We are almost finished with our first year of homeschool,
which I’m considering Alexa’s preschool year. We should finish up this academic
year in three weeks—at least we’ll finish the most structured part of it, and
we’ll carry the rest over to her PreK year. Before we started, I wrote a little
about our plan for this first year of doing school at home. This post can be considered an
update*, a statement of what we actually did, what we liked about it, and what
we need to tweak for next year. I’m organizing this post in the way that Alexa
and I currently talk about “doing school”—by type of school, or subject.
Bible and Phonics
School
We started out the year using the Little Hands to Heaven curriculum published by Heart of Dakota. At first, I made an effort to do every
recommended activity, though I skipped some art projects because I had not made
it to the local art supply store yet. I honestly don’t recall how long I did
every activity. I do recall that I started dropping activities when Alexa’s
enthusiasm for school started wearing thin, and I recall the first regularly
scheduled activity that I dropped: the creation of a counting book—which I
dropped primarily because it required too much preparation on my part, due to
our lack of magazine subscriptions (required for finding pictures to cut out). Then I started dropping other activities
for which I did not see much point, or which seemed designed to work better
with a small group of students rather than a singleton. At this point, we
regularly read the Bible story and do the finger play, which reinforces the
Bible stories and the letter we’re learning that week. I regularly use the “Letter Hide and Seek”
pages, in which the student searches through the enlarged text to find the
letter of the week. I use some, but not all, of the letter familiarization
exercises—she’s already so familiar with the shapes of the letters that she
just doesn’t get much out of most of them.
I am glad that we purchased this curriculum. It has provided
an excellent overview of the Bible for Alexa, mostly because of the wisely
chosen New Bible in Pictures for Little Eyes and the clever finger plays—though I do admit to changing a few isolated motions
and words here and there to make the rhythm work
better. I also enjoyed most of the weekly devotionals. However, much of the luster of the rest of the program faded rather
quickly. The math activities, art projects, and drama activities often seemed
like a bit of a stretch to me; they sometimes seemed only peripherally related
to either the Bible story or the subject they were meant to cover. I do believe
that this curriculum would work better with younger children, but Alexa was
right in the middle of the recommended age range. We will not be continuing
with the next curriculum by this publisher after we finish Little Hands to Heaven three weeks from today.
Literature School
(also includes Science)
The core of our literature school is Sonlight’s Preschool Full-Grade Package (formerly P3/4 Multisubject Package). When we started with this program, I
was enthralled with the stories. Unfortunately, Alexa was not so enthralled
with most of them, at least not the ones scheduled for first trimester reading.
As the year has progressed, though, her opinion seems to be changing.
Gradually, she began to enjoy more of the stories. She began asking for me to
re-read stories. Over the last week or so, she’s requested three or more
Sonlight stories each day. I’m not certain if we finally got to the stories
that match her interests, or if she’s maturing enough to be able to appreciate stories
that she would not have appreciated a few months ago. Actually, I think it’s a combination of those factors—her ability to
focus on longer stories with fewer pictures (which describes several of the
stories she didn’t like earlier) has improved dramatically, but the stories we’ve
been reading lately are stories that seem to have been written just for my
little girl: Bedtime for Frances, The Story of Babar, The Berenstain Bears and the Spooky Old Tree (all from The 20th Century Children’s Book Treasury).
We went through a couple of rough patches with this
curriculum. Alexa was on the younger end of the recommended age range (3-4
years, according to the description of the program at the time of purchase, now
simply labeled “preschool”). I think she was a little immature for most of the
program at first, but she did grow with it. For example, the first time I read
from The Usborne Flip-Flap Body Book, Alexa was decidedly uninterested. Two months later, I tried again, and she
insisted I read the entire first section (about digestion) rather than just the
first two pages I had intended to read that day. Likewise, we read each of the
later two sections (senses and reproduction) in one day each, because she kept
asking for more. Over the next few months, once we finish our first pass
through this curriculum in a few weeks, I intend to re-read the stories that
she did not enjoy the first time; I anticipate that she’ll enjoy them much more
with a little more maturity. Overall, I’m very pleased with this curriculum.
Math and Critical
Thinking
Sonlight's curriculum came with two games: Mighty Mind and Teddy Mix & Match.
Mighty Mind helps students develop spatial reasoning and problem solving skills. Alexa was interested at first, but quickly found the progressive tasks to be too difficult. We did not use this game much throughout most of the year, but recently she has developed a renewed interest in it, and her skills seem much better suited for it now. I would recommend this game for children who are around four years old and older; younger children who are advanced would enjoy it, but it's a little difficult for your average three-year-old.
