You know there's a pandemic going on because this is my third post in a month. Ha! Suddenly we've all got a little (or a lot of) extra time on our hands.
To be clear, our school year has not officially ended yet. I plan to continue our current schedule until the end of April and then switch gears to a looser schedule, but continue with some work throughout the summer. Although we're not quite "finished" (and I'm not sure when we will be exactly and precisely "done"), I wanted to document what we've done so far this year. Our second full year of homeschooling is (almost) in the books! Beware, this is a long post. Here's the quick summary if you don't want details: it was good and profitable and I want to continue.
Daily Routine
I covered this partially in a previous post, but it was pretty flexible this year (hello, new baby!). The basic framework was as follows: after breakfast & chores, Baby Sister goes down for nap and the boys and I gather on the couch for morning/Bible time. When we finish there, Middle Brother and Little Brother do independent playtime while I do some focused work with Big Brother. After that, if the baby is still sleeping, we do some school time with Middle Brother and occasionally a little with Little Brother just for fun. I usually read aloud during lunch, and other school subjects that haven't been finished yet are squeezed in before or after nap/rest time.
Materials We Used...
... for Big Brother (currently 7 yrs old and finishing up 1st grade)
Math: We are still working through Shiller Math Kit 1 and I still love it. This year Big Brother did the first half of Book 3 as well as the first half of the Fractions Kit. We could have moved on and finished Book 3 but I felt like he wasn't quite ready for some of the more advanced concepts coming up and I wanted to spend more time reviewing concepts he had already been introduced to. I got the same feeling as we neared the halfway mark of the Fractions Kit (just a few weeks ago), so we have now put that one aside as well. I LOVE how Shiller Math introduces abstract ideas in a concrete way that children can understand, and how manipulatives are used for almost every lesson to give children a visual, tangible representation of the math concepts described. However, I also feel that the curriculum is a little short on review material, so we are supplementing with several Kumon workbooks which give my seven year old the extra practice that he needs right now. I plan to continue some math work through the first week of May and then take a break during the summer.
Phonics & Reading: We completed Logic of English Foundations Book D (the last in the series, hooray!). It was a great experience and I'm happy with it. After that, we started working through Language Smarts Book C from the Critical Thinking Company and have completed about a third of it. Some of it was review that he had learned earlier from LOE and some was new, but we have now put that book aside until next fall. The rest of the book is more grammar/sentence structure oriented and I don't feel he needs that right now. Big Brother is reading quite well and I'm proud of how far he has come! He has been reading aloud to me throughout the year from books that we have chosen from Sonlight's Grade 3 readers list, as well as a few others I have thrown in. So far he has completed 18 books this year! Most of these were short to medium-length chapter books.
Handwriting: We completed Copybook 1 by Memoria Press, and have also been working on copying a poem that I downloaded from Simply Charlotte Mason.
Science: This year we have been working through Exploring Creation with Botany by Apologia. It is an immersion approach - we spend the entire school year just studying botany! I was curious to try this method, and so far I've liked it. It feels satisfying to be able to dig deeper into a subject and really study it thoroughly. We have not finished the course yet, and I plan to continue working on it through the summer.
History: We've been reading through The Story of the World Volume 1 by Susan Wise Bauer, which has probably been my personal favorite part of this school year. I disliked history as a child; now as an adult I am finding it fascinating and I am thankful for the chance to relearn it. After I read a section Big Brother either tells me orally what it was about or draws a picture of some aspect of the story. We have not finished this book either and I plan to keep reading it through the summer.
Art: No curriculum for art this year! But Big Brother loves to draw and spends a good chunk of every day drawing whatever he might be thinking about (mostly trains and cars and trucks). We also do many projects together with his brothers - often painting, or a holiday craft, or cutting and gluing, or stickers. We have many craft supplies accessible for them all to use and so art happens every day, whether or not I plan any specific projects.
Morning Time & Extras: All three boys sat with me for morning time each day and we read through several different story Bibles/devotionals. We memorized 16 passages of scripture and sang songs together. We completed seven books that I read aloud to them during lunch times throughout the year. We worked through most of the Safety unit study from The Good and The Beautiful. Big Brother continued with piano lessons and practice.
... for Middle Brother (currently 5.5 yrs old and finishing up 4K)
Phonics: We've been working through Logic of English Foundations Level B this year, and I hope to finish it by early summer. I am definitely seeing how each child learns a little differently and at their own pace! He enjoys it, and is doing well, but is not picking up the concepts as quickly as his brother did at that age. And that's perfectly okay! I know it will click when he is ready, so I am trying to keep it enjoyable and not push too hard.
Math: To be honest we have not done a lot this year. We had started Shiller Math at the end of last summer, and then he went to public school preschool for a month (and I didn't do any work with him at home), and then we pulled him out and decided to just homeschool, and it took a while to find a routine that worked again. I have not worried about it much because he is technically still only in preschool; so we have worked hard to fit in phonics, but most days that is all. Some days I will find time to do math with him also, and he loves it, but not every day.
However! Phonics may be the only "official" school that Middle Brother has completed this year, but I have no doubts about all that he has learned. Let me compile a short list in case you too have worried about your preschooler not completing a formal curriculum.
