Beast Academy. It's an elementary math program put out by Art of Problem Solving - known for their challenging math texts.

HTH!

We have Rosetta Stone Homeschool Edition and really like it. My 8yo and 6yo are using it. I like that I don't have to actually teach anything (though I am trying to keep up with them in the program!). I like being able to just assign them to spend some time at the computer learning... without me having to prepare or teach. They both enjoy it, though they can't yet converse. I'm not sure how far into the program you have to get in order to actually have a conversation. They've learned a lot, though, just doing it 1-2 times per week. I'd say that 6-7yo is probably the youngest to use the FULL program. Younger than that, and they could just not do the reading, grammar, writing parts.

Copywork sentences using the correct terms? Or actually make something HAPPEN when she does it instead of just reminding her. It doesn't have to be a punishment. It could be something like she has to freeze for 10 seconds and then say it the correct way.... or something.

Singapore 1A (make sure to get the HIG!) Your kids will most likely get stuck somewhere near the end of 1A. Children have to reach a certain developmental maturity in order to mentally move numbers around the way Singapore expects them to. With yours being so young, you will almost surely run into a wall at that point. Don't give up on Singapore when that happens! Move to Miquon Orange and Red while periodically doing the mental math at the back of the HIG with your kids. (Do the mental math WITH manipulatives until they are ready to do it without.) Once they can consistently do it WITHOUT manipulatives, then you can move back to Singapore (and keep Miquon, too, if you like it as much as we do!) and they should be fine from there on out.

Sort buttons/beads/etc. Play-dough Play with toothpicks and marshmallows (or just toothpicks). "Read" books for 10 minutes. String beads. Lacing Cards Pattern Blocks Legos/Blocks Cuisenaire Rods Listen to an audio book. Read Aloud time with Mama/Daddy/older sibling Dot to Dot books Mazes "Water play" in tub or at sink Sidewalk chalk on driveway

We have just started Chapter 2 this week. I think the geometry chapter was sort of difficult for my 8yo because, with many of the problems, she was just supposed to TRY things and see if they worked or mentally rotate/move things in her mind - totally different from the number manipulation she's used to doing in Singapore math. My 6yo is actually much more visual/spatial than my 8yo so she had an easier time than her older sister - but she is done with BA now until she finishes more of Singapore and Miquon. My 8yo is much more comfortable with the skip counting chapter! I noticed, though, that she was COUNTING instead of adding when marking multiples on the hundred chart. Ugh! Or she'd look at the visual pattern and just continue that instead of thinking about the numbers - taking the easy way out. It did make me realize once again how glad I am that we homeschool because things like that would not be noticed (or even worried about) in a public school setting. She'd get by just fine, doing the least amount possible, getting straight A's, but not truly understanding the material. For now we are using BA exclusively. I think it will be approximately a full year's worth for us, but I have plenty to fill in if it's not. I'm very happy with it so far. The comic book is still adorable and the problems are still at just the right depth and difficulty for my dd (who is more language-y than mathy and doesn't like to think hard if she doesn't have to). I read the comic book out loud to her (and don't let her read ahead) and I use voices for each character to make it more interesting. Lizzie has a stutter, Professor Grok sounds like Einstein, I'm working on improving my pirate (Irish?) accent for Capt. Kraken, and Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are British. It makes it more fun! I don't think my dd is as excited about BA as many of your children, but she does seem to enjoy it a lot. I'm working through AoPS PreAlgebra right now and I can see how BA is preparing kids for that. I don't think the PraAlgebra will be too much of a leap at all once we get there....

Beast Academy is another math option. Killgallon Story Grammar - or Sentence Composing for Elementary School. Listen to recordings from Librivox.org and write narrations. Nature Walks and Nature Journaling

Miquon is one color per page - the ink on one page may be orange and the next page may be green, etc. It is very simplistic looking, no cartoons, has an almost hand-drawn look, no visual distractions. And, IMO, it is the absolute best elementary math curriculum for creating good number sense and making kids feel like they are "good at math." It is a discovery program strongly focused on conceptual learning, not rote memorization.

