Our Homeschool English Curriculum

Recently, I posted on SM about my son completing his IGCSEs a couple of weeks ago, and a number of people reached out to ask how possible. 

How did I homeschool my child up until highschool? 

In response, I decided to start on this series; writing – as the spirit moves me – on our homeschooling journey so far. I do not claim to be an expert, except on what has worked on my family so far. But that is the joy of homeschooling, you get to do what is best for your family – trial, error and all!

So, I’m starting with this piece about my English/Literacy Curriculum first because it was the curriculum that I struggled with the most, and the curriculum that I am most proud of. Unlike other ‘core’ subjects, our English curriculum was the sole one the children solely depended on, especially through middle school. Living in the Middle East, outside of an international school setting, it was on me to nurture their English literacy skills. No pressure, at all!

For ease, I’ll break this curriculum into several stages, although each of my children did not start at the same level, and the stages kind of just flowed on into the other.

1. Identification, Writing and Sounding of the Alphabets

Only Child 3, my second daughter, had this stage; the others started out in conventional school system. We began when she was three years old, getting her to identify the alphabet by sound. At the same time, she was learning to write the alphabet. Prior to starting this, I had not let her engage with any of the alphabet songs that abound. So she was coming fresh with no knowledge of what the alphabet names were. The only thing we’d done up until that time was pencil grip, and plenty of lap-reading.  

We started with block letters, of alphabets that consisted of straight lines (just because they are easier to write) – A, E, F, H, I, K, L, M, N, T, V, W, X, Y, Z

Then the alphabets with curves that faced one direction – B, D, J, P, R 

Then the alphabets with curves that faced the other direction – C, G

And then we had alphabets that curve in both directions – O, Q, S, U

When we finished the uppercase letters, we started with the lowercase alphabets in roughly the same order (i.e. lines, curves etc) By this time, we’re several weeks – if not months – in. And this was the point I introduced her to the alphabet names. Before this, the only thing she knew was what the alphabet sounded like: ah, buh, kuh etc.

2. Vowels and Blending two letters

Once she could recognize all of the alphabet and their sounds, I introduced her to the vowels. We paired the vowels with every consonant; first in front and then behind them, starting with a: ab, ac, ad, af – – up until az. Then ba, ca, da, fa – – up to za.

We did the same thing for the next vowel, then the next, until she knew how a particular vowel sounded when it preceded a particular letter or when it came after. 

3. Blending Words

Next we moved on to blending words, starting with three letter words (the two letter words are already covered!) This is when the pre-school textbooks came in. Mostly I used Jolly Phonics at this stage – as a guide to finding which words to blend and how to escalate but generally, I depended on my own flow and words. 

This – blending sounds into words –was the stage I started with Child 2, my first daughter. She had been in school (KG to grade one) when I realized she couldn’t read. She had fooled her teachers, though, because she had memorized passages in her textbooks. We had just moved cities then, so we decided to homeschool. Suffice it to say, it was a herculean task I would hate until years later when I started teaching her sister years later! In fairness to her, I was less patient with her than I later learned to be with her sister.

After the three letter words, as blending became easier, we went to four letters, five letters, then diphthongs and on and on.

Notice that I was not in a rush here. The first stage: recognizing and sounding alphabets: took six to eight months. At least that’s what I remember planning for although I don’t think she – Child 3 – spent all of the allocated time. The next phase of sounding out the vowels, up until three letter words was supposed to be another six month, bringing us to the end of “grade 1”. 

I did every stage up until this level in instalments of six months. 

I introduced the Jolly Readers when she was blending confidently, letting her sound and blend through each book herself. The books were non fiction, in levels of increasing difficulty. And by the time we’d worked through the Jolly Phonics big book and the readers, including the unusual words (end of “grade 2”) she was able to read even above her grade level confidently. I continued to read to her everyday, usually lap reading that allows them to recognize the words. 

4. Writing and Reading in Earnest

Once she was able to sound out words easily, including the unusual words, we started reading the Ladybird (Peter and Jane) series, from the first book until she mastered them i.e. could read them perfectly or became bored with the stories. Often, she raced through them without waiting for me. I never got beyond book 8 with either girls!

At this point, they have graduated to ‘serious work’ and I introduce handwriting practice, usually in the form of copying. We use a three line notebook and they have to copy a sentence I had written out. None of my kids liked this part!

