Classically Minded
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Posts posted by Classically Minded
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I don't think anything compares to All About Spelling for those who struggle with spelling. My DD20 who struggled with spelling used it and it was excellent, we did 6 levels. My DS11 is a natural speller and didn't struggle, so we used Spelling Workout workbooks for him and utilized Spelling City for the tests.
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I highly recommend Saxon Math with the Saxon Teacher CD-ROM and Art Reed videos. My DD20 did them and scored the highest possible on standardized testing all the way through as is my DS11. It is thorough and helps them retain prior math skills. The saying goes that if you do Saxon Math, you WILL KNOW MATH! I have had local friends who quit Saxon and went to other math curriculum (and kept switching), only to return to Saxon years later because their child couldn't even remember basic math skills as the other programs didn't practice them constantly like Saxon does. The Well Trained Mind by Susan Wise Bauer recommends Saxon all the way through for a reason - it's quality. I also think you should email or call Art Reed and talk with him about it, he has talked with us over the years and is an awesome help. We also use his book as a guide, Using John Saxon's Math Books.
I came from public school to private school and that is when I first encountered Saxon Math and I struggled because it really showed how inferior the books where from public school and I had many gaps. I determined that my children would not have gaps and use Saxon Math.
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I think I may have this finalized now:
Bible - Bible Study Guide for All Ages (finish this mid-year); MP's Christian Studies I - using KJV Bible
Math - Saxon Math Algebra 1/2 (We use the Saxon Teacher CD-ROM and Art Reed videos)
Language Arts
- Reading* - Assigned Book List; Fun Book List & Family Read-alouds AND I'm adding in MP's Book guides to see how that will work for his assigned book list.
- Grammar* - Grammar for the Well Trained Mind; Editor in Chief workbook
- Writing* - Writing With Skill I; Writing and Rhetoric 4
- Comprehension - Abeka Skill Sheets; Reading Detective A1
- Spelling - Spelling Workout H (finishing last half of the book and will be done with spelling)
- Vocabulary - Finish MP's Roots of English; Vocabulary from Classical Roots A
Logic - Fallacy Detective (finishing up)
Foreign Language
- Latin - Latina Christiana II (finishing last half)
- Greek - Memoria Press Elementary Greek II
- Hebrew - Miiko Shaffier's Hebrew
- Spanish - Getting Started with Spanish
Science - Jay Wile's Discovering Design with Earth Science
History* - The Human Odyssey; Story of the World; The Good and the Beautiful (we started HO in late 4th grade and continuing on and probably be to the Renaissance come 6th grade)
Fine Arts- Art - Home Art Studio (my adult daughter teaches art)
- Music - Piano lessons - Hoffman Academy (finishing program in 6th)Computer - CompuScholar's Tech EssentialsI'm adding in the Science Detective and History Detective workbooks. Our history mix is going VERY WELL!! So, we are going to continue with that through the next 2 years and then move on to American history come 8th grade.
DS is doing 4 foreign languages because he begged to add in 2 more. He will be stopping Latin after finishing LCII and continuing on with Greek, so I think he can handle some easy introductory courses in Hebrew (this summer) and Spanish; both he has requested.
*I will be teaching: history, Writing & Rhetoric, grammar, logic and study guides for reading - the rest DS will be doing independently. We don't do everything every day - some things are interspersed throughout the week(s).-
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2 hours ago, Ellie said:
I'd say Analytical Grammar, or Easy Grammar (my personal favorite), or anything else that teaches...only grammar.
I actually went to buy Analytical Grammar the other day and they no longer sell them. Do you think the new books with levels are just as good as the old one that was just one book?
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23 minutes ago, JazzyMom said:
Just to encourage you…. My kids do a lot of their work independently, and that has worked well for our family.
I would not have been able to manage hours of one on one work per child. I truly admire moms who can do so, but that is beyond my ability. If my kids depended on me to teach and discuss most things with them, it would have been severely limiting for them.
Once my kids are reading, I start teaching them how to read directions and learn from a text. I tell them it’s okay if you get these answers wrong, but I want you to try. I meet with each one of them once a day to look over their work, correct it, and explain things, as needed. I do more with a kid who is struggling in a particular area, but independence is the goal. My 6th and 8th graders are about 80% independent. My high schooler is 100% independent. I just check his grades periodically.
