LEMI stands for Leadership Education Mentoring Institute. It is a collection of semester long projects for students. They follow the Thomas Jefferson Education philosophy. The courses are for children ages 12 and up, and different classes teach history, Shakespeare, math/science, and world views. They incorporate classics, and the higher the course, the more rigorous it is. The first class, for 12-13 year olds, is called Key of Liberty. It is a two semester course. The first semester discusses the Revolutionary War and the kids memorize the Declaration of Independence along with several reading and writing assignments. The second semester covers the Constitutional Convention and the kids are encouraged to memorize the Preamble along with more reading and writing assignments. In the Shakespeare class the first semester is spent reading/viewing/listening to as many Shakespeare plays as possible. The kids participate in a "race to royalty" receiving higher rankings for reading/viewing more plays, until they finally become "Kings/Queens" after at least 17 plays. Then the second semester they put together a production where they perform one of the plays, complete with costumes, sets, lighting, props, and often done with a modern interpretation as far as costumes (I've seen one set in the 50s, and one set in the 20s) but still with full Shakespeare language. Hope that helps some!

I don't post a lot here, but I need some help. We've used Phonics Road for several years now. My oldest is most of the way through Level 3. But it's become way too much for us. I have 8 children, 5 of whom are in Phonics Road. They don't always work well together, so even the ones who are close to the same level need to be taught separately. We have taken a break from Phonics Road for the past 6 months or so as we have been prepping a house for sale, moving and settling into our new house. As we are settling back into a routine I am realizing that my children are doing great with reading, literature, and writing but need tons of help with spelling. I'm considering dropping Phonics Road all together and replacing it with AAS, and possibly a grammar curriculum. So, my questions: 1. Given that my children have done Phonics Road and know most of the phonemes and many spelling rules, would they still need to start at the beginning of AAS? Is there a placement test available? Should I just review each level with them anyway? 2. On average, when do kids finish level 7 of AAS? My oldest is finishing 5th grade and is a very good speller already. Looking at the scope and sequence of the different levels, I would guess she already knows everything through at least level 5, most of level 6, and a lot of level 7. Should I still review with her? Should I have her jump into level 6 or 7? Or should I just let her go without additional spelling? She does writing exercises now, I help her edit them, and then she corrects her spelling mistakes on her own using a dictionary if she can't figure out the spelling. 3. How fast could one go through the levels if children already know the material? Should I buy as many levels as possible to begin and just review them quickly? Or should I buy one at a time and help each of the kids through it? 4. Especially during the review stages, how feasible is it to teach multiple children at the same time with AAS? 5. What grammar curriculum would you recommend? I'm not too concerned about grammar for my lower elementary students, and I would like something basic and independent for the upper elementary students. Thank you for your help!

Hmm... we have Math Mammoth and all my kids hate it. It's torture to get them to do any of it and they are so bored. My daughter has all her math facts down cold. She knows a lot of algebra concepts that she didn't learn in TT5, but just in every day life. We talk about math a lot. The other thing I need to worry about is that my 10 year old is the oldest of 8 kids. Whatever I get for her needs to last through 7 other children and various learning styles. I'm looking at Life of Fred. Any comments?

My oldest is now 10 and would be 5th grade this year. We have always homeschooled. We started with RightStart Mathematics and she completed Level B and about 1/3 of Level C before family dynamics pushed us to switch curriculum. Last year she worked on Teaching Textbooks level 5, and also used TimezAttack for fact drilling. She recently finished TT5 and all levels of TimezAttack for addition, subtraction, multiplication, and division. We have talked about going back to RightStart as I haven't been super impressed with TT, but I am second guessing that as well. She is a very independent learner and is really loving math right now. According to RightStart's placement test she could start in Level E or even Level G if I cover factoring with her a bit more. I think there are valuable lessons in Level E for her to learn, so I don't want to push her to Level G right now, but I'm nervous that she would be bored with some of the repetition in Level E (though it would probably be good for her). Now I'm wondering if I should do something completely different and go ahead and put her in a pre-algebra program, but I am really not familiar with what is available for curriculum beyond grade school. She has also played around with the DragonBox app and loved the puzzles in that. I think she might be ready for pre-algebra. What would you recommend? What curricula should I be looking at? I am a mathy person, as is my DH, and this daughter seems to be as well. I would love a good, solid program that would be able to take her through high school math and make it possible for her to take an AP test in the future.

Has anyone used these programs together, or do they overlap too much? I feel quite drawn to IEW, but we are currently loving PR. We're only now in the middle of PR2, so I don't even know how much writing is taught in the later levels. Any thoughts or experience would be much appreciated.

So many options! Thanks!!

