Thanks! I'll check it out.

My 12 year old has finished everything I planned for her to do in science this year and would like to spend the last quarter learning about human growth and development. Any great book ideas for this topic and age?

We went into CLE Alg 1 without a hitch after 710. We briefly tried Saxon ALG and it was just awful. CLE Alg 1 introduces one new concept each lesson and then reviews previous material, while Saxon was teaching several things each lesson. My son HATED it, and I'm sure that a lot of that has to do with the fact that we've used CLE since 1st grade. It is very user friendly. We're doing Jacob's Geometry next year, and I'm hoping CLE's Alg 2 will be ready by the time we need it.

A set of goals rather than a list of page numbers. This is exactly what I'm trying to work out on paper right now. A very loose plan with lots of wiggle room and space to let real life experiences interrupt without having to feel as though the plan has been completely derailed.

I'm completely with you on dropping the very handsy on-y type lessons. They feel very meaningless to me and so it's nearly impossible for me to stay consistent with them. Plus, my kids always complain. No issues dropping that stuff. And I do need to be more mindful of how many lessons are required to complete the curricula that I choose. Although, I will say that I'm less and less drawn to curricula as time goes by and more to just plain books. Ah yes, planning in pencil. I plan..re plan...and then re re plan. I'll admit that I tend to enjoy the planning more than the actual doing. I'm envious of the organizational skills that y'all possess. I can do the planning to break things down and make things fit, but it's really stressful to me having everything broken down into so many pieces. If it's something like math or grammar, we just do the next thing, but the other subjects like science and history.... I feel like I need a looser way of planning. I feel like my heart wants to be a type A person, but a space cadet lives in my brain. ;) I love Melissa Wiley and the analogy of having high and low tides speaks to me. I would love to find a middle ground between structure and what she describes simply because I have so many learners to juggle. Now Sarah Mackenzie gets me. Maybe it's having all those little ones with a set of twins at the end, I don't know. ;) But just her outlook and ideals align very much with mine. This is huge. All of the little extra subjects steal focus from the main ones. It's very difficult for me to have so many different subjects with so many boxes to check. Fewer subjects done better is what we need. For example if you are a free spirited person/parent, homeschool in a box from Abeka will probably drive you nuts. If you are a very rule focused, step by step, type A person, unschooling would probably be a poor choice. I've spent so much time trying to teach in whatever way I think I'm "supposed" to (And how I think I'm supposed to teach has see-sawed quite a bit) rather than what's most natural for me. I like that saying of Hunter's. To teach from your strengths rather than your weaknesses. And therein lies much our problem. I'm very aware of my many weaknesses, but I'm still working on figuring out my strengths. I tend to have high expectations of myself that I'm not able to reach.

I hit stress and overwhelm every single year. My oldest is 14 and we've always homeschooled. Always. I know it takes awhile to find your "groove", or so I've been told, but I don't know that I'd say we're there. Or rather...I'm not. I know all homeschool moms are different. Some are very organized and have an ability to focus and juggle all the details and moving parts of life. Whether that means they use something completed scripted or construct an intricate plan from scratch and follow it to the letter. They have it all together. Consistent. Organized. Not me. Despite my best intentions, I get lost in all those details. I'm not the best at following a plan, even if I make it myself. On the other hand, I see moms with this amazing ability to just go with the flow of life and embrace all kinds of projects and experiences that are completely open ended. I simply cannot live like that either. I need to set a course. To know where we're headed. (That and I really don't like crafty, project type schooling. And there's a certain amount of guilt that goes along with that...) So here I am, like I am every year, trying to take a good long look at myself and my children, letting everything sink in. Contemplating how I'm going to balance my ideals with what's realistic. My ideals tend to be unreachable. At least, not completely reachable. And so I'm trying to find that balance. Previous years I've sway back and forth- textbooks. CM(ish). A mix of CM and textbooks. And yet, I still haven't found "it". Maybe I never will...but I'm going to change my approach to planning this go around. Instead of going through a list of subjects I want to teach/have them learn and picking resources, I'm trying something new. Realistically looking at my routine (which includes my low energy level), and our natural rhythm and seeing what types of things/resources fit into it. I read somewhere that homeschooling is a natural extension of parenting and so how you homeschool should be a reflection of that. That concept has always resonated with me, and yet I haven't truly embraced it. I'm going to try. It would be nice to know I'm not alone. I've met so many homeschool moms, and yet I've yet to meet one that I felt truly understood where I'm coming from. It can be so discouraging. I'm not exactly sure what my question is. Has anyone changed your way of planning rather than just changing curriculum? Did you find what you were looking for?

