A New Face and a New Journey

This blog is officially switching venues. It will no longer be a homeschool only blog, although it will always be a treasure for homeschooling families as well as teachers, and educators. 

I have taken a new teaching/administration position that has resulted in our family's departure from the world of homeschooling. This is a very bittersweet move for me, as it has forced me to say good bye to an era that I have held and still hold very dear to my heart. I feel there is no going back from here. My children are happy; and that's what matters most to me.

Teaching is my passion, and homeschooling my children was my wholehearted effort to fulfill that. While I feel I have lost a part of myself, I also feel I have gained a thousand times more-because now I have the opportunity to not only teach my own children, but the addition of many others, as well as entering into a field overflowing with fresh ideas and experiences.

I have already crossed many hurdles; both in my heart and mind, as well in the dynamics of this new educational setting. I am aware there are yet many more hurdles to cross. I won't belabor them here; here you will find documentation of what we are doing to pursue the dreams and goals I have set for myself and those working with me. I am grateful there are many individuals who share my passion and ambition. I realize the road won't be easy, but I plan to persevere and push it through.

I've always dreamed of a day school that provides every student it serves with what I worked to provide my own children over the years. An environment of exploration, discovery, and experience.

So as we embark on this new journey, I intend to share our joys and our accomplishments here. 

Discovery Tree Learning Center, a Christian Education, Charlotte Mason and Reggio inspired, K-6th grade. 

Welcome, and enjoy! 

Homeschool in the Woods

We started a new history adventure today. I ordered this awesome unit from Homeschool in the Woods and we LOVE it. It comes as a cd rom you can pop into your pc and print whatever and how many you want. I was extremely pleased with the layout, the ease of navigation, and the user friendliness!

I love that it provides activities as well as notebooking and lap booking pages galore. I am so glad we decided to give this a try! It's very reasonable for what you get. There are about 25 lessons we are going to do our best to cover before school gets out. We got a little bit of a late start with our recent change of school plans but even if we take it into the summer we will enjoy it thoroughly. :)

Spring School Switch

We made the decision to move our family to be closer to my parents, therefore we had to pull the kids from the charter we were with and enroll in another. I had originally hoped we could scoot through the end of the school year but unfortunately that did not happen.

I went Monday to choose curriculum from the new schools selection. I was please with what they had to offer, as in addition to what I have on hand from years passed, I have a great set of curricula to finish off our year.

I feel I've been homeschooling long enough to have a good handle on what publishers work best for my family. I'm only a little perplexed with the math selections, as the school provides 3 publishers, 2 of which are not aligned to common core, and 1 that is, which is Saxon, which they did not have for the upper levels, and my 4th grader hated Saxon. So he's in a sort of bind. I am fairly certain we will scale down on the Saxon assignments however, and focus on learning times tables as that is imperative.

The following is a list of what we will be using from now until the end of the year:

Spring Curriculum replacements:
Make reading notebooks

2nd
LA: ETC, AAS or SP, WWE, PLL
History: Homeschool in the Woods and History Pockets
Science: Little House Nature Study
Math: Saxon

4th:
Math: Mammoth? Or just learn times tables
LA: ILL, SP, WWE
History: HITW/CA Missions
Science: Little House Nature Study

8th
Pre Algebra-Prentice Hall
US History-Holt
English-Writing Strands, Vocabulary from Classical Roots, Spelling Power
Physical Science-Oak Meadow
Art-site based course
Guitar-site based course

9th
Algebra 1-CK-12 flex books
World Geography-Holt
Spanish-Rosetta Stone
English-Site based writing course and Vocabulary from Classical Roots
Earth Science-Holt
Art-site based
Piano-simply music/private lessons

That's it in a nutshell! We are focusing on the art of note booking and lap books for the little ones. Lots of hands on activities as this was missing badly in the other school. Only 10 weeks of school left so gotta get er done while the gettins good.

Experiment with, TOG, EP, and HITW

Fabulous US History Resource

I was lucky enough to catch a wonderful sale this vendor was running and I bought the huge history bundle. It is chock full of dramatized historical old time radio shows!

I seriously need to organize them by timeline. Hoping to do that this summer!

Take a look at what this homeschool family offers. Lots of goodies!

http://homeschoolradioshows.com/

A Reading Machine

I am so very proud of my little buddy. He took a little longer than most kids to catch the reading bug. But when he did catch it, boy oh boy!!!!!

Among many books that he has read and thoroughly enjoyed, are the Christopher Paolini series: Eragon, Eldest, Brisinger, and Inheritance. A total amount of a whopping 2,759 pages!!!! It took him about a year to read these, however he has read many other books in between including The Lord of the Rings series.

I am so proud of the avid reader he has become. What a joy to have taken a child from kindergarten to where he is now, not yet 10 years old, having accomplished as much as he has.

While homeschooling can be a challenge, these rewards make it truly worthwhile.

The Fourth Grade Rite of Passage

Can anyone guess what we are doing?

Caeden has chosen the Santa Barbara Mission for his research project and model. Traditions traditions!!!!! What child can possibly grow up normally without having built his or her very own mission in FOURTH grade???? Will it hurt my second grader if she makes one too? Because she really wants to..... ;)

Outdoor Love

There's no doubt about the love of nature in this homeschool! While we live on 3 acres, and have lots of space to roam, there is just something fantastic about the rolling foothills near my parents home.

We needed to pick up some tack equipment from my dad today, so we decided to spend the afternoon there on his property.

Here are some beautiful photos of our littles doing what they like best!