Tag: reading

2024-2025 Homeschool Curriculum Picks

~ wattlesandcombsfarm ~ Leave a comment

Here we go again! We are back in the homeschool swing and of course, we changed up a few things again. I wrote a post recently about how we were going to continue to use Acellus Academy for homeschooling, but about 4 days before our school year started I changed my mind. I changed my mind for a few different reasons, the main one being I didn’t like the idea of my kids going to their rooms and sitting on their computers for a few hours and that was the school day. We homeschool so we can do this together, not sit in front of a screen and barely interact. Acellus Academy was what I needed last year. The year was hard and there were a few extended family issues early in the year that were overwhelming, and then we moved. So, for that, I am so thankful I had that option, but I decided not to continue down that road. There were a few other considerations with the curriculum itself mainly because I was not sure how good overall the program was. Most of the programs seemed to work just fine, but we did not care for the writing portion. I had also started looking for Math options that would work better for my daughter, who struggles in math, and that led to me going a whole different route this year. Lastly, I knew that some of the curricula we had chosen and used in the past were great and I wanted to get back to those. I have state-tested my kids twice and they were pretty far ahead in most subjects. Their language skills were always top percentile, so if nothing else I know for a fact what we do for Language Arts is working. All of that together helped me choose this year’s curriculum.

(2024-2025 will be our ninth year of homeschooling and I will have an 8th grader and a 6th grader)

Homeschool Planner

I have not always been great at using my yearly planner. I have homeschooled in three different states and none of them have required that I keep records on hand. I usually keep a homeschool planner for myself, but since it’s not mandated I tend to get a little loose with that planner halfway through the year. I don’t really need it, since we typically have a curriculum where you simply do the next lesson, but I do like to have one. I have tried numerous versions of pen and paper planners over the years, but my favorite has surprisingly been an online planner. So, this year I went ahead and signed back up for the Well Planned Gal’s online homeschool planner. The Well Planned Gal has a great paper and pen planner if that is what you enjoy, but for me, it was too much stuff. I like a plain planner. The online version has a free 30-day trial of the full planner, and if you don’t want that it has a limited free version. I know I like it so I went ahead and signed up for the year subscription. My favorite thing is that I can enter all the lessons/Assignments for the week or month and then print out weekly plans for my kids. I can also print out weekly sheets that tell us everything we did and then put those in a records binder. This is what I did two years ago to make my own records. I will warn you that there is a bit of a learning curve to learn how to assign things well, but it’s worth it. You can also track grades in the program, meal plans, chore charts, and attendance. In fact, it tracks attendance for you as long as you are going in and checking off the daily assignments. For me, this has been the best and most used planner I have tried.

Online Planner- https://shop.wellplannedgal.com/index.php/shop/well-planned-day-online.html

Language Arts

Language Arts was a pretty easy call. As I mentioned my kids have scored high on their language skills so I trust the programs that we have used for years. First and foremost we will be going back to IEW. We used both their Structure and Style and their Fix-it-Grammer programs. Structure and Style is the one thing my kids were not excited about bringing back as the weekly assignments can take a bit of time, but the program is fantastic and we are keeping it. Fix-it-Grammar is also something I have been impressed with for years. They are better at grammar than most adults I know and it doesn’t take very long each day. It’s a simple but very effective program. To round out the Language Arts curriculum we will continue using Wordly Wise for vocabulary, and Spelling Power for spelling. I will be putting an emphasis on read-alouds this year as that was something we let go of for a time last school year, and they, of course, have their own daily individual reading.

