I am glad that you have settled on something that will work for both of you. I like the Apologia books, and we will be going back to them, we are just taking a break and doing AIG this year.

My oldest is in 8th, so take this with a grain of salt. We have been much the same as you have in regards to science - my kids do interest-led science in early elementary. My DD13 tried Apologia General Science last year, with the CD and Audio formats, but things didn't seem to click. Before this school year started she said that she hated science. Our problem is that she wants to possibly be a Registered Nurse. This year she would have been into Apologia's Physical Science. I decided to do AIG's God's Design for the Physical World books with my 4 oldest children, together. I have purchased all three Building Foundations of Scientific Understanding books and I have gone through them to match up the BFSU lessons to the God's Design books and they have added immeasurable amounts of information and clarity to the God's Design books. (I just highlight what I want to discuss/demonstrate from the BFSU books - we don't do the BFSU lessons.) I have also searched the internet for corresponding video clips to go with each lesson. Science is now one of my DD's(and sons) favorite subjects, go figure. I have gone through and typed up the vocab and lesson questions so that my children just have to fill in answers, which makes our lesson move along faster. I put the vocab definitions on the whiteboard and require that they have copied them down before our 'class'. The God's Design books have pretty simple experiments in them, and I am sure that you could look for video clips that would demonstrate the concepts if you didn't want to do them. I think you could probably do the same thing with the Apologia General Book, and I am considering doing Apologia Biology with my 4 oldest next year in this same way.

:iagree:We are young earth creationists, and we are using AIG's Physical Science books this year, but I have purchased all 3 of the BFSU books as a reference for me. I have marked the corresponding sections in BFSU, so that I will read ahead and make sure that I am covering all that needs to be covered(I feel that AIG is a little light). I love that Dr. Nebel really explains the concepts that need to be covered which I might forget or assume my kids 'get'. I will add in ideas from BFSU as needed as well. I do not have your science background, so take my opinion with a grain of salt.

My edition was printed in 1995, so keep that in mind... I have not looked at the book recently, but when I read through it a few years ago, it really felt like a 'public school' writing program. At that time I was mainly doing copywork and narrations(WWE), so moving kids through to essays by 4th Grade was not my goal. I think it is well organized, and if you want to stay on par with writing in the 'schools', it is probably an option(it covers everything from poetry to figures of speech to punctuation, grammar and capitalization, to letter writing, book reports, factual reports, story writing and essays). We have since moved on to IEW, as our current writing curriculum. Roxanne

I have an older version of it sitting here, but I have not used it. Do you have any questions in particular?

I did look at the newsletter more thoroughly, and it definitely has more than just the Bible story list that I received.

PM'd you, Hunter.

I am not sure if it is the same thing. I did not know that Home Life Ministries had a newsletter using the Character First curriculum. I have subscribed and I will let you know if it is similar. All I received from Robert was a list of Bible stores for each trait.

I have the first set of teacher guides for the elementary grades in my hands, as well as the other three on order. I also have the junior high and high school material as well as the elementary posters and cards. If you have any questions in particular, please pm me or post them here. Robert Greenlaw at Character First is awesome to talk to and he will email you a list of Bible stories to go with each of the character traits if you talk to him, as Character First is a secular curriculum. We are planning on using Character First in our family devotional time, mainly because I want our whole family to be on the same page as far as what is expected around here. We will add the Bible stories in to back up the traits, and I plan on having the kids each do a notebook in which we will make notes on people we come across in our literature, history etc, who display(or do not display) the character traits we have covered.

I think we will be using the guide from Center for Lit - http://www.centerforlit.com/Materials/TG7.aspx I think it may be the same one that a pp linked. It is by Teaching the Classics.

I am looking for input from those of you that have used MM 6A&B. If you have completed these books, which curriculum have you gone on to? Pre-Algebra or directly to Algebra 1? If you moved directly to Algebra 1, were you successful? Thanks in advance,

I tried SWI-A by itself, with my oldest, a few years ago, and it bombed here. This year, I realized that I needed to try again, because consistent writing was not happening here. I purchased the TWSS and actually took the time to watch ALL OF IT, and take notes. It was the best thing I could have done. I finally get it, and understand how the sequence works. I would totally recommend watching all of TWSS before attempting to teach it. We are now working through SWI-A. We are watching a section with Mr. Pudewa and doing the assignment, then I teach the next couple of assignments(as found in the downloadable book on the IEW website that goes with SWI-A), and we move on to the next section in the SWI-A. I plan on using SICC-A next year and adapting the assignments I teach to include information from our content subjects.

