Grade 4 - The Plan Redux

I didn't plan on it, but Elle ended up getting the summer off. I prefer going year-round so that we can slack off as needed, not according to the dictates of the county school board, but this year, with the shift to the temporary house and then the shift to the newly renovated house, it just sort of happened. It concerned me that we would fall behind. So while Elle is busy tearing around with the neighborhood public-schooled boys, I'm getting to know them, asking them how old they are and what grade they're going into, and I come to find out that Elle, if she were enrolled at our local elementary, would this year be entering fourth grade.

Did I just climb out of some space-time wormhole? Or have I just watched Donnie Darko one too many times? Didn't I do this already?

Well, then, that just makes planning this year so much easier, doesn't it?

Forget the Foster books. Elle liked it when I printed out the illustrations and she colored them, but other that that the books did not capture her fancy. And now I know why: She was too young for them. They're more middle-school level. And she's not. Lucky for me I still have The Story of the World and the activity book handy. For all my guilt about giving up our time-tested history spine, here I am, right back where I started. Last August.

We'll keep chipping away at Level 4 of First Language Lessons and when she finishes with that I've got Easy Grammar ready to go. We did a couple lessons in Write With the Best Volume I and I need to make more of an effort to include that on a regular basis. Same with Latin. Elle has shown an interest in learning French, and I'm open to that, but that will be in addition to Latin, not instead of it.

Math? Saxon. We're still in 5/4. Heh.

Gymnastics, lyrical dance, hip hop, and jazz made up her physical education for the past year. Now we have a great local county facility that offers gymnastics, swimming, taekwondo, and even fencing. Her homeschool girlfriends play soccer and softball and she is very interested in horseback riding (but not formal lessons, just Western-style, or bareback like she did in Australia) so we have plenty to keep her busy.

Wow. If planning last year was easy because it was simply a case of Do-the-Next-Thing, think how easy it will be this year when we Do-the-Same-Thing.

Ready...set...DO OVER!