For this, and many other reasons, you are my hero. :) My husband (who is a very competent cook) and I were talking about this the other day -- the necessity of being intentional, of scheduling it in. This actually turns out to be an increasingly important reason to continue homeschooling, because we have "more time." My parents were visiting the other day. We were running a wee bit "behind," and they showed up a wee bit "early." So we still had some chores to do. My dad sat in the dining room (adjacent to the kitchen and garage). He watched the girls work through the following: Ladybug Girl -- This child swept the kitchen, the hallway, powder room, and back porch. Also, "Take this laundry upstairs, and put your laundry away." She then came down and helped me prep the vegetables for lunch. Done, no problems. Bumblebee Girl -- This child was doing laundry round up, taking it all down to the basement laundry room. Also, "Bring up the laundry from the dryer and fold the load." She then emptied the dishwasher and loaded up the breakfast dishes. Done, no problems. Butterfly Girl -- This child was cleaning the upstairs bathroom sink, stocking TP & soap, doing trash round up. She also took all the trash out through the garage and put it in the big can. Done, no problems. So my father was watching this, and you could tell he was impressed. He mentioned that my sister's kids (15, 19, 21) still don't pick up their bath towels or wash a dish or take out the trash or fold laundry or help in any way around the house (no sibling rivalry here, LOL). Throughout this speech, I didn't say a word, I promise! :) He kept watching my girls work, like eager beavers. They were happy, and they are used to working, but they knew he was watching them. They were showing off a bit. :D Still, the competence was there. But then I felt some inner remorse for gloating, so I said to him, "Well, it helps that we are home. I mean, So-and-So's children have been out the door by 8 or 8:30 every morning from the time they were five years old. If So-and-So didn't catch the towel being on the floor before they went to the bus stop, she could either pick it up or let it sit there all day. You see? Here it is, a weekday, mid-morning, and we are still working on chores and cooking, which is fine. We didn't plan to do any school today, other than Math, and that is done. But, really, we can work on chores and cooking all throughout the day, if we need to. We are here, so the girls don't get away with anything. I can always call a kid to hang up a towel!" From the start of our homeschooling years ago up until now, my father has constantly asked, "When are you going to put those kids in a real school?" I figure, since he can't seem to see the academic and social advantages, we'll make the competent completion of cooking and chores the defining feature and he'll be happy. Score one for the homeschoolers! :001_rolleyes: And, :grouphug: I hope you feel better soon!

This made me laugh out loud. :) Isn't that how it goes, though? Have fun being ring master of your Regular Three-Ring Circus, :willy_nilly: :willy_nilly: :willy_nilly: plus the occasional rambunctious two year old! ---> :willy_nilly:

I know! It was kind of sad. Of course, I told them that, yes, they could color cats forever! They could color cats purple and green forever, too! :) I still love to draw and color. All three of mine color and draw and sketch all the time, when they are not knitting, crocheting, beading, making friendship bracelets, embroidering, or sewing. Girls! :001_wub: Glitter glue and gel pens are investments in happiness.

This might be a girl thing. My girls all suffer from it. I have kept everything we have ever done for homeschooling. Yes, I keep it. In neatly labelled Home Depot boxes on sturdy wooden shelves in the basement (it's dry). One box per year (or two, when they were younger). And I do this because we live in New Jersey, which is actually a no-man's land in terms of its homeschooling laws (or lack thereof). You never know. If you get called on the carpet, the burden of proof is on the parents. So, I keep the tangible stuff. The girls were asking about the contents this summer. Did I have this, did I still have that? In particular, did I have the math page from Pre-K, the one on which Squishy colored the cat purple and green? "Yes, would you like to see?" Three eager girls crowded around the first box: Pre-K & 1st. "Oh, look! Here is [special nostalgic memento]!" I think it was Mini Letter Books in a small metal box. They loved to cut and paste. They still do. "Oh, look! Mommy kept our [special nostalgic workbook]!" I think it was Kumon Animal Mazes. Back then, they adored mazes. Now it's word searches and Mad Libs. "Oh, look! Here is the page from Pre-K where you colored the cat purple and green!" It was like Christmas and a funeral, laughter and tears. They all gazed at the green and purple cat, as if recalling deep things. "School used to be simpler." "Yeah." "Yeah." "But it's still fun, Mommy, really." "Yeah, it's still fun." "Yeah. We can't color cats forever."

