We're planning the traditional MP sequence. We just started Prima Latina this year (late 2nd), when we're done it's on to LCI, then the First Form Series. After that, we'll see. Maybe accelerated Henle?

Honestly, I haven't used Singapore, and don't really have any desire to do so. BUT, we are using MUS and MM. MUS works for us, I like his teaching of concepts. So my question is more of a 'Why not use MUS?'

Well, SL is pretty easy to use across fairly large age spans if you are flexible about how you use it. In my opinion, any literature-based core program will yield remarkable results in knowledge gained compared to any public school curric. (I would just ignore those SAT scores for placing your children too). We have been relaxedly using Core A this year for my grade 2 and early, early K girl. It is a bit easy for my grade 2, and a bit advanced for my just-turned-5. SO, I get my grade 2 to do all the listening, the timelines, and the maps. My little K just sort of flits around, does some comprehension questions with us etc. You can definitely combine, you just can't expect your little one to 'get' as much as your older one. Still, it is surprising how much they DO get that you hear coming up in their discussions later :).

Some people have used AAS to teach reading, but I haven't. It seems that my girls progress at different speeds for their reading and spelling skills. Reading goes much more quickly, so we work on AAS at a level below their reading skills. It is definitely a great intensive phonics review, but moves more slowly than a phonics program would in my opinion. I'm sure after Christmas would be fine, there's no big rush to start at 5, I don't think we started level one until late grade one :).

We are using AAR Pre-1 and you can definitely use it apart from AAS :). I haven't used Scaredy Cat Reading though, so I can't say there.

I agree, any literature-based program. We do literature based for history/geography (Sonlight) and science (NOEO). We also do a lot of face-time in our skills, Rod and Staff - we do together, mostly oral - All About Spelling - together, and I am involved in...pretty much everything. My oldest has a quality time love language, so she can get pretty grump in a hurry when we aren't doing school! She can't handle too many days off in a row :).

We are mostly reformed ;), and we just use story Bibles and family readings of the Bible together until 3rd. Another wrench :).

I didn't get any email notices for 2-3 days, I thought I would go bonkers! Thankfully it seems to be up and running today though.

Personally, I think AAS is easier to implement for the teacher from what I've seen, you just open and go. SWR is more involved.

Very much so! Homeschooling has taught me so much about myself and my children. I thought I'd never teach spelling, but I do! I thought we'd only use real books, and no readers, but we NEEDED readers during the learning to read process. I thought I'd never use a textbook for anything, but now we do use one for English. I also thought - no way workbooks, but our Latin is pretty much like a workbook! So funny :).

A Beka and Sonlight have very different approaches and philosophies. I think A Beka is good for some skill areas - I used their A Handbook for Reading and leveled readers to teach our first daughter to read. I wouldn't want to use it for content subjects though, because it is all text based. We do use Sonlight cores and really enjoy their use of real books to teach history/geography/literature. Nothing has sparked my children's love of learning more than SL has :). SL's strength is their cores, personally I don't use their skill subject recommendations, I have other things I like better :).

I'm still waiting to get a better look (dial-up SO slow), but there are some samples I found that you might want to check out: An ancient times sample, one on world explorers, one from their Book of Centuries coloring pages, and a topical page from the Book of Centuries. I really need to take better advantage of their history pages in the future! Right now we are using some of the Canadian geography pages in our Canada studies. Oh, actually, if you go look here, they have descriptions of their entire history system (it sounds really cool), and there are a LOT more samples to download there :). Sadly we aren't making toys right now (so that website is closed, we let it go). We just had too many moves, and not enough room for a workshop in the new house that we are both living in and building at the same time. We still look back on those days fondly and hope that someday we might be able to make toys again once things are better set up here - but that looks a long ways off :).

Let me look at the history timeline notebook, it looks VERY impressive, but we already have a timeline going for DD so I haven't taken a great look at it yet. So, the way it works for the membership is if you buy only a single year, you don't get the updates after your membership expires BUT you do get access to everything that was on the site during the period of your subscription. I hope that makes sense :). Oh, thanks Melanie! I'm so glad your family is still enjoying your toys! I'll let me DH know! We still don't have a workshop set up for him (so many moves, so much chaos!), but he absolutely LOVED making them!

It works out to $17 off or so (plus the goodies), but it is a huge savings over buying the individual page packets.

We have four girls too! I think it is a bit easier to start at ground zero than it is to jump in in the later grades. Of course, I've never done the latter, it's just that when you start from the ground up, you intimately know where each of your children is at. :) Either way, there is trial and error involved. You really need to get our feet wet and actually TRY different methods etc. to find what will work for your family. There are things I was SURE I'd love that just haven't flown for us. There are other things where I thought - nah, we're not that kind of family - only to find that those resources actually met our needs the best! That being said - if your children like reading, I'd check out Sonlight's high school cores for your older children - they can be done pretty much independently. It is all pre-planned, open-and-go, so it's a great lit-based choice to get started with. For your younger children (anyone who doesn't have a solid foundation in basic academic skills - reading, spelling, basic grammar, basic writing, basic math etc.) start there. Don't even worry about content this first year! Just do some bedtime read alouds, it will work, I've done it! Since you specifically asked about reading, A Beka is a good choice. I agree with a previous poster, you don't need all the 'stuff'. I taught my oldest daughter to read using A Handbook for Reading and their leveled readers, you don't need anything else :). AND - use the Hive. This place is fantastic! Once you start to narrow your choices down, and when you have a better understanding of what you are looking for, list your requirements and people will gladly recommend some choices for you to research further :). I have found some great solutions for our family here :). Have fun!

