Thumbs Up to Visual Latin!

This year we are learning some Latin!  I say we because I am learning right along side the kiddos!  The only foreign language I ever studied was French.  I took 3 years in high school, but,sadly, can only speak a few words today.  In my many hours of homeschool curriculum research, I see many families incorporate Latin as their first foreign language and they start at a young age.  I've wanted to slide it into our schedule but honestly I've been intimidated since my knowledge is a big FAT goose egg!  Luckily, in our Classical Conversations class, Latin is covered- we are learning enough to translate John 1:1-7, but I felt we needed a more thorough background.  Enter VISUAL LATIN!

A couple of weeks ago we were sent a DVD copy to review courtesy of Timberdoodle.  At first, I wasn't sure it would be a great fit since the kids are only 6 and 4.  There aren't any cartoons, it is very straight forward.  The videos feature "The Latin Teacher" in front of a black board. 
That's it!  He is very engaging and humorous and keeps with the KISS principle I learned in business school - Keep It Simple Stupid!  The simplicity is what makes this such an awesome program.  My 6 year old begs to watch her Latin now.  In fact, I will catch her pretending she is the Latin teacher.  Even my 4 year old will sit and watch for far longer than I ever imagined!

The first 4 introductory lessons cover the following topics:  Why Study Latin?  Latin Then & Now, How to Learn a Language, and Stuff About Latin.  I highly recommend taking the time to watch these lessons!  I especially enjoyed the Why Study Latin? section.  He highlights many of our English words that are derived from Latin.  Studying the Latin, can totally change how you view some of our common everyday words!  Very insightful!

Each Latin lesson is divided into 3 sections:  Grammar, Sentences, and Reading.  A definite plus for this program is each section's video only lasts about 10 minutes!  This short time commitment allows it to fit easily into our schedule.  Each section also has a corresponding worksheet to print.  Since my kids are still young, we do one section plus worksheet 3 days a week.  That way we complete one  lesson each week.  If your student is more advanced, it would be very doable to complete an entire lesson in one sitting.  

Since I'm learning along with the kids, I always watch the videos with them.  However, it could be a completely independent program, especially with those that are very proficient readers.   My 6 year old can fill out the worksheets with my help. 

If you are looking for a Latin program with a lot of bells and whistles and entertainment value, this program probably wouldn't appeal to you.  If you want a basic, straightforward program that is very easy to incorporate into an already busy schedule, give Visual Latin a try!  I'm glad we are and I can't wait to see our progress.

School Year in Full Swing!

Sorry for my absence to blogging, it has been extremely busy around here lately!  Baby shower here at the house which resulted in a lot of cleaning!  Soldier boy has been out of town for 2 weeks, so that means wearing both mommy and daddy hats, exhausting!  Tuesday we started our Fall Semester at Fern Academy and we've having a lot of fun.  The kids attended their first Classical Conversations class and LOVED it, they can't wait to go back next week.  Here are a few pics of the kids in action at home:


First Day of Classical Conversations

Gman loved working on his Batman Preschool Pack from 1+1+1=1.  

"B" is for Batman tracing fun!

Forming his letters with play-doh!



One proud boy after doing his Batman Color by Number all by himself!

One thing I'm doing more of this year is letting the kids pick a subject they want to learn more about and do a unit study using lapbooks.  Livy decided she wanted to study about the ocean and fish after checking out Rainbow Fish from the library.

We started on our Ocean Lapbook today:



Working hard on Mammals vs. Fish!

I found some great printables for our book via Homeschool Share!  We added a Fish life cycle  wheel and whale vocabulary cards.

Stay tuned for more Ocean Life activities!

Showing off her Lapbook cover art!



2011-2012 Curriculum - a work in progress!