My older kids are curious, self-directed learners who know how to teach themselves things I don’t know or have time to learn. One of my kids is on a national full ride scholarship studying biochemistry. My current high schooler won a national competition last year in architecture, a subject I know nothing about. My middle schooler (who has an LD) is trying speech competitions this year and chose a pretty heavy topic that he researched himself.
I choose resources and curricula. I help keep my kids accountable to a schedule, and in some subjects (like math), I grade their work daily. Beginning in middle school, they do co-ops for some subjects. In high school, they take some DE courses and some co-op courses. Online courses have not been a good fit for us.
We listen to audiobooks and do a few things together, but nothing time consuming. They like to get up and get started on their work without me - even my 2nd and 4th graders do this. And we all value leaving space in our day for their hobbies and extracurricular activities.
I share all that to say, teaching kids to work independently can be good for *some* kids/families. Not all. There’s not one right way to homeschool. You have to find what works for you and your kids.
As for the OP, I felt very overwhelmed with homeschooling after my 4th child was born. One day I sat down and prayed, “Lord, if You want me to homeschool these kids, You have to show me how to do it.” God gave me a very simple plan that I still follow 13 years later. I didn’t know my life would get so much more difficult - since then I’ve had 4 more kids, responsibility for an elderly parent, some hard times and shocking disappointments... However, even through extremely tough times, we have been able to continue.
My advice would be to stop looking at what others are doing and pray that God will show you what’s right for you.
I agree with others who say it is okay if you need to put your kids in school. I have read accounts from homeschoolers who feel their parents did not teach them well, and they have very sad stories.
Thank you so much for your encouragement!! How timely it was and much needed, thank you for sharing everything you did.
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1 hour ago, 8filltheheart said:
He must be a very compliant child. My gifted kids would have rebelled with what you said you have done. I am not going to answer your question bc you need to do what works for you. But, I am going to encourage you to stop approaching education with fear and trust yourself to be able to see gaps if they actually occur. (FWIW, Saxon would have made my kids hate math.)
Both of my kids love(d) Saxon so much they tell a lot of people about it. They also both scored highest possible on math in testing. Could be they are gifted in math or could be Saxon is just that good.
So sorry your kids didn't enjoy certain things, I never had that issue except with my oldest hating Rod and Staff English so much, we ditched it 😂 Now my youngest doesn't want to let it go because he loves it. He gets sad when we don't do school in summer until I told him he could do school on his own.
I wouldn't call it fear, more of not wanting to deal with holes later on that I had from being accelerated in school. Thanks for your concern!
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1 minute ago, 8filltheheart said:
I am another who disagrees with the bolded. Kids deserve actively engaged teachers. My youngest of 8 is an 8th grader. I have been an involved teacher for the past 30 yrs. (We dont do coops. They have only taken a handful of outsourced classes.) Independent in completing assignments, yes. But, not independent in teaching themselves content. And even when they are completing work, I'm there to help. I personally think that kids who are "independent learners" in 5th or 6th grade are receiving a subpar, flat education. In depth learning comes from being able to discuss, be challenged in thinking=interaction with others.
The OP has been floundering for a very long time. I dont think her ds working independently is realistic solution that would solve the numerous issues. I am a huge proponent of homeschooling. But, when it's not working after yrs of trying, it may not be the right choice for a particular family.
Thank you for your insight! I honestly never thought of it that way. Personally for myself having brain damage and being disabled, I have tried to do everything but this year I have realized I can't. I'm getting him a self taught science, writing and maybe grammar to help me out. I do teach history because he struggles for some reason with reading history and comprehension of it. Math, he has no problem and I'm glad 😂. He does foreign languages with DVD teacher on one and self taught the other.
I don't know anything about the poster but don't you think public school would actually be the worst move? It requires a lot out of children and many are left behind with no help.
I do still lean towards what SWB teaches because it sounds good to prepare the children for independence but at the same time I am amazed a few here rebuff that and are so involved in the middle grades and beyond. I really have to figure this out and what's best for my son. I know I have limitations but I am trying to give him everything I can of me to help him reach his potential but also have a childhood. Thanks for listening!
