10th Grade Homeschool Curriculum Choices 2017

Well here we are, at the tale end of our schooling years for my first born. Oh how bittersweet these times are!

It's so wonderful seeing him grow and flourish and gain more independence, but those times where he would curl up on my lap, or the hours we spent pouring over picture books, or when he would, completely on his own accord, offer you his very last sweet, all seem like they were only yesterday. How I wish I could have those days back, those slow, carefree, full of cuddles days.

Any how, this wasn't meant to be an all out sappy post so let's get on with it. We are doing Grade 10 officially this year. Following are the resources we have chosen. In some areas it will appear as though we are doing way too much but I am now looking at these last years as a whole, so many of them will continue to be used into next year and maybe even the following, depending on where he is at.

Family Morning Basket

*Read Alouds - his choice & mine
*Logic Of English - we are taking our time slowly working through this, it is an extra but we like it
*Rotations of - Nature Journal, Artist Study, Current Events, Character Study, You Tube Learning

Mathematics

*Math U See - Algebra 1, moving into Geometry sometime in the year
*Life Of Fred - Pre Algebra with Physics, he is continuing to supplement with LOF, keeping a little behind where he is at with MUS so that he can come back around and practice, in a different format, already learned material.
*Brainetics with co-op - full of fun math tricks

English/Language Arts

*Institute Of Excellence in Writing - Level C (with co-op)
*Word Up for Vocabulary (we didn't get to this last year)
*Logic Of English, covers spelling & grammar
*All In One High School - we are going to take a look at the English over there this year, but just working slowly on it, will see how we go with this one
*Novel Studies
*Assigned Reading
*Free Choice Reading

Science

*Exploration Education Advanced Physical Science Kit
*Engineering topics with our co-op, including a Science Fair
*We hope to look at the Physics over at All In One High School, will just see how things are going in that area.
*You Tube supplements from Crash Course Physics and Doc Schuster Physics
*I believe our co-op is looking at Joy Hakim Story of Science for later in the year
*Plus supplementary living books on physics

History

*Big History Project, we will be very much taking our time with this one
*Documentaries
*Living Books
*I believe our co-op is looking at Joy Hakim Story of Science for later in the year (history & science)

Humanities

*Australian Civics & Citizenship with co-op
*Emergency Services Cadets Program with Rural Fire Brigade

Geography

*He is still working through the Visits To Europe he began last year. This is really a supplementary course so it doesn't get looked at all that often.

The Arts

*Drama Lessons
*Musical Theatre Productions with community theatre group
*Documentary Film Making with co-op
*Art Classes with a teacher
*Art Appreciation, morning basket and/or All In One Highschool course

Technology & Design

*Wacom Drawing Table
*Coding with Raspberry Pi with co-op
*We are currently chatting to an Art teacher about the possibility of doing some Technical Drawing classes with a small group of teens.

Sport

*Sailing Lessons
*Karate Lessons

Home Econmics

*Weekly Cooking of Family Meal
*Baking
*Washing
*Household Chores
*Managing his own money

Other

*A resume is high on the list
*Studying for his Learners Permit
*Saving for a car eek!

Seems like such a huge year when it is all typed up like that, but even with all of this I am still pleasantly surprised with just how relaxed most of our weeks are. He and I have chatted about ramping things up a little for this year, but mostly it's more about ensuring that whatever he chooses to do he gives it his best shot. As is always the case with each year, we are very fluid. We always have a plan but we are always open to plans changing.


Happy Homeschooling,
Kylie

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The Way We School

It's week two of the Not Back To School Blog Hop for 2017!

Have you all been and read the posts from the first week of our not back to school blog hop? If you haven't done that yet please go and check them out. You will find the links to them here at the bottom of this post.

This week our theme is

The Way We School

Like most homeschooling families, this has changed many times over, during the past eleven years for us. I try my hardest to be fluid, to meet the kids where they are at and to find ways that work for all of us. Simply doing what works, as opposed to what everyone else is doing, has been my mantra for quite some time now.

For now what has been working for us is a 4 pronged approach to homeschool. Those 4 prongs are made up of co-operative peer group learning, morning basket family group learning, independent rotation learning and doing one more thing.

I'll give you all a quick overview of each of those prongs and how we roll with them.

Co-operative Peer Group Learning

This is an area that has grown exponentially for us over the past couple of years and for my teen especially has become an imperative part of his education. I am a strong believer that we all need a peer group and even more so as our children age. That's not say that I agree with sending off them for 6 - 8  hours a day 5 days a week to spend all of that time with their peers. No way! But we do need peers, they help us see the world through their eyes, to learn from, to grow with, to bounce ideas and thoughts around. To be there for us celebrate to good times and hug us in the not so great times. Our peers help us navigate the world around us, they assist us in learning how to deal with others both in good times and bad. If we forego those experiences as a youngster then how will we ever learn to navigate the world that is full of strangers out there.

However, co-operative learning for us needs to be quality, it needs to be able to mark off a true day of school. Yes we are absolutely having fun, but we are also learning and learning at a deeper level, not just gathering with others for socialising and calling it educational.

