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Tina P.
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To all:
What's nice about CHC's lesson plans is that they incorporate hands-on history, religion (this is a biggie), sometimes science, all of this that I would not have thought of myself because of time and creativity restraints.  Also, these ideas are home-grown. You don't have to go out and buy tons of materials to complete the projects. They can easily be completed with what you have at home.
Like you said, Elizabeth, if you want to just use the lesson plans as springboards, they're worth it. I have lesson plans from first grade on up. The second grade lesson plans have absolutely *wonderful* preparation for First Holy Communion.
Tina (again)
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Karen T
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Tina P. wrote:
To Karen T: The Middle School Lesson Plans include 6th and 8th grade, both of which study World History, not American. In 5th and 7th it's American. But who says you can't swap?
God bless, Tina |
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Thanks! I really would like to see them but no one around here has them. I might end up getting them later on in the year. I'm afraid as a relative newcomer to homeschooling (2nd year) I'm easily tempted by yet another website, yet another book, yet another curriculum. And then I end up picking and piecing through it all anyway, putting my own things together! Right now I've pretty much used up my fall budget, though, so I'll have to wait a bit.
Karen T
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MacBeth
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Thought you might all be interested in CHC Chat, a Yahoo group for discussing the lesson plans.
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MacBeth in NY
Don's wife since '88; "Mom" to the Fab 4
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Karen T
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I wrote last week that I'd gotten CHC's kindergarten lesson plans but hadn't even opened them yet b/c I wanted time to really read through them. A few days ago I did just that, and wow! I love it. I'm wondering, though, what others think of their phonics program specifically compared to Phonics Pathways? B/c that's what i have right now and I'd heard lots of good things about it; I can plug it into the CHC plans and substitute, but if y'all think theirs is really better, I'll make the switch. It'd sure be easier to have it all part of the same program. But I'm looking at all the other stuff I'll need to buy (letter practice, the readers, etc.) and it's adding up. I do have Who Am I already, including the teacher's manual.
Karen T
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Elizabeth
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I have now made three CHC orders  . I have the middle school plans and the third grade plans for my middlers and third grader. I have the kindergarten plans (can't remember why I ordered them--but I've decided that Nicholas is definitely ready for them). I've got the second grade plans because I'd committed to doing a tour of continents this year, so I ordered those first even though I don't have a second grader. I think I've gotten sucked in!
I like the plans, for the most part. I was telling Irene today that they work as a nice skeleton, but definitely need the living books touch to be brought to them. And this is suggested in the plans--though I find the actual book suggestions to be lacking. For me, that's probably good because I have no end to ideas about books to read.
I don't really like the middle school science and All Ye Lands has flopped with my kids (I like it well enough). Spending just two weeks on ancient Greece or Rome seems like an impossiblity to me. Not yet sure how I going to adapt. Anybody have the plans and some experience CMing them?
The tour the continent plans are pretty sparse, I think. But they are good reminder of how little is necessary. Or is that really true? Maybe I overdo it all--or maybe they've just given you enough to get you started on the trail and they assume you will fill in as it suits you...we won't do a lapbook this mo nth because I'm just too overwhelmed right now, but I can see using those plans and FIAR books and even some Sonlight books for great lapbooks in the coming months.
I like Lingua Mater. I've never used a grammar book before and if you have to have a book this is one to have. Not sure still whether we really have to have a book. My kids like the Nancy Nicholson books. I think they're a bit sticky but they're not my books  .
The religion plans are nice; it's nice to have things combined and laid out so well. Still partial to my atrium but we can easily do both. And the infusion of religion was a big reason I decided to do this this year.
The other big reason is that we have a 1 year old spending her days with us this year while her mom is at school. I'm challenged by a baby I can't nurse. Her presence and the fact that I now have six children of school age and that my oldest is needier this year than he has been in awhile (just a lot of mom/guidance counselor/teacher things to do this year), has made me appreciate the reassurance of someone else's checklist.
We're only two weeks into it, but all in all, I think it's been money well spent.
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Elizabeth Foss is no longer a member of this forum. Discussions now reflect the current management & are not necessarily expressions of her book, *Real Learning*, her current work, or her philosophy. (posted by E. Foss, Jan 2011)
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Courtney
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I just recently ordered from them as well. I ordered the kinder. plans and the second grade plans. I also ordered a couple of the religion books to go along with the religion plans.
I like how the religion is laid out but I couldn't stick tightly to the overall plans, either. I do think it will provide a nice framework. I am somewhere btwn wanting to unschool and following a regular scheduled day. I continue to re-evaluate what I think we should/could be doing each day!
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Bridget
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We are on week 3 of the lesson plans. I'm using the middle for 7th and 5th, and the 4th and 1st grade plans. Everyone likes them so far and they are simple enough to keep us on track and add whatever literature we wish. My children like the hands on projects and can do much of them on their own.
I'm very happy with it all so far except the 5th grade science, 'Universe in my Hands'. I just haven't figured out how to use it well and it hasn't sparked mine or my 5th grader's interest yet.
