VA6336
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Posts posted by VA6336
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Classical Conversations is AWESOME for what you're describing. Even if you don't choose to join a community, you might want to invest in the Foundations Guide. It has three 24 week cycles of memory work designed for 4K-6th grade. Having a logical, written down (where somebody else did all the legwork!) plan for memory work has been the best thing we've chosen so far. It's laid out a week at a time so it's easy to see how much they should do each week.
Even with CC, my daughters go through "not knowing" their MW, too. There are just some days they aren't interested in spouting off the information. I have to be sneaky and play games with them. They love doing Candyland with an extra draw pile of flashcards with MW questions on them. In order to move the way the Candyland card says they have to answer the MW question. You could do that with almost any board game. So games help, but another way is listening to it on an audio cd. They absorb it without us feeling like I'm banging it into their heads.
Games and audios are our biggest helps with MW besides drill.
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Whatever the consequence is, it should definitely be immediate!
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We've had a problem of this sort...we have one boy in a class of girls and the girls seem to think it's fun to start pushing and shoving the boy. He doesn't do much to stop them and laughs but then at some point he decides it's not fun anymore. At which point he kicks up a fuss and we have to do something. We've instituted a "hands-off" policy where you are absolutely not allowed to touch the other students and if you do you are removed from the room for a short time-out (this happened to my daughter and I'm the tutor so another parent took her out). If it happens again, there are home consequences to be determined by the parent and you are not allowed to play after lunch. We're hoping it works.
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Wow, there are a lot of really great ideas on here!
We started using http://www.couponmom.com back in the spring and it has made a huge difference (but I wasn't really using coupons before that). We got a discounted Sunday newspaper subscription, so I add the $8 to our monthly grocery/household bill.
I shop at Sam's Club regularly and while I'm not an organic food buyer for the most part, I have been impressed with the selection they have in addition to what I consider "normal" stuff. For things like laundry detergent, paper towels and toilet paper I'm rarely able to buy enough of it on sale at the grocery store (combined with coupons) to make it last any length of time and they are always cheaper at Sam's. If Costco was closer, we'd shop there, too. I have started substituting rags for paper towels on occasion and I've been surprised at how such a simple thing has cut down on our paper usage.
For my family of 5 (small ones: a 5 yr old, a 4 yr old and a 1.5 yr old) we spend around $400 a month for grocery and household items. Not $100 a week, since I go to Sam's twice and the grocery store once or twice in a month, but it evens out by the end of the month.
Good luck!
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Horton Hears a Who!
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...I say take a week off ...
I'm only a first year homeschooler, but it sure sounds to me like no matter what route you end up taking (boxed, or simplifying your current curriculum) you need to give yourself a short vacation! You need time to think, clean, organize and prepare. If you go with a boxed curriculum, will you wonder if you've taken the "easy" way out by scrapping all your other great ideas? I say take a week (or two if you need it) to make your decision carefully, get the house ready, reward everyone at the end of it with a field trip and then plunge back in.
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My daughter received a set for her 4th birthday. They are very easy to put together (they actually stay together) and take apart again. She was given the ones that make bug-robot looking things. She did them a few times, but now they're sitting in the corner, lonely. I think if she had two or three times the number of blocks, she might enjoy it, but with the construction toys you already have, I wouldn't waste any money on them!
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We had a similar cash flow problem and started to run up some cc debt, too. My father-in-law suggested that we get an auto loan on one of our paid-off vehicles. The interest rate was much lower (4.75%!!!) and we could rest easier knowing that auto debt is much less damaging than cc debt on a credit report, and we could build up our savings and remain living within our means. It worked wonderfully.
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You might consider that if you intend to stay in the house for three or more years that it wouldn't be worth paying down your mortgage more quickly until you're fully funding your other long-term savings. A house is the best investment you can make and with a reasonable interest rate (4.5-5.5%) on a 30 year loan, you'll make more money by funding your retirement and other savings over the length of your mortgage than if you paid off the mortgage. If you're already funding your long term savings, don't have any credit card debt and are living well within your means, then I guess your choices would be to invest in home improvements or to pay off the mortgage. Then, it's totally up to you!
