curriculums

So, once I decided it was time to homeschool, I knew that I would not have any problem finding enough resources that could work for us. It has actually been an interesting experience trying to narrow down the choices! 

This is what I'm currently using...along with random 'Life Lessons' that I pull out of my hat based on our own experiences. 

MATH: Saxon-math workbooks
Elle & Sam are almost 9 and 7 and these work beautifully for them. They learn new concepts and review each day. They both have fun doing their math, especially when we make things more exciting! Like we did here.

LANGUAGE ARTS: Learning Language Arts Through Literature
I am on the lookout for something better than this. Elle is very independent and a self-motivator. She does these lessons (the yellow book) very quickly, but after a few weeks she became bored with them because it's a lot of busy work for her. She could definitely use something more creative and that puts her to work on the real thing, rather than tons of examples with obvious answers. Sam, however can really benefit from the repetition and writing answers for all the examples. (He doesn't love to write, or really...he might tell you that it is his least favorite. Okay fine, he'll tell you he hates writing, but it's more of a confidence issue for him. He just needs to see that he CAN do it.) One thing I REALLY like about this program is that it includes many 'outside' literature books that make it more interesting. Sam needs more of a phonogram approach (possibly like Spalding) and Elle needs more of a 'get to the point and learn something deep approach'! If you have any ideas, send them my way!!

SCIENCE, ART, GEOGRAPHY, HISTORY: The IRON ROD Curriculum & Latter-Day Learning, The Family School curriculum. The IRON ROD curriculum is a borrowed copy from a friend and I would LOVE to get my hands on a real copy. It's been around for more than 20 years, but the publishers and authors have dropped off the face of the planet. The Family School Curriclum is awesome so far. It is full of great family lessons that include scriptures and object lessons and visual examples to teach in a fun way. 

LANGUAGE: AMERICAN SIGN LANGUAGE: Signing Time! And whatever my brain feels like teaching... We use ASL in our home regularly (since my ears don't work like most peoples and I can't hear, ahh okay, to clarify, I'm deaf to the deaf world and hard of hearing to those that don't get it. IT is okay to say 'deaf'.

OTHERS: We cook, we clean, we breed puppies, we garden, we play in the snow, we camp, we hike, we read and read and read.  We play the Wii, we play sports, we ride our bikes, we go to church, we tell jokes, we try to serve others and we live our lives the best we know how by following God's commandments and loving each other.