Twelve Weeks Later: Homeschool Update

Here we are twelve weeks into our school year and I have no idea how we are almost halfway through it already. I feel like September was last week and the fact that we are basically in mid-November is mind blowing. Is this from being busy with school, being busy growing another human, or a combo? Not sure, but so far we are having a ton of fun this school year!

Our School Curriculum

For those of you new to our blog, we are using Torchlight Curriculum. I originally started Wildchild with their Kindergarten program last spring, but it became quickly apparent around week 6 or so, that it was getting slightly out of his skill level. Luckily, they came out with a Pre-K level during the summer. He is slightly advanced in some areas, but the overall skills needed are much more in his wheelhouse.

This curriculum is super focused on building a child’s curiosity and character. There is a special focus on learning emotions and executive function which I absolutely love! So far the Wildchild is ahead of the game with the Math that has been scheduled each week. I think we are about to catch up to his skill level though, so he won’t be as bored.

Next spring I will be purchasing another separate Math curriculum, as well as another English curriculum. They are both used for the Kindergarten level as well and we can use them once Wildbaby is of age too. The only issue I am running into is choosing between options for Math curriculum at the moment. I really like Saxon Math as that is what I used at private school and I remember it being thorough and much easier to comprehend. The other option is RightStart Mathematics, but the price tag for everything is making me cringe. It’s over $300 before tax and shipping charges. I guess the only brightside of that is I probably wouldn’t have to buy more supplies for the next level.

Add-Ons

One of the things I have added on for the moment is a letter recognition/intro handwriting practice. I found this super awesome worksheet pack on Pinterest. After printing it off, I put it in the binding machine and got it all situated. We go with the letter of the week that is focused on in the curriculum and knock the sheet out on Monday with some review throughout the week.

For an interactive reading program we are using ReadingEggs and so far we are mostly having a blast with that. Not gonna lie, there are some days that he absolutely does NOT want to do it. Those are days that we either skip it all together or only complete one part of a lesson. The program works really well though and on the days he does want to do it, he loves it. He is pointing out letters and words he recognizes in our read-aloud books which just makes me super ecstatic. I am a nerd like that.

With Wildchild still being obsessed with dinosaurs, we basically consume any sort of content we can find on them. Mommy sees an article on FB about a new dinosaur? We read about it together while looking at the pictures. New kid appropriate dino show? We watch it. We have watched Dino Dan, Dino Dana, Dinosaur King, etc fifty bajillion times. Yes, that is a real number. Seriously, ask any Mom who has had to watch something more times than necessary.

Fun

For movement we still love to have crazy dance parties and our little Echo Dot gets the trick done. He has his own playlist on Amazon Music and he basically only needs our help getting it started because Alexa has issues understanding him sometimes. Wildchild has some pretty awesome dance moves!

From time to time Wildchild will join me while I get a workout in. He likes to pick up my smaller weights and try to imitate whatever I am doing. He is not a big fan of HIIT moves, but honestly I can’t blame him. I am not a huge fan of it etiher, especially now that I am pregnant. Speaking of being pregnant…..

School Going Forward

We most likely will not be completely done with the school year by the time Wildbaby arrives. Even right now there are some days where my energy level is pretty low and I just want to skip a day. Don’t worry though, we usually combine the skipped day into the next day of lessons.

I feel like we need to start coming up with a plan now to finish the current school year and get started on the next. We school year-round, so once Pre-K is finished we will take a couple of weeks off and immediately head into Kindergarten. Luckily, we have a good portion of the necessary books for Kindergarten already. Whatever we don’t have we can use the library for. Basically, what we do now.

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