You've hit on my issues. There's a huge push to make sure you find curriculum that meets the learning style of your student regardless of whether said materials make the teacher want to stick a fork in their eye. I'd really prefer to keep my forks separate from my eyes this next year....

Anybody have any ideas at all? I'm thinking maybe getting my hands on an old ultra cheap set of abeka english 9 lessons plans just to see what/how many assignments might be a good idea.

I'm trying to determine what course to take as far as writing for my oldest son who will be in 9th grade next year. I asked a similar question earlier this school year and we were in a really bad place as far as writing went. So I let go of the curriculum, gleaned ideas from the ever helpful hive, and trusted my instincts in teaching him. It's made a world of difference and I'm thrilled with the progress we've made. Our current routine is to do two narrations per week (one history, and one literature) as well as work on one project (report, essay, creative piece) per month to go through that whole process of brainstorming, organizing, writing, editing etc. After a few months on a roll I thought we should get the IEW back out....Nope. Frustrating. Too many steps made every assignment take forever. It felt like were going backwards instead of forwards (I still need to send this back...) I have come to a realization that in teaching I do much better without ultra scripted material. I get completely lost in the details if I can't see the big picture. I thought I wanted step by step but really what I need is clear expectations for each assignment....and then I can just reverse engineer a plan from there that fits each child. Does that make sense or do I sound like a crazy person? (Maybe better not to answer that.) I've been using the books Write On and Writers Inc to get ideas for different types of assignments and that's working really well. I'm not exactly sure what I'm looking for, but I do need to know what types of assignments he needs for high school as well as how long they should be etc. That type of thing. Guidelines. Or perhaps a really bare bones writing program? Help me out. What am I looking for? I'm not panicked as I know we moved forward, but I need help to gain some focus on what's next.

Yup. This is me too. We're not even technically half way through this school year... We'll continue with CLE math and read lots of books. I may as well not even try to guess what else, because my plans will change 3,587 times between now and when we begin.

Yes, we've made changes. I didn't even realize how much of a total overhaul it was till I started going through it in my head. Math is the same. My 8th graders science is the same. I put everyone together in SOTW 4. I read that aloud at family hour and then give everyone books on their level. That family reading hour followed by quiet reading hour is our constant. I let a lot of the other things go, so I could give each child all the hand holding they need for writing. And it's helped SO much. My oldest especially is coming along amazingly with his writing. No regrets in focusing on that for awhile.

I've regretted MOST of the extras we've gotten as I've discovered I really do better with less stuff. With that being said, we regularly use- -wall maps -laser printer -prismacolor colored pencils -pencil sharpener -audio books

Someone asked this very same question in the facebook group. The suggestion was to email her. I do know that Kathy Jo will email you what she has completed of Level 6 if you need it before she finishes it.

I've had the same issue this past year with my dd (then 11 now 12). No matter what I have on her list of things to do, she will finish it in 2 hours. And she does a decent job. Math is above grade level even though she doesn't like it and writing well is easier for her than her older brother. She can take notes, write narrations and whatever I ask....but she's really really fast. If I add project based hands on things to her work, she sees it as "pointless busywork". And the times that I've said we should try to work based on time instead, she's very frustrated. Her mindset is that doing it in that way is punishing her for being efficient...and she has a point. Now we do other things that she doesn't think of as school like family reading time (ie morning time but in the afternoon), an hour of reading time in the afternoon, and an afternoon activity (art, poetry tea etc). But I'm letting go of trying to make her work for a certain amount of time. The other side of the spectrum is that I have a teen who takes ALL DAY to accomplish the same amount of work my daughter does in 2 hours. :huh:

Yes. In sitting down with him and helping him write today, it was clear that his major issue is organizing what he wants to put down. That is where we need to start. I printed a couple lessons from this last semester when we needed an IEW break and it really went okay. Not sure why we didn't use it more? I think I needed to get back to the super expensive writing program that I bought.... I know I'm a huge part of the problem here. I have sooo many resources around and I'm not sure how to utilize what we need without jumping all over the place. We sat down together and did the sample from Write On! that Hunter linked to. So, he did the 3 sentence report and then built a paragraph off of each sentence. He had no problems coming up with the topics. And he had no problem writing coherent paragraphs once I had helped him with the notes for each paragraph as well as assuring him he was able to scrap the checklist and just write for this assignment. I'm not entirely sure what our next step should be. Practicing more of the same? Last night I read through the Write On sample. Tonight I'll go and read a few more lessons in school composition.