  It's that time of year, time to unveil our plan for the upcoming 2011-2012 school year!  We are year around homeschoolers, so we officially started 1st grade stuff  in May -  A light schedule of Bible, reading, and math with a few fun science things thrown in here and there.  Come mid-August we will be jumping into our new schedule full throttle and I'm so excited!  Hopefully the kids will be as stoked to start as I am :)

Our main curriculum will be Classical Conversations Foundations Cycle 3.  We are so excited to join our new, local CC community this fall!

First Grade Plan:

Bible:  Bible Study Guide for All Ages, Beginner Unit 1, Qtr. 1(we are almost finished), Intermediate Qtr 2 & 3

History:  American History cycle.  We will be using SOTW 3 & 4 as spines and will be doing many unit studies and lapbooks along the way to make this phase of history come alive.  We will also be reading from The Children's Treasury of Virtues

Geography:  Road Trip USA, TAG U.S. Map

Science:  through CC we will be studying Anatomy & Chemistry...we will use My Body by Patti Caretello, Janice Van Cleave's 201 Awesome Experiements , Mr. Q's Classic Science

Math:  Horizons 1

Phonics/Spelling:  All About Spelling 1 (we are finishing it up now) then will move to 2, First Language Lessons, Hooked on Phonics.  We will also be reading the Little House on the Prarie Series as read alouds.

Handwriting:  Writing With Ease, lots of copywork sheets from CurrClick to go along with our Bible and History lessons

Latin:  Latin's Not So Tough!

Music Appreciation:  Classical Music for Dummies

Art:  Discovering Great Artists, Drawing with Children,

4K Plan:

Gman will be also be doing Classical Conversations, in addition I will supplement phonics, writing, and math with:

Rod & Staff Preschool Workbooks, Letter of Week K4 Curriculum, and Explode the Code Get Ready, Set, Go

I feel very good about this plan, but I'm also somewhat of a curriculum junkie.  In a world with unlimited time and money, I would own it all!  Therefore, I still consider this a work in progress...

The Old Schoolhouse Deal!

If you are looking for a deal on the homeschooling mainstay, The Old Schoolhouse,  your wait is over!  TOS is doing a major wipe out of their warehouse and are offering  over $104 of merchandise for only $25!   This includes 7 issues of TOS, Homeschooling with Heart Tote bag, free shipping and up to 4 freebies.  You can earn freebies by sharing this deal on your blog, facebook, twitter, or through email.  Simply put in the comment section how you shared and they will put your freebies in the box!  Quantities are limited so hurry if you want to take advantage of this deal.

Dinosaur Fun!

We have 2 new members of our family this morning...dinosaur babies!  Yesterday, we had to make a stop at Michael's and of course the kids found something they wanted too.  Out of all the cool stuff to choose from they each chose a hatchable dinosaur egg.  I have to admit I tried to steer them to something else, knowing that once this baby hatched the fun would be over.  Wow was I wrong!  I never dreamed this $2 toy would turn into a unit study on dinos. 

The directions were easy, just immerse the eggs in water and after 24-48 hours the dinos will hatch. 

Then change the water and leave the dinos in for another day or so to let them "grow".  Our dinos only took 12 hours to hatch which was a bummer because it happened overnight.  It didn't disappoint the kids too much since they awoke to the babies sticking their heads out of the eggs, but it would have been cool to actually see it happen!  My advice:  put eggs in water in the morning and keep an eye on them throughout the day!  We went to the Kids Dino website to identify our newly hatched babies and learn more about them.  Fun activity, definitely worth  2 bucks!!!

The proud "parents"!

Enter to Win!

Have you heard of Timberdoodle?  They are a family owned company specializing in homeschool curriculum and educational products.  They held a Facebook party today and posted giveaways for lots of awesome products.  You still have time to enter!  Go here and you will see all the giveaways listed on the right hand side under recent posts.  Click on each one and scroll down to the "join giveaway" box.  I highly recommend using FireFox instead of IE to enter!  You can gain 4 entries for each giveaway and you are eligible to win multiple products.  Good Luck!