Our Curriculum

One of the pushes that helped me decide to homeschool was that I learned our state requires public schools to provide homeschooling parents with public school books free of charge. I knew that I could use the internet and library as resources (the cost of complete curriculums had me worried) but I felt I needed to at least see what other 6th graders were learning. So, last year, I requested the 6th grade textbooks when I sent my notice of intent to homeschool.

We didn't use the literature or history book at all. I knew, from the history books J.T. brought home from K-5 that the public school textbooks are full of errors and omissions. Last year, we did ancient Rome all year long. I did purchase one workbook from Ebay and the rest was filled in with library books, movies, and television shows. I noticed a gap in U.S. Geography. As of 5th grade, J.T. hadn't had any. My mom purchased a set of magazines from Highlights. There is one for each state. So, we are learning each state one by one and then will move on to mapping. We also used a state geography card game I found at a dollar store. And for literature, I thought it most encouraging to let J.T. pick out what he was most interested in. For spelling, I picked each week's words from the book J.T. was reading from.

For science, we started off the year with lots and lots of Bill Nye the Science Guy DVDs from the library. The Bill Nye series rocks! We then moved to the public school textbook and used it traditionally...chapter by chapter with the review at the end. We also did some at-home experiments, made use of J.T.'s holiday-gift microscope, and supplemented with interesting Discovery, National Geographic, etc. shows.

For english, we skipped around the PS textbook, cutting out a lot of the redundancy and using it for ideas for creative writing. I let J.T. do a whole lot of his work orally. He detests writing and, while I think it's important for him to learn to write properly, I don't feel a need to try to force a love of writing on him. We also did cursive writing practice. When I was in school, from 3rd grade until High School, we were required to write in cursive. While J.T. learned cursive in 3rd grade, they were never required to use it...so he needed to be reminded of the letters. We also utilized an online typing program.

We also used the PS textbook for math. I should say we tried to use it. The textbook is completely confusing....especially without a teacher's edition to go along with it. We actually mostly felt out what J.T. hadn't completely understood in previous years and practiced that.

There was also a Health book from the school. I picked out the most interesting and least childish chapters to go over now and then throughout the year. We covered a lot of "health" with science programs.

Art was just the every day stuff J.T. would do anyhow. Drawing, painting, using clay, building with legos, decorating gifts, etc. For music we learned and listened to different genres taking turns focusing on each one and taking random songs and deciding what genre we would stick it in.

Our state requirements for end of the year assessment (we choose a portfolio option) only call for proof of Literature, English, Science, History/Geography, and Math. Portfolio reviewers don't even want to see anything outside of those subjects...so those are done on a more casual basis and less detailed records are kept.

So, our first year of homeschooling was mostly learning how J.T. learned best and what types of materials to use. While I felt the need, getting started, to see the public school text book...I was completely over that by the end of the year ;-)

Up next...our curriculum for this year!

J.T.'s Library Essay

I know I said I'd talk next about our curriculum, but first I figured I'd share the essay J.T. wrote.

Our local library is having an essay contest. Their motto is something to the effect of "We'll Show You the World" and the title of the essay contest is: What My Library Card Means To Me. Anyone can enter and there's a 250 word maximum. This essay is all J.T. I helped by going over his first draft and finding misspelled words for him to look up and by, while he was writing the second draft, saying "write neater" every so often ;-)

What My Library Card Means To Me

My library card means many things to me. It allows me to get books I need to be home schooled. It also allows me to read about fictional universes, and I can learn about other countries that I'm interested in. I can also learn about ancient history and what life was like back then.

Thanks to my library card, I enjoy learning about ancient history. Like how Hannibal crossed the Alps into Italy to try to capture Rome. I also learned about the mighty 300. Only 300 Spartans defended Greece at the Battle of Thermopylae. They stood ground against over 1 million Persians. It was also fun to read about how Alexander the Great conquered the Persian empire.

My library card means many things. I most enjoy using it to travel through ancient time periods.

Home Schooling Style

If I *had* to tell you what our home schooling style was, I guess I'd say it's closest to School at Home. But without any schedule or lesson planning (I gave that up at the start of this year). I do have particular books we learn from and (usually) follow those in some kind of order and do things like review questions and tests...mostly for things to stick in a portfolio at the end of the year. I started school with visions of how I would be TEACHER and stand in front of my child, having his rapt attention, while I regaled him with the day's information in a fun and interesting format...with a big easel in front of us for me to write key points on. Uh huh. Mostly I thought it would be fun to write on one of those big easels but I can't figure out exactly why I need one or what I would put on it.