I was able to get in today to see one of our area's top gyns, and it turns out I'm okay. The uterus is where it should be, in little to no danger of falling out. :) She said I just need to exercise the PF muscles, and that should be sufficient. Because I didn't know if I would even get an appointment this week, let alone today, I told the girls last night that we would get up and "do the day." Roll with it. They were great! They worked on their independent work while I was making phone calls, they each did one or two lessons of math, did their assigned reading, their chores, their rabbits, and then they "organized." The girls sound like my mother when they say that: "We are organizing." :laugh: So, no real "school news," but good news all the same. Tomorrow = a full school day. :thumbup:

My two cents is that very few 7 year old children need an 8 or 9 hour work day. The few who might truly need to work like this would be exceptional. Say the child gets on the bus at 8:20 am, is at school all day, and gets off the bus at 4:20 pm (this was the schedule in our old town). This is already a 40 hour work week, even without any homework. Add in 1 or 2 hours of homework per night, and you have that young child putting in a 45 to 50 hour work week. Ridiculous, IMO. 1. Don't compare what you do at home to what is done at school. Apples to oranges. 2. Do what you have decided to do. If you want to lay a solid foundation, but still give your child the gift of childhood, then put your blinders on and continue to "do what you do." 3. A consistent, daily dose of math, reading, spelling, writing, and content (science/history/geography/literature) will build up over time. Give it time. The results will probably amaze you! :) 4. Finally, you got to witness the learning. You saw the "aha" moment. That is worth its weight in gold. The other mother gets to trudge with her son through a pile of pages and workbooks, at the end of an already long enough day for both. Me? I'd rather be on the sofa, snuggled up, and reading to my girls at the end of the day!

Yeah, it all may need to come out. We'll see. I thought I dodged a bullet when my upper right quadrant pain turned out to not be gallstones, but "only" my liver. Still, I've been exercising faithfully, 30 minutes (at least) per day, six days per week. I've enjoyed the exercise, to be honest. It was just time to stop putting myself last on the list each day. So now I exercise first thing in the morning, even if someone is acting "needy." The kids are old enough to deal with it now. Their needs will have to wait for half an hour. I've also been sticking with this low-carb lifestyle, which I also enjoy. I'm eating so many vegetables, but I've always liked vegetables. Now I can justify purchasing them! :) We also eat chicken, fish, eggs, and some beef. Very low carbs. I've lost 33 pounds so far. Perhaps the weight loss rearranged some things internally? I do think that may be a part of it. In the beginning, my legs were wobbly, as they seemed to be adjusting to things changing. Now they are much stronger, just from moderately walking on a treadmill in a garage for a few weeks! Who knew? :) I wonder if I can get the internal things to be stronger, too? Both pregnancies were C-sections, so there's a lot of scar tissue. The first was an emergent breech (her foot popped down while I was washing dishes)! I suppose my muscles were weak, even back then? I never thought about that until now. Hmmm... The twin pregnancy also ended with a C-section, because the breech twin slipped below the vertex twin at the last moment. Those twins went to 39 weeks, and were 14 pounds together. Imagine my size! I was three weeks away from turning 40. Well... I'm still very thankful to have my children, even if they did stretch me out, LOL! :) It isn't their fault, it's just gravity, ha ha. If I could hang upside-down all day, I'd be okay.

Sunday -- We went to church, the girls had a friend over afterwards, they played outside most of the afternoon, we took her home, went grocery shopping, put everything away, took showers, went to bed. Monday -- My parents came up to visit. Hubby grilled/smoked large amounts of chicken and beef. ;) I chopped large amounts of vegetables (salad, veggie tray, grilled veggies). That was today! Tuesday (tomorrow) -- I'm not sure yet. I need to call a doctor ASAP. Grossness warning: I think this is happening (because I haven't had enough going on lately). :glare: So, I'll call first thing in the morning, and take it from there. If I don't go in right away, we'll do as much school as I can manage. All I can say is... actually, I'm speechless. :001_unsure:

My 9.5 year old twins burst into tears simultaneously tonight. Why? Because neither my husband nor I wanted to climb up the stairs to tuck them in. Sigh. So Squeaky climbed into my lap and wailed, "I miss being little! I miss eating applesauce and taking naps. Well, I mean I miss liking taking naps." Me: :blink: (thinking, "Where did this come from all of a sudden? And what's with the applesauce?"). It turned out that Squishy (on hubby's lap) was also crying. She wailed, "I hate getting bigger! I miss getting tucked in and all the silly things you do when you tuck us in." She was right on that, he has made it into this elaborate, 50-step procedure. Hey, Buddy, if you're too tired to do all of that tonight, guess who started it? So I told them, "Well, when you were little, we mixed your applesauce with cottage cheese, so we could do that on Monday and then feed it to you and then put you down for a nap. How would you like that?" So much empathy in me. :nopity: But I did snuggle them a bit. I had no idea about the applesauce! The things you learn about your kids, as they are bursting into tears! :grouphug: Hang in there, Farrar, this too shall pass.

