Back to Homeschool Coffee Break - Curriculum

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After so many years of researching and hunting and figuring in order to put together a curriculum and course line-up for the coming school year, it was odd to have so little that I needed to sort out for this year. Some of our courses for Kennady's junior year were decided before we were halfway through her sophomore year! And a couple of others fell into place without a lot of effort on my part. Now, I will still be doing a fair amount of lesson planning, but I'll get into that later in this series. For now, here are the courses and curriculum we've settled on for 2017-2018.

Grammar and Composition

We had intended to use The Power in Your Hands from Writing with Sharon Watson last school year, to tell the truth, but not very far into the year I realized that it would be the text used in the High School Writing class at co-op this year, so we sure didn't need to do it twice! We switched things around and in a couple weeks we'll be ready to start on this. I'm actually the instructor for the co-op writing class, so it will be a somewhat new experience for both me and Kennady. I've taught co-op classes before, but not at high school level; and it's been a few years since we were in a co-op of any kind.

(By the way, we were introduced to this curriculum when we reviewed it just over a year ago. Read our review here: The Power in Your Hands (A Schoolhouse Crew Review))

Math

It's finally time to make a switch for algebra. We have loved Life of Fred math over the years, as it is a low stress way for Kennady to learn a subject that just plain causes her stress. Several months ago she discussed with me whether using a video instruction course of some kind would work for her, and while we mulled that over, we had the opportunity to review No-Nonsense Algebra from Math Essentials. Kennady's older brother used it quite a few years ago, and did great with it, so we jumped at the chance, and it has been quite successful so far. So we have made the choice to keep it as our primary algebra curriculum.

(Read our recent review here: No-Nonsense Algebra from Math Essentials (A Homeschool Coffee Break Review))

History, Bible, and Literature

Once again, we started off with something last year and then adjusted expectations and will finish it this year. Instead of completing all of Exploring World History from Notgrass last year, Kennady did about half of it and I adjusted the course descriptions, titles, and number of credits. This year she will do the second half of the course, and we'll adjust as well. Last year we added a few things along the way and this year we'll do the same, so I'm planning on this coming out to a full credit in History, but still looking at whether the Bible portion will be a full or half credit. And we'll have to look at the Literature portion and decide what we want to do there as well.




Electives - Co-ops and Classes

French I - This is being offered by our high school co-op and Kennady had wanted to learn French, so that made for an easy choice! I even signed up to sit in on the class so maybe I'll learn something too. Here's hoping I'm not too much of an 'old dog' for that! 😉

Speech and Presentation - This is also through the co-op, and is a half credit class. I thought it would be an excellent addition to her coursework that will help prepare her for college, for leading worship, and for teaching.



Children's Chorus - Kennady will be in the upper level chorus again this year, in an excellent program that provides outstanding music education in choral singing. It's a full Fine Arts credit. In addition, she has been accepted as an intern with the Chorus for this year, so she'll be assisting the Director of the upper elementary age chorus, and will earn credit for that. As well as very valuable experience if she continues to pursue music education!

Members of the Chorus on the trip to New Orleans in June.

Guitar Lessons - another full music credit will be earned with her guitar lessons again this year. She also gets plenty of opportunity to play and sing in worship teams at church.

Okay, this is her ukulele and not a guitar, but she
probably plays the uke more!

Apparently she didn't want her face to show in this picture.

We don't have specific plans for Phys.Ed. or Art this year, but Kennady already has her required credit for Phys.Ed. so that's not an issue. She already has way more than her requirement for Fine Arts as well, but it's possible that she'll do enough artwork, especially if she's asked to do more backdrops or live art at church, to warrant another partial credit. I always figure if they are doing worthwhile work, they should earn some credit for it!

What's in your curriculum line-up for this school year? Leave a comment and let me know! And visit the Homeschool Review Crew Blog to find all the Back to School Blog Hop posts about curriculum.

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