A few days ago I shared my plans for the upcoming school year, in particular for Celeste's grade 4. Now it is time to share my plans for my son Andre's grade 9 year. After spending a year in public school, he asked to come back to homeschooling.
I have homeschooled grade 9 before, with Adrienne, still I prefer to approach this year with a blank page. Each child is different and I know that not every curriculum will work for all three.
Andre is currently at Army Cadet Camp, but before he left we spent some time discussing his grade nine year at home. Some subjects were simple to figure out, like Math and Language Arts. For some of the other subjects, I asked him to think about and then let me know if he had some particular interests he would like to study. Those subjects were History, Science, Geography & Cultures, and "Extra Projects".
In the past year, I have learned a lot about Project-Based Homeschooling and I wanted to make sure it was part of our experience. I learned by reading Lori's book and also by encouraging, then stepping back and watching Celeste direct her own projects. Hers were so varied, from Queen Elizabeth II to History of Fashion to Sharks!
Andre and I met after a couple of days of him thinking about my request. We sat together, talked, and I took notes. Below is the plan so far. Changes and/or additions might be made as we go along, nothing is ever set in stone!
MATH: Teaching Textbooks Pre-Algebra.
LANGUAGE ARTS:
Brave Writer: The Writer's Jungle first, then maybe Help for High School. This approach will be new to him, but I think it will work well. He will also be using The Boomerang for language arts, which includes spelling, punctuation, grammar, literary elements, and literature. At his request, he will have Growing with Grammar 8. I didn't even mention this one, but he asked for it. He did use it for several years and he loved the whole curriculum, especially diagramming (I know it might sound odd..!). I already have it, minus the workbook.
SCIENCE:
I asked him to let me know which field of science he was interested in. He answered: Electricity, Robotics, and Computer Technology. We will both be pulling together resources. We will use a "spine book", a main reference text to learn the basics from and some hands-on experiments. I started putting together a list of books from our local library. Once he comes back from camp, we can go through the list and select our books and make a list of experiments to complete. I will expect lab worksheets completed by him as well as notes from what he has learned.
GEOGRAPHY & CULTURES:
For this subject, I asked him to choose a continent to focus on. He chose Asia (minus Russia, he told me he would want to cover Russia when he does Europe). For this, we will use a mixture of resources. The Trail Guide to World Geography will be one (especially the Points of Interests section), along with an atlas and almanac. I found the Usborne Introduction to Asia which we will also use as a spine. I also will be using the Ultimate Geography Guide to help in planning our studies, the library and internet. I think we should be able to cover two continents a year at least.
HISTORY:
History Odyssey - Ancients Level Two Celeste is studying the same time period with the same curriculum, but at a different level. Andre chose this time period too and asked me to add some historical fiction novels.
FRENCH:
see Part One post.
EXTRA PROJECTS:
I am copying his list from our notes here:
* Learn an Asian language (Mandarin)
* Make movies (animation, real life, stop motion)
* Minecraft (make things, download mods on extra computer, make skins)
* Learn to play electric guitar
* Play badminton and/or table tennis
* cook
* put together a fitness program and schedule for Celeste, Mom, and me. And do it.
For all his projects, I will help him make charts to keep him organized and that he can use to keep records of what he has done. For cooking in particular, I liked the idea from Barb of "a simple chart with all the recipes he wants to try with a place to record when they are finished." I think the same idea could be used for the movies project, Minecraft, and the guitar.
Another idea that I will implement from Barb is the weekly meeting. Some of Andre's school work will be more independent, so I think that having a set meeting time every week will help to review any areas that need attention or to just chat about the week past.
This is the plan so far. I am looking forward to this year!
I have homeschooled grade 9 before, with Adrienne, still I prefer to approach this year with a blank page. Each child is different and I know that not every curriculum will work for all three.
 |
| December 2012 I need a more recent photo of him and I! |
In the past year, I have learned a lot about Project-Based Homeschooling and I wanted to make sure it was part of our experience. I learned by reading Lori's book and also by encouraging, then stepping back and watching Celeste direct her own projects. Hers were so varied, from Queen Elizabeth II to History of Fashion to Sharks!
Andre and I met after a couple of days of him thinking about my request. We sat together, talked, and I took notes. Below is the plan so far. Changes and/or additions might be made as we go along, nothing is ever set in stone!
MATH: Teaching Textbooks Pre-Algebra.
LANGUAGE ARTS:
Brave Writer: The Writer's Jungle first, then maybe Help for High School. This approach will be new to him, but I think it will work well. He will also be using The Boomerang for language arts, which includes spelling, punctuation, grammar, literary elements, and literature. At his request, he will have Growing with Grammar 8. I didn't even mention this one, but he asked for it. He did use it for several years and he loved the whole curriculum, especially diagramming (I know it might sound odd..!). I already have it, minus the workbook.
SCIENCE:
I asked him to let me know which field of science he was interested in. He answered: Electricity, Robotics, and Computer Technology. We will both be pulling together resources. We will use a "spine book", a main reference text to learn the basics from and some hands-on experiments. I started putting together a list of books from our local library. Once he comes back from camp, we can go through the list and select our books and make a list of experiments to complete. I will expect lab worksheets completed by him as well as notes from what he has learned.
GEOGRAPHY & CULTURES:
For this subject, I asked him to choose a continent to focus on. He chose Asia (minus Russia, he told me he would want to cover Russia when he does Europe). For this, we will use a mixture of resources. The Trail Guide to World Geography will be one (especially the Points of Interests section), along with an atlas and almanac. I found the Usborne Introduction to Asia which we will also use as a spine. I also will be using the Ultimate Geography Guide to help in planning our studies, the library and internet. I think we should be able to cover two continents a year at least.
HISTORY:
History Odyssey - Ancients Level Two Celeste is studying the same time period with the same curriculum, but at a different level. Andre chose this time period too and asked me to add some historical fiction novels.
FRENCH:
see Part One post.
EXTRA PROJECTS:
I am copying his list from our notes here:
* Learn an Asian language (Mandarin)
* Make movies (animation, real life, stop motion)
* Minecraft (make things, download mods on extra computer, make skins)
* Learn to play electric guitar
* Play badminton and/or table tennis
* cook
* put together a fitness program and schedule for Celeste, Mom, and me. And do it.
For all his projects, I will help him make charts to keep him organized and that he can use to keep records of what he has done. For cooking in particular, I liked the idea from Barb of "a simple chart with all the recipes he wants to try with a place to record when they are finished." I think the same idea could be used for the movies project, Minecraft, and the guitar.
Another idea that I will implement from Barb is the weekly meeting. Some of Andre's school work will be more independent, so I think that having a set meeting time every week will help to review any areas that need attention or to just chat about the week past.
This is the plan so far. I am looking forward to this year!
thank you so much, alex! :) i hope you and celeste share something this year on pbh kids! (and maybe andre if he’s willing! ;o)
ReplyDelete