4th Grade Charlotte Mason Homeschool Plans, 2019-2020

This is our third year of doing a full Charlotte Mason style curriculum with short, morning lessons on a wide variety of subjects according to a strict timetable designed to fit our family. I love to consult Ambleside Online, a Catholic Charlotte Mason curriculum, as well as Wildwood Curriculum for ideas, but I put it together in my own way.

I love our homemade Charlotte Mason plans so much for many reasons. I can plan knowing myself and my children to ensure that we can actually accomplish 90% of our plans. I can choose affordable books of the highest quality and I can keep everyone in the family in the same historical time period on a 4-year history cycle with up to three different streams of history (our country, a near neighbor, and ancient). Finally, I can avoid books that I do not care for . . . even if everyone else in the world thinks they are wonderful or appropriate.

I have tried to note in [ ] whether I'm using a free book or how much I paid for each of the resources we are using. I am committed to homeschooling with free or really cheap books as part of our journey to be debt-free while living on one income.



You can see past plans and recaps here.

This post contains affiliate links. Read my full disclosure to learn more.

Bible Lessons

This year I am reading narrative portions of the bible during our morning time during breakfast using the lists available on Ambleside Online and using a New Revised Standard Translation. In Home Education, Charlotte Mason stresses that reading the bible should be enjoyable and I feel that we are enjoying a more modern translation better than the King James Version.

Language Arts: Reading/Literature, Spelling, Copywork/Handwriting, Recitation, Grammar, Modern Language

Reading/Literature (30 minutes/week of a book chosen by me, plus evening readings of Shakespearean plays as a family)

This year, Peter will be reading the following titles at least 1 afternoon per week and in other free time if he chooses:

Tales of the Greek Heroes by Robert Lancelyn Green [$.50 book sale find!]
Number Stories of Long Ago by David Eugene Smith [free Google ebook]
Robinson Crusoe by Daniel Defoe [Nice illustrated hardcover for $5 from a local used bookstore (also free ebook)]
The Heroes of Asgard by A. Keary [free Google ebook]

We are planning to spend about 30 minutes twice a week in the evening reading a Shakespearean play aloud. We will have 2 Folger editions of the play to share among me, my husband, and my son. Our tentative plans (flexible at this point to accommodate any local performances I learn about!):

Term 1 - Julius Ceasar - We will attend a local abridged free Shakespeare in the Woods performance this week! [2 copies of the play for $4.49 each from Thriftbooks]
Term 2 - Romeo and Juliet
Term 3 - The Taming of the Shrew

Spelling (3x10min/week)

All About Spelling Level 3 and All About Spelling Level 4 [bought both teachers manuals from eBay for about $15 each]

We have a few lessons left in level 3 and then we will go on to level 4.

Grammar (2x15min/week)

Grammar is a new subject for us this year. Honestly, I didn't look at many options. I took a look at KISS Grammar and liked how it was organized. I also like that it is in a workbook form and that it is free! We are using the middle school level 1 book which I had printed at the local university print shop for $11.

Copywork/Handwriting (4x10min/week)

This year, Peter will select his own sentences for copy work. He will select sentences in his afternoon occupation time and mark them with book darts. Later, during lesson time, he will write a few lines in cursive in a notebook. This year he will be doing this writing in a wide-ruled notebook instead of a primary-ruled one. He will also begin writing narrations. He will start at about 1 per week. He is dreading it already, but I know it will not be too hard once he gets used to it.

Recitation (3x10min/week)

Each 6-week half term he will prepare to recite beautifully (often memorizing) 2 poems and 1 passage. I will choose a poem and a passage and he will choose the other poem.

The whole family will take part in reciting our prepared pieces at our low-key poetry teas during our break weeks. We will eat a snacky dinner, drink tea, and enjoy everyone's unique contributions.

Poetry (Listen to the same poem read aloud every day for a week at morning time)

We focus on a different poet each term and although I do not follow Ambleside Online's poetry schedule, I do choose the majority of our poems from their collection. This year we will focus on:

• Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
• John Keats
• Eugene Field

Modern Language: German (4x15min/week)

We are continuing our study of German through Talkbox.mom [generously funded by a grandfather]. This year we will also include learning German songs using YouTube and other resources found on Mason's Living Languages.

Social Studies: History, Geography, Citizenship

History (2x30min/week, 1x20min/week, oral narration after each reading, plus occasional written narrations)

I spent a very long time trying to find a good history spine for both of my students this year. I knew that I did not want to use This Country of Ours or The Story of the World because I do not care for them. I looked at many other options in light of Mason's words about history and history books. Some I eliminated because of their price, some for racist content, some for drawing too many conclusions for the reader. In Mason's own words:

It is not at all easy to choose the right history books for children. Mere summaries of facts must, as we have seen, be eschewed; and we must be equally careful to avoid generalisations.

The natural function of the mind, in the early years of life, is to gather the material of knowledge with a view to that very labour of generalisation which is proper to the adult mind; a labour which we should all carry on to some extent for ourselves. 

