Our new curriculum is arriving. I got Christian Light Education for Reading, LA, Bible, and Math. I'm going to re-do Story of the world since we only got into it just a little bit before life happened a couple of years ago. So I think we're ready for it now. And I'm waiting on my Harcourt science textbooks. I'm so excited about getting started on school and kind of renewing our learning (this has been one crazy year and as you can imagine, school has kind of just happened as our lives have allowed). I'm anxious to get started now though! lol. I've decided that I think I want to go for a 4 days/week; 4 week on, 1 week off approach and work year round (I'll have to do my math, but I think that adds up). And I'm sure the kids probably need to wait a little while, but it's so difficult! For those of you who do school year round, when do you start new curriculum? In August like regular or just as you finish the old?
I start the new when we finish the old. Homeschool curriculum is too expensive to skip anything; I squeeze everything I can out of it! I like the thought of starting all new curriculum at a given date, but the last time we did that was at the start of Kindergarten. Our start and end dates on each subject are so staggered now that the only way I could start everything new is to either skip chapters or start over on some things. I'm not willing to do either, so we just roll in the new books when needed. One positive from this is that that cost is also staggered.
I start most stuff in August, but I also go with the flow. Depends on the subject, really. Math has to be done year-round because it's his worst subject. Reading covers more than one year per year. Everything else is pretty much on schedule.
I think I need to sit down with what we've got right now and look to see if it'll be finishable anytime soon. I do want to finish our history (We're watching the Liberty's Kids video series) because we're really enjoying it. I also want to see what I want us to continue working through. Thanks for the input ladies.
Just to keep my brain on track with our state requirements I start new things (or well start our year) in July (our laws say July-June is a school year and well it's just easier for me to think that way too). Lots of times things run from one year into the next and we may move on and start something new in the middle of the "year".. but just for sanity sake I say that we start in July... did that make any sense? I have been hearing lots about Harcourt science.. guess I need to check it out..lol.
We take a small break, maybe like 2 weeks and jump right into the next one. This year we are ending 4th grade in a week or two. So we will take a break and start back up in May. Actually DS was finished in Feb but I didn't tell him,because he would have wanted to be off Feb-May.I made the mistake of telling him 5th grade officially starts in May. I just started giving him stuff from our 5th grade curriculum.
Harcourt is just a basic science textbook, but I've used them for 2 years now (going on 3) and like them pretty well. You can also get the workbooks to go with them. I get mine from textbooksheaven.com and they're so much cheaper because they're used. I think the last ones we got were maybe $10 each. I'm forgetting one major point about all of this though...I need to remember that the curriculum belongs to me, not vise versa. It's my choice and I can do what I want and what I think will work for us. Not when the schools say we have to start or when the curriculum says, lol
This thread is good for me! I learned while talking to a kid last night about my dd who looks 13 but is graduating this year, techicaly one year early but about 2 before her peers. I was explaining how she actually schooled year round for her first two years out of choice. I just did not stop her, so I would have stressed over it had you ladies not been talking about year round schooling. I can see how it benifited dd in her early years of learning letting her keep going. Now my older child would not have done well with this as he was a fighter of learning back in the early years. Youngest would have taken it in stride cause thats his personality. SO--- if I can interject a question kind of thing maybe because I am thinking of extending our schooling so ds and I can not be so stressed as Drama class gets intense the next couple months-- what do you do to make your kids okay with year round? Or do you just keep going and not mention the rest of the kids are out for summer? I want to get ds into the idea now that you all sound so excited about it!
Well, I think inevitably they're going to know it's summer vacation. 1) everyone always asks "are you all out for summer", 2) they've had summers off before. What I think I'm going to do is just explain that we're going to do something different and that way we'll have time off more frequently (because to them, that will look and feel like we're out more). I guess in my opinion (and hoping it works out), if you approach it as a positive instead of a negative (not saying "you have to work while everyone else is off), then they may get more into the idea. And if someone else does say that (about having to work while others are off), I'll just remind my kids that we'll have more breaks during the time that they'll be working.
This year cause my ds is in higher math than I planned for him at this point I am allowing him time off now as well. Then will get back to work, trying to to stress its hardest on me I guess, I want school to be over so I can do fun stuff for me, lol. Not that it changes much but swimming pools are open in summers and stuff. Will you take that into account? I think I can do PE swimming, feild trips for Camping trips and just bring some of the book work along incase we get boared or something.. It has been a different year here with me working at the school part time and co ops and stuff I have missed more things thats why I am wondering about doing more during summer this year wihtout causing a problem.
