I have the older IG but going by that I think it would be hard. You'd definitely need the Bible, Lionteller Storybook, Little Golden Book Collection, and Usborne Things People Do as those are used multiple weeks. Also the Developing the Early Learner books. My IG is from 2004 or 2005 and it looks like the book selection has changed quite a bit.

I bought one of the hybrid versions last month and Unit 1 does not have color to the edges of the page, Units 2-4 have color to the edge of the page. I'm not aware of any other differences.

My dd just did TT4 and I was kind of disappointed with it. I felt it was behind for a 4th grade level textbook and did not do nearly enough division. Simple division isn't covered until late in the book and it's at around lesson 104 (out of 119 lessons) that long division is done at all. There was not enough done with long division in my opinion for a 4th grade math book. I wound up putting dd into Saxon and am supplementing with MM division sheets to make up for what I feel was a wasted year with TT4. That said TT worked great for my oldest dd. She loved doing math independently. She did TT 5 and 6. My second child did not do well with TT and did not do well with it independently. I wound up sitting with her through most of her time working on the lessons or it did not seem to stick with her. The explanations especially for fractions confused her. After doing just a few MM fraction sheets she had a much better grasp on fractions than what she got with TT.

I'd probably get B. I did A with my 6th grader last year and it worked well for her. She is dyslexic and I saw vast improvements in her writing from using it. I had gotten A so I could use it with my younger dd but then I held off using it until this year anyway.

I started LFC A with my 5th grader this year and it's a good fit for her. It is one of dd's favorite subjects to do and I think that is partly due to all of the fun things in the activity book. I think it would have been a struggle with dd to use it for 3rd grade. I bought SSL earlier this year to use with my twins but I'm planning to wait until at least the fall to start it wince we are still working on phonics. I wish there was another level of SSL because I don't think they'd be ready for LFC A once we finish SSL. Maybe I'll have them do Prima Latina although I really disliked Latina Christiana.

I usually buy online stuff in Jan and Feb and then will get stuff in person at our curriculum fair in April. It works out well to buy then because we have tax refund money usually and if dh gets a bonus he gets it in March. My main issue with buying ahead for fall is there have been a few times where I wound up switching curriculum and not using stuff I bought way in advance.

Pretty much all of it can be reused. The only consumables are the charts. Level 1 comes with a phonogram chart and another for each step. My kids like to put stickers on them when they complete each step. I didn't think to photocopy them but I think I could easily make up a chart when I use the program with my younger kids.

I'm waiting on Bridge to the Latin Road. It probably won't be here until next week but I'm very anxious to get it. I have a couple small Amazon packages coming with books as well.

My 6 yo dd prefers to start her letters from the bottom too. She also likes to go clockwise which has been the bigger issue. Her handwriting looks very nice but the form is very wrong. When I sit and try to correct her she starts crying every time. My 6 yo ds on the other hand uses great form and forms all the letters right. He is so so sloppy though.

My kids have workboxes and most everything goes into them. I don't follow the exact workbox method outlined in the book but my kids work through their boxes each day. Many of the boxes they need help with. There are very few they do totally independently. I like them because the kids can see when they are done for the day. Here's what is in my 10 year old's boxes most days. I make her work in order. 1. GWG (I read lesson with her and help with the worksheet) 2. Saxon (I do warm up and lesson with her and stay close by if she has questions) 3. Mindbenders (mostly done independently) 4. Geography (mostly mapping and done independently) 5. Latin (we do this together) 6. Silent Reading Book (done on her own) 7. WWE (done together) 8. Handwriting (done independently) 9. Spelling (done together) 10. Science (done together) 11. History (I read to her) 12. Read Aloud (I read to her)

I just ordered this exact one. I can't comment on how much I like it because it just came today but it arrived in less than a week. I can't wait for dh to get it up for me. It looks perfect for what I wanted it for. I had planned to just get showerboard from Lowe's until I found out it wasn't magnetic.

