I am in the process of trying to get together my final curriculum for homeschooling this coming year.

Earlier in the year, I made a wishlist at christianbook.com - the cheapest place to buy all your books (Christian or non) in one spot. My total was just over $500 for all subjects including art and phys. ed. for Painter and Jokey and some pre-school stuff for Baby Smurf. Not bad.

Only there is one problem. I spent the money I had saved for homeschooling books and haven’t replaced it yet.

Then the other day I was reading a post on another blog about homeschooling for free using web resources. The more I thought about it, the more doable it seemed.

I went back and forth several times, then decided on this: I will purchase, as planned, SOS math for each of the two boys at CBD and I’ll buy Learning Language Arts Through Literature on e-Bay. (I already got the Orange Teacher’s book for $10.73 inc. shipping!) But the rest I will do using the library and online resources.

The thing that terrified me most was science. I kept thinking, “What if they don’t learn enough?” I have always wanted to keep them at or above grade level in three things: math, science, and reading. I don’t really worry about the other things because they can learn whatever else they need or want to as long as they can read.

If I have that level of confidence for everything else, why am I afraid about the science? I had 24 credits of university lab sciences - not the easy classes either - so I can’t figure out why I am so unconfident in this area.

I think it is that popular concept that only professional teachers can teach. At least with a packaged curriculum, I know that I am doing it “right,” but this unguided foray into science leaves me with no metrics by which to gauge my success or theirs. That scares me.

It shouldn’t though. After all, the elementary science teaching is just an introduction to get their feet wet. It is not until the high-school level that they need to tackle a full year of physics, chemistry, and biology and hopefully retain some of it.

My focus at this age should be fostering a love of exploration of the natural world. Who needs a curriculum to do that?