5 Days of Homeschool 101: Encouragement (From One Husband to Another)

Welcome to the fifth and final day of this year's Back to Homeschool Blog Hop, brought to you by the Schoolhouse Review Crew.

It is that time of year when my fellow Crew Mates and I share our thoughts on different subjects related to homeschool. This year we will all be sharing on the following topics on the specified days:

• Monday: Curriculum
• Tuesday: Planning
• Wednesday: Home Management
• Thursday: Traditions
• Friday: Encouragement

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Hi.  Harold here.  I've fired up my pirate blogging system and taken over my Wife's blog.   She doesn't know I'm here.  I control the Fonts.  I control the wording.  I'm gonna talk about the topic that *I* want to talk about.  Sit back, relax, and wash your eyeballs with Listerine because THIS..is my blog post.

One of the things my wife said to me while we were dating that I found intriguing was the fact that she had always wanted to home school her older children.  The other thing she said that I enjoyed was "yes, I'll marry you"  but this was a close second.  Sure, I had my doubts about home schooling based on what I had been told when I desperately wanted to get out of my own personal hell known as public school. No socialization, not respected, etc. 

Fortunately, my wife was able to calm my fears with good, solid research and a sledge hammer to my brain to help me forget about them.

Fast forward a few years.  We have four younger children who we are privileged to train up in the way of the Lord.  Yup.  We get to homeschool four of them.  Something my wife would not have been able to do ten years ago.

She didn't have any encouragement with her older children.  In fact, just the opposite.  She was told "no".  Things are different now and I for one, am very glad.

The best thing I can do, is encourage her but not in the way some would think.  Sure, I tell her what a great job she's doing (because she is), and I do my best to make sure she has the supplies she needs (Even after working 12 hours through the night when she gets a last minute idea), I even assist with getting the kids ready to go out the door to co-op weekly. 

Big deal.  That doesn't have anything to do with what's changed over the last ten years.  

I encouraged her to try.  Not only try, but to fail if need be and know that It's okay.  And to try again because she WILL get it.   Every child learns differently and unlike public school, we don't need a one size fits all mentality.  It is Okay to say, "this isn't working, I need to try something else" or even " they don't like this and aren't learning as well as they can.  I need to try something else."  

Failure is always an option.  I hope it doesn't happen, but I encourage my wife to keep going no matter what.

Gentlemen, after ten years of blissful marriage, the best advice I can give to you is this:

Never stop encouraging your wife. Not just in words, but in actions.  Help her every way that you can and understand that God made your children unique so their learning styles will be unique as well. Don't make your wife feel that she isn't allowed to make a mistake with curriculum or teaching styles. Remember, she's learning along with your children.

The difference I've seen in my wife over he last ten years now that she knows I'm not going to yell and scream over every tiny mistake and I'm not going to leave or threaten to leave if things aren't perfect has been immeasurable.  She is much more outgoing and confident now (even if she doesn't always see it)  and confidence is sexy if I do say so myself.  

Gentlemen, make sure your wife knows that you are by her side NO MATTER WHAT.  It really helps in ALL aspects of your marriage.

Well. Looks like my pirate blogging system is on the fritz.  So I'm signing off for now.  But keep your eyeballs peeled for when I take over again.  But keep them in water so they don't dry out.

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Yes, I found him out. I wasn't sure what I was going to write about for today's topic of Encouragement. Next thing I know, hubby had taken over the computer and my blog and was halfway done with writing a blog post. A blog post he says he had been thinking about last night instead of sleeping. Isn't he just awesome. Anyway, I hope your husband's can find some encouragement from today's blog hop post fellow homeschool mama. 

It's a blog hop!

Don't forget to stop by to visit my fellow Crew Mates. We are all sharing Back to Homeschool from our own perspective, so enjoy the varied subjects and views this week. You will be able to find the posts linked up to each day's linky.

5 Days of Homeschool 101: Traditions (Our Homeschool Traditions)

Welcome to the fourth day of this year's Back to Homeschool Blog Hop, brought to you by the Schoolhouse Review Crew.

It is that time of year when my fellow Crew Mates and I share our thoughts on different subjects related to homeschool. This year we will all be sharing on the following topics on the specified days:

• Monday: Curriculum
• Tuesday: Planning
• Wednesday: Home Management
• Thursday: Traditions
• Friday: Encouragement

Let me just start out by saying, no you did not miss a post yesterday. This may be the fourth day of the blog hop, but this is my third post. Home Management is not one of my strong points, so I really didn't have anything to share yesterday. You can head over to the Schoolhouse Review Crew blog to check out the 5 Days of Homeschool 101: Home Management post. I have every intention of taking some time to read those posts to see if they can help me.