That sounds like a good way to do it. I hadn't even thought of trying to do it that way. I spent a lot of yesterday pouring over MFW 1 because we'll be done with K in a few weeks and I love the Bible part so much. I've already spent the money on the entire grade 1 kit and second student pack I really want to use it. My big reservation is the phonics in there. The method looks good but there is not enough review. On Day 18 they introduce long A and then on Day 19 they introduce long E. That is way too fast for my twins who are just now starting to read CVC words well after lots and lots of practice. The K program only goes through CVC words so if you are only using MFW then this is the first introduction to long sounds for the child. Day 20 is an exploration day and then Day 21 introduces long i and Day 22 introduces long o. I cannot see keeping that pace unless it is with a child already comfortably reading long vowel sounds.

I really like MFW but we will not be using it next year at least not with my 10 yo. We've had a couple long talks recently and she hates the history. She really can't stand the history narrations. We use WWE 3 and she is fine for those narrations but she can't stand doing them for MFW. We are on week 6 and I own the entire Explorers to 1850 package I really hate to jump ship now. We are going ahead and just doing the readings and skipping the narrations for now. I have liked MFW K alright but I wish they had varied the format of the worksheets from week to week a little bit. Neither of my kids could stand the math worksheets or the ones where they are supposed to draw pictures of things that start with the letter for the week. I do love the easy readers they include and the Bible and Science in it is really good but there are definitely things I don't like. I'd planned to go into MFW 1 next month but I think the phonics is going to go too fast for my twins so now I don't know. So much of MFW 1 is tied to the phonics if we have to slow down for phonics then we'll have to slow everything down.

Sonlight. I own both and much prefer the Sonlight package. My WP stuff is a few years old though and it looks like they changed it.

My original plan was to do MFW 1. I purchased it last summer at a convention. Now I'm rethinking that because it is so tied to the LA instruction and I'm not sure I want that. I love the Bible reader and a lot of stuff about the program though. I may just incorporate the Bible reader into another program. We'll definitely be doing ES Bio, FIAR, and continue with Rightstart math. We supplement RS with Singapore.

I haven't decided for sure yet. We put dd into the lottery for a charter school so she may go to school next year. Right now my tentative plans are TOG 1 UG level Saxon 7/6 Elemental Science- Biology (new Logic level) continue LFC A GWG 6 not sure on spelling continue with Mindbenders

I bought the DVDs but we've not yet used them. I think once we get more into 6/5 we'll use it more but the beginning is a lot of review. We just started in Nov.

Only 2 of mine are in school but I do miss having all of them home. I put my 3 yo in for special ed services and he's only gone a little over 3 hours a day but we can rarely go do anything during the day anymore because ds gets picked up at 12:45. I miss the freedom of getting to do what we want. My oldest might come home next year but my 10 yo is begging to go. I'm tempted to just say everyone will homeschool next year except possibly the 3 yo. I love his Pre-K teacher (he'd stay with her for the next 2.5 years) and while I thought he'd be getting more one on one services it's been a good transition for him.

I've got a 4 year old that loves doing schoolwork too. She isn't reading yet but we are doing some B4FIAR and FIAR along with letter of the week, Developing the Early Learner books, and HWT preschool book. We don't do work everyday only when she wants but I think she'll probably be reading earlier than some of my others just because she loves doing schoolwork. I may do K in the fall with her depending on her interest. She turns 5 in October so is still technically Pre-K for next year. I don't understand why you'd not include a 6 and 7 year old with FIAR unless they are not at all interested in the books. My 10 yo frequently listens in on the FIAR books we are doing. I only do a couple a month because of the other curriculum we are using but my kids generally are excited to read most of the books through the ages of 8 or so. Even after they have started reading chapter books.

We've looked at CC and they follow a 3 year cycle which would be difficult to match up exactly with a lot of the curriculum choices out there. Since you already have Core 1+2 I'd just go ahead with that. When CC gets to Ancients the next year you'll have already covered it. My twins are a similar age and we haven't gotten started a history cycle yet. They are technically K this year as well and we will do more history in the fall. This year we've been focusing on learning to read and we do occasional FIAR books. I would go lighter on the history until your dd is reading well. I'd probably do just SOTW1 or Core 1+2, not both. Core 1+2 uses CHOW so it already has a spine.

