This sounds really, really handy! Thanks! Okay--this is good to hear. Right now we've been incorporating some reading on science and social studies topics along with a choice of various fiction books. I will just keep plugging along like that for awhile!

Any thoughts on novel studies for 4th/5th grade? How many would you do? What would your expectations be?

I've seen this in a book I checked out from the library where the author told us that she had homeschooling experience from the time her child was born so she really had a lot of experience. It felt like she was trying to convince us to trust her with her advice using that line of thinking. It was definitely offputting, but I didn't know that this sort of character was becoming more common. I was pregnant with my oldest back when this became popular and definitely made all my own cleaners, laudry detergents, etc. from scratch for several years. 😆 Never tried to do all of the cooking and such, but I remember reading all of the blogs and thinking it was a fun way to go about things. I stopped doing that when I became dissatisfied with the quality of DIY cleaning methods, got in to couponing, and needed to focus on homeschooling. We are on the younger side of homeschooling, so we haven't seen much come and go. I did use TGTB to start out 😆, but just for the LA component. I have since moved away from it. It's cheap, and it does kind of hold your hand at first so you can gain the confidence you need to move on. The only local hybrid everyone regards as a private school option. They are definitely going for the private school vibe: school uniforms, universal curriculum selections, hired official teachers. I think it attracts people who want private school but who also need to save money. I'm sad to hear that a lot of the informal opportunities to meet are not only getting rare but are getting completely replaced. I would love to do things like invite a handful of families over for a middle school science club so we could run labs together and then hang out, and I really want to do more park days. Any time we plan them through our co-op they are pretty poorly attended (like one or two families come besides the one who planned it).

Tomorrow is the day! I've got everything ready, and even though there has been some tweaking and some changes I think I will be able to handle the next few weeks. We are starting 16 school days before co-op begins, so we'll have those be 16 very consistent and productive days. After that things get a bit hairy, but I will know more about how the kids are doing with some of my expectations and the tweaks we have made by then. I'm feeling better and in the frame of mind to "just do it" tomorrow.

This is really good advice. We've made moves to increase social time for myself as an adult, and that's got me feeling better about things. I also came back from my break taking Spanish, so having something that I am learning will help feed me and make me feel like a more interesting person, too.

My favorite new thing that we are doing this year is for science and social studies. Our co-op has a lab science class for 3rd grade, so I asked the teacher for her scope & sequence so that we can do outside reading, videos or other activities related to it. The co-op is also doing an American Girl book club over eight different time periods in American history, and I am building unit studies around those, too (Memory Work: states, capitals and locations, order of the Presidents). I love unit studies, but this year bringing the magic and dazzle to homeschool is going to be harder for me to pull off because of our schedule. I'm thankful to be able to use the co-op for that so that we can focus on basic academics and get through our day more quickly.

Hello! I am new to the K-2 boards. We are starting this year on the 10th, and my little guy is finally school aged! He's my third one, and I have the benefit of knowing my style and what is/is not worth it to do with a Kindergartener. 😆 That feels good. Our focus is going to be math and handwriting (fine motor skills in general). He is already reading very well, so I am going to do shared reading with him and begin Explode the Code for "spelling" sometime in October or November (depending on writing skills). He is going to get to join the homeschool co-op and is happy about that!

I'm starting on Thursday and am glad to have given myself a decent amount of lead to to emotionally prepare. I'm feeling better about starting but still tired thinking of all the work involved. I would like homeschooling to not be an isolating experience this year. Even around other homeschool families it can feel that way since we are all so busy with our own stuff. My husband works from home, and we have arranged one afternoon a week for me to get out and do something social for myself. This is outside of night/weekend opportunities that come along, and it feels good to have time to count on to be social! I am going to make an effort to cast my net wide this year to find people I have something in common with (outside of homeschooling). I think the biggest thing is viewing my self as a whole person and not "just a mom." Not everyone goes through this struggle, but I am not lucky enough to have been able to avoid it. 😆

Thanks--I think the "just do it" mentality may get me started for the year. Tonight I'm going to block out a sample week of where my time will be going and begin to mentally accept the schedule. This year I'm going to be pulled in a lot of different directions, and I'm feeling kind of stuck in this time of life. For a silver lining to focus on: our general community is expanding this year as we start a couple of new activities, and I'm excited to get to know more people. Part of why I feel stuck is that I'm more of an extrovert. I need more face time with people outside of my family, and I also need guarded time for education at home because taking our work out & around or attempting to squish schoolwork into the corners of life does not work for me or my kids. Combine that with time needed at home for general homemaking responsibilities, and it's just a lot of time at home for us built up over a few years.

We are two weeks out from our first day of school. I'm not looking forward to it. In fact I have all kind of emotions swirling around about this. Who has been there? What have you done to regain a positive outlook? I have things prepped out for at least the first nine weeks so at least that part is under control.