2018-2019 Homeschool Curricula Choices for 9th Grade - My Father's World

Year 8 of our "I will never, ever, ever homeschool" journey. LOL
I was thinking the other day that my padawans had a combined 6 years in Christian school but now we're at 16 years of homeschooling. Crazy daisy!

While those first years were full of hands-on projects, activities, and field trips, that aspect has definitely slowed down as we've hit high school for both of them. If you follow my blog regularly, I'm guessing you've picked up on the fact that there's very little worth blogging about when it comes to high school work. We still have a few hands-on projects, but it's shifted to more writing and textbooks than picture-worthy assignments.

Anyway, here's what Soprano's freshman year will look like:

Math: Saxon Algebra 1 and Algebra 2 and Life of Fred books
She needed a little more time in Algebra 1 to really grasp all of the concepts so we're scheduling it as half the lesson one day and the rest on day 2. She worked through about 2/3 of the Algebra 1 book last year, so we're plugging away at finishing it sometime this spring and then will move right into Algebra 2 (and probably continue that over the summer). To mix things up, every Friday she will do several chapters in Life of Fred picking up where she left off last year with the Pre-Algebra series.

English/Bible/History/Geography: My Father's World - Ancient History and Literature
Soprano is back using My Father's World this year after having two gap years using Notgrass and Beautiful Feet Books. She is a good writer, so I think she will have great success with AHL this year.

She also has a required literature list from which she needs to pick at least 20 books. Plus there is a good selection of lit recommended in AHL (see the stack with yellow tape on the spines).

Science: Compass Classroom Devotional Biology
I saw a great pre-sale offer for the DVD set, and it really caught my eye. I've just never jumped on the Apologia bandwagon and was on the hunt for something that Tenor and Soprano could do together this year. Devotional Biology has a great premise for teaching attributes of God as they teach aspects of biology. It also includes a full lab program that we'll be using.

Music/Art: Harmony Fine Arts 9th grade plans
Soprano will also be working towards a fine arts credit using the Harmony Fine Arts plans from 9th to 12th grade. This year she'll be focusing on ancient art through the Byzantines and baroque and early classical composers.

I'm also adding in a hymn study this year. Once a week, I'll read a chapter from one of the Mr. Pipes books and together, we'll learn and sing the hymns. Next year, I'd love to continue the hymn study...maybe adding in one of the books about some of our modern hymns or worship songs. Music geek alert. :)

Foreign Language: French Essentials Books 5 and 6 and Learn French the Fast and Easy Way
We need to get her 2 credits in foreign language to graduate. In previous years, Soprano has worked through the elementary and middle school levels of French Essentials. In order to make sure she will get a full credit this year, I added Learn French as well.

Electives:
Spelling - no credit/not graded
Soprano is going to work on her spelling this year using Apples and Apples 2. They are short, daily lessons specifically for secondary students. No random spelling lists...just quick reminders of basic spelling rules and then some practice exercises or word puzzles each day.




Logic - 1/2 credit
I did not like the logic books recommended by MFW when Tenor was in 9th grade, so Soprano will be using Art of Argument (Tenor used it in 10th) for her logic elective. She was grumbling about having to take it, but then I told her since she likes to argue this will help her learn to argue better. Then I stopped and thought about if I really wanted her to be able to argue better.... parenting fail. ;)
At least we'll be finishing this one up at the end of our first semester. Should I just give her an 'A' now? ;)


Creative Writing - 1 credit
Soprano is my writer. Since I despise writing, I am so pleased that I have one kid that enjoys it and doesn't seem to struggle with it like I do. AHL has plenty of academic writing in it, but we are also using The Creative Writer and My Book of Stories: Fairy Tales to give her time to work on her stories.


Interior Design - 1 credit
I sort of suggested this as a possible elective, and Soprano got really excited. Since we won't start this until after Christmas break, I haven't purchased any of the books yet. I have several resources in mind and once I get them in hand I will be able to pull the course together and come up with a schedule. I'm pretty sure we will definitely need to resubscribe to Sling TV so we can get HGTV and DIY Network...for research and educational purposes of course. :D
Possible books/resources:
Learning Zone Express: Interior Design
In the Hands of a Child Project Pack: Elements of Interior Design
AOP Consumer Science Lifepac 6: Interior Decorating 
Interior Design Studio (Kit)

Interior Design Course (book)
Design Your Dream Room (book/toy)
My Beautiful Room: Interior Design Workbook
Fashion Angels: Interior Design Sketch Portfolio (book/kit)
Interior Design Master Class (book...which is at our local library)

These lit-based curricula make the amount of needed books look insane!

