Here's what RACHAEL has to look forward to!

Things are coming together for the 2010-11 school year and, as usual, I thought I'd share our curriculum choices...in case anyone is interested. :)

One of my favorite aspects of homeschooling is the ability to tailor our curriculum to Rachael's level, and it's all over the place this year! Here's what we'll be studying, in no particular order.

• Learning Language Arts Through Literature - this is a comprehensive language arts series that covers grammar, reading, spelling, vocabulary, writing mechanics, creative writing, thinking skills, etc. I love that it's laid out for me, day-by-day, and in the 3rd grade book that Rachael will be using this year, it's really geared toward independent work by the student with very little help from the teacher. I have a feeling she'll be working on this one while I'm working with Milly!

• Grammar, Usage & Mechanics - even though grammar is covered in LLATL, a little extra practice won't hurt anything. I've read wonderful reviews of the GUM series, and it's another subject that she'll be able to do independently. It's a smallish workbook, so it won't be an every day thing. I went with a 3rd grade level here too, so it should compliment her larger language arts course nicely.
  

• Spelling Workout - we used the Natural Speller last year, and I liked the word lists, but Rachael breezed right through it. She's very fortunate to (apparently) have gotten my knack for spelling. So again, I've read great things about Spelling Workout, and after looking at sample pages online, bought the 4th grade book for her. Maybe it'll challenge her a little! Again, this one is meant mostly for independent work. I'm loving that theme. Language arts is the area in which Rachael excels most, so I'm fine with her doing most of it on her own. I'll have to be much more involved in the other subjects.

• Math-U-See (Beta) - dreaded, dreaded math. Again with following in my footsteps, Rachael isn't a huge math fan. I'm not sure why this is, as she hasn't had any trouble understanding the concepts...she just doesn't like it. I was tempted to explore other curriculum choices because of that, but MUS just looks like more fun than the other, drier options. We actually started on the Beta (2nd grade) book back in the spring, so we'll be working through it this school year - multiple-digit addition and subtraction, etc. We're not going to be in a big hurry to get through it, but IF she finishes it before spring, we'll move on to Gamma (single and multiple digit multiplication, which I can't imagine her being ready for...but I've been wrong before.)

• The Story of the World I: Ancient Times - okay, we slacked off on history last year. We got about halfway through the book, so we'll be reviewing and then moving on. I'm really looking forward to SOTW II, which covers the Middle Ages. I'll be more in my element teaching from that one!

• Apologia - Exploring Creation Through Botany - so, I'll admit, I'm not terribly excited about this one. Maybe it's because I've never been terribly excited about science, maybe it's because we still have a couple of chapters of last year's Exploring Creation Through Astronomy to wrap up first. I'm sure it'll be more fun than I'm anticipating - classifying plants, making slides and checking them out under the microscope, making our own "light hut" and growing plants, etc. Rachael will love it, and I'll try to! At any rate, I'm a big fan of Apologia in general, so I'm sure it'll be a great book.

• Map Skills For Today, Grade 2 - throwing a little geography into the mix this year! She's already somewhat familiar with maps thanks to our history book, but this will give her a more thorough lesson in directions, symbols, etc. (I also bought a huge wall map of the world that I'm pretty excited about using this year!) This is another small-ish workbook that won't be an everyday activity.

• Horizons Health 2 - focusing on safety, hygiene, nutrition and fitness. We used Horizons last year too and found it a little dry, but it does cover the topics that need to be covered. Fellow homeschoolers, if you have any health curriculum suggestions for next year, I'd love to hear them!

• God and Me! Devotions for Girls 6-9 - I had to spend a while browsing in the Lifeway store for just the right book for our Bible study this year, and I'm really excited about this one! This is SUCH a cute book - full color, with a devotion for each day and an activity to go along with it (questions to answer, a picture to draw or a puzzle to work - things that I know Rachael will enjoy.) There are three God and Me! books for girls ages 6-9, and I'll probably be going back to pick those up before the end of the school year. This will definitely be an everyday activity - probably the first subject of the day, to get us off to a good start. This is going to be so much more fun (for us both) than the Bible studies we used last year!

Those are all of the big/important/book-based curriculums we'll be using this year...although I have a few more things in mind as well.

