Not Back To School Blog Hop

This hop lasts all month with a new theme each week and is hosted at Heart of the Matter Online.  I’ve done this hop since 2009, pretty cool, huh?  This week we are to wax eloquent on our curriculum choices for the year.  Let me just start with our homeschooling facts for this year…I’ll be schooling two, my 10yo 5th grader and 6yo 2nd grader.  Both boys have October birthdays and are in fact kind of “between” grades right now, but saying they are in 5th and 2nd is easier for everyone else.  ;)  Let’s start with ds3, shall we?

Ds3, 10yo, 5th grade

Math Mammoth
Writing Tales
Vocabulary Word of the Day
Elemental Science  Earth/Space
Daily Geography
HWT
For reading I always choose some classic books to study and usually can find a few lesson plans to go along with each on the internet.  This year we will cover

1. Fantastic Mr. Fox
2. James and the Giant Peach
3. The Mouse and the Motorcycle
4. Stuart Little
5. Mrs. Frisby and the Rats of NIMH
6. From the Mixed Up Files of Mrs. Basil

We are finishing up SOTW vol1 and then moving on to some U.S. History.  I was going to go straight to SOTW vol2, but came across the neat US study and thought it would be a great tie-in with our presidents study.
Ds is finishing up his states study and will move on to a presidents study.  I was going to have him do a notebook like he did with the states, but found a workbook in the dollar section at Target (along with flashcards and a puzzle) and figured it will do just as well (and save me a lot of time and ink and paper.)
Famous Artists study
Outdoor Hour nature study

Ds4, 6yo, 2nd grade

Math Mammoth
First Language Lessons
Ordinary Parent’s Guide to Teaching Reading
HWT
Explode the Code
You Can Read
Ds4 will sit in on ds3’s history, science, artist and nature studies.  I am still working on coming up with a FIAR type literature plan for him.

We have a few fun extras for this year, including a very neat calendar idea and “sensory bins,” both from Carissa.  We will probably call our bins imagination bins or something, as my boys are both a little old for sensory development.

And there you have it!  Today was our first day of school!  Very light, just getting back into the swing of things (as in mom still hasn’t finished all the lesson planning yet.)  Well, and the fact that our science books haven’t arrived either.  But none of that matters, we homeschool!  :)

Hey, somebody better enter this giveaway I’m hosting or I’ll just have to keep them for myself!!  Enter now, get a jump on Christmas.