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Monthly Homeschool Update January || Changes + February Plans
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Jun 19, 2024
How is it time for a January monthly homeschool update already? Yet here we are! January went well for us, but we ARE making a few updates and changes. I'll chat about it in this video, plus share some BIG plans I have in store for my channel this month. Come catch up with me! Resources mentioned in the video: ❤️ Valentine's Day Online Interactive Notebook — https://techiehomeschoolmom.com/product/valentines-day-activities/ ❤️ President's Day Unit Studies from Homeschool Planet — https://homeschoolplanet.idevaffiliate.com/idevaffiliate.php?id=242&url=617 Stick around! Subscribe and hit that notification bell for updates on new videos weekly. 📧 Let’s Connect! 📬 Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/blessedhomeschoolblog/ Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/blessedhomeschool ********************************************* Hey there! I’m Sara, and I’m a teacher-turned-homeschooling mom to 4 kiddos (including a set of twins!). I balance homeschooling while working full-time from home, and am so thankful you are here. I love sharing about homeschooling on my blog, Blessed Homeschool, where you’ll find tips, resources, and curriculum reviews. Whether you are a newbie or a veteran, I hope you will leave inspired and equipped with what you find.
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Well, hey you guys, welcome to today's video. I am going to be sharing my January homeschool update
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and giving you guys details on how our month went, what's new, any changes we're making, things like that
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So if you like this kind of video, this is the perfect time for you to grab that cup of coffee or that basket of laundry to fold and just hang out while we chat
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In case you don't know me, or if you're new here, I'm Sarah
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I'm a homeschool mom to four kids. My youngest is five. My oldest is 12, and I've got 10-year-old twin daughters in between
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So this year on my channel, I focused a lot on preschool, fifth and sixth and sixth
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and sixth and sixth and sixth and sixth grade curriculum as that's what we're currently using. And obviously I'll be sharing our journey as we move into kindergarten sixth and seventh grade next year
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I love sharing tips and homeschool encouragement with other moms both here and on my blog
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blessed homeschool.com. I've got a lot of great content coming up, so make sure to subscribe to my channel
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and hit that notification bell so you don't miss out. Okay, let's get started with what went really well
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in January. So math, I think, is going really well for us. You guys know or you may know that we've
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been using CTC math for about a year now, and so far it's working really well. My son actually
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finished up his sixth grade lessons this week. So we're going to be doing a little bit of
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review over the sixth grade material and then moving on to seventh grade work. What I love about
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CTC math is that when you pay for a family membership, first of all, it's super affordable
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But second, you get all levels for all of your kids included in that. So I don't have to pay
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for a different curriculum now that he's moving into seventh grade. We just continue with our
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lessons. It's great. CTC math has really great tracking and reporting. So it's
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It's really easy for me to log in each week and see exactly how my kids are doing
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on each of their lessons. It is a mastery program, but they have what's called weekly revision tasks
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that I can assign to my kids. And what this does is each week
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they will get a set of questions, usually about 20 to 30 questions or so
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that covers previously taught concepts. So these are concepts from last year
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And then once we get into our second semester, it covers the previous stuff from this grade
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grade level as well. So my kids still get to go back and practice things they've already learned
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and moved past. They don't just learn it and then forget it, never touch it again. So you can have
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your kids do these online or you can print them out and have them work on them by hand. I have my kids
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do them online because then they are automatically graded. But then when I go back and look at them
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and if I see they didn't score really well, I will print them out and sit with them to go through
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the problems. And that's been working really well for us. Anyway, one more thing about CTC math
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They recently released a new feature I saw on their website, which is exams
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This is brand new. I haven't used it yet, except that I created a kind of final exam for my son for sixth grade
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that I'm going to have him take this week. So I will update you guys on how that goes after we do that this week and see if I can
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share any more thoughts on this new feature. My plan is for my son to start his seventh grade lessons and get about halfway through
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that by the end of our school year. Then he will finish seventh grade
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and eighth grade lessons during next year, which is his seventh grade year. The reason for this
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is so that we can move on to algebra in eighth grade and he can earn dual credit for this. It doesn't
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feel like we are super close to high school, but I know we are getting close. So I'm starting to think
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a little bit about what some of this is going to look like. And I'll probably be talking through
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more of my thoughts on this in upcoming videos. My girls are working through fifth grade lessons in
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CTC math and those are going well too. They will finish fifth grade math by the end of the school year and then the plan is to take them on the same track
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as my son okay what else is going well science is going pretty well if you've been with me for a little
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bit probably know we have been giving sunlight science e a try this semester i like it so far i'm not
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gonna lie it's not my favorite but we are enjoying it you can check out my other video on this
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if you're interested but in a nutshell we have lessons four days a week which
