Its been a question I have been asking myself a lot lately, too! We did LLfLOTR over a year and really loved it. Lots of parts we skipped. I dont like comprehension questions that ask for recall- I prefer narration for that. I don't mind questions that ask for deeper thinking. I used online resources to help us spend 6 months on the Iliad. At the moment...no resources, although I have some up my sleeve. I like the look of the Glencoe online ones http://www.glencoe.com/sec/literature/litlibrary/ and think I will use the Canterbury Tales one next term when we study that. A shame they dont have more. I really like SWB's comments around not spoiling a good book with too much analysis. I have taken that to heart, and i think it has been good for us. However every now and then I get drawn to picking one book to analyse and I do need help. Its not that SWB doesnt recommend getting help- she says there's nothing wrong with using Sparks notes etc. Lightning Literature and Composition 7 and 8 unfortunately for us uses books we have already read, otherwise I might have bought it. But I am kind of glad, because it would have pushed something else off the schedule. I may use one of their guides for Shakespeare next year though. Literature for us still tends to be a family thing, with discussions and telling each other our favourite bits and read alouds. I am careful not to spoil that.

Yeah, this one is coming up for dh and I. He hasnt enjoyed holidays and for a large part of the kids' childhood he woulndt do them. I have taken them places but we haven't gone as a family. Then last year he realised they wouldnt want to have holidays with him soon....and he took us all to Bali. This year, we are going to go Snorkelling at Ningaloo Reef soon (it's a world class coral reef about 12 hours drive up the cloast from Perth). We have also all got involved in the SCA abd started camping together. I am so glad we are doing these things together now.

Ill back Winston Grammar as well, although we dont tend to use the cards much anymore. My son has never been bad at grammar but he has LDs and with Winston he just does really well.

I like to pull together my own stuff and make it fit us as closely as possible. This year I am using Ambleside HEO7 (medieval year) as a kind of foundation, but it doesnt look much like Ambleside any more. I just like to pull together books for history and literature that I feel will suit us. Ambleside is free. Lately I have been re-reading TWTM and getting more ideas from that. I am using IEW's medieval writing lessons as a foundation for writing. For science, my kids do a class, and at home they are reading Tiner books. I prefer to do my own thing.

I wouldn't be surprised if neither of mine go to university, but they both actually think they are because their friends all plan to, and so they think that's what you do. :) . I think they had better know what they want to do and be clear about it though...its too expensive to go just because your friends are doing it. They will both be entrepreneurial though so I am not too worried. I suspect both will go to TAFE- I am not sure what the U.S. equivalent is, but its for more practical skills- apprenticeships, business studies, vet nurse, furniture maker, art....thats where i intend to send them even if they dont know what they want to do...and they can go from there.

Oh, thankyou so much everyone for sharing these ideas. I feel like taking the day off and exploring some of them! I want to do more cooking with both my kids. I want to take more days off and go places with them because I have been too busy focusing on academics, even though we don't do heavy academics. I feel I am lacking in direction with them. We probably just need to have some more fun and do more extra curricula stuff. Kate, Toastmasters is a great idea- I have dd in a debating class for the same reason. She is a natural at public speaking although she is still nervous. Any one else got ideas to share?

I am looking for some out-of-the-box ideas and inspiration about what to do with my dd15 over the next couple of years. It is not certain she is university bound, but she is capable and may well. She is artistic, creative, intelligent- at this point she woudl like to be an artist. But more than academics or preparation for a career, I am wondering what else we can do in these next couple of years as she grows up....so that I don't look back with any regrets. She is a bit wild, still sweet, may well leave home to live with friends early rather than later (loves her freedom)...I want to teach her more cooking. She is terribly messy and we are workng on that. She doesnt get enough exercise and the chiropractor just told her today, she needs to walk every day before her body stops growing because her spine is not in such good condition from sitting too much- so focus is on daily exercise right now. I am feeling the years are slipping past and dont want to forget anything.....what non academic things have you covered with your kids that you are glad you did?

I like our Australian system. We have 4 ten week terms (sometimes I little shorter), with 2 week breaks between them (Autumn, Winter and Spring breaks) except for about a 7 week break in the summer (which we call Christmas holidays because that's when they start). Our summer holiday is therefore naturally a little shorter than the U.S. one and I think it is perfect except I think 6 weeks would be better. I am usually champing at the bit that last week, to get back into school. Forget the kids. *I* need a long break. We do no school in holidays. I do my planning then, though. We have a pool and airconditioning, beautiful beaches and a river, walks, movies and just hanging out. I think its important for kids- and adults- to learn how to relax and just "be" rather than being productive all the time.