I'm most definitely overwhelmed with life. That is just the way it is. I really would rather him master the basics rather than throw things at him that he just isn't ready for. My goal for him (and all my kids actually) is to be ready for community college. I spent the evening looking through links and saving and printing files (thank you, btw, Hunter!) It's hard not to feel overwhelmed in moving forward. The Write On Teacher's Guide made a lot of sense to me. I remember reading it through a few years ago, perhaps? It just wasn't what I thought we needed at the time, but I'm ready for it now. Funny how that works out, isn't it? We're going to start with lessons 15 and 16 from that at the bottom level and go from there. I KNOW he can do it at that level without a meltdown. He is OCD with sensory issues being taught by a mama with Sensory Issues, high levels of chronic anxiety, and compulsive tendencies. Maybe I should have lead with that part... ANYWAY, thank you again for the links and responses. A lot to look through. A lot to ruminate on.

Looking forward to this post... I'm not looking for great right now. I'm looking for "enough".

Thanks Hunter. I know I've looked at these samplesonce upon a time, but perhaps I need to revisit this resource. I do like IEW very much. Not getting it done is more MY problem. I will say my 11 year old doesn't enjoy it BUT she has no problems with it. She just naturally writes with most of the things on the checklist already, so most of the time the editing is very quick for her. DS on the other hand spends SOOOO much time planning out every. single. sentence. before he gets it down on paper to make sure he will get everything he needs from the checklist.

He has a near photographic memory for factual information.Ask him a direct question about anything he has read and he can answer it. Writing another thing entirely for him. For years, he did ok. Not fantastic, but ok. When he was working through Climbing to Good English he was able to construct paragraphs, because it gave very STEP-BY-STEP instruction. With an IEW assignment, again, he can complete the assignments with that very micromanaged instruction. WITHOUT all the steps, he is unable to do it.

Teaching writing has been my achilles heel. I honestly feel we're strong in every other area...but writing is kind of important. :crying: This is mainly an issue for my older two children. We've been doing IEW SWI B. This is year two on it. The instruction is good, but for a couple of reasons Im wondering if I need to do a reality check and go another way. Firstly, I'm not seeing what is being learned carried over for my son into anything else. If it's not an IEW assignment, he is still completely paralyzed by writing even a simple paragraph well ( I can relate). Also, while I believe this instruction is solid, the way it's organized is making it very difficult to stay consistent for me. (I mentioned this is the 2nd year working on it, right?) The DVD lessons are sometimes an hour long....and then other days are sometimes short...it makes me feel all over the place. If my kids are independent, I have no problem with them doing an hour and a half of writing one day and 5 the next. That's fine. But if I'm going to be involved, I need each day to require similar amounts of time from me. I know that makes me seem like a crazy person...but I do need that in order to be consistent with ALL my kids. My 11 year old is fine with whatever I ask her to do. She isn't writing phobic like her brother and can crank out a well done narration or essay with no issues (minus intro and conclusions as we haven't covered that yet) We've done sooo many things with writing and I feel sooo wishy washy. Bravewriter, writing in CLE and CTGE, trying to pull assignments together myself (that was a nightmare), IEW etc I'm considering EIW for my older son. Is there something else that I'm missing?

^Yes to the above. We've flopped out a total of 4 times trying to use Apologia science, but my kids have ALL liked the Abeka science books. The early books are slim but it's easy to pick up a few more books at the library on whatever they're reading about. Retention has been surprisingly good. We've not done the tests, but from 4-6th I've made them take notes and/or do all the questions and reviews on paper. SOTW is another hit here for all my kids. I'm reading a section a day to my middle ones (a section. Not a whole chapter), jot down their narrations and they copy them the next day. I give the map work on Friday and hold the AG recommended books from the library for them to read alone or for me to read to them. My 11 year old outlines a section a day and does a written narration of about a page or so.

Thank you for the input, ladies. I'm still trying to make up my mind. :willy_nilly:

I feel like such an idiot. We burnt out on CLE la last year so most our year was just iew writing. I was fine with that but knew I wanted to get good grammar coverage this year especially for my older two. We've tried Rod and Staff before and it's always flopped as in kids not like it and stressing me out. For some reason that escapes me at the moment, I was determined to make it work for us. So yeah, that's not happening. I need something independent so I can spend time helping with iew. Yes, I know Rod and Staff can be independent but that's not going to happen here. Please hit me with your ideas. Before I determined to use RS, I almost bought fix it. I backed off because 8th grade seemed too old to start it. Nothing expensive.

August 15th and no, not for everything.