I'd have her sign away parental rights so she couldn't show up one day, in a worse state than ever, and take her daughter back.

The apron's a cute idea. Instead of a baking set, I'd get cake mix. I don't see any reason for a five year old to have her own pans.

I eat Spam. You know somebody's buying it because it's still on grocery shelves. It's me. :spam:

I've heard of people writing words from OPGTR on a white board so their student doesn't have to look at a busy page in a book. Reading to my kids while they followed along in the book helped my kids so much. Big, thick easy-to-read books might make her feel grown-up. The first grade Pathway reader, Days Go By is good. Sometimes I teach my kids to read a specific poem which has some difficult to read words. When they can read it out loud to the rest of the family, they feel like they are really reading.] Hope something here helps.

Agreeing with FloridaLisa, don't meddle with his free reading.

She's telling you she is not ready for this. Back off.

:spam:

I don't think that we allow anything as long as it doesn't interfere with other citizens. For instance, a doctor is not allowed to kill his patient, even if the patient is terminally ill, and requests for the doctor to do so.

Well, if same sex marriage is evil and wrong, then outlawing it would be akin to outlawing theft, assault and fraud. We should outlaw what is evil and wrong. If same sex marriage is good and right, then no one has the right to interfere with it.

Will she sit and focus on anything? Will she sit and play a game with you, like Uno or memory? How about to color, paint, or glue? To play with something on her own? Puzzles, or something?

We did the one lesson over two days. I'm thinking we'll do Saxon for 45 minutes every 'school day' regardless of whether we finish a lesson or not. We wont do it all in one block of time.

My first grade teacher assigned reading aloud as homework. For 15 minutes I laboriously sounded out words. I couldn't recall the beginning of the sentence by the time I reached the end. I don't know how my mom pretended to enjoy it because it sounded wretched. It's no wonder by second grade I hated reading. So, I wouldn't have second graders reading second grade-level books aloud for 20 minutes. I'd rather poke my eyes out with a fork! Instead, I'd read easy books to them very slowly, while they looked at the words. I did this with my kids and after a while they would chime in with me, and even read aloud ahead of me. Then they started taking the book from me and saying, "I don't need you to read this to me. I can read it myself." And they could.

One of my dumplings spilled water on my keyboard. Now that it's replaced I can post an update. Since I last posted, we've done Xtra Math, and only one Saxon lesson.. That one lesson was well done. My son didn't act clueless or have a stinky attitude. I did the math alongside him. That made all the difference. We're having a hard time with prime factorization, so I put on a Khan Academy video for that. My son said it was easier to understand than the lesson in his Saxon book. As we go through the book, if it gets too hard for him to do along side me, I'll put 8/7 aside, and get him something easier. Thanks for all the advice.

I can't know what is going on in the OP's home. But I have known children IRL who misbehave only for who lets them get away with it. The mom who really needs some better parenting tools, comforts herself with creating a safe place for her child to misbehave. For instance, I have a friend whose child will request candy 25 times in a row, and my friend will respond with a random order of "no" in various degrees of harshness, and even slaps on the hand....and then give the child candy. "At least I know she'll behave at day care and with her grandmother. She just feels safe with me, so that's why she's so disgusting."

In the past day, we've had the worst time ever doing math. Half the problems were left blank, were answered with a question mark, or were wrong. While doing Mixed Review, he told me he had never seen that kind of problem before. He tried to tell me "they" should change the laws of math so that his answer would be correct. It took 2 minutes for him to understand what "Copy the problem in your notebook," meant. Oh, and he gave me The Stink Face. Note To Self: Work on that bad attitude. I looked at the Saxon placement test, but I don't think I made him do it. Now, I think I should have put him in a lower grade. I think the problem is a combination of the wrong placement, puberty brain fog, a defeatest attitude and grouchy resistance. Here is my plan: Have him work on Saxon Math for 45 minutes, only. We'll finish the book one day. Help him do all the problems. Hopefully, he will decide he doesn't need so much help, after a while. Stop slacking on giving him the timed tests. I won't time him, though. Continue using the website Xtra Math for extra math practice. He feels successful at that.

New. He did Singapore 1A-4B. We used the textbooks and workbooks, not the Challenging Word Problems or Intensive Practice. I supplemented with various things to cement the math facts. Then he did MCP Math F (grade 6). I let him skip problems. Now we are using Saxon 8/7.

We're using 8/7. He is demoralized by the size of the book, and the number of problems that have to be done. He has stopped complaining (mostly) but his daily work has "careless" errors, like somewhere in there he thought 2 x 3 = 5. He skips problems, and puts a question mark as the answer for others. He will never go back to reread any lessons to figure out answers. He will not write down his calculations, even when he can't get the correct answers mentally. He'd rather get it wrong than write the steps down. He gets distracted while doing mixed practice which makes his 'school day' long. I have to keep telling him to get back to work. When I let him skip 12 problems he nagged and whined to skip more, and the ones he did were mostly wrong. So, it was worse when he skipped problems. Even though I think he should be able to do it independently, I have realised he can't or won't do well that way, so we do the warm-up, lesson, new concept, and lesson practice together. Is that how you do it? Do you have your child do mixed practice independently? Does he correct the problems he gets wrong? Do you let him skip problems? Does your child do mixed practice in one sitting, or more? What is your child's motivation to do well in math? I am not above bribes/rewards/punishments. The reward of good grades, and free time when he is done is not motivating him.

No. LOL We left a church and it's members were sorry to see us go and even now, 5 years later hope we'll come back. They miss seeing my kids growing up. It's really disappointed them.

I'd try showing him that it is broken and useless. Tell him your are sad you can't use the object anymore. Make him throw it in the garbage, while you look disappointed. If it is an expensive item tell him you'll buy another one...some day.. when you get enough money... *sad face* *sigh* With my kids, I would never bring it up again. That would be enough for then to really understand what they have done. No punishment or long lecture necessary. They don't want to waste and destroy our things, nor do they want to disappoint me. Frankly, his behaviour does not sound normal. If he was two years old and showed remorse, at least some times, I would think that it was normal.

Don't really like it. Hate the spelling. Sorry.

When you are at home, challenge him to change out of his swim suit quickly. Use a stop watch to time him. Have him guess how long it took. Tell him how long it took. Have him guess how long it would take him if he didn't rush. Talk very briefly about how silly it is to take an hour. Tell him you will give him 15 minutes to change while he is at swimming. That's plenty of time! You'll be waiting outside the dressing room. If necessary, repeatedly practice changing clothes at home. At the next swimming time, as he is going into the dressing room, tell him to change quickly because you have some chocolate-covered sugar puffs in your bag for him to eat as soon as he is done. Then start eating them right in front of him. - ha! If he doesn't make it out of the dressing in room in 15 minutes, make him go home wet next time. He can sit on a towel lined with a garbage bag.

I got a newer Hooked on Phonics from Christian Book Distributor that comes without a DVD. I never missed it.

Meh, I wouldn't complain.

6th

Sounds normal to me.