homeschool plan

I am in full homeschool prep mode around here, and today, the first of my books came in!  Here is a brief run down of what we'll be studying this year:

History:  The Middle Ages, Renaissance and the Reformation

This will be my first time to use one of Sonya Shafer's guides.  The past two years I have used The Story of the World as my scaffold.  This year we are going headlong into the Charlotte Mason method. I am excited to read all the biographies, and hopeful that this guide will enable me to tie up the loose ends.  I am no history buff, I need the guidance!
Some of the living books we will be using are:

• Around the World in 100 Years
• Famous Men of the Middle Ages
• Explorers Who Got Lost
• Castle Diary
• The Vernon Reformation series
• The Apple and the Arrow
• Viking Adventure
• The Sword in the Tree

History will also cover time lines and map skills.

Math: Singapore Math

We are sticking with Singapore Math this year.  I thought it was not the right match for Moonpie, but after a little math break, she started using the concepts she learned over the year on her own!  I really like this math program and I'm comfortable with it, so I am thrilled that we can use it again.

Poet Study:  All the Small Poems and 14 More by Valerie Worth

Language Arts:  

• First Language Lessons for the Well Trained Mind- Level 3 (Moonpie)
• First Lang. Lessons- Level 1 & 2 (Buddy)  I'm using my copy that I used with Moonpie.  I am going to ease into language lessons with Buddy, we probably won't begin the year with them.
• Reading-  I plan on using a combo phonetic and whole language approach with Buddy this year.  I will be using our poetry book to teach him reading.  He really did not enjoy using 100 Easy Lessons, which Moonpie LOVED!  We'll see how the whole language approach works for him!  I might even do a mash-up of the two- whatever works for him we will do!  Moonpie is a bookworm and needs very little prodding to read.  However, I would like to challenge her with some books that are somewhat outside of her comfort zone this year.

Literature:

The books recommended on our Charlotte Mason reading guide (that we haven't already read) for 1st and 3rd grade are:

The Trumpet of the Swan EB White

The Princess and the Goblin George Macdonald

The Railway Children E. Nesbit

Heidi Johanna Spyri ( I have a vintage copy that we will be using)

The Secret Garden Francis Hodgson Burnett

We will add to this list as the year goes on.  We still have a couple of Tum Tum and Nutmeg adventures to go on as well as a few more with Laura Ingalls.

Science:

• The kids are very eager to learn about space, so we will kick off the year with this as a unit study.  I am piecing together this unit with books we already own and library books.  We have a very small library with not a whole lot of selection, but we will make do!  I plan on covering the night sky (stars, comets, the phases of the moon), with a break in there to discuss nocturnal animals.  We will then cover planets and the solar system, and anything else they want to learn!  I love teaching space- very excited about this!
• We will work in experiments on Fridays when dad is home to lead out in that area.
• We will also pull out A Child's Geography: Explore His Earth by Ann Voskamp.  We used this some last year and it is fantastic!  I learned by using this that geography is more than just knowing where countries are- it's earth science!

Art Study:

We will be studying the works of Michel Angelo and Leonardo Da Vinci in our history unit.  I enjoy using Getting To Know the World's Greatest Artists series.  They do a great job of mixing biography with the actual works of art.  I also love that I can find these pretty regularly at the thrift store!  I will be using some Dover coloring books along with this and some sticker books.

Music:

Moonpie will be starting piano this year!  Buddy likes to play guitar alongside daddy, so he will keep doing that!

Bible:

We usually use the Bible Study for All and we really like it!  However, this year we will be participating in our local Community Bible Study.  The kids have daily homework along with my daily homework!  I love that we are studying the same scripture together.  Then, on Bible study day, they go to their own class while I go to my small group and lecture.  It is a wonderful program and we learned so much last year!  The kids also take part in Awana at church so we spend a good amount of time working on scripture memory for that.

Nature Study:

We will just go outside!  Yay!

Umm...did I say "a brief run down"?

Have you started your planning yet?  What is your slated "start date" to get back to school?  Mine keeps getting pushed back as invitations to swim and water slides comes up!  Oh, and then there's that closet that needs to be cleaned out...As of right now, I'm thinking to ease in next week with our study of space, and then hit the ground running August 20.

I am linking up with the not back to school blog hop.  If you want a look at some more great curriculum ideas, check it out!

ps- I'm an affiliate with Amazon.  Any link you click up there that turns into a purchase results in our family getting a little back to help with our book costs.