Wondering if anyone has a model of the skeletal systems that they really like to recommend? Looking for something for my hands on learner to put together like a puzzle. Thanks for any help!

We start our day with snuggles and lots of reading. Any book my daughter likes. Sometimes we read together, or some times we read our own books. This way, we stay out of my hubbie's way while he is getting ready for work. Once he leaves, we are up and at 'em. Little Bit plays in with her toys while i work on breakfast. After that, we ease into math or english. From there, it's just a series of breaks and work time. By 10, it's snack time and we usually have school 2/3rds of the way done by lunch. Good luck! :001_smile:

My 8y/o daughter loves these silly read alouds: The Undone Fairy Tale Washington State Kindie-rocker, Eric Ode--his poems: "Tales of the Wild West" Mrs. Piggle Wiggle Tin Tin books (comic-novel books) -- he's like a European Johnny Quest prankster to catch the bad guys Pippy Longstocking Big Friendly Giant Scrambled States of America and it's sequel Mary Poppins (especially a chapter called "Bad Tuesday") Canterbury Tales (the Oxford Illustrated Classic)...the tale of Chanticleer the Rooster. Some of the stories are a little dicey, but funny. Read first before sharing. :) How to Eat Fried Worms

News of the World Tabloid, owned by Rupert Murdoch, has closed due to evidence that they hacked into phones of victims of murder, kidnapping, or sometimes to simply find out where celebrities were. A couple of higher-ups in Scotland Yard have resigned due to rumours of bribery. A man that was a whistleblower about the phone hacking last year to the NYT was found died in his apartment this weekend. Many people are speculating that FOX News. Corp will somehow be implicated in all this too--Rupert Murdoch runs them as well as WSJ and Fox Sports and a few movie production businesses. Especially interesting due to a first cousin of Dubya's, working for FOX at the time, calling the 2000 election in Dubya's favour; Tony Snow going to work as WH Press Sect. It will be interesting (and scary) to see where all the connect the dots end up. So far, it is reminding me of the beginning of the propaganda machines that the Nazi regime had set in place to "educate the sheep-eople". NYT, Thom Hartmann, Randy Rhodes, The Hill, Huffington Post, The Nation, The Guardian...you can find info on it just about anywhere. And for info-tainment, give a look at how FOX News is explaining it all. Almost as sad as seeing Rupert Murdoch up on the stands basically claiming that the company was "too big to know" (e.g. Too Big to Fail?!?) what was going on. Right. Because anyone who runs a company doesn't really want to know exactly what is happening within the company. Now i see what Aussie's meant when Rupert became a US citizen and they said we could have him. :)

In the attachments you'll find what i think of SWR. :) I took this picture somewhere after the second week of re-reading the first 12 steps of this program over and over. After 4 weeks of reading the 12 steps, i was wishing we hadn't invested in it. My daughter picked up the diagraming of words quicker than i, but now her chief complaint is about how boring this program is--she gets tired of the constant repetition of rules and phonics that she understood the first time they were taught (that visual learning at work, eh?) We started at the beginning as Ms. Sanseri suggested, however, that is what killed the love/hate relationship we had with this program. On another note: even though we are respectably regilious in our family, my child found the constant bible quotations and reference to religion annoying and useless--i.e. in the sentences that were supposed to help define words through context promoted confusion more often than understanding. We've manipulated it to work for us...we went through the first 12 steps and the extra pages of phonetic learning, however now we just review the spelling rules and phonetics at our leisure (read "when we have a problem figuring out a listed word) and since my child is more of a tactile/visual learner, we use the American Sign Language alphabet to spell the words in the weekly list. We are going back to Spelling Workout...and my daughter thinks she would like to keep up signing out the words in SWR. :)

That and don't worry...especially since you have already been at this a while. You are a facilitator, not a teacher. I think that is the biggest misunderstanding with homeschool. We never claim to be professors when taking our children out of the government's school system. We are mothers first--and no one knows how to care for their children better than a mother. We can deliver the food that feeds the brains of our child--the facilitator that helps indulge their curiosities with the big wide world. And we can do this better than the brick and motar school systems because we have only a few little bodies filling the seats in our homes and because we know those little bodies better than anyone else. Then we can creatively find ways to instill grammar, math, spelling, etc. through these subjects. The paperwork you will be filing will be new and will require a learning curve on your part, however i would say that if you've been committing any time to your child in the form of "homeschooling", and as you say he's learning tons of information, you're an old pro. Remember to think outside the box...writing to Grandma and Grandpa can be history, social studies, writing grammar. Helping you grocery shop or cook dinner can be math, grammar, spelling, social studies, occupational ed. A walk in your neighbourhood can include math, history, science, health. You can do this better than anyone... Good luck figuring out the hoops with the paper work and evals. :grouphug:

