Next year is going to be a very exciting school year for both Kelly and Christian. We bought the Sonlight books for Kelly this year, but not the study schedule. We were not even going to do that, but when we got to looking at them, we realized it would be a shame not to read them. Still, we are going to deviate significantly from the type of schedule she has followed in the past because we/she wants(s) to concentrate on college level material and material that will prepare her to take college classes. We will emphasize Math this year so she will be well prepared for Calculus next year. This year’s science is a Biology program that is nothing short of amazing. We are planning to supplement it with some discussion of current topics, too. We bought Understanding Intelligent Design by William Dembski and Sean McDowell and Explore Evolution by Stephen Meyer, et. al. Christian, Kelly, and I plan to read those books aloud together. Kelly’s other main area of concentration will be the CLEP tests she plans to take. They include Biology, Spanish, U.S. History II, Psychology, and Sociology. We are not sure how fast she can go on those tests, but it is a good goal that we can modify if necessary.

I started creating the 2008-2009 homeschool plan this weekend. I got a good start on making it significantly more automatic than in years past. I keep the schedule in an OpenOffice.org spreadsheet, so I downloaded the lasts version (2.4.1) to get started. Early in the process, I realized it would be easier to set up a schedule for the whole year, then make modifications to it when there were changes than to add one week at a time like I have done in the past. I finished about half of Kelly’s schedule, but have had some additional thoughts on how to improve it, so I might start over again from scratch next weekend. After I finish Kelly’s schedule, I will be able to start with that as a base for Christian’s schedule so it will go a lot faster.

Diet notes: This is the first weekend in the history of my diet that I have not gained wait on Monday. If I can just do that a couple of more times, I might be able to continue to lose weight. Bryan has almost met his goal. I will bug Lyle about where he is.