Tag: Little Hearts for His Glory

Week in Review: April 27-May 1

Grace-Filled Writer

Two weekly reviews in a row feels great! This week went very well. We didn’t get through quite everything I wanted to and got a little sidetracked by some some health issues, but I feel good about the week. We had some really neat experiences in addition to our regular lessons I’ll share at the end.

Little Hearts for His Glory: Unit 13

Grace thoroughly enjoys all of her history, Bible and poetry in her guide. She really likes having her own readings and focused attention at her own level. We will continue through the summer and probably start Beyond Little Hearts for His Glory in the fall even if we haven’t finished Little Hearts.

For handwriting we are using Fundanoodle. This is a program I reviewed with The Old Schoolhouse Review Crew a couple of years ago and we absolutely loved it. It has the same type of feel as handwriting without tears, but is more affordable. I love that Grace builds the letters on a magnet board before writing them. She has worked through all of the upper case letters and is now doing lower case. My younger two daughters both used A Reason for Handwriting, which was good and did the job, but I really like the tactile nature of this program. She uses this one day and then practices the same letter in the Handwriting Without Tears book the next day.

For reading Grace is using the 1st grade readers from Abeka and a Dick and Jane book her great grandmother gave her. She loves the stories about Dick, Jane, and their little sister Sally. She actually likes it better than the Abeka books. If I could find more Dick and Jane reasonably priced I would probably just stick with that. After we get done with the 1st grade readers we’ll move onto the Emerging Readers set from Heart of Dakota. She could probably handle them okay now, but I like the idea of building her retention and comprehension before moving onto those too quickly.

Since she is reading really well, I let her call out sentences to Beth this week for her dictation in All About Spelling. She really enjoyed this and felt quite grown up. Her older sisters quite often help her with various subjects so this was a nice change for her.

Bigger Hearts for His Glory: Unit 24

We only have 10 more units left in Bigger! I may just do the history activities when summer comes because I want to start Preparing as she is entering 3rd grade. She may only go half-paced as her older sister did, but I feel she is definitely ready to move ahead in the guides.

As Beth has progressed I am encouraging her to read some history on her own as well as do some of the activities with little guidance from me. I now give Beth the guide and she works on her timeline alone. She is free to ask questions or ask for help, but this is one way I am helping her become more independent.

This week we had to catch up with four units on the timeline. Sometimes this box gets left out, but it’s something I always make sure to go back and catch up all the way. She has very much liked reading Stories of Great Americans and she can easily read and comprehend this book. I like giving her the freedom to read on her own although I do still read it to her sometimes.

Isn’t this the best picture???? We are working on math. Ha! The thing is that both girls are doing well with math, even Rose who has struggled some in the past. They weren’t upset or anything, just a bit tired and ready to be done. But hey, I felt the same way they did at this point that day!

Creation to Christ: Unit 7


Although it is a little strange to have started this guide mid-year, it’s working out well. The level of work has increased, but not too significantly. Rose really likes the notebooking pages and has done well to transition to using cursive all the time. She forgets sometimes, bu these erasable pens recommended in the forum and facebook group have been excellent. She loves having a special pen just for her to use.

Here she is listening to the “What in the World?” CD by Diane Warren. She absolutely loves this and I’m excited that she’ll get to use the next 2 CD sets in the upcoming guides.

I love learning about grammar, but I never expected my kids to! I’m so thrilled they love it. Yes, Rod and Staff can be a bit tedious, but the more you can do aloud, the better. I usually leave the written work for diagramming. I know diagramming can seem old fashioned and unnecessary, but I do see a benefit in being able to identify and classify the part of a sentence not only for school studies but for language study in the future. I don’t know what language she will study, but when she does having a solid grammar base will help her tremendously.

Other exciting opportunities…

I know other families have the same opportunity to do fun stuff that we do, but I think it is sometimes a little easier to fit into our lives because we homeschool. Here are some fun things we did this week.

This week was the Deerstream Learning Center Art Show and Exhibition. Each students has several pieces of art showcased. These are just a couple of pieces my girls had in the show. Grace is very excited to be a part of this next year. 
You can listen to the radio drama my English students recorded and produced for the art show by clicking here!
Another really cool thing is that these…
Hatched into these! 
This has been an amazing observational experience for them! They check on the little babies daily and have named them. They are at ground level inside an old plastic filing cabinet and easy for the girls to see without disturbing the chicks or their mama. 
Our final really cool experience was skyping with my aunt while she was in Haiti. My aunt takes a yearly trip to Haiti and works with a school there. We arranged for the girls to Skype with students in the second grade class there. They sang Jesus Loves Me and the girls sang Amazing Grace. We showed them around our schoolroom. It was really cool! 
I also enjoyed International Scrapbook Day and purchased some digital scrapbooking supplies on sale and completed a few layouts. This is one of my favorite leisure activities. I love preserving our family memories and I like the creativity of scrapbooking. I’m working on our 2008 album so Rose and Beth are quite little! Grace was a little confused that she wasn’t in any of the pictures, but very much enjoyed seein gher big sisters at play. 

So there was our week. Pretty smooth and lots of fun!

Week in Review: January 5-9

Grace-Filled Writer

Oh the first week after break…glad we’re back at it, but I couldn’t help but feel like I needed a vacation to recuperate from our vacation! Anyone with me? But, we persevered and got a good start in the new year.

Preparing: Unit 31

We are so close…so close…to finishing up this guide. I can’t help but feel a little anxious to get to the end. I always feel this way. Sometimes I forgo the last few units if I feel like I just want to move forward, but I’m not doing that this time. Preparing is such a sweet guide and we are both enjoying it immensely. Here she’s reading about Peter the Great. We had to catch up from the previous unit learning about Shakespeare because our library had it at the beginning of the year, but not anymore when I needed it! I save a lot by using what our library has from the HOD books, but every once in a while I run into a situation like this. No biggie though. I hopped onto the ABE Books website and snagged a copy.

