Calvert Pre-K

I can hardly wait to start Pre-K with Elinore. Hannah was three years old when she started and she's now about to start seventh grade. Elinore, however, is not ready for Pre-K, even though she will be three next month. The main reason is her speech delay. Pre-K starts off each day with a discussion. When Elinore is able to hold conversations, I will consider her ready for official Calvert Pre-Kindergarten. Until then, we are using a Rod and Staff Bible storybook, Tot School printables from 1+1+1=1, Early Childhood Themes from Evan-Moor, some Nursery 2's from ABeka, Kumon workbooks for folding, cutting, pasting, and numbers, and the Starfall website.

In September, I want to try the Saxon Math Kindergarten. I picked up the Teacher manual from The Book Thing, and the Meeting Book from CBD and some of the manipulatives from Amazon. The scripted lessons specifically begin in September, so I want to start then. I am not concerned about the academic portions of the lessons. I am just excited for the scheduling and the manipulatives like pattern blocks, counting bears, dominoes, and geoboards.

I figured out I am not as excited about Saxon Phonics K and 1 as I thought I should be. I taught all four of the older children to read using Calvert and they all did well, no struggling, and they all turned out to be prolific readers. Saxon does engage full body participation, good for kinesthetic learners, as I am sure Elinore is, but even in K the student learns phonetic coding, which I think unnecessarily complicates the reading process. So my friend Cindy, at Cindy's Life as She Knows It, is going to locate a recipient for me.