Yes, I noticed more hyper-sensitivity to existing issues at first. I thought it was because the Concerta helped her brain focus more, thereby she notices things that bothered her more. But, this issue later dissipated. However, after a couple of years with Concerta, I took her off for a while to re-evaluate and get a better sense and baseline for how she is at this age without meds. Then I realized that certain SPD issues I thought she had grown out of, she had not. The Concerta maybe was actually helping her deal with them, such as noise sensitivity. Without the meds, she covers her ears and runs for the hills just as she did when she was younger. All this to say, I think Concerta can afftect how they react with their SPD issues. It may at first exasperate the issues or it may in fact help with them, and it could change over time.

I guess I just need to vent. Once every few months. It took DD8 1 hour and 20 minutes to copy her narration which she asked me to write down for her, onto her paper. I am super worried about officially starting fourth grade in a few weeks. We've been doing math review and trying to do some SOTW Vol 2 and Science during the summer. She barely manages to get math done in two to four hours in the morning most of the time. It's not summer, it's ADHD. It just feels like there's no way out of this situation and no way I can teach her what she needs in her time frame.

I guess I just need to vent. Once every few months. It took DD8 1 hour and 20 minutes to copy her narration which she asked me to write down for her, onto her paper. I am super worried about officially starting fourth grade in a few weeks. We've been doing math review and trying to do some SOTW Vol 2 and Science during the summer. She barely manages to get math done in two to four hours in the morning most of the time. It's not summer, it's ADHD. It just feels like there's no way out of this situation and no way I can teach her what she needs in her time frame.

Has anyone signed up for these? They are free for kids 8-13. There are five different ones. http://content.microsoftstore.com/summercamps I'm confused about whether they are one day for each topic or several days. The sign up page will have the same class on different dates, some of them say Day 1, or Day 2, etc. but they all have the same description. Here's the thing, my DD8 went to one Monday and they did everything that's in the description. I'm not sure I want to drive her 30 minutes for Day 2 at a different time if they are going to do the same thing.

I'm listening to the full version of this book now. This just gave me the idea to have my DD8 read the Stepping Stone version.

Concerta is the only med that doesn't put her in a fog. In fact, when she got on this initially, that's when her reading really took off. I do notice she doesn't appear as "quick" or "sharp" as before but I don't have reason to attribute that to the meds at this point. The thing is she really likes SOTW (with exception of writing the narrations), we just never get to it. She likes science too for the most part because it involves labs, hands on stuff and little writing. She loves to do art. It's the "easy", for review stuff that she's not getting done. I bit the bullet the other day and sat with her for 3 solid hours going over a Singapore Math exercise she had not completed successfully before. I just don't have the endurance to that everyday. There has been improvement since then though. So I'm hoping to capitalize on the momentum. Thanks for the book suggestion though! We do a lot of outdoor stuff, some nature hikes, kayaking, biking on trails. I'm looking into these right now. She does like books that are in a series. Maybe this will spark her interest again. She's currently reading "The Secret Benedict Society". I asked her if she wasn't enjoying it. She said she liked it fine but that she mostly liked fiction, fantasy, adventure books (Secrets of Droon.) We'll see, maybe this will expand her reading horizons! Thank you so much for taking the time to reply.

I'm needing to vent. My DD8 is done with 3rd grade, but we continue to review during the summer. We did take a solid two weeks off and take days off when we have other activities planned like pool or playing with friends. In other words, yes, I'm giving her a break. For the summer, I planned on having her finish her cursive workbook that was not completed during the reg. school year, work on Singapore Math Extra Practice workbook and catch up on SOTW vol 2 and Science for which we are way behind while also doing some art. I expected to spend no more than two hours each day. She barely manages to get cursive and math done and it's taking about three or more hours! The quality of the work is poor (measuring against her previous work) and she is generally just slow. I don't know how else to describe it. It's driving me crazy. She has had problems focusing and with distractions in the past but this is just slow. I don't know what to do. She's currently on a rather high dose of Concerta, I don't really feel like asking for another increase. Beyond my current frustration, I'm really concerned she won't be able to keep up when we start a much more robust 4th grade curriculum in the fall. She also seems to have completely lost any interest in reading and there's nothing I can do to get her back into it. Any ideas or experience with this?

I got an e-mail offer for Reading Eggs for $49.95 for 12 months. Is this a good price? Do they have better prices through Homeschool Buyer's Coop or anything else like that? My son will be doing 1st grade in the fall. He's used the trial version and REALLY likes it right now. But the Math Seeds doesn't seem to have much to offer for 1st grade.

