I am doing a similar geography idea for my daughter who us going in to grade 4. I am actually in the process of writing the plans before we start in a week. The books I am using are the Usborne Geography Encyclopedia, Usborne Peoples of the World, Dk Where on Earth, and Material World: A Global Family Portrait. I figure these resources will give help to accomplish the idea that I have in my head ;)

This made me chuckle a bit because I order from RR all the time for its cheap shipping to Canada and it gets here in a timely manner.........which is generally 2-3 weeks ;) But everything generally takes a long while to ship here.

This may sound horrifying, and I don't know if it is even doable, depending on what your course load is for this year. But, is it possible to do mini classes of the subjects archeology, anthropology and paleontology. Each one of those 1x a week. We are trying something out like that this year, where we have our basic history and science days, but also each day of the week I have planned out 1 per day of World Religion, Classical Studies, Geography, Art/composer study, and Mythology. I have no idea how this will work out though since we aren't starting for a few weeks.

Yes! It's How-to-Learn-Any-Language.com ;) Right link though. They are so knowledgable and so helpful on there. I am so amazed by some of their abilities to learn multiple languages, I find it very motivating. On a side note, I do have Rosetta Stone because my husband won it at a work party. It's pretty and more fun than most programs BUT I have only used it during spare times as a kind of vocabulary lesson. I spend the main portion of my studying time on Assimil because that is where I have seen the best results.

I frequent a language learning forum that is full of linguists and polyglots. I am really determined to become fluent in French and who better to get advice from than people who have achieved your goal :) The general consensus on the forum is that Rosetta stone will not bring you anywhere close to fluency for the amount of money you spend on it. It will teach you a lot of vocabulary which is good, but for the price there are much cheaper alternatives that do a better job. One of the programs that seems to work well for a lot of them is Assimil. I am currently using the Assimil French with Ease edition (they offer a variety of languages) and it is by far the best program I have used. You need the book and CD set because all pieces are an integral part. I bought it used off Alibris for $30.

A few years ago when I went to print the colouring pages, I scaled them down so they fit 8-9 per page and then I coloured, cut them out, and laminated them to as as a kind of memory/flashcard tool. You can see a picture in my blog post here partially down the page. They were useful and are still in great shape while awaiting my youngest to get old enough to use them :)

I live in skinnies. I am a 5'3", small framed woman and they are a wardrobe staple for me. I find that other cuts tend to overwhelm my frame now that I am used to a more fitted style. I live in boots as well so they kind of go hand in hand. I am a long loose tank top, long chunky knit cardigan, skinny jeans a boots kind of girl.........and I can't wait for fall.

If you look at the samples of SWB's WWS, it actually includes in the sample how to complete a few basic outlines.

My dd8 does this. I chalked it up to her being lazy. I think she looks at it, decides she doesn't "feel" like borrowing, so she switches it around to avoid the borrow step. Once I point it out to her she sighs and does it right.

We have done both. Elemental Science for elementary Biology, and Earth Studies, then switched to REAL Science for Chemistry. I preferred the Elemental Science, but I think I have heard that The Chemistry Level of REAL Science was not the best one of the series. We are going back to Elemental for Physics this year because Real Science doesn't have a Physics level for me to compare it to, but we are using Pandia Press for History this year.

Thanks. I'll wait until Friday and then resend if they haven't responded :)

I guess I would totally be considered immodest on a daily basis. Pretty much everyday I rock skinny jeans that are tight enough that I can put anything in my pockets. That's the norm for me. I like it, they show off my assets ;) Back in college I was known to wear a headscarf as a shirt when clubbing. A flowy triangle knotted behing my back falling to a point right at my belly button. I am truly surprised that it never fell off during one of my "almost not remember the night" drinkfests. I guess even in that state I was hyper attuned to any shift in it's placement. I was a hottie back then. I didn't wear stuff like that because of low self confidence, I wore them because I had extremely high self confidence.

Since I live in Canada, I have to email RFWP to get my invoice with international shipping charges. Now that we are into primo curriculum buying time, I was just wondering if any other international shoppers have a longer wait period to get a response from them? I bought MCT last year and remember getting an email back within that same day. It's been about three days now and I know I am being obnoxiously impatient, but shipping can take a while too so I just really want to be able to purchase it and get it crossed off my list. How long do you think I should wait to resend a international shipping inquiry?

Ha! I am contemplating getting that one too. My dd8 is a video game junkie (I know, it's not good) so I think the combination of spongebob and the video game look to it would be the perfect motivational tool. Not that I need her playing more video games, it's hard enough to pull her away from the screen :glare: but sometimes you need something that will be a little more fun and a lot less of a fight.

After several writing fails we switched to CW Aesop and it fits well. She has scattered thoughts and some writing issues, and as a teacher I find it fairly easy to implement once I got my groove with it. I am combining that with Caesars English 1 and Apples and Pears for our coming grade 4 year. SInce it has integrated grammar I chose to bypass using a separate grammar program until 5th grade in order to lessen our load and help streamline our days.

