My Blessings Homeschool: 2013-2014 Curriculum and Calendar

Been a while since I've posted! We finished our My Father's World Adventures program earlier this month for Chelsea's 3rd grade! Pics are on my phone which the hubby has so I'll have to update with those later. We school year round. I know a lot of people are curious about it and so was I a year ago! Here's what our schedule looks like for the school year. This year will be a little different with taking August off instead of June since we have a little one due in July but here's general idea.

Our Schedule

New year starts beginning of July (this year June)
3 weeks of school
1 week off
Taking most of December off
School year finished by the end of May.

Why do we school year round?

The main reason is because I absolutely hated the burnt out feeling I got come April and May! I didn't want to work nor did Chelsea. I felt pressured to get things done by a certain date and really wanted to avoid feeling stressed, pressured and burnt out.

One of the perks to this though is that we don't have a LONG break for them to forget much of what was learned during the year. With shorter breaks things stay fresh in the mind and aren't completely forgotten as with the 3 months off that many public and homeschools take. .

Other Thoughts

We do let the kids have their sleepovers with friends, VBS or other activities in the summer. With spreading the school year out we are able to be more relaxed about things. It still is summer after all so we don't deprive them of the fun things that come with summer. We simply work around those events.

Onto the fun stuff! Our curriculum!

Curriculum for 2013-14 School year

Grades: 4, K and Pre-K

4th Grade

My Father's World Exploring Countries and Cultures a.k.a ECC for history, Bible, science, art and music. ECC is a 1 year world geography focus which teaches children about the cultures of the countries being studied. Science is a study of animals and their habitats that correspond with the country of study. For example, rain forests and Brazil. Art projects are from Global Art which has projects for many different countries. Music teaches songs from each country using a Wee Sing CD and book. We are really excited to start this program! We enjoyed Adventures so much this past year that Chelsea wanted to start right away with ECC.

Saxon 5/4 for Math
We were blessed by the Book Samaritan this year for our math program. With my husband just starting a job a few weeks ago funds were quite tight. The Book Samaritan sent us the student text and masters to be copied along with a DIVE CD for the computer! Last year we used BJU math. We liked it but I got very frustrated with the amount of printing required from the teacher CD-Rom. In my mind if I pay $60 for a teacher book it should have ALL of the things I need and not need lots of pages printed. I'm excited to be going back to Saxon this year and Chelsea is excited for the DIVE program.

Intermediate Language Lessons for English
We used the Primary Language lessons last year and really liked it! It's a Charlotte Mason inspired program that includes dictation, picture study, writing, narration and other aspects to teach many of the needed skills.

Writing Strands 3 for Writing
This is the My Father's World suggestion for writing starting in fourth grade, We haven't used this yet but I have heard good things about it.

A Beka Readers 3rd Grade
We tried the "pick a library book to read" method last year and it's not for me. I need more structure and guidance to keep us on track. Earlier this spring I went to a curriculum night with our home school group. One of the moms had great things to say about A Beka's readers so I thought we'd give them a try.

Extras
Chelsea enjoys ballet lessons, our Keepers at Home group and co-op classes with our home school group. She is really interested in learning French so we are hoping to find something to use for that soon.

Kindergarten

We originally planned to start kindergarten this summer but Hunter was SO eager to get started that we began early this spring. We are using My Father's World God's Creation from A-Z. Each letter of the alphabet has a theme from God's creation, most of them animals but some other things such as moon, sun, rocks and jewels. Some say it's too light for kindergarten but we love it! The lessons don't take long, my son enjoys school and is beginning to learn to blend words together. The curriculum is Charlotte Mason inspired and offers a gentler approach but he will be reading and doing basic addition by the end of the year.

Picture from mfwbooks.com

Preschool

This is the one place I'm sort of stuck! Natalie wants to do school like her older brother and sister but isn't ready for what they are doing yet. She does tag along for a lot of the fun activities and crafts of course and will get out her puzzles, coloring books or Dollar Tree workbooks while we are doing school work. I would love to be able to find printables that go along with our MFW themes!

So there you have it! Our plan for this coming school year which will start officially June 3rd for us.We are looking forward to a fun year!