Our newspaper here in Seattle just picked up a video from a principal in the area who is a diver and happened to catch video of a Pacific Octopus tending her eggs in an underwater cave off West Seattle over the course of 4 months. You can find the video here for now: http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/fieldnotes/2015374366_video_eight-armed_moms_give_their_all_in_puget_sound.html (If you are reading this at a much later date, hopefully you could find the link to the video by Google-ing giant Pacific Octopus hatch 2010) The article given in reference to this video is chock full of info for parents to read & condense for little ones (both the parent octopi die--dads after they mate; moms after the babies hatch.) The video itself will show the mother in the cave, the thousands of eggs hanging in the cave, and you'll see the mother tending the eggs by blowing fresh oxygenated water across the eggs with her syphon. There are some up close gandering at the suckers under the mom's arms too as she moves around. Then you'll see the small little hatchings grow and grow in numbers. There are some amazing still shots too! Please watch the video first without the little ones and decide what you are comfortable with...at the end of the video there is a snippet where the team of divers toast to the new little octopi with a cute birthday song and clinking of beer bottles all round. Just incase there are families that has sensitivities to alcohol, i just wanted to let you know. That scene can easily be avoided though because there isn't much at the end of the video other than copywrites etc. Enjoy and happy hunting

We just received our 2nd grade daughter's test results as well...with below average score in phonetic vowel analysis. Actually, her grade score was 2nd grade, so i was a bit confused on how they qualified it as "below average". Wouldn't 1st grade or lower be "below average"? We were wondering the same thing as far as where to go from here, as her spelling questions were all answered perfectly. Thanks for you help in solving this predicament that is apparently a non-issue. :D

Lake Morton is east of where i live. Nice area. Treed. Has to be some great hikes out there--you wouldn't be too far from Flaming Geyser State Park. There is a great bbq place called Rooters near Lake Sawyer. Ask a neighbour, it won't be far from where you are staying. There is every thing under the sun, er...rain clouds to do here. Tacoma is a favourite spot of ours. Dale Chihuly Glass museum, fantastic farmers market on Thursday (free light rail takes you there), Point Defiance Zoo, Ruston/Proctor area is delightful for relaxing and shopping. There is a ferry from Ruston to Vashon Island...even better is the ferry to Bainbridge Island from Seattle--Bainbridge has an amazing public garden, children's museum, knitting shops and ICE CREAM! :) One thing that may come in handy for you visiting Seattle from the Kent/Covington area is the Sound Transit light rail from Sea Tac airport to Seattle. There are maps for the parking lots that the light rail services on their website. It's often cheaper to ride the light rail in than park in Seattle. From the light rail (it's called the Link), you can walk to Pike Place Market, the museums, catch a free bus from King Street Station to the Waterfront to visit the carnies and aquarium. Our bus system is called King County Metro Transit, and you can find busses and schedules on their website. If your children don't mind tunnels, there is a wonderful and historic tour provided in Pioneer Square in Seattle called The Underground Tour. The Ballard Locks has a fish ladder, so you could see the inner workings of the boating in Seattle and see some salmon too. We have everything from Sci Fi Museums to Nordic Museums to Police Museums. Not far from here is Mt. St. Helens too. If you head out to Mt. Rainier for a day, there is a great conservation zoo called Northwest Trek, a native species zoo with a tram ride through wild areas filled with bison, moose, and Roosevelt Elk. Also, you'll be close to the city of Kent, Wa (where i live). There is a hydroplane museum here. Just south of us is a horse racing track called Emerald Downs. You'll see we are very sprawled out here. But it's beautiful. The City of Kent's website may have some info on free summer concert series and free movies in our downtown area, incase the wallet needs a little breather while you're here. :) Feel free to contact if you have any other questions. :D You'll love it here! Sincerely, Whit

Wow! 4 weeks just the two of you. Routine and distraction is the name of the game. My dad used to work out of town months on end, and i remember my mom had our daily routine nailed down so tightly that looking back, i can't even remember the times my dad was gone seeming like a long time. One thing that might be of help too is if your hubbie can write your child. Postcards, little comics snipped from the paper, or little trinkets from the area he'll be in. Kids love that stuff! When my hubbie had a horrific work schedule one year, working often 12 - 14 hour days, i distracted my daughter with the 4 items mentioned above. We stuck to our commitments, however we would carve out a day or two during the week that we could do whatever we wanted. We would take little road trips on our own, or plan playdates with friends that would span the afternoon because we didn't have to be home to cook for daddy. We'd shop at a shee shee bakery, and pick up items for a tea party. Sometimes we'd watch Mary Poppins during the tea, or other times we'd have a dance party at the tea. Sometimes it was a Wii Tea. :) Ah, Grandparents. Grandparents are great, aren't they? Enough said. :) Camping trips are a great idea!...even in your yard?!? Good luck and safe travels to your hubbie. Sincerely, Whit