 History vocabulary was once a pain to get through for various reasons. This year I’m letting Rose define what words she already knows aloud and only write out the ones she doesn’t know. She likes this and does well with it. She still has to write her sentences, but this is working to keep her on task.

One of the things Rose is enjoying this year is writing poetry based from the Robert Lewis Stevenson poems we are reading each week. This week was supposed to be a multiple paragraph writing, but she chose to do a poem instead which was really liked.







Bigger: Unit 13

I really, really wanted to be to unit 17 by Christmas, but since that didn’t happen I’m letting my original plan go and be okay with that. I’m really good at planning and not so good at keeping the plans loose. But Beth is doing great and doesn’t care one bit we’re behind where I’d planned to be so I’m taking her lead in that! She had some grammar tests to finish this week that I thought she had done before Christmas, but hadn’t checked yet because of kids coming down sick and distracting me! No big deal to her though. She sort of sighed when I told her, shrugged her shoulders and carried on.

Dictation has been going quite smoothly…until right now. Beth suddenly got stuck on one particular set and we spent an entire week on it! Now we’re past it and she’s fine. Whatever mental block she faced, she overcame and I’m grateful she persevered!

Sometimes I feel a little jealous of Beth. Math makes so much sense to her and she easily handles new concepts and ideas. She loves nothing more than to work on new math concepts, as long as it doesn’t take too long! This week she’s working on geometry and building shape patterns with smaller shapes. Think pattern blocks, but for older kids. I found an app for my iPad which she enjoyed using to complete the pattern assignments.

My oldest girls really work well together and do a good job of staying on task for the most part. They have their moments of being distracted, especially Beth. Her biggest challenge is wanting to play with her youngest sister. They like to chatter while working which can be distracting for Rose so I have to get creative and sometimes send one or both out of the room to work alone. She hates this, so it is quite the incentive to settle in and focus!

Little Hearts: Unit 2

Well, after several months of waiting, Grace is finally in Little Hearts for His Glory! The first time I taught this was in 2008. I’m looking forward to this third time around and Grace is even more excited to have history and activities just like her big sisters. This is a picture of her working on her poetry for the week which she thoroughly enjoys.

This little girl is such an avid reader! She is working through the 1st grade readers for Abeka, but she’s charging through chapter books like crazy. Magic Tree House, Imagination Station, American Girl…she just can’t get enough of the written word and it makes my heart smile. She doesn’t always understand a word, but she’s quick to come and ask without being frustrated. Her older two sisters didn’t accept help as easily and I see so much benefit in her easy way of handling both questions and corrections.

When we’re done with her work for the day she begs for more, so to keep her occupied I pull out one of the many fun learning games I’ve collected through reviews, freebies, or friends who gifted them to us. This is one of her favorites currently, the Cookie Sheet Challenge for sight words. Such a fun and simple activity which is already helping her build spelling skills. You can click the link to see my review, but forgive the lack of pictures. All of the pictures from my older posts have disappeared. Boo!

Here is another fun activity. I have no clue where these little cards came from, but they are like puzzles that spell three-letter words. She loved doing this and it occupied her happily for about 45 minutes!

Okay, so there was our week. It was great and I’m glad to be done with the first week of the new year. I’m anticipating the year more now!

Week in Review: May 13-17

Grace-Filled Writer

This was our last week of Heart of Dakota for the year!!!! Well…sort of. I’ve held off with Grace and Little Hands for a few weeks. I’ve had something unexpected come up for this summer and I wanted to get school done sooner than I originally planned. So I bumped everything ahead and we have been doing two units of Heart of Dakota in a one week time period. This seems like a lot…and it is! Keep in mind that I do skip a lot of science due to the fact that my daughter takes a three-hour science class each week.

I also just finished up the history readings for Little Hearts for His Glory. It bothered me at first not to do all the activities and I may go back this summer and do some, which would be a lot of fun! I’m not bothered by it anymore though. I know there are times I have to be flexible and homeschooling allows for that. No matter how much I plan and schedule, my good intentions will inevitable be interrupted by sickness, unexpected life events…sometimes even surprises and amazing once-in-a-lifetime opportunities. I like those interruptions best! 
Bigger Hearts for His Glory: Units 33 and 34
We have loved our time in this guide. Rose had learned so much and grown an incredible amount since we began in July. While I intended to do this guide half speed over two years, but after four units I realized she was more than ready for full-speed. Rose’s favorite set of units was the ones about The Wright Brothers and their Sister. She enjoyed this history so much I had to stop her from moving on! 
This week she studied more about the Panama canal and we looked at why it completely changed travel and commerce between the west and east coast. Since our studies have focused on American History she completed a map of the United States and its surrounding countries. She did a fabulous job! The proportions are a little funky, but I think this is great for a seven-year-old 2nd grader. 
She also finished up 2nd grade math from Rod and Staff and Wordly Wise 3000 book 2. There is something  incredibly satisfying about finishing a book for all of us. We came to that point in the year when staying focused was difficult. I remember this all too well from my full-time classroom teacher days, but honestly didn’t expect it with homeschooling. I think it may have to do with seeing an end in sight. We feel antsy and are so anxious to get to the end that it’s sometimes hard to stay the course. 
We are looking forward and excited to start Preparing Hearts for His Glory in August! 
Little Hearts for His Glory: Units 33 and 34
This is my second time through this guide, but I have enjoyed it immensely more. The first time I used it for K-4 as I anticipated never homeschooling my daughters. I really don’t recommend this unless you have an incredibly advanced child. Even then I’m not sure I would ever recommend this! 
This time as a K-5 curriculum Little Hearts was a fabulous fit. Beth really started to enjoy history and began asking questions and wanting to know more on her own. This was one of my goals for homeschooling. Learning for the sake of passing a test is not what we want for our children. Yes, I want them to do well as they go through school and remember what they have learned, but more than that I want to encourage a heart for learning and desire to know more. Heart of Dakota is just so good at that! 
Since Beth finished up the 1st grade reading curriculum I’ve just been having her read books at or slightly above her level and narrating for me. She has really enjoyed this and got  handful of books from my parents which I read at her age. She loves that they were once Mommy’s books!
We’re looking forward to Beyond Little Hearts for His Glory next year!
Little Hands to Heaven: Off Week
Like I mentioned I took a break from this guide with Grace this week so I could get through everything else with my older girls. She was not happy. My little sweetie loves to learn! I found out this week she has learned to read colors because of spending so much time with a small book about colors. I knew she loved it; I had no clue she was learning words! I plan to start Teach Your Child to Read in 100 Easy Lessons soon and I’ll be highlighting our language arts plan at this point. 

