The start of a new school year and a new season brings new enthusiasm, at least for me.
Homeschool Activities:
I break our schooling loosely into 3 semesters - Fall is Sept - December, Winter/Spring is Jan - May, and Summer is June-Aug. I say "loosely" because we do a subject until we finish it whether that crosses semester boundaries or not. But if we are close to finishing something I will put in extra effort at the end of a semester so we can start fresh in the next one.
We are currently getting close to finishing Fall semester and things are going well. Perhaps the best semester of school we have had. Not because we have done anything particularly special but because maturity in the kids has seen less complaining.
Updated at 12/30/21
Here is our Fall recap.
Tom - High School - He did LA (completed the Other Worlds curriculum and is continuing editing his novel, Zandor), Math (finished Trigonometry using School Yourself), PE (two-thirds done with a half-credit physical exercise and is registered for the other half credit - Scuba Diving certification - for February), Biology (finished Biology of Amphibia, high school Biology on Outschool, many labs, dissections, etc.), Technology (Programming was put on hold while he finished Geographic Information Systems and his Multimedia studies half-credit - Audition audio software). He is also continuing his Druidawn writing club and his editing tutoring.
Emily - Middle School - She worked on Math (has 1.5 chapters to go in Beast Academy 5), Language Arts (working on Logic of English Essentials part 3), Science (completed a unit of Physics and Chemistry), and Technology (Youtube channel and Minecraft Animation). She finished Girls Fun class, horse riding, and her dog walking job. She also started drawing for fun.
Fall in Detail
Language Arts
Tom - Twice a week, Tom worked on a curriculum called Other Worlds. It is Part 2 of the One Year Adventure Novel program. It focuses on writing Fantasy and Science Fiction. It includes video instruction and literature. He read many excerpts from fantasy and fiction classics like 10,000 leagues under the Sea, Aladdin, Alice in Wonderland, Beowulf, and Frankenstein. He learned aspects of writing fantasy and fiction as well as the history and the difference between the genres. He has completed the curriculum and the associated literature book.
Twice a week he worked on editing his novel with me as a helper. He has a list of words (like was, being, had, etc.) to be improved and a list of revisions. He has made many great improvements this semester and I predict it will take another 6 months. The next step will be to have another group of people read it and give recommendations for improvements.
He also continues his Druidawn writing club. This is a weekly club with a group of teens and a group leader. The first half of his class is sharing and giving feedback on peer writing and the second half is a storytelling activity like D & D.
Once a week, Tom meets with an editing coach to work on his novel, Zandor.
Em - She is continuing with Logic of English 2 days per week and is up to part 3 of 4. (ch 20 out of 22). It is an intensive program learning the rules of English. We spend most of the elementary (primary) years learning to read. Now, for middle school, we will work on writing (and therefore spelling).
Twice a week, she will do a writing program called Cover Story. She is learning a lot of different forms (fiction, non-fiction, poetry, letter, editorials, etc.) while writing a magazine. The program has 3 parts - video lessons, a journal, and a workbook.
We will also add in more practice reading - read aloud mostly (by both me and Em).
She worked on a writing project to document all of the characters from her cosplay games. She got some Minecraft books for Christmas and is enjoying them on her own.
Math
Tom - He finished his introduction to Trigonometry. He used School Yourself - an online mastery-based program and will add another geometry program in the spring.
Emily - She is almost finished Beast Academy online (has 1.5 chapters to go). She is working on percentages, square roots, and exponents. She does the online version but this semester we are taking our time to work on the writing out of the steps in solving math problems.
Science
Tom - Herpetology is now finished (although he is doing another 6-week class in the spring). Tom is also done with Biology - he completed Biology of Amphibia and General Biology on Outschool. The Biology of Amphibia is based on a college book that I made 10 lessons from. Tom watched videos I made and completed an activity book. He also participated in a PARC herp survey.
Emily - This year Em chose Physics and Chemistry. We did part 1 of a Kosmos & Thames Physics Workshop kit. She learned about gravity, mass, force, etc. by building models and conducting experiments. Then she chose to do a unit of Chemistry. It was all hands-on with real chemistry equipment. She learned about acids/bases, properties of matter, etc. Next, she will do Space and Biology.
Technology
We are doing My Tech High again this school year for both kids and Technology is a required part of that.
Tom - He is continuing his online programming class from CodaKids to program a Mod for Minecraft. He chose a frog theme. He finished up a Media Arts credit by learning Audition audio editing software. He did a project to record 7 of the Frog stories he wrote between age 7 and 11. Finally, he did a Geographic Information systems program learning about the combination of data and maps.
Emily - Em is doing YouTube creation again this year. She worked on a video about her cosplay costumes - a 3 part series, and has done a travel video, made a new logo, and a new intro video this semester. She also used tutorials to work independently on animation software to create mini-Minecraft movies.
PE
Tom - He has done a variety of physical activities this semester - Mowing, paddleboarding, bike riding, hiking, etc. He goes swimming to prepare for both his lifeguard test and scuba swim test. He continues to earn hours of exercise toward this credit. He plans to do scuba diving next semester for PE.
Extra Curricula activities
Since Covid is still a problem in society, we still cannot go back to full activities that we did pre-covid like nature days, Minecraft Mondays. Nonetheless, we sometimes did 2 weekly masked playdates, plus another playdate for Tom and another for Emily. Tom did his writing club and Emily did horse riding and an online Girl Fun club. Steve and I continue to hike and bike.
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