Our Fist Week (week 0)

Well I'm calling this week 0 since we didn't really begin our main studies, but I needed to share about our first day and the following day.  We started our day out with our yearly photo shoot in front of the tree(I already posted those pictures).  Then the girls requested that we pretend to drive to school, so we all hoped into the van (bare foot of course) and pretended to drive to school.  We then had breakfast.

A most nutritious breakfast of french toast bake and chocolate milk.  This was M's request, I did make it with whole wheat bread, but that's  the only thing good about it lol.  Next they went downstairs to the schoolroom to see what surprises I had for the first day.

 For M a new NIV bible, I also bought tabs, we are working on adding them.  She was using an early reader version, so she can hand that down to K.

For K Hot Dots Jr, she love them!

Then we did some basic stuff, Spelling, English, coloring of our time line pieces, some reading and then the FUN STUFF - we did 2 of the experiments from our mind blowing science, the picture is of color changing water.

Then some art.  We did the first assignment from Keely's book The Way They See, Artistic Pursuits If you can see K's picture it's of a pregnant lady.  At first she said she's fat cause she's having a baby.  I had to correcter her and tell her it's not fat it's pregnant and she better not refer to it in those terms lol.

The next lesson was from M's book Artistic pursuits book 1that we are finishing up from last year.  It was on sculptures and so we were making them from construction paper.  Here's K's that I helped with some - it's Duke our friend's great dane.

Meet the Students

 

 Here's K the baby of the family at this point, she's 4 and very funny and super loveable, she loves to snuggle and hug a lot, but this makes it difficult sometimes when trying to school #1.

 Here's #2 -  M, she's 9 and super fun loving although we have our days when we clash(not because either of us is strong willed or anything).  She loves to draw, sing and play with friends.

 These are our main curriculum material for the year. K is super excited to officially do school, although it's pretty light and I don't plan on pushing too hard.  I want her to have plenty of time to just play.

 They really are loving sisters and play together quite well despite the age difference, maybe this is because we homeschool or because when they fight I tell them they must be best friends or we won't have other friends over hee hee.

and teacher and students - not the best picture since we did the reach and shoot method.  The girls are sporting their back to school outfit - yes I said outfit, the beauty of homeschool we don't need a closet of new clothes every fall.  We did get a few new things since there have been some good sales.  I actually bough M several new Jammie pants since that's what she like to wear around the house and they work well for swim club too.  Also you will notice they don't have shoes on, again we don't need to wear shoes at home, but the truth is they do need new tennis shoes we just haven't gotten around to getting them since it's been summer and they live in flip flops.

Our Classroom

 So after 2 days(I wanted to start School on Wednesday, but had to start on Thursday) of rearranging an organizing we were ready for school.  I moved our big map to our chalk wall and plan to get a book shelf for art and Science supplies to go against the wall there to the right of the map.  Then there's the  computer desk I picked up at a garage sale and hope to have a desktop for soon for the girls to do Rosetta Stone Spanish, Computer Activities Through the year, Typing Instructor, Vroot and Vroom, Building Thinking Skills and to watch educational videos like Times Tales, Letter Factory and such.  If you have any preschool computer recommendations I would love to hear what you use.

 
 Here is Keely's new work area.  I hope to give her 4 activities(educational toys) per day in the 3 big drawers and her work in the smaller workbox drawers.

 Molly's spot remains the same and workboxes the same.  She is showing off the cool folder and notebook she picked out.

 My spot and my coffee, Side note I love this nissan thermos coffee mug, coffee stays hot all day and it has a pop up lid so no more spill, well hardly ever sometimes I forget to close the lid hee hee.

 our white board(shower board from Home depot) and our art/science table.  It's a little high for Keely so I had to bring down the youth chair.  Toy bins , I have to keep some toys for Keely so they have littlest pet shop and little people to play with and a few miscellaneous one.  Sometimes Keely will set up to play and Molly will ask for a break to play with her awhile - this works good sometimes if I need to grade something or set up for a project.

 This is our new calendar area, I don't think we'll go through everything daily, but a few things each day. Some of these I got from http://www.confessionsofahomeschooler.com/calendar-printables  the actual calendar from Target dollar spot.

Here is a shot of my bookshelves and book basket books for the first week.  I kinda have a system for library books between the blue milk crate and the book stand.

Well there you have it our wonderful space in the basement we have been blessed with.  Sometime I wish we did school on the main floor but then I think how blessed are we to have a space for everything and plenty of room for projects.  Thank you Lord for knowing what we needed before we ever knew there was a need.