My very reluctant writer in 7th grade is doing well with Lingua Mater. My 4th grader really likes her science, 'My Temple of the Holy Spirit' and her geography study of the states.
I would love to see someone write up a book list to go with each grade of CHC's lesson plans. Cay....
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Bridget, happily married to Kevin, mom to 8 on earth and a small army in heaven
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Tina P.
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Elizabeth wrote:
| I don't really like the middle school science and All Ye Lands has flopped with my kids (I like it well enough). Spending just two weeks on ancient Greece or Rome seems like an impossiblity to me. Not yet sure how I going to adapt. Anybody have the plans and some experience CMing them? |
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I use All Ye Lands as a read-aloud starting point. My kids, I've learned, do *not* get anything out of reading it themselves. I ham it up. I also beef up that reading with Hillyer and Huey, and an Usborne book that really fleshes out prehistory (some of which, sadly, is inaccurate; I've read bits of A Father Who Keeps His Promises by Scott Hahn to the kids to clear up the inaccuracies). Once I delve into recorded history, I'll be able to use a whole lot of Bethlehem books and some saint stories to round out the history readings. And no, I don't think *any* particular period in history is capable of being studied in two weeks, particularly with the second week being reserved for projects! 
I don't know how to quote the other sections of your post that I wanted to address. I always know when I'm delving too deep when my kids' eyes glaze over and they stare longingly outside.  If your kids are still showing interest, by all means keep them happy!  My 2 yos (at the time, now he's 11) showed an interest in dinosaurs. SUCH an interest that I had to actually limit the amount of dinosaur books he could borrow from the library at any given time. His knowledge of dinosaurs exceeds mine and *I* read the stories to him!  The second grade Tour The Continents was perfect for my second grader. He especially loved working on the projects.
What does it mean when you say you think the Nancy Nicholson books are 'sticky'? And what is an 'atrium' as regards religion? I like CHC religion because it gives me an opportunity to do something with the kids other than have them read or read to them.
Science, I completely agree, is weak. We all sort of suffered through The Universe in My Hands and are going to do the scientific sections of Pilgrims of the Holy Family with supplemental stuff (not sure what yet...sometimes CHC gives a little too much freedom!)
I'm so glad that you like CHC, Elizabeth. It helps to make me feel like I'm doing the right thing. I get the glahs (I don't know exactly how to explain this glah thing. It's an uncomfortable sticky, lumpy feeling in my throat) when I read children's books or curriculums that I cannot fathom using. I had the glahs while reading The Universe In My Hands to my kids.  Toward the end it became better. Besides that, I have pretty definite ideas about how to delve into history and make it alive for the kids with reading and projects.
God bless,
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Tina, wife to one and mom to 9 + 3 in heaven
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Elizabeth
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Dear Tina,
I think that the Nicholson books are just a little too sweet for my taste. Not a big deal at all. I spent the afternoon correlating All Ye Lands with Bethlehem's timeline so I think I'm all set there. We're thinking alike. And...I had just announced that AYL would be a read aloud henceforth and that we would take two years to get through All Ye Lands. Ahh...the pressure is off. So on we go!
An atrium is fully described in this thread: What is an atrium?
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Elizabeth Foss is no longer a member of this forum. Discussions now reflect the current management & are not necessarily expressions of her book, *Real Learning*, her current work, or her philosophy. (posted by E. Foss, Jan 2011)
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Louise
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For The Universe in my hands you might want to check the Mater Amabilis website. They have some really nice resources to flesh it out. And to round things up you could use their level 2 (year 1) and level 2 (year 2).
Raphael (13) loves their level 3
and level 4 (scroll down to science)
Louise, who also likes to tweak curriculums.
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Louise
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A nice supplement to AYL is The Story of Mankind by Van Loon. It is more CM but lacks the Catholicism of AYL. So they complement each other well.
Louise
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Natalia
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Regarding history, I like the way MA has it set up. Two days of World History and two days of American HIstory. So I am using a combination of MA and CHC for history. So far it has worked nicely because we had left off world history last year at the Age of Exploration point so that has fit real well with the beginning of American History.
So we are taking two years to do FSTSS and AYL supplemented by This Country of Ours and Story of Mankind and lots of living books in between.
We are following the MA for science (level 1A) which combines UIMH with some exploration kits.
Natalia
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Tina P.
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| Posted: Sept 20 2005 at 8:18pm | IP Logged
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OK. I'm embarrassed. It took about 2 months for us to fight our way through Universe In My Hands (UIMH). I guess we didn't get a whole lot out of it. However, we studied space before, we don't have a microscope or telescope because we're looking at moving in six months and I don't want those delicate instruments to break, and my 4 yog is the closest of any of us to 1m. Am I making excuses? Yes, I am. I was truly bored through this whole study. I guess I'll do better with my littler kids using these Mater Amabilis sites.
Somehow, I think the holes in my older kids' educations will be filled anyway. They always are.