My almost six year old does this too and I see it continuing the same way. If he doesn't sound it out, he simply "guesses" wrong. I'm wondering the same thing. If it would help me to have him evaluated. Can't this be done at the school district?

Really enjoying listening to Les Miserables right now.

Can anyone say what the coop discount was last time it was available. Trying to see if I want to get this now or wait until there is a discount.

Thank you! I wonder if they're not very popular with homeschooler because of the price. Is it me or do they seem really expensive?

I wonder if there is an option to get them all at once instead of one per month.

Has anyone used these? Are they worth the price? http://www.engagewiththepage.com

Also @Alte Veste Academy, the parrot thing reallly made me laugh when I read this late last night.

I can't say I've had enough time to fully process all the changes I need to make, and most of all, to make change my own outlook first. @Alte Veste Academy I really appreciated your wisdom and insight on this. This morning, I did take some baby steps. We didn't need to do FLL3 but I told DD that she could attempt to pass off a poem from FLL of her choosing if she wanted to. She did, and she passed it off. Instead of disappointment, there was clapping and it set a good tone for starting the day. I then opted to do Song School Spanish which has been neglected for at least 2-3 weeks instead of LA. They were both quite excited. We finished up a chapter that had already been started and moved on to WWE3 for DD. This time, I don't know if it was coincidence or not, she read the story and she went about writing the summary directly on her notebook right away (like I've seen it play in my mind while day dreaming about how school should be going). I was very happy. We moved on to RSM and left Spelling for the end. She also had time to listen to SOTW and do some activity sheets even though we started a bit later and stopped earlier to go out to lunch. It went well. Now, that's not to say, I haven't tried to mix things up a bit before. It usually does go well the first day but I eventually get frustrated when the initial good feelings go away because everything starts dragging and taking too long again. Then I do an about face and thrust the 3R's to the beginning of the schedule to make sure they get done again. Hopefully, this time, I can do better at maintaining a positive, fun atmosphere while keeping things going and not allowing them to drag on. I will be re-reading this thread to refresh myself for sure.

I think there are a lot of public school alternative programs cropping up these days. A lot of them are K-12 online type things. This is one where you have to already be enrolled in a participating charter school as a distance learning student or participating alternative (online) school. They kind of piggy back on to that. It's a bit confusing. You can read about their program here. What it boils down to, I think, at least in part, when it comes to the charter schools for example is --if a charter school is struggling to keep up their numbers, they may resort to providing "distance learning" programs where the student can participate in school part time or not at all, use their curriculum or their own. Depending on what options they decide to make available, they might offer a small curriculum reimbursement because this is coming from the funding they receive for that student in their school. So giving some of that money to you is better than not getting enough enrollment and face closing. They, in turn may contract with another company that offers certain curriculum or programs of their own. In this case, that company is the one that also handles the student. So, they must be the ones getting the money, and they decide if they want to use it for their programs or to provide some of it as reimbursement for curriculum. The reimbursement option, I think, is definitely a way to draw in homeschoolers but legitimately does give you the freedom to pick soley from their offerings or at least create one course yourself.

Looking at getting the USA edition. Any more reviews?

Microscope also a great idea. Already bought one. I bought all this stuff for my first long before we were in this program. Also have Magic School House DVD's, a few Prufrock Press logic books and Tin Man. And yes, it does have to be for the grade he is in. I can't buy something that is clearly 3rd-5th grade curriculum and it does have to be ONE subject. That is the only thing that makes it hard to get up to the amount. Thank you all so much for all the great ideas! Life of Fred - I might be able to get that! I'll have to check. Didn't even think of it even though I've considered buying it. Magic School Bus Science Kit Subscription - great idea! Little Passports - great idea! In fact, all subscriptions are expensive, why didn't I think of that. I have him doing Kiwi Crate right now for K (with no reimbursement) I could even continue that, duh.

Already have the RSM games. Music instrument is a very good idea. I did just buy him a ukulele but that was around $50 and I can't really cover the rest as a music class. Also, DD is in the program but I shouldn't have as much trouble with hers by simply getting the next level of her current curriculum. I'm not sure of anything I could get that would work for both of them though. I like Games for Logic. Not sure I can come up with $150. Same with literature. A lot of classics are free on Kindle which we have. I don't even know what IEW is, I have to look it up. Really, I should be sleeping right now!