• Muzzy French - a "sometimes" and "mostly for fun" thing, for now. Rachael is already a little fascinated with French vocabulary thanks to Fancy Nancy (who is currently the top contender for this year's Halloween costume, by the way.) I may even be able to help a little, having taken four years of French myself. Of course, that was a long time ago, and off the top of my head, I'm pretty sure I remember how to find a restroom, an airport, and some green beans. Maybe I'll just leave it all to Muzzy.

• Art - something else we're really excited about this year! Rachael will be taking an hour-long art class on Thursday afternoons at the Danville School of Arts and Science, a homeschool co-op. We just visited yesterday for their open house, and Rachael met her art teacher and got to check out some of the projects they'll be doing this year. They'll learn some art history and practice methods used by great artists, they'll sketch and sculpt and paint gourds that are grown by the teacher. They'll also get to help create backgrounds and props for the drama class's annual production - and they're hoping that it'll be Charlie & the Chocolate Factory this year. I can't wait to see what she creates! (THANKS to Gramma for Rachael's "scholarship" to DSAS!)

• Piano lessons - Rachael and I will both continue piano lessons with a wonderful friend-of-a-friend this fall. Rachael can already play a couple of simple tunes with her fingers on the correct keys, and she can't wait to learn more!

• Girl Scouts - my big girl completed her two years of Daisies and bridged up to Brownies in June! We're looking forward to a great first year of Brownies...we since I will be her new troop leader. :) I've completed a portion of my training already, with another session next week, and one more to go before our first meeting on September 13th. I have a wonderful co-leader who will be working with Daisies in the same troop, and I'm sure we're going to have a great bunch of girls this year too.

Now that all of that is out of the way...I just need to put together some "school" activities for Milly, and we'll be good to go. She insists that she wants to "do school" too, and I'm looking forward to it being much easier to keep her happy this year than it was last year. Homeschooling with a toddler under foot was, I'm sorry to say, just not much fun. This year will be different...details on her "curriculum" are coming soon!

Halfway through week three...

 Originally posted on September 1, 2009

...and things are going pretty well! Milly is getting used to the idea of doing something on her own for a few minutes here and there while Rachael and I do schoolwork, and that's a tremendous help. Rachael is learning so much - Bible verses, common and proper nouns, pronouns, syllables, alphabetizing, telling time on an analog clock (she finally got that pesky skip counting by fives thing down pat!), planets, gravity... It's a good thing she loves to learn!

The only thing she isn't enjoying so much is handwriting. She seems to have a generous amount of "don't want to" combined with a dash of "don't care", and that makes it a bit of a struggle some days. We've started the first grade Handwriting Without Tears book, and that's a little easier for her. She still has a tendency to make sloppy letters in an effort to rush through the lesson, continues to mix up her b's and d's, and makes several of her numbers (2, 3, 7 and 9) backward. What to do with her? Everything else is so easy for her - maybe this will just "click" one day as well.

It's been a while since my last update - would you like to see pictures of what we've been up to?

 

Well, we have school outside in our pajamas sometimes. Just another perk of living in the middle of nowhere! Rachael has a nature journal that she draws in every day - anything interesting that she finds outside. In this picture, she's sketching her beloved tomato plant. Going to need quite a few more of those next year, I think.

 

We still have our "pet" turtles in a makeshift pond outside, and Rachael and Milly love to go out and watch them every day. They're in charge of feeding them, and once in a while we get a good action shot of them fighting over their breakfast. In this picture, Ruby is snapping at Felicity. Ruby is quite a bit larger and tends to be a bit of a bully, but Felicity gets her licks in too. We've added one more turtle since this picture was snapped - as with the others, Gene rescued Lilly from the middle of the road. Rachael knows that, with fall approaching, we'll have to set the turtles free soon, and she isn't terribly thrilled at the idea.
 

We play a lot of games, and Math Bingo is one of her favorites. She uses the manipulative blocks from our Math-U-See curriculum to help her add the big numbers, but she's starting to remember a lot of the smaller sums now. The pink card is always, always hers.

Coloring (okay, scribbling) is one of Milly's favorite schooltime activities. Anything with Dora's face on it is a BIG hit with her right now.
 