My DD12 is in 7th Grade. We had been using MUS up until this year(finished Zeta in 6th). We started out the year trying Chalkdust BCM. She couldn't handle the text. It was too dense(especially after MUS). So I ordered MUS Pre-Algebra and she couldn't handle the new concepts that were thrown at her - it is basically a catch-all text for the things that weren't covered in the lower grades. I found Saxon 7/6 used, so we started that after Christmas. We got up to about lesson 25 and floundered. I had a discussion with her about putting more effort in to her math and she started 7/6 over again. We are now up to about lesson 25 again and she is getting 15 questions wrong in each lesson(we do all the questions). I am at a loss as to what to do. I know some of it is adolescence. I switched one of her younger brothers to Saxon and he is in 6/5(in 5th Grade). She refuses to do the same text he is doing, and already says she is 'dumb'. I am tired of fighting with her about math. She wants to be a Vet Tech, so she needs to be able to get into college. I need recommendations of a curriculum and path that will get there without us killing each other. At this point I am willing to try anything. Thanks in advance,

My oldest loved The Whipping Boy by Sid Fleischman.

Thank you for your responses. I have printed off the samples and I will have to do some careful reading before I make a decision.

Any users/thoughts? I have looked at the samples on the website, and I am wondering how these would compare to SOTW 3/4.

:bigear: FYI - I emailed to find out if they were working on more guides and the response was that they are just finishing up the 7th and 8th grade guides. They will be ready by the end of the summer.

:iagree: I have been lurking and reading this thread as it has developed and I want to say thank you to everyone who has posted. The above quote really pulls this all together for me. I am evaluating where I want to go from here.

Jen, do you mind me asking what writing programs you have used up until this point? Your daughter's writing is impressive.

:bigear: I am looking for something similar, preferably something that ties Canadian content in seamlessly.:tongue_smilie:

:bigear: I am considering Core H with my crew for the fall. I am thinking that I will do it over 2 years, adding in Canadian history as we come to it. My younger DC will probably just follow along with SOTW and some of the read alouds. My DD12 will do the readers(adding in Canadian content) in addition to the rest.

We are currently using Children's Music Journey - http://www.adventus.com/store/childrens-music-journey/ My DC love it and they are learning basic music theory that will transfer to other areas and instruments. One of the cool aspects of this program is that it uses famous composers to 'teach' the lessons, so they are getting a little music history as well, because the composers play their music and tell some background behind some of the pieces.

:iagree:with the bolded. All four of my older DC had to slow down at this point. We ended up taking a break for a week or two at that point. I found that the complexities of long division(I am talking 2 and three digit divisors) seemed to be taxing on their brains and taking some extra time off gave them time to process all that they had learned. We then picked up where we had left off.

You could easily stretch GSWL out for a year and a half as a gentle introduction to Latin. My DD12 and I are working through it verbally this year. I am not sure how committed I am to teaching Latin long term, but this has been a great introduction. We are doing one lesson a day and it only takes a few minutes. My DD is retaining everything we have gone over.

The word list book is similar to Abeka's lists in their Handbook for Reading. It would be similar to most reading programs. We use Saxon Phonics as our main phonics curriculum, but I use the I Can Read It books instead of the little readers in Saxon's program. My DS also reads the Sonlight Word Lists when they are scheduled by Sonlight as we work through the books. We are currently half-way through Saxon Phonics 1 and we are just about finished the 3rd I Can Read It book. I love Sonlight's reader schedules. We start with the I Can Read It books then move through their schedules until we finish the Advanced Reader schedule. It is a great line-up of incremental 'real' books. As my children read through the levels, I move from asking them comprehension questions verbally to having them read the chapter on their own, and I type up Sonlight's comprehension questions for them to answer with full sentences. HTH!