Why do you think poetry is important to incorporate into your homeschool day? Why do you think it is important to read, discuss, study, memorize? (I have some ideas of what I think the benefits of poetry are, but I would love to hear others thoughts on this) How do you do poetry in your house? Do you read one poem a day, spend a whole week or month on one poem or poet, etc. Do you just read the poem, or do you study and discuss it. I would love to know the details of how and when you incorporate poetry into your day. If you have your kids memorize poems do you have any certain order to it (i.e. by poet, season, etc.) or do you let them pick a poem. Do you memorize poetry as a family or let each student pick their own poem to memorize. Any details of what you do would be very much appreciated. Right now I read one poem a day to my kids during circle time. We have no specific order to it, I just open the book and pick one poem to read. We also do some memorizing through FLL (I haven't been very good at either lately). But I am wondering if there is a way that would make poetry more meaningful to my kids. Growing up I was never a big fan of poetry, but now that I am an adult I can see that there is great value in it and would love to instill a love of poetry in my kids. I would love any ideas and thoughts anyone has on this topic.

Wow their website is really confusing now. I was seriously thinking about using sonlight for next year. I think all these changes made my decision for me. Oh well. Back to researching.

:lurk5: listening in!

As some others have mentioned. I would love a device that would freeze time, just the world around me and leave me with the ability to do whatever I want, and when I was ready I could resume time. That way I could catch up on sleep, housework, planning, reading, drawing, etc. I would be the most relaxed happy person if I had all the time in the world ;). I actually came up with that far fetched dream in highschool while hitting my alarm clock and wishing I could sleep as long as I like and still get to school on time. I would love it even more now that I have kids, and especially now that I am homeschooling. :)

What a great idea to read books to go along with the movie. We might just do that for fun! Thanks for sharing. :lol: :lol: :lol: This sounds just like my house! My kids are constantly singing Let it go. I now find myself singing it throughout the day as well. The funny thing is, is that my kids have not even seen the movie yet. But they have watched every single music video they can find on youtube. We are super excited for it to come out on DVD.

Wow, I can't believe that my Dd is going to be in 3rd, where has the time gone. My very rough plans for next year are... Math: Singapore 3 and possibly try Beast Academy Spelling: AAS 4/5 Grammar: FLL Level 3, GWG 3, and MCT Island Writing: This is my biggest question mark (currently in the stage of researching it to death) . My Dd is getting frustrated with some aspects of WWE. I think we may continue with it, possibly using the guide rather than the workbook but we will see. I also want to add some other type of writing program as this is one of my Dd's strong subjects and I think she is ready for more than just WWE. I have looked in to possibly using CW or CC. Or maybe doing our own thing. Maybe MCT Island will be enough of an addition. I think we may continue WWW as well (I will see if my Dd will let me drop it, but I think she will be sad if I do). Reading: Possibly Sonlight Core D readers, still thinking on this as well Science: Finish up RSO Earth and Space and Start RSO Chemistry (we are a bit behind) History: Finish up Middle Ages and Renaissance with SOTW and continue to SOTW 3 ( we are a bit behind here to) Latin: I plan to start Lively Latin, but we will see how it goes Art: Keep using HAS as well as our own projects P.E.: Continue with Iceskating and start FTF Music: Continue our study of composers as well as piano That's the tentative plan for now. I am sure a lot will change. I feel like I can't think much about it until we are moved and settled into our new house.

I don't know if anyone else mentioned this as I have not read through all the posts. If you haven't already, I would highly recommend reading The Well Trained Mind. It immensly helped me figure out the direction for our homeschool. It helped me know where to start teaching my kids and helped me discover my immediate and long term educational goals for them.

When I ordered FTF from HSBC it seemed to take a while before they emailed me the PDF. Maybe even a week or two if I remember correctly. I was getting frustrated as well. But I did eventually get it. The only advice I have is to keep watching your email. And maybe keep trying to contact them. Best of Luck! ETA: I ordered it at the beginning of this year. Because I know how frustrated I was with how long it took I just decided to look up the timeline for you of when I orderd and then recieved it. The HSBC group ended on Jan. 31 and I got recieved the email with the PDF links on Feb. 12. HTH!

