First day of 2nd Grade!
Going to school.
GO!
Tag Archives: homeschool
Set
There’s a bigger weekly planner on the way. But it doesn’t have all the pretty colors.
Ready
I have a little bit of a crush on our school room.
All the right colors.
Miscellaneous books and craft supplies. The cats are a souvenir of preschool.
I decided (at the last minute) that a dry erase board would be a good idea after all.
The first bookcase is the everyday materials. Those little things on the wall are Command clips.
Gotta have a motto. Bonus: self portrait.
The future Nature Table and one of Lucy’s hidey holes. We’re still waiting on the cat tree.
The map and stuff are hung on those wire curtain hangers from Ikea.
We’ve been hanging out up here a lot. I hope we like it just as much when school starts on Monday.
Course Work
It’s Meet the Teacher night at our local elementary school. (Look who’s not there!)
I don’t think I ever talked about curriculum.
Here it is:
It came in a big box.
Everything to guide a year.
The Oak Meadow curriculum materials have just been re-worked and reprinted. The new books are attractive, the teacher books are spiral bound, and the whole system is easy to use even when you need several books to assemble a lesson plan. I’ve seen examples of older versions of the materials since I ordered the ‘Home Teacher’s Process Manual’ before we enrolled to get a feel for the program. The improvement in visual appeal is marked.
New one in front. But I’m sure you can tell.
Now known as the “Guide to Teaching the Early Grades,” the new version of the Process Manual isn’t just prettier, there is also an appendix in the back with rhymes, songs and poems.
Pro Tip: When you get your Oak Meadow curriculum, start with the Resource Book. That’s where the introduction is. Nothing makes sense unless you read the introduction first.
The Coursebook contains the outlines for 36 lessons that are to be completed over the school year. Each lesson contains one week’s worth of activities sorted by subject: all of the Language Arts assignments for the week come first, followed by Social Studies, then Math, and so on. As the teacher, my responsibility is to read through the Lesson, sort out how and when we will complete each activity and gather any resources we’ll need for that week. A ‘boxed’ curriculum doesn’t mean that parents can just follow along step-by-step! Especially since this is project-based learning and not a stack of worksheets to complete. There are still lesson plans to make! Schedules still need to be sorted! My personal plan is to stay two weeks ahead with lesson preparation. That’s plenty of time to request books from the library and get any Thriftbooks or Amazon deliveries to enhance the lesson. Social Studies is about China for the first two weeks, so I’ve got a few library books that directly support what is covered by the included projects and stories. In Lesson 2, Health focuses on the systems of the human body and how the whole thing works together. My library didn’t have the book I wanted (it’s got transparent layers!), so I’ve got one on the way from Thriftbooks. I (probably) won’t buy one-time-use-resources, but this particular book is pretty cool and will stay useful later. Plus it’s Thriftbooks* so I spent all of $3.59.
Everything on the shelf.
I’m not sure how Oak Meadow could have made project-based learning any easier. The Coursebook contains weekly planners, weekly checklists, and Learning Assessment pages for every lesson. Stories in the Resource Book and Readers, and activities in Crafts for the Early Grades are referenced – this makes it extra important to look through the lessons ahead of time so that you can have all the needed materials ready. The craft instructions are detailed and the stories fit the methodology (you’ll have to read the introduction). I feel prepared and supported and pleased.
All that to say: I’m feeling pretty good about our choice.
I’m ready to get this show on the road.
*I have a small Thriftbooks addiction.
Home Improvements
Gran and Pop (my parents) were down this way last weekend so that Pop could help me with some Back to School projects. School starts in two weeks and we’re trying to get our school space in good shape.
Ellie, Michael and Pop put the new table and chairs together.
I painted bookcases. I had vowed never to paint laminate again but they were black and I couldn’t stand it.
Pop and his bigger-than-the-Blueberry vehicle helped haul away the second bed in the schoolroom. This caused a wonderful chain reaction where the bookcases in the hall (the ones getting painted) swapped places with the chest in the schoolroom, Ellie’s dollhouse (made by Pop) moved upstairs to the top of the chest, the table that used to hold the dollhouse moved to Michael’s office to hold the big desktop machine (game computer), and that liberated the card table that I need for the sculpture workshop on Friday. It was just like the trading quests in The Legend of Zelda.
The best part (for me not for him) was that Pop spent most of his weekend creating a Stuffed Friend Containment System.
Shelves!
That’s not even all of the animals. Great Gran’s doll bed ended up caddy-corner.
Ellie’s stuffed animals are friends. You can’t get rid of friends. She feels very strongly about this.
When you walk into the room, they all stare at you.
I’ve already asked if we could have more shelves over the top of the windows the next time he’s here. Pop didn’t answer my text.
Oak Meadow Family (What We’re Doing About School)
Ellie has been accepted to Oak Meadow, a distance learning program based in Vermont.
She’ll work from home, but her school is in Vermont. Just like Michael works from home, but his office is in California. Or like I work from home and my office is where I’m sitting. I’ll be her main teacher, but she will also have an Oak Meadow teacher who will review and grade her work, provide support and help keep us on track, and maintain her transcript with this fully-accredited school. Oak Meadow has a curriculum-only option, but enrollment feels like a much better choice for our family this year*.
The curriculum has a wonderful Waldorf flavor in the early grades without placing limitations on academic endeavor (unlike traditional Waldorf-Steiner programs). In second grade, Ellie will study poetry, history and geography, fables and folklore, and multiplication. Her science program and the reading selections are focused on animal study (Yay!). Art is integrated throughout the curriculum. If I were going to hand pick a curriculum tailored to Ellie’s strengths and interests, I’d end up with something very close to what has been working for Oak Meadow for 40 years.
As students move through the grades, the curriculum grows and changes. In fourth grade the focus shifts: the syllabus speaks to the student rather than the parent, who begins to take a supportive role rather than one of leadership. It is gratifying to see that the progression of the curriculum reinforces the natural development of the child. This is a program that we can continue all through high school if Ellie chooses. We are incredibly excited. The minute I found their website, I knew it was an exceptional choice for Ellie and for us as a family.
*Left to our own devices, Ellie and I might just read and paint all day. And bake (to learn fractions). With enrollment, not only is my life simplified as far as record keeping, dealing with the local school board, providing balanced learning, and staying on track, but I don’t have to be the bad guy when we’ve got to get stuff done! It’s actually DUE! It has to be TURNED IN! As a first time homeschool parent, this makes me feel a lot less pressured. And Ellie gets to have school swag. Which she loves.