Poor Jason. I adore him, but I don't think he has it in him to actually TRY to win American Idol. I just can't see him picking songs strategically and doing all the stuff you need to do to win. I think he's just going to keep saying, "hey--that song's pretty cool; I think I'll do that one" every week and hoping for the best. Ah well.

I just noticed on the back of FLL 3 the other day that it says it can be used for an older child who hasn't done FLL 1 and 2. My son did do the first two volumes, but everything that's covered there is also covered (at a much faster pace) in FLL 3. You may have to spend more time reviewing some concepts, but I think you'd be fine starting with FLL 3.

okay, I'm convinced! thanks everyone.

my son's a natural speller, so we dropped spelling as a subject about midway through Spelling Workout B. I try to pick copywork that has difficult to spell words in it. He writes "books" constantly in his free time and asks me how to spell words a dozen times a day (and I've started sending him to the dictionary some of the time), so I figure between this and just doing a lot of reading he's picking it up on his own. If he ever seems to be falling behind, we'll add it back in, but for now I'm not the least bit worried about it. If he's doing phonics, he's essentially getting spelling (just sort of backwards) anyway.

That's pretty much it....I'm looking at this for next year (for my strong reader/writer 7 year old with a 5 year old listening in) and wondering whether it's worthwhile to get the teacher's book. thanks!

I don't sell much anymore, but when I did I always refunded shipping. My experience as a buyer is that most sellers will say in their terms that refunds don't include shipping, but in actual practice a good seller will always refund shipping if the error is theirs.

We have a scholarship program paid for through lottery money in GA, so I'm hoping that will still be around and we won't need to pay for college (it covers tuition, fees, and books (at least last I checked, which is when I was in college) at in-state public schools. If they want to go out of state or private, they'll need to figure out how to pay for it). My husband is a public high school teacher, and we have three kids (with 4 1/2 years between the oldest and youngest, so there'll be a lot of time where 2 are in college at once), so whether to pay for college ourselves or not likely won't be a choice for us. As far as what I would WANT to do, I think it's reasonable for kids to work part time while in college and to work hard and try to get scholarships, but I very much hope we're in a position to help out enough that our boys don't have to get loans. I had scholarships and DH had parents who paid for everything, so neither of us has had to deal with loans at all. I see a lot of people my age really, really struggling financially, despite making more money than we do, because of student loans.

this is how I've been making mine lately: 1 tbs yeast 1 1/4 cup very warm water 2 tbs honey 3 tbs oil 3/4 tbs salt about 3 1/2 cups flour I use instant yeast, so I mix it in whenever. If you're using packets, you probably want to do the thing where you put the honey and 1/4 cup of water in with the yeast first then add that to the other ingredients. I mix everything except the flour, then mix in the flour slowly until it comes together enough to start kneading. Knead 6 or 7 minutes, adding in flour as needed. rise until double, punch it down and shape into loaves, rise again, then put it in a cold oven and set to 450. Turn down to 350 after 10 minutes or so and bake until it's brown and sounds hollow when tapped. Sometimes I substitute a cup of oatmeal for some of the flour--that should make it softer. It's based on a recipe from "Our Daily Bread" by Stella Standard, but I tweaked it a good bit. It makes a nice, easily sliceable, not too dense loaf of sandwich bread.

I'd make sure she gets the basics of phonics down somewhere--either through a spelling program or maybe just some workbooks that she can do casually (my son adores doing workbooks in his free time, so it's easy for me to reinforce stuff that way). DS taught himself to read before he was four, but it was a long time before he was confident sounding words out (it was almost all sight reading). My observation was that that's just how it is for awhile for kids with very strong visual memories, because they just don't encounter unfamiliar words in the stuff they're reading. But he's at the point now where he DOES, and having the phonics skills to deal with those words is really important now.