I kept her as busy as I could with fun activities, but it seemed I couldn’t keep her busy enough! She’s enjoyed her year with Heart of Dakota so very much. I plan to finish the guide throughout the summer and we’ll be using it again next year for her K-4 year along with reading, pre-K math, and the Rod and Staff ABC series. 

We’ve also enjoyed reviewing some really great stuff! 
Art… (Review Coming Soon)
Games… (Review Coming Soon)
Sign Language…(Click for Review!)
Be on the lookout for some really run reviews over the next few weeks! 

Week in Review: May 6-10

Grace-Filled Writer

The beginning of May is a whirlwind around here! We finish up with Deerstream Learning Center and I finish up teaching piano lessons. Life feels crazy and then there is a sudden and wonderful calm. It hasn’t arrived yet, but it will next week after my piano recital. With the craziness we try to squeeze in a bit of fun like New Orleans Style shaved ice! (Yes, it’s pouring the rain, but boy was it a memorable visit!)

Some things have come up for us that has made me feel like I need to finish up school for the year in the next couple of weeks. Because of that I’ve made a few changes. Grace is going full-out fast-paced through Little Hands to Heaven. I’m doing 2-3 units a week. I want to get through this guide so she experiences the poems for each letter and we’ll be doing it again next year for k-4. I’m only going to be reading the history and finishing the last several units with Beth by the end of next week. She is already into her 1st grade math and reading so I’m okay with moving more quickly. Rose will be finishing the last two units of Bigger next week.

The following week Rose and Beth will be completing their required state testing. Testing is one of the few requirements in our state for homeschooling and it is required to begin the school year when a student turns eight. I choose to test earlier because I want them to feel comfortable with testing in a comfortable environment I can control and I am covering my bases for the state. With the way educational requirements change so frequently I want to make sure I have done everything possible in order to show I am providing my girls with an excellent education.

In between all of this I have found time to still squeeze in my reviews! Make sure you check out the review of Trailblazer Books. They are offering a free e-book to my readers for this month only! More reviews will be headed your way soon!

And here is our week…

Little Hands to Heaven: Unit 19
We studied the letter P this week…mostly in one day to be completely honest! Grace did other work the other days, but we spent mostly 1 day focusing on this letter. I really enjoy adding in Do-A-Dot pages to coordinate with these. So does she! I let her pick the colors and then she has fun dotting the pages. To find these and others like them simply google “Do-A-Dot alphabet pages”. You’ll find more than you can ever use!

She opted to do her work in the hallway. Grace has been clearly trying to become her own person recently. This has sometimes played out in some rather defiant moments, but also has shown itself in small ways like when she says, “Mommy, can I do lessons on the floor?” As long as there isn’t a good reason I’m trying to allow her some flexibility. I am having to say, “No!” to her so often at the moment that anytime I can, “Yes,” it is a relief.

Her favorite part of the lessons is almost always the finger play which goes along with the letter for the week. She really gets into this and it typically involves her entire body, not just her fingers!






Little Hearts for His Glory: Units 28-29

I have several units to finish this coming week, but that’s okay. I need to finish and so we’ll make it! Beth love the GHI series from Rod and Staff. This is the new series Carrie Austin has chosen for Little Hearts for His Glory since Thinking Skills for 1st grade has been discontinued. We were using them already because Beth finished the Thinking Skills book in about a month. She kept sneaking it into her room during rest time and working on it when I didn’t realize it! I have to say I am very pleased with the switch and find these to be more challenging and fun than that Thinking Skills book was.

Since she finished up her reading books last week I’ve just been having Beth read books to me and I’ll ask 2-3 comprehension questions at the end. Her favorite book a Dick and Jane reader given to her by her great-grandmother. It is very simple for he at this point, but she loves it so much and at this age, reading is reading! I love our time cuddling on the couch while she reads to me. It is such a blessing!


Beth continues to use Math Rider in addition to her Rod and Staff math. This has improved her already strong math facts and she loves it! If you haven’t heard of it, take some time to check out my review. It has been a wonderful blessing to our homeschool curriculum!


Bigger Hearts for His Glory: Units 31 and 32

When I told Rose we were going to move more quickly through her curriculum, she said, “Oh. I guess I’ll just have to be more diligent!” What a sweet answer! We’re already on target to finish grammar and math next week without speeding up pace. Rose worked on practicing alphabetizing this week in her grammar book. This was very simple for her since the vocabulary with HOD gives her a chance to practice alphabetical order.

She was very excited to study two poems this week! Both poems for the week are on the page so it was easier. When studying rhyme scheme I have her first highlight the rhyming lines and then add in the letters. This has been a great way for her to visually see the rhyming pattern. I love that Heart of Dakota incorporates poetry from the very first guides. They are developing and appreciation for poetry and Rose has even been chosen for publication recently for a poetry contest! Her inspiration to write poetry definitely came fro her studies each week.

I often let Rose read her history on her own by her choice. Her narration skills have improved so much and I’m so pleased with her progress! She will many times read in the living room while I teach her sisters in the school-room. I will usually find her snuggled under a blanket completely drawn into her reading assignment. This week she finished up the entire book about the Wright Brothers. I didn’t intend for her to, but she got so excited about finishing she didn’t realize she was supposed to stop! You know you have an excellent history program when a child is so absorbed they completely forget to end their assigned reading for the day.

One more subject we have added to our week is typing. Rose has been hounding me to let her learn how to type. When the opportunity came up to review Typing Tournament I was so excited! Check out this really fun program for typing lessons for kids and adults. My husband said that if he’d had this to use to learn about typing when he was in school he might have actually learned the first time around.