I think DH mostly wants them to have some exposure to History & Science, and to be in the habit of "doing school." I think he would like them to be doing things so they actually retain some of the information they learn, but he knows I'm not very good with the projects & activities, and he'd really just like us to be doing something rather than nothing. Those Task Cards look fantastic! My oldest could definitely do those on her own. I have no idea what her official reading level is, but she enjoys reading Magic Tree House and American Girl books out loud to her sisters after bedtime. :) My second might not enjoy the task card idea as much as my oldest, but she would love to explore in a "prepared environment." Actually, all of my kids would enjoy that. :) Hmmm... good things to consider, thanks! If anyone else has other suggestions, I'd love to hear them!

My oldest will be 8 in May, #2 will be 7 in May, #3 turned 5 in December, #4 &5 are 3 1/2, #6 is 18 months, and #7 is 4 weeks. Next fall I'll have a 3rd grader, 2nd grader, kinder, 2 pre-k 4 (they'd miss the deadline for public school), and a toddler and infant. I have no problem teaching my older three together... in theory. In practice, my oldest is more advanced and happily does the work, while the others drag their toes, whine and complain, or just don't pay attention or understand. My 5yo isn't writing more than letters at this point, and can't really do much more than listen to read-alouds, give me a short narration, and possibly some very short copywork. Which is probably fine for her. The main issue though, is that I don't seem to even be able to have time for that. We had a girl coming to play with my littles once a week so I could do history with the oldest two, but she moved out of state and can't come anymore. When she did come, she was here for two hours, and we could sometimes finish a week's worth of history in those two hours... depending on cooperation. Without someone watching the younger ones though, I'm just not able to give a history lesson the focused attention it would need. I only have one who takes consistent, predictable naps, and when I do manage to enforce a quiet time, I end up napping too... and I need it. I'm really hoping to find something that I can give to my kids workbox style and have them do mostly on their own... at least the oldest. I could possibly do some read-alouds for history & science for the younger ones, but then I'd like to be able to hand them a composition book, or a worksheet or something and have them complete it on their own. I've seen some of the Evan-Moor things. We used some of their History Pockets last year. My kids loved them... but I had a hard time with the projects. I'm probably horrible for this... but I have a really hard time with my kids using craft supplies. There are so many little ones around here that it's nearly impossible to monitor all of those, and we end up with far too many markers/crayons/pencils/pens on walls/furniture/clothing/etc, as well as scissors & glue being misused to glue papers to the wall, or cut clothing/hair/toys/bedding/etc. And it's not always the tiny ones doing it. My kids are very artistic and creative and I try to give them a chance a few times a week to create things (plus they get a lot of art time at our co-op), but I don't have the energy for extra crafts right now. I'll need to look into the Elemental Science stuff, thanks for the link. My kids LOVE Magic Schoolbus when they watch it at Grandma's. We are trying to limit screen time as much as possible, do you think they'd get as much out of the books? Maybe I could get some from the library.

We have seven children from 7 1/2 years down to 4 weeks. Currently we have a 2nd grader, a 1st grader, a pre-k, and several younger ones. We LOVE using Phonics Road with our oldest two, and we have enjoyed RightStart Mathematics. We have used some various science and history curricula, but I'm not using them now. DH is very concerned and would prefer that we "did school" more often than we are currently doing. Unfortunately, I'm having a really hard time finding the time to do lots of teacher-intensive curricula at this stage of motherhood, and I'm trying to find some other options. We would like to continue with Phonics Road, but we are trying out Math Mammoth now, and are specifically looking for history & science options. My hope for the "perfect" curriculum: Using classic books at appropriate reading levels. Written work (essays, copywork, etc) to test comprehension Book lists focusing on four year history rotation & four year science rotation Conservative Christian values, but non-denominational Minimal parental involvement (making reading assignments, and correcting essays & copywork, but not involved in lecturing or projects or anything) Inexpensive (isn't this helpful for all curricula? ;) ) I have looked a bit into Robinson Curriculum and Accelerated Achievement, but I'm thinking those are focusing more on the 3-R's, and less on history and science? I feel like we have the 3-R's mostly covered. One other thought is if there is some formula for using any book for a self-teaching curricula, I would love to know it. (Something like: read 3 pages, write 4 sentances about what you read, define 2 vocab words from the passage you read, and copy one sentance.) I guess Charlotte Mason basically teaches this, but I'm just not sure how to assign things like this to my kids. I don't feel like I have time to research much of anything, and really I just need something I can hand to my kids. Currently I'm handing them a folder each day with a handwriting worksheet (that I created) to practice with, and a few Math Mammoth worksheets. Then I'm working on making sure I spend 30-45 minutes with each of the older three doing PR. I would like to be able to add a reading assignment with comprehension exercises or writing assignments to the folders of the older two, to cover their history and possibly science. Any ideas, thoughts, suggestions? Thank you!

Is there any resource where I could possibly find a discounted or used copy of the Phonic's Road Level 2? I know the price works out quite nicely when used for multiple children... and this would be just starting with my oldest (7 1/2), and I'm currently expecting our seventh... She has 4 weeks left in Level 1, and we absolutely do not have the cash to pay full price right now... any ideas?