Spirit of Obedience: Planning for Another Year of Homeschooling

Amazingly it is already time to think about the new school year as our little summer break comes to an end. I have been busy preparing for our fourth year of homeschooling. I enjoy planning our lessons and organizing our materials. Each year I tweak the previous years curriculum. Our first year of homeschooling I did mainly Classical Education using The Well-Trained Mind. Being a newbie, I felt like I needed to run a tight ship to be sure my children were receiving an adequate education. The second year I had just given birth to my 5th baby in August and felt like I needed a curriculum that made schooling easier. We went with a computer based program called Switched-On Schoolhouse for their major subjects and used Seton workbooks to cover the rest. This past year was our first year of having just two of our daughters at home. My oldest daughter went into 6th grade. We decided, for a number of reasons, it was best to send her back to the local catholic school. Again, we went with The Well-Trained Mind and Seton materials for the other two.

I discovered Educating the WholeHearted Child by Clay and Sally Clarkson at the library. I liked it so much I bought my own copy. I have decided to use it as the basis for this school year, coupled with Charlotte Mason and a hint of Waldorf. Now that I have a few years of home education under my belt, I feel like the past few years have been getting "dry". When I first came into homeschooling I loved the idea of using life as the classroom, of making learning fun. This year my goal is to get back to that ideal. While I'm not comfortable with unschooling, I'm confident enough now to use a loose curriculum covering the basics, but leaving room for exploration and creativity.

I'll keep you posted as I continue to gather resources and materials to begin our Homeschool Year 2012-2013!