We finally made the balloon model of the solar system today. They're lined up in order from the sun - the big orange balloon - and even though it was officially stripped of planet status, she wanted Pluto to be included. (That's the little purple speck behind Neptune.) I thought that it would be appropriate to hang her solar system over her WALL-E poster, and she agreed. However, I'm not very happy with the whole thing. Her astronomy book actually outlined this project, using the balloons, and the diameter of several of them were so small that you couldn't even put air into them. Not to mention that NONE of the planets are actually ROUND. It's odd...I feel styrofoam balls and paint in our future.

This little monkey likes to steal the teacher's chair every chance she gets - and if she can grab a pen and scribble in the lesson book, so much the better.
 

We've had two Thursday morning co-ops now, and both have gone well. Rachael loves going to learn with her friends - and play in between lessons, of course. So far, she's made her own personal timeline in history...

...sorted shoes to learn about taxonomy and classification (this was a drawing of the process afterward)...

...and done leaf rubbings while examining the symmetry of several leaves' veins.
 

Naturally, Milly also works very hard while Rachael is in class.
 

After history, science, Bible and art comes lunch - where Rachael can be found at the end of the table with her "boy best friend", Patrick...who she will marry and have a hundred little girls with someday (the first two being named Genevieve and Lacey), but for now, they're just friends. Daddy is only moderately displeased, having seen for himself that Patrick is a very polite young man. :)

Then comes P.E. before heading home. Needless to say, we don't do a lot of other schoolwork at home on co-op days - just reading and math.

So, there's our week three update! We had two weeks to get into a routine without worrying much about outside activities. This week, Girl Scout meetings and craft time at the library resumed, as will gymnastics on Thursday. Thankfully, those are all late afternoon and evening activities, so we can still knock out schoolwork (and Milly's nap - very important) before rushing off to those.

More to come soon...!
 

A recommitment to the blog...and a grandparent tutorial!

 Originally posted on July 23, 2009

Okay, you caught me - the blog isn't a new idea. I actually started it LAST fall, with the intention of updating throughout our kindergarten year. That didn't work out so well, as kindergarten was largely chaotic - especially when I had to hold Milly practically all day on top of everything else we were doing! This year will hopefully be easier. Milly is old enough now to sit at the table with us while we "do school", and will very likely be doing a bit of school herself this year - although she won't know it. Alphabet coloring pages, here we come!

Even though we're still in July, I'm already looking forward to beginning this school year. I haven't set an official "first day" yet, although I imagine it will be in mid-August. I still have a few textbooks to buy, plenty of planning to do, an overflowing bookshelf in the kitchen to organize (and figure out how to KEEP it that way!) Rachael is ready and would gladly "go back to school" just anytime now - so as soon as everything is in order, we'll get going.

Before I tell you what we'll be up to this year, a quick word to the grandparents (and anyone else unfamiliar with blogs) that I'll be inviting to read along with us... A blog is basically an online diary. Bookmark this website; you'll need to come back and check in to read our udpates. Assuming that you want to know, of course.  :)  The newest entry will always appear at the top of the screen - which means that, if this is your first visit, you'll need to scroll all the way to the bottom to read the first entry. When you come back, just scroll down to the last entry you read and work your way up. I'll attempt to update every day or so, at least - and also have every intention of making Rachael dictate a bit about what she's doing and learning. And of course, there will be pictures - especially when we do FUN things and field trips!

Now, about our school year... To begin with, if we were not homeschooling, Rachael would be starting kindergarten at Drewry Mason Elementary School this fall. I must admit to some degree of curiosity, being that I spent three years there during middle school - I'd love to see how they've revamped the place to accommodate even smaller children. Henry County's first day of school will be a little bittersweet, knowing that my baby would be gone all day to "real" school - I might even be tempted to drive her over there, just depending on what kind of day we have here.  ;)  But sending Rachael to kindergarten this fall would be a huge disservice to a child who is already reading books with several chapters and very few pictures. We can do better - and we will do better.

Here's what Rachael will be studying this year at Regalia Academy...

MATH
We will once again be using the Math-U-See curriculum, which relies heavily on manipulatives (ie, "little blocks") to help kids figure out number concepts. For instance, two "5" blocks laid end to end are the same length as the "10" block. 5 + 5 = 10. Makes perfect sense, right? We made good progress through the first book (Primer) last year, but got hung up with skip counting by fives. Need to figure out a way to make that click for her, then we'll be moving on - and probably into the next book (Alpha) before the school year is over.