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5 hours ago, BusyMom5 said:
I have a 7th grader doing WWS1 this year and it does exactly what you said you wanted. She has enjoyed the range of topics in the book and become one of my favorites! I also love the W&R series and have used almost all the levels with some of my kids. The skills and feel of these two programs are totally different. I feel like WWS focuses on the mechanics while W&R has more focus on voice, flare, tone- plus it's just more fun. I will be using both, but my kid loves LA and writing!
As for grammar, you can skip it if you think he's good. I usually skip it in 8th grade and do a refresh in 9th. Fix It Grammar is more like sentence correction and handwriting. I plan to use this again.
You mentioned the Killgallon books- I used these with my kids who liked writing. If he likes this style book, there are high school books that cover paragraph composition! If he wasn't a fan of this style learning, I think WWS will still give enough structure.
Thank you so much! He loves W&R but I wasn't sure about how it would fit in going forward as I have read that some say the books get harder after book 4.
I'm so glad you and the other commentor said WWS will give me what I'm looking for. My daughter did it in high school but my husband helped her, so I didn't get much experience with the books.
He didn't enjoy the Killgallon book. I also have the middle school paragraph book but we never did it.
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5 hours ago, ScoutTN said:
Neither of my kids we’re anywhere close to independent at that age. And one is an oldest child, girl, who enjoys school, is disciplined and diligent, and was mature for her age. Neither of mine would ever learn from a video - live online works for one, but not the other - and all day on a screen is not great.
Do the problem set independently after the lesson, sure. But even corrections require interaction to make sure the mistakes are understood.Literature and history require discussion in our homeschool. Really everything does.
That's why homeschooling is great because the children can get that but not in public school. I think the way SWB laid it out on her book and lectures is an excellent path to strive for to enable the children to be able to do more and ease the burden on the Mom; which is what the original poster is needing. I understand myself and am going to try and let go of a lot with my son heading into this fall.
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57 minutes ago, PeterPan said:
Hogwash. Some people’s kids are but that’s a slim percentage. We should not be guilting ourselves with this. We can STRUCTURE our kids for success and do checkins, etc.
Susan Wise Bauer states this important for independence in her book, Rethinking School, and actually has an entire section on it in chapter 19. I don't consider that hogwash. I've also listened to her lectures about this.
I didn't see the original poster saying the children had any delays or learning disabilities but I think that would obviously be an exception if that was the case.
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What if you did a year of online learning or boxed curriculum that you didn't have to teach? I don't know how old your children are but by 5th or 6th grade they should be mostly independent. I knew a lady that used Christian Liberty Press to homeschool her many children and it seemed to work well for them.
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I would greatly appreciate any advice on what to do going forward with my DS11. He is highly gifted across the board and I was advised back in 3rd grade to move him to 7th grade in math but ultimately decided to not skip any of the Saxon Math books because I feared holes in his learning. That seemed to be the right choice, as he is now going into Algebra 1/2 and did trigonometry for fun on the side with Khan academy in his free time.
I'm now wondering what to do with his writing and grammar progressions. His favorite subject has always been grammar (after Greek now) - I think I probably could have done more for him by now but honestly I'm wore out and just now dealing with this. We are finishing Rod & Staff English 5 and it was way too easy for him but he said he liked it. He remembers grammar he learned in FLL 3 and 4 and hasn't needed the constant practice but we did R&S anyway. I am either going to let him continue with R&S 6 OR start Grammar for the Well Trained Mind. I was saving GWTM for after we finish R&S but I'm wondering if the R&S is just wasting his time because he doesn't need the review and it slowly introduces new things.
For writing, we will have completed WWE 1-3, Writing and Rhetoric 1-3, Sentence Composing for Middle School and Writing Strands 3 & 4 (original edition). He writes narrations also in history and science once a week and we are about to start doing outlines of his history once a week. I submitted a sample of his writing to the Well Trained Mind Academy and they said he is ready for Expository Writing I, which uses Writing With Skill I. He was able to do an outline for the assessment and I was amazed he could do that?? I think he picked it up in R&S 5, as we read the writing lessons in there but never did the exercises for them. Mind you, it was only a one-level outline. He also wrote a paragraph about the solar system. We have never actually "taught" paragraph construction, like the proper way to do it, yet he does write them I suppose when he writes his narrations - so does that mean he doesn't need a course on forming paragraphs? I hope I'm making sense.
