Hey Friends! My name is Amanda, and I am here to share my adventures in motherhood and homeschooling our three wild children!
Our Little Path is a place where I share my journey in motherhood and our family's path to holiness. I have a specific devotion to this by educating our children at home. As a mother, I am called to bring my kids closer to Christ and through this Little Path, I hope to do so. With the inspiration coming from St. Therese's Little Way, we strive for little ways to bring Christ in our lives and to others. It is through the small things that we do that can create change and impact our family and our faith. I hope that I can provide inspiration for you too, to seek St. Therese's Little Way to holiness.
I love these!! My favorite camis to wear under super low cut dresses are the built in bra tank tops/camis from Uniqlo. Their airism fabric is fabulous for the heat.
We really liked it. It is quite book heavy though, so some we cherry picked reading through some, some we listened on audiobook. But overall we’ve really enjoyed.
Thank you. What did you do, if anything, for literature study? Being that this will be a lot of reading, I don't know if I should add in a bit of literature or not. I will add in writing, grammar and spelling.
I think it depends on your kids and their ages. Mine are 11 and 8 and I chose to do the books in this study as our family read alouds. Some I have even been able to find on hoopla for free for audio books in the car. If I was going to have my kids read the books themselves, I would likely not do a separate literature study.
We used MP Enrichment for kindergarten and we love it ❤ I’m thinking about doing the enrichment for first grade next year along with story time treasures. I love the way they break everything down for you and make it very easy to use.
Im considering this literature curriculum for my 3rd grader next year. We are right in the middle of 2nd grade right now, and I can tell she'll be ready for it next year. So exciting! Thank you for your review ❤ have a Blessed Day
This is so informative and helpful! Were finishing our current Social Studies Textbook so were looking for other types of curriculum now that we haven't tried yet!
We're doing TGTB Geology now, I hope it works well for you. I found it rather in depth for a 3rd and a 5th grader. I would also add that it is definetely teacher intensive.
We just finished the geology. We liked it! It was a bit in-depth by kids seemed to do ok with the detail, I did skip quite a few of their demonstration/experiments. Too much work 🫣
I can't believe I missed this video! I also bought this and it will be our first time using their literature studies. I am excited to see how it goes because I've been really looking forward to this every catalog. How did you do the readings for your 4th grader? Did you read the chapters aloud or read ahead of their schedule? I'm not sure whether to read it aloud with my child together or if I should let her read it on her own first and then me or keep ahead of her.
1) What are the podcasts you use for your kids? I'd especially love any Catholic materials. 2) How did you get around the "but all my friends are in school" social aspect? My eldest has asked for more friends and I am at a loss for what to do. Our church is small, and families are coming from an hour away so getting together isn't always feasible. I also find it hard for myself to make new friends, as I shy away from asking people. I find when I do all the work to find new people to make connections with, I'm always the only one putting in the effort. So when I get tired and drained from doing all of that and pause, we lose all connections we had made. It is very frustrating for me but I think my eldest has been suffering in silence with me. 😢
Our favorite podcasts are Saints Alive, saint stories for kids, The Merry Beggars presents On the Night Train. We also love the purple rocket podcast and the reading bug. Neither of those are faith based. Just good fun stories. We haven’t really had to battle the “all my friends are in school” since we pulled my oldest out after kindergarten. My oldest did ask why she wasn’t in school the first year we started, but we just tried to talk to her on her level of why homeschooling is important to our family, and why we choose it. My best advice would be have her in activities. Is there a local homeschool sports PE class, homeschool classes at a gym or music/acting. If you are on Facebook, search for groups on homeschooling in your city. We have met lots of people through “homeschool group classes” at sports/rock climbing. Are there local co-ops you can attend, even if it’s just a simple park day weekly? Is there other Catholic Churches near by you can reach out to, to ask about their homeschooling families? I am similar to you, I really struggle with reaching out when meeting new people. And then often am the one making initial plans and then it feels like there is a lack of follow through. The biggest thing I did when I was struggling to meet/click with other moms and families was pray every day for God to lead me to the right friends. People who I could have a true friendship with, not just the coined “how are you” surface friendship. It took a few years to get connected with a solid group, but even then took a few more to find which moms I really clicked with.
Also, even if your church friends are spread out, could you try to coordinate once a month field trips where you all could meet up? And again I can’t stress enough, Facebook groups for local homeschooling groups or co-ops can be a great starting point if you can’t find anything at your local churches.
I like to wait and watch videos and do my own research before purchasing any curriculum or supplements. I start researching our next levels after we hit first term of the current year. LOL Pretty early, but if we finish something early I want to be prepared.