Today I will be talking about our Homeschool Traditions. Each year we seem to add additional traditions because the children remember something they did and think it has to become a yearly tradition. 

Now that we are officially homeschooling and I can see how our year is going to flow each year, I have decided that we will most likely be having 3-4 weeks of "summer school" each July/August after taking a break starting at the end of June. This will give me a chance to catch up on any subjects we are behind in. Because I am on the Schoolhouse Review Crew, we do have products we are reviewing in the summer, so this gives us a chance to use the products in an organized way as well. 

Our first day of homeschool for the new school year has fluctuated between being in August or September. With the addition of our summer session, I am thinking the first day of school is going to be toward the beginning of September. This time next year, when I see how the 2016-2017 school year has gone, I will know whether this schedule will still work or not. So, I'll have to let you know then. 

No matter when I schedule the first day of school, one thing will have to always be taken into account. It has to be a day that daddy can take the children out to breakfast. This has been a tradition since the year Tabitha and Amelia started Kindergarten (well, K-4 for Amelia). 

So, what does our First Day of Homeschool look like? 

Well, something we started last year was purchasing one new outfit for the first day of school. We hope to be able to do that this year. So, they get those clothes on and stand at the top of the stairs to get their picture taken. We do this at holidays too. Before coming downstairs on Christmas or Resurrection Sunday morning, mommy has to get her picture. Oh, we do that on birthdays now too.

After I get the girls' hair done, they pose outside and get ready to go to McDonald's for breakfast. 

One of my ulterior motives for sending them off to have breakfast is it gives me time to finish cleaning, organizing, and decorating. Sadly, I have to make the banner by myself now, as Harold goes out for breakfast as well instead of staying home to help me. 

I also set out their school supplies.

This will be the third year the Homeschool Elf stops by. He likes to hide their supplies and have them find them using riddles. 

When they get home, I have them line up like they would have to do in public school.

Our first day of school is always a light school day. They have a celebration with balloons and find their missing school supplies. 

Sometime during the day, I have them fill out "About Me" pages

We also take first day of school photos by the easel. 

When daddy is available, he takes a picture of me with the children. This is our class picture. 

And here is the picture from last year:

In addition to our First Day of School Traditions, we also have keep one other tradition.

Children's birthdays are always a holiday. Mommy's not so much. 

Well, there are all of our traditions I could think of. What sort of homeschool traditions do you have?

It's a blog hop!

Don't forget to stop by to visit my fellow Crew Mates. We are all sharing Back to Homeschool from our own perspective, so enjoy the varied subjects and views this week. You will be able to find the posts linked up to each day's linky.

5 Days of Homeschool 101: Planning (To Plan or Not To Plan? To Plan...Obviously)

Welcome to the second day of this year's Back to Homeschool Blog Hop, brought to you by the Schoolhouse Review Crew.

It is that time of year when my fellow Crew Mates and I share our thoughts on different subjects related to homeschool. This year we will all be sharing on the following topics on the specified days:

• Monday: Curriculum
• Tuesday: Planning
• Wednesday: Home Management
• Thursday: Traditions
• Friday: Encouragement

Well, as I mentioned yesterday, part of the reason we didn't follow the plan I set for last year is because of my lack of planning. If you have been a follower of my blog for any amount of time, you may have seen me mention one time or another that I have problems with organization and planning. I also mentioned earlier this year, I know this needs to change. It is imperative that I get and stay organized now that we officially have to report to the school district. At the end of last school year, I was fumbling around to pull together information for Tabitha's portfolio, because I hadn't kept track well enough through the year. Now this year, I have two children who I have to file paperwork for. 

At one point I figured I could consider us relaxed homeschoolers, and then I realized then isn't really what we are. I need structure too much to keep myself in check and make sure the children are doing what they are supposed to be doing. What I have discovered is that I am lazy and very easily distracted. I need to have a plan to focus on to keep me on task. When I say I am lazy, I mean I can't be bothered to actually sit down and do the planning that is necessary. And yes, sometimes I just let the kids do whatever, which works well when the children want to have "Kid Teach Days." Because I am so easily distracted (and frankly forgetful), I find myself reaching the end of the week and realizing we didn't get to everything we were supposed to get to. I have accepted that I NEED to have a plan in place to keep us on track. 

As Leah Courtney mentions in her new ebook, Creating Homeschool Lesson Plans That Work, planning is important and as homeschool parents, we really should have a plan. If you need some direction in creating lesson plans, you may want to check out her book as she gives step-by-step instructions on how to set up lesson plans and even shares a link to her Google Sheets Planner as a bonus. 