LANGUAGE ARTS
I'm excited about this one! We'll be using a curriculum called Learning Language Arts Through Literature, which focuses on...well, learning language arts through literature. It's kind of an all-in-one phonics, spelling, reading, grammar and handwriting course. Thankfully, you can browse the curriculum pretty thoroughly online, which led me to buy (are you ready for this?) the second grade books for Rachael. Kindergarten and first grade were simply too easy, and even the second grade readers are no challenge for her - she picked one up, read a few pages, and fixed me with the "I AM NOT A BABY" glare that said she expected more difficult fare. *sigh*  However, she needs practice with her handwriting (we may also use a book called Handwriting Without Tears for extra practice) and skipping ahead any farther would also mean skipping over punctuation, parts of a sentence, nouns/pronouns/verbs/adverbs, etc. As it is, that ought to provide her with an adequate challenge this year, even if the included readers do not.

We'll also be learning spelling words from a book called The Natural Speller, and reading lots and lots and lots of things other than what's included with the curriculum. There are so many wonderful reading lists online, and I've snagged the public and private schools' first grade reading lists from the public library. We shouldn't have any trouble knocking those out! Rachael will very likely have an independent reading time each day as well as read-to-Mommy or listen-to-Mommy-read time. All three of them are pretty important to me and, as much as she loves her books, I don't expect any argument from her.

SCIENCE
We'll be using a book called Exploring Creation with Astronomy, published by Apologia. The Apologia series sounds wonderful - it's a Christian curriculum consisting of five books that teach about the world God created. The first year focuses on astronomy (because in the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth.) After that was done, God created vegetation - so the second year in this curriculm focuses on botany. The next three years cover the animals in the order that they were created - one year of winged creatures, one of aquatic creatures and finally, land animals. Pretty neat, huh? We're looking forward to digging into this one - Rachael loves looking at the stars, finding constellations, looking for planets - so this will be right up her alley. And of course, with the whole WALL-E fascination and his propensity for space travel...it'll be easy to throw him in there to get her attention as well!

HISTORY
 Her history text is called The Story of the World: Volume I - Ancient Times. This book covers the years 5000 BC - 400 AD. We've already read about the nomads and how they had to hunt and gather for their food. Rachael and her friends all thought that was pretty neat until they were turned outside with baskets and told to go find lunch! Now we're on to ancient Egypt - we've written in heiroglyphs and cuneiform, mummified an apple (that was interesting!) and will be building a pyramid out of sugar cubes when we resume studies. I'll be incorporating Bible lessons into her history - Moses and Pharoah's daughter, the plagues of Egypt, etc. My goal here is to take the "stories" - both from the history book and from the Bible - and help her to see that these were real people, real events. That's hard to understand sometimes when you just read the "story"!

Rachael is also VERY into the American Girl books right now. There are about a dozen girls, each one with eight or nine books, and each lived in a different area and time in history...so they're great story books, and great history lessons too. We've read all of the books about Samantha, a wealthy Victorian girl circa 1904. Now we're reading about Kit, who is weathering the Great Depression with her family in 1934. Next up, I think, is Kirsten, a little pioneer girl whose family immigrated from Sweden - and Rachael's tentative plan is to be Kirsten for Halloween this year! So we'll keep reading the American Girl books and learning about different eras in American history along the way.

BIBLE
Of course! We'll do a refresher course on her A-Z memory verses from last year (probably rusty by now). Daily devotions from the God's Little Princess Devotional Bible. Doctrine from the A Beka curriculum we didn't finish in kindergarten. And I'll be needing to make another trip to the Lifeway store in Danville. That can be a dangerous place - so many awesome books to choose from!

Those are the "big" subjects, but certainly not all of them. She'll be learning about health and hygiene, manners, social studies (gleaned from holidays, current events, etc.), art (seasonal crafts, projects to go along with her lessons) and hopefully some music. We'll start watching the Muzzy DVDs to expand on her French vocabulary (already pretty impressive, thanks to the Fancy Nancy books.) As for extracurricular activities, she will continue in gymnastics and in Girl Scouts. She's itching to play soccer too, but we'll have to see about that...don't want to stretch her (or us) too thin.

So, there's our current plan - now to get busy implementing it! YOUR assignment is to check in here regularly to see what's going on - and feel free to offer suggestions, ask questions, or just leave encouragement if you're so inclined. Although I'm comfortable in our plan for this school year, homeschooling for the long haul is still a bit of an overwhelming thought. And as always when working with children, there will be good days and bad days...here's hoping the 2009-10 school year consists of more good days!

