Second Grade Curriculum Overview

We started school last Wednesday. So far, things are going along fine. At this point, my plans are working out. Obviously, freedom to change mid-stream is one of the benefits of homeschooling. Below is a pretty thorough rendering of my curriculum. I post this for those who might find it useful and for those who are interested in seeing what J is "into" this year.

Plan for Second Grade:

Bible:

• We are reading through the Bible, beginning in Genesis. (This lines up with our history as we're going through the ancient civilizations. It's very useful to helping J understand what the true God was doing while others were worshiping false gods.)
• We're also going through the "Discovering Jesus" series a second time. I'm finding that it helps J to have the characters reappear. He remembers the stories from last year and seems to be picking up on the points of the stories, because of their familiarity, this year. After we finish those, I'll find another devotional book.
• I found an "alphabetical" set of memory verses for kids HERE. We're doing one per week.
• I found a stick figure timeline to accompany our Bible reading HERE. J is enjoying it.
• Daily we are praying for the children at church. I've divided them up by the number of school days, so we pray for the "Tuesday" kids, etc. Last year we prayed for the neighbors on our street each day. We saw some amazing things because of that and it was great to point out to J how our prayers were answered.

Spelling:

• J is an amazing speller. BUT, there are still lots of words and the accompanying rules that he doesn't know. I am currently using some spelling workbooks that work through the rules. I picked these up at curriculum sales. One particular book that we're both enjoying is Spelling Made Easy.

Grammar:

• For grammar we're using English Made Easy, Easy Grammar, Daily Grams, and a really fun book called Grammar Cop. J is a big fan of grammar. He gets it from his daddy.

Literature:

• For this year I wanted to bring in some of the classics, especially the ones for boys. Many of these will be new to me. I talked with L and he made some suggestions. Then I showed them to J via Amazon and asked him to decide the order. We're reading one book a month and here and there I will bring in unit studies, lapbooks, etc. to supplement the story.
• The book list is: Five Little Peppers and How They Grew, Peter Pan, 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea, The Indian in the Cupboard, Swiss Family Robinson, Tom Sawyer, Charlotte's Web, Captains Courageous, Black Beauty, something by James Herriot, King Arthur, and Robin Hood.

Math:

• We're continuing with Verbal Math Lessons, and I'm supplementing with worksheets. He's also memorizing his multiplication tables.

Writing:

• J does a lot of writing on his own. For his assigned writing, we'll be sending letters to friends and relatives (check your mail--one might be arriving soon!) as well as copywork to help him become stronger with his cursive writing.

Science:

• Beginning now until the book is complete, we are doing the experiments in a book called My Book of Science Experiments. A neighbor had this book at her yard sale and I loved the full-color appeal.
• The rest of the year is laid out as follows: (Sept.) Constellations, (Oct.) Sun and Moon, (Nov.) Planets, (Dec.), Nutrition, (Jan.) Herbs, (Feb.) Homeopathy, (Mar. - June) Oceanography
• I will pull books, worksheets, online info, library info, etc. to cover the year's science plans.

History: This summer I read the book, The Well-Trained Mind. I discovered that the author's philosophy pretty much lined up with ours. The only difference was that we had not planned to go chronologically through history. After discussing it, we felt that it was probably a good idea. I started our history study this summer and have discovered that it really IS a good idea to go through history in order. Well, there ya go.

• Story of the World, Part 1 provides the order for us.
• I have lots and lots of books and workbooks that provide plenty of supporting activities. As you can tell from the Ishtar Gates post, this is right up J's alley.
• Since, according to the Well-Trained Mind, we were supposed to start with ancient history in first grade, I decided to try and catch up. We began the ancients in July and I plan to continue through January. In February we will start the middle ages. I still need to order the Story of the World, Part 2, for that.

Latin: L and I have always planned to include Latin in homeschooling. It provides a great foundation for our own and other languages. It's also the language of science and law. Since J's abilities in language are what they are, we knew he would be able to pick this up with no problem. I haven't quite decided my plan of action, so I will write about that in a separate post.

Art: We will finish the remaining artists in MaryAnn Kohl's book, Discovering Great Artists that we began in first grade. I'm also going to incorporate what I learn in reading Drawing on the Right Side of the Brain. For fun, we'll do some graph drawing from a series of books called the I Can Draw series, by Walter Foster.

Music: We'll continue with drum lessons. I'm also going to begin teaching formal piano lessons.

This is really just a skeleton. I will fill it in as the year progresses. It's more challenging than last year, but the structure is good for J. My favorite part of this plan, though, is how the history and Bible converge so well. It has brought up some great discussions.

J is handing me a worksheet he's finished. I guess I'd better go and teach instead of just writing about it!