That was our week! We’ve has a busy and full weekend with a fun surprise coming for the girls next week! I can’t wait to share it with you!

Here is a hint: They Glow 
Any guesses?

Week in Review: April 29 – May 3

Grace-Filled Writer

School is starting to wind down and everyone is getting a bit anxious for a break. I remember coming back from spring break when I was teaching full-time was always difficult and the same seems to be true for homeschool! The excessive pollen which is still floating around isn’t helping either! Still, we are making it through our curriculum and finding fun things to do along the way. Check out our break-from-the-ordinary field trip by clicking on the picture.

We have been reviewing a lot of really great things from several companies! In case you’ve missed some here is a list of our most recent reviews:

Advice for Seekers by Charles Spurgeon
Composers Activity Pak
Dr. Craft’s Active Playbook
Tower of Babel: The Cultural History of our Ancestors

Look for many more to come in the coming weeks!

Little Hands to Heaven: Unit 18
Grace is so incredibly impatient with me if we don’t do lots of school! I’m trying to teach her that sometimes she has to wait and sometimes we won’t do everything. She doesn’t like either of those truths, but I do try to make it up to her another day and do more!

Our letter of the week was O. All of our magnet letters are stored in this large tin. We play a search for the letter game sometimes on the lid. I didn’t realize until after I took this picture that I had put the O’s all together! But Grace didn’t mind, and didn’t even notice to be honest.

She has moved on to the C book of her About 3 series from Rod and Staff Publishing. These books have progressed her thinking skills and handwriting to a really good place as we finish up her K-3 year. She is one of those kids who would either start Kindergarten as a 4 year-old or wait and start just before she turns 6. While I completely hated the idea of her older sister starting Kindergarten just as she turned 5, I knew academically it was the best thing for her. Now I don’t have to worry about those problems! I can challenge her academically without the added stresses of needing to mature somewhat.

I did a fun new activity I found on Pinterest. I actually combined a couple of activities. I put a dice into an empty baby-food jar. She shook the dice, then she put that many noodles in one of the cubes in the ice cube tray. This occupied her for a full 30 minutes. Win!

Grace enjoys these types of activities and she’s still at an age that she thinks it’s a new activity if I change from noodles to dry beans or beads! It’s also really nice to be able to give her these small things and know she’s not going to try and eat them and choke. She really likes to use Cheerios  but ends up eating more than she counts.

Little Hearts for His Glory: Unit 27

Beth is working hard and getting close to finishing up! Since our allergy attack last week knocked us off from finishing up Unit 27 we just picked up where we stopped last week. We finished up the history readings which she enjoyed as usual.

Since finishing up her handwriting book we’ve moved on to a phonics practice book which also incorporates handwriting. She really likes these activities and it has not only helped improve her handwriting, but it also incorporates critical thinking, spelling, rhyming, and reading. Yay for Grandma fining this for her!

Beth also completed her first math speed drill! Rod and Staff is a very traditional mathematics curriculum without any frills. It’s no-nonsense approach has been a good fit for my girls and they do quite well with it. I’m not actually doing the speed drills exactly as they are intended yet because she has moved on to 1st grade level math very quickly. I told her to do them as quickly as she could and I just kept track of the time. I was very pleased that she finished all 18 problems in only 65 seconds. She knows the answers quickly, but is sometimes slow about writing the numbers because she wants them to look neat.

She also finished up her reading curriculum this week. Now that she has completed through 1st grade Abeka phonics we’ll move on to the emerging readers set used in Heart of Dakota. I’m not sure if we’ll start them next week though. For now I think I will just have Beth do some reading and narration each day.

Bigger Hearts for His Glory: Unit 30

Rose started off the week with an art show at Deerstream Learning Center. She created her own national park complete with unique land forms. She was so proud of her project and her grandparents were able to come and see it. Homeschool classes have been a great addition for Rose. Beth gets to start taking classes next year and she is looking forward to joining her big sister.

Rose has adjusted well to completing all three of the vocabulary words which encourages me that she is completely ready for the next guide from Heart of Dakota, Preparing Hearts for His Glory. She does tend to get a little sloppy with her handwriting at times. Her original sentences were excellently written with good context, but were not nearly as neat as I knew she could write. I decided to have her rewrite them. She wasn’t thrilled at first, but when I asked her if she thought she had used her best handwriting, she gave me a guilty smile and didn’t say anything more!

We have added an official typing program which Rose begs to use frequently! I’ll have a review of this program coming up soon. It’s one of the most fun I’ve used and is quite affordable. She has completed 2 lessons and is working on her write hand letters. I honestly wasn’t certain how well she would do but I have been pleased with her progress!

Another great week and looking forward to just a few more in our guides!

Week in Review: April 22-26

Grace-Filled Writer

Our week coming off of Spring Break was nice and easy. The girls were up late every night the week before…2 hours after bedtime late! Their Grammy and Grampy were visiting from FL and we also spent some time with their cousins. No wonder they were up late! Then the allergies hit. I really struggle with allergies here in the south every spring and have lost my voice for 2 weeks for the last 5 years and this was the week it started! So we had a couple of sick days when my voice was at its worst. I also pondered all the advice I was given when we first started homeschooling and wrote a fun post incorporating it all! Click the graphic and you can read the only complete list of homeschooling advice you’ll find!

Little Hands to Heaven: Off Week
I’ve been thinking about what to do next year with Grace next year since she’ll still be preschool. I plan to start teaching her to read because she is ready although I’m flexible depending on how she responds. I have decided to do Little Hands to Heaven through once more with a different Bible option and more letter and number practice in addition to the Rod and Staff ABC series. I think she’s really going to like it!

This week she just explored, colored, played games, built puzzles, and worked in preschool workbooks. My favorite part of the week was when she took her magnifying glass and examined a but outside on the back porch. She loves bugs as long as she is assured it won’t sting or bite. She looked at this little guy and said, “He looks sad Mommy!” I’m not sure what kind it was, but she had a good time inspecting it!