- READING: We read a lot, and he loves it. We read picture books every day. I read aloud a chapter book at lunch time, and he listens and remembers and talks about it afterwards. Daddy reads a devotional at bedtime. I read from a Bible story during morning time. He often listens to me read history or science to Big Brother and picks up little bits from those readings too.
- COOKING and CLEANING: There's a lot of learning going on when children practice these skills. All the boys practice cleaning every day, at least a little, and at least one of them will help in the kitchen once a week, sometimes more often.
- MATH: We count, we add, we play games (which involve numbers), we cook (which involves counting), we see patterns, we find shapes and colors in our house and on our walks and on our drives. This is all real-life math.
- SOCIAL STUDIES: We added a new family member this past year, and I see a HUGE amount of learning that has happened with all three brothers as they have watched and participated in the care of a baby. They have watched her grow and develop, they have seen how she is fed and changed and given naps, they have helped to care for her by bringing diapers or toys or bottles, and they have seen the joy that a baby brings. They all love playing with her and making her laugh, and it's been so fun to watch them learn to be gentle and loving with a small person. These are important and real life skills!
- OUTSIDE PLAY: This is necessary and so important for gross motor skills and creativity and social skills (with his brothers), and Middle Brother spent lots of time outside this year.
- NATURE WALKS: Umm, hello free science lesson! Our boys LOVE being out in the woods and we are always finding something interesting - maybe a plant, or a nut, or a bug, or a frog! Many of our discoveries have prompted more research and more books to answer questions that arise.
- FIELD TRIPS: Sadly, they are prohibited at the moment, but normally we spend a lot of time at the library, zoo, botanical gardens, and museum.
- ART: As I mentioned above, our boys make art every single day. Sometimes I have a specific project for them, but other days their own creativity takes them down rabbit holes and they cut and glue and color and draw to their hearts' content. It's very messy and very good.
- MUSIC: We sing together often. He hears Big Brother practice piano, he hears Mommy and Daddy play duets, we will often take out the rhythm instruments and let the boys play along with us, and we listen to lots of music whenever we are driving in the car.
- PLAY IS WORK AND WORK IS PLAY: I really believe that if you choose your toys carefully and let the children alone, they will play in a way that is incredibly educational. There's a plethora of studies validating the power of play and documenting the amount of learning and growing that happens through free play. Besides the official and scientific studies, I see this happening every day. Just take a moment and watch your toddler construct a block tower, or watch your big kid create a vehicle from Legos, or watch your preschooler work on a puzzle. They are thinking and experimenting and using creativity and testing hypotheses all day long, so let's not interfere with that!
Okay, there's probably more, but I am convinced and I hope you are too. Preschool does not need workbooks and fancy curriculum! Let me repeat it for those in the back: PRESCHOOLERS DO NOT NEED CURRICULUM.
All right, let's finish this monster of a post.
What We Learned and What We Will Change
- We learned a lot about flexibility this year, which I need to remember because I'm not certain that homeschooling with a toddler will be much easier than homeschooling with a baby. I am sure we will need to adjust and continue to be flexible in the coming year!
- I've become more certain in my own mind that this is the lifestyle we want for our family. When I first pulled Big Brother out of public school, I often thought and worried a little about all that he was missing out on. You know, all the fun things his class would be doing together that he would never be a part of! However, my thinking has gradually changed since then, and when we made the decision to pull Middle Brother out of preschool last fall, one of the reasons we did so was because I felt that he was missing out by not being home. Ha! I thought of all the books we were reading, adventures we were going on, and play time that his brothers were having - I just realized that he needed that too. Seeing this has helped me to understand that I really do enjoy this time and it's what I want for our children.
- I plan and hope to spend more focused time with Middle Brother in the coming year as he begins kindergarten. I still plan to keep his "school days" very brief and give him lots of play time, but we want to start incorporating a few more subjects than we did this year. I also want to start just a little bit of phonics with Little Brother (because he is eager and ready and has known his letters for two full years now), so it will be an interesting challenge to work in "school time" with three children!
- From this pandemic in particular - I will no longer be taking the library for granted, or our time with friends! Ugh. I cannot tell you how many times I have wished for a book for myself or the children, and remembered the library is closed, and have put it on my ever-growing "to buy" list instead. And it's only been a month! Quarantine-schooling is NOT homeschooling, and we miss our friends and play dates just as much as everyone else.
- As Baby Sister has grown and dropped naps and been able to handle longer outings, we have started spending more time outside and in the woods and it is amazing. I hope we can keep doing more of that, as much as the weather allows! I'm learning that when the weather is good, we NEED to take advantage of it, because there are plenty of days here in Wisconsin when it is not. I would like to be one of those people who haul their children out to climb mountains and ford rivers in any and every weather and just tell you "there's no bad weather, just bad clothing!" but with four children in tow, and most (or all) of them being small and wimpy and in need of being carried or hugged or fed snacks or encouraged to "Look how strong your legs are! You can keep going!"... no. We are not those people. At least not yet. (If you are those people, please tell me your secrets.)
That's it! We are all looking forward to real spring weather arriving soon, and a looser school schedule. Happy spring to you all!
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