These aren't free, but they come with a lot of options such as daily, monthly, and weekly planners, unit study, book logs, ect. and are editable. There are about 200 pages of extra things like meal planning, chore charts. Print out only what you want/need. https://sallieborrink.com/product-category/planners/

My 6 yr. old goes to speech therapy once a week (going on a year now). I didn't know there is speech therapy in a group format, would individual sessions be more helpful for him? My daughter has her therapy at a local hospital.

My kids have been using this since April because I needed a break. They like the math, science and English. Two of my boys do not like the history so I am looking for something else for history. There is an official parent group and an unofficial parent group on Facebook which is very helpful for questions. For $9.99 a month it's not bad. It has some kinks, but overall it is helpful. I wouldn't use it as our only curriculum. They recently added tutor mode to the homeschool mode, this allows you to go back & forth between the two modes without losing progress in homeschool mode. In tutor mode you can review the lessons as many times as necessary and you can skip lessons your child doesn't need.

We did CC for three years, two in a community. After we left it was so nice to choose our own books and delve into topics we wanted. We had been told by the director that Foundations all by itself was enough. In hindsight, it wasn't enough for our family. I look back at all the money we spent on it and we could have gotten so much more curriculum and joined a different co-op for the social interaction the kids love. I also love to read good books to the kids but that got set aside to practice the memory work.

I loved using this series with one of my older kids (she is a high school English teacher now), I'll have to pull it out and use it with some of my younger crew. .

I see the Leigh Bortins is going to be at the Teach Them Diligently conferences. Thankfully I wasn't planning to go. I also got an email from HSLDA promoting CC which was sad to see.

My son took this class a few years ago when I attended the 3 day seminar and helped volunteer in a gym class. He said it was boring. I spent the whole time trailing a boy in the gym class because he was hitting other kids and every time I took my eyes off him he would harass another child. Turned out that was the child of a director, it was enough to turn me off from ever attending that campus. I know some kids have issues that need to be accommodated, but to put them in an environment where someone else has to keep a constant eye on them and not even tell those people isn't very nice. As HSmomof2 said, we basically found it was babysitting.

I am so glad to hear that weight has been lifted off your shoulders! Since you mentioned needing to pick your own curriculum, I have been enjoying this https://layers-of-learning.com/ lots of neat bunny trails in the boarders of the pages. It's a 4 yr. cycle and there are 20 units to each cycle. They recently added this https://layers-of-learning.com/homeschool-curriculum-catalog/ you can click on the tabs for every single unit and there in the tabs are the library top picks (the guides have more extensive lists), links & videos, printables, and library extensions. They have youtube playlists, Pinterest boards, a correlated guide for spine books ( history, science, geography, and art) such as DK & Kingfisher encyclopedias, Khan Academy videos, and Story of the World https://lookaside.fbsbx.com/file/Layers%20of%20Learning%20Science%20Correlation%20Chart.pdf?token=AWy7CkJfEWKtc-oBnr4sbyblOJ4WoQODF_XJic3v8eD9cr_58BZzroiVqRLMY2mpxgHakYQWdLPpn5VT2YGFBFTO-f9r7zTp_ZIAXwkFUZLnGg74WnlXfG_EhirR3pd_IiKQQ9LM4tRjXPZ1fXKbzuev I am enjoying that we can study a topic as in depth as we want or less in depth with a few books and videos.

Now I understand what you were trying to say, thank you for clarifying! Looks like you will have a ready made group to do a small group. Did/do you tutor at CC? If so and they get wind of you doing your own thing, you may well get accused of breaking your contract. You CAN use your materials, you just can't call it cc (I don't think you were planning to anyway). To this day people who were in the cc group I was in are still rude because they believe the false allegations. Sadly, the people at the top of the chain encourage their members to assume that someone may be doing something illegal and to report them, even before seeing if they might have made false assumptions.

