Yes I have read it all the way through at least a couple of times. Each year I try to read through the stage that currently applies to us. I am always finding something new and shiny in that wonderful book ;) :D !

I am far from experienced ;) , but these are the things I wish I would have done differently. I really wish I would have known about and had read The Well Trained Mind before starting our homeschool journey. To go along with that I wish I would have figured out what philosophy of education fit the goals and needs of my family from the get go. It would have saved me a lot of time and money ;) . I wish I would have felt more comfortable to relax and enjoy the pre-K and K years with my oldest Dd. I wish I would have spent more time doing and not as much time researching and planning. I am still trying to work on this. I still tend to overcomplicate things by attempting to plan for all K-12 years :rolleyes:. I need to learn to relax and take one year at a time and worry more about meeting goals and less about what particular math I predict we are going to use in 9th grade :lol: . Good Luck on your homeschool journey, homeschooling is the best decision we have ever made for our family! :)

:grouphug: No advice as I am going through the same thing. I sure miss the days when all of my kids took naps ;) !

If you really feel the need for workbooks. Kumon books are great for that age. They have books to help teach cutting, tracing, coloring, etc. My kids have all loved them.

I do the same thing. I hit the max with the "Save for Later." :tongue_smilie: But then shortly after discovered what a wishlist is. :lol: I now have many, many wishlists. :D

:lurk5:

:iagree: Potty training and teaching my kids to read are my top two least favorite parenting jobs. It is so hard to listen to them sound out every. single. word.

I thought this might be helpful...here are links to 2nd, 4th, and 6th grade threads with a lot of examples of what curricula others are using for those grades. The first thing I would advise you to do is research the different homeschool methods and find which one matches best with your goals. It sounds like you may have already done this. If you haven't already I would highly recommend reading The Well Trained Mind, it was a huge help to me. Figure out what your goals are for each of your kids and your family. Having goals in place will help guide you in figuring out what curricula to use. Depending on how confident you feel about selecting your own various curricula for each subject, using a boxed curriculum may not be a bad way to start. Here are a couple of threads discussing some of the different boxed curricula.... Boxed, total package curriculum box curriculum Also here are links to a few threads discussing what homeschooling looks like in various homes. I am sure there are more, these are just a few I found with a quick search.... What does your daily schedule look like for Homeschool? What's your schedule like? Your Daily Schedule? I think you have recieved some great advice thus far. I agree with the pp who said focus on what skill level your kids are on, and start there, and not necessarily what "grade level" they should be at. Be patient with yourself and enjoy the journey. Just remember that not everyday will go smoothly. And when you have a rough day it is not the end of the world. I am excited for you. Homeschooling has been a huge blessing for my family. :)

LOL this is how I feel also. :-) My Dh and I are both committed through 8th grade. I personally would love for our kids to homeschool all the way through. But come 7th-8th grade we will reevaluate our options, and they can help make the decision of whether to continue at home or not.

We have fallen a bit behind this year. So we will be continuing most subjects throughout the summer. Which is okay, we took last summer off and I sure regreted it. It seemed like they forgot e.v.e.r.y.t.h.i.n.g we had learned the year before. We might do something fun for science also.

I met a few other homeschoolers here and there. But I am not good friends with any of them. I have two sister in laws that homeschool, but we live far enough away from both of them that we rarely see one another.

Those Amazing Musical Instruments is a great book , it has fantastic pictures and interesting information on each instrument and its family. It comes with a CD to use in your computer with sound tracks of all the different instruments. My kids have enjoyed reading through the book with me. We have also really enjoyed books from the World's Greatest Composers series. What we have been doing lately is I pick one composer to study. We read about 1 or 2 pages a day about them from that series. We then listen to a couple of their songs. We continue this until we have read the entire book. I plan on spending about 1-3 months on one composer. We also are studying one instrument/family at a time and have been reading from the Amazing instrument book. This routine for us has been fairly simple to accomplish but the kids seem to be picking up on the things we are learning. I have also seen a great lapbook from Homeschool in the Woods on instruments and composers. We haven't used it, but it looks fun. Just in case it is helpful, a great inexpensive soundtrack we have used is Masters of Classical Music.