Now personally, I am not one that can plan online or on a computer. I discovered that last year. So, I was so glad when I had a chance to review the new Hey Mama! Schoolhouse Planner earlier this year. For now, this is what I am using, and it is working for me. Three weeks in to summer school session and I have been using it daily to help keep me on task. Do we get to every assignment every day? No. However, because I have the assignment listed in the planner, I know what needs to be moved to the next week. 

Here is how I use this planner:

I put the days of the week across the top and the subjects down the left side of the page. There are books I want to make sure we read, so I list them and then remind myself that there are specific books I want our leader of the day to choose from for story time. A lot of our subjects are taught together. Even though My Father's World Adventures is for the older girls, I still read the books and other info to all the children. We all learn the same memory verses. The younger children even do science with us, or sometimes the science lesson will be out of our Kindergarten book and the older girls will join in. Math right now is being done on the computer using CTCMath, so the children will have their tasks assigned in their account, which means I just have to remind myself that they need their computer time. Now, for Language Arts (phonics, spelling, writing, etc) the children will have separate lessons, so I just use their initials in the box with their assignment. Right now, during our summer school session, the older girls don't really have any spelling or such. However, the younger two are working in the Jolly Literacy books, so they are scheduled in. 

I do need to remember to put little checks next to the completed work, just so I know it is completed later down the road. Currently, I am just scanning the previous week on the weekend when I set up the next week's pages to see what I need to move because it didn't get finished. 

As a member of the Schoolhouse Review Crew, it is nice to have a flexible planner, so I can change the subjects around when we get new review products. 

I have tried planning out for weeks in advance, only to fall behind and get discouraged. I am still trying to figure out how to have more general monthly plans while planning out a week at a time.

I recently received a copy of The Relaxed Mom Homeschool Planning System by Tauna Meyer of The Proverbial Homemaker. This includes a planner and an ecourse which takes you through the set up and use of the planner. The planner is quite flexible and it includes customizable pages. I am trying to go through this planner and get things like our homeschool vision, our goals, and the "big picture" of our homeschool figured out. She includes different types of pages for you to figure out what works for you. That is the benefit to having a planner you can print. I will be sharing a more lengthy post about this planner soon. It is already available for purchase, so I thought I would mention here. It is regularly priced at $25 but the introductory price is just $19 (through August 16th).

So, that is a quick look at how I am trying to get used to planning in our homeschool. How do you plan for your homeschool days? What is your favorite type of planner?

It's a blog hop!

Don't forget to stop by to visit my fellow Crew Mates. We are all sharing Back to Homeschool from our own perspective, so enjoy the varied subjects and views this week. You will be able to find the posts linked up to each day's linky.

5 Days of Homeschool 101: Curriculum (Our 2016-2017 Curriculum Choices)

It is time for the annual Back to Homeschool Blog Hop from the Schoolhouse Review Crew.

It is that time of year when my fellow Crew Mates and I share our thoughts on different subjects related to homeschool. This year we will all be sharing on the following topics on the specified days:

• Monday: Curriculum
• Tuesday: Planning
• Wednesday: Home Management
• Thursday: Traditions
• Friday: Encouragement

As I was getting ready to write this post, I glanced back at last year's post on curriculum and was shocked that we didn't really follow the plan I set last year. There are two reasons for this. The first was lack of planning on my part, which I will touch on more tomorrow. The second was changes due to new review products coming our way thanks to the Schoolhouse Review Crew. 

There are some products we are going to be using this year, that were supposed to be used last year, plus new ones, plus ones that we are continuing with. A lot of these resources have come our way thanks to being on the Crew. 

Core Curriculum

As I stated last year, our core curriculum continues to be My Father's World, and I still see no change in the foreseeable future. I really do like this curriculum. We will be starting off the year by finishing up My Father's World Adventures. We are actually in the middle of our short summer school schedule which is helping us catch up a bit. 

We will then start the new level, Exploring Countries and Cultures (ECC), in October. 

I do not currently have the curriculum, so I can't really share a picture of everything that is included. We will be purchasing it closer to the time we are starting. However, we will be looking at world geography, studying different countries, learning about traditional foods and music, and making native crafts. Our science will revolve around the different ecosystems that we learn about as we travel around the world. We will also be learning about missionaries who serve in these countries we will be studying. I can't wait to get our curriculum to be able to really get a feel for it, and I will make sure to share it here on the blog of course. 

While we all move on with ECC, Harold will be taking over as the primary student using My Father's World Kindergarten. Last year, I wasn't sure whether we would be finishing K in one year or two. The way our schedule worked out, with trying to fit everything in, we ended up sticking to a 2-week-per-unit schedule, similar to what I did with the older girls. 

Hannah is ready to move on to My Father's World 1st Grade: Learning God's Story, so Harold will be using the Kindergarten worksheets.