I feel like he needs a course in forming paragraphs and then 3-paragraphs essays before starting WWS1 or am I overthinking this? Are the narrations from the WWE books and history/science enough? He never learned about how to develop a topic sentence, supporting details or close out a paragraph. Maybe this is taught in WWS1? Or does he need to do something like The Paragraph Book or Lantern's English 8-week paragraph or composition course? Or do I just go ahead and start him in WWS1 this fall?
I hope I explained that well! To sum it all up, would you recommend I:
Grammar: Start GWTM or continue on with R&S 6 (or something else)
Writing: Start WWS1 or continue on with Writing Strands, add in Lantern English 8-week courses (or something else)
(My son loves creative writing and writes his own short fables for fun for a few years now but I don't grade it, other than what he does for W&R)
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We do it similar to the way The Well Trained Mind suggested - DS11 is now reading 40 minutes in the morning from a book from the history list and then fun literature reading in the evening that is easy for 1 hour and this is only 5 days a week, not weekends. I've followed this morning/evening reading from the beginning and works great. My husband also does a family read-aloud in the evening before bed usually for about 20 minutes.
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We have used and currently use their Latin, Greek, Bible, cursive and going to try their book guides this coming school year. Both of my kids love(d) MP curriculum, so I haven't experienced any bad feedback from them.
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5 minutes ago, LauraClark said:
I haven't looked at it yet-bummer. I was thinking that because atomic was so hard Earth would be even harder. I'll have to look at it and rethink my plan-thanks for the heads up. I'm wondering how different Apologia General is from Atomic. I seem to remember looking through both of them and thinking they looked really similar.
It just occurred to me that when I look at a curriculum, I'm looking with my son in my mind who is strong in math. The Earth Science sample showed a lot of things I know he'd love with calculations but some children, who aren't as excited about math, might really be turned off. So, if you go see the sample on his website, you can see what I'm talking about.
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13 minutes ago, LauraClark said:
Whew! You've got some hard stuff in your list! (Or it would be for my crew, anyway). Ds12 did Atomic this year in 7th and it was a definite step up from what we had been doing. He really struggled the first half of the book-there are some pretty detailed and difficult to comprehend things about atoms for a few chapters. I'm planning on doing Earth Science in high school.
I was surprised to see Wile's Earth Science wasn't as difficult as I thought it would be, have you viewed the sample? I've seen his biology and it is way more advanced, even for 9th grade. I'm still trying to decide what path to pursue going forward - the worst thing that could happen is the Wile science is too difficult and we'd revert back to Masterbook's Heaven and Earth and save Wile's books for 7th or 8th. I have Apologia's General Science but I am not a fan but keep it around in case I change my mind.
My son is fairly advanced across the board but I decided to just let him progress in each subject as he wanted to and not push doing college early but rather, give him MORE to do each day to fuel his hunger for learning. He has areas that I see that are not ready for higher learning in certain subjects and then areas he is far more advanced. He does trig for fun in his spare time but wanted to do all the Saxon books and not skip any, so I let him and he rarely misses anything. His passion (besides math) is writing fiction, grammar, vocabulary and foreign language - I'm really trying to figure out how to go forward with him in regards to science. Like I said, if the Wile books are too much, we can revert back to MB but if I never try, we'll just stay where we are.