Child's Name: __________ School Year: 2016-2017 Language, Reading, Spelling & Writing All About Reading All About Spelling Copywork, Dictation, Narration Geography, History & Government Beautiful Feet Early American History Mathematics CLE Math Science Library science books Nature study Field trips Physical Education Regular outdoor play time Participation in family hikes (or sports?) Health, First Aid, Safety, and Fire Prevention Abeka Health, Safety & Manners Fine Arts & Music Library art books & art supplies Classics for Kids

Would this help? http://www.homeschoolinginohio.com/subjects/subjects/history.aspx http://www.hslda.org/hs101/OH.aspx

Yes, I teach it. We use CLE for Math and LA for twin 4th graders and a 6th grader. There are times when my oldest will say, "I can do this entire Math lesson by myself," but I don't expect my 4th graders to do that too often. They generally get started with the flash cards, speed drill, and the We Remember sections, turn in their workbooks, then move on to other independent work. When it's their turn for 4th Grade Tutor Time, I first work side-by-side with them to go over (and correct) whatever they already did, we check the speed drill, I may or may not check them on their math facts (LOL), and then we work on the "new material." Then the lesson is complete. We skip all the quizzes (5s and 10s). We also skip the 401 math book (review). When my 6th grader is done with her lesson, she works with me to make any corrections (if any), work through the new material and complete that section, and answer any questions. Then the lesson is complete. We skip all the quizzes (5s and 10s). We also skip the 601 math book (review). For the LA, we first cross out the Penmanship and anything else we don't intend to do. We work through each lesson's new material, then they are free to complete the We Remember section. When they are done they put their workbooks in my "Please Correct Me" bin. After I mark corrections, the student works through those (with or without my help), until it's all correctly done. So there is a lot of back and forth, some independence, and some explicit teaching on my part. I think it works out well. We're new to CLE for LA this year, so we're also doing the Extra Diagramming and Extra Practice workbooks, as needed. We use CLE for Bible, too, and we do that together as a group. HTH.