For such volumes of feedback, i thank you kindly! There is a lot here to deliberate and digest and we are looking forward to set in place a plan. Thanks for sharing your experiences!! Blessings for a relaxing, enjoyable summer! Sincerely, Whit :grouphug:

Hoping to reach a concensus among us here. I am starting to panic because my 8 y/o isn't really up to speed with the writing skills as outlined for a 2nd grader in WTM. There i've said it. deep breath :D I've been re-reading Ms. Bauer's advice, and wondering if i have understood it correctly. Up until this year, my kiddo hasn't had interest in picking up a pencil. When i ask for narratives, she usually just repeats the entire story she just heard back to me. Occasionally she'll pull out the typewriter and write her own newspaper, or she's made a couple of storybooks of her own volition. However, needless to say, she isn't at the point where i can dictate or ask her to write her own narratives. I read about the WWE program, and wondered if it would be useful? But i see in the section on Writing in WTM that Ms. Bauer states that if you're consistently completing narratives for history, science, and reading, that your child should be learning written usage just fine. Am i reading that correctly? As she's grown more fond of the writing utensils, i've had my child pick out two interesting details in her science books to write; we shorten the given narrations from the SOTW workbooks and have her copy them as one paragraph. Wondering if it would just be adding more to an already full plate of copywork if we were to throw in WWE? Sometimes more is just "more", you know? What are your thoughts?? Those of you that use WWE, do you complete narrations for other subjects too, or use WWE solely for its intent to improve writing skills? Thanks for any feedback you may have.

We found a quick history on St. Augustine of Hippo in a book of saints called Saints: Lives and Illuminations. He was a very miraculous character, living such a sinful life as a young adult--his mother spent years praying for him--and then experiencing an utter tranformation with his conversion in his 30's.

We checked out every artist book by Mike Venezia in our public library. His books are really kid-friendly...down to the artist license he uses with his comic strips about interesting events in the artist's life. Preview them...a few are going to be dark and twisty, like Frank Goya. My daughter absolutely loves Beethoven's Wig too. We will play a song there, and then find the original to listen too. She's been getting really good about picking out the composers just from listening to Beeth's Wig over and over. And truely, when you have a child begging to listen to classical music...life is good, eh? :D

That's funny! I just put a few of those in my Amazon cart. I was going to get the Complete Tales at one time, however i noticed something curious--that probably depends on your kiddo. My child likes books she can handle. She carts them everywhere. And when all we had was either paperback baby books (like SkippyJon Jones and the like) or big "complete edition" books, she'd favour the babyish books, just cause she could carry a lot around. Once we started acquiring more user friendly books, she ditched the babyish ones. depends on the child i suppose...and when and where they do most of their reading.

We used the Usbourne encycl's for my daughter to pick out what she wanted to read about. It was our job to find books on the subject the week before we needed them, and after a few "hunts" at the library, we discovered that the Space Launch "Let's Explore" series we liked best for the planets (Simon's series are really great too, however most were printed in the late 90's/early naughty's and there have been more discoveries or newer pictures since then.) Sometimes we draw a picture and write a summary or do copywork on the subject. Sometimes we don't. And the only project we've done regarding Earth Sci or Space is an experiment on which kitchen acids are more reactive with baking soda (volcanoes!!) and a 3D model of the planets. Nat Geo has a great book too called "13 Planets" that introduces all of them cut and dried. That would be a quick way to "travel through space". They also have a book about "The Planet Gods" that talks about how the planets were named after the Greek and Roman gods--reinforcing not only that part of history, but also connecting the dots between the similarities of the gods and the planets. For constellations, since we live in Western WA, which doesn't actually see clear sky until the months of July and August, we are planning on taking a little family trip to the nearest telescope, bringing along the recommend texts from WTM, and making a quick study of it. Instead of view constellations now, we've found books of myths about the constellations and read these during bedtime or... Also, Powerkids Press has a short and sweet series of 6 books that focuses on constellations...Andromeda, Orion, Big/Little Dipper and so on. Good luck!

Soon he'll be memorizing his first poem and things will look brighter from your side of the table. :) We also tend to read the lesson together, so that has made it feel like we are discovering the material more together than me feelling like a puppet. :) Hang in there, in second grade, you'll be marching around the house to the tune of the list of prepositions!

