These are pretty much the exact same suggestions I was going to give with one addition. We have a moveable alphabet set that I use frequently with my 4 year old to play letter games. I'll put 4 or 5 letters out and we play the "letter mystery game" where I'll give a clue like, " or this letter makes the /t/ sound" or "this letter looks like a circle" or something like that. We also use these letters to experiment every 4-5 weeks with sounding out some CVC words to check to see if he's ready to really start blending. It's a no-pressure way to check for a little more readiness.

I graduated in 1999 and was homeschooled for a total of 7 years (2 years in high school), and went to private school or public school the other years depending on where we were living at the time. The homeschooling I received before 4th grade was fine, but after that she gave me a stack of books to read but there was never any testing or follow up to it, so I floundered horribly in math and science (I was a music major in college). I was never even asked if I'd completed the reading. I did well on the ACT though and got scholarships so my mom feels like she did just fine. I want much better than that for my kids. When I was in school I got in trouble for grades lower than a B in everything but math and science. They just cared that I passed those with a D, which isn't right IMO.

If it's the shot I'm thinking of it's Joseph Gordon Levitt-- he and Heath Ledger do look very similar, especially in such a fast shot. Toward the end of the trailer there's a shot of anne Hathaway in a big hat, then Christian Bale in his full batman gear, then people repelling down a tunnel, a shot of Bane, and then the guy I'm guessing looks like Heath Ledger to you- he's going through a silver door and turns back right before he goes through- if that's the right shot then it's Joseph Gordon Levitt.

Right now I'm dragging every day. I'm about 22 weeks pregnant and I am just so tired all the time, even if I get to sleep super early. I've already hit the insomnia I usually get in the third trimester and it is kicking my butt. I am certainly not a morning person by nature, but generally if I've had enough sleep I'm ready to go in the morning as long as it's after 7. It used to be that I wasn't doing well til 8 or so, but my 4yo got up at 5:30 a.m. for a long time when he was 2 and that kind of retrained my body to be up earlier. He's still up by 6:30 every day- He just knows he isn't allowed to come out of his room until the clock hits 7.

I work early on Wednesday so we have a regular school day Monday, Tuesday, Thursday and Friday, and a short day on Wednesday where we only do two-three subjects on the list. Our schedule looks like this: Math 5x HWT 5x Faith 5x Reading 20 min. 5x Violin 5x History/Geography 2x Science 2x Art 1x In January I'll add WWE 4x and FLL 2-3x. It looks like a lot to me when I write it out, but it really doesn't take us very long.

We were married at 19 and 21, and will be married 11 years in a few months. Age is certainly not the only factor that determines the risk of divorce.

Books and educational toys show up in the spring (for some fun stuff to do over the summer that isn't normal school work) and fall (to support what we're learning during the new school year), but otherwise it's Birthday and Christmas.

I think some of it has to do with your personal planning style too- I really dislike writing out our plans only to not quite get everything done in a day and having to erase and move assignments or if we do extra in a day and part of the next day is checked off, but not all... I like it to look neat! The answer for me has been to make a checklist of all of our work for each month and check off each item as we do it. I know the pace we need to keep to finish by the end of the month (5 math lessons per week, science 2x, history 3x, etc.). If we get done early then we've earned some "vacation time" and we'll have a day or two of art projects and reading. At the end of each school day I write what exactly we did (page numbers, book titles, etc.) that day in our journal, which is just a plain notebook. At the beginning of each month I make a quick "hours" chart and keep track of our daily core and non-core hours as required by our state. It takes just a few minutes, and helps me fulfil that need t okeep a really neat record. It does take a little time to make up the checklists before we start the year, but it's so worth it to me to work that way.

We start taking them every year at age 5. I got glasses at age 9 and DH got them at age 10, so that's a factor, but the biggest factor is that my MIL died of a rare occular cancer and while there may not be genetic factors the cancer is so rare that there hasn't been enough research to tell either way. So we're going on the safe side and having them checked more frequently.

My now 4.5-year-old started using them just before he turned 4. He wanted his own school work to do, he knew a handful of sounds and most of all he wanted to really write and not just trace. We don't do any certain amount of pages in a day or anything, but that is his school book when he wants writing to do 2 or 3 times a week.

I was homeschooled a total of 7 years, private school for 5 total years and public school 1 year. We moved frequently and that affected my schooling the most. I did learn valuable things whether I was in school or out, but I do wish I had been pulled back out of school earlier so I could have pursued my music career even earlier. They made me go to private school my senior year so that I'd have a diploma, and it was the biggest waste of time since I only needed 2 classes to graduate. I would have rather gotten a start on college credits.

