We went to Yosemite last September and it was amazing. (We were doing quite a few destinations, including Grand Canyon, short stops in LA and San Diego, visiting the Channel Islands, driving Hwy 1 up the coast, and Yosemite). I had originally wanted to add in Sequioa or Kings Canyon, but that got cut from our list. It was probably for the best in our case anyway, since at the time we were in CA there were awful forest fires nearby those parks and there were a lot of closures - we might not have gotten to go anyway. I defintiely want to visit those parks on a future trip after reading the comments in this thread. One thing to note is that the Mariposa grove of Sequoias at Yosemite is closed for trail and facility restoration until 2017. We visited the Tolumme grove at Yosemite instead. We were still pretty impressed by it, but it does involve a bit of a hike back up after you enjoy an easy walk down to the grove. :-)

I've never seen the 2nd edition (it is pretty much brand new, right? I don't think many people have used it yet). I had Essentials before I had foundations (used it with oldest DD), and it was perfect for me as I was just learning the LOE "system". That being said, after having done Essentials and really understanding what is going on with this type of method in general...I think I now have the understanding that I could use to teach using WRTR or SWR if I needed or wanted to. As others said, it might be worth it to you to check out WRTR from your library or buy a cheap used copy, and see if it makes sense to you. I couldn't make any sense of it before I did LOE, but when I read it later, it made perfect sense . Other options to consider would be How to Teach Spelling by Rudginsky...and for something totally different, consider Apples and Pears. This is not a popular opinion, but I think for my DS8, going to apples and pears after doing LOE was actually a good move for him. I apply my knowledge of phonograms as I teach him, even though they aren't explicitly taught as such (teaches using morphemes instead). It is still teacher intensive, but you might able to combine kids. And it is zero prep.

I think though to "finish" LOE you would have to go through Essentials, which sunshineslp hasn't done with her oldest. While Foundations certainly introduces all the phonograms and most of the rules, it is more at an introductory level for the harder rules and phonograms. A student who goes through all of essentials might be done with spelling, but a struggling student needs more practice. (Perhaps similar to the way a student in a Spalding method classroom might go through some of the lists more than one year in a row if they can't test out of the list the next year?).

Another option would be a used 1st edition Essentials. There should be good deals available with 2nd edition coming out, and you probably already have some of the materials on hand (phonogram cards, game cards?). Depending on your comfort level with the idea of teaching the concepts and knowing how to mark words, you could use a list from another source, and just teach the markings/phonograms in the LOE manner. I got the "rules/phonograms" quick reference from LOE, and then also purchased SWR's "alpha list" to use as a reference, even though it doesn't match up perfectly to LoE's marking scheme. Then I used the lists and dictation sentences from Spelling Plus and Dictation Resource Book. But, this was with my DD who had already been through Essentials and just needed more practice...so she had a stronger background in spelling than a student just coming out of Foundations.

So with the microphone and amplifier, you could just turn it on and sing? I guess when it talked about "built in songs" I thought maybe that was all you could do was sing along to the built in songs. But just the amp is interesting too, since maybe the mic grandma bought could plug into it! That was what I was worried about with the "toy" microphones in general - that all you could do was sing along to the songs that were pre-recorded, which is why I was avoiding those. I think all the toy ones I saw in store (granted, I didn't have a chance to look many places) had tunes built in that DS would have no interest in, and I was worried that if all they did was function as two song karaoke machines he would have no use for it.

The boy who is turning 7 on Saturday has been telling me he wants "a microphone" for his birthday. Obviously he doesn't just want "a microphone" even though he doesn't quite realize this...he wants something that will amplify his voice. As if he actually needs to be any louder! :001_rolleyes: But, he loves microphones and wants to sing, rap, beatbox, whatever and hear himself amplified when he pretends to be a rock star. It doesn't need to be very loud or sturdy (maybe it is okay if this potential gift doesn't last long?!?!). Not realizing what we exactly needed, grandma picked up a Karoke mic, but hasn't given it to him, so we could return it. Could we plug that into a portable speaker that has a line-in jack (a lot of the bluetooth speakers for phones have these)? That seems too simple to be true. I also saw little tiny portable guitar amp/speakers on amazon. Or is there something else we want here? I am not looking to buy a whole Karaoke set up, and am not looking to spend too much on it. $20-$25 max (or a bit more if we return the Karaoke mic for something else)...if we can't do it for that budget, I think I will tell him the rock star microphone dreams have to wait since I already bought a couple other items on his bday list.

