Back To School

Here at the Moore house, Monday marks the official beginning of our school year.  We start here at home on Monday, and we are back in the CC classroom on Tuesday.  And you know, I think we are all ready to get going.  About two weeks ago, I was dragging my feet a bit, not really ready to get things going.  But all of a sudden I feel ready--just in time ;)  I think it was all the back to school photos on facebook, maybe.  I am ready to join the rest of the world. 

And, in typical last minute LB fashion, I finished ordering everything we need just yesterday.  But, I signed up for a month of free Amazon prime, so everything will be here by Tuesday.  For reading, our BIG focus this year, (if Ada is reading confidently by the end of this year, I will consider kindergarten a success), I am doing a combo of a lot of things.  I was looking through Writing Road To Reading on Monday of this past week, and I began to feel very overwhelmed.  I had a little "talk with myself," and realized that the beauty of homeschooling is I can pick and choose what we do--creating something that works for us--so, I will probably still be using the phoneme list from WRTR as a guide, but I am going to use The Ordinary Parent's Guide To Teaching Reading as my "script," plus I have Phonics Pathways, which will provide extra practice.  The main rule I made for myself--DO NOT ORDER ANY MORE READING CURRICULUM.  We haven't even started kindergarten, and I already have three reading curriculums!!  (is that how to properly write that?  curriculums?)  Granted, one was given to me, but still.  I told myself that I had to use what I already own, and surely, out of all three, Ada will learn to read?!!

The second "subject" of our school year is handwriting--another kindergarten must, right?  Again, I was going to use The Writing Road to Reading for that, but being really honest with you, if it's not user friendly, I probably won't do it.  So...I headed over to school box, spent about 7.00 on a handwriting book (that I looked through first to make sure it was okay), bought a 2.00 tablet of extra handwriting paper, and I am calling it a day.  We are keeping it simple over here.  I did buy Zaner Bloser handwriting paper, because that's what The Well Trained Mind recommends, and I am partial to the Well Trained Mind because it was what first convinced me that classical education is the route that we are going to take.  (And I talked to Ann about what she uses).

Okay, next is math.  And we are Saxon math all the way over here.  I am a big believer in Saxon because that is what we used in highschool at my public school, and I still remember all of that stuff when I am tutoring my high school student, and I am not a math person!!  Plus it's user friendly.  So, we are Saxon people for sure.  It was a no brainer for me.  I predict we will go all the way through with Saxon. 

Those are our main subjects--you know, the three R's--reading, writing, and arithmetic.  We will also be reviewing CC memory work every week, and that will fill in our history and science--with a bit of grammar and Latin thrown in.  I did order The Story of the World Volume I, which we are going to treat as a supplement.  We will most likely read through that at night, like a story, crazy enough ;)  And, of course, we will spend lots of time at the library, picking out books to read together at home.  Books, books, books!!!!  All the time books.  That is a must, right!!  There will be chapter books we read together before bed and during John's nap, and also easier, shorter books that Ada and John can both listen to.  Though, ideally, I would love for John to get used to listening to chapter books, even if he doesn't pick up on everything yet.  I am picturing him and Ada coloring at the table while I read so that everyone is happy, but maybe the words are still soaking into their brains ;)  Or at least a habit is forming.  It's such an ideal little world in my head.

Bottom line, we are diving in on Monday, and mostly I am bathing this thing in a lot of prayer because I am winging it just a bit.  We'll see what happens... ;)