Thank you - very helpful. Good to know. Not many assignments, and they are difficult....hmmmm. I am also thinking about letting him type stuff. Good idea.

I'm trying to decide what to do for 6th grade writing, and have been looking at MCT. It kind of blows my mind. I'm not sure if I don't really get it or if it's awesome! Probably both. Anyway, after spending about an hour reading through it all, I'm now thinking that maybe I should use the whole LA program rather than just the writing portion. But if we do that, I'm not at all sure what level to go with. So if anyone could make suggestions, I'd love that. I'm also wondering if it's a bad idea to mix the components from a couple different levels. I think we should probably do Town or Voyage - please correct me if you think that's wrong! Grammar - we are currently doing Rod & Staff 5, so I think that doing Grammar Town next year would be nothing new at all and potentially too easy as far as the grammar book. It seems like Voyage would be a better fit. Vocabulary - currently doing Vocabulary from Classical Roots 5. The MCT vocabulary books look pretty advanced to me. I guess it isn't really the words, but it isn't super-simple like VFCR but has difficult reading passages. I suppose Caesar I would be a slightly better fit here, not sure. Writing - omigosh, my son HATES to write. I mean the physical part of it. He actually likes creative writing, and on his own has written stories (heavily influenced by "Redwall", which is pretty adorable). When we do Rod and Staff, we do as much of it orally as we can since he takes so long to write it out (mostly due to messing around/;becoming distracted), and he hates it. This is good and bad. Good because it is less tedious for him. Bad because it requires more of my time to go through each question with him. Anyway, we are using IEW SWI this year. He is doing ok, likes it ok. He LOVES to read, reads all the time and at a fairly high level. The writing is the one where I am most unsure. It seems like it's a big jump from Town to Voyage, and that he might be in between. I like the idea of Voyage more, and think he's ready to do essays rather than paragraphs. But I don't want him to struggle. Poetry - we haven't done much of this, other than memorizing poems and a few poetry lessons from the English book. I already have the MCT Town level poetry book - Building Poems. It sure would be nice to just use that and not have to buy an additional poetry book. Has anyone combined books from different levels, such as Town and Voyage? So I'm really unsure what level to go with. I like the idea of Voyage, but part of what is really holding me back is all the excerpts and articles and things. WOW, they seem really advanced. It seems like they will be hard for him to understand, and likely bore him. He isn't gifted (I see that the curriculum is a good fit for gifted kids), but he's pretty bright. What do people's kids think about these? I should mention that next year will be my last year homeschooling him, so if we choose Town we are unlikely to ever get to Voyage. I sure wish we could do Voyage, but want to choose the right level for him. ------------------------------------------- One other question! I also have a 7th grader (finishing 7th grade) at school who really needs some writing instruction. I want to start this after school and through the summer (and into next year 8th grade). So it needs to be pretty painless. His grammar is awful, so I'm thinking of doing Easy Grammar with him (it looks like he can do it on his own mostly). Do you think I could jump into MCT Voyage with him for writing? I really hate to start him on paragraph, since I don't think I'll get him to agree to more than one course. So if we do Town, that'll likely be the end of it. His ideas and organization are fairly decent, it's mostly his sentence structure/grammar/word choice that is problematic. THANK YOU for reading through all this and offering any advice. Heidi

Jamee - thanks. When you suggest previewing it, do you mean for romance scenes? Yikes, I don't think I can preview 24 hours! Was hoping to find people who have seen it and can tell me what kinds of scenes there are. I think I'll skip the War and Remembrance one. theelfqueen - I LOVE the idea about the 1940s House show. Great idea, thank you. I love those house shows.

Thank you both so much. Very helpful. Yes, North and South is about the Civil War. Whoops, I added that to my list after I'd written my post!

These miniseries look great for some fun summer TV-watching, and learning about WWII in the process. But I'm having a hard time finding any parental reviews or information about how appropriate it is for young kids. I'm not concerned about violence, but wondering about any romance scenes. I'll want to avoid it if there is any nudity or much beyond basic short scenes of kissing. I get the impression that North and South might have a bit more romance action than I'm looking for. If anyone has seen any of these and remembers anything as far as this, I'd love your input. Thanks so much!

Thanks for everyone's responses. Sounds like most girls like them. Hope my niece is not one who doesn't. I always think it is funny that some people don't like Jim Weiss's voice! We just think he's awesome (have at least a dozen of his CDs), and can't see why other's wouldn't. My mom would start her out with Volume 1, so at least there are some myths/fables included in that.

My mom has been getting my 8yo son one of these each year for Christmas since he was five. He LOVES them, and requests them almost nightly. So she got one for my nephew, who didn't love it. She is wondering about maybe my niece, who is 8. I'm not sure a girl would love them as much as a boy would. I think some of the appeal for my son is lots of batles! So...does your 8yo daughter like these or no? Thanks so much!

I think this would be the biggest problem, and getting them to work their hardest and do quality independent work. It's too easy to not do that, especially (as I've recently learned) for a boy that age!!! I also agree with the person who mentioned extracurricular activities. I know sports take up a lot of evening time for us, as well as playing with neighbor kids who are not home during the daytime. And it seems like a long day that would be pretty hard. Spend most of the day doing independent work, then a couple of hours (?) working in the evening with you when they probably would just want to be done. If you still plan on going ahead with your plan, I'd see if you have any kind of cafeteria-style homeschool "school" they could attend. My son attended a school that met on Mondays and Wednesday and you signed up for classes like you do in college. So you might just choose Algebra and Spanish, add a study hall in lunch. Meaning you'd be there from 11:30-3:00 or whatever on Mondays and Wednesdays. These were academic classes with homework and grades. Or at least sign them up for some enrichment or sports classes during the day.

:iagree:

Looks like there is a BBC podcast called "World News for Children" for ages 7-14 that is 4 minutes long (perfect!). Haven't checked it out yet. Also found this woman's blog with some ideas: http://planningwithkids.com/2010/10/17/world-news-for-kids/

We love Channel One News, and it's perfect for ds13. But I'd love to find something similar, but more age-appropriate for my two younger kids (ages 6 & 8). A daily news show - video, not text. Would love any ideas! I thought there was something on Scholastic Magazine, but couldn't find it. Plus I don't think that is daily, maybe just some topical videos. But if anyone knows how I can find videos there, a list or search, etc. that would also be helpful.

I disagree. I don't think the books will be confusing without the DVDs. I agree that the parent/teacher will not have as deep of an understanding of the program, but that is different than being confused and not understanding how to implement and teach the writing course.

I guess others disagree with me, but I think you could definitely do it without the DVDs, that it is self-explanatory and not confusing. I do think you may not get as MUCH out of it as you would if you watched the DVDs, but that doesn't mean it is confusing or not worth doing. I vote go for it.

I don't know - I think you could use it without TWSS. We did SWI-B last year (never used TWSS) before using a theme-based book this year. It was definitely helpful, and I'm sure TWSS would have been even more helpful. But I don't think either is necessary for teaching the theme-based books. I really like the layout and explanations. Yes, you'd be a better teacher with TWSS. But I think using just the theme-based books is also a very good option for teaching writing. I guess the question is...assuming no TWSS existed, would the theme-based books on their own be a good choice for teaching writing?

I think those might be a bit hard for 5 and 8, especially 5yo.