I am so close to being done putting together next year's entire set of lesson plans and collecting all the supplies! Woohoo! (We do school June-March, so it's coming up on us fast!). Anyway, several projects in SOTW and Telling God's Story call for "air drying clay" and I was wondering what type of clay most of you choose for these projects. I can't remember which projects they were at the moment. I think maybe the 10 commandments tablet and also the paper vs. tablet experiment in SOTW?

I've got the cheapo Scotch brand as well. I got it on Amazon on sale for something like $19. It works with off-brand pouches and I was able to get a 100 pack also on Amazon for really cheap.

Thanks so much. I think I'll hold off on the WWE instruction book for now and see if I can get it at the used curriculum fair in a few weeks. If not, I'll probably order it later. Thanks again!

Do I understand this correctly? The WWE text will be used for 4 years and I only have to buy it once, right? And then I just buy the workbook for each year? And with Telling God's Story, do I *need* the Parent's Guide to Teaching the Bible? If it's key to the curriculum, I will buy it. But if it's just about getting comfortable with teaching the Bible, I don't think I need it. I went to Bible college and I'm pretty comfortable with teaching it. Thanks! :)

Thanks. Sometimes I forget she is only 5. In other subjects she's pretty advanced so i guess sometimes I forget that just because she can read at a 4th/5th grade level doesn't mean she can always COMPREHEND at that level. I think i need a different children's Bible, though, because hers is very Baby-ish (2 sentence summaries of 5 - 10 chapters) and she's read the entire thing through 5 times already. Any recommendations for a better Children's Bible? I forget which one we have but if you go on CBD.com and search children's Bible, it's the first one that pops up. That much I know!

Sigh... what do I do? she despises it. I picked it because it seemed to be the most Biblical and it has enough to do right in there that if we have weeks where we don't hit the library for extra reading, it's OK because we can keep busy anyway (Or weeks where our library has nothing on-topic, as is the case with creation and most of the first few weeks of the curriculum)... She cries when I tell her it's time for history. She pouts. She rolls her eyes. She sighs. She tunes me out. I really am out of history curriculum money right now and I already bought Volume 1 and the lapbook downloads... Does anyone have any ideas to make this more fun for her? I already made some file folder games from a free website but I'm not sure what else to do. Help! Please! Thanks...

Thank you! So many ideas for me to digest, I can't wait to dig in, print some lists and hit Half Price Books! :) I think I like the idea of moving on to a good spelling program instead of phonics. She seems to just "get" spelling rules but I figure it can't hurt to make sure she really knows them. I'll be picking out a program this week, that will be my project. Thanks!

My five year old is an extremely good reader. I gave her a few of the online reading levels tests and she scored 4th grade, 4th month on one and another said her instructional reading level was 5th grade. Right now I have her doing a 1st grade A Beka Book phonics workbook because I got it for $1 at a curriculum sale. She does 4 pages a day and it's really just busy work to her, it's not teaching her anything. I'm thinking about spending a few weeks going through the A Beka phonics handbook with her, since that is for through grade 3, just to make sure that she knows all the rules. But past that, I don't know what to do with her! I find that anything on a 4th/5th grade reading level has subject matter that isn't really appropriate for a 5 year old. I just don't know what to do with her as far as reading/phonics goes. Anyone have any suggestions? I would greatly, greatly appreciate it. Thanks!

We combined 100 Easy lessons and A Beka with great success. I am a former private school teacher, so I understand that tendency to lean towards schoolish ways! I feel like A Beka covers that and 100 Easy Lessons gave us that one on one, at her pace aspect. We did them at the same time so she wouldn't rely too heavily on the notations they use in 100EL.

