Homeschool Year in Review: 2018/2019
The Italian Mama
June 16, 2019
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Our Homeschool Year in Review:
2018 - 2019
Remember how I was all into classical education and nothing would be a better fit for my family? Yeah? Well, I still love classical education. I love the concept of the Trivium and Quadrivium, but I would definitely add in the concept of primary school to the set.
We hit the ground running -- strong start
I spent a lot of last summer talking with the director at our local Highland Latin School. Basically a really organized co-op (actually...this is just what I thought it would be). I took the leap and enrolled the two littles; first grade and pre-kindergarten. I will be honest, pre-k was only my radar because I was planning to teach and needed both littles in one place. Weekly lesson plans made life easy, but the weekly classes kept us right on track. The kids made some friends...I did have my reservations because I really prefer to keep my littles surrounded by Catholics and we were one of TWO Catholic families in the school. Of course...I knew this was going to be an issue when I opted to pass on the Catholic co-op. I just knew right away that Memoria Press was it. It was everything.
The teens went another route, of course. Bear used Moving Beyond the Page again and hit the ground running (until the wall that is Abigail Adams), while Boo jumped full force into Kolbe for her second year and it was a smash hit.
Until it all broke down
HLS was...rough...okay, we will go with that, from the get-go. From week one we struggled, not with the curriculum or lessons, but with the actual co-op portion. I like organization, and our family tends to avoid co-ops; people tend to flake, or maybe not do any of the work at home, or the kids are totally out of control. These were all the case with this co-op, so I knew it was going to make me bananas all year long, but the kids loved it, so we stuck it out...until...the incident.
There were some very serious issues with safety, and I was forced to pull the kids right after New Year. I was upset and horrified. Our year was totally shot, and the director was totally unapologetic about all the issues (including one life-threatening one) until money was being lost. Weeks went by with lost schooling and sad kids. We did get back on track again, but it just wasn't the same.
The older kids started to dawdle while I was hyper-focusing on the littles and trying to recreate the classroom environment in the house. Mistake. Huge mistake. I momentarily forgot why we homeschool. Time to shift gears...we Charlotte Mason-ed it for the remainder.
What Worked
1st Grade: Memoria Press was not a total wash, but there is a lot of workbook writing going on. Recitation was a total HIT. Once I got my hands on a decent recitation schedule so we weren't doing every single question every single day, it was actually something we looked forward to. Enrichment was an excellent beginning. We expanded on it by adding a project to the social studies aspect each week, which allowed for us to have a bit more fun. Cursive went well, and when Copywork shifted into cursive full-time, it went really well. It seems that cursive is a ton of fun for my growing girl. I did have my doubts because I tried really hard to use another program a few years ago and it was a total disaster.
Geography was alright, we used the Kolbe geography plans for this year. In all, while I really did like the program, I fully recommend using it as a summer program due to the lower level of work involved. Baltimore Catechism was a smash! It follows along with the idea of recitation...we recited each individual question and answer each day following recitation. Because of how much Nani loves her recitation, this worked splendidly for our home.
8th Grade: My sweet Bear used a combination of Moving Beyond the Page and Kolbe. Both did fairly well. Language Arts, History, and Science all went well this year, so the entire lot of MBtP went relatively well (there were a few suck-ish books, but that is everywhere). The courses used for Kolbe were Latin and Religion.
ASL went very well this year and is opening up to lead Bear into taking some college level courses for her next level of American Sign Language.
10th Grade: Boo opted to do another year of Kolbe this year. As a whole, the entire year went really smoothly. We did add in Traditional Logic II by Memoria Press, and it went very very well. Boo really enjoys that particular course and find it just the right amount of challenging. Aleks, as always, was a success and Boo is yet again requesting it for next year. If it ain't broke, don't fix it.
What didn't work so well
Pre-Kindergarten: All of it. I don't even know where to start on this, well, recitation did go okay-ish. Overall, the program was, in my opinion, a total waste of money for my family. Everything in the pre-k package can be taught totally free of charge...the curriculum felt like it was a little over-the-top for this particular level.
1st Grade: Well...I will go from least of my issues to the biggest issue. Reading gave us some push back this year. Not because of the level of difficulty, but rather the fact that it takes three weeks to get through such a small book. It was totally exhausting for Nani, she did get really bored really fast. The books themselves were actually really good reads, and Nani did love reading them. Faith & Life...this was not a win for us. Neither myself nor Nani were thrilled with this particular set. We found it dry and well beyond dull. The absolute failure of the year was Rod & Staff math. I did give Memoria Press a pass on use R&S because they are not "technically" a Catholic company, but rather a non-denominational protestant company. Not a huge deal, but I did ignore my gut instinct in using it in our home. Mistake.
Rod & Staff is a blatantly anti-Catholic curriculum. Because of this, and so sorry to Memoria Press, I do NOT recommend this curriculum. Overall, I loved the concept of drilling and mastery, but it was a total disaster for Nani. She enjoyed the pages, but the drill and kill did eventually get to her. She stalled out and we ended up switching back to Math-U-See.
8th Grade: The only class Bear really blah-ed out on was math. She just wasn't feeling Mobymax this year. I still recommend them, especially given the low cost, free if you want. My girl just didn't jive with it this go-round.