IEW- https://iew.com

Wordly Wise- https://www.rainbowresource.com/wordly-wise-3000-all-editions

Spelling Power- https://www.rainbowresource.com/002784.html

Math

Math has been a bit of a tough spot for us for a few years. For most of our homeschool time, we have used Math-U-See. It works great, I have nothing bad to say, but my daughter in particular struggles with math. Some of it is that she hates Math and therefore doesn’t try hard, but some of it is that she needs it explained in different ways. Because it’s difficult for her I have also tried a few online programs. We used Teaching Textbooks, CTC Math, and then Acellus Math. They all work about the same. My son doesn’t struggle with math as much, but he also hasn’t been thrilled with a math program yet. I happened to watch a YouTube video about a week ago talking about Dension Algebra and it sounded wonderful so I ordered it. The thing that really caught my attention is that there is a solutions binder as well as a video for each and every problem he will have. One of his biggest complaints last year was that he would be taught a concept and then have problems that didn’t necessarily line up exactly with that concept. Math is not my strong suit and there were a few times that even I couldn’t help him after watching the instruction video. So, if he gets stuck at all this year there will be a step-by-step how-to for that problem. I also prefer paper and pencil math. He would try to do the online problems in his head instead of using scratch paper and sometimes that would cause him to get a problem wrong that he shouldn’t have. Dension Algebra has instruction videos for each lesson and then solution videos for each problem. This I think is the best compromise for math. It’s still being taught by a math teacher, someone who really understands the concepts, but he has to work the problems out on paper, and if he gets stuck there are numerous help options available to us both. Denison Algebra however only starts at Pre-Algrebra or around eighth grade. Therefore, we cannot do Denison Algebra with my daughter. For her, I decided that we should try something a little different. I have always had them in the same math program but at different levels and I realized that homeschooling is about finding what works for each child. She obviously needs something different. After looking around we decided to try Math Mammoth and if needed/wanted we will add Beast Academy. I have often put a lot of pressure on myself as a homeschool mom, that my kids have to be above average in every single subject. Now, I am starting to look at this like not every child excels in every subject and we do our best to get those children where they need to be. I graduated from public school and barely passed math. I can’t get frustrated with my very artistic child when she doesn’t naturally take to math. My goal for her now is to take it slow, make sure she understands the concepts before moving on, and get her through math.

Denison Algebra- https://www.denisonalgebra.com

Math Mammoth- https://www.mathmammoth.com

Beast Academy- https://beastacademy.com/

Science/History

I am still struggling with both these subjects. I know what I want to do, but I have not found the curriculum. For science, I want to split my kids this year. We have always had them in the same science as a group subject, but they have such different interests and I want my son to be able to get his work done without waiting on his sister. If you haven’t guessed by now I have one child who buckles down and gets his work done, and one who can’t sit still. My son is very science-brained while my daughter is very much an artistic brain. It makes doing everything together a bit of a challenge especially as they get older.

For my son, I am looking for a space-related science program. Even some sort of astronomy unit study. The problem I am facing is that there isn’t really anything geared toward his age/understanding. There are tons of space units for younger children or ones that have basic space facts. He knows more about space than I could ever hope to. We have taken him and let him talk to scientists and they are always amazed at his understanding of space and what he talks about. So, I need something more challenging but also I don’t know that he is ready for something like a high school level course. He also wants to know things about black holes, or other topics that there simply isn’t as much information on as the planets for example. I did order him a few textbook-type books from BookOutlet and I may have him read those and report back to me. I think this is very much going to be a piece-and-go year for us and science. I will have him watch any documentary I can find, use NASA’s, and anything else that comes our way. I am still hopeful that I will find a good program for him soon, but he will learn either way.

For my daughter, she is very into animals, so I am looking for a Biology unit for her. She doesn’t want to do human biology, only animal biology. Again, the problem we face is that we have studied biology and she knows quite a bit. I would love to find something that dives a little deeper into things. For her, I am leaning more toward unit studies so she can study a topic in-depth and then move on to a new one. I will find something this week and print it off for next week. I am not too worried about timing since we take the first couple of weeks pretty slowly anyway.

For History, I am planning on studying American History as a group subject. I am splitting them for science but I think History is still something we can do together. I had a plan to use these great American History books we’ve had for years, but I can’t find them. We moved and I thought they moved with us, but I have no idea where they ended up. It was actually stuff we got from BookShark years ago that we haven’t used yet. If I can’t find them soon I will have to find another avenue to go down. I have looked into programs like the Tuttle Twins, Notgrass History, and what we have used in the past Story of the World but I am not sure what direction we will take yet. Again this is a subject that I wasn’t planning on adding until week two or three so I have a bit of time. We also have been homeschooling for quite a while, so we have all kinds of books and encyclopedias to get us started while we wait.

