Sonlight for history and science All about spelling math mammoth

If you have The Complete Writer, it tells you how to plan for each week, pulling passages from books you're already reading together. I have been surprised how much we like pulling our copywork/dictation. You might try borrowing The Complete Writer from your library or a friend, and implementing it for a month or so on a trial basis to see if you like pulling your own passages, or whether you'd rather use the workbooks for ease of planning.

I thought I would feel this way, but have been surprised how much we like pulling our copywork/dictation from books we're already reading. You might try borrowing The Complete Writer from your library or a friend, and implementing it for a month or so on a trial basis to see if you like pulling your own passages, or whether you'd rather use the workbooks for ease of planning.

Looks great - those are so handy! Love the blog header :)

I agree, and would have started in Kindergarten if I had realized it earlier!

Thanks for sharing - you have a beautiful family! :D

Those 3 days of rest are very, very, VERY important. It's very important to make them go straight home and rest, and not, oh, say ... go shopping at Wal-Mart and out to Wendy's because the pain-killing drugs have convinced them they're Superman and they can handle it. Because the antibiotic shots a few days later are really NOT fun. Just saying! :tongue_smilie: Otherwise, the actual procedure was really pretty simple ...

Seeds Family Worship has GREAT music and free downloadable memory cards and checklists. http://www.seedsfamilyworship.net/kids_stuff.php http://www.youtube.com/seedsfamilyworship

All About Spelling - no more printing worksheets! Writing With Ease - my kids love it!

This is what we'll be using this year: Math Mammoth 1 Math U See Foundations Growing With Grammar 1 Writing with Ease 1 Explode the Code 2-3 All About Spelling 1 Sonlight Core 1 (history, geography, literature, cultural study) Sonlight Science 1 Sonlight Readers 1-2 Reg Sonlight Bible 1 A Beka K4 Manuscript Artistic Pursuits/Rosetta Mandarin as tolerated :tongue_smilie: Kajukenbo classes Upwards Basketball Galloping the Globe looks like it will be the most enjoyable one for us. I'm not using it for history simply because it's not chronological. I like that it's a unit study, so you can do as much with it as you want. There are enough coloring pages and activities to make my 2 yr old feel like she's doing it along with us.

That's what we do - I keep a crate on my desk (right behind our school table) with all the books I'll need in a week/teacher's manuals, etc.). Here's what goes in the kids' boxes (I do the same stuff everyday, occasionally hiding a treat in a box, but we don't schedule 'fun' boxes 'cause the kids like to make their own fun in the afternoons). Anyway here's what we have: We start with Bible and history before starting workboxes #1 Bible coloring sheet #2 ETC #3 SL readers #4 Handwriting Without Tears ~~break for recess #5 Math Mammoth #6 Science #7 All About Spelling/Writing With Ease #8 DD Rod & Staff English 2 (DS - art) ~~break for lunch #9 DD Artistic Pursuits/Rosetta Stone

We finished all but 3 weeks of science ... meant to do it over the summer but didn't, and I'm perfectly ok with moving on without it!

whenever someone asks if anyone likes it or what everyone uses instead, people come out to post their experiences :001_smile:

Generally in big blocks, with an estimated start time - I didn't assign times until we'd done a few weeks of work with a new schedule, and based times off of how long it generally takes us. And I'm not rigid with the time, but it helps me to estimate what to do if we need to change our school routine for some reason. Last year we tried alternating history and science, and while it worked fairly well, I think we'll go back to doing them daily. We only do art once a week, generally, but everything else 4-5 days a week. I go week by week. Sonlight schedules out history, literature, geography and science for me, so I retype into my master schedule, adding in reading, LA components, math and electives. I assign specific pages each day, then adjust as needed. We stick pretty well to the Sonlight schedule, so I know we'll finish that stuff each year; if we don't finish the other stuff, we'll just let it flow into the next year, but I do try to finish within a calendar year if not the actual 180 days of 'school.'

Last year we started in August, but this year (and from now on I think) we'll start in July when it's hot so we can be done in early spring when it's time to be outside! :D

What a great update! I'm sure you must be relieved :grouphug:

I think the SL forums are full of people who love it - and several mention schooling kids all the way up to college level with great preparation; it just don't think it works for all kids. I think it just seems that way because those who are looking for something else are more vocal than those for whom it works. :tongue_smilie:

:lol:

that's great, thank you! :)

We're doing that too. DD LOVES it; DS is ambivalent but prefers it greatly over the forced creative writing assignments in our previous LA. I might also consider backing up to level 1 if you haven't done it before.

:iagree:

we'll see (which according to them mostly means no) it's starting to sound like naptime do you need a do-over?

Agreeing 100%. DH and I were raised with liberal amounts of (and no controls on) tv. I never NEVER thought we'd become one of THOSE families :tongue_smilie: but I banned the kids from tv yesterday - until after Christmas, when we'll reassess. Up until this year, they were content with DVDs, Noggin, and the occasional PBS Kids show. This year, they started branching out into Disney, Boomerang and Discovery Kids, and attitudes have gone WAY downhill. I know tv isn't the only influence, but i'm sick of hearing disrespect on tv and then hearing it repeated at home. If we go back to allowing tv, it will be with more limits (and probably set Disney on parental control).

We love SL's core and science, but didn't find the LA to work for us. You won't miss any of the good stuff from the core by not doing the LA; the LA does reinforce some of the stuff in the readers, by way of copywork/dictation and writing assignments, but not enough to make it worth it if you have other LA items in mind. We're doing R&S with AAS and WWE this year instead of SL LA.

Kind of - DD has been reading a LOT more than usual lately (DS will even cuddle up to listen), they're begging for more chapters of our summer read-aloud, and DD even voluntarily did 6 pages in ETC yesterday! :) We're starting formally on Monday.