My approach to 6th Grade home education differs from the previous years. Last year, apart from combining Grade 4 and 5 in one year, which created a whole pile of work, I also settled for covering the work the kids in public schools cover. It almost ended in disaster.
So I had this flash of inspiration to tackle my son’s Grade 6 year in the following way:
Daily/Weekly Learning Activities
I used The Story of the World Volume 3 as a guide for studies for the year (we read volumes 1 and 2 in previous years). I learned that the time period covered in this volume is 1500-1850, so I decided to compile daily learning activities related to those periods in weekly themes. Here’s what I did:
- I printed out some “headlines” for our notice board so that we could easily see which period of time we’re covering for the week (we’ll be adding the display cards I created for each topic as we cover them to the notice board so that it is visible throughout the week)
- For each week’s period of time, I included a topic to learn about (spread over the days of the week):
- Artist Time Periods (I suppose you can include Art Appreciation to learn about an artist that lived at this time too)
- Weapon (research project – to teach my son to do more independent learning)
- Inventions and Discoveries (research & computer project for more independent learning)
- Natural Disaster – I created a poster onto which he can paste a label every week that in a nutshell refers to a natural disaster that happened in that period of time somewhere in the world. He has to find the place on a map.
- Composer – Just an introduction to a composer that lived in the same time period we’re reading about in history. We’ll also be listening to music the composer composed…
- Musical Instrument – This doesn’t really relate to the time-period we’re studying, but I thought it a good idea to introduce the sounds and some information about some musical instruments. After listening to the sound of the instrument, I will let him listen to some movie soundtracks he likes to try to identify where the instrument is played.
- Other weekly learning topics:
- Idiom – a picture and the meaning of the idiom to display for the week. He also needs to give his own example to check understanding and application.
- Element – An introduction to The Periodic Table in bits and pieces. I created some worksheets onto which he can record his research about a specific element every week. This will also teach him how Bohr diagrams and Lewis Structures work. We will watch the video clips linked to on http://ed.ted.com/periodic-videos.
- Insects – to learn a bit about the insects that crawl, jump or fly into our house, and for drawing practice.
- Drawing Lessons – We’re tackling Drawing with Children by Mona Brookes, and I compiled some simple lessons from the book for three drawing lessons per week.
- Nature Photography Challenge – since I found it challenging at the time to do nature study, I thought this challenge could cover some nature study and photography skills development all in one. You can read my explanation on how it works in this post.
- Musical Instrument Practice – We’ll see how this goes, but we’re going to try Joseph Hoffman’s piano lessons
- Handicraft – I wanted my son to learn handy skills, not just any craft (most of which ends up in the rubbish bin at the end of the year). So he’ll be sewing (beanbag, placemat, notebook cover, pillow, stuffed ball, a circle pillow and a drawstring bag), creating picture & mirror frames (from different implementations of craft/popsicle sticks), doing mosaic decorations for his room, mod podging handy things like trays and bird-houses to decorate the garden, making pompoms to make useful items like an accent rug and desk caddy, macramé (bracelets, keyring holders) and fabric painting (to make a throw-pillow, table-cloth or T-shirt).
- Daily eye exercises to counter the dreadful effect of technology.
- Speed reading exercises (simple daily exercises to increase reading speed)
- Typing challenge (I cannot be more grateful for learning to type when I was a teen, and I would like my son to learn this skill as well – it makes life so much easier, especially for those into software development)
- And most important of all, Character Training (read my post that explains this here)
Daily Learning Activities
As always I included recording the temperature and rainfall, and tallying the Days of School for daily learning (read this post for free downloads).
English Home Language
We’ll also be working through LLATL Tan for Grade 6 Language Arts. I can’t give my opinion yet, though, because it will be a first for us. Even though the book lacks visual stimulation, I was happy with the layout of the lessons when I looked through it – they clearly define work for every day. After we’ve worked through it a while, though, I’ll be able to write more about it.
Afrikaans First Additional Language
Afrikaans Sonder Grense – even though it is written for the classroom setup, I am happy with the content and my son finds it easy to work through.
Spanish as Third Language
We’ll be using All-in-one-homeschool curriculum for Spanish this year.
Mathematics
Platinum Math again until I find something better and more realistically priced…
And mental math that focuses on those multiplication tables.
History
The Story of the World Vol 3 by Susan Weise Bauer.
Geography
Platinum Social Science again, some of it, I added some stuff, so we’ll cover the following topics:
- Map skills (Latitude, longitude, hemispheres, scale, our province)
- Trade
- Resources and their value
- Climates around the world:
- Tropical Rainforests
- Hot Deserts
- Cold Deserts
- Coniferous Forests
- Temperate Deciduous Forests
- Temperate Grasslands
- Tropical Grasslands
- Lowland Tundra
- Highland Tundra
- People and Provinces in South Africa
- Why people live where they do
- Rural and Urban Areas
- People around the World
- Research Project: Brazil
- The City of Rio de Janeiro
Natural Science & Technology
I used the workbooks on http://www.thunderboltkids.co.za/teachers-parents.html as guide and created my own curriculum for the year. The following topics will be covered:
- Photosynthesis
- Nutrients in food
- Nutrition
- Food Processing
- Eco systems and food webs
- States of Matter
- Atoms & Molecules
- Solid, Liquid, Gas
- Mixtures & Solutions
- Electric Circuits
- Electricity
- The Solar System
- Rockets
- Systems for exploring space
I included A LOT of hands-on activities, since I’ve been neglecting them in the previous years. My son is more hands-on than me, but learning is all to his advantage, so I have to budge a little… (okay, a lot!)
Have a great time with your kids, we’re certainly having fun!
