9th Grade Add-Ons and Deletes

Language Arts: I'm still looking for a spelling curriculum for Miss Green to review. I haven't had time to really research it yet though, so I'm putting it on hold. English is going great, though I need to add in the tests. She really likes tests, oddly enough.

History: She finally admitted she needs something more in depth than Mystery of History. I'm going to have her start History of the Ancient World. I think it will go well for her. 

Latin: I can't believe how well First Form Latin is going for all of them. I'm absolutely thrilled! 

Logic: She's enjoying Fallacy Detective, but again she wants tests to do. The Bluedorns offer a test, but it covers the whole book. I have recently discovered Quizlet and am loving it. Others have uploaded the lessons and you can print tests for each lesson there. I think this will work perfectly for her, especially since she likes to study on Quizlet. They even have an iOS app, so we have it on everyone's iPods. You don't have to be online to use it, as long as you load the lesson while online. Then you can use it anywhere. 

Everything else is going well. I think she's finally happy in her schooling, for the first time in, well forever. We have settled into a nice routine working with one another. It's nice to be able to have a less hostile relationship. I think a lot of this may stem from allowing her a little more choice in choosing curricula. I choose the subjects and then give her a variety of choices to work on that subject. It makes it easier for her to accept when I say we have to do something and why, since she has had a say in much of her schooling. 

Miss Green Starts High School. Ack!

I have been worrying about high school for years, but now that its here, I'm not worried. I had planned a more challenging year, a la Well Trained Mind, but she needs a different pace and that's fine.

Math: She has been asking for Teaching Textbooks Algebra for quite a while, and I finally found it for the right price on Homeschool Classifieds.  I'm so happy we did. She is loving it! This is working so well, I hate to say anything to jinx it.

Language Arts: I decided to give Rod and Staff another try for her and purchased Preparing for Usefulness. I was a mean mom when it came in the mail and teased her about how much she was going to love what was in the package. When she opened it, she literally cried. I felt horrible, but she's starting to come around a little. She has asked to start doing the tests, so I plan on starting them this week. She really learns more if she knows there's a test coming. I also need to get the next level of Vocabulary from Classical Roots, but I've dropped the ball. She also asked to get a spelling curriculum to review, but I don't know what to get yet. I had her do the Sequential Spelling placement test, and she only missed one in the uppermost level. I'd love suggestions!

History: She asked to use Mystery of History 1 instead of Susan Wise Bauer's History of the Ancient World. I've decided to roll with it, since she's planning to beef it up and write weekly papers. We'll see how that goes.

Science: I had planned on using Apologia's Biology, and when I found out our local homeschool group was having a science co-op using the same, it was a lock. Miss Green wasn't so sure about it, but she is loving it! Well, she loved it up to the Chemistry module. Hopefully it will go back to loving it now that we're done with that module. I bought her the audio as well, and it helps tremendously to get it done in the car.

Latin: She is doing First Form Latin with Mr. Blue and Miss Pink.

Logic: Together, we settled on Fallacy Detective combined with the Art of Argument. She really likes Fallacy Detective, but she doesn't think she's retaining what she learned. She liked the look of Art of Argument, so we'll try adding that in.

Rhetoric: This past year she discovered Public Speaking and fell in love. She won the county 4-H competition and went to state where she got the highest honors possible at her level. She wants to start a speech and debate club and really wants to develop her public speaking skills. She likes the look of Argument Builder, and we both think it will help develop her speech writing.

Art: Drawing on the Right Side of the Brain in our little co-op.

Electives: She has asked if she can independently study Soil & Water Conservation. I'm excited to see what she comes up with!

Algebra, here we come!

We certainly did a shortened day, but since we missed so much time with the baby we have to be diligent.

We did have an amazing, wonderful thing happen today. Miss Green has always been math phobic to say the least. She has resisted my teaching on anything related to math. I had decided though to switch her to Teaching Textbooks next year, since its something the younger ones will be able to use as well unlike Aleks which is a subscription. I printed out the 7th grade placement test last week, and to my great surprise she said it was too easy. She asked to have the next test to take. So, I printed the Pre-Algebra test. She did great on it! She missed a few questions, but was still passing. So, she wanted the Algebra test. That was more challenging, but after I had her do 2 sample lessons of Algebra, I made the executive decision to order Algebra 1 for her. I can not believe how excited she is about it. She called Grammy to share how thrilled she was. So, it looks like I'll be placing a Timberdoodle order soon.

