A Few Changes to Language Arts Curriculum for 10th grade and 6th Grade

While at a birthday party, for a homeschool friend, yesterday the mom and I got discussing homeschool curriculum, of course.  She buys from the Critical Thinking Company, for Language Arts, and has been very pleased with the results.  Since Language Arts is on of the more boring class to teach, I am always looking for something more interesting.  So, I went to their website last night, and decided to save a few of their products, to purchase when I am ready.  Oh, by the way, I am considering getting the Algebra 1 book from The Critical Thinking Co, as well.  I was checking it out, and it looks amazing, especially for the way they want the kids to learn the Math now.

http://www.criticalthinking.com/word-roots-level-1.html
http://www.criticalthinking.com/critical-thinking-book-one.html

For Writing, I have saved:
http://www.rainbowresource.com/product/sku/047638

Those are all for my High School child, though word roots I may use with my 6th grader as well.  The earlier I start, the better.

For my 6th grader, my friend is letting us try a curriculum her girls did not care for, but that I think mine will love.  It is from Micheal Clay Thompson, and we are starting right off with level one.  If she likes it, I most definitely use it again.  Language Arts is her biggest complaint, and hardest subject to teach her.  I am hoping this will be a good fit for her.

http://www.rfwp.com/pages/michael-clay-thompson/

Tomorrow we are off to a fun day at the water park.  I feel like we have not accomplished a ton the last week.  We were at the springs twice, and now the water park.  However, this time of year with lots of birthdays, and end of year fun stuff it is hard to say no.   We aren't behind, I just like to drive myself crazy, lol. 

100 Words Every High School Graduate Should Know

Ha, I don't even know what some of these words mean, and I have been to college, and will be returning again this year.  My 9th grader will start working his way through this list tomorrow.  He will have to look up the definitions, then put them all in a sentence.  He will then study, and memorize them, with a weekly test.  Here is the list. 

Rather than continue with new spelling words each week, my 5th grader will revisit previous lists and do definitions, sentence writing, find the nouns and verbs, and alphabetical order.  This serves many purposes all centered around one group of words each week.  She too will be tested weekly on these words.

DJ will also be doing the ACT Question of the Day, and the SAT Question of the Day, each day.  This is a great way to practice and prepare for these tests.  There is also an app that I love it is shown below. The first one is free, and the one we use.  The second is not free, and I have never used it.  I have Android phones, so any apps I share should work on Android phones, but be sure and check first.

First Quarter Report Cards are Done!

Yesterday, I worked on report cards for the first quarter.  A lot of DJ's grades are done online, and I just have to record them.  Caitlin's, however, still need to be graded manually and recorded.  After I get everything in line I can figure out averages.  I did not scan them, because their full names are on the report and well you know you can't be too careful with their privacy.  So, you will just have to read it below.  Thank goodness I can type, and you don't  have to try and make out my handwriting.  They both did awesome, by the way, and the first ten weeks were a success.  DJ was contacted to join a Bio Mass 4H group, which will be during school hours, so if he tries it and likes it, we will have to do some adjustments to be sure he gets enough hours for credits.  Even though I don't have to do that until high school, we are adjusting and practicing this year in preparation for next year.  At this time we have opted not to do a Health class this year.  They did First Aid last year, and we are active, so this year we have opted not to focus on it much. 


Caitlin 4th Grade 1st Quarter Report Card

Science:  99
History:  93
Language Arts:  78
Math:  83
Spelling/Vocab:  84

Even though Caitlin only has a C in Language Arts, this is a massive improvement for her.  Creative Writing and the rules that come with it, are not natural to her like her brother, and she has struggled with it.  Likewise her Spelling has been amazingly good, but she needs to work on her Vocabulary.  Her overall grade is an 87 and I certainly can not complain about that.

DJ 8th Grade 1st Quarter Report Card

Science:  85
History:  89
Language Arts:  83
Math:  87
Spelling/Vocab:  93

DJ has awesome Creative Writing skills, as well as Reading, however the rules of Grammar continue to bore him and make it a challenge for him to pay attention to it.  Science is his favorite subject, but he is studying Atmosphere and Weather, apparently not as exciting to him as it is to me.  I am super pleased with his Math grade, and it has been a much more pleasant Math year so far.  He is still doing the challenging Algebra type work, but in a much more relaxing way.  His overall grade, believe it or not, is also an 87. 

Sylvan Workbooks And A Contest

I was recently asked to review the new line of Sylvan workbooks. This is a new line or workbooks, that you can purchase for at home education, or for extra work for public school children. Sylvan is well known for their tutoring, now you can get tutoring in a workbook.

I was supplied with 3 workbooks, all for the 4th Grade. These workbooks will be given as a contest prize, to start in teh middle of February. See the post at the top of this blog, for details.

The first book is Spelling Success. I really like this workbook, as it is complete with fun activities to help learn spelling. Each chapter has keywords, and then various activities to help learn those keywords. Each chapter focuses on a topic such as, prefixes, suffixes, root words, and homophones. There are also review chapters, for a total of 17 chapters, in the workbook.

The second book is Reading Comprehension. I love this book. Of the three books, this one is my favorite. It has all kinds of great ideas for learning, and evaluating your child's Reading Comprehension. The activities are thoughtful, and extensive. There are a total of 10 Chapters, with 4 to 5 activities per chapter.

The third book is Vocabulary. Like the spelling book it centers around keywords, with various activities to learn, and use the keywords. There are reviews, and 14 chapters. Each chapter has its own set of activities with topics like prefixes, suffixes, root words, and homophones. The only thing I did not care for with this book, were the chapters on foreign languages. There are two, and you have to find the meanings of the words, as I doubt most kids will know that many foreign language words. These two chapters, were the only two inconveniences I could find in any of the books. It is not like they are that big of a deal either. You could easily find them online, and incorporate them into the chapter.

While browsing at the Sylvan website I noticed that these great books start at 12.99, a great value, in my opinion. I also noticed that they have a 5th grade writing book, which I will definitely be in need of, in the very near future.

If you are starting to plan your curriculum for next school year, you might want to check out these great workbooks.

Tips For Learning Vocabulary

Yesterday I posted some tips for teaching spelling, here are some of the methods we use to learn vocabulary words.

Each week I pick 10 words from our spelling list. These are the vocabulary words for the week. As with spelling every day we go over the meaning of each vocabulary word. These are the other activities we do every day, for Vocabulary.

Monday- using a standard Websters Dictionary, look up the meaning for each word, and write it on your paper.

Tuesday- Use each vocabulary word in a complete sentence. Use each word only one time each.

Wednesday- Think of either a synonym, or an antonym for each vocabulary word. I generally alternate this from week, to week.

Thursday- Write each vocabulary word, and the meaning two times each.

Friday- Test to see how much was retained.

One other thing that I find to be very helpful is, if DJ finds a word during his readings that he does not know, I have him look it up in the dictionary rather than just telling him what it means.

I hope everyone is having a marvelous Tuesday.