Middle School Curriculum

 This post has been linked up to the Weird, Unsocialized Homeschooler Weekly Wrap Up! 

Emily and I went to get some homeschool supplies today.  We have new notebooks, folders, binders, pencils, sharpener, erasers, stickers, note cards, highlighters, and of course an Angry Birds pencil topper :)    I have a teacher's notebook all clean and new, waiting for my plans to be laid out in ink!

Seeing as we are on the waiting list for the online public school, I am hitting all of the online curriculum, books, links, freebies, and ideas that I can to put together a very eclectic, CM-ish first semester of 7th grade.

I am also planning our first day of NOT back to school!  The Detroit Institute of Art has just passed three county millages so we will now be able to go for free!  I am SO happy about this!  So I am thinking of having a day of art.  Maybe draw some of the traditional art, then find something beautiful in the not-so beautiful areas of Detroit with their boarded up windows, broken glass in the street, piled-high tires in driveways, and crumbling brick facades.  Finally I think a picnic in the park on the river - beauty in nature.  They are all just ideas tumbling around in my head right now - so I will need to fine tune!

Another thing that Em has really become independent about is her musical taste.  She prefers music that is sung by females, fun, upbeat, and danceable.  So I want to find some Christian music that will draw her in so that I am not having to constantly listen to the words of all the songs she likes!

I think she'd really like Britt Nicole - who sings Christian pop songs.  That and V. Rose, BarlowGirl and Kari Jobe.   I see some i-Tunes purchases in my near future!

I decided to use Complete Curriculum  for her core subjects of math, science, social studies, and language arts.   We'll be starting out with Beautiful Girlhood, using Pearables for home economics, and reading daily devotions, starting in Matthew.  I'll be following Ambleside for art, music (composers & hymns), current events, and poetry.  Old Fashioned Education for their literature recommendations which can be read online and biographies.  For French I'm using a few different websites - we are still just at the learning words stage.  Last year third semester we began learning numbers, colors, family names, and a few others.  We'll continue from there.  Oh!  And for nature study I'm following along with The Handbook of Nature Study blog with the book by Anna Comstock. 

I plan to use the notebooking approach in several subjects.  We'll continue our nature journals, book of centuries, and start new ones for other subjects.

The first book of the year will be Ann of Green Gables.  I read this to Em several years ago, but now I am going to have her read the series herself.  I hope she enjoys it as much as I did, reading it just a few years ago as an adult.

I think that's about it!  I'm trying to get it all written down in that new teacher's journal of mine!  Hopefully I'll have the first few weeks hammered out by the time school starts on the 4th!

Sherry

The Middle School Years

I absolutely cannot believe that it is that time of the year again!  I am simply amazed how quickly time flies. 

Emme has truly been a bump on a log for the past couple of months, and I will blame mostly myself!  There have been a lot of family issues over the summer and I have been on a tremendous journey of faith.  We've done a few nature walks and she has been reading a lot - so I will be happy with that!

School doesn't officially start until September 4th, as I am following the same school calendar as my two older children do.  However, we are going to start some pre-school activities just to get into the swing of things!

One hour daily of mandatory reading for both of us!  I probably read double that every day, but I know it helps if we are reading at the same time for it to be more consistent. 

We will be starting Beautiful Girlhood along with using the Companion Guide and this great blog, B'Twixt & B'Tween, that has lessons for each chapter! 

We'll be watching a few videos on Netflix about history and animals over the next few weeks too. 

The Blue Planet and The Story of Us are two series I've chosen. 

Here is a study guide for The Story of Us.  Here is an activity guide.

Study guide for The Blue Planet video 6, The Coral Seas

I have a few hikes planned for the girls and I as well.  And that is about all we'll do over the next few weeks until school officially starts!  I'm working on a mixture of curriculum this year.  I had planned to start with an online public school but there is a long waiting list - so I suppose that will just have to wait until 2nd semester!  So until that time I am going to be doing a very eclectic mix of Charlotte Mason, notebooking, and using Easy Peasy Homeschool as well!

Looking forward to a good year,

Sherry