I think it depends on the child. Neither of mine would enjoy it quite yet (they are ages 13 and 14). I seriously considered using it last year when my oldest was 13/14 and I felt, even though she is a god reader, it would be too heavy going for her.Since history is our favourite subject I didn't want to spoil it. I am sure there are some 13yos out there who might lap it up, but I suspect the average one would be a bit overwhelmed by it. Perhaps it could be done as a read aloud though. I don't know quite what age grade 9 is in the U.S. but SWB does recommend it for then. I think it might be just a little older? We did Guerber instead with lots of supplements, using parts of AO year 6. Guerber is a bit light for the age, but was the best option I coudl find and we did enjoy (them- we did Story of the Greeks and Story of the Romans). We supplemented with K12 History Odyssey as well.

I am trained as a naturopath and I tell you I have tried many things and nothing has worked remotely as well as progesterone cream. I don't know how old you are though- I think you really should be over 35, preferably 38, before you use it. The herb that has a similar progesterone enhancement is chaste tree, and thats the next best treatment for me. Other than that, I think PMS shows up where we are out of balance, but most of the month we can override and manage ourselves. During PMS, we kind of lose that ability to override and manage things, and anything that's under the surface that's not quite right, quite emotionally healthy, suddenly are in our face and we cant escape it. Relationship issues, anger issues, resentment than we normally swallow suddenly looms large. Minor anxieties seem suddenly very important to express and get weepy over. All those things. I don't think they suddenly come from nowhere during PMS time. I think they were already there but we could push them aside. So I think it is a good time to actually take note of what comes up and see if you/we can deal with it the rest of the month when it's not so intense. I know for me, for years, intense relationship issues would come up during PMS time. I have learned to deal with them and they don't come up as much- although if there is something there, thats when it will show, thats for sure. Exercise helps release those positive hormones to help balance the negative feelings. I find it really helps although I really have to force myself sometimes just to walk around the block. Healthy fats, good diet- all these things are important for reproductive health as we get older. I think it is important to actually take that time for extra sleep (go to bed earlier!), cancel less important things off teh schedule, and really take care, during that time. I have learned its not a good time to plan to be really busy, although gentle routine can help keep me grounded and less emotional, less self-focused.

:iagree: This is also how I feel about the term.

I honestly haven't found that any vocabulary workbook type thing has had much effect- yet both have good vocabularies just from reading. It feels like they do the workbooks as busywork and promptly forget the words. My ds13 is doing a vocab workbook at the moment (with Greek and Latin roots) and it feels more like an exercise in learning how to do workbooks (he has never been good with them before), than that he is actually learning the vocabulary. However, we are doing IEW's Medieval Writing lessons, and there is a vocab component where you learn 4 new words a week, and then you have to use them in your writing assignment. That actually seems to have some effect for them- they are remembering the words because they are "owning" them by using them in their own writing assignments. I have found both my kids, even though they are very different, are like this.

Australia. I leave the shower water running, but I don't use soap on my body, either. When visiting India, I enjoy bucket baths. One nappy size bucket and a jug. Amazing how little water can actually get you clean.

Your son sounds completely normal. Apart from the bathroom thing, my son is the same and he is 13 now. Yes, it's hard not to compare, but I think its good to remind yourself to accept him as he is. Boys have their own beauty, for all their later maturing :) My son does Scouts and has done overnight camps for years now (and now much longer ones). I find camps and such actually help him to learn socially acceptable behaviour. You don't leave the toilet door open once other kids tease you for it, or a leader tells you to close it.

I think you and your kids are normal- so don't feel you are not- but it sounds like you would like to get a better handle on things. May I suggest flylady.net? If it weren't for flylady, I wouldn't now be homeschooling ( or married, for that matter, but that's another story). I found flylady, got my act together considerably, learned to love and take care of myself, and then I felt fit to homeschool. Flylady is not just for cleaning house, it's an attitudinal thing for life, and it is wonderful for mothers who feel not in control, chaotic, and who would rather be more organised and on top of things but just dont know how to get there. It helped me find reasonable expectations for both myself AND my kids. I could say, it helped me to grow up so that I could help my kids grow up. We are not perfect. I still yell sometimes. But a basically healthy household can handle a bit of yelling here and there. And, I dont actually use the system any more, or rather, I use it very loosely, but it has done its healing work on me and I can manage without it. I declutter regularly, I deep clean a spot at a time regularly, and I get the kids to do the same, and clean and do their chores. Do they try and get out of them? Sure. Do I nag sometimes? Sure. But overall, there is no longer the feeling of life being out of control.