Dave Ramsey has good advice, but remember that everyone has a unique situation and that blanket advice doesn't apply to everyone. As an alternative and another good viewpoint, you might look at Bert Whitehead's book, Why Smart People Do Stupid Things With Money.
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Woo-hoo! At least now we know there's two of us. :001_smile:
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We're doing CC with my 4K and Kindergartners and while I had intended to do CC day + 4 school days, it's really working out to be CC + 3 school days. That fourth day we've ended up spending doing all the fun stuff that homeschoolers get to do like going to the library, zoo, nature center, etc. Maybe I'm not pushing the math as much as I should, but I'm finding that retention isn't a problem.
We did start our school year about 6 weeks before CC started and we'll keep going another 6 weeks after it ends. That makes our school year about 36 weeks long with a nice long break in December. So it works out this year to August-end of November, then beginning of January-beginning of May (or something like that, don't quote my spring end date!). I guess we're "sort-of-year-rounders."
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I'm hoping to find other classical homeschoolers in the Memphis area. We live in East Memphis. Anyone out there? There's another thread for Tennessee, but it seems to be overwhelmingly middle to eastern Tennesseans.
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We're using Phonics Pathways with Starfall.com and Bob books and it's working really well. When my oldest gets tired (and cranky) reading out of the PP, we use the white board and I usually just copy out the words and sentences onto the board.
I had a little trouble getting started with PP because there is SO much on one page. A good friend suggested a blank piece of paper to cover what we weren't looking at and it's been fabulous. It helps with the visual tracking and keeps both my girls from being overwhelmed. I really like that in the newest edition there are lots of games included in the text that are easy to use and flexible for many different lessons.
Another friend of mine is using OPGTR and one of the differences we've noticed is that OPGTR teaches the end of three letter words, while PP teaches the beginning of them. For example, her son learned in OPGTR "-at" and "-ot" then was taught "c-at" and "c-ot." In PP, my daughters learned "ca-" and "co-" and then added ending consonants.
Hope that helps!
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That's great to know that there's a Yahoo group for CWH, I'll look for it tonight. I didn't know there was a Catholic WTM group, either. Where do I find it?
We just have volume 1, and it's my understanding that only volumes 1 & 2 are published so far. It definitely looks preparation-intensive! I don't intend to start using it until next fall with my what-will-be first grader and kindergartners.
For those of you that have looked at it, do you think the reading lists are enough? Do they cover what needs to be covered or am I going to find big holes?
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No one?? AAHH! If no one on here has used it, surely I'm in trouble....
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My 5 and 4 year olds practice piano first thing in the morning while I'm setting up for our day (or doing the breakfast dishes, or changing a diaper, or running the trash down to the street before the trash truck passes us again...).
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I'm considering using Connecting With History as our history backbone next year and I'm hoping that some of you have some comments about it for me. Any thoughts?
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We've been using Music for Little Mozarts since the spring with my then-barely five year old and three and a half year old daughters. They really like the stories and haven't lost interest in the books yet (and we're finishing the second one). I will say that it helps if there's a grown-up around that can play the accompaniment (gosh, wouldn't it be great if I could spell?), otherwise it could get dull. My girls LOVE playing with someone and it's the highlight of their week (if they practice like I ask, then once a week Daddy sits with them and plays). I've never seen the other one you're considering, but I recommend this one.
Resources for Memory Work?
in K-8 Curriculum Board
Posted
Yes, you could use it at home and do CC secular. If you're in a community, it would be much more difficult to avoid Christianity. CC uses Veritas Press history timeline cards which are Biblical in perspective, so you might skip that section. The History Sentences are really broad in perspective.
The memory work "subjects" in the Foundations guide are Math, English Grammar, Science, Geography, Latin, History Sentence, and History Timeline. There are also sections on Fine Arts (music theory, music history, basic art instruction and art history) and Science Experiment but they are both hands-on materials and not memory work. In addition to the Foundations guide which has all the memory work written out with the essential maps, CC also produces audio cds, resource cds and online tutorials to go along with the work.
I don't think we would be having nearly as much success with memory work if I hadn't had the CC materials to "show me the way." That said, I know there are materials out there that give different ways to present memory work once you've decided what that is for you...but of course, I can't find the notebook I've kept that stuff in. :glare: