King's Academy Year in Review

Preamble

A new school year is about to begin. I’m seeing pictures of children looking all grown up in their new uniforms, or out of uniforms going to University! I’m just here waiting on my new curriculum to arrive. We’re homeschooling! I’m so excited!

If you are thinking of homeschooling, this post might be helpful . If you are not homeschooling, it will be a bore. Be warned.

Technically, this is Judah’s first year. He really should have registered last year (He turned 5 in June, which is still within the 2016-2017 school year), but I went, bodily, to the ministry when he was 3 and they told me I didn’t need to. When I went this year to register, they said I should have registered last year. Anyhow…

(The actual registration process was pretty straightforward and not at all unpleasant. )

The wonderful thing about homeschool, though, is that you work at your child’s pace. So I did do more ‘formal’ instruction with Judah last year. It probably took us about 20 minutes to do a sit down lesson, so nothing near to whatever it is they are doing all day at school. Sometimes we only did one ‘subject’ in one day, sometimes none and sometimes loads. Just whatever was keeping his attention.

What we did aka Pre-K curriculum
We did three broad subject areas: English, Maths, and Science.  We also did devotions every school day (I’ve written about their Spiritual training here), and the rest was just learning through play and real life experiences like cooking or going to the supermarket or grandad’s farm, etc.
I used November to teach him the National Anthem of Barbados. It was our 50th year of Independence so that was special. And I was learning it for the first time too, right in time for me to sing it by memory for my citizenship induction ceremony 😄

Science was basically unschooling. We discussed ‘current affairs’, like animals or the weather, then looked up books and Youtube videos to go along with it. We also tried a little bit of Mystery Science with the free trial. I really liked the few lessons we tried. They kept Judah’s interest and he really did learn.

Learning about shadow movement from Mystery Science

For Maths, we used Singapore Math Essential Math.
We only got through Kindergarten Book A working at his pace, even though both book A and B are meant to be used in one year. Maths was probably my favourite subject at school, so I’m also enjoying teaching it. The program is simple to follow and I didn’t need to buy any extra manipulatives. Things I had around the house were sufficient.

For English, we used a free curriculum I found online called ‘Reading the Alphabet’. I really like it, and was so impressed that at the end of the year, Judah was actually reading short words. It was amazing to watch the learning process live and direct. I would highly recommend this curriculum.
With reading the alphabet, it can get pretty repetitive, but I found that at the point where I was getting bored, she changed up stuff here and there. I didn’t follow the entire thing to a T, I added things here and there and left out stuff where I needed. I suppose every homeschooling mother does that, but I’m still learning to enjoy that freedom.
It does require a bit of printing, so we used page protectors and white board markers for many of the activities so that I can re-use them for my second son.

Reading the Alphabet's Letter Q week.

We did swimming lessons and good news club each week and an Easter Camp for extra - curriculum. We also met with another homeschooling family from time to time.  

Teaching with Ezra
Ezra was 2yrs old through the last school year, and I can hardly remember what I did with him. He wasn’t much of a distraction. It could be because of his laid back personality, and it could also be because the ‘sit down’ times were so short. There isn’t a huge age gap between the boys, so Ezra could easily listen in on a lesson or look at the pictures in a book I was reading.  Every now and then he would ask for ‘school work like Judah’, so I’d give him a white board marker to scribble with, but that only ever lasted a few minutes. He’s older now, so I have more of a plan for him for this year.

How I felt

I can truly say that I enjoyed the year. I loved spending time with Judah and figuring out his strengths and finding ways to work through his struggles. I can already see some of me coming out (he hates making mistakes) so it also has me doing a lot of self-evaluation and trying to see where I can do things differently for him.
The hardest part of the year was finding the balance between focusing on his and Ezra’s needs while still trying to keep up with the housework. I failed miserably, and seeing my failure day after day was frustrating and depressing. I have come to accept, now, that it is simply something I need to learn. I would get it done one day, but not the next, and I never really gave myself time to settle in. So this year, I am starting again. I’ve got a schedule (I work well with structure) and I’m sticking to meal plans and we’ll see how it goes.
I’ve also been building up my courage by watching other homeschooling mom’s Youtube channels. It is great encouragement and they have such great ideas. So I don’t need to re-invent the wheel.

All done

So I’m waiting on my stuff to start next week. Look out for another post so I’ll let you know the registration process here in Barbados and our curriculum choices for 2017-2018 for my 3yr old and my 5yr old.
Bird