I have never graded anything, but my kids are young. My expectation is that they complete everything and that's really not been a problem. Not that it sometimes doesn't take too long! They all like their 1 hour of TV/video games a day so they don't want to miss that (which is what would happen if they didn't finish their work), but I rarely have to mention that to them. They like to be done as early as they can so that often times drives them. I check for completion and accuracy every day (completion at school time and accuracy in the evening while I set up next day's school). If they have errors I put it on their workspace to be fixed the next day with their errors marked. I think checking for errors daily is important because in so many of the subjects mastery depends on getting each day correct. My kids would be very frustrated going back and having to fix a whole week's worth of work... or not being able to do their math the next day because they didn't "get it" the day before.

Hmmmmm... Monday's are rough here too..... glad I'm not the only one! I try to lighten Mondays as it is piano lesson and library day, but maybe I'll try putting art on Mondays... they love that!

My 2nd grader is probably doing about 2.5 hours. We do stop for a "snack break" mid morning.

I rarely if ever consult the teacher's manual. And, for the couple of times I did, I didn't find what I was looking for! (mainly in the cursive book) As far as manipulatives, I did end up buying the wooden letter pieces and the blue mat. This is mainly because I have a child who needs them. If I were not schooling him I would not have bought them. The chalkboard you can do on a marker board if you have that and the dough you can obviously use play dough. If you are someone who does everything "by the letter" (no pun intended!) you may want these things or if you have a child who needs them... otherwise like I said, for my other three I would not have bought anything other than the workbooks. Our kids have done real well with this method. Only my K who has fine motor issues complains about handwriting, but it is very doable for him, even with his delays.

Nice! Thanks so much!

:iagree: We use this. The kids have done real well with it... no complaining.

I think it's a good skill to learn (if not just to read it), however I'm not going to press it after they learn it. My writing is a combo of printing and cursive. I would like them to develop a "signature" at some point, but other than that it's up to them what works best for them. I think it's a disservice not to teach it at all.

There is also some evidence to suggest that raising your vit. d levels can help ward off all the silly flu's everyone gets so worked up about. It boosts your immunity.

I picked up "Igniting Your Writing" this past spring thinking I could use it for my 8 year old. He's just not ready... but the thing that I wanted to share with you is that it is written by a writer. Her name is Sandy Larsen and I met her at a curriculum fair. She wrote it based on the steps she takes as a writer. It has 3 different levels in it beginning, intermediate and Advanced. Looks really good, but too much for my non-writers. She also has a 2nd book that she said was for more advanced writers. It's not a typical "writing program" though.

We have two on piano (ages 8 and 7). If they get their chores done early enough before school at least one can practice then. Otherwise they do it sometime during their school time. Sometimes I sit with them, sometimes not... depends on how hard the lessons are or if in the case of my younger one (I'm teaching her) she needs new songs.

FWIW....we just started PL. I do not know Latin so I wanted something easy. I would have to say it's not the most exciting, but quite frankly, I don't have time for exciting if it means lots of time! I am only doing it with one as he is my oldest at 8. Since I don't know Latin, I'm doing it with him. One day we sit and watch the DVD. The next day we do worksheet one, the next day worksheet 2... that's it! Three days a week I've decided is enough. We may take one more day and review. To me, the program is simple and it teaches Latin. Since Latin is just an "extra" thing, not one of the 3R's I feel that is enough for us.

My oldest did Easy Grammar in 2nd grade and he did fine. I found Growing With Grammar toward the end of last year though and started my daughter in it at 1st grade. I liked that better so both the older two are doing Growing with Grammar this year (one in 2nd and one in 3rd). Jayden hasn't had any trouble switching programs so my guess is Easy Grammar was a fine choice for 2nd grade.

Thanks for that Grammar Stage Memorization link! That's a great place to get some ideas!

:lol: I'm so there with you!

