Have you tried Math U See? I really did take dd all the way back to the beginning (Alpha), and it's helping so much to have that foundation built up. Like your dd, she doesn't retain well, but the curriculum has enough review that she's doing pretty well. It's mastery-based, and the teaching is on DVD, so you get to hear someone other than mom (yes, my little darling came from public school, too, where the teacher knows more than mom) state how important it is to go back and learn the basics, and you can do as many of the pages or as few of the pages as you need. We alternate between new and review. Like I said, she went all the way back, but she flew through the first book in just a couple months, and this time actually knows what she's doing. Second book is going fairly quickly. I'm hoping to be in the third one by fall, and fourth by mid-year...it's semi-familiar to her because she's studied it before, but we had hit a wall. It's soooooo much less stress now to do the same things but understood and remembered better.

We tried this with dd, taking the pedals off her bike. And then one day, she went around the block with grandma, and a neighbor saw her and offered to "fix" her bike, and grandma let him--put pedals back on!!! I don't where he got pedals of his own to install, but it was so embarrassing...he thought we were making dd ride a broken bike. I need to find the site I was looking at that sold these for older kids/adults so I can get her a spiffy new one that doesn't come with pedals in the first place. :tongue_smilie:

A very large part of our decision to homeschool was that public school couldn't change the curricululm to fit individual students. As a tutor, I learned that very often, attitude problems can be traced back to difficulty with the subject being taught. Students with the worst attitudes were generally feeling bad because they didn't understand the material, and that feeling bad translated into sulking and so forth. It didn't come from no where, it came from genuine stuggles. So, if a curriculum is producing tears, I figure it's my job to ferret out what the problem is...Are there gaps in the foundation? Does this student need a different learning style to be emphasized? More structure? More freedom? Slow down? Less busywork? If I can't make the current curriculum fit the needs that I ferret out, it's time to move on instead of digging a deeper hole by getting further behind and confused and reluctant. On the other hand, if I ferret out that the problem is a misunderstanding, like "Why can't I have my entire summer off?" or "Why am I learning such simple spelling words?" THEN we have a conversation to address the rationale for year-round school, or how the AAS words are building blocks toward bigger words instead of being limited to only the words you study on a list. Usually, if I take the time to explain, I can get my student to come back on board with a much better attitude. Only a very few things have I ever pressed on despite tears. Usually that has to do with subjects where there is a huge fear of failure (due to prior schooling or learning disabilities)....at that point I become a cheerleader for how I've picked the very best effective curriculum I could find, and it's going to help this subject become easier, but we have to put in the practice, and I will be there to hold hands, etc., etc., but we ARE going to do this, one small step at a time. That's really the only circumstance in which I press to stick with a curriculum, when I'm sure it's the best one for remediating a dreaded subject for that particular student. Sometimes moeny prevents switching as soon as I'd like, but I don't see the value in sticking with something that isn't working.

Here's what I have so far: Spelling--AAS (includes some dictation) Grammar--Winston Grammar (looks like mainly parts of speech?) Writing--ok, don't have this yet, but really want IEW, or WWE Handwriting--HWT Sonlight LA and readers for Core D (before I considered HOD) Math--MUS Science--random collection of materials, this area needs organization History--a handful of items from Sonlight's D+E Amer. Hist. core, and the If You Lived with the (various Indian tribes) series, and a few other random related books... Would it still be worth it to buy HOD for the history and Bible and maybe science? Or at this point should I just try to organize what I have? Should I try to sell off some of the above, or substitute it into HOD? Or add it in addition to HOD's related activities? Would I need DITHOR? I'm looking at Bigger Hearts, extending for a 10yo.

I think I missed your other thread. Off to go find it. :)

We'll be schooling through for the same reasons. I really only care about the 3 R's, but dd likes the content areas much better, so we won't put them entirely on hold. We might try evenings, or outdoor work, or something, but we can't quit. I'm thinking about even spreading it out, so that we just do maybe two subjects a day, like math and spelling, reading and science, social studies and math, spelling and reading, etc....but the thought of having an entire day off in math or spelling gives me the shivers...

wow

What are you studying in science and history?

Handwriting Without Tears....some of their stuff is for more of a group setting, but they have a whole bunch of activities in their preschool manual to choose from, and a schedule in the back if you need. I know with my boys, they've all of a sudden taken an interest in learning...little boys who barely ever sit still to hear a whole book..so they are wanting to write and learn the letter sounds, and I want to catch them before they develop bad habits of drawing letters every which way. So, HWT's preschool materials seem like a good way to start teaching them that will lead to writing skills, particularly since there's an emphasis on readiness, on not pushing them, but letting them work on all kinds of activities that are good for their development.

hmmm...if 100% of the classmates are homeschoolers, their ages might vary, too. Is there any chance he might feel less awkward around younger children than himself? Some kids do.

You might want to read up on dyslexia...a page I found last night clicking through the Barton Reading site onto more info about dyslexia mentioned how early intervention is much better than waiting around. I know that's my biggest regret for how we handled my dd's issues. I could tell there were problems like really struggling to blend/segment letters or to rhyme in kindergarten; now that she's in fourth, it's catching up to her that the words are harder and harder to just guess, so were realizing that she does need to go back and build up those foundational skills like phonemic awareness. You might want to try flipping through some of the info and links there about dyslexia, see where it takes you.

