What's the deal?

I don't know what the problem is, but lately I have had a really hard time keeping up with my house....huh.. now that I mention it .... it's probably because I'm always on this darn computer looking at everyone's really cool blogs. Ugh! They are so addicting. So, today I will be kicking it into high gear to get my house somewhat back in order. I will also be taking a nap, because boy am I tired!

I've been doing a ton of research on curriculums. I decide what I'm going to use and then I change my mind. Some curriculums stay the same and some seem to always be changing. The one that has stayed the same is the spalding curriculum. I have looked at doing SWR instead of WRTR, but I keep coming back to WRTR because it has a lesson plan book. I really want things mapped out well for my first year. I will have enough of a hard time just trying to keep us all on schedule without having to worry about lesson planning for WRTR. I did read SWR, though, and got a ton of great ideas from it. I really appreciate the work that Wanda Sanseri has put into her book.

I have been teetering back and forth between Sonlight and TOG- Tapestry of Grace. I have to admit that I absolutely fell in love with both of these programs. They are amazing! Homestly, these companies did a great job of incorporating quality literature. I am a huge fan of using living or real books instead of textbooks. ( However, I do plan to use textbooks for my LA/spelling/writing program as stated earlier as well as for my math program.) I think that I have decided to go with Sonlight for at least Kindergarten and probably 1st or second grade as well. The reason for this is that I really do want my lesson plans laid out for me in most of my curriculum to begin. Also, I feel that the main benefit of TOG is that you can easily teach several different levels at the same time and I will only be teaching 1 level when I begin to 2 students. So, when my youngest is older and ready for school I will look at TOG again. That's the plan, at least. If you can't tell I am REALLY a planner. I have to have everything planned out. Actually, I can do spur of the moment, too. I just love planning.

Anyways, the plan is to use Sonlight (SL) for History, Geography and Bible. It is possible that I will use them for science. It depends on where we live. At first, I was very against using them for science but I have begun to warm to the idea. If we are living in Africa by then I will probably go with SL for my science so that I have everything that I need and I don't have to be trying to search for everything in Africa to do all of the hands on projects that I want to do. Otherwise, if we are still living here I will be piecing together my own science curriculum. I know, I said that I wanted everything layed out for me, but I haven't been able to really find what I want in a science curriculum. With science all that I want to accomplish in Kindergarten is to establish a love for it. I plan on mostly doing experiments and following all of the little bunny trails that result from the experiments. I ordered some great science books that Cathy Duffy recommends. I haven't gotten them yet, but when I do I will start planning a few projects that I want to do, and the rest I will figure out when we get there. I don't really feel that science is all that necessary in Kindergarten. I just want to expose them to it.

That leaves me with math. Ugh! I have only heard amazing things about Math-U-See (MUS). I really love this program, but the advances nature of Singapore math is really drawing me in as well. I ordered the free demo video that you can get from MUS and I really enjoyed it. So, basically, I don't have a clue which one I am going to go with. I guess that I have a few months to decide. I know that if I go with MUS I want to get the new binding, etc. that they are coming out with in March. So, I would wait to buy that stuff.

There's my ramblings for today.