2018-2019 Curriculum Plans

So these are our current plans for this school year. Knowing us, some things may end up changing, but I'm hoping for a productive year since we're not starting a lot of new programs.


Princess: Second Grade

• Build Your Library Level 2 (we've used this literature based curriculum for the past two years) 
• First Language Lessons Level 2
• Pentime Handwriting Grade 2 Transition 
• All About Spelling Level 1 (This is new for us this year since the curriculum we started last year just wasn't a good fit for either Princess or me. Hoping to go through Level 1 fairly quickly.)
• Bookshark Level 2 Regular and Intermediate Readers (We got behind last year, so she's finishing the last handful of books from Regular before moving on to Intermediate.)
• Math U See Beta
• Oak Meadow Healthy Living From the Start (doing the Second Grade Lessons)
• Family Time Fitness (we lost our homeschool PE class she was doing at the Youth Center, so we're going to try PE at home since I got a good deal on it through Homeschool Buyer's Co-op)
• Teaching Music To Children
• Photography (this is something she's specifically asked to study, and I'm pulling from several resources starting with a Udemy kid's photography course.)
• Song School Latin 1
• Telling God's Story Year 1 (We started this last year, but got out of the habit because the girls were doing a daily Bible Study with my mom (including a handful of the lessons from this book. It's an amazing series, and I think probably the only progressive homeschool Bible curriculum I've seen. Definitely worth checking out for unfundamentalist Christian homeschoolers.) 
• Junior Ballet class (Princess has been dancing since she was three and a half, and we found a studio for her to transfer to here. They have a homeschool class at her level that meets during the day.)
• Brownies 

Butterfly: Kindergarten

• Moving Beyond the Page 4/5 (We started this last year, but she wasn't quite ready for formal school work at the beginning of the school year as a very young summer birthday 4 year old. We'll be starting with Week 10.)
• Sonlight Language Arts K (We tried Ordinary Parent's Guide to Teaching Reading that worked wonderfully for Princess last year. Butterfly has a very different personality combined with some of the same issues we had with Moving Beyond the Page last year. We're trying out Sonlight's full language art program this year, and hopefully it will be a better fit.)
• Pentime Handwriting Grade 1 Book 1 (They don't have a kindergarten level, but Grade 1 is divided into two separate books.)
• Math U See Primer
• Oak Meadow Healthy Living From the Start (doing the the kindergarten lessons)
• Teaching Music To Children (doing with Princess)
• Telling God's Story Year 1 (With Princess) 
• Gymnastics (She switched to tumbling after a year and a half of dance because she didn't "like doing what Mrs. 'Dance Teacher' says." Gymnastics has been a better fit for her, and she's excited to start back at a bigger gym this fall taking a class through a local Parks and Recreation program.)
• Daisies 
• Build Your Library Level 0 (We may possibly start this since both this level and the Moving Beyond the Page 4/5 are 30 week programs, and Butterfly should finish 4/5 well before the end of the school year.)

Busy

• Learning to walk, speak English, plus all the little bits and pieces she picks up. 

Updates Over the Past Three Years

So it's been three years since I last posted. And much has changed since 2015. We're still a military homeschooling family. Princess is getting ready to start second grade, Butterfly is starting kindergarten, and Busy (one of the many changes) is 6 months old and trying to keep up.

So obviously Busy is new. She was a surprise, but very welcome, addition to our family last winter. It's been an experience learning to homeschool with an infant added into the mix, but I'm figuring it out and I'm hopeful for a productive year for all three of our girls.

We are also no longer living in Nevada. This past summer, we PCSed (aka moved) to Virginia. It's been hard leaving the village that we built for ourselves out west, but an exciting move since it puts us within about a half days drive of our family. And it made for an exciting family road trip across a desert, two mountain ranges, a prairie, and ten states. We're mostly settled into our new home, and trying to settle back into our normal routine. The biggest homeschool change we're finding (other than the new base doesn't have a co-op or other homeschool programs that we're used to) is having to register both Princess and Butterfly (Nevada I didn't have to register Princess until she turned seven last winter) with the local school district, testing Princess (Butterfly gets a pass this year since she won't be six before September 30, 2018), and then having to re-notify for both the older girl for next school year.

My hope is to actually keep the blog updated, and try to get in a post a week.

2015-2016 Curriculum Plans

So for this school year, we'll be using Sonlight's P4/5 Curriculum as our base for Princess's K4 year with Butterfly tagging along for read alouds and whatever else she's capable of participating in. We'll also be using The Ordinary Parent's Guide to Teaching Reading with Princess. While technically she won't be in kindergarten officially until next school year, she knows all of her letter sounds and can pick out the first letter of most words by sounding it out. She still has trouble blending the sounds together, so I think that she's ready for some dedicated phonics instruction and that formal phonics (she's picked up letter sounds from alphabet books, Letterland songs, and Sesame Street and Super Why) will push her into reader territory. Jessie Wise recommends starting handwriting around lesson 115, so if we make it that far this year I'll probably add in the Zaner-Bloser K handwriting book. But that's only a future possibility since once we get through the letter sound lessons, I'm not sure how much we'll need to slow down. The rest of my at home academic plans are to work on some sensory activities, as well as working on the alphabet (she can mostly sing the ABC song, but not much recognition) with Butterfly as well as on counting, shapes, and colors.

We'll also be participating in the preschool class through the homeschool co-op at our current base, as well as we're members of a local Mom's Club that has park days and field trip type activities. Princess (she's in her third six month session) and Butterfly (who just started in July at the start of the current session) are both taking once a week dance classes at the Base Community Center. I'm a little worried we may have too much activity going on, but if we need to we can always stop the co-op class. I signed us up for co-op when I found out they were doing a preschool class since it will be a good way to connect with other military homeschoolers, and since we should definitely be in Nevada for Princess's official kindergarten and first grade school years I think getting involved with the Base group will be an asset especially since it's connected with the Homeschool PE class the Youth Center teaches. That starts next week, so we'll see.


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Welcome!

We're a military family, and while we're originally from North Carolina we currently live in Las Vegas, Nevada. "Dad" and I have been married since 2006, and we have two daughters. "Princess" is four, and is our resident expert on all things fancy and royal; and "Butterfly" is two and is an expert on pushing limits and Daniel Tiger.

We're planning to homeschool partially because of not that great local schools, as well as thinking that as long as Dad is active duty not being tied to a traditional school schedule is what's best for our family for right now.

Homefront Homeschool is our record of our homeschooling journey starting with preschool for the 2015-2016 school year.