Homeschooling...thus far

We quietly started school the first week in April. The timing made the most sense to me because Caleb is 5 1/2 and because the summer is really our indoor season. I have noticed in the past that Caleb preferred to do a lot of art in the summers and a lot of digging in the winter. So as far as planning is concerned, I'm planning for school to go on from now until Thanksgiving or possibly Christmas. But honestly, what I'm seeing so far is that it is needless to plan anything concrete.

We are not using a particular curriculum. For math, Caleb has the Early Start Kindergarten Math workbook from Singapore Math and for phonics, I bought a copy of only the Handbook for Reading from Abeka Books. Since I taught Abeka phonics a few years ago, I think the Handbook will be sufficient. I didn't buy any readers. Our library has a large selection of simple readers and a couple of friends have offered to lend us books too. My experience with Abeka was that an average student could read quite well by the end of 1st grade.

Otherwise, we are studying the Bible, doing a lot of reading aloud, doing some extra art, practicing our Spanish, and getting familiar with US Geography. All total, we work between half an hour and an hour each day. (Broken up in bits.) At first, I made a little lesson plan, but for what he is learning now, I am finding it easier just to move on when he seems ready. For math we are moving more quickly than I expected, phonics is going more slowly.

I also expected Annalise to want to be involved in all the lessons, and she is usually there, just she is usually a little annoyed at having her playing interrupted. However, she has her short vowels down pat!

After considering it, I decided to put off handwriting until the fall. Can that be it? I guess it is.