A Look Ahead at January

This week we head back to the lesson sheets after taking off two full weeks for Christmas. We worked up until December 23.

I have done monthly lesson sheets for my kids for a couple years now. Even for Suzy (age 9), it works well for us. They like crossing off their work in each little square. (For a pic of the lesson sheets, go to the end of this post.)

Why do I do it this way?
They can work ahead if they want to (though they almost never do). It's once-a-month planning for me (which streamlines things). A lot of their work is independent, so they can work on their own anyway.

They don't have to accomplish their work in any certain order, other than I do tell them what to start with - mainly because we have to schedule computer time and mom-time for some of the work.

So, here's what's going to be happening this month:

Bible -This month our hymn is "He Keeps Me Singing" by Luther Bridges. We will also review 6-8 previously learned hymns or choruses each week. Our Bible study will cover Elijah and the book of James. 

Math - David will pick back up in Algebra 2, which he is doing on his own with Teaching Textbooks; I aim for him to spend 90 minutes on it each day. Emily will be doing over some lessons as well as doing some remedial work; she also does 90 minutes. (Math is her difficult subject.) James and Suzy will be working in their Teaching Textbooks math - James does 60 minutes a day in TT6 and Suzy does 45 minutes in TT4.


Literature - David and Emily are both reading The Count of Monte Cristo (abridged version) and writing chapter summaries as they go along. James will be reading The Adventures of Tom Sawyer.

Reading - 
Suzy is doing some work in Phonics Pathways Pyramid (multi-syllable words) and also Reading Reflex. We are going to be done with Pyramid this month and I will move her into some real books after that.

Language Arts - We will all be working on editing our National Novel Writing Month novels. I am going to have each child spend 30 minutes a day working on that. Everyone will write in their communication journals once a week. Typing, penmanship and spelling fill up James and Suzy's schedules, while Emily and David work on grammar and typing.

Science - David is working his way through an free online physics curriculum, supplemented with Khan Academy videos. Emily is teaching Considering God's Creation to the younger two (a real challenge for everyone!) and this month they will be working on plants (photosynthesis, parts of a plant, fungus, trees).

History - David and Emily are studying the modern age, guided by the Billy Joel song "We Didn't Start The Fire". They are going year by year to understand the events mentioned in the song. This month they will cover 1959-1961. They are creating a presentation to explain the names and events. James and Suzy are not doing History this month. EDITED: James and Suzy (along with Emily) are attending a once-a-week Michigan History class which will last 12 weeks.

Other - David will also continue with his ACT prep course through Kaplan. His practice scores look good. He'll likely take the test in April. I've got to figure out those details.


David is also going to be very busy with Robotics for this rest of this month. He is participating in First Robotics Competition with a local high school's team and they will be working on their 'bot 6 days a week. (5 evenings for 2.5 hours each night and Saturday all day)