Rough Course Outline

Our goals for John are to become confident in his ability to learn independently and not feel pressure from his peers. John has a unique imagination, in which he express’s himself through molding pipe cleaners into anything hewants, from the star ship enterprise to iron man. He is very interested in how things work. He wants to build arobot! I have felt that all through his early school years that the school system has been stifling his creativity an need to learn the things that interest him. This year (2010-2011) is our first year of homeschooling and I am optimistic that we can approach learning in a new and exciting way for John.

We will break the year into for quarters and then again into months. We will be discussing with John what he wants to learn and focus on those things and things related to it. We will be using Geo Caching as a way to contain all the information and make it into a report that can be shared. Johns last day of public school will be Monday the 4^th of October, 2010. He will begin is school year at home Monday the 4^th of October, 2010.

Unit Formula: We will begin the unit by writing down questions that we have and answering questions that we already know (or think we know). Next we will write down things we want to know. Then we will begin our hunt for information, starting at the library. John will be allowed to use whatever is available to him to complete his search. When we have exhausted our search will begin our preparations for the geo cache. The geo cache can be as elaborate or simple as John would like. Possible problems I foresee are running out of material to last a full quarter or John losing interest. In either of these case we will simply finish what we have and start a new unit.

Week 1: We will start off by going to the library and begin with reading and learning to enjoy it! Discuss topics of interest for the year. Figure out a schedule that will include my working at the studio. We will continue looking for a math curriculum that suits our needs. In the mean time I will go to Walmart and see what they have available. The first few weeks will be spent focusing on what he already knows and building his confidence back up. We will also work on memorizing the multiplication tables.

· 1^st Quarter

o Unit Study

§ Lady Elgin

· History

· Health

· Spelling

· English

· Science

o Study for Lake Michigan

· Art

o Math

o Science (1 day a week)

§ Hydraulics (October)

§ Chemicals(November)

· How to make a smoke bomb

· 2^nd Quarter

o Unit Study

§ Prehistoric Times/Mummies

· History

-Mummies at Milwaukee Museum

· Health

· Spelling

· English

· Science

· Art

o Math

o Science (1 day a week)

§ Power(December)

§ EGG-speriments(January)

· #1-How to Tell If An Egg is Cooked

· #2-Can you Make An Egg Bounce?

· #3-Egg in a bottle

· #4-Bernoulli's Principle

· 3^rd Quarter

o Unit Study

§ Titanic

· History

-A night to remember by Walter Lord

· Health

· Spelling

· English

· Science

o Ocean Study

· Art

o Art Math

o Science (1 day a week)

§ (February

§ (March)

· 4^th Quarter

o Unit Study

§ Things that fly

· History

· Health

· Spelling

· English

· Science

· Art

o Math

o Science (1 day a week)

§ (April)

§ (May)