I'm looking for a typing program for my 6th grader who has little keyboard experience. It seems like some of the programs offer practice, but I'm not convinced they all teach proper technique, like hand position and which fingers to use on which keys. The habits learned at the start will carry through so I'd like to find a program that teaches good form. Does anyone have a recommendation for what to look at? Thanks.

@WTMThanks for those detailed comparisons! This whole thread is very helpful so thanks to all. I'm still not sure what direction to go but I'm gathering info!

I'm wondering what you found worked well for your older daughter instead of AoPS, and what your 6th grader did before Foersters?

I don't know very much about Dimensions but I'm interested in learning more. Can you tell me about some of the differences you find between that and AoPS, and also how it was to move from Singapore Standards (which is what we currently do too) to Dimensions? Thanks!

Thanks to everyone for helping me think about this. Here are some more thoughts: She is very smart and does well with math and every subject. But because things usually come easily to her, she tends to get frustrated when it takes longer to really understand something. So something really challenging would probably frustrate her, but it may be good for her if she gets over that and realizes that she can push through it and figure it out, and it's OK that it's not immediately easy. She does like puzzling through problems. In Singapore she enjoys word problems the most. The end of Singapore 5B introduced some basic algebraic concepts and she told me that she enjoyed them and is looking forward to more algebra. I am interested in a curriculum that helps to understand to really understand the "whys" behind math, and not just memorizing the formula or the algorithm. I feel that Singapore has been good about this. So when I heard about AoPS I thought it seemed interesting. But as I read about it I'm starting to doubt if it is the right fit for her. My concern is that, as I said, she isn't passionate about math. Her passion is writing and she enjoys all things language arts. Unless she has a dramatic change it seems likely that she will pursue something related to writing and probably not in math or the sciences. So realistically, she may not end up doing calculus, and that would be OK. If she wants to focus her time in high school on language then she may not have as much time to spend on math. But I'd like her to understand WELL the math she does know. I've seen people say that AoPS takes their kid 2+ hours a day. I don't know how common that is, but I could see that being tough for a kid that does well on math but doesn't care that much about it. But if we don't do AoPS I would still want to make sure she understands the "whys" behind math. I've also been thinking about my teaching time being more limited with younger siblings coming up behind her. This isn't absolutely required, but it would be nice if whatever we use had more of a "coach" model where she could come to me if she doesn't understand, rather than a teacher model where I explain everything as we currently do in Singapore. That would help me afford more time to spend teaching the younger ones. Thanks for helping!

My DD just finished 5th grade and with it Singapore Standards 5B. I trying to decide what to do next. We both enjoyed Singapore and she did well on it. She is very good at math but it is not her passion or anything. Does anyone have any advice about if I should do Singapore 6A next, or move to AoPS PreAlgebra, or switch to Dimensions or Math in Focus or something else? I'm not really sure how to decide right now. Thanks.

We'd like to add Spanish to our homeschool. Our oldest is 11 and our youngest is 5. Our goal in Spanish is that they are eventually able to have conversations with each other in Spanish. It would be ideal if all the kids could kind of be taught together instead of each one learning on their own, at least at the basic level. I have some Spanish knowledge but that was many years ago so I'm very rusty. Once they get far enough I plan on getting Spanish first readers that we can start going through, and eventually adding audiobooks or some sort of cartoons, but right now I'm trying to figure out a curriculum that we could do as a family to get us to the place where we could read simple books and have basic conversations in Spanish. Does anyone have a curriculum recommendation? I've seen TalkBox.mom which looks interesting, do others recommend that or do you prefer something else? Thanks.