Mighty Mind helps students develop spatial reasoning and problem solving skills. Alexa was interested at first, but quickly found the progressive tasks to be too difficult. We did not use this game much throughout most of the year, but recently she has developed a renewed interest in it, and her skills seem much better suited for it now. I would recommend this game for children who are around four years old and older; younger children who are advanced would enjoy it, but it's a little difficult for your average three-year-old.
Teddy Mix & Match can be played in a variety of ways, but primarily is a visual and working memory game. Alexa loved it from the start, and because it is such a flexible game, I was able to make it be always at her level. My biggest problem with this game was convincing Alexa that she was not allowed to sleep with these particular teddy bears. This is an excellent game for any child old enough to know not to chew on the cards.
I think it was just after Christmas that we ordered two
workbooks published by The Critical Thinking Co.: Mathematical Reasoning Beginning 1 and Building Thinking Skills Beginning. Our
intent at that time simply was to have the workbooks available, since DPO mail
service had become so slow with the combination of a new processing center and
the holidays. However, we did not count on Alexa’s excitement as she watched us
open the box. “Is that a new book for Lexa?” And then, after being told they
were books for math school and critical thinking school, “Lexa wants to do math
school and critical thinking school now!” (She had no idea what math or
critical thinking was at the time; she just wanted to use her new books.) Even
though it was almost bedtime, we obliged her excitement after noticing that the
math book was labeled “Age 3” and the critical thinking book “Ages 3-4” (she
was almost exactly 3 ½ at the time—apparently we were starting late!). She did
several pages of each workbook, loving every moment of it. For the next several
days, she constantly wanted to do math and critical thinking. Since that time,
we’ve done as many pages of each as she wanted (or until I said “enough!”) each
day.
Over the last couple of weeks, the critical thinking in particular has become a little more challenging for her. I have begun to hear her utter the dreaded words, "Lexa is not very good at this." I immediately encourage her, telling her that new things often are hard, but they get easier with practice, and she will become very good at this if she practices. Still, I do not want to overwhelm her, so I've started doing one or the other—but not both—of these subjects each day. We’re around three-quarters of the way through the math book, and halfway through the critical thinking book.
Over the last couple of weeks, the critical thinking in particular has become a little more challenging for her. I have begun to hear her utter the dreaded words, "Lexa is not very good at this." I immediately encourage her, telling her that new things often are hard, but they get easier with practice, and she will become very good at this if she practices. Still, I do not want to overwhelm her, so I've started doing one or the other—but not both—of these subjects each day. We’re around three-quarters of the way through the math book, and halfway through the critical thinking book.
These two books are very similar. Both begin with colors and
shapes. The math book introduces and works with the numbers 1-5. At first I
feared that they were too easy for her. However, the ease with which she
handled the first several pages—and with which she handles many later pages as
well—built confidence that was needed when she hit her first unfamiliar skill.
The books gradually build in difficulty, starting at a level that most
2-year-olds would be comfortable in, before moving to more advanced topics.
They use a spiral approach, introducing concepts such as pattern recognition or subtraction,
practicing just a little, then moving on to something else before coming back
to reinforce the first topic. This approach does help avoid frustration, for
both Alexa and me, when she doesn’t grasp a concept easily or quickly, though I
think I prefer a mastery-based approach once she’s older. So far, the books have covered pattern recognition, addition concepts (using pictures, not numerical representations), subtraction concepts, measurement, shapes, logical elimination of options, and object comparison. I'm sure there are others as well, but these topics are representative.
My biggest complaint about these books is that there is very
little script. That’s fine for pages where there are pictures of circles at the
top with the text “These are circles,” then pictures of circles and squares at
the bottom with the instructions “Point to the circles.” However, Alexa
had a hard time realizing what I wanted her to do on the page with the
circle-square-circle-square-circle-and now tell me what’s hiding behind the
curtain? Her response was “a triangle?” I found myself at a loss for how to explain the concept of a repeating pattern in a way that she would understand. Some skills are so fundamental that it’s
difficult to explain them at a three-year-old’s level, and I failed miserably
in every attempt I made to explain simple pattern recognition and prediction …
that task got relegated to Daddy after Mama’s frustration levels got a little
too high. On the bright side, Daddy did fine without a script, so although it
would have been nice, it was not, strictly speaking, necessary. Overall, though,
these books are a gentle introduction to mathematical and logical concepts. We will use the next books in each of these
series—we already have them, hiding in our closet where she won’t see them. We
may or may not continue with them after the primer levels (the next ones—Mathematical Reasoning Beginning 2 and Building Thinking Skills Primer). If we
do, the math ones will be relegated to supplemental status as we choose a mastery-based
curriculum for kindergarten and beyond.
Tracing School
Last summer, while we were in the United States for home
leave, we picked up a cheap workbook at Wal-Mart: Fun to Trace.