I haven't quite figured out how to work in IP and the mental math (practice problems in the back of the HIG). But here is what our day with SM looks like. Before we begin math I have my Dd practice skip counting and do one or two pages of story problems from the CWP. I am using CWP one grade behind, so for example we this year we are doing SM 2 A & B, but we are using CWP 1. We do these problems using a white board, that way I don't have to purchase a copy for each child. I then look through the HIG and figure out what I need to teach, and then I go through the lesson with my Dd as laid out in the HIG. Sometimes this only takes a minute if it is just review. If it is a simple concept and I don't feel like my Dd needs to use any manipulatives I just look through the assigned textbook pages with my Dd. If not then I get out the needed items and we work through the lesson. If I feel more reinforcement is needed then we will go through the textbook pages as well. After that I then assign the workbook pages to my Dd and she can often do it pretty independently.

:hurray: Good for her! I love stories like this!

I sent you a PM. My answer would be too politically charged! :)

OP, I understand what you mean. I too worry about the social maturity and social awareness of my kids at times. I think my kids are sometimes oblivious to the norms, attitudes, or comments of kids around them. But when I have seen some of the behavior of some their peers I am glad. Sometimes my kids will talk and talk and talk and I worry that they don't necessarily recognize what an appropriate length of conversation is at a particular time. But I went to PS and I ended up with a hyper social awareness (due to constant teasing) and as a result I had a lower self esteem and a fear to speak up and express my opinion, so I am not about to create that fear in my kids. So I will let them talk :001_smile:. And yet I have had so many comments from adults on how kind, and happy, and smart my kids are. I think they have a pretty good self esteem and confidence, which at their young age is the most important thing to me. I have also seen my kids interacting with kids of all ages. They will take the time to pay attention to kids younger than them. I have also seen junior high kids asking my kids for skating advice, and my kids will gladly give it. I have seen them play with kids their own age and get along well. I have also seen kids their own age blow them off, I guess my kids weren't cool enough :001_rolleyes: , and they just moved on to the next kid. I am not sure if they even noticed the cold shoulder and I am okay with that. When I do have doubts I have to remind myself to analyze what social awareness practices I picked up from PS and many of them were negative in my opinion. I think most of the positive ones I picked up were from home. I think that I will need to spend more time directly teaching my kids some social skills, like when meeting a new friend ask their name, but that can be done. I will gladly take a few quirks and have my kids grow up confident and kind over fitting in and knowing who the latest pop star is. Just remind yourself of the end goals and push forward with confidence. :)

If it makes you feel any better. I had a really embarrassing moment in my sophomore year of high school. I didn't know what the difference between sophomore and junior was. :blushing: At least I knew what senior meant! :001_rolleyes: It was just one of those things that I never bothered to pay attention to and learn.

I don't know what it is. It made me curious though, looking it up... :001_smile:

Yes, I was homeschooled from 7th-10th grade. I went to public school from K to the first part of 6th grade. We moved about 1/3 into 6th and I attended a private school for another 1/3 of 6th. Than I went back to public school for the last part of 6th. I started the first few weeks of 7th at public school and for the rest I did homeschooling all the way up through 10th grade. All the while I attended a few classes here and there at the public schools (i.e. art, music, etc.). In 10th I decided I wanted to finish up highschool in public school. So I went back to public school for 11th and 12th. So yes, I have been all over the place :). My mom needed to pull my brother out of school while he was in 3rd grade due to some academic difficulties, and I thought staying home for school sounded like a great idea so I begged and pleaded for her to bring me home as well and I am thankful that she agreed. I woudn't trade it for the world. I don't know if I would have had the courage to homeschool my kids if I hadn't experienced it first hand. I am inspired by all of you, like my mom, who have the courage to venture out into the unknown world of homeschooling. :) ETA: I was homeschooled pretty much with a traditional curriuculum. So Classical Education is a new adventure for me. But I am loving every moment (okay not every moment, but most ;) )