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I'm still working on what we're going to use in some subjects but here's what I have so far:
Bible - Bible Study Guide for All Ages (probably finish this mid-year and start MP's Christian Studies I using KJV Bible)
Reading - Assigned Book List; Fun Book List & Family Read-alouds AND I'm adding in MP's Book guides to see how that will work for his assigned book list starting with King Arthur.Math - Saxon Math Algebra 1/2 (We use the Saxon Teacher CD-ROM and Art Reed videos)Grammar - Rod and Staff English 6; Editor in Chief workbookWriting - Writing and Rhetoric 4; Writing Strands (original edition) 5 OR Writing With Skill IComprehension - Abeka Skill Sheets & Reading Detective A1Spelling - Spelling Workout H (finishing last half of the book and will be done with spelling)Vocabulary - Finish MP's Roots of English; Vocabulary from Classical Roots A & possibly BLogic - Fallacy Detective and The Thinking ToolboxLatin - Latina Christiana II (finishing last half and starting Henle I) OR scrapping LCII and doing First Form Latin I OR doing the bridge after LCII to FFIIGreek - Memoria Press Elementary Greek IIScience - MasterBooks Heaven and Earth OR Jay Wile's Earth Science or Atomic AgeHistory - The Human Odyssey; Story of the World; The Good and the Beautiful (we started HO in late 4th grade and continuing on and probably be to the Renaissance come 6th grade)Art - Home Art Studio (my adult daughter teaches art)Music - Piano lessons - Hoffman Academy (He will probably finish up all the units left in HA in 6th grade)I'm either going to go the easy route with science and get the MB or go the harder route with the Jay Wile book that has a lot of experiments. I'm adding in the Science Detective workbook as well, along with the History Detective workbook for history. Our history mix is going VERY WELL!! So, we are going to continue with that through the next 2 years and then move on to an American history come 8th grade.DS11 wants to add in another foreign language, a modern one, but I'm hesitant because of his workload already but... he REALLY loves foreign language (and grammar) and handles Latin and Greek well, so I'm considering it. I have looked at Getting Started with Spanish and also MasterBooks Beginning Spanish for Families program.-
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We did the maturation unit with my DS10 last summer and it was great for us! It was very well done and gave opportunity for further discussions as a family.
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All About Spelling is what helped my daughter who had issues spelling words. It is teacher intensive but it does work well.
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We did the first 2 books in one year with my son at 9 years old and he loved them. We're now doing book 3 at 10 years old a little slower because I'm turning our focus to more sentence/paragraph structure using the Killgallon books as well.
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On 9/15/2023 at 1:08 PM, dodgeat2 said:
What I would like is a program that uses literature to teach reading comprehension/analysis and writing.
Writing With Ease Level 3 would be my recommendation for what you described.
I have the Complete Writer guide for Writing with Ease but it has been too much work trying to implement the program from the guide. Maybe the workbooks would be an option for us.
The workbooks are excellent and sound what you are looking for! He will do narration and dictation from literature selections that are already in the book.
I am also looking for a science program that is inexpensive and he can do independently, that is light on experiments.
Masterbook's God's Design has 4 science books (Life; Heaven & Earth; Chemistry & Ecology; Physical World) for grades 3rd-8th and we love them. Easy daily reading with a workbook that has the questions he can answer on his own. Minimal work on your part, just for the activities and experiments that come up and doesn't seem like a lot to me but we've only done the Life book so far.
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Bible Study Guide for All Ages is what we love for those ages! We use the primary level with the teacher's guide, student pages, audio CD, Bible Book cards, wall maps and timeline. It's excellent and they memorize all the books of the Bible, sons of Jacob, etc. We read the lesson from the KJV, it has you stop every few verses and has a short summary and then a cartoon illustration of that part and an activity or question. It takes us about 30 minutes to do everything. You could do the intermediate level but we started with primary and just decided to stay with it. You can see the free samples on their website and Rainbow Resource also sells the materials.
We do the MP Christian Studies books after 4 years of BSGAA.
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I actually compared 5 and 6 and found that most was the same but 6 increases in difficulty and doesn't explain a few things, so I bookmarked those in 5 to go over. You could always give the tests from 5, I have the test booklet and that is what we are doing this week to spot any weak areas that may need more attention. We don't do any of the writing lessons.
*Update - I had my son do the tests from the R&S 5 test booklet and he didn't do as well I would have hoped, so we ARE going to do R&S 5.
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We use Writing Strands (the original edition) and my DS10 loves doing it and we also are doing Killgallon's Sentence Composing for Middle School and it's excellent.
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Middle School Geography
in K-8 Curriculum Board
Posted
We're using Memoria Press Geography for 6th-8th and they have 3 levels, an older student could possibly do more than one level a year.