Rachael for President!

Originally posted on November 1, 2008

This has been a crazy week - thus the lack of updates. Truth be told, there hasn't been much school done this week. Thank goodness there are opportunities for learning everywhere we go!

Rachael learned her Bible verse for the week - "Fear not, for I am with thee." Isaiah 43:5

And we talked some more about politics and the upcoming election. We covered:

• Speeches - as promised, we checked out the Silly Speech Maker. Rachael's speech goes as follows: "My fellow gymnastics class: As I look out at all of you, I see a future that's excellent, but to get there, we need lovely leadership in the White House. With your help, and your Wall-E toys, we can do this together! I promise to ban Hannah Montana, to hop the budget, and to save the snowglobe. Further, all babies should get a chance to make Halloween cookies. Our spinning schools are filled with crying, and this can only be fixed by giving kids more blue fairy Barbies! Finally, I promise that if I'm elected, you can come visit me in the White House, (though you'll have to sleep in my bedroom.) Remember, a vote for me is a vote for books!"
• Campaigning - what it is, why it's done, and whether or not everything said during the campaigns can be made good on. We read a great book called Duck for President, about a duck who campaigns for (and wins) the job of farm manager, then Senator, then President - only to decide to go back to being a duck on a farm. I found a "campaign for the presidency" worksheet online that I had Rachael dictate - apparently, she wants to run for President "because I want more attention", she wants me for her campaign manager (aww!) and two issues that she wants to tackle are buying food for hungry kids and fixing their broken toys. Oh, and she wants voters everywhere to know that she's willing to share her home with them. It looks like we'll need to add on a few bedrooms...
• The candidates and where they stand on important issues. Okay, you try explaining this one to a four-year-old! It was hard enough explaining what issues are, much less where the candidates stand on them - especially as there's a lot of overlap. I used the Time for Kids website to help explain them to her, but I'm afraid it didn't do much good. Obama wants to "give the general public the option to choose health plans similar to that of government employees" while McCain would "make patients the center of care and give them a larger role in both disease prevention and care." They both sound pretty good, right? That's what Rachael thought too. (Naturally, there are several issues that we did not discuss, as they would be either a) just too far over her head or b) completely age-inappropriate.)
• Choosing a candidate. Based on what she learned about the issues...oh wait, that's not true. Rachael is a staunch supporter of McCain/Palin, "because she's a girl." Nothing that I've taught her yet has made her waver for an instant on her stance. (Disclaimer: she still has no idea what our political views are or who we'll vote for. I've done my best to present the facts to her in a non-biased way, my goal being to make her think. So far, I'm thinking we'll do better in 2012 when she can get past the whole "vote for the girl" idea!)
• Mock election! On Friday, we came up with our own issues - two per family member, excluding Amelia (I assume the minimum voting age in our home is four-ish...) Once agreed upon, Rachael, Gene and I put them to a vote. (A brief tussle ensued over who was to read the ballots, wherein I appointment myself President of our household and assumed the responsibility. Gene, apparently, is the Electoral College, and got to read nada.Rachael's proposition that we have 100 babies was shot down two to one, as was Gene's idea of declaring his Sunday afternoon nap an official family holiday. Allowing dirty work boots in the house was a unanimous "NO", and beginning to give Rachael an allowance was a unanimous "YES".

Rachael is excited to go and vote on Tuesday, and hopes we can go before gymnastics so she can show off her "I voted" sticker to her friends...

On Friday (Halloween), we did a spooky science experiment called "The Witches' Potion". To do this, we had four beakers (okay, glasses that we don't use very often) - two contained phenolphthalein (a common pool-cleaning chemical) and two contained ammonia. We also had a glass of white vinegar handy. All of these substances are clear. According to the story that goes along with this experiment, the first witch was upset because only pink potions have any power - the second assured her that the pink was there, and invited her to combine their potions. Sure enough, when beaker #1 is combined with beaker #2, they turn a bright, vivid pink (a result of an acid combined with a base.) Same went with beakers #3 and #4.  BUT, when the two beakers of bright pink are dumped into the glass of vinegar...poof! Everything turns back to clear.