Is your question really then how many other people are in cc for the social benefits? Are you looking for support in what you feel is a less than ideal educational environment and you want to focus on the good things about the current situation? I have a 15 yr old who wants social opportunities and I'm looking in the areas I suggested in my previous post, so I really do understand the desire/need for friendships. I've got a few leads and will be pursuing them.

If you think there aren't other hs groups in your area, go online and see what you can find. Surely not everyone is in CC, there has to be some families who didn't fall prey to cc. Try looking for group music lessons, ice skating lessons, book discussions at the library, classes for home educators at the zoo, museum, or local community college. If you are okay with a church group, call local churches to see if any of them have a group of homeschoolers that meet (they just might not advertise it). Find local evaluators and ask them if they know of any groups that meet for classes or social activities. Maybe check facebook for a local group? If these friends can't be bothered with your daughter outside of CC, then maybe it is time to seek out other friends. I started posting here when I had a terrible experience with a CC director who made false assumptions and accusations. I searched old posts here and read for hours. I felt rather foolish for having been sucked into CC after everything I read here. I sold and gave away my materials. I have a few things left, but will never use them because it was a bad ending and I don't want to be reminded of it. To answer your question, there is nothing I regret about not being involved in cc anymore. As far as being in group with various opinions, I watched the peer pressure in the Essentials class when they had to take a side on an opinion paper for the IEW lesson. Nope, I don't miss it at all.

I'm sure it was here that someone said cc is like the Amway of homeschooling. My friend and I laughed at that and now to hear they have someone who worked for Amway is hilarious. Thanks for sharing that!

I know she wasn't being malicious. I'm irritated (?) that this seems to be a new narrative or way of referring to people who don't pay to join an official campus. Saying people are using their curriculum illegally makes it sound like people are doing something wrong when in fact they aren't. It seems to lead members to think badly of other people when there is no reason to do so. I don't understand why they even have a disclaimer in the front of the guide saying if you use the book in a group setting to make sure each family has their own book if they attack people who do this. Why even bother selling their products to the general public when they don't want people using them on their own?

Hi everyone, I don't post much here, I came to the WTM to read about the experiences others had with Classical Conversations and a thread that was about 10 pages long was so helpful and thought provoking! I'm not sure which board to post my comment/question. I left a licensed community I was in after two years when it became too expensive for my family. I also had some concerns. When I left, a friend left also and we decided to use our books and do some of the things and skip other things (like the tin whistle) at home together. Two other families who were not a part of the community asked to join us so it was a total of four families. We didn't call ourselves a CC group and no money was exchanged so it was kept perfectly legal. To keep it short, the director was very angry and made false allegations against me. I did talk to an area manager as she suggested and the area manager assured me it was fine to use our books at home and gave me suggestions to make sure it didn't look like we were duplicating a CC community. We finished the cycle and then I sold my curriculum and never looked back! Today, a person from that community commented to me that someone who was evacuated during the severe weather last month does CC illegally. At my puzzle expression, she matter of factly explained that the person meets with other families and they use their CC material as a group and don't charge anything. She is a very sweet person and I don't think that phrase originated with her. Perhaps I am sensitive given the experience I had. I think that used to be called having an unofficial group. Saying "doing CC illegally" sure has a different connotation to me! What do you think? Thoughts on why it was it phrased like that? Perhaps scare tactics for anyone thinking of using their books at home with friends? Hearing it phrased like that made me even more glad we decided it wasn't for us.

It is too bad they don't do exit surveys when people leave CC and have something in writing from everyone involved about how a conflict was resolved when there is a problem. I had a director assure me that her area manager backed her up completely and she confidently gave me the area manager's email and phone number. The area manager's interaction with me was the complete opposite and she assured me it was not illegal for me to use my books at home with friends. She even told me how to make sure our use of our Foundations guide didn't look exactly like a day on a campus. I wonder now if the area manager told the director she was completely wrong? Even two years later the director and her friends are rude to some of us who chose to leave CC.