Homeschooling Curriculum - Waterbury,CT

Yay, fun!

We're eclectic homeschoolers, so curriculum finding is one of my favorite things :) :) :)

If you google homeschool curriculum review, you'll get hundreds and hundreds of stuff listed... probably about 3/4s christian. I've found my best "ins" on curriculum to be homeschooling boards, find out what other people are using and what they like/dislike about it. We find amazing things through other people (like "Minimus, the mouse that made latin cool" or http://www.lessonpathways.com/ or that national geograhic and discovery both have *education* sites, in addition to their adult and kid sites).

Personally we do about a 40/40 split between Charlotte Mason & Montessori... with the other 20% being all over the board. We pay for very very little of our curriculum.

I also have to disagree about computers and movies only being a small part of education. For some kids they're phenomenal tools, for others they don't work at all. For my super sensory visual-spatial learner they're incredible. We also stream an educational movie at lunch every day through netflix after we get home (if you haven't found the BBC's "Walking with _______" series -dinosaurs, prehistoric beasts, monsters, etc.-, DO check them out. So killer. Not to mention about 1000 streamable movies/documentaries on everything from the universe to leopards, engineering an empire to magic schoolbus. For our history units we usually have a stack of movies both fiction and non-fiction that we use for a variety of purposes).

Anyhow... Time for Learning is a very popular curriculum... we don't use it, but it is one of the better ones out there. I have several friends who use it, particularly for math. Here are some links for the ones that we use...

Charlotte Mason
http://simplycharlottemason.com/basics/started/charlotte-...
http://www.amblesideonline.org/
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/SecularCM/

Montessori
http://www.freemontessori.org/?s
http://www.freemontessori.org/?page_id=9
http://www.montessorird.com/index2.php?cPath=1&osCsid...
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/playschool6/

Beginning Reading & Writing
http://www.starfall.com/
http://www.hwtears.com/

Science
http://www.noeoscience.com/
http://www.discoveryeducation.com/

History
Unit Studies

Most people recommend that you stay as far away as possible from K12 and the state virtual academies that use k12. They have a notoriously bad reputation. In large part, because although they're selling themselves as an INTERACTIVE online program, they're not interactive at all, and they're UBER expensive. There's just so much better for so much less out there. HOWEVER, I've found their stuff to work well as an outline/ jumping off point for many things. <laughing> Actually, I have about 3 years of their history printed off. They're not bad if you pay for a month or two's worth of a subscription and just print everything off. But that can still run you $$$.

My biggest recommendation is that you pay for as little as possible, and try out as much as you can the first year while you get your feet under you. Play play play. :)

Also, TRY not to get too swept up into the "OMG... am I doing this right, cram cram cram info out of insecurity". There have been months where I've literally taken a sharpie and written "Love of Learning" on one hand, and "You have Time" on the other.

Welcome :) It's a wild ride

R.

'

Sonlight.com is awesome. Get their catalog and just read through it. There is too much stuff for the younger ones so pick and choose but all of their stuff is awesome.

Worksheets is one of the worst ways to teach children. They need many hands on activities to do. Also, sitting your child in front of a computer and expecting them to learn from a computer is also not very affective. Worksheets, computer programs, and movies should only be a VERY small part of you curriculum.
That being said, I like starfall for fun phonics games. And hubbards cupboard has printable books.
http://www.starfall.com/

http://www.hubbardscupboard.org/printable_booklets.html

sight words list
http://gemini.es.brevard.k12.fl.us/sheppard/reading/dolch...
I hope some of these links help.
I would also suggest finding a homeschooling support group in your area. I am sure they could be a helpful resource for you.

I love Superteacher worksheets - all free and TONS of printables! About.com has a whole section as well.

If you want to include any early hands-on science and math experience, check out the materials my husband and I produce at TOPScience.org. We have three really nice programs that appeal to children in your kids' age group. The first two use lentils in a "sandbox" approach, the third uses two folded paper balance beams to do all sorts of mass comparisons and simple arithmetic:

http://topscience.org/books/lentils71.html
http://topscience.org/books/grip73.html
http://topscience.org/books/balancing31.html

We get wonderful feedback from parents who have used these with even really young children.

Best wishes for your homeschooling adventures.