With 1st & 2nd graders, and two younger children, I would keep things simple. Having said that, I do know what you mean about adding in things of beauty and enriching your days. We felt the need of that here, too, especially when the "basics" were going along nicely. So here are some ideas for young children: Bible Egermeier's Bible Story Book (no planning, just put this in your Morning Basket and move the bookmark along) Science What are you studying this year for Science? What kind of materials do you want to use? When my kids were younger, we did what you are doing -- we read books from the library (about animals, one group at a time), went to the zoo, the aquarium, the nature center, the parks, and so on. We had a few fish, raised a spider :), and visited a farm. That was enough at that age, IMO. Since that time, we have enjoyed using these resources, along with the audiobooks (but not the kits or journals): https://www.rainbowresource.com/product/Exploring+Creation+with+Zoology+1%3A+Flying+Creatures+of+the+Fifth+Day/010470 https://www.rainbowresource.com/proddtl.php?id=000176&subject=Science/11&category=Exploring+Creation+with+Zoology+1/8815 https://www.rainbowresource.com/proddtl.php?id=013236&subject=Science/11&category=Exploring+Creation+with+Zoology+2/9271 http://www.rainbowresource.com/proddtl.php?id=058357 http://www.rainbowresource.com/proddtl.php?id=005555&subject=Science/11&category=Exploring+Creation+with+Zoology+3/9272 http://www.rainbowresource.com/proddtl.php?id=058358 Nature Study I used to wonder this, too, and so many people recommended Handbook of Nature Study. Other than reading it myself (it does have good content), I never could figure out how to actually use that bulky book with outdated, grainy black and white photographs. So... we simply started to collect field guides (books) and small field guides as brochures. We found these at Cabela's, but they might be available online. We have small, laminated field brochures for all sorts of things -- Eastern Birds, Forest, Pond & Stream, Coastline, Reptiles, and so on. TODAY, the girls found a Fall Webworm Moth caterpillar, and were able to identify it using the Pocket Naturalist Guide: Pennsylvania Butterflies & Moths (we are in NJ). I would begin with up-to-date, laminated, portable guides (that you keep in a certain spot in your Science Center ;)), and then when you come across something, you can at least try to learn what it is. Abeka has lovely flash cards for learning the names of birds, flowers, and insects. They also have posters for trees, planets, parts of a flower, parts of insects. My children enjoyed Christian Liberty Nature Readers at those ages (but not anything else from that publisher!). Literature At your kids' ages, I would honestly stick with mostly picture books. Bring home a laundry basket full from the library. Read, read, read, return and start over, LOL. Add in some chapter books you think you would like to read and that your children would love to hear. For poetry, a children's poetry anthology is good, along with "When We Were Very Young," "Now We Are Six," and "A Child's Garden of Verses." You might enjoy looking at the "1000 Good Books List." Biography, Geography & Civics Often overlooked, biographies are a great way of learning about people and the world. If your library has them, the D'Aulaire biographies are fun at this age: Leif the Lucky, Abraham Lincoln, Benjamin Franklin, Buffalo Bill, Christopher Columbus, Pocahontas. Also, you might like David Adler's series, "A Picture Book of ______________." There are many of these. As your children get a bit older, you might like the "Childhood of Famous Americans" series (COFA). Guest Hollow has a free Geography course, along with many other resources. For Civics, my girls read through a basket of these and these and these books, along with a few others. This year, they will read portions of this book. For little kids, I'd stick with the biographies first. History What are you studying this year for History? While I didn't do ancient history in the younger years (we did World Geography, then US History), we are doing ancients now. I read aloud the SOTW chapter, we discuss it, we do the quiz, rarely an activity, and then we have a History Book Basket (with books on that week's topics) that the girls are free to read from. When they were younger, I did a lot more of the History Book Basket reading, but now they do this primarily on their own. The "If You Lived...." series is fun for 1st & 2nd graders. The "You Wouldn't Want to..." series is another fun one. The Maestros have some lovely American history books, for a slightly older audience. A Book in Time is a website with ideas for books by time period. Composer Study & Classical Music We have enjoyed composer study materials from Zeezok Publishing (but I think I purchased them from Rainbow Resource?). We also simply listen to classical music (from that quarter's composer) from time to time. It does add beauty to our days, and it's not that time-consuming! I've been teaching all three to play the recorder for a few years, and recently my mother started all three girls on the piano. They also all sing in a children's choir. Maybe some of these ideas will work for you where you are. Artist Study & Art We have enjoyed using artist study portfolios from Simply Charlotte Mason. For art, we purchased the complete set of Draw-Write-Now books, along with plenty of paper, colored pencils, crayons, markers, watercolors, and sketchbooks. :) I have three girls, they are always drawing! They have drawn for hours using the DWN books and basic art supplies. I'd like to get See the Light Art Class DVDs someday, when the money is in the bank. Starting in about 3rd grade (with my oldest), I assigned independent reading across the subjects. I organized the readings in an "Ambleside-like" grid, but with my own selections of reading materials. If you'd like me to email you a sample, I'd be glad to. HTH. Edited to add links!

:lol: I do this! Yes, it is weird! LOL. I'm going along, reading aloud, with dramatic inflection and voices and periodic explanations of arcane vocabulary and everything, but I'm also thinking about what to cook for supper or what the weather will be tomorrow or that it's time to clip my fingernails. Or all three things at once! :laugh:

