Wordless Wednesday--November 9, 2011

Ozzy's choice for breakfast reading: the American Physical Society Newsletter

Standards and Grade Levels

Kindergarten isn't mandatory in California, so last year, which would have been Ozzy's kindergarten year, we didn't file an affidavit with the state or register with a charter school. I researched curricula and settled on a plan, then we implemented it. I didn't worry much about how he compared to public school kids, though I did try to pay extra attention whenever friends with kids in school mentioned what their kids were required to do, in an effort to make sure we didn't miss anything important. This year, having registered both goblins--Ozzy for first, Sofie for kindergarten*--with a charter school just to take advantage of the funds available for curricula and activities, I'm required to fill out a form throughout the year, indicating when they reach certain milestones in various subjects. I sat down with it at the beginning of the school year in August, and checked every.single.box. Everything Ozzy was supposed to be able to do by the end of first grade, he'd been doing for months. In fact, Sofie, at 4.5, was halfway through the list herself, and every box on her kindergarten form was checked.

Keeping up

Another question we're frequently asked about homeschooling is whether we plan to keep ahead or even just keep up with the goblins in each subject we cover--i.e. do we plan to keep our knowledge of each subject ahead of or at least equal to the goblins' progress? This question comes up frequently in homeschooling groups or forums as well, and I'm continually surprised by how many respond that they don't feel any need to stay ahead or keep up after a certain point, often the beginning of the high school years. This seems to come up most often in regard to math, and many parents (but not most) freely admit that their children have surpassed them so they just buy the textbooks and leave the kids to it.

Kindergarten Curriculum

With Sofie having a just a few weeks left of kindergarten penmanship and having started first grade in all other subjects, this seems like a good time to write about what worked and didn't work for us for kindergarten. Our main foci in kindergarten are reading, penmanship and early math, balanced by a picture book tour of ancient history, lots of projects, and playtime. The goblins took very different amounts of time to do kindergarten due to starting at different ages, which I'll discuss in another post. I'll do a set of curriculum review posts soon, as well, with more details and descriptions of how we used the materials, if our methods differed from the recommended ones.

Weekly Lesson Schedule--Fall Quarter 2011

Note: We homeschool year-round and don't use a quarter or semester system for our homeschooling, but Brandon and I are both undergraduates (for physics and math, respectively), so our own schedules change with each quarter and the homeschooling schedule is adjusted accordingly.


I think I've finished revising our weekly lesson schedules, at least for a little while. B and I start back to school ourselves on the 21st, so things could be in flux for a bit as we adjust. I've scheduled the goblins' lessons around my class times, but if there ends up being some reason that the homework schedule I anticipate for myself will need to be changed, I can shift theirs around as well.

Long-Term Plans

One of the first questions people ask when we say we're homeschooling is "How long are you planning to do that?" We've always planned to homeschool through at least middle school, but we weren't sure how we would proceed after that. Many homeschoolers that continue through high school enroll their kids in classes at community colleges, which I myself did when I was in high school. Having gone that route myself, however, I'm unconvinced that it's the best option for my own children.

Fall '11/Spring '12 Curricula

I've been meaning to make a list of what we're using this year, and I've had questions asked on occasion so posting seems the most efficient option. As it stands now, Oscar (6) is finishing up first grade in a few subjects and working on second in others. He's using: