Homeschool Curriculum Update

Well, our school year will "officially" begin on Thursday, August 16 (in solidarity with the local schools - upon Rebekah's request).  That being said, we have a few more days to "goof off" so I'm taking a little time today to try and give you a quick review of what we have in store for this year. I've stock-piled a hodge-podge of resources I hope to use.  I think I'll break things down by subject.  (For the record, Rebekah is entering 2nd grade and Samuel is entering Kindergarten.)  Enjoy all the links!

READING

Samuel is doing little phonics books from Catholic Heritage Curricula (CHC) called Little Stories for Little Folks.  The program starts at the VERY beginning with alphabet cards and detailed instructions.  Fortunately, Samuel already knows all his letters and sounds from preschool last year, so we worked on blends a little bit and then jumped in with the little readers.  He is on his second book and so far we like it.  Tom saved his sister from the hot pot and Nan and Pat sat at Mass.  Good lessons so far :)

Also from CHC, Rebekah is reading Devotional Stories for Little Folks and both she and I really like it.  She reads a short selection each day and then I have her orally answer the questions.  As the title suggests, lots of good moral things go on in these stories.  There is a second book to this, Devotional Stories for Little Folks, Too, and then Bigger Stories for Little Folks, so we can enjoy these for a while.  I'm also having her read at least one other book (preferably a chapter book) per week.  I am also having her read a certain amount of younger-kid books out loud to her brothers.  I think this is very good practice and she seems to enjoy it.

RELIGION

A friend of mine had religion books from the Seton Home Study program.  Religion 1 for Young Catholics is for Samuel and Religion 2 for Young Catholics is for Rebekah.  They are not my favorite, but I cannot seem to find something I REALLY LIKE, so we are doing the Seton.  Pros to the Seton study are that it seems thorough, yet easy to understand and I like the review pages at the end of each lesson and how they use the question and answer format (and perhaps the exact same wording - if I'm not mistaken) of the Baltimore Catechism.  I wish there were some additional sheets for coloring or drawing or SOMETHING for them to interact with, but I'm supplementing with what I can find and it seems to be going ok.  There are A LOT of materials available at the blogs Catholic Icing and The Catholic Toolbox. I guess most of our subjects will have a "religious flair" as our faith colors everything else.  I'm also planning to do some extra study with Rebekah since it is her First Reconciliation and First Communion year.  We have lots of little books to go through several times so she can familiarize herself with the sacraments she will be receiving.  Some of the titles are The Mass Book for Children, Child's Guide to First Holy Communion, The Holy Eucharist, The Sacrament of Reconciliation,  Living the Ten Commandments, Beatitudes for Children, and  Little Acts of Grace.

SCRIPTURE

I really like A-Z Memory Verses from CHC.  The worksheets are perfect level for Rebekah and the verses are short enough that Samuel can get them, too.
I also found My ABC Bible Verses: Hiding God's Word in Little Hearts and it looks promising.  Unfortunately I bought it originally on my kindle (what was I thinking?) and it is one of the older, more basic kindles - no color, smaller screen, etc, so I will have to make up some sort of work-sheets for the kids to see/color, or I will have to break down and purchase the actual book if I want to read it to them and just show them the pictures.  (My kids really dig books with pictures - even just simple little pictures like this one has.)

MATH

Math from the Catholic curriculum companies seemed pricey and while I believe God is in everything and all subjects should be taught in a Christian point of view, I think Math (at a basic level at least) might be the exception.  It is pretty straight-forward for a while.  So I read several reviews on Amazon and decided on some consumable books from Spectrum.  I went ahead and purchased the Kindergarten, 1st, and 2nd grade levels. I feel fairly confident Samuel will make it into the 1st grade level before the year is out.  On suggestion from a friend, I tore the books apart (as the pages are made to tear out anyhow) and put them in page protectors in a 3-ring-binder.  I have the kids do them with dry erase markers.  Then, every page or two I "check them" and have them erase.  This way they can be used for multiple children.  And so far the kids seem to like them a lot.

SPELLING

I liked the spelling books from CHC, so I got My Catholic Speller, Level A for Rebekah (as that is the "second-grade" book), but we had to skip several chapters in before we got to words that challenged her.  I like the words and the worksheets that go with them.  I also pulled this book apart like the math books, so I can use it for the other kiddos, too.

