Monday, August 23, 2010

Book List- Kindergarten




Through collection, acquisition, and exploration I have stumbled upon some great materials to piece together a curriculum for the first year. I knew from the get go that I wanted to use Montessori in some way because I studied her in undergrad and had great expectations for AMI teacher training (maybe later in life). I had written my thesis at Hartwick as an expose about Social Stratification in the education system starting in Preschool and compared a Head Start program with a private Montessori school. Now full circle I have found a way for my children to grow up with the Montessori premise primarily because I am home with them. While digging through my old materials I found an amazing resource that was my jumping off point and from there I have just been lucky! Here are the titles and authors of what I have found:

Over all Curriculum-

Montessori Play and Learn: A Parents Guide to Purposeful Play from Two to Six by, Lesley Britton

*Project Wild: K-12 Curriculum and Activity Guide and Project Wild: Aquatic

Project Learning Tree: Environmental Education Activity Guide

Language and Reading-

Reading Aids Through the Grades by, David Russell and Etta Karp

Let's Play a Game The Ginn Basic Readers- Ginn and Company

The Really Useful Literacy Book- Scond Edition by, Tony Martin, Chira Lovat, and Glynis Purnell

I have also been exploring a wonderful Curriculum from a group called Oak Meadow- and think I may buy it for First Grade! Check out http://www.oakmeadow.com/

* while looking at Project Wild I found a curriculum called Growing Up Wild which is the early ed counterpart to the former. I found out that trainings can and are provided in pretty much every state in the county! I have set one up in our area and have invited other Homeschooling parents, Head Start teachers, and daycare providers. It is free and they provide materials! Look on their website if you are interested: http://www.projectwild.org/growingupwild.htm

Saturday, August 21, 2010

Homeschooling for Mummies


This blog will record the trial and error on my path to Homeschooling. My eldest daughter will be turning 5 this September and would be old enough to enter Kindergarten at our public school. We went through the whole process enrolled her, got the required immunizations, intellegence screening etc. When I recieved the test scores in the mail I just sat with them for a long time, "what did they mean?" I tried to look up the testing used and found nothing. This sent me on an adventure. The world of homeschooling began to open up to us and we to it. It became not a question of can we do this but when can we start! Calling the school and pulling her from their roster was the most freeing thing I have done in a long, long time.
This is a little known, and I find misunderstood world. Shrouded with ideas of weird, unsocialized kids and religious fundementalism. My family and I are here to prove that all wrong. Although we have just begun I feel the momentum building and oportunities taking hold that would never happen in traditional schooling. We are not teaching our children at home to keep them from the world, rather to open the world up to them...
Please join us!