Moments like these make me so grateful she’s spending her preschool years with me and not in a classroom with a different teacher. I love seeing her explore, teaching her the basics, and encouraging her to try new things. She has friends her own age she plays with each week and she gets along with kids of all ages because of church. I know universal preschool is probably inevitably going to happen and almost many of my mommy friends send their youngers to preschool, but I feel blessed to have had all three of my girls for this age!

Little Hearts to Heaven: Part of Unit 27
Poor sweet Beth has inherited my allergies. She’s had a tough time getting a full night’s sleep and spends her days blowing her nose and coughing with me. So we started off with Unit 27, but then I just let her read and color for most of the rest of the week. This is not a big deal at all since she is almost finished with her first grade reading, half-way through 1st grade math, and half-way through All About Spelling level 1. Taking a few days off certainly won’t get us behind!

Beth loves coloring more than any other child I’ve seen! She begs to color and loves it when someone colors with her. Grace happily colored along with her all during the week! She did some math and spelling early in the week before she started feeling really crummy and has enjoyed learning about how to tell Time!

She spent lots of time reading and is in the middle of reading a chapter book her older sister picked out for her at a local thrift store for $0.10. I love it when the girls encourage one another’s love for reading like this! I also love that when she can’t think of anything else to do, she picks up her book to read.




Bigger Hearts for His Glory: Unit 29

I was neglectful of pictures this week! I think all the allergy medicines I’m using is messing with my thinking skills. We continued reading through The Wright Brothers and Their Sister. I have to keep Rose from reading ahead in this one! She has loved this part of our history this year. Rose loves history of any kind in reality. This week she asked permission to get some extra books off the shelf to read about George Washington. Um…yes! I also told her there was no need to ask permission to read anything we weren’t going to use in school. She told me she liked being able to learn even more about history than what our curriculum tells us. When your regular curriculum inspires more curiosity and learning you know you have an excellent curriculum!

She also spent time completing up a lapbook on composers we’ve been reviewing for the TOS Review Crew. I’ll be posting about this on Monday so stay tuned! Her favorite part has been reading about all the different composers. This is my first try at lapbooking and although it has been a good experience I have to say that I prefer our HOD curriculum. It has been a good addition to our regular studies though.

In addition to the regular schooling we did the girls enjoyed watching The Magic
School Bus. Grandpa and Grandma gave them this for Valentines Day this year. It has inspired lots of scientific conversations! This series does talk about millions of years, but that is the only reference to evolution I have found. Our family believes the Bible refers to a literal 6 days of creation and do not teach our children that the earth is millions of years old. However, this does not keep me from allowing them to watch mainstream science videos. When these references started popping up a few years ago in shows like Dinosaur Train I simply told Rose that the people who made the show didn’t believe God created the world. I also explained that the other information was good, but we just needed to remember that when they say millions of years that means they don’t believe God created in the way the Bible says He did. This has been a fine explanation and my girls are not confused or conflicted by it. 

I hope your week was lovely and you can enjoy the spring weather more than I can!

Week in Review: April 8-12

Grace-Filled Writer

Next week is spring break! My in-laws will be visiting with us next week and we’ll be enjoying the company of Grammy and Grampy! We’ll also get to see my niece play Amaryllis in The Music Man at the end of the week. I can’t wait to blog about that field trip!

Don’t forget to stop by and enter the giveaway I’m hosting this week! It ends Sunday (4/14) at midnight! This is a really fun one and my daughters have thoroughly enjoyed this particular review!
Little Hands to Heaven: Off Week
We’re half-way through Little Hands to Heaven and I’m so pleased with Grace’s progress. I decided to take a week off because of some plans for major house cleaning! We still did “lessons” because Grace won’t let me get away with much of a break. We just didn’t follow the plans in her guide.
This is a fun math activity I’ve had tucked away which I found a while back. Unfortunately I can’t find the link to where I found this! If I find it I’ll add it in later. Each flash card up to 10 has a stack of legos. Grace simply counted and stacked until what she had matched the card. This is done to scale, but since we only have duplos our towers were MUCH taller! 
We began learning about O even though we didn’t move forward in the book. I intend to go through the guide a second time next year since she loves it so much for preschool and I found a new book of worksheets for each letter at Scholastic’s dollar deals sale. If you haven’t checked out Scholastic Teacher Express I encourage you to do that. I have found a number of resources during their Dollar Days Sale (On right now!) which have enhanced our HOD studies and provided more learning fun! I plan to use the book I found next year.