So we currently partake in 2 co-operative learning days a week, during school terms. One runs for 6 weeks and the other for 8 weeks. One is very small with only 4 families involved, but it allows for a real closeness to grow. The small size also gives us the opportunity to really dig deeper in what we are studying and truly spend time on the things we need or want. For example our teens in that little group have spent the last 2 years working solidly through Australian History and a Creative Writing Program. We have time to take our time, we don't need to limit what we are doing to a short 8 week block.

Our other co-op is larger, with around 35 children across a wide group of ages in attendance. This co-op is a bustling hive of activity and all of us enjoy our co-op days immensely.

Morning Basket, Family Group Learning

I've mentioned our morning basket time a bit here on the blog, simply it is a way for us to gather together as a family. To bring all the various ages, abilities and interests of my kids together. A time to begin the day, to bond and to grow together.

As the kids have grown they have needed to branch out and work more independently, morning basket has been our way of keeping at least part of our day for us to all be together.

Independent Rotations

This part of our day is exactly as it sounds. Independent Rotations follows straight after our Morning Basket time. Basically each of the children complete independent work and then I rotate through seeing each of them.

Each child heads off to their own area to work independently. For my 8 year old this means still having me very close by, but slowly he is becoming more and more independent in his work.  As soon as he and I are done, he has some free time.

I then move on to my middle child to go over her work and to complete anything we have that we do together. We also use this time to do more reading aloud, when it's just us and she can choose a book she really wants to read.

Then she joins her little brother for a spot of free time and I head over to see what my eldest is up to. We don't meet every single day, but at least twice a week he and I will sit down together to chat about what he's up to and where he is headed.

By that time it is well and truly lunch and we are all ready for a break.

Doing One More Thing

Now this is one area that I am really not very good at. We always start the year out well but I do tend to let this slip by the wayside. So once again my plan is to be more intentional with our 'doing one more thing'.

All this simply means is that after lunch we do something else. It doesn't mean that it is an afternoon spent tied to the books. So basically it could be an art project, some history reading, a documentary to watch, a science experiment to complete etc etc.

In my head I see us rotating through topics and subjects for this part of our day and I have begun writing out some plans for this, but in reality it is more likely to be, let's just see where it takes us.

And that then brings us to the end of the day, or the more structured, formal learning part of our days anyway. It's been working well for us and it is a routine we will continue to put into place until it longer works.

How about you? Do you have a routine like structure to your day? Please share it the comments so others may be inspired. Or if you blog, why not join us in our blog hopping fun.

Be sure to read the other bloggers posts on 'how they school' by visiting the links below.

Happy Homeschooling,
Kylie

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Hope, Dreams & Goals For Our Year Ahead

Well the start of a new school year is already upon us! Once again I have teamed up with some of my Australian Homeschool Blogging friends to bring you four weeks of 'not back to school' blogging fun.

Over the coming weeks we will all be blogging about our year ahead, and what we envisage that to look like for us. At the bottom of each 'not back to school' post you will find links to the other bloggers that have joined in. Simply click the image and it will take you to their blog and their post on the same topic.

This is such a great way to get a well rounded overview on differing ideas. Two heads are better than one, so the saying goes and when it comes to planning for and setting up your year ahead this is definitely the case.

If you are interested you can view past Not Back To School Blog Hops at this link.

Our first themed NBTS post is one of looking ahead, one of dreams of the future and of the goals we've laid down, not only for ourselves, but for our children, our family and our homeschools.

And so as Walt Disney said:

We've had such a tumultuous eighteen or so months that our lovely homeschooling groove really has fallen by the wayside. We kept up our academics as best we could but it was very haphazard and snippets of time were grabbed when we could get them. Then there is the constant battle of the screens in all of the their various forms that have invaded our days and have affected how they pan out.

Now I take full responsibility here for that one. I spent many years fighting screens, and not allowing mindless game playing, until finally giving in to the dreaded peer pressure, which at the time was Minecraft. This it seemed, has opened the flood gate. I know I am in a place where it can't be closed and in all honesty I don't want to close the gate completely. There are many valuable uses for the various screens and let's not forget the joy my kids derive from them. We all need a little mindless downtime here and there.

As most of you are aware we were also experiencing some major life trauma's and my guard was down a great deal of the time. I just didn't have the emotional capacity to worry about my dying friend and how much time my kids were spending on screens. After all my kids are all fighting fit and healthy, my best friend was dying before my eyes. And so the kids easily gravitated to their screens more and more. Whilst part of me regrets allowing that to happen, I am choosing to give myself some grace here. Last year was a majorly 'sucky' one and I know I was doing the best that I was able to do given the circumstances.

We've also moved from a very home centered school day to one where we partake in two relatively academic co-ops. These have been a wonderful addition to our lives in many aspects, but in part they have also made learning at home with just one's brother or sister appear a little boring.

So, whilst I do have a long list of hopes, dreams and goals for the year ahead, my number one focus will be on bringing back the joy into our homeschool. Bringing back our focus, our routines and connecting our hearts once more so that our days at home together, albeit different, are just as joyous as the days we spend with our co-op friends, or the time the kids are playing with their screens.

It's called balance isn't it and that is my main driving force for the year ahead. Bringing back the balance.

What about you? I'd love to hear what your hopes and dreams are for the year ahead. Please share them in the comments.

Don't forget that there are some other wonderful Homeschooling Blogs joining me in this post, just scroll down a little and click on the images to be taken directly to their posts about their hopes and dreams for the year.





Happy Homeschooling,
Kylie

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