This looks like a great book! Thank you! I may have to find some way to incorporate this into our day, I think my Dd could handle it if we work through it slowly. I would love to hear updates on how this works out for you! :)

So I have been reading, and re-reading all the posts here. Thank you so much to everyone for all of your responses. I have been pondering what all of you have said. I think I am going to make poetry a more organized part of our morning circle. I think I am planning on picking one or two poets a year and focusing on one new poem every week. I think I will also read an additional seasonal poem as well. I am going to have to think about this tea time idea some more as well. I think my kids may really enjoy that. I will have to incorporate that after we get a better sense of what this new year will be like in our new house ( I know moving is going to throw a huge wrench in things, but hopefully it will settle down before fall). Critterfixer, I really appreciate this post. I have been thinking a lot about your thoughts you shared here. Thus far I have never critiqued any of my daughters free writing. I have only offered praises. I have always planned to leave her free writing alone, and let her experiment and try new things without worrying about making sure it meets any criteria or approval. I really appreciate your thoughts on this. I relate to this as an artist, there are times I just want to draw and not have anyone give any critique. Other times I appreciate critique but in those instances I ask for it. So I understand this need of freedom to explore and try new things without the fear of being judged. I also really appreciate your words of wisdom with making sure I provide structured lessons on writing. This is a trap I could see myself falling in to in the future if my daughter every pushes back against formal instruction. At the moment she actually enjoys formal grammar (FLL and GWG) and writing instruction (WWW), it is one of her favorite subjects. But she has pushed back with WWE, and I have decided to push ahead and I am very glad I made that decision because I can see her benefiting from it. I would love to hear your thoughts on using a formal writing program like Classical Writing, it seems pretty rigorous. Do you think something that rigorous would benefit a natural writer or hinder them? I just thought I would ask because it seems from your post have some writing expertise. :) Thanks again!

I agree with both sides. I think the school system is pushing too much too soon. Thus I agree that parents are feeling a lot of pressure to have their kids "keep up." I know I did, and still do sometimes. One of the reasons I started homeschooling was the fact that I couldn't bare sending my 3yo away to preschool (in my mind she was still just a baby). But I did feel the pressure. So I pushed my oldest Dd to learn all of those things to "keep up", and I regret that. We decided that homeschooling was working so well that we would continue. So for my second Dd I still felt the pressure of keeping up but started to take in the idea of slowing down and going at a more natural pace. Little did I know that her personality would make it impossible to do anything but slow down and take it at her pace. Even though we homeschool I still feel the pressure to push her more but I have to remind myself that this is a marathon and not a sprint. My current 4yo begs to do school everyday, so we do. And my almost 3yo I can't really imagine starting formal "school" with him anytime soon. I think it varies so widely with each kids personality, that is why I am so glad that we are homeschooling and have the luxury of slowing down when needed and teaching according to their current needs.

Sorry no advice for you, but I am glad to hear that I am not the only one. My kids can be playing quietly and as soon as I start an audio book they start to get loud and/or start arguing. It is very frustrating. I have tried to turn one on during lunch, it sometimes works.

