Starting to home school my 4 year old daughter?

Question

I started homeschooling my 4 1/2 year old daughter today. She is my oldest child & I am very new to this. I am starting her with workbooks & flashcards. Can anyone recommend any websites where I can get her preschool materials. I ordered a few things from christianbooks.com but I was wondering if anyone could recommend something that they had a good experience with. Thank you :)

Answer 1

What sort of materials are you looking for? Do you have a particular style you want to follow (traditional, classical, Waldorf, etc?) If so, join their online group and see what everyone else is doing.

I am intending to pretty much follow the Well Trained Mind, which is neo-classical, so with that in mind, here's my plan (subject to change whenever it needs to be!)

English: Lots of read alouds, then The Ordinary Parents Guide to Teaching Reading and First Language Lessons (both by Peace Hill Press) when the kiddies are ready for formal work.

Maths: Maths stories, maths games, counting, sorting shapes etc, then Ray's Arithmatic (Amazon for hardcopy or Project Gutenberg for free download) and Miquon when I feel it's time to start bookwork. http://fun-books.com/books/miquon_math.h...

Science: Building Foundations of Scientific Understanding by Bernard Nebel http://www.amazon.com/Building-Foundatio... Plus gardening, because that's what we do.

Art: Artistic Pursuits, possibly supplementing if they ask for more. This program has some art history and some art instruction. Lots of people following The Well Trained Mind like it because the art appreciation matches pretty well with the Story of the World (Peace Hill Press) series most of us use for history in the early years.

Social Studies: Various books and jigsaw puzzles on geography to give the kiddies an idea on where places are, as a preparation for starting history in grade 1. We'll look at world and Australian geography. I've heard there are some kind of irritating, but effective geography songs cds around, so I might check them out too. Most of this will come from the library.

Music: Probably the K12 program. I'll have to see how the budget is.

This is just my plan. As I said, it is subject to change whenever I see fit. Quite a few of those programs can be done orally, which suits me because I don't think small kids should be chained to their desks for too long. Also, there's no point insisting on too much writing until their fine motor skills allow it. A heck of a lot of it will be read alouds, which they can listen to while playing with blocks, for all it matters. I think the aim for the younger years is to introduce topics for the sake of interest, not to expect them to master anything. Even with reading and writing, who is going to know if they manage that at age 5, 6 or 8? Will it even matter? Anyway, online forums are good places to read reviews, and so is http://www.homeschoolreviews.com

Answer 2

You are off to a great start.  I am using A.C.E. Paces for my sixth graders whom I will begin homeschooling on Thursday.  It is a good program but so my daughter doesn't get bored I am also introducing some of my own curriculum for her.  You daughter couldn't do the paces until she was six.  From your screen name it sounds like you are expecting.  If you plan to homeschool your daughter longterm it is going to be very challenging with other children.  I am homeschooling my daughter only because she will be my only child at home during the day and I can give her my 100% undivided attention.  If you don't ever plan to send her to a school down the road then just make sure that she is getting plenty of socialization.  You can find lots of help on the internet.  Why don't you try googling homeschool for preschoolers.  Good luck.

Answer 3

Thrice Blessed gave an excellent list of links.  Here's one I suggest: www.lakeshorelearning.com.  Lakeshore sells educational products, toys and manipulatives.  They can be a bit expensive, but it'll give you some ideas.  Children your daughter's age should have a chance to learn through play as well as paper/pencil activities. :-)

Answer 4

Congrats on your baby girl btw:)

We're secular homeschoolers but we get our books and advice from the people at www.sonlight.com because they're just that good. You can call and ask advice and they deliver to your door.

Another site I used was www.ladybird.co.uk coupled with Amazon.com. I taught both of my boys to read at 4yo using the Keywords with Ladybird program - just 10 minutes a day and they were away. Good luck:)

Answer 5

We started making phonics cards, stick the letter/sound at the top and then find pictures (cut from magazines and junk mail and stored in a box) and stickers for words that use the sound, when all else fails, draw things. Well, we did the basic ones months and months ago until dd (now 4 3/4) lost interest but today she picked up the folder they're stored in, had me help her read through them and then picked out X and said we should do a sheet for that (we managed to find jack-in-the-box, Swiper the fox, Sphinx, Oryx and Max and Ruby). You don't have to spend a bundle on pre-made resources, sometimes making stuff yourself works better :-)  Invest in lots of arts and crafts materials and you'll never be at a loss for something to do.

Answer 6

Preschool through 6th:

http://www.starfall.com  (Free learning site, preschool to 2nd grade)

http://www.handwritingforkids.com (Free worksheets)

http://www.enchantedlearning.com (Free learning site with purchased membership, I REALLY RECOMMEND THIS ONE, ITS WORTH THE MONEY!!!)

http://www.abcteach.com  (free learning site with purchased membership.)

http://www.earlychildhoodlinks.com (links to lots of sites)

http://www.kn.att.com (has some learning links)

http://www.first-school.ws  (free preschool stuff)

http://www.wxdude.com  (Meteorology studies)

http://teacher.scholastic.com  (some free worksheets and activities)

http://www.tlsbooks.com  (LOTS of free stuff-no membership required)

I will post more links in the "source" section, Yahoo limits the number of links in the answer.

Answer 7

Sonlight  http://www.purehomeschooling.com/2008/08...

has great programs from preschool up through high school. We have used their materials for 5+ years and never been disappointed!

Best of Luck!

Jana

http://www.purehomeschooling.com/