2018-2019 Homeschool Curricula Choices for 11th Grade

Year 8 of our "I will never, ever, ever homeschool" journey. LOL
And this might be Tenor's last year *sniff, sniff* pending his acceptance into an early entry full dual enrollment program at a local tech college.

That potentiality has made planning this year a little tricky. But I think we have a good plan that could work with either scenario (either early entry/dual enrollment or regular homeschooling for his senior year).

Here's Tenor's Junior Year in our house:

Math: Life of Fred books
Since he doesn't *need* calculus to graduate (he already has enough credits) and doesn't need it for college admission and doesn't need it for his career path, we're not tackling a full year of Saxon Calculus, which would have been the next step for him. We talked about a business math type course or statistics but then I had the brilliant idea that we could use this year to do a math overview/review using Life of Fred. We'll try to get through Beginning Algebra, Advanced Algebra, and Geometry very quickly and then slow down and work through as many of the remaining high school level and college level books as he can.

English/Bible/History/Geography: My Father's World - U.S. History to 1877 and American Literature
Just like last year, we're staying with MFW. The biblical worldview is integrated extremely well; the literature selections are thought-provoking without being controversial or edgy; the composition instruction is thorough; and the overall package is put together very well.
He's not really excited about reading The Scarlet Letter, but seriously after reading Silas Marner last year, how bad could it really be?? ;)

I've also assigned him a required literature list with about four pages of titles (some that were left-over from last year). I let him pick at least 20 books from the list...just for exposure to other styles of lit or classic lit titles that he probably wouldn't choose on his own. (Um, especially considering he just pulled out some Garfield cartoon books this week. lol)

Science: Compass Classroom Devotional Biology
I saw a great pre-sale offer for the DVD set, and it really caught my eye. I've just never jumped on the Apologia bandwagon and was on the hunt for something that Tenor and Soprano could do together this year. Devotional Biology has a great premise for teaching attributes of God as they teach aspects of biology. It also includes a full lab program that we'll be using.

Foreign Language: Nothin'. :) Tenor finished his requirements for foreign language last year and chose to not continue with it.

Music/Art: Harmony Fine Arts 11th and 12th grade plans
In order to finish up his fine arts credit, he's doubling up this year. Since his other electives aren't full year, I don't think his schedule will be too overloaded with it.

I'm also adding in a hymn study this year. Once a week, I'll read a chapter from one of the Mr. Pipes books and together, we'll learn and sing the hymns. Next year, I'd love to continue the hymn study...maybe adding in one of the books about some of our modern hymns or worship songs. Music geek alert. :)

Electives:
Auto Maintenance and Repair
Since Tenor got his learner's permit earlier this summer, we're using Auto Upkeep as an elective and a much-needed life skills type class.

Practical Drafting
His future career path will probably include at least reading technical plans, if not creating them either by hand or with CAD. This used to be a recommended MFW elective, but they don't carry it anymore. I happened to find it used for only $10, and Tenor is pretty excited about it.
A friend who has been a drafter (or whatever his title actually is) for years recommended DraftSight as a free CAD program that we can use too. He said that his company has actually been considering dropping their paid CAD subscription and switching to DraftSight. That was enough recommendation for us.

Health (with Phys. Ed. and Driver's Ed.)
For graduation in our state, we have to teach health at some point in the secondary years (7th-12th grades). A friend gave me a box of old curricula to sell or dispose of for her, and Abeka high school health happened to be in there. I looked into some other publishers but free seemed to be the right choice. He'll finish up the Abeka health before Christmas and then I'll have him read a few books on relationships and dating. Pending my reading them, I've got When God Writes Your Love Story, Holding Hands Holding Hearts, New Rules for Love Sex and Dating, and Boundaries in Dating planned. We were also given Driver's Ed in a Box for free so we'll be using that too. I added it as a resource to our health elective even though it's an automobile thing. :)

Lots of books, y'all! :D

2017-2018 Homeschool Curricula Choices for 10th Grade

Two posts in one day??? Shocking, I know. :)
I sort of talked about where the blog has disappeared to over in this post about Soprano's curricula.

This post will shift to what Tenor has been using for his sophomore year of homeschool.
{Yeah, sophomore. 10th grade. Two years left. I am not old enough for that to be happening so obviously I'm stuck in some sort of weird, Doctor Who-esque time paradox type thing. ;) }

Whether I'm prepared for it or not, here are Tenor's courses.

Math: Saxon Advanced Math
In this edition of the book, we are able to count it as two credits. The first half of the book is Geometry with Advanced Algebra. The second half of the book is Trigonometry with Pre-Calculus.
Fortunately, Tenor has been rocking this out and has needed practically zero help from me. (Which is great because despite my absolute surety that I'm not *that* old, it has been a seriously long time since I've done Trig or Calculus.)

