2011-2012 School Year Review

There were times this year when I felt like I’d rearranged things too often…but I tried to remind myself that the beauty of homeschooling was the rearranging:  if something isn’t working I can adjust until it works!  While camping on the coast of Maine just after we finished full-time school I took the time to really reflect on the year and what my plans were moving forward.  Luckily, in spite of all the changes and adjustments and trying to figure things out, one over-riding truth remained:  homeschooling is a great fit for our family.

What did work this year:

• All About Spelling: My daughter and I both enjoyed this spelling program and look forward to moving ahead with it next year.  The biggest bonus:  I can see using it with my son when he’s ready, too.  Since my children have such different learning styles, if a curriculum can be used with both of them it offers something for everyone!
• Funnix as a reading program for our son.  We are so thrilled with his progress in reading and will continue through all the lessons.
• 50 States Study:  This year-long study I put together from various resources was the highlight of our year.   My son was actually sad when we finished the last state!  We had so much fun learning about our country and its geography, history, and people.
• Nature Study:  I may say this too often, but finding Barb’s site The Handbook of Nature Study blog was a God-send.  I used her ideas on a regular basis and it’s a very welcome part of our school schedule.
• Working together on subjects:  I will continue to combine subjects whenever possible.  Both my kids are happier and still learn a lot when working together.  It really becomes a bigger part of our life when we are studying the same topics.
• Homeschool book club:  A friend arranged this casual group of a few homeschooling families meeting once a month, with each mom taking a turn planning the meeting.  Getting together routinely with other homeschoolers was paramount to our success this year.

What did not work at all:

• Writing With Ease:  At first we loved it.  Then we dreaded it.  Why?  It felt like the same thing every day.  A different piece of literature but doing the exact same thing.  Once my daughter got the idea of summarizing the piece in two to three sentences I felt like it was too repetitive.  So in December I dropped it, and it became the first purchased curriculum that I gave up on.  At first it was disappointing, but then I felt empowered.
• Easy Grammar:  This seemed okay at first, but then both my daughter and I learned something about ourselves:  we are not worksheet people.  This especially surprised my daughter who, coming from public school, had been overjoyed to see workbooks arriving in the mail when I began ordering homeschool supplies.  I felt like it was too shallow and mixed up and that the actual teaching of grammar was missing.  Plus it wasn’t carrying over into her work, so I dropped that after December.  The rest of the year we focused on grammar in her own writing, making index cards with grammar rules.  That worked well to some extent…but I still see room for improvement in self-editing.  Stay tuned for next year’s plan, because I’m excited!
• Math Workbooks #1:  Okay, so maybe we both needed to let go of our attachments to workbooks.  I started both kids on Singapore Math.  It took a fair amount of prep and teaching time for me, and none of us was enjoying ourselves.  Mr. Technology (my husband) had been trying to show us Khan Academy and my daughter and I resisted.  When we finally tried it we both loved it.  I don’t see a lot of people using it as their curriculum but it works for us.  I’m keeping track of the core curriculum standards and standards in our local school district so I can be sure she covers necessary topics, and I try to bring math into real life to solidify what she’s studying.  Did I mention it’s also free?
• Math Workbooks #2: For little brother we did finish the Singapore Earlybird Kindergarten Book A.  The problem:  math concepts on paper don’t work for him.  I figured that out early but thought the workbook would help keep me on track with which concepts to cover.  It just wasn’t time or money well spent, though.  We found computer games and apps and hands-on activities like playing store to be the best way to teach math concepts to him.  Bonus:  free and he is excited about playing with numbers.

What needed some tweaking:

• Science:  Our weekly science class was wonderful and was where we met other homeschooling families.  Unfortunately our instructor decided he had too much on his plate and he cut our class.  I had already been considering supplementing at home for two reasons: science is little brother’s favorite subject, and although the class and teacher were fun and exciting, I thought my kids could use some building blocks of science that weren’t being covered.  So stay tuned for next year’s plan, because I’m excited about this, too!
• My scheduling:  I started off the year just a bit too uptight.  I was nervous and had a schedule typed out down to every fifteen minutes.  I kid you not, I had a spreadsheet that showed who was working on what, with a little “M” showing which child I was helping.  Honestly, what was I thinking?  That left no room for Daddy suggesting we go out for breakfast, the dog throwing up on the carpet, or wanting to play oustide after lunch because it just snowed and it’s that really good sticky snow!  Not to mention if a certain subject took a little longer and the other child needed me or didn’t know what to do next.  My little schedule went through several redesigns over this first school year, and I finally landed on what works for now:  a simple weekly grid with nice big open boxes for each day, plus list boxes for weekly goals.  I can write in something happening on a certain day (like a class or piano lesson) and then I just work away at our weekly goals in a flexible way.  Maybe today the weather is nice and we’ll do some nature study.  Or we feel like flopping down in the living room to finish that book.  Or the kids feel like cut-and-paste crafty lapbook work.  I based my schedule on this free weekly planner printable I found at The Home School Mom.  I just broke up the “To Do” box on the right into three boxes: one box for together work and one for each child’s individual work.
• Tracking school days:  I kept meticulous records, but didn’t have benchmarks to guide me throughout the year.  I had set a self-imposed goal of finishing our required 175 days before Memorial Day and was determined to meet it.  We had to work really hard in April and May to finish on time.  It was worth it when we were camping the next week and knew one year was behind us, but I plan to be more prepared next year.

We’re now well into our more laid-back summer school schedule and enjoying ourselves immensely.  I’ll post our summer homeschool plans as soon as I get a chance!