One of my boys came home with a package of radish seeds.

My 6 year old son started violin over the summer after playing piano for a year. He tolerated piano but absolutely loves violin. My 4 year old will start piano when he turns 5. I teach violin, viola and piano, and I want my kids to have a music education through elementary school as part of their regular education. After 5th grade they can switch to other instruments or whatever, but they need to play long enough on one instrument to be proficient before they move on to something else.

Scrabble Ticket to Ride Acquire Settlers of Catan Canasta Regular decks of cards for Euchre and Nertz My boys are young and really like monopoly Jr. And all the Lego games like Lego Sorry and those types.

I think your schedule looks fine if it is working for you. Go for it. :) Our school day is shorter with my first grader, but I don't assign times to achieve- we work until we are done with the day's assignment. So math could take 10 minutes one day, it could take 40 minutes on another. But if it's a concept he understands and can demonstrate to me in 10 minutes, I don't make him do another assignment or play more rounds of a math game to fill in "math time". My son does very well when he knows exactly what work is to be completed that day. It doesn't matter how long or short the list is, but when he knows exactly what must be done he is cheerful, diligent and careful in his work. When he doesn't know the list and he worries that we'll "never be done" he rushes and gets really sloppy and whiny.

Could you maybe try two sets of work? Do your daily stuff first thing in the morning right after breakfast and then after lunch would be your history/science/anything else you only do a few times per week. Then your work times are pegged to meals so that he doesn't feel like you are interrupting his play time. If it were me I would also separate the time you learn and practice new math concepts from the time you spend drilling facts. We divide our day in half mostly because I work in the afternoons/evenings and my husband gets home mid-afternoon, but it works really well with DS1. I school about 3/4ths of our work in the mornings and then DH finishes up anything we didn't get to in the afternoon. I work a lot of hours Monday-Wednesday and so DH does more school work on those days but I only work a few hours on Thursdays and Fridays so generally DH doesn't have any school to finish up those days or it might just be having DS1 read out loud or something like that. I organize our schooling by the amount of writing required since that is DS1's criteria for difficulty. We start with 2 things that require writing, then do 1 or 2 things without any writing, then something else with writing, etc. Writing consists of 1 page in HWT, 1 very short sentence for copywork (usually something like "Cows live in barns." from DWN) and then whatever math writing he has from SM1A. I write/type his narrations, but I'm hoping to get 1 short written sentence out of him in the second semester for those narrations.

I've spent $150 on the upcoming year total for my 2 boys who will be 1st grade and K4. Most of it was on a math curriculum and art supplies. We have an awesome local library system that we use extensively. We'll spend another $100 or so total.

My rising first grader is very young for his grade and we thought about holding him back another year before Kindergarten but he was so ready academically that we went ahead with K last year. So technically he's in first grade this year but we're considering stretching first grade over a year and a half and then second grade over a year and a half- it kind of depends on how much he matures over the next 6 months or so. Our goals are mostly foundational: 1. Learn to work with diligence at the task at hand. 2. Continue to grow in the habit of attentiveness. 3. Continue to grow in the habit of obedience without complaining. Academically, our big jobs this year are to read with more fluency and keep growing his math skills. We're also exploring other subjects, but if all we do this year is read with more fluency and continue in math I'll be happy.

Definitely stick with it! Balance is one of the most noticeable improvements for me doing this program! I've never done a regular exercise program before either and I'm getting ready to start the third month of P90X with my husband. The first month I had the same balance problems that you're describing and I put a chair out for myself so that I could do balance moves modified. By the end of the first month I was able to do most of the moves by balancing with the chair and then letting go and in the second month I've hardly needed any support at all. I definitely modified everything in the first 4-6 weeks of the program but now we're starting week 9 tomorrow and I'm able to do most of the pushups in the normal position and only some from my knees, I'm able to do about 95% of the 1 leg balancing without any help or support and my endurance level is crazy good now.

I think it depends on the church. We belong to a megachurch and we've been there since it was 300 members. There is serious depth in the preaching, there is a firm discipleship program in place for both new and experienced believers, and we have a lot of opportunity for small Bible studies and even just "get to know you" groups like the playgroup that meets monthly at the park. As far as getting lost in the shuffle, you get out of it what you put in. If you are very involved, volunteer to help and get to know people through a ministry or two it is very easy to get to know people. If you just show up for the sunday service, don't talk to anyone and then head home you won't know anyone. It sounds like they provide a ministry that would really support you and you will get to know people within that ministry.