Dh works so called full time, but its really not full time - he runs his own business and probably works 25-30 hours a week, but earns a good enough income from that to basically support us. I work part time connected to his business- I cook two meals a week for between 12 and 18 people.

I didnt, but two friends have each had their two dds do Science as in TWTM. Seems to work well for them, but the parents do a lot of running around for all the material for making those experiments. Their dd's were all good at sitting down and taking notes and doing experiments on their own etc. All very good students. I tried, but it just didnt resonate here.

When I first started homeschooling, nearly 6 years ago, I bought the Environmental Science- online- for my then dd10. It was 5th grade. It was too much for her and she didnt enjoy it at all. 5th grade in the states is a good 6 month to a year ahead of here, and I think she was just too young. I think as with many of these things, it depends. There were hands on aspects, like experiments out in the field (literally) that I found exhausting (I have never been good at hands on stuff), but they did look like a good idea on paper! After several years of homeschooling I would probably now know how to tweak the program for myself but at the time it was all so new and overwhelming. It involved a lot of reading, and unless I printed out reams of colour pages, it was reading off the computer screen which she has never liked. I felt, for that age, it was too much. If my dd had actually been interested in the subject, it might have worked better for her, but she had been used to being spoon fed pretty basic stuff at school and it was a big leap in expectation for her. So I dont think my experience is very reflective of Oakmeadow in general. I think the Environmental Science program i itself was good. Lots of info, lots of hands on. It just didnt click with us at the time.

Wonderful, thankyou, that's it.

I have used Grammar of Poetry and Imitations in Writing Medieval. Both were good at the time- Grammar of Poetry is excellent actually. There are downloadable samples on the website- what you see is what you get, basically.

I used to have a bookmark (before my computer crashed) to a site that had blank maps that you could make extra large, such as over 4 or 6 sheets of paper when you print them out. You then stick them together. I am looking for a large blank map of Europe in particular. I remember the website had an owl on it? It was an educational site. thanks

I just pulled out my square foot gardening book a few days ago and decided to use that method for my rather small patch. I have some bamboo stakes, so I am using them for now. I might evolve to 1 inch square tomato stakes if I find some cheap because the bamboo stakes are not quite straight-but they will do for now. I saw in the book someone had used tomato stakes. I feel better if my squares are clearly delineated. If I were to just used string, I would end up not using the method at all- it needs to be very visual for me.

Well, neither of those are what we call chip board here in Australia, lol. here chipboard refers to fairly thick wooden board (half an inch or so) that is made from chips of wood somehow stuck together. Its often used for furniture. It tends to disintegrate when it gets wet. It is used the same way a slab of wood would be, but is a cheaper quality.

Yes, my 13yo son babysits regularly. It is at home. He babysits younger boys. I would not like to be prejudiced against all boys just because the few bad cases out there are usually male. However, I would always just trust my gut feeling about any particular person, male or female.

Well, I bought it and got halfway through the first DVD and haven't got any further. I am terrible at watching DVDs. I would much rather read something. Amazing how expensive a lesson that can be. It also seems too teacher directed to me- although I like that ideally, it just isn't happening. It is sitting on my desk right now, hoping I will pick it up again. But, sadly, I don't think so.

I am amazed how much classical literature and poetry, including good modern day stuff, makes so much more sense to me now that I have a decent grounding in Ancient History. It realy is foundational, and you dont realise it until you learn it. You cant know what you don't know.

