Home-Schooling Mama: 1st Quarter Thoughts

Okay, I've tried some new things this year, and I already have some pretty solid opinions and thoughts.

In no particular order:

1. Don't waste your money on Wordly Wise 3000 Grade 1. I bought this workbook and looked at the 'sneak peek' online. It looked perfect! I normally read reviews, but I had already read reviews on the other grade levels and figured it would be the same. Lesson learned: ALWAYS read reviews . . . for EVERY item. Here, the workbook has to be used with a teacher's guide. It did not state that on the website I was on. Usually it has at the bottom, "People who looked at this also looked at that." Or something like that. Well, no big deal. Order a teacher's guide, right?!? WRONG!! The teacher's guides are only on websites like Ebay and are going for just under $200. My assumption is that they're no longer in print. So why would a bookstore sell a workbook that you can't use?? Good question. Still don't know the answer to that. So we're struggling through Wordly Wise for my 1st grader. But 2nd -4th are great!!

2. Teacher Time / Self Study (a tutoring method I came up with) is working really well! This is our best year yet!!! I have had no, I repeat no, complaining about having to do school. No moaning. No 'aawwWWwww'. Zilch. The kids love it. And I love it. Makes our days go much smoother. In fact, my kids get up early some mornings and are asking to start school at 6am.

3. Unit study is the way for us! We are almost done with our Science Unit. The kids love it. We do it daily. I think it's their most favorite subject. Next up is Geography, then History and lastly Health. For Language Arts, our first quarter we did Spelling everyday. Three kids completed a level. One kid came close. Now we are doing Vocabulary. And the last unit will be Phonics. Grammar, Reading and Writing are our all year subjects in that category. Anyway, Unit Study = success!

4. Harder subjects in the first quarter. Since we are doing a lot of unit studies this year, it made this method easy. I scheduled it where all our 'tougher' subjects were done (or started) in the first quarter. Then as time goes on, they drop out one by one and are replaced with an easier subject. We worked our behinds off in quarter 1, but it has made quarter 2 seems so much easier so far. Hopefully that trend will continue to the end.

5. Because the harder subjects are over (or almost over) we were able to add some fun electives in for the rest of the school year. My oldest is doing Piano and Typing. My oldest middle is doing Typing and will be adding Art on soon. And the second to youngest is doing Typing.

6. I can never get enough of Astronomy. And luckily for them, neither can my kids.

7. Science projects can be fun! Every year I've avoided Science experiments like the plague. My kids love them. Maybe that's because they didn't have to gather materials, read through directions to make sure they understood, take the time to prep, etc. Don't get me wrong, I enjoy watching experiments just as much as the next person. Mythbusters is a favorite show of mine. But I always hated doing them. Well, Exploring Creation with Astronomy has healed me of that. I love doing the experiments with the kids. Just take a look at all my Astronomy posts. Point proven. ;) It probably also helps if you're interested in the topic. Anyway, Science is fun this year.

8. I'm so proud of my 6th grader. He struggles in Language Arts. I mean really struggles. But he worked his tail off this past quarter and got a 4.0 GPA. Yep, All A's. Congrats Kaidin!!!

Here are a few end of quarter pictures: