Back to School... Homeschoolers Top 10 Things to do.

It seems like we just began our summer vacation and here it is - time to get back to the daily grind. We have been organizing, cleaning, scheduling, and ordering books. A great time to review what you did last year in your homeschool,  and what you would like to do this year. Here are my top ten "to dos" before school starts each year!

1. Go through your supplies - get rid of things that are broken, don't work, or are not useful.

2. Take an inventory of what you need to replace, and what supplies you need to purchase for the year. I like to buy all of my school supplies in August - because the retailers offer them at such great prices! I buy a bucket load of mechanical pencils, notebooks, and glue sticks; and I typically have enough to make it through the year. Last year we ran out of mechanical pencils in the spring, so this year I have been sure to buy more than enough! (At $.50 for 10 this past week at Publix - we use mechanical pencils for everything!)

3. Clean out the area that you like to use for "schooling." Educational research has clearly shown that a cluttered work area is a big distraction for children. Even though it may be a huge inconvenience for us, making the "school" area neat and organized can pay off with increased time "on task."

4. Set up a school/work area that is conducive to learning. Make it kid friendly, comfortable, and learning rich. Make sure each child has a place to sit, that is comfortable.

5.  Go through your curriculum. Yes, homeschoolers tend to be curriculum collectors. Come on now... admit it... go through it - and get rid of what you don't like, won't ever use, or just plain old unnecessary stuff. List it on ebay, and you'll be able to fund #7 below.

6. Sit down and review what you did last year. Did it work? Was everyone in your family satisfied? Was there any stress? Write down what you like and what you didn't like. Write down what you want to see out of your homeschool.

7. If you haven't already done so, look at new curriculum. (Most homeschoolers do this in the spring - when homeschool conventions abound and discouts are great!) Look for programs that will help you obtain the goals that you wrote down in #6.

8. Once you have researched, and reviewed curriculum that will help you achieve your goals for your home education, order it. My favorite place to order is CBD. I have a link on my sidebar that will let you search for various subjects on their site.

9. As soon as your curriculum arrives, review it. Make sure that it is what you expected and will fit your goals. Learn all you can about the requirements it will have for you family. Find out what work is involved, and what your children will need to do on a daily basis. Look for any suggested schedules contained in the curriculum.

10. Finally, make your goals clear and distinct. Construct a schedule, and organize you and your family's time. This year, I am going to try something new for us. We will be operating on more of a block scheduling system. So, our schedule will be something totally new for us.

Homeschool Hope...

Oh... my... goodness... school hasn't even started yet and I already have a headache...
Just trying to get my thoughts together for the fall and what we plan to teach and learn this year.   I have been gathering items over the past several months and setting them aside for this fall. Now I have to put all those bits and pieces into a cohesive learning plan.  Just to be honest, it is giving me a bit of a headache.

Yet, the teacher in me just loves to get out the new pencils and pens, notebooks and paper, and textbooks and learning programs.  Setting everything up with the anticipation of a great year of learning.  There is truly something exciting in that for me.  Maybe it is the new beginning, or the possibilities that a fresh start brings, or maybe even the hope that this year the problem areas will just "click" and we will have success in areas that we struggled with.  Hope...  that is what it is... hope for better things... new paths... greater success... achievement.

What are your homeschool plans looking like?  Have you been able to sit down and put together your learning plan?  Make some goals - if you give yourself something to shoot for... you will be more likely to hit it!!  Well, I am back to the drawing board... and my learning plan for the fall... Good luck with yours!

Related posts: homeschool science, homeschool resources

Homeschool Resources

I wanted to post about some great homeschool resources that we use.  These are free internet based sites that offer a lot to augment your child's homeschool education. Take a look at what I've listed, I am sure you will find a "goodie" to take with you!

Are your children having trouble remembering the various vocabulary words – such as homophones, antonyms, synonyms, prefixes, suffixes, and root words? Try this Free Vocabulary site that has all levels from Kindergarten through Twelfth grade. This is fun and educational – your children will love it!!