We are skipping most of the Kindergarten stuff because my daughter's a smart little cookie, she reads well and she has better handwriting than her daddy... and a better memory than her mommy. :) We are in no rush and may take 15 to 18 months to finish first grade since we are starting it a year early. She just tends to be fast so I am trying to prepare myself to keep up with her!!! We will use A Beka Kindergarten cursive because she wants to learn "pretty letters". She currently has a broken elbow on her right hand so we won't be starting this anytime soon! Science: WTM outline, just using Kingfisher Animal Encyclopedia, library books and Netflix. We are doing animals over the summer and we have already had caterpillars, worms and ants living in our house with us, it's been an adventure! History: Mystery of History 1. Ordered it and it's on it's way. Still debating buying the lapbooks or making my own. Math: MUS Alpha. We are on lesson 5 or 6 now and she loves it. Language Arts: First Language Lessons and Writing With Ease. Might hold off on WWE for awhile but I'm going to order it because we will start it whenever she seems ready and I'll only be able to gauge that by having it in front of me! Probably A Beka for spelling but maybe some of the free books on Google Books. I have the A Beka phonics book that is for grades 1 - 4 and ALL the A Beka readers from Pre K through 3rd grade that someone gave me. We read them sometimes but she has such a good grasp on phonics that we don't spend too much time on this. I am planning to rotate history and science because I want to be able to give each of them a good part of our day. These are MY weak areas (I'm one of those weird people who is good with English and Math, most people are English/History or Science/Math) and I will need to work harder at them along with her so I want to rotate. All of our reading will come from whatever we are learning in history and science and plus they each pick 2 books every time we go to the library. I have been trying to mix in non-fiction books with fictional books. For example, for Worm Week we read "Creepy Crawly Composters" (non fiction) and 'Diary of a Worm" (fiction). I am trying to find memory work for each week that matches what we learn or something important for her to know... This week it's a Bible verse and her personal information-name, address, etc. I just stick a card stock paper with the memory work on the wall and a few times a day she repeats it. She memorizes so stinking fast, last week by Tuesday she could tell me the characteristics of an ant without looking. My two year old is NOT an active participant in lessons but he does sit with us during read alouds and colors pages that match our topic... in the fall he will be at preschool at our church. He is learning to write his letters right now, though, so we are focusing on the letter that matches up to our animal of the week. I am still amazes at how well he is writing his letter A!!! Am I missing anything major? No music this year, at least nothing formal. I'm on a musical soundtrack kick so the kids are currently learning every word to Wicked by shear torture of hearing it over and over in the car!

I want a school room so much that I have considered putting an addition on our house or moving or having my two kids share a room for a few years until we can afford to do one or the other. I do well with compartments and organization and mixing school all over the house is making me break out in hives!

I am doing science almost completely free (I bought one $5 book at a second hand store, and I've spent about $50 on ink, paper and cardstock to print everything I need!). But I have little kids and it's easy with them. We are doing library books and free lapbooks from homeschool share. I found a free site for printing handwriting sheets so I won't be paying for that! I'm thinking about basing our spelling and vocabulary on words we find in the library books, rather than buying curriculum. I *am* planning to purchase Mystery of History and the lapbooks... and I did drop $70 on MUS blocks but I see that as an investment since both kids will use them for years to come. I also obsessively stalk this site because people post free resources all the time and I download or save them whenever I see them, even if my kids won't use them for years. I sat through a seminar on homeschooling for free at the Expo I went to and she had some cool ideas. The lady who gave the seminar is the author of Homeschooling for Dummies and I guess after she wrote the book there was an accounting mistake and she didn't get paid for over a year and had no income at all. So she spoke on her experiences doing it for free and mostly emphasized searching the internet for free printouts, using the library so much the librarian offers you your own key, and connecting with other home schoolers so you can trade and borrow.

Do you have any home school expo type things coming up in your area? We just had an expo that was pretty much only booths, not like a convention with all the other stuff going on. I took my daughter and she helped me pick. I had been set on A Beka math, but we got there and she fell in love with MUS and that's what we got. I think it's important to remember that we are home schooling to benefit our kids, so whenever possible, let them give some input on what they like. Obviously that's not always possible, but sometime it is. For me, my plan for history is MOH. We are starting this year. When my son officially starts school we will be on year 3 or 4 (depends on how long he stays at our church preschool). He will just jump in on year four and we'll keep going. If (and that's a very big if!) we ever have any more kids, they would just jump in on whatever year we happen to be on in history and science. Less stress for me! So I picked MOH because it can work for any level.

I have a bay window or garden window or whatever you call it, it seems different depending on where you live? Anyway, our kitchen table is pushed up against it and it used to be pretty and decorated... Now it's home school stroage! Not nearly as pretty but necessary. I'm also thinking about getting the Sauder Project Organizer to put in the kitchen... it's not that big so it would fit! I think I can organize all the binders and stuff pretty well on this.

I've never participated before but here's ours... a few words because otherwise what they are doing is just silly! :) http://toriandlucasathome.blogspot.com/2010/06/strong-as-ants.html

If i use a spelling book right now (I'm debating) we will use A Beka because that's what we use for readers as well. To me it just makes sense, because they use the same rules worded the same way in both.