I have not been very consistent using the review cards so I am listening in for ideas. This is what a typical day for AAS looks like for us.... I get out the board and set up the magnetic tiles. We try and complete 1 whole step/lesson on monday, if it is a really long lesson I spread it over two days. Then after the lesson I read the words in the word bank to my Dd and she writes them down. We are currently using grade 3 ZB lined paper folded in half. With the paper being folded in half it usually leaves enough room for all of the word bank words, and most if not all of the "more words" for that step, as well as about 2 or 3 review words from a previous lesson. So she writes a total of 18 words a day. I then have her turn over her paper and I dictate three of the sentences to her. We had to work up to this. In 1st we did three phrases. In second we did 2 phrases and 1 or 2 sentences. And then in second (because the level of AAS no longer has phrases) we do three sentences. On either thursdays or fridays I have let her do the writing station, she loves doing this so to her it is a treat. We usually spend a whole week on one step. I have her write the spelling words on paper everyday as well as 3 dictated sentences. If the step is more of a "review" step or a particularly easy step than I may do two steps that week. I don't ever purely "test" her knowledge of the spelling words. What I mean by that is I read them to her and she writes them down. If she writes one incorrectly I make her fix it. I first have her read it and see if she can figure out whats wrong, she is usually able to correct it just from that. If she can't then we may review the rule for the word. If she is really stumped I help her figure out how it needs to be fixed (this is pretty rare), and I make a note of the word that it needs extra review. My reasoning for doing all that is I don't want her to incorrectly write a word and think that it is correct and just move on. I want the correct word practiced. I don't know if that makes sense. I am not very good at using the cards for review, or following the suggested review schedule. So here is a review schedule that I made up that makes more sense for me. This schedule will allow me to get to some of the overlooked sound cards and phonogram cards. This schedule won't work for everyone, but I thought I would share in case it is helpful for anyone else. Keep in mind I have not started using this schedule yet so I may end up tweaking it a bit. We just finished up AAS3 so I am planning on starting this with AAS 4. I purposefully made monday the heaviest day so we get it over with and friday the lightest so we can drop it if needs be. Here it is... Mon: New Lesson, do the 10 word bank words and 3-5 words under "more words", review 3-5 previous lesson words, review Phonogram cards (orally), 3 sentences on back Tues: Word Bank, more words, Review a few previous lessons words, Review Key Cards (orally), and 3 sentences Wed.: Word Bank, 2-3 "more words", Instead of reviewing previous lesson words review Sound Cards (Dd will write these on the paper), 3 sentences Thurs: Word Bank, Review a few previous lessons words using word cards** (I usually just flip back a lesson or two in the book for review, but this would force me to review words from lessons further back that we may not have done for a long time as well as some trouble words), Writing Station Fri: Word Bank, more words, Review a few previous lessons words, and 3 sentences **Sometimes for reviewing words for previous levels instead of using cards I have copied the index of words in the back of the book and just read words from that list and mark them off as we have done them. Hope that helped :)

I have thoroughly enjoyed reading through all of your posts. Thank you so much to all of you for taking the time to respond. You have all given me a lot to ponder. I will have to look into all the links you have provided as well. I am sure I will have more questions come up. I have always been so inspired by everyone's experience and thoughts I read here on the forum, I always feel so out of my league :). I love the thoughts you have all had about the benefit of including poetry in the school day. The main benefit that comes to mind for me has been the ability to fill my kids minds with beautiful language as well as a way for them to see the world through someone else's eyes (art with words). You have all confirmed that idea, as well as added a couple more benefits that I hadn't thought of ;). A bit more background on why I asked about poetry... I loved writing books and stories when I was young. Gradually I moved away from that and began to dread writing. I now think of writing as one of my weak points. I am guessing the reason for this change in attitude towards writing was not being equipped with the proper tools of writing. My oldest Dd is now showing a strength and interest in writing as well. She loves writing stories and books just like I did, as well as poems. I am hoping to encourage this and equip her with the proper tools so she can continue to grow in writing. I feel completely inadequate to do this. It seems the most common piece of advice I hear for teaching writing is to Read, read, read. So I have decided that one of the most important things I can do to help her with writing is filling her mind with words from great authors and poets. All of the Circe threads have inspired me to do this by reading the classics. Poetry also seems to be an important piece to the puzzle. Thus why I have decided that along with reading the classics poetry needs to be a higher priority for our school days. And as I mentioned earlier poetry is not my field of expertise so I am greatly appreciating all of the thoughts all of you have had. A couple of you have mentioned doing poetry tea times. Does bravewriter talk more about how to go about doing this? Do you read poetry the whole time or do you read other things as well? walkermamaof4 you mentioned focusing on one poet for a whole year. Do you and/or your kids enjoy this more than just reading from various poets? Do you think they get more out of it? This has been one idea I have been thinking about doing. I am not sure if it would be better for my kids to hear a lot of different styles or have time to focus on one poet at a time. After reading through all of your thoughts it seems like spending a week or more focusing on one poem is a pretty good rule of thumb. It sounds like your kids have more time to take ownership of the poetry that way. That makes more sense than what I have been doing, reading a new poem everyday.