I bought it about a year back and we have not used it yet . We live in an extremely tight space at the moment so doing it indoors right now would be difficult. It would be possible, it would just require some clean floor space which despite my best effort is hard to come by in our house (more often then not it is covered in pillows, blankets, toys, and books :blushing: ). We are moving soon, and I plan to begin using it then. Each lesson is broken up into 4 sections: Warm Up, Activity/Game Play, Cool Down, and Outdoor Activity. The first three seem like they are pretty easy to do inside. The last one, which I believe is optional, depending on the game could probably be adapted to be an indoor game if you have sufficient space. For example one of the day's outdoor activities is jumping rope. This activity may be possible for some to do inside, for us at the moment it is not but will be when we move. I am excited to start using the program. I know my kids would really benefit from the activities in the book. The best part for me is that it is all ready planned for me. So it will literally be open and go for us, which for my personality makes it more likely to happen.

Thank you for all of your responses. They are all very helpful. I think I will do what all of you suggested and just do narration on that day and drop the dictation. This will alleviate the frustration for my Dd and allow her to focus on just getting down the summarizing skills. If I do this, does anyone forsee any issues this will create when we get to WWE Level 3?

So far we love AAR! My Dd5 is a very hands on learner so the multisensory approach works really well for her. I also love the readers. They are just the right length with the right amount of words on a page. She is doing very well with AAR, it is a lot less frustrating to her than OPGTR and HOP (which i used for my older daughter). I agree that if your child is a natural reader, or doesn't need a multisensory approach than there are other great options that would be less expensive. But this was a blessing for us. We will continue to use this with teaching the rest of our kids how to read.

My 2nd grade Dd is getting very frustrated with the day 4 (narration and dictation) exercises in WWE level 2. I am not sure how to proceed. She is able to do narration pretty easily (she is still getting used to the idea of summarizing) as well as dictation (which we do every day in spelling as well as in WWE). She is a pretty strong writer. She doesn't have a difficult time getting thoughts down on paper. During her free time, when she could be playing, she enjoys writing chapter books and writing in her journal. But when it comes to this one exercise in WWE she takes f.o.r.e.v.e.r. to do it. I think she is worried about writing whatever she narrates to me. I have explained to her that I will only have her write one of the sentences (out of the 2 or 3 ) and she still gets frustrated. Has anyone else had a child struggle with this. What did you do? I am not sure if I should push forward and make her continue to do this exercise each week? Or just practice narration and dictation as separate skills? Any thoughts or opinions would be very much appreciated.

Just following this thread. I am working on coming up with plans for 3rd next year as well. What to use for writing is my biggest question mark right now. Thank you everyone for all of your great posts!

Oh also. Two quick thoughts when it comes to private school in general. Not sure how you would regulate this, but the amount of homework should be reasonable. When I attended a private school I had homework from the moment I walked in the door till about 10-12 at night ( I was in 6th grade). It was insane. I loved most of my teachers and classes, and think they did a great job, but the amount of homework was unbearable. Also have a low tolerance for bullying. My brother attended a different private school and had issues with another kid bullying him. My parents informed those in charge but they did nothing about it. The reasoning for their inaction was that they couldn't afford to lose any of their students (their finances were poorly managed). Ironic because my mom eventually pulled my brother out, so in the end they did lose a student.

Listening in! I have thought about the idea of starting a classical private school. I would love more parents around me to have access to the benefits of classical education, and I think there would be a large demand for it. But I have no idea how to financially do it. Something to keep pondering I guess. I am really enjoying reading through all these posts and ideas.

This makes me so mad ! Complete infringment of homeschoolers rights! What about all the children who are abused by teachers (whom are not fired because of tenure), or by other staff members, or bullied by fellow students. What about protecting those children? Maybe each staff member and student that set foot in a public school should be background checked and interviewed by parents every few months so parents can decide whether they feel their child is in a safe environment. After all it is OUR children's safety at risk, right?! In this case homeschoolers should not be punished because the state failed to its job of investing existing reports of abuse.

:lol: :lol: :lol: Thanks for sharing!