Which is very cool in theory, except that Rachael loves pink, and was more than a little irate when it all disappeared. So we repeated the process later for Gene, and were sure to take pictures of the pink.

Rachael had a great Halloween, with several events leading up to it - decorating cookies with her friends on Monday, a party at the library on Wednesday, a pizza party at church on Thursday night. On Friday, we went to Trunk or Treat at her Gramma's church, and then trick-or-treating around her neighborhood. There are few things I can think of that this child loves more than trick-or-treating, and I was so happy to hear several comments about her good manners when she thanked people for her candy. Unfortunately, no one recognized her as EVE from the movie Wall-E, but plenty ooh'ed and aah'ed over Amelia's white tiger costume (it was adorable.) But Rachael loved being EVE for an evening anyway, and hopefully she'll choose someone/something a bit more recognizable next year - so far, she's thinking Smurfette.

Our (School) Year to Date

Originally posted on October 24, 2008

Rachael officially started kindergarten on Monday, August 25, 2008. She's a little young - in the state of Virginia, a child must be five years old by September 30 in order to start kindergarten, and Rachael won't be five until February. But she was so ready for kindergarten - and maybe even a little more. Want to hear about what we've done this year? :)

BIBLE
We start our morning with a devotion from the book God and Me, followed by the weekly memory verse and review of the verses she's learned already. We have a list of verses from A to Z - we started with the vowels and now are going back to pick up the other letters. Currently, she knows:

A - All have sinned and come short of the glory of God. Romans 3:23
B - Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved. Acts 16:31
C - Children, obey your parents in the Lord, for this is right. Ephesians 6:1
D - Depart from evil, and do good. Psalm 34:14
E - Even a child is known by his doings. Proverbs 20:11
I - If ye shall ask any thing in My name, I will do it. John 14:14
O - O give thanks unto the Lord, for He is good. Psalm 118:1
U - Unto Thee, O God, do we give thanks. Psalm 75:1

I'm fascinated by how quickly and easily she learns these verses, and can't wait to hear her rattle off 26 in a row when we finish the alphabet! She's also memorized the Lord's Prayer and, although it isn't Biblical, we do the Pledge of Allegiance at the same time.

We use the A Beka K5 Bible Curriculum - which is okay for this year, but I'll be looking for something more substantial for next year. This curriculum offers a Bible story about every other day (we started with "in the beginning" and are working through Genesis - we're up to Jacob's ladder as of this morning) with lots of time to review and some doctrinal drills in between. In regards to doctrine, we've discussed:

- how God wrote the Bible
- what is sin, and who sins
- the Trinity (and let me tell you, THAT was fun to try to explain!)- God had no beginning and will have no end
- salvation, why Jesus died for us, why we must accept Him as our savior
- Heaven, and who gets to be there, although God wants everyone there

MANNERS
We have a great little book called 365 Manners Kids Should Know, and we read about a new manner each day. Some of these are quite obvious - don't talk with your mouth full, don't interrupt when someone else is talking, how to address adults. But there are also sections on being a good friend, a good guest, gift-giving and holidays, and lots more - all in all, it covers every topic I could think of regarding manners, and more that I never would have come up with on my own (Quaker weddings? Sitting shiva? Private or semiprivate audience with the Pope?)

GEOGRAPHY
She already had a beginning grasp of geography - she had looked at maps and knew that we live in Virginia, Daddy works in North Carolina, Disney World is in Florida, Aunt Annette lives in California, and we want to visit Alaska. So why not learn the rest of the states as well? I printed out a coloring page of the U.S. and we color in one state each day, after reviewing all of the others to be sure that she remembers them all. We have only ten states left to go!

Our only issues with learning the states thus far have come with Alabama (which she called "Obama" for the longest time) and Montana (which she occasionally refuses to identify because of a deep disliking for Hannah Montana. I've explained that the state was not named for the girl, but this makes absolutely no difference to her.)

MATH
After covering all of the above at the breakfast table, it's time to dive into math. We knock this one out of the way early in the day because, to be quite honest, math has never been my favorite subject and I just prefer to get it over with early. We use a curriculum called Math-U-See, which relies heavily on the use of blocks to not only teach, but show the concepts. She likes playing with the blocks, and used them a lot early on, but hasn't used them much recently. I'm sure they'll be used again when we encounter something that's hard for her to understand, but thus far, the Primer book (the first in the series) has been pretty easy for her.

