Next year will be my second year homeschooling my oldest. This past year I just winged it, made up our curriculum and really feel I did pretty well. This year I am adding my two toddlers into the mix with a touch of preschool and feel that a preplanned curriculum would make my life easier, but at the same time I'm afraid it will take away too much of our flexibility. Anyway, my question is this... Have you used these books? Did you like them or not? Any feedback on them would be great!
I used it for part of 4th grade. There is a lot of planning on the part of the teacher. I practically lived in the library until I was able to get a good handle on the curriculum. For us, it took too much planning and I felt we lost the freedom we had before. For someone who is experienced teaching, it's great; as an actual homeschool curriculum, I would use it only as a spine, tweaking it to how it works for the individual child.
Nellie.. I will go looking. I don't even remember where I stumbled across them, but I did. I came across them last summer when I had just decided to hs and was afraid I wouldn't know what to do. I couldn't find 2nd grade, but came across another grade really cheap (a few cents!) looked at it and liked it, so throughout this past year I have "collected" all the books (k-6) and the weekly assessments books. They are no longer published and some of them are pretty expensive on like half and amazon. Mrs. B.. I'm sorry your experience with these books wasn't a good one. I have read through almost all of the lesson plans for next year, and have even made all my copies for the 1st 9 weeks, typed up all that needed it, and created everything that needed it for the first 18 weeks. I have also made a list of every book listed in the book as recommended reading and have bought about half of them off ebay and yardsales. I really think we are going to like the structure that this gives us... even my son is excited since his work load will be cut in about half compared to last year.. except for the fact that I am adding creative writing, expressive reading (poetry and plays), a full music program, art, phys ed and health, but even adding those won't make up the difference. here is the first grade book listed on Amazon.. you can look inside a bit this way. http://www.amazon.com/Home-Education-Curriculum-Grade-1/dp/1568225156 Sorry this was so long
OH YES! I've seen that book! I remember getting it from the library! Geeze..I don't know what I was thinking! Are you using it currently? It looks good. Thanks for the link too, sometimes I need reminding!
We will be starting it Aug 6th (our 1st day "back to school"). I don't think it is very hard to figure out and it only has taken me about 2 hours tops of working to prep everything. I have made shopping lists for the stuff I need each week, made some of the stuff into folder games he can do on his own, and even filled it with sticky notes on what it is I want to do when. My favorite part of it is it is secular, we are Christians, but not overly religious and so much curriculum that is available is too strong for us, so we decided to stay with something as plain as possible. I think the only thing I won't like about it is that we won't be so far ahead anymore, but I have decided to work right through the 3rd grade book (his actual level), then go right into 4th and am hoping by the time he finishes his "4th grade" year he will be finished with the 5th grade book or at the very least finishing up with the 6th grade book by the time he finishes "5th grade".
Oh, I hope I didn't discourage you from using the book. I know a few people who have used it who absolutely love the curriculum. My problem with it was my lack of preparation. It seemed like there was a lot of teacher prep time and not enough in the lessons. Considering the cost of curriculum today, I would say it's a good bargain
I remember looking at it and 'almost' getting it when I first started. I am glad it's going well for you. It's nice to find a curriculum you like and will also use Have fun HS'ing!