As it is, our minds are so poorly furnished that we accept the conclusions presented to us without demur; but we can, at any rate, avoid giving children cut-and-dried opinions upon the course of history while they are yet young. What they want is graphic details concerning events and persons upon which imagination goes to work; and opinions tend to form themselves by slow degrees as knowledge grows. --Home Education, 287-288

After much searching, I think the books I have chosen will serve Peter well this year.
He will learn about the American history of the 1800s using the following books:

• Landmark History of the American People from Plymouth to the Moon by Ruth Frankel Boorstin and Daniel J. Boorstin [free with reading rewards book credit from Thriftbooks]
• Freedom Train: The Story of Harriet Tubman by Dorothy Sterling [Library]
• Commander in Chief: Abraham Lincoln and the Civil War by Albert Marrin [$3.99 from Thriftbooks]
• Gettysburg by MacKinlay Kantor [$3.20 from Thriftbooks with coupon]

He will learn about British history of the 1800s using the following books:

• Our Island Story by H.E. Marshall [already owned, bought used for $4.99 but free with Amazon credit]
• The Story of Florence Nightingale (Signature Biography) by by Margaret Leighton and Corrine Boyd Dillon [vintage hand-me-down from my mom's childhood]
• Charles Darwin chapter from Famous Men of Science by Sarah Knowles Bolton [free Google ebook] 

Peter will also begin keeping a Book of Centuries. I splurged on this beautiful heirloom-quality book in the hopes that it might be a treasured possession one day. For that to happen, it is going to require regular additions. Peter will be asked to add at least one entry and one picture per week during his afternoon occupation time.

Geography (2x20min/week, oral narration after each reading, plus related mapwork that I keyed to the readings)

• The Lewis and Clark Expedition by Richard Neuberger [$3.60 from Thriftbooks with coupon]
• Our Country and Its People by Will Seymour Monroe and Ann Buckbee [free Google ebook]

This is a subject that we all love and I think that it is going to be even better this year after I have learned more about how Charlotte Mason did geography with her students by listening to the ADE podcasts on the subject.

From last year, I have reduced the number of pages assigned for each lesson to leave more time for using maps without rushing. Each lesson begins in front of an appropriate atlas page where I ask my son questions about geography that he can answer using the map. We will also have some lessons for map drills where he will complete a blank map with the atlas in front of him, then will complete a blank map from memory.

I also bought an atlas. I choose this one from 2010 which was recent enough and affordable enough for our purposes. [$25.20 used on Amazon]

Citizenship aka Plutarch (1x30min/week, oral or written narration after each reading)

Another new subject for Peter is Citizenship. For term 1, he will familiarize himself with some of the names and places of Rome by reading Stories from the History of Rome by Mrs. Emily Beesly [free Google ebook).

Then, he will follow along while I read one of Plutarch's lives per term. We will use Anne White's study guides to study Julius Caesar and Demosthenes this year.

Maths

Math (5x30min/week, dictated narration after each lesson which I record in our math notebook (we use one of these)

Beast Academy, 5B-5D [already owned gift from grandparent]

My son loves math. And I mean really loves it as in he will sometimes work on math for hours a day if he has free time. This year, he hopes to take the AMC exam in November at a local university for fun, so we may spend some time preparing for that, but otherwise, we will work on completing Beast Academy. When that happens, we will move on to The Art of Problem Solving: Prealgebra or Algebra depending on where he places according to their diagnostics.

I have zero interest in rushing him forward into any level of math. However, I want him to find math challenging and enjoyable. So we work on our math curriculum for only 30 minutes a day and he enriches that experience with books, websites, and apps in his free time.

Science: Experimental Science, Nature Lore, Special Studies, Nature Notebook

Experimental Science (1x30min/week science reading, oral or written narration after each reading, 1x30min/week activity or experiment)

Another new subject this year for Peter is experimental science and he is excited to begin studying a new topic each term. He will use the following books for science this year:

Term 1: Find the Constellations by H.A. Rey [previously owned $1 book sale find!] and Astronomy for All Ages by Phillip Harrington [already owned]

Term 2: Matter Molecules and Atoms by Bertha Morris Parker [$14.79 new on Amazon]

Term 3: Magnets by Rocco V. Ferovolo [$12.61 new on Amazon]

Each book will be supplemented with activities and experiments that relate to the reading, chosen from experiment books I own or from the web.

Nature Lore (1x20min/week, oral or written narration after each reading)

Peter will read 1 chapter a week of The Story-book of Science by Jean-Henri Fabre [free Google ebook]

Special Studies (afternoon occupation)

I chose the following topics for the year using the rotation found on Sabbath Mood Homeschool :

Term 1: Butterflies and Wildflowers
Term 2: Evergreens Trees and Birds in Winter
Term 3: Insects and Non-flowering plants

Peter will read a bit from a book on the topic of his special study about once per week. I will also continue to read seasonal nature books and books on our special studies at morning time.

I will prepare object lessons as I find the wherewithal based on things I think we will be able to observe. I will prepare by reading the Handbook of Nature Study and watching YouTube videos on the topic.

