I definitely fell off of the blogging bandwagon! After UNit 5, we took 2 weeks off for vacation, and life got busy! I returned to my part time job working from home, activities picked up for the kids, and blogging just didn't get done. But I want to give a brief overview of how your year with Beyond went!
We did almost all of the left side of the guide as written. We didn't always do the poetry things every day, but we did at least a few days each unit. We also didn't do the memory work for the verses because my daughter memorizes enough in Awana and church (and we use KJV so the music CD wasn't a fit for us). Rarely we would adapt a rotating box activity, but otherwise we loved the left side of the guide!
Now for the right side. We were already using a different math, so that box was just ignored (we use Horizons). We worked through the emerging reader books basically on schedule and loved them! We had to skip a few because our library didn't have them (Animal Adventures and Prairie School), but otherwise we did all of the books plus many of the supplemental titles. I really do enjoy Carrie's picks and the questions she has! We used Rod and Staff 2 instead of the grammar in Beyond because we had covered all of the Beyond grammar concepts with a Scholastic workbook in 1st grade. So, that leaves spelling, copywork, and storytime.
Spelling was a battle after the first five weeks or so. Those first five weeks we were able to do both lists. But then when the words weren't simple phonetic spellings, my daughter really struggled to follow the directions. She was afraid to misspell the word on Day 1 when they look at the card, turn it over, and write it. We ended up just putting spelling on hold and worked on writing. Near the end of Beyond when I was ordering things for 3rd grade, I ordered Spelling You See Level B for her. We started it as soon as we got it, and it has been a good addition I think. It is similar to HOD's spelling and dictation in a workbook. Since I am not the one telling her what to do, she doesn't struggle as much. Each day she finds things in a rhyme and marks them - grammar or spelling notes for later. Then she copies 1-2 lines of the rhyme. Then, she has words to spell like a spelling test. The words progressively get harder, and it seems to be working for her.
Copywork was another battle. My daughter just doesn't love to write. So, some times we did the copywork and sometimes I just made sure she was writing somewhere else in her day. Since we were doing Rod and Staff grammar, we often used that for copywork. Other times we would copy memory verses for Awana. When we started Spelling You See, the copywork was in there was well. She also asked to start cursive so she could read everything Grandma wrote. So, we started Cheerful Cursive in January. Again, because it is a workbook, she enjoys it a lot more! She can't wait to do cursive copywork when we are done with Cheerful cursive.
Finally storytime. I learned using the library isn't a great option for us! Sometimes I would forget to get a book. Other times I had to wait longer than expected to get a book. Then there were the times we couldn't go because someone was sick or the weather was bad. We ended up reading books for all nine genres, but we failed in getting the activities done in the guide. I normally got a few done each genre, and that is it. My daughter did LOVE the books though! I think the books were her favorite part of Beyond, with history reading a close second.
As for things we added to the guide (other than above), we didn't keep up with the history or science notebooking. We completely stopped the science about the time we went full speed and life got busier. History we did occasionally, and we finished up all the sheets at the end of the guide as a good review. In the future, I might use the history ones every few months as a review if we need a break from full time Beyond, but I won't print them all in the beginning.
At the end of the year, I created a little survey sheet for my daughter to fill out. It has a spot for her name, her age, and the date we finished the guide at the top. Then, we recorded her favorite history book (Stories of the Pilgrims), favorite art activity (tulip - Unit 5), favorite science activity (Unit 1 Day 2 - boats), favorite poem (The Cow), favorite ER book (The Courage of Sarah Noble), and favorite storytime book (GInger Pye and Pagoo)
Beyond definitely was a great year! We both learned so much, and I can't wait to do it again in a few years with my next child!
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