My mom is a first grade public school teacher. She's taught elementary school over 40 years, the last 26 years she's taught 1st grade. For the most part we don't discuss homeschooling because she is so opposed to it. I had noticed some readers in a recent Scholastic flyer that were leveled A, B, C, etc. that I'd not heard of before. Even the level A looked like it had a lot of sight words. I asked her if she knew what the levels meant. She says it is the new way to teach reading and I really need to teach it to the twins so they won't be behind when they go to school. (I have no intention of putting them in before high school if ever but in her mind they should be doing exactly what PS kids are doing) She was so concerned that she is mailing me a list of 125 sight words that the twins need to memorize immediately. :glare: She really thinks I should aim for them knowing all 220 dolche words as soon as possible. She says that the kids can read more fluently at a younger age if they have all these words memorized. She is totally convinced it is better. They have been using this method at her school for a few years and I know when they first introduced it she was so opposed to it because she said phonics was the best way. Apparently she now has bought into the whole Balanced Literacy approach now. :glare: This is someone that has probably taught thousands of kids to read. I know she has no say in the curriculum used in her class but I'm kind of surprised she has totally jumped on the sight word is better bandwagon. It sounds like the kids spend a lot of time using the pictures in a story to figure out the words when they read. This method seems like the polar opposite of PR which I just started with the twins. Her school uses Everyday Math and has for probably 8 years. When my oldest was in 1st grade she sent me the complete 1st grade EM because she wanted dd to learn math the new way. It was 2 books and we made it through half of the first one and I kept waiting for the real math to show up. She's totally bought into new math as well even though she taught the old way for many years. I have never had a child learn to read at school but we are considering PS for our youngest child. He is delayed and gets a lot of services through the PS. I have found out from other parents that they use Balance Literacy at the school ds goes to and the more I hear about it the more I don't like it. I think it makes the kids appear like they are reading great by the end of K but it seems like so much of it is due to sight words. I had no so much emphasis was on sight word methods. My 6 yo ds attends cub scouts with boys that are in 1st grade and I know my dh has been impressed by some of the words the boys knew. I'll be interested to see the list of sight words when it comes. Several of them ones she mentioned were totally phonetic and the twins already know but they do sound them out. They are getting more fluent in sounding out CVC words I can't see any advantage of them memorizing them. My dh and oldest dd have dyslexia so I've really tried to avoid sight words with the younger kids.

I'm in Frederick County which has never asked for anything like you've described. I was super nervous for our first one but it was so laid back I've relaxed a lot. I know a lot of people use umbrella's in MD but Fred Co is probably one of the easier counties to homeschool I can't see paying for an umbrella. We've had 2 different reviewers and both of them have just quickly looked through our stuff. I try to date stuff if I remember but a lot of stuff isn't dated and I've never been asked how many hours we do schoolwork or anything like that. I've never had much for younger kids (especially at the ages of 5 or 6) and I think reviewers expect that their will be less written work for younger kids. Last time I brought a lap book in my twins had made and that's all I had for History.

I'm looking at Latin Road and Bridge to the Latin Road for my 7th grade dd. She currently attends PS but they don't do any grammar in her LA class. Dd is interested in doing Latin at home and I thought LR would be a good way to combine the 2. If I do LR would I need to do the Bridge first or could I start with LR? Dd is not very strong in grammar even though she did Daily Grams for years when she was homeschooled. Is there much Latin at all in the Bridge? When I mentioned doing LR to dd she said it sounded good but if she has to do 36 weeks of just grammar first it might be a struggle to get her to do it.

If the baby is tiny a carseat that is rated for 5 lbs would be necessary. My youngest dd is a 29 weeker and discharged at 5 lbs. We wound up buying a new seat the day she came home because the carseat we had was rated for 6 lbs and up and the straps were too loose on her to be safe. Other than that there wasn't anything special we needed. It was very nice to have some preemie clothes that fit well but they were outgrew quickly so I wouldn't get many. My dd was fine with newborn pampers and we never bought preemie diapers. We just folded them down a bit. They are much cheaper than preemies plus they are more absorbant.

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