A New School Year Begins

Well we did finish up our year of Exploring Countries and Cultures contrary to what you may see from my blog - yes bad blogger here.  I love to post what we are doing as it encourages me to keep doing what we're doing and to include the fun stuff, but when time is tight it's the first thing to go, sorry.

Well that said I am planning to begin our new school year next week and hope to post weekly.  So here it is - The Plan.  I always start with high ambitions and want to include everything that looks good to me, but I am going to go easy on myself and say IT"S OK IF WE DON"T DO IT ALL.  If it's suppose to be fun and ends up stressing me our my students out we can skip it right?  No Molly that does not mean you can stop doing math.

I will be using/following My Father's World Creation to the Greeks for our main curriculum, this will be our 3rd year with My Father's World and  I love the classical/Charlotte Mason  approach and the Biblical world view.  I have changed science for this year and will be using Apologia zoology 3 Land Animals of the Sixth Day instead because I didn't really like the recommended science and I found that you can purchase all the supplies for all the experiments in one box, making my life easier.  I also think the timing for this is good, Molly loved the brief studies of animals by region last year and said she wants to be a zoologist when she grows up (she also said a missionary's wife or a beautician lol).  Only God know what she will be doing, prayerfully it will be all to the glory of Him.

Resources for Molly's 4th Grade studies

History :  
bible on cd
Streams of Civilization, Volume 1

The Usborne Internet-Linked Encyclopedia of the Ancient World 

make it work Ancient Egypt
Story of the world cd

Draw and Write Through History (Creation through Jonah, Volume 1)

Draw and Write Through History: Greece and Rome (#2)

History Pockets: Ancient Egypt

History Pockets: Ancient Greece 

Make This Egyptian Mummy 

Make Your Own Papyrus

 Science:
Archimedes and the Door of Science
Learn about Pyramids
Dinosaurs of Eden 

Land Animals of the Sixth Day: Exploring Creation with Zoology 3 

Zoology 3 Notebooking Journal

Zoology 3 Lab Kit
zoology 3 lapbook

Language Arts:

Language Lessons for the Elementary Child Volume 2
Writing Poetry with Children
Writing Strands level 3

A Reason for Handwriting: Cursive C

Spelling Power

spelling power student record book 

English From the Roots Up

Words on the Vine

Drawn Into the Heart of Reading

Drawn Into the Heart of Reading student book

Book Projects to Send Home 

Aesop's Fables for Children
The Trojan Horse
The Children's Homer
The Tanglewoods' Secret
Star of Light
Treasures of the Snow

Math:
Singapore 3B/4A Two-Semester Set
Singapore Math Primary Math Intensive Practice U.S. Ed 3B

Singapore Math Primary Math Intensive Practice U.S. Ed 4A

Vroot and Vroom CD-ROM

Times Tales DVD 

Think Fun Math Dice

Geography:
Daily Geography practice Evan Moor - after a 2 years of geography I really didn't want to lose everything we learned so we are going to give this a try.

Foriegn Language:
Rosetta Stone Spanish
Rosetta Stone level 1 Spanish workbook

Music:
Piano Lesson with Katie (this will be Molly's 3rd year)
Introduction to Vivaldi, Bach, and Handel (6 CD set)


Art:
Artistic Pursuits book 1 grades 4-6
Lots of art supplies from Rainbow Resource
God and the History of Art 



Phy Ed:

Karate
Swim Club
PE activity cards courtesy of http://www.confessionsofahomeschooler.com/ 
activity cards
Wii fit games


Bible:
Old Testement
Journey through The Bible
Celebrating Biblical Feasts

Health:
The care and keeping of you
Before I was Born

Home Ecc:
The official Princess Handbook
Financial Peace Jr. books
My first Patchwork book



Computer Science:
Computer Activities Through the year
Typing Instructor


Family Devotions with Dad:
A Child's book of Character Building
Leading Little Ones to God

For Keely she will be doing Pre K and while I bought a curriculum I am not going to push too hard, I want her to have fun and learn to love learning.  I got the preschool curriculum from The Learning Parent


Resources:

Character Concepts for Preschoolers Complete Curriculum 

Teach  your child to read in 100 easy lessons

Christian Liberty preschool activity book 

Education Insights Hot Dots Jr. 

Educational Insights Hot Dots Jr. Cards - The Alphabet 

 Music:

Hide em in their heart vol 1 & 2 

Art:

The Way they See Artistic pursuits 

Science:

Mind Blowing Science 

Big Bag of Science