I hate to be a curriculum hopper, but I'm thinking Phonics Road might not be the right fit...what grade does LOE go to? I see you are using it with your 2nd and 5th graders. My first grader is using PR 1, which at this point is spelling, a little composition, and a little reading thrown in.

Oooh, love this thread! Manifying glass Bug house Field guide special nature notebook Art supplies

If you don't mind my asking, what age/grade levels are you using with LOE? We are using PR 1, but we are having a bit of trouble with it and I am wondering if LOE is, well, more logical. :)

My daughter hated OPGTR. I wanted it to work so badly...cheap, no frills, easy...BORING! I am using Spalding methods to teach my DD age 4 her letter sounds and letting her read Sam books. (You can print the first 52 of them for free at readinga-z.com.) Pass on OPGTR

This is my worry with PR 2. My daughter is only on week 19 of level one, but I struggle with thinking she will be ready to read Little House in the Big Woods after 15 more weeks of instruction. I want to trust the system, but having some doubts.... And eyeing Logic of English....

:iagree: Had to do the same thing with WWE 1 and remind myself that it's not about finishing tye book, it's about teaching my child!

Part of this is developmental, moving from concrete manipulative to seeing the "abstract" number symbols and understanding a "5" means five beans or whatever. I love Right Start because it gives me the script for what to say and it uses games to help with mastery instead of tons of worksheets or flashcards. I know Miquon is well liked too, but there is a bit of a learning curve...RS is more open and go...but also more expensive. HTH!

Welcome! I agree with the previous posters about The Well-Trained Mind. It can also be alot to grasp, but it gives a good overview of classical homeschooling. You might also check out The Ultimate Guide to Homeschooling as a nice general overview. Welcome!

I know the agony of decisions. I am pm'ing you...the programs you describe wound like we might live close to each other :)

I know LOE is fairly new, so there may not be a lot of people who have used it yet :) I just heard about myself a few weeks ago. Debating whether to stick with Phonics Road or go to LOE.

The great thing about homeschooling is you can be eclectic. You don't have to stick to just one boxed curriculum...you can pick different books/publishers for what works for you. Of course, that can also be a nightmare because there are too many choices! Is your son advanced in all subjects? Or is he a good reader but is on grade level for math, etc. The more specific information you can share, the better help you can get on the board :) Are there things you have looked at that you like it don't like?

BUMP :)

:001_smile: Right Start is the perfect fit for us because it provides scripted lessons for the teacher and lots of hands-on activities for the student. Dr. Cotter was a Montessori teacher in her former life, so it is a wonderful combination of things I love.:001_smile:

I am certainly no expert, but the more I learn about Spalding, the better. We are using Phonics Road, level one, and I just started reading the sample of The Logic of English on Amazon. It is parts-to-whole ...and makes SO much sense.

I heard Jim Weiss two years ago at our homeschool convention...Susan W Bauer was there too--swoon! I was in WTM heaven! He is SO entertaining. My girls adore both Greek myth CDs. I am debating about getting Shakespeare...thinking I should wait until we study the Middle Ages, but then shaking myself and thinking that you can never start to early to instill a love of the Bard in your kids.... But I am stretching our budget to the max already!!

I am considering Easy Classical for ancients next year. I like the combination of Biblical history with SOTW for my rising second grader. Does anyone use the geography with the history schedule? I haven't looked at the SOTW AG, but I know it uses mapping activities. Does EC geo offer anything extra that I would want?

I am using Phonics Road, a spin-off of the Spalding method. Reading WRTR helped me understand the "why" of what we were doing in PR, but I think it would be a little hard to implement a program just from the book. Another Hive member led me to The Logic of English--a homeschool mom takes the Spalding ideas and makes them open-and-go. I started reading the book sample on Amazon, and she has created a curriculum to implement the ideas as well. HTH!

Will the t-square not just work on the table? Excuse my complete ignorance of geometry... :)

So, we must be curriculum twins, separated at birth :) We also use PR and RS, and now I am going to run out and look at Nancy Larson science! I could have posted this--I am on exactly the same search. I want more than SOTW because I want more Biblical world view. I LOVE the looks of TOG, but I am waiting to dive in until I my kiddos are older. I have eliminated MFW, SL, HOD because at each grade level, everyone is doing something a little different, and I want all of MY plans to work. (I already love my math and LA, so I don't want to be confused by other suggestions!) In the meantime, while I wait for TOG, I THINK I am going to use Easy Classical for next year. You can get plan for everything, or you can buy plans just for history or science. Ancients include Biblical history and is divided between 2 years--Bible history with ancient Egypt and then ancient Greeks and Romans. "Modern" history seemed to get a little crunched on the end of year 4, but I think I might spread that out to two years --if I am still using the program :) I also like the looks of Truthquest, but I know we would like more activities and such with the program. I can't tell if it has enough activities for my littles crew. Good luck as you make your decisions...and let me know what you decide!

BUMP :)

Asian math refers to a way about thinking about math--understanding numbers and finding multiple ways of solving problems, thinking about math conceptually, instead of just memorizing facts. Right Start, Singapore, Miquon are all popular programs that teach this style of math. I have not used Miquon, but I have looked over the book. We used Singapore briefly. Both are outstanding programs, but Right Start is a good fit for us because there are very few worksheets for kindergarten and first grade, and everything you need is in the Teacher's Edition. I am NOT mathy, and RS gave me confidence in teaching math. The reason we didn't stick with Singapore was simply a personal preference--with RS, I have one book to look at. With Singapore, there is the HIG (home instructor's guide), the textbook (colorful, and used to illustrated concepts), and the consumable workbook where the student shows his work. (They have other supplements such as a Challenging Word Problems book and a test book as well.) After using on the RS TE, I had a hard time juggling all of those books to teach a lesson. But as I said, this is just a personal preference. Some people get sticker shock with RS when they see the cost of the book and manipulatives. If you can look at the TE first, you will see you don't need everything up front. You can get away with the TE, student worksheets, and some popsicle sticks at first! See if you can borrow the book or at least look at it first before you make the commitment, and that might help your decision-making process. I talked to a great rep at our local homeschool convention, and I have been sold on RS ever since!

Looking for ways to save some money, but I don't want to be cheap just to find out I should have spent the $ in the first place, YKWIM? Should I buy the geo drawing set from Right Start, or can I get the pieces (T-square, 30-60 triangle, etc) from Wal-Mart or whatever during back to school sales? Thanks!

I was an English teacher in my former life, so I didn't think the grammar would be completely inaccessible, but I wanted to make sure!

I am looking at samples of Easy Grammar for grade 2 on Rainbow Resource, and I am trying to figure out if you need the student workbook along with the teacher guide (or if you order the student book so that is consumable and keep the TE for future kids.) TIA!

That is a huge relief! :) Thank you for posting that...I hate to compare, blah, blah, but it's nice to have SOME kind of measure!