I have no long-term plan. My children have been learning German from birth, and have attended a German-language preschool. My Kindergartner is now attending a German class for native speakers on Saturday mornings (they study reading and writing), and we also devote about 90 minutes a week to formal study, plus watch German TV and read German books. We devote so many hours a week to German, there is no way I can think about adding another language anytime soon. Someday, sure, but I can't possibly predict when that will seem like a good idea. I would rather study one language with great thoroughness, and worry about an additional language later on.

I agree, I don't think it's unusual.

I definitely agree with the notion of a timer that's easy for him to understand. We use the "Visual Timer" software on the iPod Touch, but there are other alternatives. My daughter really enjoys being able to monitor for herself how long it's going to be until we change subjects or take a break. It vastly reduces stress in our schooling.

Fantastic! Has he tried Amelia Bedelia? My daughter has enjoyed those at the same time as the Nate the Great books.

My husband and I went out to see it for 15 or 20 minutes (I set an alarm for 10 minutes before totality), but we didn't wake the kids. We didn't think they'd appreciate being woken up for it. Anyway, it was great!

Well, you certainly wouldn't want to do the same type of work you've already done again, but that doesn't necessarily mean moving on to "first grade" is the best solution, either. My situation this school year was similar with my Kindergarten-age daughter, and I opted to do "kindergarten" with her. That doesn't mean I don't meet her where she is from a skills point of view -- of course we're not doing math or reading that's too easy for her -- but we're also not forging ahead with certain more typical first-grade topics. The main stuff we're doing this year is: Math -- We're using the Math Mammoth Blue series books. She's completed addition 1, more than half of subtraction 1, and 3/4 of place value 1. This is "first grade math" by most definitions. English -- We're focusing mainly on reading. No formal curriculum, just reading actual books. I also have her write something at least once a week, but we're not following a formal method. No grammar or spelling beyond what comes up in the context of our other work. We also don't do penmanship in English, because we do it in German (below) and it would be overkill to do it twice. Geography -- We're studying various countries around the world. I have no particular agenda about which countries we'll study -- I ask her what she'd like to learn about next. She's also doing memory work on the locations and flags of different countries, and is starting to learn the US states. Science -- We do a ton of stuff for science. We learn about the animals and habitats in the countries we're studying in Geography. We're studying rocks, doing early lego robotics, learning about electricity, watching nature videos, reading about animals, etc. She loves science. Music -- She's taking relaxed piano lessons with dad, and we also listen to Classics for Kids and related music. Art -- We do various art projects, visit art exhibits, and practice drawing. German -- We spend more time on this than anything else. She takes a Saturday morning German class, does a reading workbook with me (roughly equivalent to something like Explode the Code), listens to German read-alouds, watches German TV, and is starting to read German books. So we're doing a lot of school and learning a lot, but calling it "Kindergarten" allows me to avoid worrying about what specific objectives we ought to be meeting. My suggestion would be to figure out what you think is most important for him to be learning at this age, taking his interests into account. Focus on that, and call it Kindergarten. He won't be bored if you're learning about things that interest him!

Our report is up. It was a really good week; I was especially impressed with Erika's reading and math.

I bought it to use with my Kindergartner, who recently turned six. She really enjoys doing the activities with me. We only do the activities in the teacher's guide. We haven't branched out into writing our own programs, building our own models, etc. The way we have implemented it, the whole thing is very step-by-step. I think this is appropriate for her age, but I will be interested to see what happens as she gets older. I have a strong background in computer programming, so I'm entirely capable of facilitating more advanced work, such as integration with the Scratch programming environment, but she's not ready for that yet. I'm thinking that using the WeDo system with me for a couple of years will be great preparation for Mindstorms in the future.

I think it depends on what you mean. I believe the authors say fourth grade, but it doesn't mean the child will be able to read as well as an average fourth grader. Being able to decode complex words is only a part of what reading at a fourth grade level means. OPGTR teaches phonics and provides a modicum of reading practice. It's entirely possible for a child to finish OPGTR and have a first-grade level of fluency, even if they can decode most words they encounter. Remember that Jessie Wise suggests that the OPGTR should be only part of the day's reading lesson, with reading real books taking equal (if I recall correctly) time.

Knock-out! is a fun game that my husband and I enjoy playing with our daughter. As a bonus, you can buy it with Muggins! on the flip side of the board for later on. :)

We do our formal, sit-down bookwork 4 days a week. We do a co-op on Wednesdays and a language school on Saturdays, so we have six days a week of planned "school," but only 4 days when we do our normal curriculum. Since I'm not using any curriculum materials that are split up into lessons, I'm not facing the problem you are. I do have one curriculum piece that needs to be finished this school year, so I just took the number of pages and divided it by the number of weeks in our academic calendar. We just make sure to do that many pages each week. I seem to recall that you come from a Waldorf background, so I'm going to toss this out there in somewhat Waldorfy terms. It seems to me that the rhythm of the day and week are important. I know that my children thrive on routine, and whenever we shake things up, it tends to get chaotic. There's no reason why you can't get work that's planned for five days a week done in four days, but if you don't have a plan for how that's going to happen, it'll probably frustrate both you and your kids. You might, for example, have a specific day of the week when you do two English lessons, another day when you do two Math lessons, and so on. I have no opinion about whether it's best to have a summer vacation or not.

Thanks to you both, these perspectives are very interesting. (And to everyone else -- what you've had to say was also interesting!)

I don't know enough about CLE to comment on this specific plan, but I did want to reassure you that there are plenty of math curricula where place value isn't introduced in first grade. I know place value is only touched on in Germany during first grade- they study addition and subtraction within 20 that year.

