2013-2014 Homeschool Curriculum Choices

Wow---we're entering into year 3 of our homeschooling journey. I wouldn't have said at the beginning that I would like it as much as I do. There are definitely less-than-rosy days but overall I'm glad the Lord has led us to be a homeschool family for this season in our lives. Only He knows what the future holds but for now, we're liking where we are at as far as schooling goes. Here's what we're planning to use for the 2013-2014 school year:

Tenor is going into 6th grade. (ACK! I have a middle schooler??? How did that happen?) He'll be working through
Saxon 7/6 and then Saxon 8/7 for math

Rod and Staff  English for grammar
Institute For Excellence in Writing - Ancient History Based Writing Lessons and Medieval History Based Writing Lessons for writing (which will correlate with our history)
Spelling is currently up in the air! I haven't decided yet if we need a formal spelling program this year or not.
(Update: I looked over Spelling Power and decided it was way too much work for me and too much to switch to after several years of Rod and Staff. I think Tenor does need spelling work of some sort so I got Rod and Staff Spelling 6 for him this year.)
We're going to continue with Across the Centuries for his reading comprehension. He will work through 3 books this year.

He has completed his penmanship work. It's not going to get any better and he has more work this year to complete so he's off the hook on this one.

Dora and Diego Homeschool Spanish Level 1 and possibly Mango: Spanish (an at home program offered through our local library)

Soprano is going into 4th grade so she'll be doing
Saxon 5/4 for math

Rod and Staff  English for grammar
Rod and Staff Spelling 4 for spelling
Queen's Copywork for Little Girls for penmanship (to refine and practice her cursive)
Across the Centuries for reading comprehension. She will also work through 3 books.
Writing is up in the air. I might incorporate IEW's Student Intensive A or just have her do some of the same assignments as Tenor using the Ancient-History/Medieval-History books.

Dora and Diego Homeschool Spanish Level 1 and possibly Mango: Spanish (an at home program offered through our local library)

Together they'll do My Father's World Rome to the Reformation.
My Father's World incorporates Bible, history, geography, science, vocabulary, music, and art altogether for multiple grade levels. We really liked our second year of the MFW 5-year cycle, Creation to the Greeks, which started our 4-year history cycle. I wasn't a huge ancient civilization fan but I liked CtG. I'm really looking forward to Rome to the Reformation as we hit the times of Christ and the apostles, the middle ages and Renaissance, knights and castles, and then the Reformation. An even bigger help, this year's science focuses on astronomy and anatomy so I won't have to do any separate health curriculum.

Science texts

Music resources

Read Alouds

Bible resources

History textbooks

Art and Vocab

Extra resources that I will probably incorporate for history and geography

To be sure to fulfill state requirements, we're going to do worksheets and activities from some different resources.

World Geography for geography reinforcement for both (We finished the first half of this book last year. They'll do the second half this year.)

Switched on Schoolhouse for Tenor and Pennsylvania: Jography for Soprano for their PA History

and a few units from icivics.com for civics 

Soprano's electives: Geography, PA History, and Home Ec.

Tenor's electives: Geography and Greek

 The only other things we have to cover are fire safety and phys. ed.  Phys. Ed. will be covered with our co-op and by doing Tae Kwan Do.

We'll be continuing with our homeschool co-op group so they'll each get gym, music/choir, and an elective each semester. Tenor has chosen an astronomy elective for the fall while Soprano got very excited about signing up for a mixed-media art class.

Our field trip ideas this year include The Christmas Museum (with a terrific Bethlehem nativity display), dinner at Loxley's, a local Robin Hood themed restaurant, the Reading Public Museum (great Middle Ages collection as well as a planetarium), the PA Renaissance Faire, and The Science Factory. I'm sure we'll find some library or local conservation center programs to go to as well as concerts. We are blessed to live in an area where the arts abound, and there are lots of free or low cost opportunities.

I'd say I can't wait to start but I'm totally going to enjoy my last few weeks of summer vacation. How about you? Have you decided on curriculum yet or are you just relaxing in the sunshine?

Linking up here: