We began our official new year on Monday. Everything is progressing beautifully. Only a few tweaks is great for me. (I've been doing well controlling that ugly perfectionist, Type A side.) The children are so excited and just eating the new material up. I've actually had to explain atoms including structural models and the periodic table to 5 year olds! They just blow my mind everyday with the questions they ask and how they relate this info to that material. It's truly amazing. It's times like this that I am so thankful to Allah that I have been given the opportunity to teach my children. Who would I be if I never got to experience watching them grow and develop into the young people that they have and are becoming?
We are year-round homeschoolers, by the way. My plan is to homeschool in 11 week semesters or terms. After each term we will have a 2 week break. During the break, I would like to say that we will continue our spiritual class time and reading and math practice/instruction. After a week in, I don't think we'll be doing anything! Our workload is pretty tough, so I want to give them a real break. Plus it will give me a chance to work on lesson plans. Speaking of lesson plans, I honestly thought I would never, ever, ever write a lesson plan. The whole idea just seemed so boring! Well the more I worked on our year at a glance schedule, the more I saw the need to break the material down even further. I also somehow overlooked the fact that I will have to do this all over again with Babygirl, so do I really want to reinvent the wheel in a few years? NO! So I 've started lesson planning. It's really not as bad as I thought. I use them just as a guide, nothing is set in stone.
So over the next few days expect a plethora of homeschool posts as I think my way through our routine, OUT LOUD!
Great! Lesson plans are the way to go. It is helpful for the next child(ren) but also for year end review or testing. Plus they prove helpful if you are ever "visited" by children's services or child welfare. I do a weekly Word doc so it's all digital if I need it. In my state, you have to notify the school board each year of the ages and grades of each child who is school age and you can be audited at any point. (I don't know if I'm sending them my childs info though :o)
ReplyDeletei pretty much keep lesson plans on my computer "just in case". in my state, there's no auditing by the state, it's not allowed but you never know when the rules will change for homeschoolers. it helps me stay on some sort of path with a goal in my mind or i'd be all over the place and that might not be very effective.
ReplyDeleteThanks you two. It's good to know I'm on the right path. Here in AZ you are not required to register your children as homeschooled until age 6. So I have a year to finalize a paperwork system. I like old fashioned paper lesson plans. Sometimes I can't always get to the computer, but my yearly courses of study (I"m up to 8th grade.) and year-at-a-glance plan are formated in Excel.
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