Saturday, March 21, 2015

K'nex Education - Car Window Crank

K built her 2nd physics project - a car window crank.  She didn't understand it at first and I had to explain to her that we used to have to crank up the window manually.  She was shocked that we had to do such "hard" things - yep, pushing a button these days is pretty easy!  Let's not forget the days of hard things...


Monday, March 9, 2015

Organizing Homeschool Books by Subject or Category

We have accumulated a lot of science, history or other books that pertain to homeschool topics and I wanted them organized even more than just grouped by science or history, etc.  I wanted to split my science up into several fields and here are the ones we did: anatomy, botany, physics, chemistry, farms, earth science, astronomy, zoology and insects. 

I couldn't find any affordable dividers, so I made my own with colorful cards but I do want to eventually make some that are sturdier; something like poster board.  I also did the few language-related books we have, math, government services and geography.  I've yet to do the history shelf but when I do, I want to divide it up into time periods; ancient, medieval, etc.


Saturday, March 7, 2015

6th Grade History

K has already completed a study of history from ancient times to modern, so she will be starting the chronological cycle all over again.

For 6th grade history, K is going to start at the beginning again with Ancient History up until 1400.  We have all 3 volumes of Human Odyssey and that is what she will be using for 6th, 7th and 8th grade history and we will weave in Notgrass American history throughout the years to meet requirements.  The first book is Volume 1 The Human Odyssey; Prehistory Through the Middle Ages.


We have many resources that we own to help her in her studies.  We have timelines, encyclopedias, primary resources, atlases, Uncle Josh's outline maps CD and other various books to read.  I took a picture of some of what we have that she will be using along with her studies.  K will also be reading from a book list for literature on correlating topics, you can see it here: http://www.cambridgeshireacademy.com/2016/07/6th-grade-ancient-history-book-list.html.




6th Grade Math, Logic and Bible

In Math, K will be finishing up Saxon Math 6/5 and starting 7/6 mid-year hopefully.  We use Saxon Teacher and love, love, love it!!


For Logic, K will be finishing up Building Thinking Skills 3 and starting with Critical Thinking Book One and then work her way into Critical Thinking Book Two.


Our Bible program is the same and we are continuing on with Memoria Press Christian Studies Book III after we finish the second book.  K also reads the Bible on her own and memorizes scriptures.

6th Grade Language Arts - English, Latin, Reading, Writing, Spelling

For English, we are still in Rod and Staff English 5 but continuing on with R&S English 6 - we love this curriculum!  It also teaches writing, so we don't need a separate curriculum for writing.


In Spelling, we are finishing up the All About Spelling series with the last two books, AAS 6 & 7.  K will also be doing Spelling Workout E & F and possibly G & H.  Since we have been doing AAS, Spelling Workout is really just extra practice for her and she has been going through a lesson faster since we returned to it recently as an extra.





K is still doing Latina Christiana I since we took off time from Latin to focus on the main subjects while I was having health issues.  She will continue on with Latina Christiana II using the DVD teacher.


Reading for us is not a curriculum, it is a book list.  I plan on listing her 6th grade book list in another post, which I will link to here (if I remember!).  She will be reading books that correlate with Ancient History.  She writes full-page narrations after she reads each book and also reads in the evening.