5. Grammar

Almost simultaneously with handwriting, I introduce grammar, using First Language Lessons for the Well-Trained Mind by Jessie Wise. The book is pretty self explanatory that we just work through  it. Usually it has a particular grammar lesson that you explain to the child, complete with the text of what you’re supposed to say and sometimes exercises that the child is supposed to work through. We usually go through books 1 to 3 in about two years while in grade three and four, and then we are done with that. It gives a pretty solid grammar foundation for the child to build on during middle and high school years. 

6. Expositional and Creative Writing

While we’re working on book 3 of FLL, I introduce them to writing skills. I use Writing With Ease, Strong Fundamentals: A Guide to Designing Your Own Elementary Curriculum by Susan Wise Bauer. (Yes, they are mother and daughter!) and all of its accompanying student handbooks. It’s a pretty straightforward curriculum, too. It is the first stage of a writing curriculum that continues all through high school – viz Writing With Skill, and Writing with Style – and yes, we invested in all of it! 

Each lesson is well laid out, usually containing exercises which, at the beginning, were copying from the book. It goes into detail in explaining the different basic tenets of what good writing is. By Style, the child is expected to be working through the material herself.

Full disclosure, the kids hated the writing curriculum! They would both later credit it for the quality of their written work, though, so…

We worked through Writing with Ease, Skill and part of Style with my son, but we never got to Writing with Style with Daughter 1. I valiantly abandoned the battle for a strategic retreat on the last book of Skill, somewhere towards the end of her middle school days. Because, another tenet of my homeschooling is to go on with the work unless you realise it’s not helping the child anymore.

7. Middle school

 Middle school is the transition period from me teaching them actively, to them self-studying.

When my son finished grade school, I allowed the naysayers to persuade me that he might be deficient, or need more help with his studies than I was able to give. As an expatriate family, and for ease of future international use, we decided to use the British curriculum, and we enrolled him to Wolsey Hall Oxford, a long distance homeschooling college whose greatest selling point to me was that they had been in existence for over a hundred years. (Ok, having Nelson Mandela in their list of alumni was pretty darn impressive, too! )

It is not a decision I regret. If anything, his seamless transition into a ‘structured’ setting, and the feedback from his tutors, were validation that we had done something right. We got all the middle school materials from WHO and I helped him to work through it until he found his feet with self studying. By the second year (grade 8) he had worked out a system where he knew what he could work through, what he could reach out to his tutors for. His tutors were helpful, and we especially loved the English tutor for how much farther she pushed his writing skills.

So yay, I was free!

I wish. 

But seriously, my work reduced mainly to nagging him to get work done and submit assignments on time. And reading over his essays before submission – though he stopped letting me do that after a while, because I was bragging too much to family and friends! 😦

With Child 2, less than two years younger, but almost an extra year later because we ran into some snafu (read, “I hate homeschooling!”) we didn’t register for WHO. For one thing we already had, and I made use of, the materials. But also, which I envisaged, less than a year into it, she kind of abandoned all of her work in the English Curricula and she concentrated on the Arabic Curriculum. Her mother for all the years until then, I chose my battle and waited. Now, a couple of years later, when she has realized she could never out-Arab the Arabs, she’s back. 

8. Highschool curriculum 

We still use the British curriculum, duh!

In Child 1’s case, we already registered him at WHO where he continued his work via self study. All grown up now, the boy refused my help – save the occasional, ‘I don’t get this’ up until he finished his exams. (Not even jealous of his physics lessons with his dad o!) He’s taking a break while awaiting his result to decide on his next step (per his request)

Child 2, you might have already guessed, is more inclined to doing things in her own way. She’s primarily self-studying now, although I insisted on signing her up for an online interactive real-time class. That has helped her realize where and how far she’s behind, and she’s slowly working through the KS3 curriculum that she had abandoned. High school for her so far (grade 10 now) has been doing her high school work and her deficit, using her brother’s old KS3 and IGCSEs materials, in tandem. My role has mostly been supervisory and helping her catch up in the places where she feels she needs help. 

This all leaves me relatively free to begin work in earnest this summer, almost year late, with Child 3, who’s about to start on her grammar lessons – all excited and totally unprepared for what’s about to hit her!

Miscellaneous – Spelling and Reading were also essential, if less structured, parts of our curriculum. In addition to the excerpts in their texts, recommended reading materials, and the books they picked out for leisure reads on bookshop haunts, our house is filled with the classics – initially the children’s version, later the adult reprints. I credit those books, and a love for reading, in no small way for how our English literacy curriculum has shaped out.

And all praise is to Allaah, Lord of the Worlds.