Our curriculum this year

Our curriculum 2017-2018

Monkey is 9 and in 4th grade this year.

Math: 
Singapore Primary Math 4 US ed.
Supplementing with Beast Academy 3

Language Arts:
Spelling: All About Spelling 3 (She was in PS last year and we didn't want to skip a level. She'll be to 4 before the end of the year.)
Writing & Grammar: Essentials in Writing 4
Cursive: Zaner Bloser 4
Vocabulary: Word Roots Beginning
Reading: I read aloud daily and she reads to herself at least 30 min. I honestly don't time her reading anymore as she reads plenty on her own. As of now I'm not assigning specific books.

Science:
REAL Science Odyssey Physics
Engineering with Engino

History:
History Odyssey Ancients

Critical Thinking:
Think Analogies
Mind Benders

Fine Arts:
Home Art Studio
Local theater class



Bear is 4 and in K this year.

Math: Singapore Essentials

Language arts:
Reading/Phonics: Ordinary Parent's Guide to Teaching Reading
Writing: Zaner Bloser K

Social Studies/Science/Lit:
Build Your Library K
She also tags along for Monkey's science and history.

Motor Skills/Just because she likes them ;) 
Kumon maze books
Kumon Logic, Spatial Reasoning, and Critical Thinking books
Any K level all-in-one style workbook she can get

Art:
Home Art Studio

PE:
Tumbling

Weekly Wrap-Up

We had a great week here! I feel like we are getting into a good homeschooling rhythm much easier than prior years.

We had our first day of co-op! The girls loved their classes. Monkey is taking a lego class, acting, history with American Girl, and animal studies. Bear is doing stories, crafts, and games in a few different K classes. 

The weather was excellent so we spent a lot of time doing school outside! 

 Bear loves workbooks. This is one she's been doing just for fun. She's only had it a week and she's about two-thirds through it already!

 Monkey is doing great building up her writing endurance. This took a while, but she finished it!

Monkey is loving engineering. We're using Engino and she's learning a lot! The instruction booklets are very thorough. We first read about the simple machine we're working with, then we do a build, and then we do 'experiments' using what we've built. Right now we're working on wheels, axels, and inclined planes. 

We spent some time baking this week. I only gave instructions, Monkey did most of the work with a bit of help from Bear. 

 Their favorite part of baking!!

Our School Room!

Our School Room

We are so excited about our school room this year! The kids helped pick out the theme and put it all up. Let me take you on a little tour!

Coming up to our room.

Surprise, surprise, a monkey theme! I wonder whose idea that was?!

View from the door. The black desk is where I keep my stuff. I have printer paper and binders for finished work stored here. Also all the sorted work for the rest of this semester. In the white cubbies by my desk is a lot of the stuff I use daily like teacher guides, pens, markers, stickers.... We also have our Dalek speaker for playing music!

Coming around the room this is from the corner straight on from the door. In the corner is our paper trays for construction and other paper. Under that is a lot of our art supplies. 

Continuing around the room, this is from my desk. You can see the rest of my Expedit shelving where I keep most of our things we've collected over the last few years. The green drawers are puzzles. The bookshelf you can just see off to the left is for Bear's activities that I can change out daily or weekly to keep her occupied while I work with Monkey. She usually finds things to do on her own, though!

View from the art corner. The white cubbies in the corner hold some math manipulatives, flash cards, a few puzzles, and some other odds and ends. On top is a carousel with scissors, markers, pens, and index cards. The drawers between those and Bear's shelves are Monkey's. We keep some of her workbooks in there and there is also a drawer for her to keep her projects that she works on during down time. The bottom drawer holds her weighted lap pad and a robe in case she gets cold! 

A closer look at our white board area. We use All About Spelling so the board is always kept set up for that. We still have plenty of space to use it for other things as well. The corkboard beneath is just for various things to keep pinned up. I do have a schedule in the pocket chart, but it's just a rough one that we may or may not follow! Also a space heater because this room is in the basement and it does tend to get cold in the winter. 

A better view of my expedit shelves. 

Top row: extra notebooks and folders; easy readers and other books; HoP, Rosetta Stone, and Bob books; bins holding manipulatives, small containers, and glitter; sensory bin stuff.

2nd row: Some of our books for reading this year; bin with random office supplies; the books for our evolution unit; bin with extra crafting supplies; art stuff

3rd row: Bear's stuff for this year; Monkey's stuff for this year; extra science stuff; extra math and art and some things Bear is not quite ready for; more art and craft supplies.

4th row: Math and LA; geopuzzles; science; random hands-on stuff; file folder games, anatomy game, and phonics helps.

5th row; 1st bin is mostly a junk drawer right now! 2nd has 'busy bags'; 3rd has science kits (mostly MSB); 4th has seasonal activities that I buy a year in advance when they go clearance; 5th has big containers and other random stuff we end up needing (craft stick, cotton balls, sand...)

On top is mostly art and science supplies. 

And that's our room! We like having the kids' desks in the middle. It gives us more wall space for stuff and room to move around them, but they are easy to slide off to the side if we need a lot of floor space for anything. 

Thanks for visiting!