Reading

I always have a giant list of books I want everyone to read in my head. Don’t all homeschool moms? Last year I more or less let them pick the books they wanted to read and then asked them to read 20-30 mins a day. This ended up not being enough. My daughter also started a ton of books but didn’t finish very many. With everything that happened last year personally, It wasn’t something I really fought. This year however we are going to fix that. I plan on assigning them one book a month and then letting them pick one. For our first set of books I simply took the number of pages, decided if I wanted them to take one or two weeks to read it, divided the pages by the days I wanted it done in, and then assigned them the reading. I haven’t made the list for our entire year but I have quite a few picked out……….

Read Aloud– Howl’s Moving Castle, Wild Robot Series, The Girl Who Drank the Moon, The War that Saved My Life, The Trumpet of the Swan, and a few more yet to be decided.

Son– Glitch, Artemis Fowl, Green Ember, FableHaven, Northwind, Stowaway, Last Day on Mars, and others

Daughter– Stuart Little, Sweet Home Alaska, Caddie Woodlawn, The Penderwicks, Princess Academy, Aggie Morton, and others

I like to leave room to change my mind as I find new books all the time, but also have a plan for quite a few required readings for the year. There are always so many amazing books out there that it’s hard to choose a few for the school year.

Final Thoughts

As always I am very hopeful that the choices we made for the year are good ones. Other than that I know that our attitudes will be the make-or-break aspect of our entire year. I am trying to let go of the pressure to be perfect and instead enjoy this time that I have been given.

Audio Books and Christmas Presents

~ wattlesandcombsfarm ~ Leave a comment

My last post was on our switch to Kindle e-readers and now I want to talk about audiobook options. My daughter is going through a big audiobook phase and wants to have one available at all times. I don’t love having her take my phone constantly, that’s where audible is, so I started looking for other options. One option is the Kindle. You can get audible on a Kindle but I haven’t really loved this as an actual solution. My biggest complaint is the Kindle will only work with Bluetooth headphones. It has a charger port just like my phone, that my phone will take headphones in, but the Kindle won’t. I don’t want everything we listen to to be on Bluetooth, so this ruins the Kindle for me as an audiobook option for her.

A second very simple option and one we use often is a Bluetooth speaker and my phone or computer. This works great and she can take it to her room and listen but again I am not a fan of her having my phone all the time or using it for sleep sounds and my phone dying. I have a friend who got her kids old iPods and using the library to put rented audiobooks on them, but the library is changing formats and that isn’t working for them anymore either.

So, this leads me to her Christmas present and what I hope ends up being the perfect solution for us. I ordered her a Yoto player. https://us.yotoplay.com/. It’s an audio player that has no screen and no access to the internet. You buy the books on yoto cards and they insert into the player and play the book. She wanted the larger one which also works as an alarm clock, plays kid-friendly podcasts, and sleep sounds. I also went ahead and grabbed one for my four-year-old nephew as it’s perfect for little kids as well. It even has an alarm clock mode where the light will stay red until it’s an acceptable time for them to get out of bed. That is something I wanted when my kids were smaller. The Yoto cards do get a little pricey, but they have a Yoto Club membership that will help with the expense. It’s pretty similar to what you would pay for an audible subscription. If you are going to order one go ahead and sign up for the Yoto Club because you get 10% off of your orders and free shipping.

Since this is her Christmas present we haven’t opened it yet and got to play around with it. I can’t say for sure this is going to be what we want it to be, but I am very hopeful this is going to be a good solution. I definitely think it’s worth looking into if you are looking for an internet-free and screen-free option for audiobooks for your kids. I will update here as soon as we have used it a bit.

Kindle E-Reader

~ wattlesandcombsfarm ~ Leave a comment

I know, I know! As homeschool moms and book readers, we prefer physical books that we can have on shelves all over the house. Books everywhere! I was the same way. My home library was quite large, and I was proud of all the amazing books I had available for my kids to read. However, we’ve recently made a change that we love and I think it might be worth considering in your own home.

