An Update

At the end of August I blogged about something just not working with the curriculum we were using. I THOUGHT it was the next book we were doing in the Little Hearts series, so I decided to "piece" together our own curriculum. I was excited, but in the meantime while I waited for our new books to arrive, we plugged along with Bigger Hearts For His Glory. Guess what?!?! We actually fell into a groove...AND enjoyed it. I think what it really all boiled down to this year was that I had been so up in the air as what to use this year until right down to the wire, I second guessed everything. I had never understood noteboooking or had any experience in it, and in her curriculum there's at least one day a week when we do notebooking. I was kind of put out by that. Not because it was hard, but it was NEW to me, and frankly, it frightened me a little.

Even though we have now found our groove, something still just was not clicking. We are getting tired of "schooling"...ALL of us! And I mean literally tired! It takes us AT LEAST 6 hours to finish everything, and that's for a second and a third grader! My husbby and I have been exhausted because it takes all day to get school finished. My house is a wreck, and I haven't felt at peace because I have not had time to do anything. A few weeks ago, I knew what has been our problem....MATH! I was bound and determined to use Saxon math this year because I really liked the concept of it, and thought it would be good for my little darlings. However, that's where all our time is going!! It takes me about 1 1/2 hours with each child to just complete math beacuse the home version of Saxon is set up to have a one on one meeting EVERY day that repeats the same things EVERY day!!! After that, I introduce a new skill, etc. My little darlings have not complained at all about the time it's taken to finish all our school work, but like I said, it's just not bringing a peace like it has in the past.

I've been praying for wisdom and for God to guide me in what to use for math for them so that I don't have 3 hours of my day tied up with just one subject. I wasn't sure what direction to go, but yesterday evening when we finally got finished with everything about 6:00 pm, my hubby said we were going to have to do something about school lasting so long. (He had spent his last 2 days off helping me teach, and he hadn't had time to do much of anything else either!) He made a suggestion after that, and I offered a suggestion, too. He told me to go ahead and order what I had suggested because it's actually what we have used every year since we began homeschooling, and it's what Bigger Hearts suggests to use, however, her curriculum is flexible so one can use whatever he/she chooses. I felt like a BOULDER had been lifted off of my shoulders...AND I felt a PEACE!!!

So now we are waiting for our new math curriculum to arrive, but we'll continue to use Saxon until it does. And I will probably continue using PARTS of it with the new book, because I DO like Saxon, it's just too time consuming for us. And isn't that what homeschooling is about - doing what's right for your family?

I hope the coming homeschooling years are not like this one!!! But that's how we learn! =)

WARNING...Detour Ahead!

Since I began homeschooling my little darlings 4 years ago, we have always used the books in the Little Hearts for His Glory curriculum line...and absolutely LOVED IT!!! This year, however, I had some mixed reviews and reservations about continuing with the same kind of curriculum in the Bigger Hearts for His Glory book. I struggled. I mean I REALLY struggled, but I continued to pray about it and THOUGHT I was doing the right thing by using it, but using a different math. It took me only a couple of days to realize that this was just not going to work for us, but we stuck with it for a week just to see if it would get better for us. I'm sorry to say that it didn't. In my personal opinion this particular book was very different from the first three (which we LOVED). I just felt like it was too much for us. That's the only way I know to describe it.

I researched some other options for history and science, and placed an order with Rainbow Resource. Now we are in a transitional phase as we await our new books!! I'm excited, though. Whenever we receive our order, we will begin using Mystery of History for our social studies portion, Exploring Creation with Zoology 1 for science, and Sequential Spelling 1 for spelling. We will continue using Saxon for math since it is new to us this year and for reading we'll continue to follow the block in the BHFHG book along with our phonics book. I also like how BHFHG does Bible Study, so we'll follow that plan as well. For writing, my eldest little darling will use Cheerul Cursive, and my son will be using Italic Handwriting Book C. Then throughout the year, I'll be working with my little darlings to create some books. I think we're in for a fun year...I'll try to let you know how it goes!