Type B Homeschooler

Somehow it gets done

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Italy unit

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Horse unit

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Chocolate Unit

I’m not going to lie, we have gotten into a funk and haven’t been doing our unit work like we should be. We did a fun unit on chocolate to keep it light, although we did touch on heavier topics like fair trade. As usual I’m missing a few titles in my picture. The encyclopedia was mostly for pictures and reference. We ended up watching Charlie and the chocolate factory instead of reading it. The Candy Fairies was hard for me to get through, but B loved it. We made Mexican hot chocolate and bought a sampler too.

[typebhomeschooler]

Bird Unit

I had original set out to make an owl unit, as I knew I would be buying the first five Owl diaries. But I realized we needed to get some basics out of the way first so we broadened it to birds in general. This was good and not good. This unit ended up getting too big, I didn’t edit enough. I had bought the Nature Mega Bundle from the Hidden Way and it had so much great stuff in it. I bought the Nest is Noisy bookseed from Blossom and Root which is also fabulous. Plus I have the Wonders of the Animal Kingdom full science curriculum,also from Blossom and Root. But I have learned, at least for B, I have to keep units to two weeks or less, at least for now.

B and her father created their own birds using collage art.

We played Bird Bingo many times. It was fun and everyone in the family learned a lot.

We tried watching Fly Away Home (1996) with Anna Paquin but B just doesn’t respond to live action movies.

I forgot to take book stack pictures this time around and I’m so upset about it. Here are some of the books we read

I cannot recommend Birds of the Photo Ark enough. It’s absolutely gorgeous. B would just pick it up and look at it for fun.

Birds of the Photo Ark

For avian enthusiasts, from armchair observers to dedicated life-listers, this brilliant book from acclaimed National Geographic photographe

Tumblr is being very uncooperative but we also read Feathers: Not just for flying by Melissa Stewart, Owl Diaries 1-5 by Rebecca Elliot and National Geographic Little Kids First Big Book of Birds By Catherine D. Hughes.

Robins!

Robins are the most familiar and beloved of all birds, found throughout North America and celebrated as one of the first signs of spring. Bu

Owls

As part of an online supplement to the monthly children's magazine "Zoobooks," Wildlife Education, Ltd. provides a description of the owl. O

The Big Book of Birds

Following up the hugely successful The Big Book of Bugs, The Big Book of Beasts, and The Big Book of the Blue, The Big Book of Birds is a fa

Migration

Animals of all shapes and sizes make epic journeys across our planet, through harsh weather, avoiding hungry predators, in their efforts to

A Nest Is Noisy

From the award-winning creators of An Egg Is Quiet, A Seed Is Sleepy, A Butterfly Is Patient, and A Rock Is Lively comes this gorgeous and i

An Egg Is Quiet

Award-winning artist Sylvia Long has teamed with up-and-coming author Dianna Aston to create this gorgeous and informative introduction to e

Mama Built a Little Nest

A delightful exploration of the incredibly variety of nests birds build for their babies, illustrated by a Caldecott Honoree.Mama built a li

There Is a Bird On Your Head! (An Elephant and Piggie Book)

Gerald is careful. Piggie is not.Piggie cannot help smiling. Gerald can.Gerald worries so that Piggie does not have to.Gerald and Piggie are

National Geographic Angry Birds

"If playing Angry Birds has suddenly turned you into a bird lover, you'll want to get your talons on the latest book National Geographic Ang

[typebhomeschooler]

Colombia Unit

To go along with September’s Universal Yums box we did a unit study on Colombia. We used many of the books in our cultural studies collection (post coming soon). We took the following from the library:

Let’s Look at Colombia was a good book for early learners, not too much info, lots of pictures. I will try and find more Let’s look at_____ books in the future. Juana & Lucas was cute, but unfortunately didn’t catch B as much as I wanted.