Grace also enjoyed another of my own creations for a math game! She found the correct number of dots on the ladybug wings and matched them up to the correctly numbered ladybug. This was another activity I made several years ago and never got around to printing and using. I regret not doing so for Rose and Beth, but I’m glad I did get them done in time for Grace! She loves staying with us in the schoolroom, but so much of my time is needed to be focused on the older girls’ studies. I like providing new learning for her so she can stay with us, not be a distraction to the girls, and still be learning! 
She also insisted on working in her Rod and Staff books. They are also having their huge spring sale right now for three more days on all their curriculum. I need to get my order in!
Little Hearts for His Glory: Unit 26
Rose loved our unit this week! I didn’t get any shots, but she particularly liked the poem about the start of the American Revolution which included Patrick Henry and the Boston Tea Party. She also seems to enjoy handwriting now, which is a blessing because it wasn’t always so! We’ve moved into handwriting which practices phonics (Thanks to this book my mom found for free!). It is such good practice and each page has a coloring or drawing activity to get her excited to finish well.
She continues to thrive in spelling as well. I honestly can’t say enough about All About Spelling. This has been the best follow up for phonics instruction I have found because it causes my girls to think about phonics in a reverse way. Both girls’ reading skills have improved as a result and neither one complains when it’s spelling time. I usually hear the opposite, “Can we please do spelling now?” Now that indicates a good spelling program! 
Our Word-Wall letter for the week was Q which I don’t believe we finished so we’ll pick that up again after our break. Her words were quill, quail, quake, and queen. I love how many of these words she is finding on her own. Sometimes her eager older sister wants to jump in when Beth gets stuck, but I’ve convinced Rose she at least needs to give clues, not just the word!
Beth is over-the-moon excited to be working on time! She is flying through her 1st grade math curriculum and the concepts are sticking! Rod and Staff takes a more traditional approach to math, but it seems to be the right one for our girls. I’m so happy to have found a math which is a blessing to our family instead of a trial. It has been a lesson in showing me just how unique each family is and how different curricula will work differently for each family. 
Bigger Hearts for His Glory: Unit 28
We are getting so close to finishing up this guide! we only have 6 more weeks left in Bigger Hearts and it only keeps getting better. When your kid begs to read, “…just one more chapter, Please?” You know it’s good! We moved on to studying the Wright brothers and their sister this week which is interesting considering the new controversy surrounding them which has just come to surface. I haven’t decided if I’ll let her in on that or just stick with what we’re learning!
Where I once heard grumbling about vocabulary I now hear excitement about learning new words. Sometimes it just takes a while for a new skill to sink in. She now enjoys learning new words, illustrating them, and even writing sentences which are also getting more creative and wordy. Heart of Dakota is so gentle in its instruction and I love seeing how much she has matured over the last year. 
We also finished up our biography unit on Sacagawea with a book by Knowledge Quest. She loved this really great, interactive e-book. I’ve already written a review about it, so if you want to see more click on the picture. I was very impressed with the quality and she loved being able to quickly research more information! 
Here are samples of her post-reading projects: 

I intend to blog very soon about out language arts plan because it deviates a little from the Heart of Dakota guide. If nothing else it will come this summer!
Just for fun here is what our room looks like after a day of learning! (Notice the kitty still hanging around!)

I hope you had a wonderful week as well!

Week in Review: April 1-5

Grace-Filled Writer
Rose and I had a week off from our homeschool classes for spring break. I teach junior high literature and writing and Rose takes a science/humanities class. We both enjoy them, but also thoroughly enjoyed the week off! We had a more relaxed schedule even though we kept on with our regular at-home school schedule. Don’t worry, I’m not refusing my girls a break! My in-laws are coming up for a visit in another week and we chose to take our at-home break then. Many of my piano students are also out of town this week so it sill feels like break!
Thankfully the south decided to finally thaw a bit from the cold and dry out from the rain! The girls have enjoyed a lot of time outside. Unfortunately a fever/cold also made it’s round and we haven’t enjoyed as much time with our neighborhood friends as we would have liked! Now that they’re all better, it’s sleeting outside. What a crazy spring!
Grace-Filled Homeschooling is also now on Twitter and Tumbler! I was so intimidated by these two, but now enjoying the benefits of both! I don’t have many followers yet, so look forward to these new options for giveaway entries. 

Before I got on with our week-in-review…
There is still a chance to enter two giveaways from two fabulous companies! 
          
Click the images above to see my reviews and enter the giveaway!
Little Hands to Heaven: Unit 17
Grace was very insistent this Monday that she do her lessons first. After her week off I can understand! She loves lessons. Her sisters do as well, but Grace nearly cries when they are over each day! Our letter for the week was N and her finger-play rhyme for this was N-N-Naughty. She thought this was incredibly funny. We also studied about the kings of Israel who were often n-n-naughty! 
One of her favorite things to do now is handwriting. I have used the pages from The Learning Page with all three of my girls and I adore them. They have sets of traditional handwriting pages with just a few examples, but they also have full sheets of dotted letters for tracing for both print and cursive. It is free to sign up and there are lots of other freebies as well.  Although they do link to sites where you have to pay for resources, all of the handwriting sheets can be downloaded free.
Our printer decided to be finicky right when I was ready to print Grace’s N to glue on, so we went old-school with a sharpie and piece of blank paper! I could have just used the glue, but her favorite color is blue, so I thought this would be more fun. My girl could do this for hours. I’m not sure what it is she loves about it, but gluing things onto paper makes her day! 
We’re just about finished with the B Book in the About Three series by Rod and Staff. She has progressed so much as a result of these simple black-line workbooks. She loves coloring the pages after she is finished so I’m glad they are black and white! I highly recommend this series and you can read my full review of them by clicking on the picture. 

Grace enjoyed playing a new game this week. Back when Rose was about two, I made a bunch of file-folder type games for her for matching colors, shapes, etc. I didn’t know of all the resources to be found online at the time and I had several made and laminated. I also made a few games like this which I never ended up printing. I came across them a few weeks ago and I printed and laminated them. The point is to match the numbers on the fish with the correct number of bubbles in the fish bowl. It isn’t fancy, but she had a lot of fun with it!
Little Hearts for His Glory: Unit 25
Our cat can’t get enough of sitting with Beth during lessons. You’ll often see her little ears peaking out of Beth’s lap in our pictures! One reason is because she loves the girls, but it also helps that our schoolroom is the warmest spot in the house on cold mornings! This is partly because of the large window facing west, but in no small part due to the space-heater I keep at my cold-natured feet!

Beth’s word-wall letter was P. Her words included panda (her favorite animal), pig, pogo-stick, pumpkin, pen, pin, and Penny (the name). She has fun coming up with words and it has been a great starter for journal writing now. I really like the e-book journal I purchased at the dollar days sale for her which lets her draw pictures and fill in just a small portion of the entries. It has been an excellent tool for her and we’ll continue this on into 1st grade.

I’m hoping to do a write-up of our reading/language arts program soon because I’ve been asked a lot about it. I will go into more detail at a later date, but for now here is what we do in the order they are added:

Heart of Dakota’s Dictation

I start teaching my girls to read when they ask which has been 4 and 3 and a half so far! This is also the route Rose took via private school (k) and homeschool (1st). It left her with a very solid reading foundation which we’re building on continually with All About Spelling. It seems a bit eclectic for my style, but our choices came from what we owned and what I saw working. I plan to stick to this path with Grace.