ENGLISH

CHC's English book, Language of God, Level A, for Rebekah, looks good to me.  She has done some of it and seems to like it.  I like that it is of course, very Christian, and it has lots of writing practice (such as answering simple questions in complete sentences).  It seems the perfect level for Rebekah, too, so that is a bonus.

SCIENCE

I got CHC's suggested second-grade science book, Behold and See: More Science with Josh and Hannah, even though we did not do the previous "first-grade" science book.  If we like this one, we might get the previous one for Samuel to do next year.  But I'm not sure if I want to individualize science like this or try a topical, whole-family approach.  We shall see.

I wanted some easy science experiments to do with all the kids to keep science interesting.  After reading several reviews on Amazon, I picked Science is Simple.
I'm also hoping to work through My Body with all the kiddos.  I gleaned it from a fellow homeschool blog and it looks really cool.

A friend also lent me Science 1 for Young Catholics (from Seton Home Study) so I am reading that to Samuel (and often the whole family) but it is definitely older and quite basic.  It also has no interactive part to it.  I'm not overly impressed with it, but it is something!

SPANISH

I have heard that second grade is the ideal grad for introducing a second language, so Rebekah is following the program, Learn Spanish with Grace. So far it is a lot of fun.  It comes with a cd that is MOST helpful as I took some Spanish is high school, but I'm sure my pronunciation is far from "acceptable."  Grace is the daughter and her mother is the teacher.

HANDWRITING

Rebekah is beginning cursive, even though it might be a bit early.  She is interested.  So I just found a workbook for her on amazon.  Nothing too exciting, but it works.

I found great letter tracing pages at either The Catholic Toolbox or Catholic Icing.  Unfortunately I cannot find them now to give you a direct link.  Sorry :(  At the time I saved them to my computer and just recently printed the Alphabet ones out for Samuel.  There are also pages with Saint quotes, prayers, names for Jesus, the Sacraments, and more, even some in cursive, that I printed for Rebekah.

MUSIC

For music, we use a homemade cd the boys got at preschool last year.  It is really awesome as they are action songs and the boys know them well.  We also have some of the muisc cds from the Signing Time Series that allow us to sing and sign along.  I also have Wee Sing Bible Songs and some other Sunday School Song cds that I cannot find on amazon to link to at this time.

ART

I purchased the preschool curriculum from Catholic Icing last year and never really got to it.  I hope to use it for our "art projects" this year.  It looks promising.

We also have The Big Book of Catholic Customs and Traditions and it has lots of crafty things to do that will follow the calendar and I am real excited about those.

IN ADDITION
We are getting ready to take a trip to Colorado for a family wedding.  I thought taking some special "activity books" along would be a good idea to help the kids keep busy.  I did not want to take our regular school books for fear they might be lost or damaged.  So I purchased some Kummon workbooks for the trip and I have to say the kids really like them!  Unfortunately, the Kummon books do not have tear out pages, so using them as consumables (which is what they are) is really the only option.  With that said, they are a fairly reasonable price, so I can't really complain.  So far we have My First Book of Mazes (for Samuel), Word Problems (for Rebekah), Easy Mazes (for Jacob),  My First Book of Upper Case Letters (for Jacob), and My First Book of Tracing (for Jacob).

I should point out that Jacob (who is turning four in about a week) is doing a "home-based" preschool.   The teacher comes to our house once a week for a little over an hour. The materials (which they provide) will all stay here at the house so I can do "the routine" with him on the other days of the week (I get to participate when she is here, also - it is a really great program). So I did not actively search for additional materials to work through with him. However, the other day he seemed a little left-out so I started his tracing book with him and HE LOVED IT! A lot of my friends have had good success with Kummon books, as well.

One final note.  As you may have noticed, a lot of my materials come from Catholic Heritage Curricula (CHC).  Mostly that is because I like them best, but it helps that they have a page on their website called The Book Nook and Bargain Basement.  It has books that are out-of-print or damaged or what-not and sells them cheaper.  I found several bargains there and they all were most acceptable to me, at much more affordable prices.

Well, there you have it!  I apologize in advance if one of my links is wrong.  There are A LOT of links in this post! I will try to check and update if I get a chance.  Now, all we have to do is get started!!  :)