We made arepas a few times. B colored in the flag and some other pictures in The Cultured Chef. We listened to Shakira and some number one chart toppers from Colombia. We had plans to watch The road to el Dorado, but B was already looking forward to the next unit and I didn’t think pushing was a good idea. In general it was harder to find resources for Colombia than Egypt 😕

[typebhomeschooler]

Cinderella Around the World Unit

This unit used a lot of the information from Match Fishtank’s second grade unit Cinderella Stories. We kept it simple. We started out by watching Disney’s Cinderella. We ended by watching Ever After (1998) with Drew Barrymore.

These are the books I took out of the library. Not pictured Step into Reading Level Two Cinderella. I also wanted Cinderella: An Islamic Story but the library couldn’t get it.

I bought some fun extras like Little Sticker Dolly Dressing: Cinderella and Cinderella Magic Painting from Usborne too.

We finished the unit with a book B made with her version of Cinderella. She named it Botella Cinderella, in her version Cinderella was a robot.

[typebhomeschooler]

Inventing and Engineering Unit

I am going to record all of our units so I can look back and see what isn’t working. After doing our latest unit I have learned B just isn’t ready for long sections. Picture books are still the way to go. Here are the ones we have done so far:

- Prehistoric man

- Cats

- Egypt

I didn’t take pictures of those units but I will going forward. I look for books, videos, and websites on the subject, then we just choose whatever will work that day. Inventions and Engineering was a unit topic requested by B.

Books that worked:

Not pictured but well loved: Papa’s mechanical fish

I’m not going over ever title but our favorites were:

- The Most magnificent thing (she requested this one multiple times)

- Awesome Engineering Activities for Kids

- The inventions scribble book

Books that didn’t work for us:

Most of these are really great books that were just over B’s level right now. The George Washington Carver book could probably be a whole unit study it itself, it had a ton of activities in it. I will hopefully come back to these when she is older.

We also watched the following on CuriosityStream:

- The Wright Brothers: Bravery

- American Icons: Tom Edison

PBS Kids:

- Xavier Riddle episodes on Tesla and Newton

We also explored kids inventors contest websites a bit but didn’t do a lot online for this unit. I pulled a few lines from some of the books for copywork. We finished the unit with a page of narration and a drawing.

[typebhomeschooler]

“I’m falling behind”. Falling behind who? I just really don’t get being beholden to these curricula the way people do. I’m in a torchlight group. I bought the kindergarten curriculum to help me make country units. But most of the people in the group think they have to follow whatever they are told to complete for the day or...? I haven’t figured out what they are worried will be the consequence besides being “behind”. That dreaded word again. One of the things I like about homeschooling is the flexibility. We do school on the weekends. We add games and fun activities. That’s what’s so great about homeschooling. But people feel like they have to do all these activities in the order they were told to do them. Or that they have to do every activity assigned.

We are finding our type b grove now. We do logic, math (Singapore) and ELA (Logic of English) every day. We just open the book where we ended last time and work until we finish a lesson or I notice B has had enough. Then we take a break. We do unit studies in the afternoon. A few times during the unit I grab a sentence or two from one of the books we are reading and B copies it out. Units are whatever books I find from the library on the subject, whatever books I can’t stop myself from impulse buying, and videos and websites I find from my curricula (Blossom and Root science, Torchlight level k for countries) or Facebook group searches. I make a big list of those sources and randomly pick some to go over with her. We finish every unit with a drawing and narration of what she learned, which I write down for her. Once a week we pick a poem of the week, throw it on the fridge and recite it whenever we see it until we have memorized it. It seems to really be working. B has demonstrated a lot of new knowledge and I’m not driving myself crazy following a schedule.

It’s probably shockingly disorganized to most people. But I love it.

[typebhomeschooler]

So you want to start homeschooling they make you submit what you are going to use. But of course I’m totally knew to this and had no experience to base my choices on. I didn’t do too bad but I have bought a lot. My best decisions were going with Logic of English and Singapore math. Like a lot of new homeschooling parents I was originally looking for an all in one. It didn’t take long before I realized that was expensive, hard to find, and rarely works out.

