Jeannie Fulbright (of Apologia's Elementary Science) has a book called Speak Up! -- http://www.jeanniefulbright.com/products.html . A friend uses this for a co-op class and found additional resources in the back.

With FLL3, you would sit with your dc for almost the entire lesson. However, there are often some sentences to diagram or practice the new concept at the end of the lesson, so I'll leave him to finish. It's true that it's scripted, but I don't read most of it. It's been easy to tell the point of the lesson at the start and then take it from there.

Ds memorizes the poems as they come up in FLL3 -- I love that poem memorization is part of the program! Dd in 5th grade has memorized two poems this year and now we're using CW-Poetry to study/analyze one poem a week. (I'm not asking her to memorize them right now.) I'm reading lots of Mother Goose with my nearly 3 yo! We focus our memorization on scripture passages, but I still try to work in some poems too. We love Beautiful Soup by Lewis Carroll (from Alice's Adventures in Wonderland) -- the rhythm and humor! The kids memorized this together this year and made it into a production that included dh getting pelted with toy food (unexpectedly, as he watched the performance)! :D

I'd try going over the lessons with him before switching, just because you already have GWG. You could still assign the workbook to be done on his own. 2nd grade would have been too early to expect my ds to do his grammar completely independently. profmom (dd used FLL1-2, R & S 3, GWG4 with CW, GWG5 with CW ds used FLL1-2 and now FLL3 with WT1)

We are using both FLL3 (all year) & WT1 (added a bit later, currently on week 9). They are both fairly quick for us. I spend up to 30 minutes of teaching time a day (sometimes less), 4 days a week to teach the two of these (one right after the other). Then, ds may have a bit of independent work to do after that. We're finding this very doable and each program emphasizes different skills. HTH!

BJU sells Better Test Scores by the grade for language arts and math practice. I think these were beneficial for my 4th grader last year, especially since it was the first year we tested.

Thanks! I took your advice and opted for insurance.

I try to make extra money by spending less. :D You could see if your library has a book called Miserly Moms by Joni McCoy. I think the subtitle is "Living on one income in a two income world" or something along those lines. I've also found that by actively managing our money by budgeting, we have a lot more money than before (but you may already do this). HTH a little!

Jessica, we got the Where in the World Game at Christmas, and it's been a big hit! There are several levels to this game, and we are still on the first one and aren't using all the cards yet. This level is similar to Uno. The continents are like the colors (in Uno) and there are 6 wild cards to change continent being played. (The other play option is to match the number on the card, which corresponds to the size ranking of the country within the continent.) When you lay a card down, you say the country name and the continent/region. At the end, there is a "winner's round," where the winner has to name the continents for 3 of the next 5 country cards drawn from the stack (quizzed by another player). The next level incorporates another aspect of the country from those listed on the card -- capital, religion, language, literacy rate, etc. After a while at this level, you can work up to using the map game boards. It's definitely a game that grows with you. HTH!

Thanks, Chris. :)

I know this one! I received this emailed response from Memoria Press today: Thank you for your interest in Andrew's titles. We are hoping to have the updated LCC printed by this summer. The Memory book will be a few months behind the Latin Centered Curriculum. Sincerely, Bryanna Anderson Memoria Press http://www.MemoriaPress.com 502-966-9115

Chris in CA, can I ask why you are switching (or considering switching) from TOG to Omnibus? (I'm researching TOG and like to hear from those who decide not to continue, along with all the glowing reviews. :D )

At what $$ amount do you buy insurance for a used curriculum purchase?

I agree. There are also risk levels to consider, in addition to things you mentioned. This is why I like Dave Ramsey's "baby steps" -- he doesn't recommend paying extra on the mortgage until all other debts are paid, 3-6 months of expenses are set aside in savings, retirement savings is at 15% of income, and college funds are going. It's nice to have expert advice on the order of the financial goals that we know are so important.

Thanks Karen and Carolyn!

Liz, I would recommend Dave Ramsey books, such as Total Money Makeover, or his Financial Peace University, which may be held at a church near you -- http://www.daveramsey.com. He talks about how to budget together when one spouse is more of a spender than another, or when one is more "geeky" about budgeting than the other. :) Attending one of his classes or his live events could be very helpful for getting you guys on the same page. We use Mvelopes http://www.mvelopes.com for budgeting here, but there are lots of other effective ways to budget -- cash envelopes, Excel spreadsheets, paper spreadsheets, software, etc. As far as tax deductions go, you don't come out ahead by keeping debt just for the deduction. Say you pay $1000 in mortgage interest and use it as a deduction; your tax savings is only your tax rate times the deduction. (So, if your tax rate is 15%, you're paying $1000 in interest and only saving $150 in taxes.) I'm with you...pay it off as soon as possible, but I do like the order of Dave Ramsey's plan. (You wouldn't pay extra on the house until you had accomplished a few other financial steps first.) HTH!