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most days we have been able to squeeze it. I would almost prefer to have just three days a week with how our schedule is, but we've been making it work. So three out of the four days, you have a lesson from this book or one of the other supplement books, but it's mainly this one. And then on the fourth day, you have an experiment. So we've been using this for about four weeks now, I think, about four weeks. And the first two weeks we were able to do the experiment. We had to skip one of them because that week we just didn't have
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have time and also this week of lessons I kind of splitting this week into two weeks so we do two science lessons a week instead of four it just such a busy time of year I sure you guys understand but I am trying to make time for the hands activities and experiments They are not my strong suit but my kids do love them So I know how important it is to include activities and things like that
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Overall, the lessons are pretty engaging. I do wish I had extra books so that each of my kids could have one to look at when we read
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Right now, I just kind of hold it up so they can see. So you'll see, you know, there's lots of little pictures and little things
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to read and for them to look at. So usually I'll just kind of hold it up like this and I wish they
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all had their own book. When it comes time to work on their worksheet, it would be helpful if they
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each had one and didn't have to fight over one of them. But I don't know, I really don't want to
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buy two more of the same book right now. So we are making do with it. Not perfect, but it's working
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out okay. My kids really like this book. I think, you know, the different pictures and everything
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in here make it really easy to understand. The concepts are very clear. The work
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that go along with it help reinforce important concepts and they don't take too much time to do
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So all of this is good. But like I mentioned in my other video when I kind of went over the curriculum
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I really wish that it was grounded in a biblical worldview. I would love it so much more. I think
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sunlight does a good job of noting in the instructor guide when certain topics will be taught. Like for example
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next week we will be talking about cloning and stem cells. So it made a note of that. But basically it just tells you that you'll have
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have the information presented and then you'll want to decide how to discuss it based on your beliefs
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Okay, yes. I do appreciate the heads up, but I think more guidance could be given to parents on
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how to teach these topics from a biblical perspective. How do I evaluate what we're learning
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from a biblical perspective? What does the Bible say about these topics? What do I do with these
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facts that we're learning? How should we respond to what we learn in a way that will glorify God
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because the fact of the matter is some parents know how to have these discussions but some might not and there are
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many scientific topics that i'm not completely comfortable talking about in this way because i don't know much about them or i'm still learning about them myself and how to talk about them through the lens of the bible so just keep that in mind
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if you're considering using this and want to use this curriculum as an open and go and expect it to be a good christian science curriculum i do think it misses the mark a little bit i'm not checking out on this one yet
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but in the future, I will be opting for curriculum that actively includes biblical principles
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So, I mean, this book might be good, but it's not neutral. It communicates that God is not applicable to the topic that it's teaching because it leaves them out
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And there's not much included in the curriculum overall that remedies that
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So we're just doing a lot of discussion about things as we read, which maybe is a good thing
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I mean, not every book my kids are going to pick up will be a biblically based book
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so they are going to need to be discerning about things they read
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You guys, see why this is so hard? Grace, that's what we get. We lean into the Lord and he gives us grace
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And you know what? He is big enough to fill any gaps. He is big enough to help us with our choices and how to teach our kids
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And he loves our kids more than we do. So we just continue to do our best, do what he's called us to do and trust that he is going
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to work everything for our good and his glory, honestly, no matter which curriculum we end up using
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Amen. Okay, let's move on. Art. One of my goals this year was to fit in our art lessons again
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and I'm happy to report. We have done two lessons and are about halfway through our current art
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project. That's one month in. We're halfway through our art project. We typically do art on
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Fridays, which is also our science experiment day, which is also the day that we have quilting
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class once a month, and the day that we take field trips with our co-op occasionally. So I think
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two lessons is a win for us. We are going to keep working at. it and you know when we can we'll just take it week by week my kids do enjoy art though too so I
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am going to continue to be intentional about it one of my daughters especially is really
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showing some talent in it so I'm going to see what I can do to encourage her a bit more
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over the rest of the school year if this is an area that she wants to keep improving in
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there aren't really any other updates for my older kids right now we are almost
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finished with our BJA Press Heritage Studies book and we are slowly but sure
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working through our biblical worldview lessons, which I'm still really loving. So let's talk about
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my pre-kare for a minute. We are using my father's world Voyageo discovery this year, and my little
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one really, really likes it. I will say he is probably my most conscientious kiddo and works
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really hard for his age. He loves his schoolwork and wants to do things well. That being said
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he has grown a lot this year. And while we are still doing some parts of the curriculum, it kind of
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feels like he's outgrown some of the activities or they're just too easy for him so we skip