Miss Pink this year, 3rd grade or so, wrote in her binder today "gnirob si htam." I think she's tired of working on clocks and time. I'll have to fast forward her to the next lesson in Math Mammoth 3A. So, here's her work for this year.

The aforementioned Math Mammoth. I don't think I've mentioned that I bought all levels of Math Mammoth when Homeschool Buyer's Co-op had it offered. It was one of my best purchases yet. It's really nice to be able to print out remedial things for any of them to complement their other math programs. Just this year we've switched over to using it as our core instead of a supplement.

First Language Lessons 3

I just can't say enough good about this program. My kids especially love the poetry memorization. I love it even more that I've got the pdf for the workbook. It makes it so easy to file.

Writing With Ease 2

This one we may skip part of to move up to 3. I'm still undecided. She's doing quite well with it so far. I have the pdf for the student pages on this one too. It makes it super easy to replace anything that goes missing in the course of the week.

So, that's her core. She also has the subjects we do as a group, which will come later.

Major breakthrough!

I'm reading The Well-Trained Mind yet again, but I was forced to take a break when it fell apart. I've since rubber cemented it, and am waiting, ever so patiently to crack it back open. While I was reading the science section for the elementary grades, I once again was motivated to "do narrations." After reading from the Apologia Anatomy book I had each one tell me what they remembered. Then we pulled out the paper and they drew something to go along with it. I wrote their narrations all on one page for them to copy, but they all ended up writing a lot more to go with their illustrations. I really can see how much more they learned using the narration method. They also made sure to pull them out to show Daddy when he got home. They don't usually want to share what they've done and only will under duress. For them to be anxious to share is a huge accomplishment. I'm looking forward to doing more for history and science.

Filing has worked surprisingly well for us. Every Sunday evening we pull out the file and put our papers in our respective binders. I've been slowing adding things to the files as we go, and we've abandoned some things that I to put in their own special file for a later date.

So, for Miss Green, now an 8th grader, we've got a short line-up. I'm still tweaking what she needs, and while we do that we're keeping it simple.

English in Blue and White.

She really, really likes this one, and insists its the best grammar program she's ever done. It was written by two 8th grade teacher's to make sure their students knew what they needed for high school.

Vocabulary From Classical Roots C

She completed the A book rather reluctantly, but after about a month off has attacked this one voraciously. I think she's realized that its fun to learn finally.

Vocabulary Cartoons

This one is quite enjoyable to flip through. I've learned a few new words.

Aleks

This is one of the few maths she's like thus far. I'm not sure what she likes about it, but she's learning, enjoying learning, and gaining confidence.

Writing With Skill

We just started this today, but I can already tell we're going to adore it. She never did Writing With Ease, but I've loved it with the younger ones.

5th grade plans

So, we're here at the end of the year, but we're going to have to work through the summer to catch up. I'm still trying to figure out what we're doing for her this year, and it helps me so much to write it down. So, here we go...

Math: Math U See Epsilon and Life of Fred Fractions. She loves Life Of Fred, but when she picked up Epsilon last week she told me she liked to do both of them. Epsilon she says explains some things better. So, at her request we're doing both.

Science: Apologia Elementary Astronomy with the 2nd and 3rd grader

History: Story of the World 3 with her brother and sister, along with accompanying reading from the library. We're also managing to do some projects this time. Woo-hoo!

Language: I just ordered Language Arts Through Literature for her yesterday. She really enjoyed the orange one, but I wanted to try something else. Well, we're going to go back to LLATL for this year.

Spelling: Spelling Workout G and H

Latin: Latina Christiana I We've worked through Prima Latina and part of LCI already. However, we need to review the first half of the book, which we're doing now. Then we'll move on to new stuff.

Classical Studies: D'Aulaire's Greek Myths and Study Guide from Memoria Press

Bible for Children I: Just starting this, but the three oldest are doing it together.

Music: Themes to Remember, accompanying books, piano lessons twice a week

Art: We go to art lessons with the sweetest woman. She doesn't charge us anything, not even for the supplies. We meet another family of 5 there as well. It's great fun.

So, that's our year!