Galore Park and homeschooling

I think it was Becky who turned me on to Galore Park books and boy, am I grateful, because I really like these books. Galore Park publishes books which are widely used by British prep schools (which, I have to admit, gives my snobby heart a little thrill) and are geared for their 11+ and 13+ exams.

We started off with Our Island Story, in hardcover and abridged audiobook. I also have the French ***(text, CD & answer book), English and Maths (text & answer book. I didn't get the pupil book or teacher's resources & it just means that once in a while I need to either photocopy & white-out an assignment from the answer book or reproduce it myself. Most of the lessons are the type the pupil has to write out themselves.)

The Science just arrived yesterday. I purchased the textbook and a Teacher's Resources CD-ROM. The CD-ROM has:
- a worksheet for each section - either a list of true/false questions or a crossword puzzle;
-an 'investigation' for each section - this is not a hands on experiment but rather an analysis of someone else's hands on work. For example it will describe someone's observations about a particular phenomenon - rate of growth of tadpoles for instance - and the students are asked to graph the data presented, comment on the validity of the experiment and what conclusions can be drawn from it
-answers to the worksheets

I think it will suit our needs. This is a very science- rich (but scattered!) home and what I wanted was a concise syllabus of science at this stage - just to make sure we're not missing something and as a review. I think it will do excellently for that. It does not appear to have much messy hands on stuff (which is what Hugo wants) but we have other resources for that.

The Galore Park books we're using are all from the Level 1 set which is intended as prep for the 11+ exams, though the maths book says "The book is suitable for 11+ preparation and would also be suitable as a Year 7 course for those taking Common Entrance Papers 1 and 3 at 13+. " which makes me glad I'm not living in the UK because I can't figure out what the heck they're saying. Up to this point I haven't been too concerned about grades and levels so I'm a bit wonky on what it is that kids are 'supposed' to know - but this math book covers a lot and for a change, Amelia doesn't hate it (unlike Saxon and Singapore which she dislikes with a passion. The kind of passion that makes marks in walls when books fly) and so it's a winner with me.

I plan on using the Science book with both kids. Amelia's Maths will, I think, take us straight through June. She almost finished the English during the summer. I think we'll just review a bit and see if she wants to do a few more of the exercises which she skipped. For the French, Amelia will do the whole program but Hugo will just listen in on the audio. He struggles enough with writing in English that I'm not about to add French to his plate now.

Buying tip: depending on currency exchange & shipping charges, it may be cheaper to buy the books through Amazon. Indeed, I have purchased all our Galore Park books through Amazon.ca though they're tricky to find as they are not clearly catalogued. What you need to do is get the ISBN's for the textbooks/answer books/teacher's books/CD-ROM's etc. from the Galore Park site, and then search the Amazon site using the number.

They are all concise - no fluff here and so may not seem like a lot of value if you're used to boxed curricula which come with tons of stuff. But they're clear, to the point, and attractive without being frou-frou. The publisher says: "The guiding principle of all of our books is that they can be used by a pupil working alone and are thus ideal for both classroom and revision use." To which I'd add, 'and great for homeschooling!'


(edited to add)
*** bringing up a question from the comments about the French program and what's on the CD:
The CD does not have the entire lesson on it but for each lesson, there's a dialogue and that is on the CD. If you go HERE you will see some sample pages from the textbook. In the margins there is a diagram of a CD and that indicates this passage is on the CD.
I'd suggest combining this program with something like the Berlitz Rush Hour French which we have listened to a fair bit (& yes, it is as corny as the reviewers say but we like it). The Berlitz is a purely oral program and gets the student used to hearing and saying common phrases. I wanted to add Galore Park for Amelia because I think she's ready for the slightly more formal intro to grammar and spelling.

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Last week's homeschooling went well. The week was sandwiched by pancake breakfasts on Monday & Friday, and in between I eased us into math, English, Arabic and Canadian history. Work got done every day, there was no whining or fussing, only a constant search for pencils and erasers - they apparently are still on holidays and hiding out in nooks and crannies. This week I'll be folding in French, maybe the science and cooking too.

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BONUS

Easy peasy strawberry syrup for eager students' pancakes

Place frozen strawberries into a 1 cup pyrex measure. You want about 1 C of strawberries and approx. a 2 cm of clear space to the top of the measure.

Add 2 heaping teaspoonfulls of sugar.

Microwave 1 minute. Watch it as it sometimes wants to bubble over in which case turn off the microwave, wait a bit for it to cool and resume.

Give the cup a little swirl and microwave another 30-60 seconds. You want to see pink bubbling froth swelling on the top.

Let it cool a bit & pour on top of pancakes, spooning the fruit out.