I see Khan Academy as a great supplement for 4th/5th grade and up. It does not teach the number sense or mental math strategies that Miquon and Singapore have taught my girls, and I think young kids need a real live teacher and manipulatives to learn math. Plus Khan's "style" is too dry for most young kids, I think. With that said, my 8yo does really enjoy playing around on it. She loves earning badges - for some reason that is really motivating for her. I would not rely on it at this stage for her only math teaching.

If she's been in PS, she most likely hasn't learned the mental math techniques taught in Singapore Math. I would strongly advise you to start at 1B with all the components and try not to worry about the number on the book. Most 1st grades around here stop at the level of Singapore 1A by the end of the year (minus the mental math) so 1B in 2nd grade is not "behind." There are very foundational concepts taught in SM 1A/B that are only briefly covered in level 2. I guess what I'm saying is that you wouldn't be buying the books for just one skill - the mental math in level 1 is foundational to the program IMO. If it were my child, I'd start her at 1B....

I read to them and they read to themselves. We do Sonlight, so I read Bible, History, Literature, Poetry, and some Science. But I also always get books out of the library about the history topics we are studying and they read those on their own, plus I assign time for them to read from our science books most days. And we have a library of over 1000 kids books so they read those whenever they want during the day and at night for an hour before bed. So, yeah, we do both. I do think it's important for us to read together and discuss vocabulary, character motivations and choices, etc. so I don't know if we'll ever fully give up reading together. I've also found the SOTW audio CDS very useful as well as http://www.librivox.org. For the past several days I've been putting books from librivox onto CDS so they can listen to them while they play.

Miquon (creates strong number sense, no one's afraid of math here!) Singapore 1A-2B (clear mental math teaching) Sonlight (Real books, a schedule, and no planning!) The Writer's Jungle (gave me a road map for where we heading and helped my relationship with my dd) SOTW Audio CDs (dds can listen to them over and over while playing - gets lots of history in that way!) http://www.librivox.org (dds can listen to classics while playing - saves my voice and time and gets them used to more difficult vocabulary. Plus it's free!) I'd like to add Beast Academy to the list, but since we've only finished the first section of the first book I don't think I'm qualified to add it yet. It sure seems like it's going to develop the thinking skills in my kids that are so important, IMO. I also really like MCT, but, since I don't think it's totally NECESSARY, I didn't add it to the list.

Possibly. I don't have personal experience with using it with a child that old, but it can't hurt to try. Get the Lab Sheet Annotations through PaperbackSwap or BookMooch (and maybe the actual workbooks, too) and buy a set of Cuisenaire rods. It's a very inexpensive program, even buying it all new. I do think the fraction work (even in the first and second books) would be good for your son, and it would probably help him understand some concepts in different ways, which can only help him in the long run. Feel free to skip things he already knows instantly (like adding/subtracting small numbers), though you should probably go over how to do those problems with the rods just so he knows.

Have you seen this? http://www.thinkingblocks.com/index.html It might be better than the app. Not sure....

http://librivox.org/ http://www.thinkingblocks.com/index.html http://www.spellingcity.com/ http://www.khanacademy.org/ http://www.coolmath-games.com/ Picture books on math, science and history topics - yes even for older kids! A seemingly infinite amount of iPod/iPad apps.

We've only gone through CWP 2 and are in BA 3A so take this for what it's worth.... CWP uses the bar diagram method exclusively for solving problems. It is kind of like "seeing" Algebra instead of using x or y. BA has much more variety in the TYPE of challenging problems. Different kinds of thinking are required. It's not just one method being used on harder and harder problems. So they seem to be two different things - both useful. If you're tight on money, you could have your kids do http://www.thinkingblocks.com/index.html in place of CWP, and then add BA in....