There is a huge range of possibilities and you wouldnt be wrong to try any of them. I would read Dr Lee's book though to inform yourself as well as you can. My doctor prescribed me a 5% cream and told me to use it all the time, but to adjust as I felt to. The label said to use a spatula full of cream twice a day. (comes with a tiny spatula). I quickly learned that did NOT work for me. If I use any amount in the morning, I just get tired and want to go to bed- virtually unfunctional. If i use a spatula full of the 5% cream, even in the evening, I feel yucky the next day. If I use one dab of cream in the evening, it helps me sleep, evens out my moods and has no other side effects. Sometimes I use it all month. Sometimes I use it from day 15 or so until my period. I experiment. I think its ok to do that with progesterone cream. However, if you are feeling much better using it from day 15, what advantage do you see in using it all month?

There is a book I have read quotes from (that I cant remember the title of) that reckons that 10% of people around the world- a full 10%- do not have the father they think they have. I would want to know, myself. Whether or not its true, whether or not you would want to tell your parents that you know if its true- I would deal with those steps one at a time as they come up. In my dh's family, the youngest child of 5, looks nothing like the rest, and we are all suspicious, but its not our business to make a deal out of it.

Why stop at 6th grade? I would use any program that is not demeaning to him- Spelling Power is good- and just plod away at it as a subject for as long as it takes. There is no magic age at which one is forever a failure at spelling and 6th grade is not that old. Also, have him checked for dyslexia. And, do dictation with him. I did repeat dictation with my son for years, and still do dictation with him although he is 13. He is dyslexic and we just did the same dictation over daily until he got 100% correct. It gives a motivation for noticing spelling. Nowadays he rarely makes mistakes. Is your son lazy about spelling? Then he may need a motivation. Having to rewrite stuff that is spelled incorrectly was motivation for my son. Even though dyslexic, he now spells well. However some kids, including dyslexics, have difficulty forming an inner picture of the word- they cannot see it in their mind's eye, let alone hold it there long enough to write it down. Dictation is great for helping with that as it trains the child to hold the words visually in the mind long enough to write it down. There is a good dictation program that specifically teaches spelling, called Spelling Wisdom. Its downloadable.

Same here in Australia. I checked with an English teacher because I wondered after reading about it here so much...but he said, no, its just not taught that way.

flylady.net

Wonderful response, Aubrey. I agree, I don't think kids necessarily understand the way it works for adults. It's not intuitive for many kids. And the future doesn't exist for them the way we have learned to make it exist for us. I remember my mother, who ran a home business, wanting my brother and I to work for her sometimes- the money was excellent and often we wanted to do the work, but we were kids, and sometimes, we just didn't want to do the work. I remember she would get resentful- but we were kids and we were asked. I think she should have told us we had to do the work, and then rewarded us somehow- probably money. But if you give a kid a choice, and then tell him he is bad (or guilt trip him) for making the wrong one...you never really gave him a valid choice in the first place! I have this giving issue a lot with my son, and dh and I work on it a lot, and still it is an issue. For all of us, because it impacts on the family. Usually when he gives, there is a rather obvious ulterior motive- with his friends, it's just to be liked. Dh and I have been talking lately- we both absolutely love to give to our kids. I give them heaps of my time. Dh loves to buy us all presents and do things for us. But we notice that ds just takes it for granted and maybe its not so healthy to keep being so generous with him when he doesnt pass it on to anyone- he just looks out for himself, even though he lives in abundance. He is much older than your son (13). We havent yet hit upon the answer except we do try different things and who knows what goes in, and will come back to him later in life. One thing he does on and off for months at a time is write a gratitude diary. He has to write 5 things every day he is grateful for. That book is so precious- the things he comes up with are often so insightful and beautiful. And another is just that we talk to him directly about it. About being generous, about how we love to give to him but he doesn't seem to care about anyone else. About how giving makes you happy. Recently I started "service" as a school subject. The kids have to find something each day to do for someone else, that is not already one of their chores. I was surprised how much they liked the idea, even though when I got sick recently I stopped enforcing it and they did stop doing it after a while. I am not sure someone should be guilt tripped into giving. Doesn't seem right to me- and yet having their attention brought to the issue doesnt seem unreasonable. I dont know..I dont know the answers, really, just fumbling along myself with it all.

I like the idea too, being in Australia and all, however I understand that Susan has to stop somewhere; there have to be limits and some guidelines for herself as to what to put in the book. It is already a huge book. These boards are where we can talk about such things- after all, she has a curriculum board for discussion of curriculum.