Decisions, decisions...

Good grief, this year has flown by so far.  I can't believe it's April 2nd already.  Our school year is nearly over (although we will be going a little longer this year due to our long, hard winter), and it's time to start thinking about next year's plan.  As you know from previous posts, we're changing up our way of doing things in our home school.  Because of all the unexpected things that happened over the winter, we didn't transition as smoothly as I had hoped.  That's why I would like to have a really good plan in place for when we begin after the summer.

We will continue with our plan for classical learning.  I really feel like that just "fits" our family.  We are all incredibly interested in history, literature and science.  We also feel like what we had been doing before made us feel crazy and rushed, and that we never actually were able to deeply dive into our interests.  I want us to really embrace the goal of classical learning....the "multum non multa", not quantity, but quality.  To pursue the Good, the True and the Beautiful.  How do I plan to implement this?  Let's be honest here, as much as I would like to say I truly implemented these things this year, it just didn't happen like planned.  We learned, but it didn't flow like I want it to.  I want my kids to find what truly interests and inspires them to life long learning.  I want, I want, I want.  Hmmm.....so, now to make it happen!

First of all, here is a list of what I have already decided on:
     Writing:
          Motormouth-Institute for Excellence in Writing, Student Writing Intensive, Level B.  I have never used IEW, but have heard nothing but good things about it.  Motormouth's toughest subject, by far, is writing.  Not handwriting, but creative writing.  This mom is NOT a writing teacher, so he's really struggled.  After lots of research, and having him check out some YouTube videos on IEW, we decided to check it out.  I'm very hopeful that it helps him really get the knack of writing well.  I opted to go with the SWI only, and not the more expensive Teaching Writing With Structure and Style.  TWSS is a 10 hour DVD seminar for parents, to teach them how to teach writing.  It's pretty pricey though, and SWI comes with a DVD that gives an overview of the program, so I'm hoping we can get by with just that.  We shall see.  Since he's really not loving the Classical Writing curriculum we have at the moment, I'm thinking about just diving right into SWI when it shows up this week.  This should take care of writing, grammar, spelling and handwriting.  I will supplement spelling and vocabulary to go along with our history, literature and science selections.

          Tweebs-I'm opting to piece together my own writing curriculum for the Tweebs.  I have purchased the Parent Teacher Guide for the Original McGuffey Readers, along with the Original McGuffey's Pictorial Eclectic Primer, the Original McGuffey's Eclectic Primer and the Original McGuffey's Eclectic First Reader.  I plan on doing most of their reading, copy work and spelling lessons out of these texts, along with some added reading in Aesop and other beginning literature that will go along with our history and science studies.

     Literature:
          Ahh...my FAVORITE subject!  I do not have anything set in stone yet, but I plan on having the kids focus on many of the classics, and am going to choose which ones based on the period of history we are studying and their reading/comprehension level.  Motormouth read The Hobbit this year, and I am considering having him read The Lord of the Rings next year.  I am going to re-read it over the next month and then decide.  He's a pretty advanced reader, but it's a pretty complicated read, and I want to look it over again to see if I think he can really get something out of it.  I want his literature selections to challenge him, but not so much that he isn't understanding or enjoying them.  If I do end up having him read The Lord of the Rings trilogy, that will take up a good chunk of the year for his Literature work. As for the Tweebs, I'm going to, as I stated above, have them work in the McGuffey's readers, but that will be more for the "mechanics" of reading.  For their Literature studies, I plan on them reading the Aesop fables, along with other selections I have not yet determined.  We shall see....the library is a wonderful resource that I plan on fully utilizing next school year!

     Arithmetic:  A.K.A...the bane of my existence.  I am NOT a math person.  At all.  So, my choices for the kids have to take into account their learning style, along with the fact that I am not a good math teacher.  I can handle the Tweebs, but the older Motormouth gets, the more nervous I get.  I don't yet have any math curriculum picked out for the Tweebs or Motormouth.  I am considering Teaching Textbooks for Motormouth.  I have heard quite a lot of good things about it.  One downside that I have heard is that it is not quite "grade level".  That can be easily taken care of though, by using the placement tests. I'm still back and forth on what to do for the Tweebs.  We'll see....

I just realized how incredibly long and rambling this post is...that probably has something to do with the fact that I am taking cough medicine and it is currently 1:30am.  So, that said, I am going to go for now, and hopefully finish up the second half of this post tomorrow.  I hope I didn't bore you to tears.  Once I get all this junk out of the way, I will post some funny, crazy things my kids have said/done.

Until next time...