Our study of George Washington was a lot of fun this week! We learned about the cherry tree story including that it may or may not be true as well as another story of his disobedience to his mother concerning a colt! I had never heard this one before and Beth really enjoyed it. One of the activities was pretending to be a colt and George Washington riding it. Grace filled in for GW since the purpose was to follow directions (right, left, etc.) Beth did a fabulous job and I even through in some north, south, east, west directions. The only trouble she had was being able to follow the directions through the giggling!

We are almost through with the the Inside Outside book from the ABC Rod and Staff series. We’ll be starting this series again with Grace next year and I will be a little sad to see them pass. My girls have all loved them and they have taught so very much. This last book focuses on wildlife in North America.

Bigger Hearts for His Glory: Unit 27
I have been informed this is my portrait! I’m glad she drew me happy and waving. She also asked me to take her picture with it, so I suppose she is very proud of how nice it looks. Nothing like a portrait of you to make the say just a little sweeter!

Arithmetic has become just a little sweeter for both girls thanks to this wonderful program we are reviewing for the TOS Review Crew! I’ll be posting on this in another couple of weeks, but I an tell you now that we use it daily and the girls beg to practice math facts now! Rose particularly likes that she is beginning to learn multiplication now. Her regular math curriculum starts that in 3rd grade and she’s been regularly asking to go ahead and learn multiplication. Now she can!

We’re on unit 8 of All About Spelling book 3. This is one of the best phonics follow-ups I’ve ever heard of or seen. Rose continues to easily recall all the spelling and phonics rules she has learned with ease. This rule we focused on this week was doubling letters to protect the short vowel and using y as a vowel at the end of words. Oh yeah…and my portrait is now saying, “I am a robot!” Hmmm….

For history we studied about the naturalist, John Muir, and touched lightly on the Spanish-American War. I appreciate that Rose is being introduced to the wars now lightly. She is young, but hears about them all the time. She also learned about some of the animals in North America that have gone extinct just in the last century. She drew a Florida Black Wolf as part of her notebooking page.

For literature Rose is reading a biography about Sacajawea from Knowledge Quest. It’s also a review we’re doing from the TOS Review Crew. I like that it is written from her perspective and Rose is thoroughly enjoying it. Since my background is teaching literature I make up my own literature units using a variety of pages and ideas. She just finished up her mystery unit and after the biography we’ll move on to historical fiction.

I’m excited to announce I’ll be hosting a giveaway from Safari, Ltd! If you’ve never seen their amazing animal and historical figures you’ll really need to check them out. It starts Monday, so don’t forget to stop by next week to enter!








Week in Review: March 25-29

Grace-Filled Writer

I remember being told when we first started homeschooling that one of the downsides would be that my kids wouldn’t be exposed to enough germs. I can’t remember who said that, but boy were they wrong! Another cold decided to visit our home although it only took down 3 of the gang. Thankfully it seems to be passing and it wasn’t very severe so we continued with school as usual for Rose and Beth.

Little Hands to Heaven: Week Off
Grace got a much lighter week which didn’t bother her for the days she told me, “I don’t feel good, Mommy.” By Thursday she was ready to be back at it, but was still a bit crabby, so we just did a few lighter things. The girls all love playing on my Kindle Fire and I don’t blame them!

She also enjoyed using her pattern blocks with some printables from Confessions of a Homeschooler. I’ve had these printed for a while, but I finally got around to laminating them so Grace could use them easily.

Grace also enjoyed using our newly acquired Nature Blocks (a set of building blocks from Lake Shore Learning). She was enthralled with these! You can click on the picture to see my full review of these really nice building toys.

Grace is feeling much better and will be back to our normal schedule next week!

Little Hearts for His Glory: Unit 24
Beth had a great start to the week, but ended up catching her baby sister’s cold! We continued with school as usual because she didn’t have as much discomfort as Grace, but she didn’t mind one bit.

In math Beth moved forward to subtraction! I once again didn’t really have to teach it to her. She just understood after having sat in on lessons with her older sister last year. I did do a few manipulative explanations, but I don’t know that there was really a need.
She also started word problems for the first time this week! She has made so much progress and I just love that we can set her own pace because of homeschooling.

For handwriting we continued with Draw Write Now. I can’t say enough good things about this curriculum! Click the picture to take a look at my review. It has gently moved Beth to thinking more about shaping her letters with appropriate size and spacing. I love it!

Our history lessons focused on the early settlement of America. Her poem introduced the concepts of North, South, East, and West. She kept asking which way was north wherever we went and then would tell me the other directions based on that. She also learned the location of the first 13 colonies. She is learning so much this year!

We took our All About Spelling curriculum and tried something new this week! Beth spelled the words, then stamped them. I found a printable online for this, but I’m not thrilled with it so I’ll probably create my own. She had a lot of fun with this and it was a nice, time-filling activity which kept her focused while I taught history to her older sister.

Bigger Hearts for His Glory: Unit 26

Our field trip last Saturday to the Bennett Place to see a reenactment of camp life for Civil War soldiers was a great kickoff for our history this week. An added bonus was that my dad was part of the reenactment! This was the first one he has participated in and it’s great that the girls were able to see him and even wear their old fashioned dresses made by their great-great-grandmother for me when I was a little girl. Click the picture to see more of our trip!

I wasn’t certain how this introduction to war would go over. Rose is very factually oriented, but can also be very sensitive to the evils of the world like slavery. She didn’t ask many questions, but did ask if a lot of peopled died. I’m glad she feels free to ask about these things. I love being able to be completely in tune with Rose’s education so I am able to address any questions or worries she may feel when studying various aspects of history. It would be easy for me to avoid some of the more difficult aspects of our history. I’m very grateful for Heart of Dakota once again which gently introduces even the harsh aspects of history in a way which is age appropriate, engaging, and leaving her wanting to learn more.

We learned more about fractions and Rose is very anxious to move on to multiplication! She asks nearly every day how soon she can move onto third grade math. I’ve told her she can move forward once she finishes and she can’t wait!