I like our Australian system. We have 4 ten week terms (sometimes I little shorter), with 2 week breaks between them (Autumn, Winter and Spring breaks) except for about a 7 week break in the summer (which we call Christmas holidays because that's when they start). Our summer holiday is therefore naturally a little shorter than the U.S. one and I think it is perfect except I think 6 weeks would be better. I am usually champing at the bit that last week, to get back into school. Forget the kids. *I* need a long break. We do no school in holidays. I do my planning then, though. We have a pool and airconditioning, beautiful beaches and a river, walks, movies and just hanging out. I think its important for kids- and adults- to learn how to relax and just "be" rather than being productive all the time.

Your kids sound just adorable. Sure, my 15yo bosses around her (slightly) younger brother, tells him what to do all the time, and how and when to do it, and he returns the favour with a good wrestle on the floor to teach her a lesson. :001_smile::glare: Gosh, I miss those cute, younger days. :001_smile: Mmm, maybe they weren't much different, I can't remember.

My kids are not adopted but now my youngest, the baby is 13, he needs far more discipline than ever, and he still cant stand me to be upset with him. Last night he kept following me around instead of going to bed. It was late, he needs sleep, and I was getting annoyed. But then he wasn't sure if I was really annoyed or just pretending to be annoyed and he had to wait till I told him I loved him before he would go to bed! This kid still sits on my lap and holds my hand in public, but wants equal adult rights in the house and as little responsibility as possible, thankyou very much, because after all, hes still a kid, and the youngest at that! At the chiro yesterday he wrote on the form in the section "past traumas" yes, I am unloved. He cracks me up all the time, yet he is soooooo annoying several times a day!

The Questing Knights of the Faerie Queen, Geraldine McCaughrean ISBN 0340 86621 7 (HB)

Materials make all the difference. Some years I have barely done any preparation time. Sometimes I do plenty. This year, I spend about an hour on Fridays making up their schedules for the following week- but I have teenagers! During school holidays I do the bulk of the planning. You can do it. My dh doesn't help at all, never has. You can leave the kids with him some time and go to a coffee shop to do some planning. Does he work from home? Then you will need to set some boundaries around school time so he- and you- can learn to treat it as seriously as his job. My dh works form home and it took a long time to train him I wasnt available at his whim for a cuppa.

On materials- far less this year than previous years. I am good with 2nd hand stuff. And I just didn't need much for some reason. (nothing to do with the fact my shelves are stacked with resources I bought over the last 6 years, of course :) ) Classes- thats another matter. Costs me a heap each year.

Depends on your kid. Mine is extremely artistic and doesn't want to be told what to do. She goes to watercolour classes but other than that, is self taught. I tried AP twice- including the Junior High- and she just rebelled. I do think its a good program, and I wanted it to work for us, but after trying twice, don't think I will try again.

Actually, your post just didn't make sense to me and I was asking for clarification. I didn't get that she was even reluctant- or even your daughter. The books at Amazon said they were appropriate for 6 year olds and along the lines of Captain Underpants,so I wondered what you were asking. But maybe I am just having a stupid and snippy day, so just ignore me. My daughter has loved Tamora Pierce books, and my son has loved the Ranger's Apprentice series.

We are only halfway through our Medieval year- well, not even that. Ivanhoe is turning out to be a great hit. I read it aloud. Its our favourite book of the week. The Brendan Voyage is also turning out to be a surprising hit. Its from the HEO7 booklist. Both my kids are sailors so that helps. Watership Down- they are doing ok with it. The Once and Future King. Ds13 has loved all the books and finished. Dd15 is doing ok with them, still plodding through, but she has already read The Crystal Cave and The Mists of Avalon- she might be a bit Arthured out. The Faerie Queen - but a retelling by Geraldine McGeoghran- has been a hit. I intend to read some of the original once they both finish it. Shakespeare's The Taming of the Shrew- very surprising to me, even though it was only the movie, they both absolutely loved it! It has Elizabeth Taylor and Richard Burton. They even watched it in their free time, they enjoyed it so much. Henry V was a big miss. We just could not get into the movie at all and stopped it. I might try it again though. Sophie's World is proving a hit. I think some of the philosophy is going over their head, but we do it together as a read aloud and discussion, and I feel we are all- especially me :)- getting a lot out of it. It puts a lot of things in context that I hadnt understood before.

