Hey guys! Okay, since we just started a new school year, I thought it was high time for a “What’s in the Workbox” post. It’s been a little bit since I’ve done one of these, and I also haven’t had a 1st grader for a while either. So let’s take a peek into her workboxes to see what she’s got going on this year!
Just to recap, Miss Lady Bug is in 1st grade this year. Her schedule is a little bit full because I couldn’t decide between a couple of things so I’m making her do it all. But so far she’s handling it well. The only thing I’ve officially removed from her list is typing. She just isn’t ready for it, though she loves to do it and begs me constantly.
DRAWER 1
Here is her first drawer. Inside you’ll find her Daily Learning Notebook She’ll be using the Elementary level manuscript version. As well as our Word of Life Challenger Quiet Time devotion, and our Linus expandable drawer divider from the Container Store. It has pencils, glue sticks, erasers, sticky tabs, and probably a few toys as well.
DRAWER 2
Her second drawer is all math. She has her Math U See Alpha, Kumon Dollars & Cents, & Kumon Telling Time books in there. She does a Math-U-See worksheet each day, and then alternates the counting money and telling time books. So for example she does Counting Money on M/W and Telling Time on T/Th. She also has a ruler in there. I keep the workbooks in the drawer, an just pull out each day’s worksheet and lay it on top.
DRAWER 3
This is our phonics drawer. When she hits this drawer she lets me know, and we do our Abeka phonics lesson, and our All About Spelling Level 1 phonics flashcards together. I just find that they go together well. Then she does an Abeka Letters & Sounds 1, and Language 1 worksheet each day. We aren’t using the word list from AAS right now, just the phonics rules.
DRAWER 4
So this is clearly our spelling drawer. And by now I think you’re all probably wondering why she has 2 spelling things in here. Partly it’s because I want her to get used to a word list each week and the Abeka Spelling 1 lists are great. I also like the Spelling You See program and it kind of doubles as handwriting for us, so yeah. She gets to do two. Lucky girl 
So she works on her Spelling You See B, and then does one sheet from the Abeka Spelling 1.
This last drawer holds her Expedition Earth Geography/Science Curriculum binder along with her vocabulary and her daily Abeka 1 readers. Do any of you do Vocab for first grade? This is the first year I’m trying it, and honestly I’m not sure it’s worth it. Since I have to read almost everything to her it almost seems a little bit like a waste of time. She’s using the Vocabulary Workshop Grade 1 Level Red book. They do have some cool online audio things to listen to each week for her word list, so that’s a plus. Hmm…decisions decisions.
And that’s all that is in her daily workbox drawers. Here are a few of the things we do that aren’t stored in her boxes:
- History: The Renaissance & Reformation (We do this as a group, and I give handouts for it so they’re not in the workboxes.)
- Art: Combo of World’s Greatest Artists 2 , Home Art Studio, and See the Light Art DVDs
- Keepers of the Faith (We meet once a month for various activities.)
- Music: World’s Greatest Composers Vol 1 (Continued from last year)
- Literature: Classical Literature Units (We’ll do read-a-louds using books from my Vol. 1 list)
- Piano: Teach Yourself Piano
- P.E. : Swim Team, inline hockey (maybe) & Co-op
- Options: This is a once a week co-op that we go to through our school district. Miss Lady Bug takes Spanish, science, art, music, & PE.
For anyone with questions on our school room or workbox drawers, you can check out our school room setup here. Links to all of furniture and supplies are there to help you out.
You can also see a check out this video I did a while back on our workboxes! We’ve stuck with the Ikea drawer units since they fit better in our room right now.
Need workbox printables? I have a ton of free printables you’re welcome to download and use in your homeschool!
- My Schedule Strip and Plain Numbers
- Workbox Subject Cards
- Workbox Scheduling Template (Editable excel file)
- Workbox Preschool Template (Editable excel file)
- Blank Workbox Numbers (with space for you to add your own images)
- I Spy Card
- Spanish Card
- JumpStart Card
- Time 4 Learning Card
I have a first and second grader, and they are doing the vocabulary workshop too. I can see your point about the first grade book. It’s pretty simple exercises that make the high price tag a little hard to swallow. The words and activities are something I probably could’ve put together myself. However, I find the next level to be great. In the future I may have my next first grader skip the red book. We didn’t start vocabulary until this year so we didn’t experience the first grade book with my now second grader.
Hello there!!
This looks amazing (all that you’ve shown for this grade). I am wondering if you have a collection for 8th and 9th grade too? I am terrible at putting things together but love these resources.
It looks to me like they’re suited up to only 5th grade?
Can you please help?
Thank you.
Shelly
This looks great, we are doing a mix of grade 1 and 2 as my eldest would be year 2 of school here in the uk but i prefer the fact that across the water school starts when they are 6. So with vocal we have started this year and have found a free online resource which allows him to hear the words and definitions and also provides activities which he gets to do once he has learnt that days quota of new words. We also only started spelling this year as we decided to wait till he was confident with reading.
My main reason though for commenting was to thank you for the great artists material. My children have had a ball in the garden this afternoon being “Picasso” using his blue and rose style, which was totally initiated by them as we have only just started the material and they were eager to get to work and put what they were reading about into practise.
Can you tell me what bible version Word of Life devotionals use!
I don’t think it’s a specific version that I can find. We just use our own bibles, and most of the ones my kids have are NIV or NIRV. I think you can use whatever you want, but you might just need to help a little if wording is off. So far we haven’t had any issues.
Curious about the Word of Life devotionals your youngest is using. From the website, it looks like something akin to Awana because there are Leader guides and awards/rewards. Is this the case? How did you come to know about it? I’d love to incorporate something like this for my boys but need a little more personal info as their website doesn’t give much. Thanks!
There aren’t any leader guides/awards like Awanas. It’s just a short daily devotion that they can do mostly on their own to get them in the Word and studying. It was recommended to me by my friend Courtney from Women Living Well 🙂
Thanks for sharing the breakdown… Have you thought at all about making sight word searches for teeny tot, I mean miss lady bug, with the first grade sight words? We loved the K4 sheets!
Great idea!
Do you find that you need the Teacher Guide for “Abeka Letters & Sounds 1” and “Language 1” ? The big teacher guide that is (HOMESCHOOL PHONICS, READING, AND SPELLING 1 CURRICULUM). 🙂
Totally didn’t mean to yell that title haha. I just did a copy/paste from their site. 🙂
I think for first grade you could probably do it without the TM, but we do use the lessons in it, then she does the worksheet following. So I guess it’s kind of up to you.
I was curious as to why you used both All About Spelling and Abeka’s Phonics program for the first grade. Do they cover different skills?
Hi Julie,
I use the Abeka readers along with their basic phonics cards and workbook. Really it’s just review practice for her. I like that Abeka has worksheets that she can do on her own. While I prefer the AAS daily phonics lessons and how they teach the sounds. I do the AAS lessons, then use the Abeka worksheets to make sure she can apply what she’s learning.
Hi Erica, is it necessary to use the Abeka language arts 1 homeschool curriculum lesson plans? I am using this as a remedial for my son who is a bit older. This will be my first time using Abeka language arts. I wasn’t sure if it was worth getting for tips and rules, or if I can just look at the workbook…it looks simple enough to figure out! Any advice?
Hi Donna,
You don’t have to follow the teacher’s manual lessons for this. You could just order the workbook and do the worksheets out of them 🙂
The Ikea drawers are AMAZING! The tower drawers are at Michael’s for $30 and are rainbow colored.