My kids sound like yours. Here's what we do.... At the beginning of each school year I test them using the evaluations in Spelling Power. If they test above "grade level" then we don't do spelling for the year. All I do is keep a look out for words they misspell in things they write and I input those into the Spelling City website. Once we have a list of about 10-15 I tell them to go play on Spelling City using that list. That's about all it takes. They know them after that. So far, I'd say I have made 3-4 lists for them, and most were words my 6yo misspelled, not my 8yo. If your dh ABSOLUTELY insists on a spelling program, then Spelling Power would be a good one to look into. Children only study words they don't know. They don't waste time going over words they already know like every other program out there. It seems like a good choice for good spellers (though we haven't actually had to use it yet so I have no personal experience here!).

I used Saxon in school (and taught it to 6th/7th graders when I worked in a school). I use Singapore with my kids. The reason I don't like Saxon is because it's focus is on learning procedures, not understanding concepts. I couldn't care less how my kids score on a standardized test. I want them to KNOW math, not just be able to spout out right answers without truly understanding. I did great with Saxon as a kid because I was good at memorizing, but I never understood what the heck I was doing and why I was doing it! I was just being a good little girl and doing what I was told to do to get a good grade. I am now learning along with my kids in Singapore all the conceptual things I missed in school. I like Singapore because of how it teaches conceptually. Since learning about number bonds and "making a ten," it was like a lightbulb went on for me. And my kids have no trouble moving to more difficult concepts because they build on what they already know. It's not just a bunch of random, disconnected things to be memorized (which is how I felt when I did math in school). It is one cohesive whole that actually MAKES SENSE. I also love the Singapore bar diagram method for solving word problems. I am a visual learner and those bars make all the difference in understanding what to do! We're not scared of word problems in this house! I personally like mastery better than spiral but that has nothing to do with why I choose Singapore. If mastery didn't work for my kids, I'd probably find a conceptual program like Singapore that was spiral, or I'd use the Extra Practice book or some other resource to add in to create my own "spiral."

Thank you. I understand now. Still not sure which one I want to get, though....

So, you do have to flip back and forth? The excerpts are not in the parent pages, too?

http://www.thinkingblocks.com/index.html

Thank you!!!

In WWE 3 are the student pages necessary or could a child just write on notebook paper? I'm asking because I'm trying to decide whether I want to buy the Workbook or the PDF version and put it on our iPad. Using it on the iPad would be inconvenient if you are supposed to flip back and forth from the teacher pages to the student pages, but it would be fine if we could just look at the iPad and have her write in a notebook. (Do I even have that right that the parent pages are in the front and the student pages are in the back?)

Yes, Sonlight's LA can be tricky with kids who are advanced readers. My oldest was reading chapter books at 5 but could hardly write her ABCs so we didn't do the Sonlight LA in the younger years. We are just now incorporating some of LA 3 for her (She's now 8) and her 6yo sister. Unfortunately, Sonlight has included their LA in with the Core package this year so if you buy a full Core, you have to also choose a LA level as well. That may cause issues for people like you who have advanced readers and may need another option for LA at some point. One way you could get around it would be to not buy a full core package and just piece together what you do want. You might want to look for the books used or on Amazon so you can get a better deal. It would be more work but you wouldn't HAVE to use their LA. That's not to say their LA is bad - it is just heavy on the writing compared to the reading level in the lower Cores. If you go with SL LA, people usually recommend to choose a LA level based on your child's writing level, not reading level. Then just get extra books for him to read from the library throughout the year. So, yes, LA 2 would probably be a good choice. From Cores D on up, the LA is integrated with the History and really should be used along with it. No, it would not be crazy to do some substituting, though some things would be easier to sub than others. Sonlight's strongest points are their History and Literature. I don't see how you could substitute these things at all and still do Sonlight. But you could substitute almost any other area. My girls and I did not particularly like the Bible/Devotional book from this year's Core so I've decided to skip a bunch of it and we do a different book instead. We also do Poetry once per week with whatever poetry books we have and want to use that day instead of doing the specific poems from the specific books that the Core schedules. Yes, you can absolutely substitute Science with something else, and, until this year, you could substitute LA if you wanted to. That's the only tricky thing and I hope they change that back next year to how it was before - where you don't HAVE to buy LA along with the full Core. Hope that answered your questions well enough!