The belief I'm talking about says that the Baptist religion predates the Reformation--that it existed alongside Catholicism before Luther. It's not Protestant because it doesn't come out of the Reformation. Incidentally, the Eastern Orthodox church would also fall outside your categories, wouldn't it?

Here's what Wikipedia has to say about it:

I certainly didn't mean to put anyone on the defensive...I'm not Baptist now, but I grew up Baptist and the belief I described (and that Wikipedia notes) is one I heard preached in my Baptist church growing up (in a large congregation in a major metropolitan area--not a tiny, obscure little church). So it's definitely out there. The last thing you say is actually pretty much what I was trying to get at--that pinning down Baptist history may be nearly as difficult as pinning down Baptist theology--precisely because Baptists are such independent types. No offensive to Baptists at all intended! ETA: it may well be that this is something that the vast majority of Baptists reject and that it's safe to disregard it when considering Baptist history--I honestly don't know. I just know what many Baptists in my family believe, and I checked Wikipedia to see if it was a noted phenomenon, so I thought I'd throw it out there. Because I like to make things complicated ;)

Scholastic has a similar site, too.

Well, it may be a more complicated topic than you're expecting....a lot of Baptists don't consider themselves Protestants, and maintain that their roots go back to Jesus in Jerusalem.

I have it. It's a bit hard to justify the cost as a homeschooler (as opposed to a teacher with a classroom full of kids to print stuff out for), but the stuff I do use I really like, so I can't bring myself to cancel the subscription. Right now we're making a space pocket book that I printed out from the site, and the kids love it. I find a lot for science; not as much for history (although some of the history pockets are up there).

Ds is doing this year: First Language Lessons Singapore 2a/b SOTW 2 Space and Earth science lessons that I put together I think that's mostly it for formal curriculum. He's an excellent natural speller and his writing is as good as mine, so we don't do formal spelling or handwriting; he does whatever copywork and dictation is in FLL, plus copywork from whatever chapter book we're reading once a week. I find history and science books that go along with what we're learning about for his independent reading (plus at least 25 minutes a day in free reading). We do art and Spanish with a group of other homeschoolers.

DS, 3rd grade: Singapore 3a/b continuing FLL 3 The Complete Writer: Writing with Ease American Story 1 from Winterpromise Chemistry (putting together myself from various sources) maybe Lively Latin assorted logic/critical thinking books DS, K: continuing Headsprout for reading may start FLL, depending on how his reading is going Singapore 1a/b following along in American story 1 and chemistry

mine is up!

this. I don't see homeschooling as a federal issue. If a candidate ever indicated that they intended to make it a federal issue (which I don't see happening) then that would, of course, be a major concern for me.

A 2 week update in my blog (in sig)

too bad we put my name first on our tax return...we could have gotten the money more than a month earlier!

your K plans (and kindergartner) sound similar to mine. My middle ds will turn 5 in May, and right now he's doing Headsprout for phonics and is 3/4 of the way through Singapore Earlybird. Next year, he'll do Singapore 1 a/b, and we'll have to see how far along he is with reading to decide what Language Arts program to do. We're planning on doing Winterpromise's American History next year, and one of the reasons I decided to take a break from SOTW and do WP is because I felt like the 5 year old would get more out of it. He already follows along in history and science, so he'll keep doing that (if he gets bored, he's allowed to go play quietly, but he usually sticks around). I try to read library books to him and his 2 year old brother while my oldest is doing his own reading. So, yeah, basically we'll do LA and math separately and just try to make sure I spend plenty of time reading to him at his own level. Oh, I also bought Lollypop Logic for him when I was ordering critical thinking books for my older son, so we try to do that a couple of times a week, too.

you have to fill it out because we live in America. The census is constitutionally mandated.

I have a BA and an MA in English (and 3 years towards a ph.D. before DS came along)

Hey--I did one this week! My previous attempts at weekly reporting have been, er...sporadic, so we'll see how I do this time. You've all inspired me--I love reading everyone's reports! http://kokotg.blogspot.com/