I have read TWTM all the way through once or twice, and the grammar stage portion many times. I read TWTM before finding these boards. I found the boards while searching for curricula by SWB, and I am so thankful that I did. My Dh and I decided to try out homeschooling whileour oldest Dd was in preschool (we couldn't afford to send her to a private preschool). It went so well that we decided to keep homeschooling. For K I decided to use a boxed curriculum (one that I was homeschooled with). Both my Dd and I became frustrated with the amount of required writing. So I searched the internet for a new curriculum. Somehow I stumbled across the TWTM. I decided to splurge and purchase the book. I figure it would be an interesting read but wouldn't solve my problem. I thought the idea of following a homeschool "philosophy" was silly. :001_rolleyes: All I needed was a brand new shiny curriculum, right?!. I couldn't put the book down, I read it from cover to cover. I knew it was the perfect fit for our family, and would allow me to accomplish my goals for our children's education. And I have realized that having an educational philosophy is vital for my endurance ( and hopefully my success)! Thanks to TWTM and these boards I have had the courage to branch out and tailor my kids education to each of their individual needs. I am on here a lot, but I don't post very often. I am very grateful to those who do, I have learned so much from all of you!

Thank you! That is exactly what I needed to know.

Quick question. I want to teach my kids the CC Timeline. Are the words to the timeline song on the classical acts and facts history cards? Or would I need to purchase the Foundations Guide? Thanks!

Thank you so much for posting this. I really needed to read this. I have just recently starting suspecting that my 5yo (almost 6yo) daughter may have adhd. She has an extremely difficult time sitting still. She has so much energy, I cannot keep up. She has a difficult time following instructions. Most of all she has an extremely hard time controling her impulses (this is where most of my frustration lies). I can bend down at her level (make eye contact) clearly tell her I don't want her to do a particular behavior (i.e. not to touch her sister with her foot :001_rolleyes:) and she will turn right around and do it again. She has an extremely difficult time in a group class setting paying attention to what the teacher is asking and following directions, she is usually off in her own world. I figured this was all just due to her over abundance of energy and that she would eventually grow out of it. But now that I see that her 4yo sister has more impulse control and focus than she does I am starting to think that maybe there is more at work than I realize (I know that I shouldn't compare siblings, and I usually don't, and I never talk about comparisons in front of them). I just wanted to say that this part of your post made me smile. This sounds just like my daughter. She loves sweeping, dusting, cleaning the bathroom, and doing dishes, anything but sitting still. If she is not doing something she gets bored, and when she gets bored she gets into trouble. I get really frustrated because I know the solution to keep her from getting in trouble is to keep her busy but I can't spend all of my time doing that. Even though I don't understand her wanting to clean, I guess I should just let her, like you said pursue what she is good at (or what she feels an accomplishment for). I know this sounds silly, but sometimes a 5yo's cleaning job helps and sometimes it just creates a bigger mess when not supervised (and I don't have time to supervise). This is why I appreciated your post so much, it made me realize that as she gets older her skills (and her ability to help) will get better, and she will be able to put all of that energy to good use. In the meantime I need to let her "practice." I don't know if any of that made any sense. I just wanted to let you know how much I enjoyed reading your post.

My three girls do figure skating. We seemed to have tumbled into a busy, expensive sport, but they love it. We have yet to meet any other homeschooling skaters (although we are just starting to get involved in more activities). I feel like we stand out like sore thumbs at our rink, homeschoolers with 5 young kids :001_cool: , yep thats us!

:grouphug: Hang in there! I have a 2 yo who can throw some pretty good tantrums. It seems like he is either getting into things he shouldn't, crying, or making his sisters cry (messing up or breaking their things). We live in an extremely tight space, so it is very difficult to get school done. The most productive time for us is during his naps, luckily he still takes decent length naps. It has been worse the last couple of days because he has been sick, today he was screaming at me at the top of his lungs while I was trying to feed his brother. Poor guy, I think he has just been feeling lowsy today. I also have a 4yo that can throw good tantrums as well, she is getting better as she gets older, but they still happen pretty frequently. So I feel your pain. The best advice I can give you is to just take one day at a time, sometimes that is all I can do.

:bigear: I am just in the process of planning our projects for the year.

I haven't read through all of the posts, so forgive me if this has already been mentioned. You mentioned that they are often in town for a couple weeks, and most of the time they spend staying with her mom. Is that true this time? If it is, could the 11yo come and stay a seperate night in addition to when her whole family is there (i.e. the night before or after)? I am sorry you have been put it this sticky situation. Hope you are able to figure something out!