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them he's an older pre-k or two he turned five in December so I will be starting kindergarten with
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him next school year right now with our voyage of discovery curriculum we are mainly still doing the letter of the week and number of the week activities because we still working on learning
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all of the letter names and sounds. But he's doing great with it. We do the Bible readings and the
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character readings and we read through the books that came with the curriculum. And we mainly are
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doing this only about two to three days a week and are kind of able to fit in everything we need
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In the beginning, we would do it every day. But like I said, a lot of the activities are pretty repetitive
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and we just don't need or want to do them anymore. And while I wasn't thinking about starting kindergarten officially until the fall
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I have been toying with the idea of starting him with some more challenging math and reading lessons soon
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Nothing too rigorous, but just to, you know, start off slow and work at an easy pace until we officially start kindergarten in the fall
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I do plan on using my father's world kindergarten curriculum, but may end up supplementing, doing something different for reading and math
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if we end up starting that earlier. I'm still kind of thinking through all of that. Okay, why don't we
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move on and talk about a few things that we changed in January? So we've been using learning language
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arts through literature this year. And as I've mentioned before, I started off really excited about
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this and there are parts that I still do like, but there are a couple of areas that need more
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focus and attention for my kids than what I feel like we're getting with this curriculum
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Language arts is not necessarily one of my strong suits to teach. I enjoy all the parts
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language arts myself. It was one of my favorite subjects to take but I'm just not the best
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at teaching it. For example, I'm seeing the need for more in-depth writing and spelling instruction
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for my kids. So in January, I did pull out all about spelling for my girls, which I have used
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with my oldest son in the past, and we started working through these lessons again. My girls are
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in fifth grade and we are almost through level one and all about spelling, and we will move on to
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level two very soon. This is a curriculum that I've been on and off with, and I actually just
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released a video sharing more about this. So if you're interested in learning more or hearing my
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thoughts on it, definitely check that out. And we are going to continue using learning language arts
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through literature right now, but I'm just going to skip the spelling portions for my girls and do
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all about spelling instead. It's been very interesting to use this curriculum. We're using
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the purple book this year and it was completely new for us. And I think it was nice to give it a try
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but we are going to be going in a different direction next year. However, I have been debating doing a video flip-through of the purple book
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I know that just because there are certain parts of this that don't work the best for us, it might be a great curriculum for someone else, and we do have experience with it
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So if you are interested in a video like that, seeing what this is like or what the lessons look like, let me know in the comments, and I can definitely do that
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Something else we started trying in January is a science curriculum for my sixth grader
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more science but what we are doing is kind of testing this curriculum out to see if it will be a good
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fit for him next year when he is in seventh grade next year we will be using my father's world
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creation to the greeks and they recommend a different science for seventh graders so this will be the
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first year that my son has had his own science lessons as this is something we've typically
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done together as a family for the past couple of years each year i think will be taking more
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and more steps towards that independent learning and my oldest son is probably the one
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who needs this the least. He would honestly probably prefer to do everything independently if he could
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but it has been fun to work together as a family for things like science, history, and Bible. So next
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year will be a little bit different, but he's getting to that age. Anyway, I am kind of debating
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between two options right now. The first one being, of course, from Berean Builders that was
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recommended by my father's world for this year. And the one, which he has been trying out right now
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is physical science from Science Shepherd. Science Shepherd is new to me and I'm actually going to be
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partnering with them to do a review of this curriculum. So I will have more to say about it soon
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We really like it so far. But what I want to do is let my son take a look at both options and kind
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of get a feel for what he might prefer for his science classes next year. I think that's important
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especially the older they get. I think both of these curriculums are great options. There are way too many
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options out there you guys right but there are some differences between the two so we will see which one
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we land on and stay tuned for that video in the next couple of weeks if you are curious to learn more
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about science shepherd especially if you haven't heard about them before i hadn't and they are pretty
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pretty awesome okay i think that's about it not much else has changed this month those are the two big
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ones so let me move on to what didn't go well in january i actually think things
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went pretty well despite the changes that we are making. We are falling behind in our read
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alouds though, which I'm not happy about. I love our read aloud time and usually I will
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read aloud to everybody after dinner, but feels like lately we have had to be out the door
