I feel like we had a really productive and postive school year this year! Mercie finished the 8th grade, Silas finished 6th grade, and Titus finished 4th grade. A few things I was reflecting on from this school year:
We didn't curriculum hop!
This is a big one! If you've read my blog for any length of time, you'll know that I usually get the 'grass is greener' syndrome when it comes to curriculum. I pretty much made a resolution that this year I would not change anything unless it was absolutely necessary. The only thing we really changed up was our language arts. We started out with Rod and Staff grammar and quickly remembered why we changed it up so many years ago! We also dropped Drawn into the Heart of Reading and I just let the kids read. We completed Heart of Dakota's Preparing Hearts for His Glory (Silas and Titus) and Missions to Modern Marvels (Mercie). It was such a good feeling to stick with one thing for the majority of our school year.
It was fun for the boys to do history and science together.
Testing out how bees suck nectar.
We read lots of good books!
Reading aloud is always something I want to do more of because I never feel like I do enough of it. I read aloud some really great books to Silas and Titus this year. They also read some great books on their own. When asked what their favorite books were from this year, they said:
Mercie: I Am David by Anne Holm
Their favorite book that I read aloud to them was Raiders from the Sea by Lois Walfrid Johnson. I have to agree - this was a fantastic book! It's the first in the series, and I just ordered the next one. There are five total volumes and I look forward to reading them to the boys.
We did some great experiments.
Science experiments are fun but sometimes I am tempted to skip the mess. I'm so glad we did most of the experiments in Preparing Hearts for His Glory! A few of our favorites were:
microwaving soap
Making perfume
Checking density of salt water
We made some pretty art projects.
Art is one of my kids' favorite subjects. There were some fun art projects in their curriculum that tied in to their history lessons. We also completed a few lessons from Art Achieve. This is a great drawing program available on SchoolhouseTeachers.com! We plan to pick this up again when start school this fall, but I may do a few lessons this summer with them as well. Here are a few of our favorite art projects from the year:
Geckos they drew using Art Achieve
Clay map of the Middle East
Roman coins from clay and a bag from a coffee filter
Stained glass from paper and vegetable oil
The boys did Bible Drill.
This was their first year participating in Bible Drill, and while it was a church program I was the director and we did a lot of studying at home - a lot! We incorporated it into our school day so the boys got lots of practice finding books and passages in their Bibles and learning scripture. It was a real blessing to all of us. I memorized all 25 of the verses, too! They went to the Church Drill and passed, District Drill and passed, all the way to the State Drill!
Looking back it was such a great and productive year. Homeschooling is such a joy and blessing in my life, even when it seems hard and I want to give up. I'm so thankful God has given me more endurance, patience, and perseverance. I'm already looking forward to starting again in August (although taking the summer off is exciting!).
How was your year?
I was so proud of us for sticking with our curriculum this year too! I think that is the first time I managed to keep us all using the same books all year long.
ReplyDeleteThat's great! Isn't it funny how we always want to switch? I learned a lot about just pushing through and making the curriculum work for us instead of us working for the curriculum.
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