Curriculum Selection Time!

Hi friends,

We are in the process of choosing home school curriculum.  I wish I would have gone to a home school convention back in April; unfortunately, I was so busy with work stuff and thought I knew what I wanted to do (HA!), so I stayed home.  So, with the help of X-Man, we are beginning to choose what we would like to study next year.  I originally thought I would go with one company's curriculum so that I could do less work (all the school days would already be mapped out for us).  But, as I'm finding the time to do more research, I'm finding that we have SO much flexibility, so why not use that to our advantage?

X-Man LOVED learning about the planets in preschool this year (he knows the planets in order and loves looking for planets in the sky at night) so, we've decided that we're going to study Astronomy with Apologia this year.  Their elementary Science curricula are based on creation.  There are six topics to study for K-6 (which don't have to be studied in any particular order), so this year we'll do Astronomy - if we like it, we'll do it again when X-Man is in 6th grade and Little Lou is in 5th.  Next year, we'll let Little Lou select the science curriculum since whatever we do next year will be studied when she is in kindergarten and again when she's in 6th grade.  We also have some great friends who gave us a membership to one of the best Science Institutes in the country, so we'll be spending lots of time there.

For math, we've decided to use Math U See.  What I like about this is that there are DVDs that correspond with the lessons.  This means they'll be learning math from someone who knows what they're doing, and I'll be learning right along with them!  We'll likely supplement with some extra workbooks (X-Man LOVES workbooks!).

For reading, history/social studies, and Bible, I'm still doing some research.  This is where you come in!  If you are a homeschooling parent, please let me know if there's certain curricula that you've really liked (or didn't care for).  For social studies, I'm finding that most curricula begin with a study of your home state or home country.  To be honest, I'd rather that my children have a world view than a local view and would prefer to begin studying the world and over time focusing on our local history.  I've been feeling stronger and stronger urges to do some mission work and would love for us to do that as a family someday.

Also, X-Man is reading at an advanced level, so I'm having a tough time finding accelerated readers with kindergarten level English/writing lessons.  I'm thinking we'll do Handwriting Without Tears since he could use quite a bit of help with handwriting - then maybe doing a 1st or 2nd grade reading program (this is where our library comes in!).  I think I may also have him start a blog of his own as he gets better at spelling and writing (of course we will be VERY closely monitoring his blog).

We're getting very excited about home school, in fact, X-Man asked me today if we could start school tomorrow.  I told him we still have to order our books and will begin school in August.  His response: "Why don't we start in July, that's one month sooner."  This kid is SO excited to start school - hope this sentiment lasts all year! 

Anyways, any tips are greatly appreciated.  Thanks for reading!