I read to my boys in the morning during our school day (primarily the 1st and 3rd grader, sometimes the 4 year old listens too, but I am not counting on it most of the time), while DD works independently. Then i have a special read-aloud time with DD most nights at bedtime, while DH reads to the boys. If DH isn't available, I either read to DD later after I read to the boys, or skip reading to her if I am too tired. Most of what I read to DD at bedtime she could read herself, but we still really like that time to connect and read things that might not be of interest to the boys. If there are things I want everyone to hear all at once, we typically do those as audiobooks in the car.

I've just barely started thinking about next year...so it will be fun to post this now, and then come back later and see how many times I change my mind! :lol: For the final 14 weeks or so of this school year (I have some updates to make for my siggy!): Finishing LOE Foundations D within the next week or so, then doing lots of reading. Still trying to figure out what else to add for language arts for the rest of the year! Starting RightStart C next week, supplementing with Miquon and Singapore CWP 1 Continuing to do history, science, Bible, etc with older brother For next year: Continue RightStart C...eventual goal (I think) is to prepare for Beast Academy (either right after RS C or whenever he is ready). Either LoE Essentials, or maybe Apples and Pears for spelling. NO IDEA for grammar, writing for next year! (I think 2nd-3rd are the hardest years for me to pick language arts for!) US History with older brother (when I did elementary US history with DD, I just made my own booklist...will probably do that again for the boys) Science...probably either interest led or pick a main topic to explore with various books (We've mainly been exploring physics and chemistry related topics this year, so maybe some biology and earth science topics). Bible and Lit with older brother also. I just pick my own lit list too, with inspiration from a variety of sources Co-op and outside activities....no idea!

We own Essentials and I used it with my older kids, I don't feel the need to rush him into it right away. His spelling is pretty decent for a first grader, so I feel comfortable waiting until next fall to do Essentials or maybe something else. I own several spelling (and grammar) options so I am not worried about having something available for him in 2nd. I honestly don't want to focus on copywork and dictation with him. He dislikes it very much...which I know isn't a reason to skip it all together, but I would like to just do it once a week or so. He has a lot of other stuff (non-school related, behavior-wise) going on in his life, so pushing him to do a lot of copywork is not big on my agenda for the rest of this year. It's not a battle I am choosing to fight right now. He likes the other workbook pages (the more creative-writing ones, matching, writing the result when base word is added to suffix, editing pages, games, etc). So I am more looking for that kind of content than copywork, with the goal of making sure he is doing SOME kind of written work every day.

My 1st grade DS (almost 7) will finish Logic of English Foundations D within the next couple weeks. I'm trying to decide what else to do to fill the year. I have no problems finding books for him to read, and I'm not particularly concerned with doing a lot more spelling this year (and I have plenty of spelling options around the house to add a bit in if needed). I haven't quite decided what to do next with him for spelling, but I will either wait until next year to pick that up again or just start when I decide. I think what we will miss about LOE Foundations is the workbook. DS loves the "Dragon workbook" and is sad to be doing the last one in the series. I like that it wasn't just copywork or spelling words. It often has pages to match sentences with pictures, words to cut out and arrange (yesterday he was matching contractions to the full spelling), games, little writing activities, etc. There is a lot of variety. He is a high energy, short attention span kid...and just doing copywork every day to teach various Language Arts concepts would be a flop. Any other workbooks we should check out to finish out the year? I am mostly looking to fill 12-14 weeks from when he will finish Foundations D until we take a break. If we do nothing, he would only be reading and not writing anything, since LOE has been our complete LA curriculum. I have no idea about next year either for him, but I am not going to worry about that yet...lol

Here's about what our year looked like (not precisely, since I didn't keep very exact records, but this is the general idea): First couple weeks: Play get-to-know-you games, agree on group rules, brainstorm team name, talk about how we could choose one name (talked about ways we could vote, etc). Drew logos and voted on a logo. Started doing 5 minute building challenges (Like "build something that represents what you like to do in your spare time" After that: More individual building challenges, and then two or three person challenges (things like, build a bridge that can support five pounds of books) Next: several weeks to do Lego simple machines lessons and learn to use the motor. We also started talking about the general challenge topic and brainstorming possible specific topics Finally: about six or seven weeks devoted to narrowing down our topic to something specific, building a model, and making a display. We have our expo in three weeks, so we are almost done with the season.

