Slowly but Surely.......

We started our school year for 2015-2016 a little late this year.  We normally begin at the beginning of August.....but didn't begin fully until the beginning of September.  We have officially started 9th, 7th, and 4th grades!

Murrayshire is settled in now and our Co-op we joined is turning out to be a huge hit for us all!

I have updated my NC State History Page reflecting our year with our Co-op.  I am teaching this class to six children and it has been a blast so far!  On my page, you will see lots of schedules, printouts, links, suggestions, and pictures!  Hope it helps you in your state study!
I'll continue adding to it throughout the year!

At home, we are all in a World Geography Year.... I will update school year photos and our yearly line ups soon.  I only have Flower's school year noted on the 2015-2016 Page.
I will get to Bambi and Thumpers soon!

Our Review of Fix It Grammar

Bambi just finished up Week 8 of The Nose Tree, Fix It Grammar by IEW.  She absolutely loves it!  Already I can see the editing skills rolling into her writing.  We are using IEW Medieval themed writing this year and with now using Fix it, it just seems complete.  As of now, I don't foresee us going back to Analytical Grammar with Bambi.

Scheduling is so simple.  Checking work is so simple.  Along with the workbook that my child writes in, I also have her keep a 3-ring binder to store the vocabulary words and correctly rewritten sentences that eventually turns into a story.

New Week:  Days 1-4:

• Go over the new material called Learn it.

• Cut out any grammar cards.  Read over any you already have for review.

• Student reads the sentence, looks up vocabulary word, writes the best choice                               definition on how the word is used in the sentence, add it to the vocabulary                                 list in the back of 3 ring binder.

• Re-read the sentence, fix and mark the passage. Complete the rewrite after Mom checks for errors.

• Done!

I usually do Day 1 along with Bambi.  After Day 1, she completes it on her own and I check once she is completed.  Working so far and no complaining!
                                     
Flower is almost completed with the Shakespeare themed Analytical Grammar high school practice book.  I may have her take a short break after she completes that and give her the placement for Fix it to see where she falls.  I'm assuming she may place in book 2 of Fix it.

Borax Ornaments & Such....

I've been updating Thumper's Science Page, ES Grammar Bio, and it got me thinking that I never posted our ornaments that we made this year for our Christmas Tree. ( We got the idea from the Logic Stage Chemistry book).

I didn't post ANY pictures of us doing festive activities.  I guess it's not too late!  We volunteered at the Ronald McDonald House this past December and baked cookies for the guests staying there.  We baked & created A LOT at home....cookies, homemade marshmallows, rum cake, gingerbread houses, etc!  We usually always make a Christmas ornament for our tree.  This year we stole the idea from the lab in Elemental Science's Chemistry that Flower did for an assignment.  We started making all sorts of Christmas figures out of pipe cleaners, made the Borax solution, waited 24 hrs, and we had beautiful crystal-like ornaments!

Analytical Grammar to IEW's Fix It Grammar!!

So.... Flower used and is still using Analytical Grammar with much success!  Bambi used Jr. AG last year for 5th grade and did absolutely fine.  We just started using AG at the beginning of January with her and she is just not meshing well with it.  I don't want her to struggle with grammar because it isn't her cup of tea anyway!  So.......
Our plan as of now is to abandon AG Season 1 for now...... pick up IEW's Fix It Grammar for the rest of the year, The Nose Tree book 1.  We'll see how it goes and I'll keep you posted.  We can always jump into AG next school year if things don't work out with Fix It Grammar!

5 Months of Neglect!!

So I haven't posted in 5 months!  I have said before that I'm not an avid poster.  It is just hard for me to find the time.  But I'll get on it soon!  We have been working on Elemental Science experiments and will update the pages for that.  We are all getting ready to start Human Body together in February for 10 weeks.  I have enjoyed the easy going-ness of science this year!

Our 2014-2015 Photo!

Off to a Goofy Start!

Spanish

We have decided to use Getting Started with Spanish this year.  I bought it last year and we never got around to using it.  We will do this together as a family 3-4 evenings a week.  So we have to turn off the phones, computers, & tv's to get this done!  So for our first week of school we have gotten through Lessons 1-6.  They are pretty short & sweet but I am assuming it will ramp up by mid year.
We got each child a workbook to use as well so they can practice more spanish terms.  I am ordering the Easy Spanish Phrase Book from Amazon as a quick reference tool.

I am excited to do this with my family!  I feel like we will all learn more & quicker as a team!

Each of us keep notes for each lesson to study on days we don't have Spanish.

Getting Started With Spanish  is full of free Mp3 download files to listen to the author, a native speaker, pronounce all the exercises for you. This may be extremely useful when we get deeper into the book.

I am not sure why this picture is uploading in a different position, but I'll add a link from Amazon so you can see it better.  

Spanish Elementary

Spanish Middle/High School

Both by Carson Delosa

The Complete Book of Spanish Grades 1-3

Some other resources that I will throw in this year are Salsa videos and Discovery Education's Elementary Spanish videos.  You can see these links on the right hand side of the blog under a "Handy" column.

Flower's First Week of School!

Flower's Transition Year in Motion!!

As I have mentioned on our 2014-2015 Page, Flower is going to do another year before High School.  I'm calling this year her Transition Year.  This will leave her to graduate high school at 18 years old instead of 17 years.  She is excited to have one more year before we are really crossing our t's and dotting our i's.  

I have let Flower choose certain topics to study this year.  She loves history and wanted to go back to the Middle Ages-Renaissance era.  She also wanted to learn more about our government and civics topics. 

In science, she felt she needed to spend more time on chemistry and human body/health.

She loves to read and LOVED The Hobbit last year!  This year she picked Literary Lessons from The Lord of the Rings for her literature study.  Inside this LOTR study, she will also learn about Arthurian legends, like Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, Beowulf, and ancient epics like The Illiad, The Odyssey, and The Aenied.  She will discover the world of Tolkien and explore Middle Earth!  I'm going along with her as well!

The month of August is the time where we will ease back into our structured days.  We are only schooling 4 days a week through August giving us our Fridays free to hang out with friends and enjoy the rest of the warm days of summer! 

 During this month, Flower is going to be using Saxon Algebra I, Lord of the Rings, Analytical Grammar's high school reinforcement book (she is using the Shakespeare one), IEW's Continuation Course Level B, Health, Guitar lessons, and Spanish.  We will start her other subjects in September!

Though we have a classroom, Flower prefers to work at her desk in her bedroom.  She seems to focus there away from everyone.