Am I doing enough?

I am having trouble with the whole Language Arts part of homeschooling.  The question is what exactly is Language Arts?

http://donnayoung.org/forms/help/language-arts.htm

We do handwriting, phonics, learning to read, reading comprehension… However we are lacking in grammar, vocabulary, spelling and punctuation the right way.

So I am thinking maybe I should not stress so much, and just try to add it in over the next few months.

We are homeschooling so I don’t want a lot of stress going on.

What are your thoughts?

Week 2–Travis and Tanner

Travis and Tanner

Reading

To teach reading I had a lot of debating and talking to many other homeschoolers about what they use. I decided I need help so I went with Hooked on Phonics.  My choice came down to the fact that my friend Luna told me about a coupon that got me 40% off! Plus free shipping. I have not regretted that choice. We are on lesson 14 today with some stuttered starts with Travis initially just being very stressed about starting something new. But with no pressure and taking a few days off here and there. We are doing great. He likes to now do a lesson a day. I actually have to stop and have him review what we have gone over. Specially the “helper” words.

Tanner also loves Hooked on Phonics..so definitely a win win for all of us.

Writing

I also got Hand Writing Without Tears for Travis too. His is first grade level and he actually said “Mom I love this workbook”.  I have noticed so far with Travis. He is very capable I just have to keep him interested and learning new stuff but not so much so at once that he gets overwhelmed. ONce again I got this from Sonlight.

Math

Travis finished is Kindergarten math book last week. So I have been printing out coins stuff and dot to dots from various sites on the web and Enchanted Learning. Well worth my $20 dollars for the year so far. Also he has been working a little bit with math mammoth 1st grade. Once again with Travis I have to keep it interesting and fresh!

Everything Else

Science is whatever Terry is doing an experiment with, going out into nature, bugs and dinosaurs. We are good with that for now.

Eventually I am hoping to get Core K from Sonlight. I love reading as do the kids.

We also do other stuff but that will come in other posts. Like Spanish, Yoga..etc..

Week 2—TERRY

Terry-

History/Geography/Reading

We are working on Sonlight Core 3 (secular), he really loves this core so far. He enjoys reading and he enjoys me reading to him. I am even learning some history that I had no clue about. This core so far makes learning actually fun!

Math

Math is not so bad either for Terry. When I pulled him out of 5th grade last public school year he came home barely able to do division because he did not fully have his multiplication down. Now my son made straight A’s. So what does that tell you? Well here in Texas they teach testing.. moving on to what I am doing for math for my son.

I have started him in 3rd grade math in this program Math Mammoth. I like this math already. She starts algebra concepts with addition and subtraction. She also makes sure they fully understand how they got the answer to the question. This is a thinking math and my son loves it. He is a thinker.

Writing

I actually bought a writing book so I would not be so mad at his poor writing skills. In school neatness does not count so I have to reteach him. Yes neatness does count. You should be writing neat your 8′s should not look like q’s and no we are not in public school anymore so I do care how you write.  This is what I went with  Hand Writing Without Tears. I ended up getting mine from Sonlight just because it was easier. I might peruse the website for when income tax comes and really get what I may need more of. Luckily this book is working out and he is starting to be neater on his other work.

Science

He likes to look up random animals, evolution and science experiments on the internet so for now I am leaving science to that.

Everything Else

Right now we are relaxed about schooling. If they need to do more like get back started on foreign language I am going to introduce that back on  Friday and set  a schedule for when he should be doing his Japanese. We are using Rosetta Stone for that. Also will slowly be incorporating punctuation, and grammar soon. Lot’s to do.. Fun to be had!