Thanks, Karen. I think I have downloaded that font (or another one if not the same), but I haven't spent enough time with it to figure out how to do the accent and breathing marks correctly yet. Do you do some extra oral (or written) review with your students? P.S. I really like your signature quotation and have written it down and shared it with my dd. :)

Debra :) , I'm a CPA, not a professor. I use profmom as short for "professional mom" and partly as a reminder to myself to treat my new profession at least as seriously as I did my previous one (meaning these dc aren't just going to grow up at my house, but I will actively parent/mentor them, etc.) I also take "continuing professional education" (CPE) seriously for my new profession -- reading on parenting, teaching, homeschooling, etc. (As a CPA, I'm required to complete 40 hours of CPE on accounting-type topics each year to maintain my license, even though I'm home full time now.) Thanks for the compliment!

It looks like there are two ways to use the subscription feature. One is in the CP. The default is not to subscribe, but it appears that setting this to automatic subscription will subscribe you to every thread you start and every thread where you post. When you're subscribed, you'll receive email notices when someone posts to that thread. Another way is to selectively subscribe to threads. Just before submitting your post, scroll down to the "Additional Options" (which are listed below the submit button) and you'll see the notification options. From there you can subscribe to the individual thread. I'm not aware of an way to subscribe to a thread where you haven't posted. HTH!

If you "subscribe" then you will receive email notices when someone posts in that thread. You can also subscribe to just certain threads by scrolling down to the "Additional Options" at the bottom of the screen where you type before submitting your message. I'm trying to remember to subscribe to the threads that I start, but I'm thinking it would be too much to subscribe to every thread where I've posted (in the CP settings).

Thanks, Carolyn. What ages were learning at your house? I agree that EG has more built in review in the workbook that the Latin I'm familiar with, but we seem to need more repetition.

Here I let dd learn during the 2nd half of 1st grade because she was asking and because she had started joining her printed letters to make her own cursive. (I didn't want her to get into bad habits.) I used Abeka for this because many other programs are geared toward older dc (height of lines and amount of writing required). With ds, I meant to start the 2nd half of 2nd grade but life got in the way. So, he's learning this year in 3rd. With him, it was just because it seemed like the standard time that children are taught. (We're using Classically Cursive from Veritas Press this year for teaching, and I will either continue in this series or use A Reason for Handwriting next year. I like the daily assignments in ARfH.)

We are enjoying EG1 this year, but I find that we have take a break every so often to allow time for extra review. For example, we are breaking this week between lessons 17 & 18 to spend time cementing the declensions learned to date (esp. now that the 1st declension F has been added). Besides the daily work in the workbook (.1 on Monday, etc.), I try to go through all the memory verses to date on Mondays and all the vocabulary flashcards to date twice during the week. I need to have a concrete plan on reviewing declensions covered. Is chanting them enough? How often? It seems like they should be written, but when we're writing one other than the standard examples, I'm not confident about where to put the accents. One other thing, should our declension review go over the endings only, example words only (man, gift, truth), or should we be practicing declining other nouns? I would love for Open Texture to offer an extra practice workbook or loose pages (maybe with the permission to copy these within the family) for daily practice and review, in addition to the review lessons that are included every so often in the workbook. So, if you're using EG, what is your routine for reviewing vocabulary, declensions, verses, and conjugations? Is the review in the workbook enough for your family?

Yikes!! :eek: I just realized that, with the ages of my children, I'll be going through all of history 4 more times (including the cycle we started this school year with Ancients)!! When my oldest is in 9th, I'll also have 7th & 1st graders. (And when my oldest is in 12th, I'll have 10th & 4th graders!) This makes me think that I need to be thinking "reusable" and "easy-to-combine," along with "quality." I'm going to spend some time looking at the high school options with each of the curricula mentioned here. Fay & Rhonda M, will you be using TQ through high school? Amy, do you think you will be using Biblioplan with the high school supplement later on? If not, do you have something else in mind? Christy, Cynthia, & Rhonda (LW), do you know yet what you'll use after MOH? Regena, high school plans yet? Continue going on your own? Jessica, I'm definitely rethinking TOG with my big picture in mind! (4 more 4-year cycles!! I'm still surprised by this realization! :eek: :) ) It makes sense to take another long look at buying TOG once and using it 4 times. Melissa, I'm sold on chronological history, but have looked at SL many times. It sounds like TOG will be a good fit for you! Thanks again for your input! And, of course, anyone else is welcome to add theirs!

I wondered about the pictures too, but I don't have any other personal info here. What did they say could happen?