We are doing Jr. First Lego league this year. If you pay the fee to register a team with Jr. First, you aren't paying for any expos ("competitions" - except they aren't actually competitive). What you are paying for is their coaching materials and the information on the "challenge" for the year. You then buy any kits separately, and would pay any fees separately to if you were able to enter an expo. But, if you wanted their coaches materials and the information on what the challenge for the year is, you could pay to register a team to get those things. Registering a team also gets you the opportunity to buy somewhat discounted "kits" that have the recommended materials and a few unique things packaged together. On the other hand, you could buy some of the Lego Education simple machines kits (we spent a number of weeks just going through those), and make up your own identical sets of blocks for "building challenges" (we did a lot of those, but ended up googling for ou own topics for the mini building challenges since the ones in the coaches book were kind of lame). We are really only spending our last six weeks on our main challenge and building a model based on the challenge. You could even come up with your own main challenge for kids to create a model. The main challenge is pretty broad anyway! One thing I would suggest, if you are doing it as a co-op class, is that you have a way to break your group down into smaller groups of 4-6 kids. When all six kids on our team were present, we found we really needed to break down even further into two groups of three even to do simple machines (we had two simple machines sets), because it is just so hard for multiple kids to build together on the same thing. We are actually down, practically speaking, to only three kids who are building the model to take to the expo (One family dropped out for unknown reasons, one moved away, and my DS6 decided he didn't want to do the expo model and I decided not to fight him on it). Even with only three building a model of a process (recycling computers for precious metals), it is a challenge to help them work together to build one cohesive model and not just three separate things on a big board.

We live in Minneapolis itself. The twin cities is wonderful for homeschooling...lots of groups and resources.

This weekend we had "Mom, someone scribbled out my half done writing assignment." DD didn't finish her WWS assignment on Friday and left it out on the table knowing she would need to finish it Saturday morning. DS6 admitted to scribbling it out when he was mad at his older brother. He thought it belonged to DS8!

<hugs> People do change, sometimes in surprising ways. I have known several women who didn't want to have kids at all in their twenties, who changed their mind and had kids in their thirties or even early 40s. But I guess that might be a long wait for you to become a grandma if your kids follow that path!

I am reading the Prydain chronicles series with DD. I think her brothers would like it too, but I started the series with DD when we were on a mother /daughter trip, so this is "our series" right now and I guess I will start it from the beginning later with them. After that I think we'll read Echo and The War That Saved My Life (Newberry honor books this year).

I think IEW's program is just words, not sentences...but I could be wrong about that. If nothing pre-recorded exists I will probably either record them myself or have her record them. We have Dictation Reource Book and I've long ago downloaded some of the public domain books with dictation, so source isn't a problem...just getting off our behinds to get the recordings made. ;-)

Ok, this is a long shot...totally a "unicorn" to use a term I've seen often recently... :lol: DD11 wants to change up what we are doing for spelling. We haven't been doing any dictation sentences this year and she feels like that is helpful and would like to add that back in. But she still wants something independent of me. Like I said, a unicorn. :huh: Are there any resources out there with dictation sentences for spelling recorded as MP3 to download or on a CD?