Thanks for this. I’ve been wondering about beautiful feet books. Just subscribed. I also have a channel mainly about homeschooling and happy to be able to connect here 😊
I need to organize my cart- stat!!!! Can you please show how you organize science? 😂 I bought the two science books you recommended, but I feel sooooo lost! You made it seem easy, so I must be missing something
Sorry if you address this in the video, I'm watching without audio as I am next to my sleeping baby.. Do you need to buy both books or would the Early Elementary Science Education book be good enough as a stand alone? Thanks heaps. Sorry if you've explained all this already.
Thank you for sharing your history choice, love literature based curriculum. Do you have a video on how to make an end of the year portfolio for record keeping purposes? How do you tackle this? Thank you 😊
Thanks for watching! I do not have a video on end of the year portfolios. It’s not something we need in AZ, for our requirements. But I believe Jessica from The Waldock Way here on RU-vid has a video, or a blog post.
Lent this year we read the gospel of John with the Bible in a year companion. And the daily Lenten journey by magnifikid. Advent we read unwrapping the greatest gift by Ann voscamp. And did some smaller stuff here and there each day.
I actually have never done CHCs science course. I was not interested in it when I was first starting out, which is how I got drawn to TGATB and BFSU, because we were in need of a science
Yes, please do a look through on the science you use- and how you do the lessons. I’d love to see. We just do G&B unit studies, but I’m so interested in learning more about what you use!
Hey! Thanks so much for doing this review and for including us in your curriculum picks! Let us know how we can be helpful to you and your homeschoolers. :)
I would like to see a review about the typing course(s) you've tried with your kids. Mine have also been asking to learn and we also limit screen time since they are under 7. But, like you, since they are asking me to learn something, I don't want to say no so I want to accommodate their request. Luckily, my husband and I have our old college laptops still (they are behemoths compared to today!), so no chance of internet access and them seeing something they shouldn't. Which is why TGATB Typing I and II interested me, I checked out their page and it only needs a word document to practice, which is great news!
I don't see my comment! I wanted to know how you structure your topics with the different grades? I find I run out of time and miss subjects when switching between my 2nd grader and kindergartener. My Kinder needs lots of 1:1 help to learn to read but my 2nd grader can work independently but will end up working on only one subject. For example, instead of doing just a page of grammer and then move on to the spelling exercises, she will just keep doing page after page of grammar. This means we are ahead in some subjects by a month and behind in others by weeks. 😅 I'm trying to group them, as in, when its time for math, they both will work on math. But my 2nd grader will finish things fast and ends up waiting. I also have a 5 month old which takes me away when awake and hates napping 😢 (unless naps happen while laying down on me!) (Sigh) its only until the baby is bigger but I feel really behind and unorganized. I'd love to see how your time is structured with the twins.
Scheduling the day is sometimes the toughest part of homeschool. I am probably due for a video detailed how we are managing with the twins right now. But in the mean time, for your second grader maybe try a daily notebook. In that lined notebook you write which pages of which book she needs to complete. Then she can check it off and go to the next subject. Maybe that will help her not do too many pages of one topic and not the others. That’s what I would do with my oldest when she was that age. When I had my third kiddo, I wore him 90% of the school day. That seemed to help keep him close (which he wanted) but still left my hands free to teach and help. As he got older, I would have him in the high chair a lot with toys or food, or we would school during his afternoon nap. The twins, currently we are schooling during nap times and on the couch while I breastfeed. We also often end up on the floor with the babies and often do math on the floor while they play or sit in my lap.
Also, I think it’s unfortunately the nature of having littles around and feeling lightly disorganized and behind. Cause girl I am right there with you 💜 I just try to remind myself, we are not on anyone’s time frame. We homeschool for that exact purpose.
@@ourlittlepath Yes, it must just be how things are when having littles but oh boy is it rough going! Haha! I love your videos, and look forward to them as they help me feel like we're chugging along just like other homeschool families. And yes, I chose homeschooling because of the flexibility to start and stop whenever we needed to for whatever reason.
@@ourlittlepath yes, we also end up on the floor a lot for subjects. I used to have the elder two working at their school desks, but its just easier having them work at the kitchen table while baby is in his high chair. I do have the daily agenda in a folder for my use, but maybe I should either let her have access or write up one for her to check off. She is very type A and would love to be able to show she is done with her stuff on her own. My Kindy is so definitely NOT like my eldest and needs me prodding her along. She gets the topics, she learns well but is a tad bit.... lazy? Not really, she just doesn't want to do stuff that doesn't interest her 🙄
@@caroblue7988 I am so glad my videos are helpful for you! That has been my whole goal with YT, providing a community and hopefully helping other homeschool mommas not feel so alone!
The TGaTB math videos are my kiddos favorite part, it’s so interesting how different each kid is about their likes and dislikes for curriculum, even amongst my 5 I have so many varied programs going on because of personalities
Right?! Sometimes I wish it was the same for each kid, but in trying to find something to fit each kids we have stumbled on really interesting curriculum. So I guess I can’t complain. … I was so looking forward to having that teaching part relieved though 😆