Woohoo Lucy...I had a feeling, ya know! Congratulations!

I don't quite understand your subject line....do you want them to just read, or do you want to stretch them a little to read good books that will actually not turn their brains to mush :) Are you going to assign books or leave them strewed around and hope for the best? Are you a teacher? A homeschooler? Did you mean 8th grade, or 8 year old? I do understand that sometimes, any book will do to get a child reading, but I don't quite understand the context of your statement/question and why you would ask here? My kids have just read and loved The Once and Future King. They have read Mary Stewart's Crystal Cave. We love all things Arthurian here :) The Eragon books are good. The Hobbit is great. I guess what it "fun" to one person is not so interesting to another.

Its an issue I think about a lot too. I think we are such a strongly "career identity" oriented society that its hard not to think of our kids in terms of their future careers and how they will make money etc. But really, that's not the centre of everybody's life- their career. For many people where and how they live is more important that the job they have. In other words, the job supports the lifestlyle. My dd15 is an artist. She already is very creative and excellent at realistic nature watercolours. She paints and draws for hours a day. She is also a social butterfly, loves the computer and photography....hasnt got a clue what she wants to do for a "real job", you know, the type that makes money :) So I just have to keep letting go of hoping she will fit into a nice box that would make my job as a homeschooling parent easier...and encourage her to follow her passion. Which I do- and I am not negative about her being an artist. She has a part time job as a book-keeper for a friend's business. She is learning the software that goes with that. She is paid an adult wage for it too since she does the job well. So, I just have to trust that life is unfolding for her as it should and not how I think it should. I am open to suggestions she has. I took her to a career information day recently but the only job she was interested in was in computer animations. I think you can talk about different possible careers and lifestyles, you can expose them to things through television, the internet, career days, but in the end, you can't have them take every extra curricula class to see if they will like it...you just have to trust that the life you are living is "enough" to provide a good foundation.

I still make my kids read books I want them to read but they don't mind much anymore, and usually enjoy it. But when my son was that age, he resisted reading and I made him read every day- and I kept reading to him a lot. At that age, he couldn't read well and it was maybe 15 painful minutes a day. I crept it up from 10 minutes, to 15, to 20, until suddenly at age 9 he grabbed Sea of Trolls, a huge book, out of my hands as I was just finishing reading the first chapters to him, and asked me if he could read it himself now. He has never looked back from that moment and for a long while the book HAD to be thick before he would read it!

I seem to be slowly handing over more and more to the kids, but we still do some things together. This is the first year my ds13, who has LDs, has really been able to sit down and do workbooks with any success (and without me sitting next to him) so I am taking advantage of that. I like to do literature together, and link that to history. I still read aloud two or three books on an ongoing basis. We do Shakespeare, memory work, and Logic together too, as well as reading Sophie's World for Philosophy. I also explain their writing assignments to them and usually need to supervise that a fair bit too. They are doing outlining for history, all of their maths and science, Latin and some English workbooks independently. I was doing an hour of read alouds a day until recently. I just burned out on it, so I have cut back to half an hour except on one day when its still an hour (Sophies World chapters generally take that long). We all love our "together time"

I rarely read a book more than once, although I will be re-reading some classics as my children go through their teens. I have recently got rid of a whole heap of children's classics that we are finished with. I have only kept a few of the more beautifully presented and "classic" of them. I know I can find the rest 2nd hand or in the library, if I want to read them to my grandchildren. I am not really a book hoarder though. I buy books regularly but I also cull regularly. It may help if you think of it as blessing some else with the books. I have friends with younger children than mine, and some are single mothers, so I box them up and let them take whatever they want. I tried selling them online and its not worth the hassle.

Basically the same style. My ds13 is enjoying it. Both my kids go to a Science class, but I felt to do something else at home, without tackling a whole science program, and Tiner books are good for that.

I love to get rid of things, and I do, regularly. However, now that we are involved in Medieval Re-enacting, suddenly all my friends that are also involved are wearing things I threw away a few months ago, as medieval clothing- like a white skirt I gave away, as a petticoat. Grrr. Although I like to get rid of stuff, I am collecting material for making costumes, and I still cant find where to keep it all.