Southeast Texas Homeschool Resources – Debbie Slaughter shares information on putting together a “DIY” homeschool curriculum.
Are you looking for ideas on how to put together your Southeast Texas homeschool curriculum?
Today, SETX Church Guide is happy to share some insights from Debbie Slaughter, a popular Golden Triangle Christian blogger.
Debbie publishes “A Million Skies”, which has become a great Southeast Texas homeschool resource.
Debbie also shares her experiences with motherhood, stewardship, and living a Christian life in the modern world.
Enjoy!
Southeast Texas homeschooling can be especially challenging when the economy is this tight.
This year I didn’t have enough money to buy my dream first grade math curriculum.
I had to make do. 
I researched online through Texas Education Agency TEKS (Texas Essential Knowledge and Skills), considered the skills that I felt were important and necessary age appropriate skills. I made a list of all the topics I wanted my first grader to master and used it to create lesson plans.
It was serious homework, but I had the time and not the money.
Every Southeast Texas homeschool mom’s priorities for first grade math will be a little different, but my math lesson plan shaped up like this:
Monday – Topics Relating to Money: coins, bills, estimations, value, presidents, states, counting, purchasing, making and receiving change…
Tuesday – Topics Relating to Time: hours, minutes, analog, digital, reading, writing, time zones, concept of time, time relations
Wednesday – Weights and Measurements: ounces, pounds, tons, metric, cups, pints, quarts, gallons, teaspoons, tablespoons, estimations, mass/ density, inches, miles, height, comparisons, contrasts. Cooking covers a lot of the bases on Wednesday.
Thursday – Throw-back Thursday: a review from something way earlier, counting backwards from 20, counting by 2s, 5s, 10s, even, odd, shapes, geometry vocabulary, etc.
Friday – Fractions: how to say them, read them, write them, their value, why and how we use fractions in daily life.
If you are a Southeast Texas homeschool mom, you know one of the challenges is keeping a child from getting bored. Varying the subject matter on different days like this can create a feeling of each topic being “fresh”. By next week, they are ready for the topic again.
I tried to be conscientious of what each day was to take advantage of teachable moments as they organically presented themselves.
For example, when I needed gas, what fraction did my gas needle indicate 1/2?, 3/4 full?, 3/4 empty? How much do you think this bag of apples weighs: almost the same as your baby doll or closer to the same as our Weenie dog? Driving out of your neighborhood presents a great opportunity to do a quick two minute activity: Sister, “can you read the time on the clock on the radio?” or Brother, “can you count that change in my purse so we can get a Sonic Happy Hour Drink?” 
I supplemented lessons from the textbook we are using and the other prepared resources with free limited use websites online and affordable downloads on the Kindle and my Android phone.
Once you get a routine down, it’s super easy to fall back on. I did integrate more concepts than those I’ve listed, but honestly it could have easily been part of this routine.
If your child conquers one area or prefers a different concept such as timed quizzes or patterns, just make your own alliterations: Timed Test Tuesdays or Multiplication Mondays, Free day Friday (pick your own lesson), Monday Measurements.
It varies up the lessons up during the week, but creates enough of a schedule that your child knows what to expect.
An unexpected perk was that it gave me a least a week to find/ create a lesson for each themed day.
Your child will appreciate that they aren’t doing the same thing every day.
Best wishes to all Southeast Texas homeschool families- have a wonderful school year!
Are you a Southeast Texas homeschool parent? Would you like to share your experiences on SetxChurchGuide.com?
We’d love to have you as a guest blogger.
You can e-mail your story (or a link to your blog) to SetxChurchGuide@gmail.com. Feel free to include any art or images that help tell your Southeast Texas homeschooling story and that will help your story standout to other Southeast Texas homeschool moms (and dads!).
We hope you have enjoyed today’s feature, Southeast Texas Homeschool Resources – Debbie Slaughter shares information on putting together a “DIY” homeschool curriculum.
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