Topics we've covered so far include:

- counting to 20 (those teens are tricky!)
- place value: hundreds, tens and ones
- addition facts: +1 (adding one always results in the next highest number)
- basic facts to memorize: 1+1, 2+2, 3+3, 4+4 and 5+5
- adding horizontally and vertically
- skip counting by 2s and by 10s
- adding tens (20+20, 30+10, etc.)
- adding hundreds (100+100, 300+200, etc.)
- solving for unknown ( __+3 = 9, etc.)

PHONICS & READING
Math and reading are our primary focuses, so they always come first - and sometimes they're the only things we get done in a day. Homeschooling with a baby definitely presents a challenge, and we don't always get to do as much as I'd like in a day! So we knock out these two subjects first, and anything else we get to squeeze in at this point is simply a bonus.

We use a curriculum called Happy Phonics, which uses games (lots and lots of games!) to help a child master everything from identifying capital and lowercase letters through the tricky -augh and -ough sounds. We've been using this curriculum for quite some time now, and Rachael read her first words in January of this year. Now, we have only a couple of lessons to go (those rotten -augh/-ough sounds, some ae/ie things and contractions) and we'll be finished! She's doing very, very well with her reading, and I largely credit Happy Phonics for it, for having made the learning process fun.

For an example of what she can read, this is the last page she read from the curriculum reader:

Dreams and visions
Go on a mission.

What's the confusion?
Do you have a question?End of session.

I have a notion
That if you shake the potion
With a up and down motion
You will make lotion.

I have quite a reaction
To doing my fractions!

Is this the nation
That has a space station?

She doesn't care much for that reader, and you can probably see why - it doesn't make a lot of sense sometimes! Thankfully, we have a pretty hefty library of children's books to fall back on, and we visit our public library each week for even more books. We set aside time for reading each day - for me to read to her, and for her to read to me. Quite often, I catch her alone in her room, sitting in her beanbag with a pile of books nearby, reading to herself - and this thrills me to no end, as I want my girls to love books the way that I do!

Along with the books that she can read on her own, she loves to have me read chapter books to her. We're currently reading the Little House on the Prairie series (we're on book #2), and Roald Dahl's The BFG. (She'll be getting several of Beverly Cleary's Ramona books for Christmas, and I can't wait to revisit those with her!)

Although we obviously don't "do school" with Amelia yet, she has her share of books to choose from as well. There are always board books scattered across the living room floor, and Rachael has kindly moved all of the board books in her room to the bottom shelf of her bookcase for when her sister comes in to play. Like her sister, we often find Amelia sitting quietly in the floor, paging through her own books. (This is always a little scary, because when she gets that quiet, we naturally assume that she's into something she shouldn't be!) Her favorite books thus far are Peek-A-Boo (she loves seeing the other babies) and Goodnight Moon, which she has already gnawed the binding off of, and will be getting a new copy of for Christmas. Interestingly, this is the only book she's ever "eaten" - she's remarkably well-behaved with the others! :)

SOCIAL STUDIES
We do Social Studies once a week - on Tuesdays, since having gymnastics in the middle of the afternoon kind of messes up the rest of our day. We use the A Beka K5 Social Studies book, which is really a bit of a joke. It's covered things so far such as public servants ("color the policeman"), government ("color the White House"), Columbus Day ("color these three boats"), and children around the world ("color Pedro's sombrero"). Notice a theme here?

Needless to say, what she really learns about social studies comes from other sources. We tend to study whatever is relevant at the time - for instance, we're learning about politics right now since there's no escaping from the election anyway. We've talked about what a president does, qualifications that a person must have to run for president, the difference between a democracy and a republic, differences in political parties, and how the donkey and elephant came to resemble the Democratic and Republican parties. Today we'll talk about primaries and conventions, and check out the Silly Speech Makers (I'll post her speech here if it turns out as great as I think it will!) I ask her at the end of each lesson who she would vote for in this election, to give her ample opportunity to change her mind as she learns more. So far, she hasn't wavered in her support of Sarah Palin, "because she's a girl." (We're very careful not to share our personal political views with her, in hopes that she'll form her own. She has no idea which candidates we support.)

With holidays fast approaching, we'll have even more material for our Social Studies lessons - the origins of Halloween, the first Thanksgiving, Christmas around the world...they're going to be fun!