Nature Notebook (daily entries, nature watercolor drawings, nature walk as an afternoon occupation)

My son is responsible for noticing something from nature and dictating a line or two to my husband or me to write into his nature notebook daily. We still miss a few days a month and that is perfectly fine for us. We do this all year round, 7 days a week.

This year, I am asking Peter to take a 15-minute walk in the neighborhood every afternoon we are home to give him some fodder for his daily entry.

Morning Time

I will continue to read living science and natural history books as part of our morning time. These titles are not narrated.

Wild + Free Nature Group

We will continue to participate in a weekly year-round nature meetup at a rural property.  With our nature-loving friends, my kids get plenty of opportunity for free play as well as opportunities like a wildflower walk with a naturalist, a bird walk with volunteers from the Audubon society, night-time backlighting with a biology professor to see nocturnal insects, as well as camping with other families at a state park. It keeps me accountable for getting us out for half-days in nature every week no matter the weather and has become an important social outlet for my kids.

Art and Music: Watercolor, Drawing, Handicrafts, Singing, Artist Study, Composer Study, Music

Drawing (afternoon occupation)

This year I am not making time for watercolor brush drawing in my son's schedule of lessons. However, he will still be required to paint about 1 specimen per week in his nature notebook. It is not something he looks forward to, but I think this small amount will keep his skills growing in a way that will not make him hate watercolor!

He will also be asked to draw along with some Art for Kids Hub YouTube videos that I curated into a list he can choose from. I chose ones that focus on realistic animals, objects, or landscapes (and not ones that are characters, silly animals, etc.)

Handicrafts (afternoon occupation)

This year, Peter will not have handicrafts as part of his morning lessons. However, he will be expected to work on handicrafts like sloyd, sewing, crochet, cooking, and gift-making of various types every afternoon that we are home. We will use resources like:

• Paper Sloyd: A Handbook for Primary Grades by Ednah Anne Rich
• Sloyd: Or, Educational Manual Training with Paper, Cardboard, Wood, and Iron By Everett Schwartz
• Sewing School: 21 Sewing Projects Kids Will Love to Make by Andria Lisle
• Kids Knitting by Melanie Falick

I will teach him new skills and help out with his projects as needed, but mainly he will manage his work himself.

Singing (2x10min/week)

We will learn the following songs this year. We will also work through the solfa lessons from Children of the Open Air. 

The Battle of New Orleans
The Star-Spangled Banner
Follow the Drinking Gourd
Will the Circle Be Unbroken
Shenandoah
Ding Dong Merrily on High
When Johnny Comes Marching Home
Battle Hymn of the Republic
The Jam on Jerry's Rock
Goober Peas
Drill Ye Tarriers, Drill
The Bonnie Banks of Loch Loman

This year, I chose many songs that match our historical time period (1800s). I only choose songs that I think we can all enjoy and I don't worry if they are true "folk songs" or "Americana" or just fun songs to sing. I consult Ambleside Online but I do not follow their rotation per se.

Artist Study (1xweek at morning time)

This year we will study 6 works from a different artist each term:

Term 1: Monet [Picture Study Portfolios from Simply Charlotte Mason, $18.95+shipping]
Term 2: Van Gogh [Picture Study Portfolios from Simply Charlotte Mason, $18.95+shipping]
Term 3: Durer [Picture Study Portfolios from Simply Charlotte Mason, $18.95+shipping]

I love how easy these portfolios make studying the artists, but I think this may be the last year that we use them because I'm not very happy with the quality of the prints for this price. I did contact Simply Charlotte Mason about what I saw as miscolored prints (that looked completely different than digital online versions) and I felt my concerns were dismissed out of hand. If the prints are not going to be colored well then I might as well just have them printed locally for a fraction of the price!

In case you are wondering, I have been least satisfied with Rembrandt, Turner, Van Gogh, and Monet. The others have met or exceeded expectations.

Composer Study (1x10min/week)

This year we will study the following composers using YouTube performances of their work and Classics for Kids episodes:

• Term 1: Robert Schumann
• Term 2: Franz Liszt
• Term 3: Richard Wagner

This is another subject that I have simplified. We may learn more biographical information about the composer, but I am not making it a priority this year. I choose compositions to listen to from Ambleside Online's lists, but I do not follow their rotation.

Music (7x20min/week)

Peter will continue to use Hoffman Academy [Not an affiliate link! We just love Hoffman Academy.] He is currently in Unit 10 and he expects to continue with Hoffman Academy as long as there are lessons available for his level (it currently goes up to unit 12, but I believe there will be more units added in the future). 

Physical Education

This year, Peter will participate in swimming lessons and will enjoy an active lifestyle with hikes, bike rides, roller skating, and walks around town often, especially in spring, summer, and fall. We may also participate in a homeschool gym class and ice skating lessons depending on whether they fit into our schedule this year.

So there is our plan for the year. And I'm so excited to get started! By the time I am actually hitting publish on this post, we already have one week of homeschooling under our belts and it is going really well. Of course, I always find that the second week is harder than the first! But Peter is excited to read new books and he is loving the new subjects and new materials for this year. I know we are all going to learn a lot and makes lots of wonderful new connections this year.

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