That is a good question! I'm glad you asked, because I'll be gleaning ideas from this thread. My oldest student is in 6th grade; her twin sisters are 4th graders, so they're not all middle schoolers (yet). Here's what we do have lined up for this year. We're working through CLE Bible 400: Life of Jesus. I chose this level because (1) we studied the OT last year, and (2) my 4th graders are also doing Bible with us. So Bible 400 worked out the best. We are enjoying it so far.Also, the girls are studying Junior Bible Quiz cards, a certain number of cards per month. When they feel ready to be "quizzed out," they ask me to test them.We sing hymns together a few times each week. We each have our own hymn book.In even-numbered months, the girls will begin each school day with a 15 minute time for personal devotions. They'll each go to a separate spot, and have time to read the Bible, pray (quietly), sing (quietly), or just listen.In odd-numbered months, we will choose a Bible book and read through it, a few chapters at a time, each school day. No planning, just bookmarks moving along. We take turns reading about 10 verses each, round-robin. Attend church each Sunday as a family.The girls are in our church's midweek ministry for kids. They memorize Bible verses, have group Bible lessons and discussions, and fun activities each week. Scripture Memory Songs: The girls listen a lot to Sing the Word CDs (we have all of them) and other Scripture memory songs. I think that most of what they have memorized comes from the songs.The girls have Assigned Independent Reading (A.I.R.) across all subjects (kind of like our own homemade AO). For Bible, my 6th grader is reading through the second half of The David C. Cook Journey through the Bible (she did the first half last year). My 4th graders are reading through the second half of What the Bible Is All About Bible Handbook for Kids (they read the first half last year). All three are finishing up Egermeier's Bible Story Book this year, as well. They don't have any written work to go along with these readings, but we do discuss what they have read, and sometimes I ask them the questions at the back of Egermeier's (a very good resource).Finally, one other thing we do from time to time is to learn to use basic Bible study tools. For example, if we are studying Ancient History, and we want to understand Abraham's travels, we might look up something in the Student Bible Atlas. If we are curious about a custom in Bible times, we may look it up in The Baker Illustrated Bible Handbook, The Baker Illustrated Guide to Everyday Life in Bible Times, The Crossway Illustrated Bible Handbook (Tim Dowley), or Children's Guide to the Bible (Willoughby). And sometimes we look up answers in The Holman Bible Concordance for Kids. This last resource must be popular with my kids, because it is always disappearing! They take it upstairs for their own personal Bible study, so that's a good thing.HTH. I'm looking forward to reading the other responses. Edited to add: I forgot about scripture memory songs, their independent reading assignments in Bible, and our occasional use of Bible study tools! If I think of anything else after I have coffee, I'll be back, LOL! :)

I read aloud to my kids every day, except on Sundays (not sure why not then?), and have since they were babies. It's just part of our family culture to read aloud. We've built so many great memories through sharing books together -- lonely Ping on the beautiful yellow Yangtze River, naughty Max on the island with the wild things, hard-working Almanzo getting his first horse, Charlotte and Wilbur's amazing friendship, a homesick Chester Cricket saying he felt "Septemberish," valiant Reepicheep sailing alone into Aslan's country, exuberant Anne and reserved Marila's mismatched expectations, Mole getting fed up with spring cleaning, the hilarious antics of Pippi Longstocking. I can't imagine not reading aloud together! When they were very little, the girls liked listening to picture book/audiobook sets (book + CD or tape). As they got older, they kept listening in their free time. They listen for hours to full-length audiobooks (e.g., A Bear Called Paddington, all of the Winnie the Pooh books (and poetry), American Girl books, Peter Pan, Alice in Wonderland, The Water Horse, Mary Poppins, The Borrowers, Mr. Popper's Penguins, The Railway Children, D'Aulaire's Greek Myths, A Cricket in Times Square, all of the Little House books, all of the Narnia books, and many, many more) and other story CDs (Jim Weiss, Your Story Hour, Adventures in Odyssey). Stories like these are wonderful! These have been such a part of their childhood, I'm sure it has shaped who they are as people and how they see and interact with the world around them. I think that if we miss out on sharing stories together, we miss out on something precious.

Thursday 9/1 I don't remember if I posted what we did yesterday. I can't find it, so I suppose I posted about everything else, and failed to say what we accomplished. Let's see... Group Work: Prayer, CLE Bible (review & quiz), Science lesson, Science hands-on labs (2), Literature 6th Grade: Math, Composition, Vocabulary, French, Independent Assigned Reading (with written work) 4th Grade: Math, Grammar, Vocabulary, Spelling, French, Independent Assigned Reading (with written work) Today is actually Friday, but for us it will be "Saturday," and tomorrow will be "Friday." Sometimes we flip these days, and this week is a good time to flip them. Errands, chores, and yard work today. School work tomorrow. Church on Sunday.

Do my kids know it's supposed to be a holiday? I'll check.... Nope, they don't know. Hmm....

Yes, I'm quoting you twice! Tawlas, I LOVE this idea! You could do a map, with a key, and include the trails (if there are any). You could write up little blurbs, one at a time, on the various features of your ranch. You could take photos of each feature, and insert those into your brochure (on the computer). Let us know when the brochure is done and the sheets are clean, and we will be your guests! :biggrinjester:

Show us how it's done, please. :laugh:

This made me laugh out loud. Hang in there. In a few weeks you'll have them all lined up like this: :Angel_anim: :001_cool: :biggrinjester: :wub: and :willy_nilly: <--- this is not going to change soon. You realize that, right?