I know. That title probably made no sense. I'm starting to think about curriculum for next year because I just want to take care of it now and not think about it all summer. I'll be doing 1st grade with my DS in the Fall. He will (probably) be in a program that will reimburse us for a small amount of his curriculum. $150 in one subject. I know, this shouldn't be a dilemna and if he was my first, the money would have already been spent. But he's my second and I already have all the curriculum for 1st grade. Clearly my imagination is lacking at this moment. What can I buy? For ONE subject only.

Well, the stuff in my sig. was the plan but for L.A. we do 1 page of D'Nealian cursive(4-5x/wk), FLL3 (3/wk), WWE3(4x/wk), and AAS5 10 words or 6 sentences/day (4/wk). We do stay on track with all this. The most time consuming subject is WWE. It's not WWE itself, it's DD doing WWE. I still think it's reasonable. I've considered this system but I've opted against it. DD works slowly, that is her pace. If I limit the time per subject, she won't ever get anything done and we'll spend the day doing small fragments of things or getting started but never taking off. I think we would be able to cover more subjects, but quickly get behind in core subjects and the fragmentation of lessons would result in less retention. That's why I've opted to cover all core subjects first. And that's why sometimes that's all we get done. After lunch, I have to clean the house, etc. and I usually have no energy to do one on one work with her anymore. I don't see how she can be overloaded sometimes only doing 3 subjects in 4 hours. I think her pace would result in having to repeat a grade. Thanks for the comparison with the schedule. It does help to see what we're doing. Of course, there would be more time if I continued to work with her after lunch, but I decided earlier in the year that I didn't want to do that because I didn't want to be in homeschooling mode for the majority of the day. It might help her tremendously but it would be bad for me. Instead, I try to give her a list of things she can accomplish independently. Listening to SOTW while she colors the activity page or does the map, Typing Web, Finishing a math worksheet or making corrections, reading her choice, or related to History, Spanish on the computer, etc. Sometimes, she does these, sometimes not. Sometimes it takes her hours. As has been suggested, I do mostly leave Fridays to do catch up or the "fun" subjects like art. But we still sometimes don't get to Art or Song School Spanish (combined with DS5) for a couple of months with this tactic. When we do get to Art and I think we'll also have time for the neglected History and Science. Art takes the whole morning. I'm mostly concerned about 4th grade, and that I was hoping by then, I could count on her to get her independent work done, so I could spend more one-on-one time with DS doing 1st grade. I just don't see her doing it and I'm afraid she'll drop behind or simply not get much beyond the 3R's. Even a K12 Music program we started in Feb. which I thought would do the trick to break up monotony and provide incentive to get the core stuff done, turns into a an hour long endeavor. This is where I need the attitude adjustment because I find myself not enjoying it the way I did doing K-2 with her.

We are getting close to winding up 3rd grade. This whole year has been a bit tough. My motivation has slowed down and my expectations have risen. Apparently, this makes for a terrible cocktail, doesn't it. Most of our school is done between 8 and noon. In that time, we are lucky if DD gets L.A. and math done. We are behind in History, Science, and other subjects we'd like to do such as Spanish and Art. There are many things that I expected DD to be able to do better by the end of this school year which have not materialized: memorizing poems in FLL, writing narrations without minutes dropping off starring into thin air; common sense mistakes in math; completing independent work assignments, etc. I'm looking for some fresh ideas here or maybe just a slap in the face. I'm really not sure what I need to do to turn my attitude around and also to help my DD do better. What can I do now or probably when we start 4th grade in the Fall to revitalize our homeschool experience. Sadly, I feel this is affecting my K'er too as I don't have the same drive or time to spend with him as I initially did with my DD in K. I would appreciate any constructive criticism and ideas, though "letting her work at her own pace" or "she's still young, that's normal" is probably not going to help me right now. Thank you! Also, I really miss SatoriSmiles blog. This was a good source of motivation for me before.

I agree. I used to work as a programmer/DBA. I think it is important to learn to write and to preserve the skill of writing in cursive as well. My daughter is just now learning to type. Ironically, I don't feel I need to spend as much time or energy emphasizing computer skills. I didn't learn to type until Junior High. I learned to program after I graduated from college with a different degree. They'll learn to type, writing needs to be taught more explicitly.

I'm using with both kids, 5 and 8. It's super easy for the eight year old but she likes doing it anyway because it's easy and she gets to hear songs and cut stuff up. I would say it's perfect for K-2nd grade. It won't teach them a ton of stuff but it's a fun, easy intro.