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somewhere almost every night after dinner and it just hasn been happening So I hoping to get back into the routine of this this month with our read aloud My girls are reading more on their own which I thrilled about
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And my kids do have reading to do with their language arts curriculum
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They are novel studies within the curriculum, but I'm not too happy with how these have been going either
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So my son currently he's reading Big Red and then my girls are about to start number of the stars
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again this is through their learning language arts through literature these are separate novel studies
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that you do kind of on your own timeline in addition to the other language arts lessons but they're
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not scheduled or built in and honestly i have not been great about reading the books and following up
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with my kids so we can have discussions about what they're reading and i feel like we've been missing
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something because of this so the next book studies that are coming up so this one and then my son's
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getting ready to about halfway through this. So it might might be the next one. I'll have to see
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if there's another one coming up. But I really want to make a point to try to read the books with
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my kids, which I should be doing, I feel, so I can actually have a discussion with them and use the
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discussion questions that the curriculum provides. I just need to be intentional about doing this
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But other than that, I can't say anything else has really not gone well this past month. And as far as
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February goes, it's going to be a busy month. So looking ahead a little bit, we are going to be more
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involved in our co-op. That started back up last week, so that is going to take up a good chunk of
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our time on Thursdays. My kids are taking drama class, J.A. Bistown, and Latin. They are finishing
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up First Forum Latin from Memorial Press, which I really, really love. We'll possibly be trying
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out some curriculum with my preschooler, like I mentioned. I don't know if that's going to happen this
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month or next month. And we'll also, again, be finishing up our level one spelling book
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Hopefully I'll be making some decisions on our science curriculum for my seventh grader, so I will keep you updated on that. Valentine's Day is also this month and also on Valentine's Day is the
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first day of Lent. We aren't doing too much extra lesson-wise for Valentine's Day. I have a book
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that we'll read about St. Valentine and we might do an online unit study if I want to add that in
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But we will also start our sunlight Lent unit study. So I'm probably going to rearrange our schedule
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a bit for a couple of weeks to add that in. What I think I'm going to do is maybe shift some of our
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heritage studies lessons down a little bit, down in the planner, because we're going to be we're going to
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we're almost finished with that book. So if I need to make some extra room, that might get shifted
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and possibly our basics for a biblical worldview lessons. We might shift that so we can add in
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some extra reflection and study time on Lent. The Lent lessons are pretty short, but they are
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meaningful and I want for all of us to do them together, even with my little one, to help us
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prepare for the Easter season coming up. President's Day is also this month on the 19th of February
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We aren't necessarily doing anything special for this. I feel like we've been learning a lot about presidents this year in history
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I do want to share in case you're looking for something I notice that homeschool planet is offering some free lesson plans on presidents right now
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So if you use homeschool planet you can download these lesson plans and you can easily apply them to your planner
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And if you don't use homeschool planet yet, well, why not? It's amazing
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But you can still get these free lesson plans and it also comes with a 30-day free trial of the online home
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planner. I will put a link in the description for you to check out in case you want to do that
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We love homeschool planet. I use it. My kids use it. We all use it and love it. All right, guys
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What is coming up on my channel this month? There is a lot I'm excited to share with you
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I am working on a vlog style video of the recent marathon I ran. Next week, I have a fun
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get to know me, 21 questions type video that is going to be awesome. I have a big giveaway I
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am sharing with you next week you don't want to miss it. Lots of curriculum to
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unbox and talk about and of course my weekly homeschool prayer challenge
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videos. I hope you guys have had a chance to watch those if not head over to
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the prayer challenge playlist and check those out. Plus my one-year anniversary
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on YouTube is coming up so I have a video plan for that too where you can get to
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know me a little bit more and I will be giving away some fun things then too. So
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there's a lot going on. It's a busy month. If you have any questions for me or any
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video suggestions please leave those in the comments so I can make sure to talk about them next month. I hope that you will subscribe and stick around so you don't miss out on any of the content I have coming up. Definitely check out some of the links I have for you in the description below as well. I really hope you guys enjoyed watching this video and catching up with me a little bit about how our homeschooling is going. It feels like things are always moving and changing as I learn more about my kids, learn more about different homeschool resources and opportunities. And I just really love sharing this with you guys and
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just getting a chance to talk this all through. So I hope you found some value and encouragement
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from listening to me ramble a little bit today. And maybe you got some laundry folded too. I don't know
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Thank you so much for watching and I'll see you next time
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