Homeschool Reading List #1: Second Grade

Goals for second grade: 

*increased fluency in reading

*increased proficiency in penmanship, spelling, and mathematics

*a well-furnished literary, historical, natural/scientific, and cultural imagination

*good habits of prayer and an expanded understanding of the faith, with reception of sacraments of reconciliation and communion.

*cultivation of personal responsibility via life skills and chores

Reading List: 

(NB:  These will be presented as individual daily readings of, generally, no more than a page apiece. I've scheduled four selections a week, which allows us to linger over something if we have to. Most of these books are long enough to last us a semester, if not the entire 36-week school year. Until reading becomes really fluent and confident, we'll buddy-read our daily selection, alternating paragraphs. My plan is to print out a week's worth of reading to put in the second-grader's binder, collecting finished readings in a larger binder to be enjoyed again as an anthology)

Kindergarten Gems 
The Burgess Animal Book for Children
Birds of the Air
A Child's Own Book of Verse, vol. 1 (copywork)
Good Stories for Great Holidays (selections)
Christmas in Legend and Story  (selections) 
Understood Betsy
Boys and Girls of Colonial Days

History, science, geography, religion, and more literature will be covered in "combined school," with second and third grades together (that reading list to follow).

More level-appropriate chapter books will be added to school box for independent reading:  The Courage of Sarah Noble, And Then What Happened, Paul Revere, etc. 

Lapbook projects for the Rosary, Advent, Lent, and the life of Jesus courtesy of ThatResourceSite.com. 

Introductory Spanish, plus fun online interactives in spelling, geography, nature, music, and art, via a customized curriculum from Head of the Class. Lapbook and folder projects to unfold from these topics as desired;  I will use file folders, hole-punched to fit into a notebook, for gluing on Spanish vocabulary cards, to keep them straight and available for us to use. I'll also be printing out cursive-writing worksheets:  this child really wants to write in cursive, and it won't happen if I don't have some kind of template.

Math via MEP. We began, experimentally, in Year 2 this last spring, but per advice from the knowledgeable folks at the MEP-Homeschoolers Yahoo group, I think we'll drop back to Year 1 to build confidence and solidify skills and concepts. It's a rigorous-enough program that I don't see this as a setback, and I think we'll be glad in the long run that we took the time to get things right.

Coming soon:  Grades 3 and 8, plus "Combined School." Stay tuned!

PS:  If you wonder how to schedule readings, check out this excellent and helpful conversation.