Can anyone suggest any books for a student who has had no previous grammar lessons? A friend has a dd approaching high school and has never done any grammar. Thanks! Anna

The books on the link are the new ones that came just came out. If they are similar to the Early Bird series, you really just need the student books. The concepts are so simple that the Teacher's Guide will have more than what you would need or have time for. I agree with someone above that said to save the money for pattern blocks, or other manipulatives. (We have the multilink cubes, a balance scale, pattern blocks, and tons of legos.) These manipulatives are not necessary since you can use anything you have in the house as counters. The balance scale section can be skipped if you don't have one. You can always go to the playground and use a seesaw (if they still have them) and use yourselves as the weights. God Bless, Anna

Linda, now you got me thinking again. At my dc's ages, I don't mind giving them the points to copy. As Kathy said, they learn by me modeling to them. But (this time, I'm talking about high school and up people).....if one is always used to being given handouts during lectures and discussion, doesn't that make it harder for them to be able to take notes on their own? This is just a thought that came into my head. I would be interested in hearing different points of view about this. Thank you all for your help! God Bless, Anna

We've tried using pre-packaged lapbooks (not for Apologia, though) and my children hated them. They prefer to make their own thing, especially when we did swimming creatures. They cut their booklets into the shape of whatever animal they were studying. It made them own it more. Just a thought....... Anna

My dc are in the upper grammar/dialectic stage. I use TOG. When we have our weekly discussion, there are some things that I would tell them that are important but are not in their notes. What is the best way to get them to know that they need to write some of those things down in their notes? I am not expecting much from them right now. I just need ideas to get them started and used to the idea of taking notes. A friend had given me a large white board. Would writing down the key facts for them and having them copy it be a good start? God Bless, Anna

most of our books for school but I've learned that my money is better used when I buy books geared towards the older kids. My criteria is usually: 1. Will I use it again? 2. Is it an interesting enough book that the children will reread it themselves outside of school? 3. Does the story have any values that I would want them to emulate? God Bless, Anna

What you can do, also, is look at the placement tests and just have her do the 6A and 6B ones to see if 6 would be a good fit for her. God Bless, Anna

It is also pricey, though. I don't have any experience with Winter Promise. We loved American History when we did SL Core 3 and 4 Blessings, Anna

I was going to go with NEM by itself but I'm not very strong in algebra so Videotext will help ds and I. God Bless, Anna

They do have a wide variety! :001_smile:Anna

What the other posters wrote are exactly what I was thinking of when I saw your question, but I'd like to add that (personally), I think SL's book choices are better. There is a lot of similar books between the two but somehow, the SL books are more memorable to me. I LOVE, LOVE, LOVE SL but decided to switch to TOG because of the combining problem. It does take me more time to plan the week's work with TOG than with SL. SL's Instructors' Guide are more user friendly than TOG. You also have to plan to spend time reading the teacher's notes to get ready for the weekly discussion in TOG. (Some weeks, it's easy. Some weeks, it could take a chunk of time.) I still pine for SL but TOG is working out well for us this year. God Bless, Anna

will be good for the 4th grader but not enough "meat" for the 7th grader. I'm using this right now for my 5th grade and below children. I've been checking out Rainbow Science for next year when my oldest hits middle school. http://www.beginningspublishing.com/products.html As for combining, I'm not sure yet myself what to do with my younger ones if I do decide to go with Rainbow Science for my older ones. I might have to do a separate science just because I'm not a planner and it takes me too long to try to plan my own thing to combine the younger with the older. I'll just use whatever previous science books my older ones used. HTH! Anna

I'm starting to see the same problem with my son. He's in 5th grade now. Thanks for asking this question. God Bless, Anna