We started on August 15th. That week, we only did Orientation (one day) and started back in on daily school routines (e.g., working from a daily work list, working independently, getting started on time, not disappearing to dress a doll, LOL!). I think we probably also did some Math and Science, but I don't remember now. We did a fun craft each day (string art, watercolor cards, etc.), and that got us all used to being back in the homeschool room, working together, and still having a good time. We still have to tie-dye our shirts, if the weather would cooperate when we have the time! The next week (8/22 through 8/26) was sort of a full school week, with some bumps to smooth out along the way (e.g., good work ethic, attitudes, discipline, maturity, accepting that we are back to school, handling a tiny bit of pressure, managing time, organization). I think the girls adjusted very well this year, and they seemed (mostly) glad to be back to school. Once or twice, someone grumbled, but that might have been me. :blushing: Again, I don't remember now. :biggrinjester: This week, we're in the full swing of school, except that my parents came yesterday, and during the rest of the year, they'll probably come on Fridays. We talked about our weekly schedules and that day works out best for all. I'm happy with the line-up for this year. I've noticed that my 6th grader now says things like, "I want to keep working. This is 6th grade, you know, that is serious stuff." :001_wub: My twin 4th graders (not in Logic Stage) also think they are Big Time now. :001_cool: :001_cool: It's going well for now. Ask me again when the outside activities start back up! :willy_nilly:

Wednesday 8/31 Hubby was up early (2:45 am) to get to Philly on time, and I couldn't get back to sleep after his alarm went off. His alarm is super quiet, too. It sounds like the chirp of a cricket. But I woke up, anyway, and that was that. So I got up. I exercised (30 minutes, treadmill). I drank two cups of coffee. ;) I cooked, chopped copious amounts of vegetables (for 2-3 days), drank a kale shake, and got the day rolling with breakfast for the girls. This past July, I was diagnosed with NAFLD and diabetes. The gastroenterologist was terrible -- he kept saying it was my gallbladder (it wasn't), that I had gallstones (none!), and that I should meet with his buddy, the surgeon, and make an appointment to have my gallbladder out. Terrible. It turns out that since I don't have a thyroid (cancer, 11 years ago), my thyroid hormone replacement level was slightly out of whack. This happens from time to time, and it can throw off a lot. But I had also become too sedentary, and the "low-fat diet" the gastroenterologist put me on was the absolute worst thing for my situation. I made an appointment to see my endocrinologist. We worked out a plan, and I'm getting better. He agreed to let me try lifestyle changes, instead of diabetes medication, since my cholesterol, triglycerides, and all those other numbers were actually pretty good (and my A1C isn't that bad). The protocol is daily exercise (every day, no misses, 30 minutes, 6 times per week) and a very low-carb diet (ketogenic Mediterranean). I've lost 30 pounds since July, with more to go. I feel better, but my pants are falling off now. ;) Yesterday, the girls did Math (all 3), and that was it for school. My parents came up for the day, and we had a lovely visit with them. Hubby made it back safely from Philadelphia, and had good news related to his work. It was a good day. :)

Also, FWIW, I don't think that two or three errors in a CLE Math lesson is really all that terrible. There are a ton of problems in some of those lessons, and even though I consider my three girls relatively strong in math (not accelerated, but solid), they still have two or three errors from time to time. Sure, they also get 100% on many lessons, but we don't focus on that score. I often think they learn from their errors, more than they learn from the 100%. They learn to pay attention to details, such as "15 cm" instead of "15 in." :) But that is math, right? Details, details! I also sit with them and offer as much support as each student seems to need for each lesson, problem, and level. We build stamina and their ability to focus and stick with the task. Step by step, we move along. HTH.

We use CLE Math here, too. It's working well for all three of my students. Some lesson really do take a long time. I wouldn't worry about how much time it takes. A lesson a day, slow and steady, will lead to progress over time. For a student who needed more time to master concepts and skills, I wouldn't try to accelerate by doing more than one lesson per day. Those lessons are long (IMO), but they are also "just right" in that they provide the review and mastery that many students need. Instead, I might accelerate by skipping three lessons per book -- Lesson 5 (quiz), Lesson 10 (quiz), and Lesson 17 (Fascinating Discoveries/Just for Fun). The quizzes don't really cover any new material, and the 17th lesson is optional, anyway. We usually just do the optional lessons, but then we continue with the next "real" lesson. So we don't waste an entire day on the optional components. If you just skip those three lessons, it might not seem like much, but you really can accelerate CLE Math by doing that. HTH.