Our Kindergarten Year

I've officially finished homeschooling my last kindergartener . . . while it's exciting to move forward, part of me is also sad.  I've taught all my kids how to read, all of them even used the same book!  Kindergarten seems to mark the beginning of the learning journey, and while it never really ends, this year was the last beginning.

Baby Girl all done with her reading book!

That said, I've mentioned in a couple of other posts that I would be looking back at our Kindergarten year and sharing how we do Kindergarten here at The Gorbics Academy.

We have basically followed the Charlotte Mason method with all the kids- you can read about what that is here.  There are many good sites out there for implementing this method.  My favorite and most used is Ambleside Online.  It is a great resource for understanding the Charlotte Mason method and for free schedules, book lists and many links to curriculum. Kindergarten or Year 0 on Ambleside Online isn't really a structured school year.  I do use their great book list which I shared here.  We worked through this book list during the Kindergarten year, reading one book each day of the week for an entire week.  

In addition to our book list, Baby Girl participated in our Morning Time.  I have loosely done Morning Time in the past, but after reading this post about using a Morning Time Binder, I made my own binder, filled it with good things and made it a priority each school day.  Well, almost every day - we participate in a Co-op on Wednesdays, so to be realistic, I did not include anything for Wednesday!  

I have LOVED this addition to our day.  It proved to be a great time for all of us to start the day together, because we were focusing on what was really important - Him and each other.  And on days that this is all we were able to accomplish - and there were many of those - I could still call it a win!

Here is a quick breakdown of what our Morning Time looked like:

Monday
Prayer (We always start with what we are thankful for and then use Prayer Calendars from Cheri Gamble)
Bible - New Testament and Psalm
Memory Work - Verse (we are working through these verses from Ann Voskamp) and Co-op Verse
Poetry - A Child's Book of Poems by Gyo Kujifawa
Read Aloud - Fiction
Copywork

Tuesday
Prayer
Bible New Testament and Psalm
Memory Work - Verse and Co-op Verse
Math Songs
Read Aloud - Life of Fred, Math series
Copywork

Thursday
Prayer
Bible - New Testament and Psalm
Memory Work - Verse and Co-op Verse
Parts of Speech (printables found here)
Read Aloud - Life of Fred, Language Arts series
Copywork

Friday
Prayer
Bible - New Testament and Psalm
Memory Work - Verse and Co-op Verse
Art Study
Read Aloud - Fiction
Copywork

After our Morning Time, our Kindergarten schedule was pretty simple and we usually finished fairly quickly. We included Math (Math U See Primer), Reading (Teach Your Child to Read in 100 Easy Lessons), the Handwriting without Tears curriculum, Character Training and our read-alouds. Most of these we did once a day, with the exception of our Character Training which we focused on once a week.  

That didn't mean that our learning was done for the day!  Baby Girl still participated in many of the other learning experiences going on in our home.  Plus we had co-op, field trips, cooking days, educational shows, playdates and most importantly, lots of PLAY!  

Hopefully this is helpful to you if you are beginning your homeschool journey or just trying to reevaluate your homeschool year.  As always, please do not let my suggestions add to your list of "things I should be doing" or "yet another thing I need to do".  Use these resources as ideas to lighten your load, not add to it!!

Rita