First Grade Curriculum

I started the research towards the end of spring for the new year's curriculum, bought most of it online, and then stuck it on the shelf for the summer. At the beginning of August, I started to get nervous I hadn't even dusted the books, so off they came. For the most part, several of the subjects were easy since it's the same curriculum- just needed to figure out the timeline.

Math we are continuing Horizons 1 and will most likely begin Horizons 2

Reading continuing with the Ordinary Parent's Guide to Reading, which we have loved! Also, building in Silent Reading time and Mac reading level 1 books out loud as she did this summer

Handwriting finishing the Draw Write Now book 1 and will soon get into book 2

Art continuing Atelier 1 that we didn't finish during the summer. Mac has art this fall at co-op so will build Atelier in to non co-op weeks.

Language Arts we are trying Language Smarts level B

Spelling was tough to look for. Most everyone I know uses All About Spelling, but I really didn't think it would work for us. I spent hours looking online, using reviews and talking to friends and finally chose A Reason for Spelling. I like the basic spelling tests and other activities involved than just copying the words like I did when I was a kid. We'll see how it works.

Geography- continuing with the next step by Evan Moor with Daily Geography Practice. This might end up being busy work with our history curriculum and may fall off our subjects but I didn't want her to forget the basics she learned last year- reading a map, continents, landforms, etc.

Science we started as a daddy daughter activity toward the end of the year and that was going well so we will continue the Clifford Science Kits.

Writing is an area I was always weak in, so I wanted to start a good writing program. Last year, we did basic journaling and journaled our trip to Hawaii. I chose Write Shop but will wait a few weeks to start this.

Finally History which I am so excited to start! We are doing Story of the World and I will definitely be blogging about it!

First Grade Idea for Organizing Subjects

I'm about doubling the subjects from kindergarten so I came up with a new system that I'm excited to implement. I bought five folders and at the beginning of the week, will fill it with the work for each day.

Spelling, Math, Language Arts and most of Handwriting have pull out sheets so I'm able to put them in the folders for the days we do those subjects. For Art, History, Science, Writing, Geography I found images of the subjects online and put the laminated heading into the folder so she knows what we will be doing that day.