We did a general science overview with Dr. Art's guide to Science to start the year, followed by a short astronomy/space exploration study (She read two older books - "How to Build a Rocket" and "How to Live on Mars", as well as reading a number of current articles about space exploration and watching YouTube videos). Right now she is doing a kitchen science study with "Cooking and Science" by Joseph Julicher. We have the secondary level book for grades 7-12. She is an experienced cook so the elementary level was way too easy. This is just a tad over her level - but mostly just the chemical equations. We did Ellen McHeney Elements last year and she had Chemistry at co-op last year as well, so she is pretty well prepared otherwise. After this is done, I think we'll end the year with an Archeology study. I have some resources on a wish list for that but haven't really narrowed anything down. DD asked for this topic a while ago, so if she has lost interest by the time we get to it, we may do something else instead. I had hoped to have DD pursue more science activities at DIY.org, but the reality is when she goes on the site she is mostly drawn to the arts related skills, so it has been hard to convince her to do any of the science skills. :-) (Even though she initially thought that might be a fun idea).

No ideas, but I feel your pain. I have this vague memory of a book that I asked the hive about and no one could figure out for me either. Still haven't found it, but I think it was an old book from the 50s, so google images/amazon wasn't especially helpful as I am sure it is out of print.

We recently bought a mini indoor trampoline (It was in the range of $40 or so). It gets quite cold in the winter here and some days are just not ideal for being outside more than a few minutes. It really, really helps my boys with having an energy outlet on those cold days. I would also be apt to say that if he has no interest in organized sports, it isn't your best use of money or time. Do any places have "open gym" near you? We have regular gyms that have open gym in the winter for running around, basketball, etc. Gymnastics places also have open gym to just play around on equipment, bounce on trampolines, etc.

Thanks for all the encouragement, everyone. :-) I'm really happy with how the appointment went. I spent about an hour talking with the woman who will be doing the evaluation next month. DS just sat in an adjacent room and played legos the whole time..she even said that the only reason he was there is that my insurance requires the child come to this initial appointment (all other pre-eval appointments with different insurance are parent only). She just asked questions and I could download on her with all the stuff that DS does. I really liked her and she seemed very supportive of homeschooling and supportive of us getting this testing done as a step toward getting answers and getting help for DS...so, I'm really happy about all of that. She said that while she thought the eval will be helpful in understanding DS better, it will take some good presentation on her part to get the insurance to cover it. She said most other insurance co's would be fine, but mine in particular is hard to get things through in our situation. She is going to emphasize his lack of flexibility and the social issues we've seen and hope that helps in getting it approved. She said that more testing that usual has been getting approved lately from this insurance co, so, we will pray and hope for the best!

It's primarily ADHD, but the funny thing is at least from how I read the insurance criteria, they don't cover neuropsych for ADHD Only. The place doing the eval knows this (We have an insurance co. that is very common here, and the person I talked to on the phone said they were very familiar with handling these requirements). So I am definitely have in mind to share my other concerns - Sensory, behavior, some social issues, lack of flexibility in non-preferred activities, etc. Some of those things could be ADHD, but ??? I am not really seeing ASD based on what I know about ASD...but that is part of what the eval is for I guess...like you said, they may see something I don't.

Our insurance plan is set up not to require referrals for anything, so I wonder if for more expensive things like this, they take this extra step to make sure it isn't a complete waste of their money. I think there must be something other than just paperwork involved, or they wouldn't need me to bring DS, right? The same person primarily doing the eval is doing this appointment too, so I am guessing they must do some kind of prelimary testing/evaluating with DS too. They were very clear that the insurance required DS to be present for the certification evaluation.

Just wondering if anyone else had to do this and maybe what to expect. Our actual neuropsych eval appointments are scheduled for early next month, but our insurance requires a pre-eval evaluation, essentially, to determine if DS meets the "medical policy criteria" for covering the evaluation. That's later today. They told me it would last an hour and that DS needed to be present but gave no other hint as to what they will do to determine if he meets the coverage criteria for insurance. it will be a real bummer if they don't prove he meets the criteria, because we went with a place that takes our insurance but is at the more expensive end of the spectrum of local cost options. If we could have known six months ago whether or not they would cover, i might have made different decisions on where to go. But they needed this appointment only 30 days out from the main appointments. Then if they say "no coverage" we have the difficult decision if we pay out of pocket for the $$$ eval, or we go with the less expensive place that didn't take our insurance and wait again. I'm just going to try and think positive today and hope it is in the best interest of the place we are having the eval done to look for reasons he would meet the criteria for coverage rather than the other way around.