Here is a great site that offers free educational games for children.  These are actually pretty fun - you need to try 'em!

Try Spelling City - they have a paid service but also some free resources.

Lesson Pathways also offers free lesson plans that are cross curriculum and organized by grade.

Looking for something specific...Education bug is a great site to begin when looking for anything homeschool. They are a forum based site with information on almost everything that has to do with homeschooling. If you need it – this site will help you find it!

If you are a homeschooling parent who likes to be organized you can find all kinds of great organization tools here. Check out the planner …. I love it!

Are you needing a report card to be able to “show off” your child’s progress this year? Here is one that may help… remember there are lots of places that will give your children free things in return for a good report card.

Do you want legal help in protecting your right to homeschool your children? Check out the Homeschool Legal Defense Association – this is also a great place for other homeschool resources – and to find out what is going on in your state.

Are you looking for a place to connect with other homeschooling parents? Try a parent forum or a Homeschool forum. You will enjoy the camraderie and encouragement.

Are you into notebooking or lapbooking? We do it with science and history, and love it! It really connects the material for the student. Try these free notebooking pages in your next project!

Homeschool blogger is a great place for you children to start "Journaling" on the computer.  I started my older children with this and they took off... they loved the creative side of blogging and I loved the fact that they were writing... on a daily basis!!
If you have any great FREE resources that you would like to share - please comment and let me know about them...
Until next time…



Related posts

Language Arts Home school

There are a ton of great language arts home school things out there. You can definitely be picky in this area! Here are a few of the ones I hear the most about!

As I have mentioned before, there are the well known homeschool options such as Abeka, Bob Jones University Press, ACE, Alpha Omega, and Sonlight. Each of these are available as a complete curriculum... meaning you can get each subject for an entire grade from one source. This is often the choice that beginning home schoolers make. Then as they gain confidence in their abilities - they branch out to different types of homeschooling resources. I pretty much did the same thing the first year we homeschooled.

Each of these resources listed above as well as the ones listed here are workbook based curriculum. They are well designed and comprehensive. There is also the Character Quality Language Arts series from Training for Triumph, and Language Lessons for the Well-Trained Mind. Shurley English series is really getting a lot of attention in the homeschool community these days. I haven't used it myself, but I hear very good things about it. Another workbook and standards based curriculum is the Jensen's Grammar. I used this series in my first year of college.  I felt it was very challenging.

This year we are using the Abeka Language Arts books with other supplements. We use Abeka spelling lists with Spelling City to help us review, practice, and test the words. We use Time4Learning as a supplement to both our language arts and math curriculum. It is so fun - the kids really don't think they are doing school!

A few free resources include Grammar Bytes, Lesson Pathways, The Web English Teacher, Rainbow Resource Center, Kid's Place by Houghton Mifflin, and Fun Brain.

Some people enjoy teaching their children language arts through a literature based program. This means that they use fiction or non-fiction trade books to teach their children language arts skills. Simply Grammar by Karen Andreola incorporates this method as does A Journey Through Grammar Land.

We typically also incorporate Latin into our Language Arts program. This year we used the Prima Latina for all of our children. We do it all together at one time, and it just takes a few minutes each week. It helps the children to understand the roots of our English words as well as the parts of speech.

And last but not least we use the Brian Cleary books on the various parts of speech. These books are so fun and colorful - all of our children like to read these.

This is defintiely not a comprehensive list of the available resources for homeschooling language arts, but it should give you a good start. If you come across some other well made homeschooling curriculum, please comment and let us know!

Homeschool Math

I am absolutely thrilled with how the homeschool culture is growing. The last decade has seen a huge increase in new homeschoolers, and public opinion of homeschooling is definitely changing.  A decade ago homeschooling was still considered the "odd" thing to do... there are still those who may think that way... but there is a growing positive outlook on homeschooling.  Yet, with all of the positive changes there is also a major influx of homeschooling curriculum.  The options are seemingly endless.  How do we know which courses of study are well designed and will fit what we want for our homeschool?  This problem is probably one of the hardest aspects of homeschooling.  Finding the right curriculum out of the hundreds that are out there is no easy task.  In the next few weeks, I'd like to post the most popular homeschool curriculum based on the responses of many homeschooling families that I know, as well as several articles from magazines such as The Old Schoolhouse.