Alexa’s idea of tracing at the time, right around her third birthday, was to
draw wild scribbles all over the page. We put the book away. Approximately four
months later, her ideas about tracing had not changed much. The workbook again
was put away. Then around two weeks ago, she suddenly announced that she wanted
to do tracing school. So I pulled the workbook back out and lo and behold, suddenly
she was willing to trace the lines and curves and loops in the workbook. After
the first couple of pages, I showed her the correct way to hold the crayon. She
still struggles with that, but she’s improving. The workbook went from straight
lines to curved lines to loops to shapes to letters. Alexa finished off the
letter pages today and will start the number pages next. She loves this little
workbook—maybe because it’s “new,” maybe because she’s reached a developmental
point where she’s ready for it. In any case, it was well worth the $2 or so we
paid for it!
Special Study: Advent
We took approximately a month off from our two primary
curricula in December. During that time, we used Truth in the Tinsel as a special Advent curriculum. This curriculum included a Bible passage to
read, discussion points, and a craft—usually a Christmas ornament—for each day.
I did very well in keeping up with it at first … and then daily “art projects”
became too much for me, and I started skipping days. Of course, Alexa does not
believe in too many art projects—she loved every project we did. However, the
effort involved in buying (or substituting) supplies, getting them out, setting
them up, explaining the project to Alexa, helping her, protecting the projects
from our two cats, cleaning up the mess … this was a great little curriculum,
but if we use it again next year, I will do some modification. I’m thinking
coloring pages for most days, and full-fledged projects only once or twice a
week.
Our Future Plans
Once we finish up
this academic year, in three weeks, I’ll take one or two weeks off from school—or
only do very light school activities if Alexa asks for them—while I finish up
preparations for “next” year, then start on her PreK year immediately. I know
that it isn’t much of a break, but our plan for this year is to school year
round. We anticipate taking a couple of 3- or 4-week breaks during the year,
and it’s important that we’re done with the academic year before the craziness
of another international move hits next spring. Then we’ll take a longer break
between PreK and kindergarten, as we’ll be in the States and then probably won’t
be up to starting school immediately upon our arrival in Greece.
We decided to drop Heart of Dakota for Alexa’s PreK year. We’re
continuing the math and thinking skills workbooks. The heart of our PreK
curriculum, however, will be Sonlight’s Pre-Kindergarten Full-Grade Package.
This package includes Bible instruction and memorization, literature, and science.
One of the things I particularly love is that it includes stories from around
the world—including at least one each from Egypt and Cambodia. I only wish
there was a Kosovar story as well, but Kosovo is too new a country to have its
own traditional stories.
We debated whether or not to get Sonlight’s kindergarten
language arts (LA K) package, which is an option with the PreK curriculum, and
eventually decided that we would. Sonlight takes a very slow approach to teaching
students to read, and LA K is at the right pre-reading level for our girl who
has known her letters and their sounds for a while now. We aren’t sure about
the composition portions of the course; they may be too advanced, but I think
they start out gently enough that she’ll be ok with it. If it turns out that
those portions are too much for her, we’ll simply drop them until she’s ready.
We also ordered the PreK curriculum for Handwriting Without Tears—the kindergarten program is recommended in conjunction with LA K, but we believed that
Alexa needed a little more development of her fine motor skills. Of course,
that was before her love affair with “tracing school,” so it’s possible that we’ll
fly through the PreK handwriting program and order the kindergarten program
early. (And, no, there’s no contradiction with doing LA K’s composition without
requiring handwriting—parents are encouraged to scribe for their children in
these very early years, so Alexa will compose orally, while I write it down for
her.)
Finally, a friend gave me her copy of The Ordinary Parent’s Guide to Teaching Reading.
Many parents on the Sonlight Forums say that Sonlight’s language arts packages
do not have enough explicit instruction on how to teach a child to read; this
book has a complete script to take a child from basic phonics to beginning
readers to more complicated rules of reading. My intention is to look at the
order in which letters are introduced in this book, in LA K, and in Handwriting Without Tears and, if they
teach in different orders, figure out a way to re-work the schedules so that we
focus on a single letter every week, giving preference to the order in The Ordinary Parent’s Guide, since that
is the book with the script I intend to follow. (This rearranging of the
instructor’s guides is what I will be doing during the week or two “off” from
school after we finish our current curriculum.) LA K came with Sonlight’s
exclusive beginning reader books, and we also ordered the first set of BOB Books.
My hope is that Alexa will be reading these simple books fairly quickly and will
enjoy the feeling of accomplishment enough to help motivate her to continue
learning to read. We’ll order additional BOB Books as necessary if we like
them.
*My thanks to Sheila at The Deliberate Reader for her
recent post that reminded me that I never finished the similar update post I started back
in January … she inspired me to try again to capture in words what we’ve been
doing.
