Kindergarten Curriculum

It has not been easy trying to decide what to teach and what method to use to teach it. There are so many wonderful free resources out there it is mind boggling at times. I have a real problem with looking at what others are doing and thinking I can do all that, as well as everything from the other dozen blogs that I have been looking at.

I have spent the first few weeks this year seeing how this would work and trying a few different school methods to see how my daughter will best learn. I have learned that she is a lot like me and an eclectic approach is definitely going to work the best with her.

I have realized that with the plethora of information out there, soo much of which is soo good, that it is not going to be possible for me to do all the planning and pulling together of resources for Monkeys Kindergarten year since I also work 30 to 40 hours each week. So after much thought and research, and very limited funds, I have chosen the following for our educational framework:

Language Arts - Time 4 Learning
Math - Time 4 Learning (level K and Gr 1)
Science - Time 4 Learning and Mr Q science program. Right now I only have the free book of elementary life science which I will use before deciding to purchase the rest of the program but so far it looks like a pretty good match for us.
Spanish - Online Free Spanish. In Canada our official languages are English and French, but Monkey is determined to learn Spanish - Thanks Diego.
Sight Words - The You Can Read program that is at 1+1+1=1 is amazing, and it is even more amazing that she is willing to offer this program to everyone for free...Thank you!
Geography - We aren't following a particular curriculum, but our goals are to learn the continents, oceans, and all the provinces and territories with their capitals, and as much other information about Canada as we can get in.
We are also working on her printing skills through journaling.


Even though the Time 4 Learning program is a subscription site, it looks like a really great fit for my DD; and since I am paying monthly rather than a yearly fee, if it doesn't work out I can cancel at any time. Also with the Time 4 Learning program we can also access the Grade 1 work where needed. This will be great since I have already had a local teacher tell me that Monkey would need to be in Grade 1 if she were to attend public school. It seems that she is already advanced for our local education system.

I only hope that I haven't gotten overly ambitious, after all, this is kindergarten, not graduating year. I will be continually evaluating our routine and methods. While I want to ensure she has a good foundation in reading, writing and arithmetic to set her up properly for all her future learning goals, above all I want her to have lots of time to have fun, play games, and be creative!