Plans for a Rigorous Year
Sunday, August 5, 2012 at 7:03PM 
This will be our fourth official year of homeschooling.
We have spent the past three years discovering our style, getting to know each other better, and learning SO MUCH.
Most of our curriculum centers around a Classical Education philosophy, with a few pieces reflecting a belief in Charlotte Mason and also Interest Led Learning.
I hesitate to call us "Eclectic" this year.... my goal is to move towards a more strictly classical homeschool.
We are believers in Interest Led learning at certain points, but I've found that in order to be sure my children are learning everything my husband and I deem important, a rigorous, classical approach works best.
It's been a journey, to say the least.
Looking back just a couple of years ago I was more than happy to let my children's interests guide all of our days, but as my oldest in now 11, I'm finding that sometimes the interest level isn't always there. Limits and requirements from mom and dad are becoming more necessary.
After rereading The Well Trained Mind and also reading The Core, I've come to agree with much of what Susan Wise Bauer and Leigh Bortins believe about the ways children best learn.
Last year we had excellent results with The Story of the World, Writing With Ease, and Spelling Workout. All of these are recommendations from The Well Trained Mind. This year we will continue with those programs, and add in Saxon Math and classical science study (as recommended in The Core). I did not arrive at the math decision quickly or easily... it took me some time. I researched very carefully!
Following is our plan for the 2012-13 school year:
Anna/Grade 6
Math:
Writing:
Writing With Ease (finish Volume 4), begin Writing With Skill
Bible:
History:
Story of the World (finish Volume 2, begin Volume 3), Heritage History Classical Libraries , Georgia History co-op class
Spelling:
Spelling Workout (finish E, begin F)
Grammar:
Grammarland living book and online worksheets (Writing With Ease and Skill also incorporate grammar)
Science:
Unit studies based on interest, nature study and journaling
The Storybook of Science w/notebooking pages
Music:
Piano Lessons, Spivey Hall Training Chorus, The Young Scholars Guide To Composers
Art:
artist studies monthly
PE:
swimming, bike riding, working out with dad at the YMCA
Home Economics:
Cooking with mom, sewing lessons
Grant/Grade 2
Math:
Writing With Ease (finish level 1 and begin level 2)
Bible:
Hide and Seek The Word of the Lord Devotionals
History:
Story of the World (finish Volume 2 and begin Volume 3), Heritage History
Spelling:
Spelling Workout (finish B and begin C)
Grammar/English:
Grammar Island & Building Language
Science:
Unit studies, nature study and journaling
The Storybook of Science w/notebooking pages
Piano lessons, monthly composer study
Art:
artist study monthly, Discovering Great Artists Co-Op class
PE:
Baseball - 2x weekly baseball coaching, swimming
Please also stop by the iHomeschool Network, where this is the first week (Curriculum Week) of the Not Back to School Blog Hop!
Reader Comments (22)
I like your approach. As much as I want us to be mostly interest-led, I keep reaching for Teaching the Trivium and Well-Trained Mind! Our bend is more toward TJEd (which fits perfectly w/both Charlotte Mason and Classical). I guess I'd be mostly called eclectic, then, huh?! haha.
It doesn't matter what label I put on it, on God's path for our family is where we must be.
Thank you for your constant encouragement! Love you!
This looks like a wonderful plan. I wish I could find some guidance as to what I should be focusing on with my 3 year old. There are some areas where he is at a Kindergarten level and others at a Preschool level. I just don't know what subjects we should be focusing on. Any thoughts?
It looks like you all have a great plan. I really enjoyed the Well Trained Mind. It had lots of great insight.
Blessings, Dawn
Loved reading this Mary. I am so excited about the Blog Hop and seeing what everyone is doing. I expect to tweak a few things myself after reading some of the great ideas! Looks like Anna and Grant are going to have a wonderful year.
I wish you the best this year! We're going with a more classical approach as well--using Tapestry of Grace as our core. It's going to require quite a bit from my high schooler!
You have it all together. Good! It is always a relief to know what you plan to do. It is also a relief to know you can change your mind or quit a certain curriculum. Homeschooling is awesome.
Wow...what a comprehensive plan! I am curious to see how things go with The Storybook of Science, and I am pleased to see the link to the notebooking pages...I have been thinking about purchasing that for our Kindles. Happy new school year :)
Looks good to me! :-)
Lots of great resources! I love WWE. We'll be using Story of the World this year, as scheduled by TOG. Looks like it will be a great year!
I agree with you. I love interest-led learning, but find that as my kids get older, they need more direction in some areas. We are on chapter 8 of Volume 2 in Story of the World (this will be our third year using it) and absolutely love it! Hope you have a great year!
Mary - looks great! Good luck with the year and See you soon!
This looks like a great plan! I am a fan of a more rigorous, Classical approach as well. This will be our first year using Story of the World, and I'm looking forward to trying it out. We're also fans of Spelling Workout -- my kids are very confident spellers thanks to those books.
Good luck, and I hope you have a great school year!
I didn't even think to include PE, but my kids run around so much it's not much of a worry to exercise.
It looks like plans for a great year!
Encouraged that others are using Writing with Ease. This is our first year using it and I was really torn between that and IEW. Anyway, hoping to get a little more experience with writing before we jump into IEW.
Looks like you all have a great plan and a full year:)
Looks like a busy but good year Mary! I love seeing how each family's style develops over time. I have a good friend who leans more toward rigorous classical learning and it works well for them. Enjoy your year!
Awesome resources! I have always used WTM as a skeleton for our studies and it provides such a great structure. You will have a fantastic year, my friend!!
Looks like a well organized list. Let me know what you think of Saxon Math. My daughter has only ever used Saxon through her parochial and now homeschool years. I'm curious to see how someone new to it feels.
I hope that you will post for the week of day-in-the-life, cause I want to see how all your great stuff gets fit into your day. I am really struggling to get everything done, and would love to see how you do it! I am new to this, so I guess we will have to discover our style too! Your plans look great. Hope your year is wonderful!
We're classical as well. I like the order and the rigorousness of that approach. I guess I'm just not a free spirit.
Found you on the NBTS blog hop.
Great stuff! I am using Writing With Ease for the 2nd time now, it's pretty good, but I find we end up just doing SO much writing/copying, maybe I need to take it down a notch in other areas. We're just settling into our style too, still very much eclectic, I hope to have more of a handle on it by the end of this year :0)
I consider us to be classical/Charlotte Mason/eclectic in philosophy also. :-) We use much of the same curriculum. We read Grammar Land year before last and loved it!
Thanks for sharing about The Storybook of Science with Notebooking Pages. Had not heard of that before and will have to look it up. Thanks for your thoughts about moving away from Eclectic into more Classical. We are still kind of in Eclectic mode here, but always find the classical discussions interesting.
Popped by from the “Not-Back-to-School” Blog Hop: Curriculum Week!
Hope that you have a happy homeschool year! Happy planning for 2012-2013!
Hope that you will pop by to say hello over at my blog and my Pinterest boards too!
Colleen a.k.a. Pinterest Mama
http://pinterest.com/f5th/
Sunrise Learning Lab
http://sunriselearninglab.blogspot.com/2012/08/new-school-year-right-around-corner.html