I will start with the most popular homschool math that is available for homeschoolers as well as some of the curriculum that I have used.

Workbook Based Homeschool Math Curriculum:
 By far the most popular for elementary math and preschool is probably ABEKA. I think almost every homeschooling family has heard of this kit/workbook based curriculum.  They are strong in most all of their subjects, and have had decades of solid performance under their belts. I went to a Christian school as a child, and this is the curriculum that I used through twelfth grade.  I scored well on my PSAT and ACT and had no problem with college level work. 
BJU press is a similar well proven curriculum that also has several decades of strong performance to speak of. I have a degree from BJU and do believe that their curriculum is a fine course of study. We have used the elementary reading series and a science curriculum. The BJU math is very manipulatives based and goes at a slower pace than ABEKA.
Saxon Math is another forerunner in the homeschool arena.  This series has been out for several decades as well and has produced very well founded math students. Saxon math is strong in review... so much review that many homeschoolers just skip some of the review assignments.
Alpha Omega offers a complete homeschool curriculum as well and has also been around for many years. Alpha Omega offers several different options from Lifepacs (workbooks) to computer based learning programs. It is a strong curriculum, and many of my personal friends have used the Switched on Schoolhouse program.
Singapore math is an increasingly popular choice among homeschoolers these days.  I have heard good things about this curriculum. It does not have the long track record of some of these other products, but it seems to be  solid curriculum.
Math U See is a great option for students who have difficulty with typical math curriculums. Math U See is manipulatives based and even has accompaning DVDs to help the parent/teacher.
Time4Learning is a complete homeschool curriculum that offers math. We have personally used this program, and it is a great option. It is a standards based curriculum available online for PreK through 8th grade.
Houghton Mifflin math texts for the high school are what we use for our upper grades math.  I have a degree in math so I enjoy teaching my children Algebra and such but this is not an easy road for everyone. If you have a difficult time with high school math yourself you may want to consider a curriculum that is teacher led and taught. ABEKA, BJU, Alpha Omega all offer individual math courses with an actual teacher teaching the course.

There are many free resources available online for help with teaching math. Here are a few:

Hippo Campus
AlgeBasics
Interactive Mathematics
Math TV.com

Comment if you have any great curriculum that you would like to recommend!

Home school Curriculum

It's that time of year, isn't it? Have you been thinking about your plans for next year's home school? I sure have. I know exactly what I am NOT going to use next year! That's the easy part right? Though a few things will get scratched from our list, there are a few things we used this year that quickly became favorites. I guess we could call them "keepers", like Time4Learning, Apologia Science, Rosetta Stone Spanish, The Mystery of History, Memoria Press Latin and certain ABEKA subjects.

On the other hand, there are a few things on our list to "try" next year. I have heard so much about the merits of Time4Writing, and with all the struggles we had churning out a few research papers this year, I know it's time for a change. I have also been thinking about trying the "One Year Adventure Novel." I have one daughter who loves to write fiction stories and I think this would be right up her alley.

I have also been thinking about changing the handwriting curriculum that we have been using.  I still haven't found one that I am particularly pleased with - comment if you have one!!

I would also like to find a better spelling curriculum or method. I have four different spelling levels I need to teach... I would love to find something that was sort of "automated." Not requiring a whole lot of spoon feeding from me. I am thinking of using SpellingCity - but I am still looking at options.

I am not finished perusing all of the wonderful home school curriculum catalogs and magazines... so I am sure I will find other items that look interesting.  If you have a particular favorite homeschool or preK curriculum... please share - let us know where to find it as well!

Related posts:
Online Education's Science Curriculum
Online Education's Language Arts
Online Education's Math Curriculum