Thank you for your kind well thought out response. I am going to start working though these suggestions. I really can't thank you enough!

I am just wrapping up my 4th year homeschooling my 10 year old. He went to public school kindergarten when he was 5 and academically he didn't get anything out of it. So, we started over with kindergarten at home the next year and have been plugging along ever since. He still struggles a lot with reading. I have read to him tons and tons and made reading a part of school and encouraged independent reading every way I know how. Over the last four years, he has gone from not reading at all to maybe a late 1st grade/early 2nd level. I tried teaching him phonics for 2+ years and it just wasn't working. He had a really hard time blending the sounds together. So, despite my beliefs that a solid base in phonics make for a better reader and speller, I abandoned that in favor of having him read read read and memorizing words along the way. He does well in other subjects. He is good at math and is behind only because of poor curriculum choices I made. He is also very interested in science and history. His handwriting is decent. I had his vision checked when he was in PS kindergarten and it was perfect. His biological father has some kind of undiagnosed learning disorder, but it seems to be more in relation to math than anything. He didn't read until he was 10, but is now an avid reader. Anyway, my 8 year old began reading fluently this year and has far surpassed my 10 year old's reading ability. I have been taking the "it's normal for boys to read later" approach, but I feel like we are to the point now that there may be a problem. I just don't know what to do. I don't know where to go. We don't have money to hire a specialist. What do I do to get him evaluated? Is there anything we can do at home?

Thanks for all the wonderful responses. They've really helped me think through this. I thought maybe I was loosing it because when we were house shopping having a schoolroom was very high on the priority list. I love the idea of hanging the kids art in picture frames! I think I'm going to go for it. Isn't that the beauty of homeschooling, being free to do what works? I think for now we'll just keep daily supplies and books upstairs and everything else will stay down in the schoolroom.

We are fortunate enough to own a home that allows us to have a dedicated schoolroom. It has darling furniture and decorations and houses all of our books and supplies quite well. We had some flooding in our basement recently and ended up moving some boxes into the schoolroom so, it was out of commission this past week. About a month ago we did away with the curriculum we'd been using and have started doing AO and just added phonics, math and handwriting. For the last week that we haven't been in the schoolroom we've been sitting up in the living room snuggled together reading lots of books and doing phonics. Math and writing happen at the dinning table. I'm not sure if it is the change of scene or what, but I think I may prefer this. It feels more natural and like the learning is more integrated into our lives instead of relocated to a specific room we are only in for that purpose. Does that make sense? I know a lot of people who would kill to have the space for a schoolroom. Am I crazy for doing away with mine? If, we do decide to change locations. I think I will still use our current area to house over-flow supplies, old curriculum and what-not. For those of you who don't have a schoolroom either by choice or necessity, how do you organize your things like math manipulative, display art or time lines without sacrificing the style of your home?

:iagree: We routinely have a glass of wine or a beer with dinner. Our children think it is normal. I would never think twice about an average non-alcoholic adult having one drink with their meal.

We are doing a nature walk tomorrow in co-op and I was wondering if anyone knows of any good online resource that might be helpful to add some structure or guidance? Like give the kids things to look for, interesting facts, etc.

We didn't purchase it and the curriculum is working just fine. I think it might make more sense to do it if you are starting it in pre-school. Also, I don't think it would be horribly hard to make one out of card stock or cardboard.

Are you looking for more of those workbooks? They sell them pretty much everywhere (Target, Walmart, Barnes and Noble, Amazon, etc). What about MM and HWT and ETC? Those are all inexpensive workbooks that she could pretty much do herself, but have high quality content (IMHO).

I LOVED those books as a kid! Thank you so much for sharing this! I just added it to my Christmas ideas list.

I don't use Miquon so, take this with a grain of salt, but I saw someone post the other day that it went from K-3rd.

What a great idea! We're currently reading The Lion The Witch and The Wardrobe.

I kind of can't believe how common this seems to be. I had a real hard nose for a teacher in 3rd grade and she made us memorize them all. AND thanks to the endless drills, and fearing Mrs. Brown more than the devil himself, I still have them down pat.

Like PPs I think it makes more sense for the man to get it done because (from my understanding) it's a fairly simple out patient procedure. Whereas a tubal is a longer recovery and has a higher rate of more severe complications.

I second the recommendation for arnica montana. It does wonders to aid in tissue healing. Also lots of rest and lots and lots of water and whole foods.

I agree with everyone else. Incorporate geography and social studies with history. I think SOTW does an excellent job of that. There is a map to work with for every chapter. Also, since your children are just a grade apart, I would combine them in as many subjects as it makes sense to.

Thank you for sharing! I have wanted to check it out forever and this is making me finally pull the trigger!

So far we don't have any misses this year... The hits are: ETC - both the boys LOVE it! HWT - They both really like this, too! They really enjoy the little sayings that go with each letter. And you should see the DRAMATIC improvement my oldest has made in his handwriting! SOTW1- We got about a 1/4 of the way through it last year. It is a little over DS5's head, but I'm mostly doing it for DS7 and he says history is his favorite subject now! RSB - Sometimes I have to spend a little extra time explaining the concepts to DS5, but they both really enjoy using the abacus and I can tell it is building a good strong foundations for them. OPGTR - for DS5. He is always asking to do phonics. He really enjoys the rhymes! Chronicles of Narnia - We are using this series for our current read aloud and they LOVE it! To be determined: We are waiting for the following to arrive on our doorstep... FIAR - This is mostly for DS5, but I am sure DS7 will be right in there with us. RSO E&S - I hope that this ends up being a science curriculum that we 1- like and 2- get done. MM - I thought this would be good for DS7 to give him a bit more math to work on. SOTW 2 - For when we finish STOW 1 in Feb/March I want to throw in Song School Latin, but I haven't got there yet.

I did purchase the letters and board, but after I did I wondered why I didn't just think to use sheet pans? I also saw this awesome idea where a woman bought a automobile oil drip pan from Walmart ($12) and mounted it to the wall for a big cheap magnet board.

Yeah, we do not allow neighborhood kids in the house and neither do others in my circle of friends. I would say if they continue to break the rules, then they can't play over at your place at all.

I would really encourage you to go for it! I got into cloth diapering because I wanted to have the most natural fibers/products on our daughter and was really excited about it, but deep down I was nervous that it would be too much work and I would hate it. It's turned out to be NO extra work at all. I LOVE IT! When you use disposables you have to do something with the diapers anyway and with cloth you throw the bag of dirties in the washer instead of in the garbage. AND no late night diaper runs!! :D

I thought of mentioning that in my post... I figured there would be one wise guy in the bunch ;) For the record, I went through a Waldorf "thing" last year and bought some, very expensive *cough *cough, bees wax crayons and my kids turned their noses up at them because they didn't work great... And they got frustrated that pieces of the colors got on each other (because of lack of wrapping). We did keep some Waldorf ideas, but the bees wax crayons are not one of them. It's worth noting that I have also seen many non-Waldorf art programs that also recommend buying better quality art supplies. One last observation, most things labeled as or recommended by Waldorf are $$$$

Like fire-breathing dragons? I've not heard this... What is YE?

DS 7 just started fiddle lessons this year. I let him choose between that and piano.

I agree with the previous posters. You can even see it in simple things like crayons. Crayola crayons are way better than the overly waxy off-brand.

Here is the link to Teaching the Classics http://centerforlit.com/Materials/TC.aspx