We started our school year the last week of August so I'm a little behind in sharing our first day of school pictures and our curriculum for the year. The fact that we are back in school is exactly why it's a whole month later and I have yet to blog about it. :)
After lots and lots of thinking and praying, we made a switch in our curriculum this year. Not because I hated what we were using before, but because there was a strong pulling in me to pursue something else this year. So far, I am enjoying the change, although there are aspects of our other curriculum that I do miss.
In case you're wondering, we switched from Sonlight to My Father's World. I am glad we made the switch, but I have to be honest, it is much more labor intensive on my part than Sonlight was.
Last year, our two oldest children did a lot of the reading together, independent of me. That, of course, gave me more time to take care of the baby and our then 4 year old. Oh, and it gave me a little more time for the luxuries of life. Like getting a shower.
With our new curriculum, I need to be more involved, although thankfully, there is still some work that the two oldest children can do together. I think the biggest difference is that there needs to be more initial instruction and then they can work independently. That, and I have a Kindergartner this year so where previously I might have had a little break, I now need to use that time to do his Kindergarten.
All in all, it's going very well and I am pleased with everything they are learning. Here are a few pictures from the first day.
I like to have the kids fill out this "First Day of..." paper. It's so precious to read these after a few years have gone by and the kids love seeing how they scrawled their name when they were first learning to write. You can print your own copy here.
I love reading what other people use for curriculum, so hopefully my run down here will be helpful to you as well.
The majority of our curriculum comes from My Father's World. Since we are new to the curriculum rotation, our 4th and 2nd graders started with Exploring Countries and Cultures. I am learning so much alongside them! *Here is my My Father's World 2-8th Pinterest Board where I pin ideas relevant to our curriculum.
Our Kindergartner is using God's Creation From A to Z from My Father's World. It is a perfect fit for our just turned five year old son. We are both enjoying it! *Here is the Pinterest Board for Kindergarten.
We have a few extra things that we are using as well.
Bible-I love, love, love the Apologia Biblical Worldview Series. It is sound and thorough, yet practical. This is the second year we have used a book from this series for Bible. We take our own pace and I am so thankful we discovered this series.
Math-we have used Rightstart Math for 4 years now. It is a hands-on math program that teaches for understanding, not just memorization. It is a bit challenging, but you can take your own pace if necessary.
Handwriting-we use bjupress.com for handwriting. I like the idea of using pre-cursive to teach our children how to write so they transition easier into cursive.
Latin-the kids started this last year and it is going great. I just have them do one small section in the workbook each day and we watch the corresponding video segments when we reach that point. We are using the Prima Latina series which is an introduction to Latin for 2nd-4th graders. This is an excellent series and I'm so grateful to have it as part of our curriculum.
Typing-I wanted the two older children to start learning to type so we are using Keyboarding for the Christian School: Elementary Version.
Art-My Father's World comes with a craft book and they encourage drawing in various science lessons, but I wanted something specific to art instruction. I am very pleased with See the Light. We are using Volume 1 and 2 this year. The kids enjoy learning specific art skills and we all love that art is taught from a biblical perspective.
Music-We just started piano lessons for the two older children, ages 9 and 7. Their piano teacher comes to our home which is such a blessing as I'm sure you can imagine. I'm thrilled they can finally take private music lessons.
I think that about sums it up. I'm curious to know what you use for curriculum. Feel free to share in the comments section below.
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