This Fall marks our 5th year with home schooling! Joseph will be a big 4th grader and Catherine is moving up to 3rd. Benjamin is still only 4 years old, so he’s not an official student yet since we don’t see the need for “pre K.” This year, I’m just buying two $4 workbooks from Rod & Staff to get out for him to work on occasionally.
Our curriculum consists mainly of Seton materials. The Seton Home Study school is 30 years strong and known for academic excellence (especially in the language arts) and solidly reinforces our Catholic faith. To save money, we don’t enroll officially with Seton. Instead, I’ve always written the lesson plans myself by hand each week.
But this year, to save LOTS of time and hassle, I’m trying something new! It’s a software program called Homeschool Tracker Plus and allows you to input lesson plans, activities and events for your children and then print them out as needed whenever you want.
I love the idea that I can create the lesson plans before school begins and not have to fool with it again for the entire year. What a blessing! Even better, once I put the lesson plans into Homeschool Tracker, they are saved for good. That means no re-do’s when a younger child reaches that grade level! Each week in the school year, I’ll be able to print lesson plans for Joseph and Catherine and they can check off items as they complete them each day.
Later in the year, after we’ve used the software program for a while, I’ll post a review and link to it here.
Does your family home school? If so, are you doing anything new or different this Fall?
We do home school, our daughter is going in the 5th grade this year. We are trying out online public school. Scary but excited all at once.
I’ve heard good things about the online public schools!
Keep posting on this topic! We’re thinking about homeschooling Simeon, but obviously a little overwhelmed and nervous. We’re looking into a classical school here in Jackson that supplements homeschooling with a 2-day-a-week program. He probably has a year before he starts that, but Elizabeth has started working from “Slow and Steady, Get them Ready”, and we’re reading Susan Bauer’s “Well Trained Mind” and “Well Educated Mind”.
Daniel, the classical school that supplements homeschooling sounds like a fabulous idea! Kind of wish we had something like that here. I know well how things can get a little overwhelming at times. But the good news is that teaching the very young is a real breeze. Kindergarten was so much fun, for me and for Joseph (my first). Early reading (1st and 2nd grade) is what presents the biggest challenge for me and my pupils because of those first initial hurdles.
Nice to meet you – thank you for stopping by and linking up to the Hip Hip Horray Homeschooll Hop! Happy Homeschooling!
Thanks, Nicole! I really enjoy your blog! Anne
Do you have an update of using the Seton curriculum with the Homeschool Tracker program? I’d love to hear how it has worked out or not for you. Thanks in advance,
Holly H
Holly, thanks for writing! Yes, we have used Seton and Homeschool Tracker together for quite a while and it’s worked really well. Here is a more recent post which talks about our experience and has some screenshots of what the program looks like, and how you can print out assignment sheets. http://www.zephyrhillblog.com/2015/07/how-to-plan-organize-and-manage-your-homeschool/ God bless! ~Anne
Hi Anne,
Thank you for the speedy reply! I read the updated link and have been watching some of the HST YouTube videos. Is Seton listed as one of the HST’s “shared curriculum,” (especially 4th grade)?
Thank you again,
Holly H
The way the shared curricula work is that parents can upload lesson plans they have created themselves and that are tried and true. Because of copyright restrictions, you can’t upload or share actual Seton plans, which must be purchased from Seton. As a member of HST, what you would do is search shared curricula for the grade and content your’re interested in. I logged in today to see what parents have shared in the way of 4th grade material. I found Abeka, Rod and Staff, Saxon, Singapore, Spectrum, Teaching Textbooks, Worldly Wise and Zaner Bloser. So no complete Seton lesson plans, but plans for some of the texts that Seton uses. Hope that helps! ~Anne