Looking Back — School Year 2012-2013

This is the time of year that we begin to think about winding things down. We’ve worked very hard this school year to get things done. There are many times that I wonder if we’re accomplishing anything. It seems like we’re always behind, always too busy, always trying to catch up. I thought I would go back and look at what I planned for us to do this school year and compare it to what we’ve actually done. Here’s a link to the post I shared our plans on: School Schedule 2012-2013.

The first thing I listed on that post was who my students were. The 3 listed are my own children and they have each had a birthday so are all now a year older. Plus, we invited a brother and sister over to join us in part of our school day 4 days a week. They are 14 and 10.

The next thing on the list was our outside activities. They have been consistent the whole year. Over the next few weeks, they are all coming to an end one activity at a time. These activities are a lot of fun and very beneficial to the kids but I will be relieved when they are done for the year.

Most of our together time stayed consistent. We read quite a bit together. In fact, we read about 2 hours everyday. The following is a list of what we have finished reading or are almost finished reading:

The Bronze Bow
The Great Turkey Walk
Burgess’ Bird Book
Charlotte Mason’s Ourselves
Jean Fritz’ 100 Years Around The World
Apologia’s Flying Creatures
Morley’s The Bee People
A Cricket In Times Square
Warhorse
The Hobbit
Edith Nesbitt’s GrammarLand
Genesis, Exodus, Joshua and Judges

In co-op the kids read Shakespeare’s Julius Caesar and The Taming of the Shrew and about half of Augustus Caesar’s World.

All of these readings were done orally. The kids read books on their own that I won’t take the time to list here. I will share a reward system that was revived after being dormant for many years. My 11 year old found out that I had, at one time, paid my older boys a penny a page if they read a book and wrote a book report about it. Being an avid reader and one not afraid of writing, he got busy. To keep up with the times, I doubled the amount to 2 cents a page. I don’t know how much he raked in this year but he has felt pretty good about having a little cash in his pocket. He recently helped his little brother, who is a very reluctant reader, write a couple of book reports for the Magic Treehouse books he has read. Now he is very highly motivated to read. I’m not usually big on rewards like this but it has paid off quite well.

On the individual schedules for the kids, I have listed Greek. The two younger ones sort of let that slide but Timothy has done pretty well with it. Hopefully next year we can get it going again. I’m not too concerned because they did very well with their Latin class in co-op.

We changed our approach to Language arts for the younger two. I discovered Edith Nesbitt’s Grammarland and just had to read it to all the kids except Timothy. Since it went so well with it, we started Winston Grammar. It’s been a little tough for the younger ones but I think all have learned something from it. We also added Spelling Power for the 4 younger ones. They all seem to enjoy it and I have already seen improvement in my youngest’s spelling.

Bible memorization has progressed well. We have been using Bob Waldron’s 17 periods of the Bible — reading and memorizing from each period, studying each period for a month. We finished up the Judges this week.

Early in the year, I realized I could help the 14 year old with his reading. He was willing to do the scripture reading during our worship services on Sunday evening but needed a little practice. I started by having him read the following Sunday’s passage to me. There was immediate improvement. My 11 year old had not started reading in front of the congregation yet but he wanted to get involved in this reading time at the house so he joined in and before long, the two younger ones decided they wanted to do it as well. Each day, each child reads the passage aloud for the following Sunday evening’s scripture reading. All four of them have improved in their reading skills.

One of the issues the 14 year old was having was reading the punctuation. He was pretty much ignoring it. Once I got him to pay attention to the punctuation, his reading improved very much. We’ve practiced reading slower so those in the back of the auditorium can understand. We’ve talked about not swaying back and forth and avoiding other distracting habits. An added benefit is that they hear the passage read 16 times — each child reading the passage four days a week. They have become very familiar with the passages. I don’t remember where we started but they read Matthew 25:14-30 this week.

Piano lessons were difficult to get to at times. Maybe if I paid myself I’d make sure they got their lessons. Even though they didn’t have lessons as consistently as my private students get, they both (Jonathan and Benjamin) improved their piano skills. They are also playing in my orchestra (one on viola, the other on cello). The two friends that come to the house play violin in the orchestra as well so they are all getting plenty of music.

The one subject I’m disappointed in is math. We’ve done better as the year has progressed but it was a little rocky getting started. With math, consistency is key and the more consistent we’ve been the easier it has been for them. I plan on continuing math throughout the summer.

Looking at it all written down, I’m pleased with our progress this year. I need to see to it they do more writing, improve their handwriting skills and be more consistent with math and piano. Having the friends join us for part of the day has been challenging but has kept us on target with our reading. I think we have all benefited from the arrangement.