This is a diorama Rose made in her homeschool class of a cave. We don’t follow the science plan in our curriculum since she takes this outside class. I do intend to cover the science we’re skipping this summer because she loves science so much!

Even though we don’t do a lot of science during the school-year outside of her class, we did take time to review a neat unit study for the Review Crew! Click the picture to learn about this fun Astronomy Unit from A Journey Through Learning that my girl couldn’t get enough of!

To end on a really fun note, I have a question: How many of you have pets who enjoy joining in on the learning? Meet Zoe, our sweet kitty who loves Beth and can typically be found sitting right by her during lesson time!

Week in Review: March 18-22

Grace-Filled Writer

Spring has bloomed which usually means bad allergies for me, but I have a new medication this season and so far I’ve had a good start! We’ve even had the windows open some which has’t happened in a while. The girls have had fun playing outside. We are blessed to have neighbors on either side of us and across the street our kids’ age. They also all go to different schools and with our homeschooling the kids love opportunities to get together. Since our yard is the center they seem to often congregate within our fence. I love this. I love seeing what sometimes feels like half the neighborhood hanging out in our backyard!

We had a great week and lots of things to look forward to! Tomorrow we are going to see my dad in a Civil War reenactment which coincides perfectly well with our history lessons next week on the Civil War! No, my dad isn’t doing this just for our benefit and I didn’t plan it that way, but it is a certainly a lovely addition to our lessons. There will also be a really exciting giveaway coming Monday, so don’t forget to check back about that! Do you like this bird’s eye view of our schoolroom?

Little Hands to Heaven: Unit 16

Grace learned about Elijah and Elisha this week with our Bible readings. She wasn’t as excited about these stories and kept wanting to skip ahead to the New Testament! I understand how she feels sometimes, but I also know there is much to learn from the Old Testament. One of her activities was sorting out small pieces of food. She asked to eat the cheerios while she was sorting. This girl loves cheerios. 
Our letter of the week, M, received a lot of attention! I started letting her trace letters as part of her letter-of-the-week work. She has become quite proficient at letter writing for those she already knows. She does extremely well with tracing and enjoyed these pages. 
Something I’ve learned from having kids who are advanced in various abilities is that often their abilities will surpass their maturity. It means I have to have greater patience when she scribbles all over the M page rather than tracing nicely like she did the day before. Grace has amazing pencil control and dexterity for her age, but she still has to develop the maturity to exhibit it consistently. 
We also had a failed soap making activity to go along with our story about Naaman washing in the Jordan River for healing, so we did something a little different. To learn about our awesome replacement activity click on the picture! 
In her spare time, Grace has been  learning piano! We have been reviewing an excellent computer-based piano teaching program for the Review Crew. Click the picture to take a look. Even though she is only 3 1/2, Grace has been learning and is thrilled to be having piano lessons alongside her sisters!
Little Hearts for His Glory: Unit 23
Beth learned about the Pilgrims, their relationship with the Native Americans, and the religious persecution which pushed them here. She is really enjoying the readings from History Stories for Children. She did tell me that it was really sad that so many of the pilgrims died. We learned that there were only 4 women still alive for the first Thanksgiving feast! 
This week our word wall words started with N. My favorite word she chose was Neverland. I was surprised she thought of it! It was a little long for the space we had available, but she made it work. 
Here Beth is chatting with her Daddy on the phone while she works on her handwriting. The girls enjoy taking a break and and chatting with him when they have a chance. All of a sudden Beth’s handwriting has gone from being random sizes to looking more uniform! She has always been one to want to do things her own way and it has taken some convincing that she should form her letters without smiley faces inside of them except on special occasions! 
This week also brought three-digit addition. She jumped right into working on this while I was cleaning up from breakfast without any how-to instruction needed! I wish I had her mind for math. She definitely takes after her daddy. On the sixth problem she looked up at me and said giggling, “Oh! I almost missed that one!” 
This week Beth learned that c says /s/ if it comes before an e, i, or y. Before any other letter c says /k/. I am amazed over and over again that there are so many wonderful rules for spelling! I am incredibly thankful to be learning them myself since spelling was always difficult for me. All About Spelling is hands-down the easiest and most thorough curriculum I have seen for spelling.

Bigger Hearts for His Glory: Unit 25

Rose learned a great deal about the gold-rush, Kit Carson, and much more! She enjoys the history readings as well and in preparation for more independent studies next year I have begun having her read her assignments on her own. Her narrations have improved so much from where they were at the beginning of the year. Ever since Christmas she has caught on to how to narrate. This was new to both of us this year so it has been a joy to watch her skill improve so much.

Her vocabulary page has also improved! After I took the picture went back and edited her mistakes, but then I forgot to snap another one! I don’t believe in ignoring kids’ mistakes in writing. After teaching junior high students who came through programs which felt it would stifle their creativity I can say it only seems to cripple them. By the time I got these kids I had to teach such basics as capitalizing I consistently that there wasn’t room to help them learn to craft their writing. With this experience in my background I make certain my girls correct their mistakes in writing. They don’t seem to mind and frequently Rose even thanks me for helping her!

Cursive continues to go well, but I’m trying to stress to her the need to be careful when she copies her words. She tends to forget letters in what I think it a rush to get finished. I am very pleased with how pretty her handwriting has become!

She particularly enjoyed one of her grammar lessons this week. It focused on making sure all the sentences in a paragraph pertain to the topic of the paragraph. The examples in the grammar book had random thoughts placed in the paragraphs and she got quite a giggle out of them!

We also started studying homophones for practice this week. We have talked about them before in the context of her writing, but haven’t formally practiced them. She enjoyed this activity a lot!

She typed up her writing assignment for the week about being healthy. She has moved on to two-paragraph expository writing. She sometimes still has trouble thinking through what to write, but the outline sheets (part of the curriculum) help her so much!

Finally she worked on memorizing more state locations and their abbreviations. She learned the 13 colonies plus a couple more the last time. This week she learned the rest of the states which were around when the Civil War began. If she couldn’t find the state I’d give her N-S-E-W directions. She did a great job!


We had another wonderful week! How was yours?