also, this will retroactively start this current quarter! In the next few days I'll try to get our February and March post up so you know what we've been doing.
Like I said, big changes!
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