SCIENCE
To be perfectly honest, most of the science we get around to so far comes from PBS's show Sid the Science Kid (which is actually really cute.) This is because, like their Social Studies book, A Beka's K5 science book is pitifully lacking in information that she hasn't been aware of for ages (the five senses, why it's important to eat well and exercise, seasons, weather - all in the same tired coloring book format as the Social Studies book.)

We have several other science books, including The Original Backyard Scientist, which has experiments from items usually found around the house. Only problem is, it takes time and planning to work these into whatever it is we're studying at the time...and I'm generally not up for the task as science is one of those "to be squeezed in" subjects at present anyway. I'm considering one of the Apologia Science texts, which are both written in a Biblical perspective and pretty much lay everything out for people like me who need more direction. It seems like a cool series in that it kind of goes along with Genesis - on the first day, God created the heavens and the earth, so the first book in the series is Astronomy. The second book is Botany, then we get into the animals with Marine Life, Flying Creatures and Land Animals.

HISTORY
We're going to have a lot of fun with this one once we get going...but that's the hard part! We're using The Story of the World: Ancient Times - which starts with asking "what is history?" Rachael's grandparents all got questions about their own histories as part of that introduction, and we loved reading all of the answers! After that, we learned about nomads and the early farmers - which was a little dry, but the next chapter is taking us into ancient Egypt. That will definitely be more exciting, although I'm not sure I want to talk to her about the mummification process just yet...

The whole of this book is in the ancient times, but covers Egypt, Greece, etc. through the fall of Rome. The next book moves into the Middle Ages, the next one covers Early Modern Times, etc.

WHAT ABOUT THE ARTS?
We don't have a formal art or music curriculum, but that doesn't mean they aren't abundant - anyone who's had a 4-year-old before knows that there is always, always art and music!

We intentionally listen to a wide variety of music - from Christian music and hymns to country, oldies, classical, etc. Her favorite music at the moment is "anything by Sugarland"!

And, she loves, loves, loves to draw. Mostly pictures of herself, but occasionally one of herself with someone else. Perhaps I'll have to scan some of her artwork to share here in the future as well.

AND EXTRACURRICULAR ACTIVITIES?
 This summer, Rachael made the difficult decision to stop taking dance classes in favor of gymnastics (difficult because she wanted to do both, and we made her choose one!) While I'll miss the shiny costumes and floofy tutus, I have to admit that she's doing really well in gymnastics - she can tumble with the best of them, isn't half bad on the uneven bars, and fearlessly leaps into "the pit" (which is filled with soft foam cubes.) At home, she is constantly leaping from the stairs or off of the furniture, thanks to an interview she saw on television with Shawn Johnson during the summer Olympics. Shawn mentioned that she was leaping from the furniture as a toddler, and Rachael took this as her cue - after all, she maintains that she wants to be just like Shawn Johnson. Also from that interview, Rachael dreams of someday seeing her likeness sculpted in butter.

We try to meet once a week with a small playgroup, made up of ourselves and three other families, two of which also homeschool. We typically meet at the park for lunch, then let the kids run themselves silly.

We also meet with the Henry County homeschool group once a month at Roll-A-Bout. Rachael went with me last month and tried roller skating for the first time - and loved it! She didn't hesitate to get out on the floor while holding hands with an older homeschooled buddy, and she's looking forward to going back.

Oh! And there's story time, once a week at the library. It's a small branch, and we're very much regulars, so she's kind of a pet of the librarians - it's nice walking in and having them greet her by name.

And of course, we can't forget church. I'm remaining hopeful that there will be more children joining our congregation soon, as having my girls be a part of a vital youth group is very important to me. In the meantime, she loves her church family - and being the center of attention.

Rachael is looking forward to playing soccer - maybe next spring, since she'll be five then. You can also join in Girl Scouts at age five. And while we want for her to learn to play the piano, she's adamant that she wants to play the flute. Appropriate, I think, since the flute takes more wind to play than any of the other wind instruments...and goodness knows Rachael has plenty of wind. ;)

I think that adequately - no, more than adequately - sums up our school year to date. There's lots more coming - years and years of material, in fact. I'll do my best to update regularly here on what's happening at Regalia Academy. One thing is for sure - with two princesses in residence and so much to learn, there's never going to be a dull moment.