Summer Learning ~ Our (My) Plans

One of the reasons I love homeschooling is because of the lifestyle you can create. I don't want to replicate school in any way - I just want to enjoy discovering and learning things together as a family. Because of this, I don't want to take a break from "school" just because it's summer. Yes - we are taking a break from our regular curriculum, but I want the learning to continue. Plus, my girls and I do much better if we stick to some sort of routine.

So here's my plan for the next few months....

Bible ~ I guess this could go under reading, but because of it's importance, I'll create a separate category. The girls are reading the book of John out loud to me. I read out loud to them quite often, but haven't been hearing them read out loud so this is good for all of us.

Music ~ We'll continue with our daily practice. The girls have practiced more than 200 days in a row and are trying to get to one year of practicing every single day. If they do, I've promised them a trophy. In addition to our daily practicing, we are attending our first ever Suzuki Institute. (I've been to several institutes and have experienced it as a teacher trainee, an administrative assistant and a teacher. This will be my first experience as a parent!)

Geography ~ We are going to learn about the 50 states in our great country. We are reading whatever books we can find about each state and will be trying to memorize the state capitals and abbreviations. The girls have lived in 4 different states and have grandparents in 2 other states, so we've got a good starting point!

History ~ We'll likely start Volume 3 of Story of the World. My oldest daughter requests this every single day! I've had the audio cds for volume 2 on hold at the library for a couple months now - hopefully we'll make it to the top of the list and the girls can listen to all of volume 2 again to review what we did this past year.


Science ~ Besides hanging out in our backyard and creating habitats for frogs and salamanders, we plan to work our way through a couple experiment books we recently found. I've told the girls we can do as many experiments as they want. I'm not very good about making time for this during the regular school year, so I want to feed their curiosity this summer if I can.

Reading ~ We've signed up for the summer reading program at our library (which doesn't really make us read more than we normally do). We'll continue to make weekly trips to the library (at least) and will work our way through our summer read aloud list.


Math ~ I'm hoping we continue to read through Life of Fred this summer. I'll also try to find fun ways to review what the girls have learned. Both need more practice when it comes to all things math. In Life of Fred, Fred often offers a "row of practice" and I plan to use this idea each day. I'll try to make it fun and different - chalk on the driveway, paper on the table, paper down the hallway, paper lined windowsills, slip the row of practice into the book they are reading, etc.


If you have school aged kids, do you have plans to keep the learning going all summer?