In another thread, someone commented that she didn't like to do ancient history with elementary-age children, because she felt they should have a stronger foundation in the Christian faith before being exposed to "false gods." I come from a different religious background, so I don't understand why learning about the gods of antiquity would be problematic for young Christians. How is this different from learning that your next-door neighbor is an adherent of the Hindu faith? If you feel this way, I'd be very interested to learn more about your viewpoint!

One thing I have found with my daughter is that coming back to things later is OK. If she doesn't get it now, maybe it will make more sense in a month or two. We are using the Math Mammoth blue series, and I have been surprised by the depth of the concepts in the Place Value 1 book. I like the way Math Mammoth builds things up gradually. I'd suggest continuing with what you're doing. If the time comes when he really does need to have a better grasp on place value, you could take a break and work through the Math Mammoth Place Value 1 book.

My daughter has been very much enjoying the book "Jaguars" by Ann Squire, from the "A True Book" series. The text is informative and the photographs are lovely. We plan to read more books from the same series.

My oldest has always been the kind of kid to have unreasonable tantrums. It's taken years for her to accept that she just can't have what she wants all the time. She gets really worked up really quickly, and can't think rationally at all when she's in that state. She's one of those kids for whom standard discipline measures just don't work. Even at five, she was literally unable to make a choice that would have kept her from doing something she wanted to do, even if she knew there would be negative consequences she wouldn't like. I think it's possible physical discipline might have worked, but only if it had risen to levels I would have thought abusive. Anyway, it will get better. My daughter still has tantrums at 6, but they are not as frequent or severe. Interestingly, homeschooling has actually helped our relationship and her behavior. That said, I have my younger child in preschool, and it's very helpful for getting schoolwork done with my older child. It's also more fun for him- why would he want to be here while she and I sit at the table and do written schoolwork? Good luck!

Our Kindergarten week 14 is up. We got everything done, but it was a challenge.

Interesting- I let my kids, 3 and 6, use the iPod Touch in the back of the car every day. It's never been a problem.

I cannot imagine spending $50 for a dedicated electronic device like that in this day and age. My daughter uses an iPod Touch with the Math Drills software. Yes, the iPod Touch is much more expensive at around $200 (I bought the one she uses refurbished more than two years ago), but it's a multipurpose computing device that can do much more than just math drills. My daughter also uses it to do memory work of all kinds, watches German-language television shows in the car, listens to music at bedtime, etc. I'm not saying I'd buy a $200 device just to do math drills, but I wouldn't pay $50 for something that can be accomplished on a wide range of general-purpose computing devices using software that's either free or costs only a few dollars. Edited to add: In the same price range, I would buy Muggins! instead.

I have the first edition of the WTM, and already owned an atlas before homeschooling was on my radar, so I've never looked to see what is recommended and how it might differ from what I have. I usually use my atlas, the Oxford Atlas of the World, when I want to look at geography in more detail than can be seen on the globe or wall map. This often happens when thinking about either current events or history. The atlas I have even contains street maps of the central parts of important cities. The particular atlas I have also contains helpful world maps showing things like rainfall, population density, standards of living, and energy production. It really helps me to understand the "big picture" on these issues. I also use it when thinking about things like ocean currents, the solar system, moon phases, plate tectonics, and the atmosphere. I don't know that I have ever used the section that describes each country. I would normally use the CIA World Factbook on-line for that, or use an encyclopedia, depending on the level of detail I needed.

How about things like: Prisms Magnets, etc A gyroscope The parts and instructions from a basic electricity kit Stuff to make paper airplanes and instructions Cards with information about things like animals and space Lego technic or other model components with gears, levers, wheels, etc. to model simple machines.

I think a well-stocked reference shelf is extremely important for education and for daily life. The Internet is great, and I use it all the time to get information about places, but it does not replace a printed atlas in my home. I don't know if I would choose this particular atlas- I own a big Oxford atlas for adult use and a smaller National Geographic Atlas for Young Explorers that I use with my (younger) children. Of course an atlas will not remain current forever, but the experience of using a printed atlas is different from using the Internet, in a way I think is valuable.

I bought a large wall map at Costco for $10 or less. It's not my favorite projection, but we also regularly use a globe so I'm not that concerned. We have been getting a lot of use out of the National Geographic World Atlas for Young Explorers, Children Just Like Me, and A School Like Mine. My daughter is really interested in animals, so we read a lot of books about animals that live in places we are studying, and watch nature videos.

We're not using the Light Blue curriculum (we're using the Blue series), but I've had my daughter do almost every page so far in Addition 1, Subtraction 1, and Place Value 1. My understanding is that 1A is roughly equivalent to Addition 1 and Subtraction 1. It looks like where we are in Subtraction 1 is around page 78 of MM 1A. Looking ahead at the rest of Subtraction 1, I will probably have my daughter do all of it unless it gets horribly boring for her. Up to this point, she's been happy to do it. We do drill outside of Math Mammoth, so I'm not concerned that she won't memorize all of the relationships. One thing I find is that although the actual math facts being practiced are repetitive, the curriculum approaches them in different ways. I think it's worth knowing what to do when confronted with different kinds of problems, so even if my daughter already knows what 6-2 is, I don't really view all of the problems that use that fact as being primarily about solving 6-2. Since we use the Blue series, I generally present her with a choice every day between doing a page from Subtraction 1, or a page from Place Value 1. If she goes a few days and doesn't choose one or the other, I have her do a page from the one she's been less interested in. Some days she opts to do a page from each, or an extra page in the one she was working on. I also sometimes offer her the chance to do a page from some other Math Mammoth book (Early Geometry lately) or another math activity once she's done her first math page.