English/Bible/History/Geography: My Father's World - World History and Literature
We're sticking with MFW. The biblical worldview is integrated extremely well; the literature selections are thought-provoking without being controversial or edgy; the composition instruction is thorough; and the overall package is put together very well.
Plus Tenor got to read Pride and Prejudice this year, which meant I got to watch that yummy 6-hour A&E movie version with him. :)

While I also assigned him a required literature list, MFW gave some great suggestions too. He's been trying to read through as many as possible.

Science: Bass planned an Arduino programming course for Tenor that involves lots of little wire bits floating around the family room. LOL The resources he's using include:
Arduino Cookbook by Michael Margolis

Introduction to Arduino: A Piece of Cake PDF

Programming Arduino: Getting Started with Sketches by Simon Monk

http://playground.arduino.cc/Main/ManualsAndCurriculum

https://programmingelectronics.com/home/

www.udemy.com/learn-to-program-cpp/
www.udemy.com/arduino-sbs-getting-serious/learn/v4/overview

and SparkFun Inventor’s Kit and Guide v3.3 (www.sparkfun.com/products/13970)

Foreign Language: Hey, Andrew! Teach Me Some Greek! Level 6

Music/Art: Harmony Fine Arts 10th grade plans

Electives:

Personal Finance: Foundations in Personal Finance by Dave Ramsey
This one, Soprano and Tenor are going through together. It's been helpful to be studying it at the same time. The course says it is for homeschool but there are several 'class' activities that didn't translate well to only two students.

Geography: North Star Geography
Yup, we did this together too, starting last summer to make the schedule not so full in the fall. Soprano kept up very well.

Logic: Art of Argument
This was a much better logic course for Tenor than last year's Fallacy Detective/Thinking Toolbox.

Career Exploration: Understanding God's Calling and Career Exploration from 7 Sisters Homeschooling

Throw in Driver's Ed this spring plus his Taekwondo practices and youth group plus church ministry....it's been a busy (and very good) year.

Do any of you have a student that has seemingly grown-up overnight? What are you using for high school curricula?

2017-2018 Homeschool Curricula Choices for 8th Grade

You've probably noticed that the blog has been on a pretty big hiatus. I have found the reasons that drove me to start the blog just aren't there anymore in this stage of life. Combine that with the death of Picasa, which has made uploading pics a frustrating run-around, my heart just hasn't been in blogging.

I have so many resources living here that I created or compiled that I most likely won't ever delete the blog, but updates will be very few and very far between. However, I never shared our homeschool curricula choices for this school year and wanted to throw it out there in case it is helpful to other homeschooling families as you start to plan for your next year.

Up first is what we've been using for Soprano's 8th grade year. :)

Math: Saxon Algebra I and the next few volumes of Life of Fred

 

English: Rod and Staff English 8 - Preparing for Usefulness
This includes grammar, composition, poetry, and speech.

Literature/Music/Art: Beautiful Feet Books - The History of Classical Music

We're using this to cover a total overview of music and art, which lines up with the history overview from Notgrass this year.

I'm adding in this Usborne Famous Artists sticker book and the coordinating Mike Venezia books too.

Science: Focus on Middle School Astronomy for the fall with some extra resources then Focus on Middle School Geology with a few extras (Usborne Rocks and Fossils and their Rocks & Minerals sticker book plus a few rock/mineral sample packs) for the spring.

 

History: Notgrass - From Adam to Us

I think one or two of the assigned literature titles she has read previously, so we're just skipping those. I also assign a required literature list each year. She will have to choose 25 titles from my list to read too.

 Bible: Bible Road Trip Year 3

Foreign Language: French Essentials

Electives:

Creative Writing - Learn to Write the Novel Way and Writing from the Heart

Geography - North Star Geography

Personal Finance - Foundations in Personal Finance from Dave Ramsey

At the end of 8th grade, Soprano will actually have earned 3.5 credits for high school. That's a great feeling. She loved North Star Geography and we've liked the finance course and the science programs. Focus on Middle School Science is a new curriculum for us, but it is working. It probably helps that she picked topics that she was interested in, too. :)

If you want to give Focus on Middle School Science a try or check out their elementary curricula, you can use my referral code for a 10% discount! (Disclaimer: I will earn a monetary bonus should you choose to buy. That will go straight towards next year's books...so we thank you!)

Referral link: http://realscience4kids.refr.cc/jennifers

What are you using this year? Found anything new that you just love?