Time for some sort of itty bitty boundary, like a little gardening fence or row of flowers? I knind laughed at the one our neighbor had when we moved in, but it is nice to know where the boundary lies...blech about the chemicals. :mad

fwiw, quite a few college majors need statistics

http://www.exodusbooks.com/details.aspx?id=12552 Hmmm...this might work. American Stories Now that I think about it, SOTW would take a lot of effort since we're not doing the rest of the world this time. If I get dh's permission to school longer, we'll keep it in mind for another pass through world history, though.

Oh! Story of the World! I've got to be the only homeschooler who hasn't looked at Story of the World. :blushing I'll check that--it's popular enough, maybe the library will carry it. Ours subscribes to some network for listening online, so it wouldn't be like checking out the tapes/CDs forever. It would be mainly for my 10yo (with 4yo and 5yo listening in when interested). We are doing American history, and we are absolutely going to make use of Liberty's Kids on Netflix online, and audio books from the American Girl series and quite a few of the Sonlight readers. ButI keep getting the impression we need some kind of spine to give the overall timeline that governs all that fiction. She's officially "on grade level," and enjoys reading, but has some terrible compensation habits to gloss over what she can't see or can't sound out. She's making up most of what she reads based on context clues, and old enough that she doesn't always know the concept/pronunciation as prior knowledge anymore, so now she's quite often guessing wrong. I'm going to try hard to support nearly all of her reading with audio until I know that we've reached a reasonable level of remediation before this gets any further entrenched. Glasses and VT this summer, Brain Gym, All About Spelling for phonics, a phonological awareness book beyond that to correct some speech/perception issues, and probably some visual discrimination practice, and THEN we'll see if her reading actually matches the words on the page.

I think we're going toward more audio books while I remediate dd's phonics. Had a horrible time trying to read aloud today around the interruption of a bored preschooler. I think maybe an audio book with headphones might be a better way to set dd up for success. Know of any history spines I should look for?

:iagree:

Sounds good to me...some places do geometry before alg2, some do it after. Half and half sounds fine...just look at the curriculum to make sure the whoe first half can be done with only alg1 equations. If not, then I'd try doing half of alg2 in the summer, half in fall, then half of geom. in spring, half in summer.

3 teacher's manuals, a pile of picture books, a historical novel to preview for dd, and Confessions of an Ugly Stepsister for me

good question

Hmm...our main purpose for using them would be to provide *something* schoolish for her portfolio...proof that we did read/discuss/answer questions about history. We live in a highly regulated state. That's good to know there are a mix of question types. I can have her do the short answer independently, and try to transcribe the longer ones. I just don't want to buy it if that means an overwhelming amount of writing b/c it literally makes her hand hurt, and I don't time to transcribe everything. A few of those questions will be good for keeping her used to composing that type of answer. As her typing gets underway, she could always do them on the computer. Are there any other alternatives? Textbooks with assessments? I really do want the bulk of her history to be literature and projects...she used a textbook this year, and retained so little of that format, it feels like a waste of time. But at the same time, there's a burden of proof here. :( I feel like I need something routine to look good and to hold it all together.

I'm noticing that quite a few curricula use these workbooks. What's your opinion of them? And specifically for our situation-- How much writing do they require? When do they begin? (Vikings? Native Americans? Columbus?) Would it be enough to use these as our big picture text, supplemented by period-specific literature and hands-on activities? Or do we have to buy a "real" history textbook? (I hate history textbooks. And dd hates writing. We'll be doing history-based writing for lang.arts; I just don't want to add busywork making her write long comprehension answers.)

Heart of Dakota? I just started a similar thread a few days ago. That was one suggestion that is supposed to be for slightly younger children according to their website. I think Winter Promise might also be said to be lighter, but you'd have to ask an actual user about that. I haven't tried either yet.

So, I've been reading up on all these links (somehow skipped Paths of Expoloration..got that open in another tab right now... :) ), and I'm so grateful for all these ideas. I may actually end up drawing up an informal Frankenstein schedule of the materials I have thus far to get us through the next few months as close to free as possible. :blushing --Hands of a Child--Viking lapbook, purchased used --Guesthollow.com--Indian studies using the If You Lived with the (tribe) series, a field trip locally, and a random hands on book for the younger kids that I found at a yardsale (score!) --TOG--3wk sample on Christopher Columbus, if I can get the books via the library, plus a picture book I found on Amazon (also if I can get that from the library), and another used yardsale purchase about all the Explorers --at that point, I'm hoping to buy the Time Travelers CD on Colonial life, or if Scholastic has another $1 sale, there were some units that might work... GAH...I hope it's not too choppy, and that we settle on something sooner or later. WP and HOD look really good, but their TMs are yet another purchase. Keeping my eye on ebay and the FS board.

*I* want the AAR for much the same reason as you...4th grader getting the bulk of school + baby getting the bulk of remaining attention + two in the middle who need to learn to read. I love the samples, I love the notes that tell you WHY certain activities are done...and yet, I've already overspent quite a bit on next year in general. But I don't want to let the boys fall by the wayside... FTR, I'm an affiliate, too, but I wasn't sure of the forum rules on signatures yet. I'll gladly share my link if anyone wants it by PM, but I'd rather not have it come across like I'm posting for the money. I like the way the program lays out what to do in a very research-based manner. It reminds me of my college days, trying to write the perfect project, incorporating everything we'd learned about how things *should* be taught....except that I majored in secondary ed. and swore that I'd NEVER teach little kids the alphabet. So, in a way, this has me nodding my head that yes, it's multi-sensory, it's rule-based, it builds phonemic awareness, etc., and in another way, it has me feeling all inferior that I don't know any of this stuff for early childhood, and I don't know if I'll realistically get around to researching and learning and doing without the hand-holding of a good curriculum.