I just found this interesting resource: https://senorab1972.wordpress.com/2014/05/08/advice-to-a-first-year-ap-spanish-language-teacher/

We're using Destinos. It's college-level Spanish. I bought the textbook, workbook and CDs used on amazon. We watch a video episode of Destinos on the internet for free, then go to the correlating lesson in Destinos textbook and workbook. There are audio CDs to go with the textbook and different audio CDs to go with the workbook. It's very thorough.

I am interested. I sent you a PM. Thanks!

Harriet - it was so encouraging to read your post (#63). Yesterday, we got a notice that our son was accepted into Whitney Young High School. We have homeschooled since kindergarten. He is now in 8th grade. Most parents would be so thrilled because it's ranked 3rd in Illinois and thousands of kids want to go there. However, like you said, the long commute (we live just west of Midway Airport) would be 40 minutes without traffic so we'd probably have to allow an hour in the morning and an hour in the afternoon for getting there/getting home. My son's reaction was "that's cool, but I want to continue homeschooling" "I like homeschooling." That's a huge relief to me because that's what I'm leaning toward. However, I don't even want to tell people he got into Whitney Young because they'd think I'm crazy for not sending him there. I have anxiety that there's no way I can offer the kind of academics that they can. However, he's done well enough thus far, perhaps we can take it all the way. Also, like you said, I love the freedom of being able to travel, do field trips and follow a classical education. He's doing Great Books (ancients) this year and loves it. Anyway, thank you so much for contributing to this forum, it's giving me strength to say no to Whitney Young. May I ask where your homeschool group meets? Thanks! Paula

My son is studying for the NLE Level 2 exam. I like the grammar found on this pdf download from Visual Latin: http://store.compasscinema.com/products.php?product=Latin-|-Dwane%27s-Awesome-Latin-Lists-[PDF]&utm_source=Compass+Classroom&utm_campaign=e31679357f-VL_March_20133_5_2013&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_a8c4cee6a5-e31679357f-311440069 Also, the NLE website has more practice questions: http://nle.org/pract.html Here are some links for history: http://www.dl.ket.org/latin2/historia/index.htm and http://www.roman-empire.net/ Hope these help!

I also agree about eliminating clutter. I'm reading "The Joy of Less" which talks about living a minimalist lifestyle. The author noted that you can be sitting on the couch reading or just thinking and about to be enlightened when your eyes rest on a pile of magazines or other clutter and then your thought are disrupted and you leave your deep thoughts to instead think about what you should do with that mess.

If you've got the windows for natural light to stream in, that's the optimum. It's pleasant and easy on the eyes for reading. If you don't have the luxury of getting natural light, a good alternative is an OTT-LITE.

Love the decluttering advice. I'm in the throws of that right now. I found inspiration for doing it from theminimalists.com - it really helps with ADHD kids not to have too many distractions around!

I work erratically as a freelance writer. I mostly get assignments to write press releases from a pr agency, and it ebbs and flows with how much news the clients have to put out. Having a daily schedule of assignments for the kids to do and check off helps when I get real busy.

I have the Kindle app on my iphone. If you buy a book on amazon, it's good for up to three devices so it goes to both my son's Kindle Fire and I can read it on my iphone. I enjoy having access to all the books on my phone.

I think Rosetta Stone is a great, incremental way to learn a language. It forces you to be "in" the foreign language. They say the item in Spanish, then you have to select which of the pictures they're talking about. After a little while with this program, I would schedule time for them to watch one 30-minute cartoon or age-appropriate show in Spanish per day. There are several TV channels in Spanish. So many immigrants claim they learned English just by watching TV. I think it works the other way around too. I took several years of Spanish in high school and college, but ever feel like I could understand a rapid conversation of Spanish-speakers. However, I started watching a cheesy Spanish soap opera and was pretty lost the first few weeks, but now I'm totally following the drama & my comprehension has significantly improved in the last month.

Hi all, I'm new here. We have one going into 6th and another going into 8th. We've always homeschooled and have done an eclectic mix of classical and CM. I've found great advice here. Thanks!