These were my original choices: Singapore math, Logic of English, Building foundations of scientific inquiry, World Myths and Legends, History Pockets, World Yums, Little Pim, Liberty Kids, Usborne Geography encyclopedia, Artistic Pursuits, Mindup curriculum, Outschool French, Outschool Broadway

Some I’m still using, some I never cracked open. I have bought a lot since then as well. I also made the rookie mistake of making a weekly schedule. Lmao that was a huge waste of time too. When they talk about deschooling, I think it’s stuff like that they are talking about. Well at least for me.

We are just beginning to find a rhythm but it’s certainly not a schedule. We don’t need a schedule, one of the beauty of homeschooling is customizing it for your kid. We do LOE and Singapore every school day. But sometimes we finish a lesson in a day and sometimes it’s two and it’s always based off my reading of my child. I also made an All about Today worksheet that goes over the date, days of the week, number of the day, how she is feeling, etc. we also fill out a three year Q & A book. Originally we also did MindUp exercises but that was a total bust. B acted like I was torturing her. We switched to Mind Benders vol 1 which she likes much better, but doesn’t address social emotional learning. I haven’t figured out a way to address that yet.

Making a rigid weekly schedule isn’t me. It was never going to work. Unit studies, now that’s me. Doing a ton of research to find resources, now that’s me. I’m also still trying to figure out what works for B. That’s where we clash a bit. I could read all day, I love the literature based curricula. But she likes more interactive activities. I bought Blossom and Root year three, one small square, Torchlight kindergarten, and Wild Math first grade. I’m sure I’m forgetting more. I pull ideas and resources from all of them. I realized I’m doing it the same way I approached parenting. I took ideas from RIE, attachment parenting, etc. I called it buffet parenting. I think this is buffet homeschooling. I guess in the homeschooling world it’s called eclectic homeschooling? I’m not sure if that term only relates to philosophy or if it is granular enough to encompass pulling ideas as well.

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I really just want a place to record my thoughts and remember our journey through this. Im going to try not to censor myself. I’m M, my husband is P. We have one five year old daughter, B. I’m a covid homeschooler. A full time working homeschooler. An eclectic homeschooler. A liberal homeschooler. I’m a Jewish homeschooler. A pro science homeschooler. But more than anything else, I’m a type B homeschooler. I am not organized, I have trouble following a full curriculum to the letter. I can be lazy. But I’m smart and creative and I can research anything. My daughter is very smart but still immature in some ways.

We tried virtual learning in the Spring and it wasn’t working well at all. Part of that I’m sure is that she had a horrible teacher. Don’t misconstrue, I have a lot of respect for teachers in general and especially the work they have had to do during covid but B’s teacher was really awful. B was on the younger side and she was immature and her teacher wasn’t patient or understanding at all. She had so many accidents, I had to send her with a full second set of dry clothes every day. She wasn’t ready for kindergarten and I didn’t have choice but to put her in there but I was working full time and couldn’t afford another year of nursery school. So I drove her to school every day, hating myself the whole time but having no alternative.

Now I’m working remotely because of the pandemic. It might only be for a year, but as I have adjusted to this new normal I hope it can continue this way. It can be annoying switching back and forth but the benefits far outweigh the detriments. It’s much better for B right now. Five is too young to be in school, at least the type of sit down and shut up school she was subjected to last year. Homeschooling let’s me break it up into age-appropriate time blocks. It lets me read her and not push her past her individual limits, something classroom teachers could never do. Plus I get to spend more time with B, something I felt so deprived of last year. I’m afraid I’m falling in love with it and it may just be this one year. I need to savor every moment of this year. I got rid of some of the more rigid programs I bought already. I have to keep her on track with math and science but otherwise we are doing unit studies. I want her to learn to love learning and I think exploring things she is interested in is the way to go. I was originally going to do ancient history. We got through early man and Egypt. But I can see it’s pulling teeth. If I’m pulling a tooth it’s going to be ELA or Math. I bought the Blossom and Root third grade science and we are going to do a lot of units on her favorite animals. I’m going to do some narration with fairy tales, watching Disney movies with her. I also bought the Torchlight kindergarten to explore countries using Yum boxes, but I must remember to keep these short. I can’t get lost in making sure she learns everything, I’m going to focus on the HOME in homeschool.