Ramblings...

According to our schedule we are in the fourth week of our second quarter, I divide the year up into four quarters schooling year round with short breaks throughout the year. Ideally, I would evaluate after each quarter, but I couldn’t with all of our traveling. Now, though, is the perfect time for a reevaluation and revamp!

So far our Math and Language Arts lessons are moving along fairly well, General Disarray usually sits down to do those subjects on his own and we go over anything that may be new or cause him problems. Generally, though, he can read and learn on his own. Professor Chaos has done pretty well with his Teach A Child To Read lessons, though they are very repetitive to the point that they bore him, so we have changed up the lessons to fit our needs.

While Math and Language Arts are doing well, we still have History and Science to contend with, and that is where a lot of the revamping is taking place. We are lacking a level of structure in History and Science, we do a lot of reading, but I want to bring all of that full circle with other activities to ensure the knowledge is retained. To help with this I’m utilizing Lesson Pathways, Spectrum Science workbooks that I found while stateside, a larger reading list, and Story of the World on audio disc. I, personally, had no desire to purchase the Story of the World books, but I found the audio for book two at our library and the kids really enjoy it. It will play during our hands on activities, after I’ve given directions, to help reiterate what we have been doing.

These few add-ons should help make the learning experience more enjoyable. I want to lean heavily on hands-on activities while T.B.M. are young, since that will not only allow for them to learn the material, but to have tons of fun while doing it. I have also changed our schedule so Science lessons on Thursdays are strictly for experiments. Instead of moving on to another lesson, we will focus on experiments and activities that further support the lesson(s) learned on Tuesday.

Other than that change, our schedule will stay the same. We are easing back into our routine and should be back to “normal” by mid-November. We will only be taking the weekend of Thanksgiving off, November 24th-27th, and then working until the week before Christmas.

Oh my goodness, it’s almost Christmas time already! I swear the older these kids get the faster the year seems to go.

With the end of the year quickly approaching, what changes, if any, have you made to your homeschooling curriculum/schedule?