I have an acquaintance from my daughter's gymnastics who home schools and leaves in the worst part of town as a ministry to her neighbors. The kids spend a lot of time in outreach, helping those around them, etc. Unfortunately I don't have any contact information for her!

OK, I'm so confused because when i tool my graduate level history of education class, my professor explained new math completely differently. He pulled ACTUAL math problems out of what he called "new math" text books that PS are actually using and they were all horrid but the one I will never forget was this: There are four yellow birds and one blue bird in a nest. How do you think the blue bird feels about being different? So I thought "New Math" was referring to forgetting math skills altogether, even in math books? Was what my teacher talked about actually called something else? He had a stack of text books he pulled out and showed us these examples in all of them. Scary stuff!

I am debating this right now. I was thinking about making lists of words she struggles with during whatever we are reading and using those as spelling/vocab. Is that too much work? Will I burn out on doing that? It's not so much about not wanting to spend the money, but not wanting something that's not really useful. I just keep thinking that random lists of words she may or may not use on a regular basis can't be all that helpful to her education. I need opinions and suggestions if I DO use a spelling book. I am looking for something with good real-life application, words my daughter will actually use in her writing throughout the day (I know she's only 5 but she writes like crazy. She is always writing down something or other, making lists on paper, making lists, etc).

I haven't read all the responses but A Beka makes a "My State" book that is pretty much blank for the kids to fill out. https://www.abeka.com/ABekaOnline/BookDescription.aspx?sbn=108731 My sister got to do this in school and she had a blast. She and my mom drove all over the state doing stuff for the book (we lived in Rhode Island at the time, so driving EVERYWHERE was possible!!!).

I've never been on time for anything in my entire life. I was born three weeks after my due date! My limo even got stuck in traffic on the way to my wedding and I was the last to arrive... I've ran through the airport to barely make a flight so many times I can't count and when i get to church on Sunday I usually have to go unstack a chair from the back because all the regular seats are taken. I pay $15/hour for gymnastics class for my daughter and we almost never make it for the first five minutes. At preschool last year, we had a car line to drop kids off and we were always last in line. And the strange thing is, I always start getting ready 30 minutes earlier than I need to, fully intending to be early for once. It's yet to happen. And I end up so stressed out over it... Part of the appeal of HS for me is that I don't have to be ANYWHERE at any time if I don't want to be. So much less stress for me. I also work from home because getting to an office on time stressed me out to the point I'd feel sick!!!

We had awesome couple friends in college... After college, all the couples married and moved all over the world... All those weddings that summer were the last time I saw any of them! At our church we have "small groups" which I never heard of until I moved to this area... We get together with 4 other families twice a month to get to know a few families better in the church. We've been with one group for 2 years now. Our group never gets together outside of these official meetings but I do get together with one of the girls and my husband is really good friends with her husband... but we never get together all four of us, which is kinda weird, I guess! Our last attempt at couple friends was so disastrous that I am not ready to try that again for a looooong time! They were so weird. They'd invite us over for dinner and then we'd get there at the time they said and they'd be done eating and act surprised that we were there. They'd pester and pester us to make concrete plans and we'd invite them over and they'd cancel at the last minute -- eight times in a row. Who needs those kinds of games? Ugh. No thank you!

I am not a social person in any way but my kids are very social creatures... While I plan to do everything possible to help them foster good friendships with both HS and PS kids, I honestly can tell you that I am not seeking friendships for myself with the mothers. If it happens, it happens. I'm not completely closed off to the idea of new friends but a social life outside of my own family is just not something I want or need. I do have a few friends that I try to see once a month or so (and they live in my neighborhood!). This past Christmas break, the mother of my daughter's best friend had get togethers planned almost EVERY SINGLE DAY of the two week break for all the kids in their preschool class. It was exhausting for ME and all I had to do was show up! I think in the end, I consider myself really weird, even among people who share my religious beliefs and my views on education. Not socializing is just easier than having to try to explain or justify my reasons for what I do or why I do it!

Looking forward to the answer as well. We are doing WTM Life Science right now and I am LOVING not having a text book and just doing the library thing. :) We've had a worm house, an ant farm and currently our caterpillars are growing rapidly! :) I haven't even remotely thought about next year, though so I'll be keeping an eye on the answers you get!

I can't tell you for A Beka Science 6 in particular but I taught A Beka Science for 7th and 9th graders at a private school and science is NOT my best subject. I didn't need a TM. In fact, I think I ended up using a copy of the student book because it was easier for me.