Our Schedule 2010/2011

This week on Not Back to School Blog Hop at Heart of the Matter Online it's post about your schedule.

We've had a tough time getting into a routine that works well this school year. We started school the end of July knowing we would take 4 weeks in August to visit family in Massachusetts and Long Island. We are currently still visiting family so a routine is hard since we're always doing something (this is after all a vacation!). Even though too much flexibility is sometimes stressful it's this flexibility that is one of my favorite aspects of homeschooling! Anway, here's our schedule that we will hopefully adhere to once we return home sometime after Labor Day.

6:00-7:00 I get up and some days attempt to work-out!
7:00-7:30 2 younger kids get up and have breakfast (no chance teenager would be up this early)
8:00 Bible devotion - START getting Teen up!
8:30 GET teen up!! Go over work with 2 younger kids (if they have new material we'll sit together otherwise they can do work on their own). Math/LA/Handwriting/Spelling
9:00 Get teen working on his assignments. I createde a weekly print-out in Word for him because he can do most work independently. He's usually done in 4 hours.
9:30 Go over keyboarding with 2 younger kids
10:00 Snack
10:30 Since 2 younger kids do American History and Science (Astronomy) together we'll do these. American History M/W/F and Science T/TH. I'll do reading and then we'll work on any projects or workbook assignments.
11:30 We're going to start Rosetta Stone Spanish I (2 younger kids and I-teen is doing German I on his own). We haven't started yet since our schedule has been crazy.
12:00 Go over any art projects with 2 younger kids, they can do either before or after lunch.
12:30-2:00 Kids have chores and free time (no TV or video games though)
2:00-3:00 Quiet reading in their rooms
After 3:00 kids can watch TV or play on their video games if they choose.

Our extracurricular activities are as follows:
MON- Girl Scouts - Becca
TUES- Martial Arts 6:30-7:30 pm - Logan
WED- Awanas/Studio 6:00-8:00 pm - All
THURS-Horseback Riding 10:00-10:30 am-Becca
Police Explorers 7:00-9:00 pm -Brandon

So this is what I hope to use as a guide once we get back home in a few weeks.

Pictures for School Year 2010-2011

Here are some pictures from our 2nd year of homeschooling for the Not Back to School Blog Hop at Heart of the Matter.


I almost didn't get a chance to post this because we are currently on vacation visiting my parents up in Massachusettes.




This is my oldest son Brandon he is starting 9th Grade.




This is my daughter Becca she is starting 5th Grade.




This is my youngest son Logan he is starting 3rd Grade.

Curriculum 2010/2011

I am new to this so I am going to attempt to link to the "Not Back-to-School blog hop" at Heart of the Matter.

We officially started our 2nd year of homeschool on July 19th. I've been doing some tweaking to our schedule to find something that works well for us. Since we are getting ready to go on vacation in a week I probably won't have something workable until September. I am also discovering that some of our curriculum needs to be adjusted, like our handwriting. Here's our curriculum to-date:

Brandon - 9th Grade

MATH: Saxon Geometry
LANGUAGE ARTS: Abeka Gr. 8 Grammar & Comp., Of Place Literature and an
assortment of novels.
HISTORY: Abeka Gr. 10 World History & Cultures and Current Events
SCIENCE: Apologia Exploring Creation with Biology
FOREIGN LANG: Rosetta Stone German
PE: Starting back to Martial Arts in Sept.
BIBLE: Not sure yet
Brandon will also be working on keyboarding skills.

Rebecca - 5th Grade

MATH: Abeka Gr. 5
LANGUAGE ARTS: Abeka Lang. A Gr 4
HANDWRITING: Abeka Penmanship Mastery I Gr. 4
READING: Abeka readers Gr. 4
SPELLING: Spelling Connections website lists
PE: Becca does Horseback Riding

Logan - 3rd Grade

MATH: Abeka Gr. 3
LANGUAGE ARTS: Abeka Language 3
HANDWRITING: Abeka Cursive Skillbook 3
READING: Abeka readers Gr. 3
SPELLING: Spelling Connections website lists
PE: will be starting back to Martial Arts in Sept.

Rebecca and Logan will be doing the following subjects together:
HISTORY: BJU Heritage Studies 3 (once we complete Revolutionary War)
SCIENCE: Apologia Exploring Creation with Astronomy
Rosetta Stone Spanish
ART: Abeka Art books Gr. 3 and 5
BIBLE: Currently doing a devotion a day and they will be starting Awana's soon. Hoping to do "Journey from Creation through Ice Age" by Ruth Martin and Cathy Canen starting in Jan.

Last year we didn't do very many field trips and I am hoping to do more this year. We are hopefully going to go into Boston next month while visiting family so we can see some of the places we are learning about in Revolutionary War. I am also hoping to visit a Planetarium.

Created signature...

Having fun adding stuff to my new blog...testing out my new signature!

So after a year of searching others blogs I've decided to start my own. I really like the idea of being able to document our adventures for family and friends and our own future record. Since this is my first post I think I'll give you a brief background on our family. A year ago I decided to do research into homeschool. My daughter was in 3rd grade at the time and struggling with all the testing the school required she take. When the school suggested she may need to be on anti-anxiety medication I knew something needed to change. I had homeschooled my oldest son when he was in 6th grade and my other 2 attended public school. That year was a disaster! The next year he went back to public school. I began researching homeschool again and talked with friends who were homeschooling. After I aquired more information than I needed (very easy to do with the internet!) I approached my husband with the idea of pulling all 3 kids out of public school and homeschooling. He was NOT for it! He was not behind the decision several years back and that helped lead to disaster. So after several serious discussions and heart to heart talks about how serious I was about doing this my husband said he would support me! My friends and family thought I was crazy!! This past year was great. It was so much smoother having all 3 kids home and on a schedule WE set. The biggest advantage was in February when we all went up to visit my parents and went skiing in New Hampshire.

I'll post more about our plans for this next year and the curriculum I'll be using.