Wow, thanks everybody for your feedback! Very nice to see what everyone is doing. My gut feeling was to just encourage the reading right now and worry about "analysis" more in the logic stage. I may go back to Drawn Into the Heart then... right now I'm trying to introduce more weighty reading to Jayden my 9 year old as I think he's ready for the challenge. This we have to do together though, because he has a hard time comprehending what he's reading when he reads the tougher stuff. I'm finding the ancient works a bit challenging too! :-) Right now he's reading through some Roman myths that are proving challenging, but doable if I work through them with him. He can read it all, it's just comprehending it that he needs some help with. I think I will go ahead and look up some literary terms to keep in mind as I guide him through the reading though. It would help me as I was never taught this way so I'm not overly familiar with lit stuff. Thanks again everyone! This was very valuable to me (and hopefully others!)

So, what does reading instruction look like at your house? Specifically, at grammar stage. Last year I used "Drawn Into the Heart of Reading" with Jayden (then 7/8 yrs.) This year, I'm not sure if I'm going to use that again. Currently, I don't have a great plan of attack. The kids each read 20-30 min. on their own during school. They choose from books that have to do with our science theme or history. Then, when I pull them over to work with me, the youngers, of course, are working on phonics... that I have figured out. I'm not sure what to do with the older two though... ages 7 and *almost* 9. They both are very strong readers. Kylie (7) needs a bit of help, but for the most part can decode well. Jayden (8) decodes very well (just reads too fast sometimes, which reading out loud to me is helping with because I can catch his mistakes). What is the next step? Right now, when we work together, they read and I help to make sure they understand what they are reading. Is this enough? We do oral narration for reading most days with one day being written narration. (Kylie is still narrating orally and I write it for her.) Thanks for any insight you may have!

I think this is a huge thing for a lot of women. I have only found one solution... I am a Christian and I have found that the only way I can be okay with where I'm at is to pray at the beginning of the day for God to show me what He would like me to do this day. I keep my eyes open during the day for ways He wants to use me. Sometimes this means just doing what I intended... sometimes this means deviating. At the end of the day I feel very satisfied (as long as I obeyed) that I was where God wanted me no matter what happened. I don't have to do any more or any less than what I did... whatever anyone else did or didn't do doesn't matter because I am confident I did what I was "supposed" to... even if it wasn't according to my plans! I'm sure not everybody will "get" this, but I'm guessing some will understand....

Here's ours.... http://momsbookworms.blogspot.com/ Just got done looking through the blogs here... very fun!! So neat to see what everyone is doing!

We use only MUS. (we can't afford to use 2 programs and I don't think my kids would go for that!) I love the program and feel that it teaches the basic math that is so foundational. Like a pp, when it comes to time, money, etc. we teach it in "real life". I live in MN and quite frankly, and yes we have to test, but since it doesn't matter what my kids score on the standardized test (we don't report scores to anyone) I don't care that they are not learning everything in the order that the test requires. The most important thing to me is that they learn their basic math skills well. So, I teach those, not to a test. I'm curious as to why people see this curriculum as "boring". I've never used another program. No, the pages aren't pretty, but that's not what is important. I'm not sure what other math programs do that is so exciting... MUS has manipulatives, it has drill and it has story problems, the best part to me is that it has an accumulative review every week... not sure what else is needed? I get the feeling people expect a curriculum to entertain...

Haven't done a school blog before. (I did have a photography blog awhile back...) Not big into blogging, but thought it might be fun to document our year. Plus, it would make me take more photos! I didn't do very well at photos of school things last year! So, it's not much at this point, but it's a start! http://momsbookworms.blogspot.com/

I was wondering how many posts it took to stop "just visiting" too!

Like a pp I'm thankful that I have a choice. Personally, I believe the basics can never be done away with.

Thank you very much for asking this question and for those of you that have shared your experiences! My *almost* 9 year old is having trouble with dictation as well. These ideas have given me some good tools to use with him. Thanks!

My 8 (almost 9 year old) is having the same problem. Narration wise he's ready for WWE Level 3. Dictation wise he is not. My plan is to really hit dictation hard. I'm just going to start with an easy length and slowly add words to make them longer. He has trouble with the long sentence followed by the short sentence. I'm hoping to at least get him to the long sentence in the next few weeks, then work on the 2nd shorter sentence. We'll most likely do a little bit each day to give him lots of practice.

We do 4 days for the K and preschooler. I have Bible study one morning a week so I leave independent work for the older 2 so we get some basics in. I takes the younger ones 2 hours, but about 1/2 of that is independent workboxes to keep them busy while I work with every one else!