This lady had a video of all kinds of plank variations. She suggests doing them daily to increase core strength before moving up in intensity in your workouts. Upper body is fairly easy to implement at home and she has a lot of upper body workouts on her site as well. I also agree, there are many exercises on YouTube on how to fix a diastasis, maybe start with those?

Legs and butt today followed by 10 minutes of interval skipping and a short yoga stretch routine. Am I the only one who is totally afraid to give it her all in case she ends up accidentally kicking her in-your-face toddler in the head when she walks by? I should start enforcing a rule where they need to put on bike helmets during exercise hour ;)

I've started a new regime over the last three weeks, and I swear I have noticed more changed in my body in this short time than I have over the last 8 months. It's much more intense and I am really enjoying the muscle aches............well, to the degree that you can enjoy them ;) Today was Upper Body day and I truly thought my arms were going to give and I was going to break my face while doing the Wall Mountain Climbers. I'm really going to feel it tomorrow. I feel it now.

My dd8 is currently in third grade and while she reads well (approx 8th grade level) her spelling is not good. She spells many words phonetically even after she has been taught a spelling rule, or the correct spelling of a word. We have been using AAS for three years, and while it was wonderful for the first 1.5 years, it seems to not work for her anymore. Halfway through AAS level 3 she seems to have hit a roadblock. Nothing is sticking, everything seems to go in one ear and out the other. I was thinking of something more workbook like. Something she literally has to sit down, read, focus, and process to do. I have heard that R&S is the workbook equivalent of AAS, and although we are not religious I have no issues using a spelling curriculum from a Christian publisher if it is going to work ;) I have also been toying with the idea of Sequential Spelling. What do you think would be a good choice? I am open to suggestions. Thanks.

I have used using Pimsleur CD's with my dd8 (and myself) for French. She didn't retain much past the first few lessons though because they are kind of dry. Also, after the first few lessons they seem to jump significantly in difficulty. They may be okay for background noise for your children as you listen for yourself though. But I don't think many kids would be able to give full attention for the half hour or so that they lessons are (they are quite boring). For my own personal learning I have found that the Assimil program to be the best I have used so far.....and I have tried many :) On a language learning forum that I am on, they suggested to teach my daughter via reading simple books in the target language, listening to fun music, and watching tv in the target language as well. That is unless I have someone who speaks the language who can spend significant time with them JUST speaking the language......which I don't :)

I'm trying to figure this out myself. So far this is the plan. Math - Finish MM3 move on to MM4, Beast Academy 3A Science - Elemental Science Physics, Intellego Physics Unit and Brainpop Language Arts - CW Finish Aesop A and move on to B, Maybe some stuff from MCT Grammar Town Like Caesar's English Spelling: Finish AAS 3 (but I am debating just using the spelling analysis built in to CW because we are trying to simplify) Handwriting: HWT 4 Cursive Geography: Intellego unit studies maybe, still deciding History: History Odyssey Modern Times French: So You Really Want to Learn French Book 1, Duolingo, and Assimil with me Latin: LFC A Art/Music Study: Weekly art class, MTM, and Intellego has some nice looking Unit Studies As you can see I am liking the look of Intellego, it depends on my budget though ;)

Bah. The plans in my head are so wonderful, but I know they are so not going to happen. My dd8 is currently finishing grade 3 and as I am reflecting on the past year, I am also trying to decide what plans would be best for next. We started the year with MCT Island - the full curriculum. When we hit the January/February doldrums I realized that the writing aspect of this program wasn't working for her. She isn't good with the "creative" writing aspect of MCT, so I bought CW Aesop A to try it out. She does a lot better with the rigidness of this program. Also, we have been using AAS and are currently on level 3. We have taken a break from it becomes it was becomes tedious and I don't really think she has been absorbing anything for the past few lessons. Sooooo, my question is, if I like the fun aspect of MCT, but she is learning more from CW it obviously makes sense to stick with that. Would it be too much to do both? It's expensive but after this year I realized I don't need the student copy of everything because she didn't use them so money would be saved there. Is both overkill? I kind of wanted to simplify school and life a little more, but for some reason can't let MCT go :( Should I maybe just use parts of it? And if so, what parts would be best to buy from the Town level? What about spelling? Is it okay to stop spelling for a bit with a child who isn't a terrible speller, but it is definitely not intuitive? Those are my 50,000 questions for the day. Thanks.

FWIW, my dd8 loves Goddess Girls as well as D'Aulaires' Myths. We read the D'Aulaires' first, then she read Goddess Girls, then she went back and read D'Aulaires' again on her own so she could refresh herself and tie them to the books. Sure people may call them twaddle, but I feel if she is getting a variety of different readings in, both quality and twaddle, she is really enjoying reading, and it is bringing out an interest towards mythology, then why would that be bad?

I tried both FireFox and Safari and neither are working, although they worked fine a few weeks back in both browsers. I'll just have to make do without for a bit and see if they work later.

I just searched this to see if anyone else was having issues, so sorry for my late response. I can't get the videos to play at all anymore. They worked fine for me a few weeks ago and today, just the loading bar and nothing more :(