Wednesday Words

pin found here

Homeschool Curriculum Pt. 4-Spelling and Phonics

Last year, we worked on Fry’s 200-300 word list and used Spelling City, but it just wasn’t enough and I wasn’t happy with where we were with Spelling.  And, it was the lowest score in our testing.  So, time to try something new!

I bought this workbook:

I backed up to the third grade book, and even though I like the way it is laid out, The Girlio did know a lot of the words.

So, after a few weeks, I gave her a massive test on eight weeks of words from the book, went through the end of the Fry’s 300 list and the 400 word list, and figured out which words she didn’t know.  I created new spelling word lists and we cut out about six week’s of spelling work from the book AND added in the Fry’s words.

We are still able to use sheets from the book that allow you to customize your own lists, and then we are also using these spelling bingo sheets from Pinterest:

pin found here

So far, this is working MUCH better, because she is actually practicing words she doesn’t know, and we aren’t just doing worksheets to do worksheets.  If we finish all the words in the book and the 400 Fry’s list, we will start on the 500 Fry’s list.

The Girlio is also working through this book:

And I purchased a Phonics workbook for additional practice:

Pinterest Thursday-1st School Day Pt.1

I found some fun things on Pinterest that we did on our first day of school.

First up, this All About Me sheet:

pin found here

I think this is my favorite of the All About Me pages we have done.  I love all the doodles, and it was fun for The Girlio to color and write in her answers.  Very fun.  🙂

We also did a couple of art projects, which I will share next week!

Wednesday Words

pin found here

Homeschool Curriculum Pt. 3-Math

For math this year, we are staying with Math Mammoth.  We used it last year, and I really like how you can focus on one topic at a time until it is mastered.  I also like how affordable the workbooks are.  I got mine on sale and they ranged between $3-$5 each.  This year, we will be covering decimals, measurement, and division 1.  If we have time, we might also work on area and perimeter or angles.

We also use Khan Academy and ST Math.  Khan is free, and is a good way for me to tell that she understands the topics.  This will be our third year using it, and it is a great tool for review.  ST Math normally costs around $130.00, but I get it for free from the school system.  It seems like a game to The Girlio, so it is another great way to get in additional practice.  Even though all of these products utilize common core, I teach it to her the “easy” way (the way I learned as a kid), and as long as she comes with the answer correctly and can show her work, I am fine with that.  Because Khan and ST Math are on the computer, she can still come up with the answer her way.

I also wanted to practice word problems this year, so I picked up this workbook from Amazon for $2.99:

Finally, we use Pink Cat Studio products (I have previously posted about several of them) to practice our multiplication, division and fraction skills.

And that is what we are doing for math this year!