Mid-Year Curriculum Review

mid-year curriculum review | evaluating your homeschool year

Mid-Year is a great time to look everything over and see what’s working and what’s not. It’s a natural time for adjustments and trying out different curriculum if something just isn’t working. We’re doing a little of all of that right now: loving some things, adjusting other things, and ditching a few things as well. Welcome to our mid-year curriculum review!

Mid-Year Curriculum Review of Fifth Grade

mid-year curriculum review | evaluating your homeschool yearMy fifth grader has done amazingly well with all of his curriculum. We are loving our DIY science curriculum, and everyone is chomping at the bit to get to the chemistry unit in just another week or so. He’s also done very well with his independence in learning, meeting deadlines, completing assignments, and self-starting in the mornings without me. It’s a new feeling, and pretty awesome. I’m just afraid to get used to it. Don’t pinch me, please.

He’s finished his Greek Alphabet Code-Cracker book, and really doing well with the Latin for Children program. (I’m kicking myself for not using this program sooner and sticking for so long with a program that wasn’t working for us.)

Here is the full run-down of his fifth grade curriculum this year. But I haven’t really changed much, if anything.

Mid-Year Curriculum Review of Third Grade

mid-year curriculum review | evaluating your homeschool yearMy third grader is a different story. While she is doing very well this year, and I am very pleased overall with her curriculum, her story is one of constant adjustments. I’m always re-thinking things for her. We are continuing with Dyslexia Games B for her, and nearly finished with it. She has done so well with this program! I went ahead and ordered a “fun-schooling journal” from this same company to see if it helps her continue her progress and enthusiasm in her other subject areas.

I have also added a couple of apps to help with her spelling and dyslexia challenges. Simplex has been a terrific addition for us. Though she is at an equivalent of first grade spelling, this app has really helped her to begin making progress in this area. The skills she’s learned with Dyslexia Games and the visual/kinesthetic aspect of this app have helped her to progress, slowly but surely, with her spelling. Dyslexia Quest helps my daughter with skill areas rather than academic areas, per se. Visual and auditory processing, working memory, processing speed, phonological awareness, and other areas are addressed with a series of challenging games. It also emails me a great progress report to let me know exactly how she is doing in these areas and where she needs the most work.

The other major curriculum change for my third grader is our math curriculum. And this switch has been so hard for me. For a few years now, we’ve used Christian Light, and I love it. I understand it, the lessons are the perfect length with the perfect amount of variety and challenge. But it appeals to a verbal learner, which my dyslexic daughter obviously is not. I like the curriculum because I understand it; it’s written to a third grader, so I know what’s going on well enough to explain it to her. But she clearly struggles with the curriculum, even though she is good at the math, really intuitively. As a temporary test-phase, we are switching to a Math Mammoth curriculum that I had on hand. She loves the math puzzles and the unique approach; she loves the color and the hands-on elements. (I love that I can try something out without spending any more money. Lol!) So we’ll see how it goes. I feel like we are at a point in the year where I can afford the risk. She won’t be too far behind if the experiment fails, and I’ll know enough before time to order curriculum for next year.

You can take a look at the rest of her third grade curriculum here.

Mid-Year Curriculum Review of Preschool

mid-year curriculum review | evaluating your homeschool yearMy preschooler is coasting. We do a few activities here and there. But he’s almost created his own curriculum of sorts. He’s so funny! He bought a Star Wars number workbook with his own money, and loved it! Worked it cover to cover, and learned a ton. Additionally, he copies letters and words that he sees and uses my daughter’s Dyslexia Aid app to write his own stories. Yep, he’s writing books before he can read them. He uses a few iPad apps pretty regularly: Cursive Writing Wizard, Doodling Dragons, and Montessori Numbers. And he plays with his bathtub letters. For the most part, he is literally teaching himself, with a little (very little, as little as he can manage) input from me.

mid-year curriculum review | evaluating your homeschool year

So, he’s ditched nearly all of his preschool curriculum mid-year and decided to unschool. HAH! I never know what to expect with this one. I am sprinkling in some Logic of English Foundations lessons here and there when I can. But I’m not pushing it.

Homeschool is just one constant adjustment, at least at our house. And the mid-year curriculum review is something that just kind of happens almost organically, whether I plan on it or not. It’s the name of the game. Thankfully, there are more than enough options to fill the gaps we tend to find halfway through the year.

2016 Third Grade Curriculum

3rd grade homeschool curriculum | homeschooling dyslexiaI’m excited for this year for so many reasons, but I’m especially excited for Middlest’s third grade year. We’ve had some major discoveries and improvements with diet/behavior over the last year and were beginning to see the fruits of that at the tale-end of second grade. I’m also eager to see her dyslexia improve with some of the curriculum changes and adjustments we’ve made. In one sense, I can’t wait to see what she is capable of now that her body is healthy and functioning well and all the pieces are in place. Here’s what’s in store for Middlest for the third grade.

Core resources:

Extras:

Middlest was only a toddler the last time we studied Ancient History. Even so, she remembers many of her favorite book titles from that study and several of our projects. That’s one of my favorite aspects of Tapestry of Grace specifically and whole-family learning in general. She is excited about getting to read her favorites on her own this time, to her little brother. I’m excited about seeing her understanding deepen this time around with new books and projects.

Writing and spelling related activities are ones that I help her with quite a bit, partly because of her difficulties with these and partly because of the anxiety her dyslexia causes her. This topic could probably be a post of it’s own, but I’ll keep it short. At this stage, I frequently allow her to “write” orally while I act as her scribe. Sometimes, she will use these narrations as copywork, copying her own words that I wrote down (with all correct spelling, grammar, and punctuation). Other times, I will use a sentence or so as dictation, having her copy down her own words as I read them back to her. Later this year, we will be working toward the writing “process” of having her write her own thoughts with all their imperfections and then editing it together before she writes or types the final copy.

I’m loving this set-up for her third grade year. It feels like the perfect fit, and I can’t wait to watch her thrive.

Check out our curriculum for preschool and 5th grade, too.