We have switched over to mostly Kindle reading or e-books. I have had a Kindle for years and have switched back and forth between it and physical books many times. Currently, it has become my go-to for one very specific reason. I can adjust the text size on my Kindle. I have had glasses since 9th grade and as I’ve gotten older I have been told I need readers. My eyes are pretty sensitive and I have found myself straining, even with readers, to read the tiny words that some books have. My Kindle has helped this problem so much. It’s super simple to adjust the text size all you do is pinch and move your fingers like you’re zooming in on your phone. My kids tease me about how large my font is, but my eyes are sure thanking me. I also really just enjoy reading on the Kindle. Somehow it makes it feel like the books go faster and I have read so many more books in the past two months than I did the whole previous year because I finally picked my Kindle back up. The Kindle also has a backlight on it and I’ve been getting a good chunk of my reading done at night comfy in bed. I love it and I have now switched my children to a Kindle as well.

Kindle Kids

Back in October when Amazon had its most recent Prime Day I picked up a Kindle kids for my kids to share. When on sale, the Kindle kids is a great option. The Kindle comes with a case and a full year of Kindle kids, which is basically Kindle Unlimited but for children’s books. Both series that we were reading were available on that subscription for free. It has been wonderful. They can take the Kindle in the car, to sports practice, in the bath, to bed, basically anywhere, and read. I have seen them read so much more than when they had to carry a physical book around. Not to mention the ease with which we can get a book. For example, my oldest is currently reading through the Harry Potter series. We own two different copies of this series. One of them is older and the cover was starting to fall apart as he read it, the other is the large illustrated version, which isn’t very easy to carry around and read. We tried borrowing a copy from the library and that also was old and falling apart. So, the Kindle came in, and we downloaded his book, and he was able to read it without worrying about his book falling apart. As soon as he has finished a book the next is readily available to download and read. My younger child was also able to get the Warriors series which our closest library didn’t have in stock and has started reading that. As of now, I have no complaints, except that the kids have only one Kindle to share. So, for Christmas, I bought another and now they will each have one. On top of the kid’s Kindle I also grabbed myself a new one for Christmas. It doesn’t come with a cover or a subscription like the kids ones, but my old Kindle was going on about 8 years old and had a few cracks in the screen. I forced myself to put it under the tree but I can’t wait to open it up and use it.

Decluttering

Another benefit of the Kindle, and the reason I started thinking about them in the first place, is my ability to clear out the house a little. As I mentioned earlier we had quite a large amount of books in our home. I love books and I loved having them on the shelves, but in reality, they were taking up a lot of space. We had books that I bought years ago because I found a good deal and I was really hoping to get to, but they were still sitting on the shelf unread. So, I cleared out a ton of our books. In fact, I did this while I went through a rather large decluttering of the whole house. I kept the books we have read and loved and a few others that I felt were worthy of keeping, but I got rid of probably 80 percent of our physical books. If it gets to a point where I want to read some of the ones we decluttered we have the library or our Kindle subscriptions. Im really happy with the switch we made and the kids seem to love it as well.

Where to get books

If you switch to a Kindle you do not have to buy e-books or a Kindle subscription. If you have a library card you can borrow e-books from the library for free. My library links directly to Amazon and sends them straight to my Kindle. There is also the Libby app, which I don’t have so I can’t say a lot about it, but I’ve heard from tons of people that it’s great. I have recently bought myself a Kindle Unlimited subscription because it went on sale and has quite a few of the books I like to read, but be aware Kindle Unlimited doesn’t always have the most popular books. There is also a website called BookBub that you can tell your preferences to and you get daily emails with deals on e-books from your favorite categories. Most of those are around $2-$3. It’s not quite as fun as getting a box of books in the mail but you can get the book you are waiting on much faster and often times cheaper. I’m sure there are many other options but those are the ones I use.

Lastly, you can get audiobooks on your Kindle. You can listen via Bluetooth from your Kindle, no wired headphones, which I don’t love, but it is an option. The Kindle kids subscription has a few available with it, not really popular ones, but still an option. I will probably keep up with our audible since that’s where the books we want are, but it is another benefit of the Kindle.