Both Hannah and Harold do know all their letters and sounds. Both of them are actually reading, Hannah at a more advanced level, but Harold is quickly catching up with her.

While I want to make sure we complete the Kindergarten curriculum, as I love the topics and science and the Bible that go with it, I will also be moving ahead with some aspects of 1st grade with Hannah. Mainly, I'm going to be using the Bible Reader and the phonics workbook with her, though I still have to iron out the details.

For both Hannah and Harold, I will also be continuing on with Jolly Literacy's Phonics books. This will be in addition to the MFW lessons. Anyway. Jolly Literacy is a company we reviewed this summer.

I am using Book 1 with Harold and Book 2 with Hannah. I will be using the Grammar book with Hannah later on in the year. 

We will also be using the Can Do Cubes from Jolly Literacy:

Language Arts (for the older girls)

Last year I had every intention of using Logic of English Essentials for Tabitha for her spelling. However, we received Phonetic Zoo from the Institute for Excellence in Writing and used that for a while. Then spelling was sort of sporadic for a while. I plan on having her continue with Phonetic Zoo this year. 

Spelling was also sporadic for Amelia and we didn't get to finish her 2nd grade Horizons spelling curriculum as planned, so she will continue on with that this year. 

As we were using so many varied products for English last year, we also didn't finish the Language Lessons for Today books. They will both continue with those this year. 

We will all continue working on poetry memorization with Developing Linguistic Skills Through Poetry Memorization from the Institute for Excellence in Writing. 

Math

When I posted our curriculum choices last year, I had every intention of using Math Mammoth. We never did purchase it however. We ended up using A+ Interactive Math. However, the children are sort of tired of that online curriculum. They never did like it as much as I did. So for math this year, we are going to be using two different online curricula. 

We recently reviewed LearnBop and Tabitha is really enjoying it, so I am going to have her continue with it.

Amelia wasn't too fond of LearnBop, so she is going to continue with CTCMath. 

Hannah and Harold have also been using CTCMath, and I am going to allow them to continue with it as well. I will also be including more hands-on things for them as well. Hannah will also be using Math Mammoth as I still have 1st Grade from when I reviewed it a few years ago.

Tabitha uses some aspects of CTCMath, so she will be continuing with it, and have the option of doing the lessons if she so chooses. She will also be focusing on multiplication with Math-U-See Gamma

Science

As of right now, the plan is to do the science lessons that focus on the ecosystems that come with ECC in addition to Science Shepherd. Apologia Astronomy will be put aside for a future year. We LOVE the astronomy curriculum, but Science Shepherd will expire next spring, so I want to make sure to use it.

Music

Last year's music didn't go as planned either. We were supposed to learn how to play the recorder. We never found a way to fit this in to our schedule. So, we will try again this year.

Tabitha may also have a chance to learn how to play the guitar. A friend at church may be teaching her. 

In addition to learning how to play an instrument, we will be listening to music from the various countries we will be learning about in ECC. We will be using the Wee Sing Around the World CD that comes with the curriculum.

We will also do the Peter and the Wolf study we didn't get to do the first time we went through 1st grade with MFW. I lost the CD, so we never did the lessons. We decided to purchase the CD again so we can listen to it.

We will also be continuing with our music appreciation study of a couple of composers using Zeezok Publishing. Last year, during the review, we learned about Mozart. We have several more composers to choose from. The plan is to learn about 2 a year. I believe the vote was for Beethoven the last time I asked the children. 

Art

We will be continuing our art lessons with ArtAchieve.

And, as I mentioned above, we will also be making native crafts for the countries we are studying with ECC. 

Foreign Language

Amelia will continue to learn Latin with Olim, Once Upon a Time in Latin from Laurelwood Books.

And she will be learning Spanish with Middlebury Interactive Languages.

Tabitha will be learning French with Getting Started with French from Armfield Academic Press.

Bible

We will have weekly readings and memory verses from the book of Matthew with My Father's World ECC. We may do the Proverbs lessons that go with MFW 1st grade as well.

The children will also continue with Veritas Press. Tabitha is working on lessons from the Gospels and Amelia is working through the early books of the Bible.. 

Misc

Tabitha and Amelia will continue to use Essential Skills Advantage. Tabitha enjoys doing the reading and language arts activities, though I will let both girls choose the subjects they want to work on. 

And that is a look at our 2016-2017 curriculum. Of course, as we saw this past year, things could change as review opportunities arise. What are you using this year?

It's a blog hop!

Don't forget to stop by to visit my fellow Crew Mates. We are all sharing Back to Homeschool from our own perspective, so enjoy the varied subjects and views this week. You will be able to find the posts linked up to each day's linky.