Happy Homeschooling! It is a bit of a hot mess to try to keep everything straight, isn't it? I started this past year at the beginning of the school year keeping a schedule for my kiddo and blogged about it here. http://knittywhit.blogspot.com/2011/01/gettin-organised-how-i-was-bitten-by.html Then in January, i tried making a home cleaning schedule for myself. You can find the results of my efforts under "organising" in my labels. Not saying that it's perfect every week, but at least my kiddo is doing her chores now and the critical areas of our house are clean each week. Hubbie encourages me to go out every Saturday morning to review school, make grocery list, read for pleasure, run errands or visiting interesting places by myself. :) Good luck finding what works for you and your family. :001_smile:

We used to "push" our 8 year old along...regimen, regimen. However then i was exposed to a talk on homeschooling where a presenter asked why you would want your home school to be like a brick and mortar school? Brick and Mortar schools are not working...and what is missing is a good balance of independent study and play along with the "3 R's". One suggestion was to acquire a notebook and ask the child to write down what they are interested in studying. My child can write, so each time she thinks of something, she writes it down herself. We started the list 3 weeks ago, and haven't done much "structured" school since beside practicing multiples and reading a few chapters of SOTW. We visit the library every week or two and while we are there, we research our topic--first off with the World Book. Then we ask the librarians if there are any titles on the subject that are noteworthy. So far we've learned what Confucius' name really means (it's Latin for Great Master Kong) and we are working our way through a small study on the Nez Perce Indians. Just this week, my daughter commented that she was missing all of her English, so we are going to start adding those in this week. I think the WTM ladies have given us this suggested curriculum to follow, however if you read careful each section reiterates that when the child is interested in something, just let them go with it. It will truely be how they discern what they find truely interesting and absolutely love from what they may be just mildly curious about or have no opinion of. When a child is interested in something, just hand them the reigns (the only thing they'll need you for is to chauffeur them places.) :) We've also done a little more tailoring to her learning style to stoke motivation. She's highly visual with a fair amount of kinestic thrown in. One thing that has helped her excell in her endeavours is finding a hobby (that masquerades as a class in our homeschool) with longevity that she is absolutely head over heels about--Irish dancing. It is something she has a talent for and has worked hard in many competitions to achieve a Novice status. Finding something that is important and interesting to them, something with friendly competition that rewards their hard work...that may be just the ticket to give them that courage to attempt something new with confidence. Then they'll be pushing themselves.:D

Reading your post sounds just like our past week. Isn't it lovely? You'll love this: the first time it happened, we fussed for 3 hours over a 5 minute test. We covered everything from going back to public school or just do the work cause that's life. Yeah, it wasn't a great parenting moment. After 3 hours! 3 hours we fussed, and she finally took the math test she thought she wouldn't be able to do and got 87 out of 100 done. And once the timer went off she started laughing and stomping around mad, acting llike Jekyl and Hyde at all the same time and declared: "Mom, all that dang fussing for 3 hours for a darn math test that was super easy. What a waste!" It's a phase, isn't it? It's something that we've all experienced whenever we learn something new. It'll be a challenge, but it will be better to work through it at home, than kids getting in trouble for "acting out" in class or not doing the work for class. Hang in there. And make sure that you get some free time from your family after an especially challenging week. :grouphug:

I'll be sure to check these resources out. Thanks for your feedback. She's very committed to Irish folk dancing, and we are trying to weed out other commitments so she may participate in competition. So an at home and effective piano curriculum really helps with exposure vs. time constraints. Who decided that 24 hours in a day were enough?? ;) Hope you ladies have a beautiful Mother's Day. Sincerely, Whit

Hello. We are looking at adding some piano lessons to our summer days, and i was wondering if there were any ideas for curriculum that have been tried out there on musically gifted 7 year olds? Is Bastien still thee course of choice for WTM families, or is there something else out there that has been discovered? Thanks for any imput. Sincerely, Whit

Your advice is very much appreciated, Tiara! Very familiar sounding to my daughter's experience. Now that she is keen on handwriting and begging to be taught cursive, it's frustrating not to get frustrated at her when she's writing her notes to family or stories and every five seconds with the "how do you spell? and how do you spell?" :) One quick question...do you use STW instead of First Lang Lessons and Spelling Workout? Daughter is finding SW quite boring, so wondering if STW would kill to birds so to speak. Thanks again so much--i shall dive into your blogpost now and glean more insight. Take care, Fondly, Whit

Hello, figuring most of you in this group were in the same boat we are: a kid that knows how to read and sound out words before they've formally learned how to use phonics to spell. I am very torn between two programs.... Spaulding or Spell to Write and Read? Anyone out there that might have some pros or cons about the two? Cirriculum i may be overlooking??? Thanks, Whit

Is there any reason no one is recommending Saxon math???