4th Grade Curriculum Choices

4th grade.  It seems like it’s starting to get real now. I still remember limping through our first year thinking “surely I can’t screw up 1st grade” and, honestly, you can’t. Suddenly I’m a little more concerned and wanting to make sure I’m giving her a good foundation before we move towards middle school. At the moment, we have zero plans to return to public school but I feel a certain amount of pressure regardless.

With that being said, I really am super excited about our curriculum choices for this year.

SCIENCE – I adore Apologia more than I have words to express. We both LOVED the Swimming Creatures study from last year and I’m looking forward to the Astronomy study this year. Even I learned a TON of cool information.

MATH – We are sticking with Christian Light Education. You may remember that we backed up last year and did the 200 series (2nd grade) but we quickly worked our way through and were in the 300 series (3rd grade) by the end of the year. I’m hoping to use this year to catch all the way up. I’m undecided on whether I will continue to the 400 series or make a curriculum switch at that point. I really do love CLE but for a kiddo who is not a huge math fan, she finds it ultra repetitive and I have to agree. However, she has made major progress in math so it definitely works!

HISTORY – I’m looking forward to our first year of BiblioPlan. It overlays Biblical history with traditional history, which I think will be fascinating! I’ve never learned them simultaneously before. It also incorporates the geography and mapping as well.

LANGUAGE ARTS – Apologia has released a brand new comprehensive curriculum that covers language arts, grammar, spelling, and writing called Writers in Residence. I’ve been on the hunt for a good LA program since the beginning of our homeschooling journey and I’m hoping we’ve found it this year! The workbook was enormous and that was a little scary but I broke it apart and turned it into 4 smaller workbooks, which I think is going to work out great!

READING – Thankfully I have a kiddo who likes to read, so I will continue our same approach. She can read whatever she likes, but I’m definitely going to encourage some titles from this awesome list of top 100 children’s novels.

BIBLE – We will continue our Action Bible Devotional this year along with some of Kim Sorgius’ devotional workbooks. (Note: Visit her blog. She has a ton of amazing freebies!) Of course, there will be a good amount of Bible covered in Biplioplan as well.

HANDWRITING – I loved Pictures in Cursive last year and we will continue that again with Books B &C. The art work is beautiful and such an awesome bonus!

ART – I think we are dropping piano lessons this year. Skylar has lost interest (as did I when I was her age). Instead, I’m planning to use Art for Kids Hub. It’s quick and easy art lessons online but the videos are very nicely done. It’s FREE and I think she will really enjoy it since she likes arts & crafts so much.

CO-OP – Now that she’s a little older we have also decided to do co-op for the first time. I have some friends who rave about Legacy Family Academy so we are going to give it a try. For the first semester, Skylar is signed up for Archery, Sewing, and Astronomy (to supplement our Apologia curriculum). I’m excited for her to have an opportunity to do some extra-curricular things and for us to network with other homeschool families.

OLYMPICS – OMG! I LOVE the Olympics and this is how we are kicking off our school year. In fact, our first day of school will be August 5th (date of the Opening Ceremony) and we plan to spend 2 weeks watching and learning about the Summer Olympics. There are so many neat ways to incorporate it into education. Geography, reading, history, graphs, life lessons, medal count, athlete study, arts, physical activity, and more! Check out my Olympics board on Pinterest for ideas.

Of course our year couldn’t even start to begin without my trusty Blue Sky Planner. They are my absolute fave and I was so tickled to find this pattern in my favorite color this year. Between that and our Farm School Umbrella registration we are ready to go!

Happy homeschooling everyone!

 What grade are your kiddos in this year? What curriculum are you using?