We did some more good planning for homeschooling today. We still need to answer a number of questions but here are our notes so far for most of the subjects we'll tackle in fall (we'll also do art, music and PE):
Composition:
curriculum:
Writing with Ease
approach:
letters to friends and family
rotating copy work and narration
papers go into language notebook
schedule:
WWE (Writing With Ease): 4 days per week for 36 weeks
TWTM (The Well-Trained Mind): letter writing twice a week, copying sentences 2 or 3 days per week, starting at 5 minutes per day and working up to 20.
Our schedule: TBD
goals for the year:
- TWTM: copy a 10 word sentence without error
- TWTM: accurately answer questions about a 3-5 paragraph passage
- TWTM: answer the question: what is one thing you remember about the passage, with a complete sentence.
Handwriting:
curriculum:
Zaner-Bloser K, 140 pages
schedule:
minimum of 2 workbook pages a day
TWTM: 5-20 minutes per day, 5 days a week
goals for the year:
get through the K book for summer and the level 1 and possibly level 2 Z-B books for the year
Spelling:
curriculum:
MSP Spelling Workout A
36 lessons
schedule:
Susan recommends: 10 to 15 minutes 5 days per week
goals for the year:
work through the A book and continue to the B book
Grammar:
curriculum:
First Language Lessons
100 lessons (approximately 3 per week)
schedule:
TWTM: 15-20 minutes a day 5 days a week
approach:
memorization, narration, copy work, parts of speech (nouns, pronouns, verbs)
goals for the year:
complete FLL book
Reading:
schedule:
assigned reading (30 minutes 5 days per week)
recreational reading (30 minutes 7 days per week)
approach:
need to read a little more on this
create notebook pages (including narration, illustrating)
goals for the year:
?
Math:
curriculum:
Singapore Early Bird Kindergarten Book A plus workbook A, 10 units
Singapore Early Bird Kindergarten Book B plus workbook B, 10 units
schedule:
minumum of 1 unit per week (approximately 30 minutes per day 5 days a week)
goals for the year:
write
and count numbers through 100, by 1s, 2s, 5s, 10s; shapes and patterns;
sets; time; money; length; size; weight; addition and subtraction
History:
curriculum:
The Story of the World Vol. 1: the Ancients
43 chapters
schedule:
3 hours per week in 2 or 3 sessions
approach:
get relevant biographies, easy history books every week from the library
take field trips
do activities and craft from activity book
narration for notebook pages
for each story in the book
make a narration page
ask the child to illustrate or color a related page about the story and write a caption
find the area on a globe, a wall map, and color the black line map
go to the library and find out more on the subject
memorize specific important dates, events and names and their order in history
goals for the year:
complete the book, subject to keeping up with the language and math
memorize two lists from the back of King Fisher history encyclopedia
Science:
curricula/materials:
DK first animal encyclopedia
Kingfisher 1st human body encyclopedia
Green Thumbs a kids activity book to gardening
schedule:
twice a week for 1 hour
approach:
study animals, the human body and plants
suggest animal kingdom 20 weeks
human body for 10 weeks
plants for 6 weeks
goals for the year:
get a lot of exposure to biology stuff and have fun with it