God bless,
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Elizabeth
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Tina,
If it's any consolation, I've tried to read it just to get an idea of what to do four different nights now and I can't even stay awake long enough to figure out how to teach it . This ithread inspired me to try again--tomorrow morning!
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Elizabeth Foss is no longer a member of this forum. Discussions now reflect the current management & are not necessarily expressions of her book, *Real Learning*, her current work, or her philosophy. (posted by E. Foss, Jan 2011)
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Natalia
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I have done two lessons of UIMH and my son hasn't loved them but hasn't hated them either. I went out and bought a meter stick and he has been measuring things around the house to put on his list of things that measure a meter. Tomorrow we are going to do the first lesson in the Microscopic Explorations kits suggested by MA. We will see how it goes. My son (8) informed me right before we started science for this year that He doesn't believe in science and doesn't see the point of studying it because scientists always lie. When I asked him why he says that he says because they say that the earth started out of this particles that exploded and didn't they know that God created the earth like it says in the Bible ?
Great conversation followed
Natalia
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ALmom
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I am not a science person - and went completely cold with UIMH. I bought it because I really loved the 3rd grade science by the same author. Our solution - whenever dad has time to do UIMH with them in a fun way - great. In the meantime, mom doesn't have time to put all that stuff together and even less time to figure it out so we opted for Kolbe's recommended 5th grade textbook. I must say that ds is taking to that one very well and my highschooler is wishing she had had that behind her. (yeah, she is listening in some to fill in for some horrible holes we left in her science.) It's a new text they just got this year- not the stuff from the past (which we sent back in the first week back when our oldest was 6 grade).
Thanks for the suggestions about resources for the science. When I have time this summer, maybe we can put something together.
Janet
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Kelly
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After avoiding Science texts like the plague for the last few years, I was inspired by this thread to order "Behold and See" for third grade. I have not been disappointed. I really like it. Of course, maybe I really like it because I have my 12 year old teaching it to my little ones She's one of those wunderkind that finishes her work really quickly and well, and is always casting about for something else to do, soooooo... Even tho it's for 3rd, we've dragged in the first grader, and the fifth grader, too---added a little more detail for the bigger ones, simplified a little for the littler one, and voila: a very doable all-round science program.
I also went ahead and bought the third grade lesson manual, for many of the same reasons Elizabeth mentioned---a need for more infusion of Catholicity into our work, a need for a small dose of direction to keep me on course amidst the chaos of teaching a half dozen in dolby stereo...and *I* wanted to do the Tour of the Countries! I tied the Countries Tour project into the LPH online course on geography (i.e. we started with Canada first and the LPH class is starting with Canada, too) so the bigger kids are "in" on the same area of social studies/geography, too. I added a few things for them, as well, like the 5th grader is reading "Evangeline and the Acadians" (since Acadia is discussed in LPH) and dd is reading the Longfellow poem, "Evangeline", then we'll compare it all to what really happened, throw in a few salt-dough maps and so on .
In any event, just my 2cents worth, and a long way of saying that I've found the CHC lesson plan to be very easy to use as a guide, too, and flexible enough to work FOR me, not against me (which is how I felt about Calvert 'way back when we used their manual: PRISON!).
Kelly in FL
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Elizabeth
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I took the Bethlehem Books timeline and the booklist in the back of Real Learning and didn't have too much trouble coming up with a reading list to go with All Ye Lands. But, the pace will have to be slowed considerably in order to allow my boys time to read the historical fiction. And then I found myself wishing I had copywork and grammar tied to the living books ala Bravewriter Arrow (sigh). Sometimes I think we know too much about options out there...
I do want to sit with the Vision books and incorporate those as well. I wish that CHC had more Saints information and a saint's timeline in their study guide.
I'm having my kids narrate the stories in the Reading Comprehension books after we've discussed them. That will give them a stack of saints' biographies, particularly since we're doing Volumes 1 and 2 this year. Then, I'll have them incorporate those with the narrations from books they've read with All Ye Lands to flesh out a book of centuries.
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Elizabeth Foss is no longer a member of this forum. Discussions now reflect the current management & are not necessarily expressions of her book, *Real Learning*, her current work, or her philosophy. (posted by E. Foss, Jan 2011)
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Natalia
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Elizabeth wrote:
| . Sometimes I think we know too much about options out there... |
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That is precisely my downfall So many resources to choose from and me wanting to use them all!
Natalia
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Cay Gibson
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Kelly wrote:
the 5th grader is reading "Evangeline and the Acadians" (since Acadia is discussed in LPH)
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Kelly,
Is this book published by Pelican Publishing?
If so, I have this book and could have sold a dozen of them at a recent conference. I have it suggested in the Slice of Pie Library Packet for the book study on Louisiana. I had it on display and everyone who passed wanted a copy of it.
Great book (as far as textbooks go) and very Catholic. 
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Cay Gibson
"There are 49 states, then there is Louisiana." ~ Chef Emeril
wife to Mark '86
mom to 5
Cajun Cottage Under the Oaks
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4Real Forums : Living Learning
Topic: CHC again