I think our schedule has the ability to be as loose as it can be partly because I'm a non-working single mom home schooling an only child. I only have to make sure that J.T. and I are schooling when we want to...without worrying about someone else's work schedule or when anyone else wants dinner, etc.

That being said, please don't spit out your Diet Coke (does everyone but me drink diet pop? do you call it pop or soda? anyhow...) when I say that we sometimes are doing school at 6 a.m. or 4 p.m. or 10 p.m. or midnight. I sometimes suffer from insomnia. I've learned (and am very thankful I have the flexibility to do this) that if I'm tired enough to go to sleep, I had better do it. And, being that I'm the teacher, J.T. pretty much sleeps when I do so that we are awake at the same time. Our first year, I started off deciding that we must get up by XX and start school by XX and take a break at XX and be finished by XX. My first big wake up was when my entire day's worth of planning turned out to be about an hour and a half of school. When you don't have to wait for an entire class to get ready, and for everyone to ask their questions, and line up and wait for everything in between...a day's worth of work doesn't equal the actual time a child spends in school. Also, neither J.T. nor I are morning people and neither one of us enjoyed school in the mornings. Near the end of that year (last year actually) we said "screw it" and started just making sure we did the necessary work each day. Who really cares *when* it gets done? If my dad were alive to read this, he'd probably have a big 'ole cow. He's the kind that thinks if you sleep in until 9 a.m., you've "wasted half the day". I say if you go to bed by 9 p.m., you're sleeping half the day away! ;-) So, anyhow, we go to bed when we go to bed and wake up when we get up. We usually start school within an hour or two of waking up and take however long it takes to get it done.

We've played around with "where" to school also. We started off at the kitchen table, but my winter village took over the table last winter and we migrated to TV trays in the living room. At the start of this year, J.T. needed a new computer desk and his old one has turned out to be perfect for a school desk in the living room. We do reading and TV/movie watching on the couch, but he does paperwork at his desk. This also helps discourage the dog from getting jealous and trying to talk one of us into holding her instead of what we are doing ;-p

So, anyhow, that's our "style" and what works for us. I imagine it will evolve as time goes on but, luckily, I'm less panicky than when we started and we'll just go with the flow.

Why We Homeschool

1. Socialization...unwanted and lack thereof. In our district, children aren't allowed to talk on the bus or in the lunchroom and rarely get more than 30 minutes of recess for an entire week. When is this socialization supposed to be happening? Also, the children in J.T.'s last class were rude, mean, and disrespectful. He wasn't being bullied, but was very uncomfortable with the way his classmates treated each other and their teacher.

2. The ability to focus on what interests J.T. Last year, he was very interested in Roman history. Rather than one chapter in a world history book, we were able to spend the entire year on Roman history. If something is difficult, we take as much time as needed. If something is boring, we move through it quickly. If something grabs J.T.'s attention, we focus on that.

3. Improper information in public school textbooks. We are doing American History this year without all the bullshit about how great people like Columbus were.

4. No need to worry about a school trying to sneak religion into a science classroom.

5. J.T. is extremely shy and intimidated by authority figures. He wouldn't ask a teacher for permission to go to the bathroom...let alone ask for help on a math question. With Mom as his teacher he knows it's okay to ask away when he doesn't understand something. We have all the time in the world and no one is going to make fun of him.

6. A million other reasons we discover every single day!

About Us

Hi everyone :)

This first post is an introduction of my family for people who may come by my page and want to know what it's all about.

My name is Cory, and online you might also see me as "HeavenLeigh123". I'm a 32 year old (as of '07) single mom to J.T. who turned 13 this summer. I also have a 7 year old poodle mix named Baby, who really does think she's a baby.

J.T. and I are originally from Ohio. We lived a few years in KY and moved here to West Virginia in the summer of 2005.

I don't currently work...I've been disabled since 2002.

I considered homeschooling for J.T. (who has always been for it) for a couple of years before decided that YES we COULD do it too! I turned in my notice to the school board before the end of the '05/'06 school year and started officially homeschooling in the fall of 2006. It's possible that J.T. and I might decide he should go back to public schooling at some point, but it doesn't look likely at this time.

I don't have a homeschool "style" to tell you about. We aren't unschoolers or using Charlotte Mason or anything specific like that. We are secular schoolers and don't use any type of religious curriculum. Other than that we basically try stuff and if it works stick with it.

I'll talk more about why we chose homeschooling (I say "we" a lot rather than "I" because I feel J.T. should definitely have a say in his future and how he learns...I discuss with him, rather than dictate how his future should be) and particular curriculum we use in another post.

Thanks for stopping by! Be sure to leave me a comment to let me know you were here and give me a chance to check out your home on the web also :)