HITS! All About Reading Pre-1 (DD 5 begs for this) All About Spelling Level 2 (DD 8 - spelling just keeps getting better!) Sonlight, Core K (A) (still in progress - started in January and had to interrupt for Canada studies but loved by all) Rod and Staff 2 (love that we can do this orally, has helped SO much with writing sentences) I feel the love, DD tolerates Math Mammoth (DD 8 is feeling the love here for some reason) General WTM LA skills - copywork, narration etc. - I feel the love, DD tolerates Bible - NIrV with notebooking pages, DD feels the love if we narrate orally, not so much if I make her write ;) Timeline Working Out OK Prima Latina Math U See Canada, My Country and supplementary books/songs etc. Total FAIL Apologia Astronomy - I am tempted to say never again, this is our second failed attempt I THINK We'll Feel the LOVE NOEO Chem I - just started More notebooking! Memory work - I think I am getting the hang of this! LOVE BUT DOESN'T GET DONE Artistic Pursuits

I know some of you ladies have been thinking of buying the NotebookingPages.com Treasury, and since the "Deals and Sales" subforum has yet to be established ;), I thought I'd post about their sale here! The NotebookingPages.com 5th Birthday Sale-A-Bration is happening this month (starting now and running until the 27th). Basically, their entire collection plus updates for a year and three months (well over $400) is on sale for $52.46 with the standard free-goodie package, fun prizes etc. etc. We own this and it is great. My daughter really likes to look at all the sheets and pick out which one she'd like to use. I plan to plumb it more deeply this year now that my oldest has really discovered notebooking :)!

I totally spend the most on history/geography/literature - ala Sonlight. That my friend, is because I LOVE books. Really, I do :). I don't need a lot to teach grammar - just a text, but to instill a love of learning and reading in my children is to me priceless.

Homeschooling has humbled me, there can be no doubt. At first I thought we wanted to unschool - my kids would just learn everything naturally without ANY instruction, right? Then we went Waldorf. Then I got saved :). Then we were going to delay math until, oh at least 10 - until DD started asking for math when she was 6: enter MUS. And I realized DD wasn't 'just learning how to read' and I didn't want to wait: enter phonics. And I realized she wasn't just going to start reading 'real books' right off the bat: enter phonetically leveled readers. And I realized she wasn't a natural speller either: enter AAS. And on and on it goes! Ha! Nothing has gone the way I imagined it would before I actually got started and had some miles under my belt. Well, I suppose one thing has - we read a lot of books out loud and are pretty lit-based for science and history, I always wanted to read a lot of books together :). What I have realized for myself is that I NEED something printed down that I can refer to. I love SL-style schedules that I can just open and pick-up where I left off in case we take an extended break ;). Takes very little brain power. I also really like scripted programs - I might not use the script, but at least I know what I'm supposed to be teaching. I also really like the gap-filling power of R&S English, I'm a natural writer but my daughter has needed some hand holding, and though I can write, I had no idea how to teach it. I love the incremental approach that I get from R&S, AAS, phonics, MUS, you name it. Incremental = love for my daughter and I (because SHE needs it, I thought we'd have huge intuitive leaps in understanding, not so!) What DOES NOT work for me as a teacher is watching a DVD and then trying to teach my children! We use the MUS DVD together and that works out great because it is chaptered in short chunks, but PR was a bust for me because I couldn't figure out how to translate the DVDs into ME teaching it! There was barely anything on paper, and I've realized that I need that :). So, there you go :). Fun thread. Like many of you I was totally, totally wrong, and knew nothing about my daughter and myself in terms of learning and teaching styles before we got started. What we do looks a lot more like one-on-one school (when it comes to the skill subjects) than I ever expected it to!

Well, this is pretty specific, but I am going to say All About Spelling. It was the missing piece in our LA studies. The further we get the more confident my daughter has become in her writing. It has been amazing. I am a natural speller and didn't really know the rules, so this has been a God-send for us. DH has also agreed (only just today) to remediate his spelling/reading with me using AAS. That, to me, is incredible. He grew up in a home where literacy was not valued (no reading aloud), and he only really learned to read as an adult (victim of the sight method). This will be so exciting and do him a world of good! I can't wait to see his confidence with the written language soar :).

If only this applied for us here in Canada :). Wishful thinking!

We also use a plastic box for our MUS blocks. It is like a large shoebox size. I would hate having to sort the blocks into their own little slots all the time. I don't think I could convince the little ones to do it!

We are doing this core right now :). My Father's Dragon is ...awesome for lack of a better word, but there are so many good books in this core. I agree that Light at Tern Rock was a bit slow, and even a bit boring, but it made me cry in the end. Family Under the Bridge - my children think this book is hilarious!! Apple and the Arrow - it IS meaty, but my children STILL play William Tell. We had a 'William Tell' supper for them with bread, milk, and an apple just the other night, and we read this MONTHS ago. We did sell our Wizard of Oz though, because we don't go in for 'good witches'. That is the only book we have skipped though :). I also agree that Core A makes a GREAT grade 1 year. We have actually been doing it with a grade 2 and a very early K (she just flits in and out whenever she likes to).

We really enjoy SL's book selections. It is really hard to go wrong with them. Something that we have done with the schedule to reduce the 'choppiness' when my children are really into a book, is to read one book ACROSS the week each day. So on Day 1, we'll read half of or all of the assignments for first book for the first week - right across all the days. And check them off. The next day we'll do the next book. It has worked well for us!

Another vote for Artistic Pursuits! It is really wonderful :). I can't figure out Atelier from their website for the life of me!