Thanks, Ladies. Any other input? It seems likely that we'll stick with the original plan.

We're doing "Geography" (very, very basic) studying ocean (names), continents, a country per continent or two this year. We're going to educate on a calendar year basis, and have just started. (What is a map? The world is a big place, isn't it? Let's make map of your bedroom stuff for January then expand). I keep looking at Galloping the Globe and thinking some of the supplements look good (particularly the cook book, as one of our main activities will be cooking food from where we're studying) and wondering if some of the activities would be something I could pull in. But, then, when I read the description, it says "cross words, word finds, etc" and that makes me think this would be a waste of money for K4 ... and that I'm not very into that kind of seat work for the long run anyway. Anyway, my question is, how much of the program is that kind of work? Should I just buy some of the reference(d) books and to supplement what I make up myself (which is what I intended to do anyway ... but if there's something that well respected where the work is done for me ........)

Our second week of school; our first week of Weekly Reporting

You can see a limited preview of the book Bill mentions here: http://books.google.com/books?id=EjkKBotJcyIC (I don't know limited it is, I just googled and looky what I found [grin])

How about games like Simon Says and Red-Light/Green Light? She's probably a bit old, but my kids like the game Hullabaloo (by the Cranium folks) which is all listening. It might be a good, fun place to start with listening. Then, again, my oldest is 4 ...

Doorposts' Polished Cornerstones (for girls) /Plants Grown Up (for boys) looks like it would be interesting for Character training and is "5-Adult" so would last a long time ...

There were 8 moms at our recent planning meeting and there are a number of other families who homeschool as well. We have a pretty even split between homeschool and Christian school ... I only know of one family who public schooled the whole way through.

I know our church holds a Homeschooler's recitation night. My friend video-tapes her kids reciting, then sends the video to her parents who don't live close by.

A resource I love is the blog Preschoolers and Peace. Kendra has many good ideas and sound recommendations on how to work with many little ones.

I saw plastic ones at Meijer for $7.99 and scooped three up.

My husband, the abdicate-all-things-school-related to me, has one request: that I teach diagramming sentences (of all things LOL) He says that it helps him understand the meaning of written statements a lot better. I can still see him parse sentences in his head when he's trying to figure them out. We'll do diagramming here for sure. (Oh, and he's a Software Developer)

O-HI-O! We're in Delaware, just north of 'old Columbus town' (Go Buckeyes) Didn't go to CHEO, but did go to Cincinnati (and hope to next year as well ... it was wonderful)

Congratulations from another dawn in Ohio with a daughter named Margaret (aged 3-1/2 [smile])

An OPC pastor, Francis Breisch Jr. wrote an OT Survey (The Kingdom of God) and a NT Survey (The Ministry of Christ). It is published by Christian Schools International (but I couldn't get their online store to load!) Amazon often has used copies and you can google other places. Anyway, it was written as a Middle School series. The Kingdom of God is ordered approximately chronologically and divided into 4 parts: Part I The period of Theocratic Beginnings, Part II The Period of Theocratic Establishment, Part III The Period of Theocratic Development, Part IV The Period of Theocratic Decline, and Part V The Period of Theocratic Transition. Each Chapter has a Purpose, Outline, Analysis, Conclusion, and Exercises (questions based on the Analysis), some "Thought Questions" which are a little more in depth and require a conclusion, and finally some memory work. Some books are covered in more than one chapter, others are covered in one chapter. I've gone through about the second half of this book with a Ladies' Bible Study at church (starting after I had my first child) and we're working on the NT book now. We use it basically as a spine and bring in more in depth study, but as-is would probably be about right for a younger student. The Ministry of Christ is set up approximately the same way, although the gospels are harmonized and a vast majority of the book is studying the gospels with much more summary treatments of Acts through Revelation.

I, too, found it dull; I did not find it an engaging read at all. Their scripture exegesis to get stages of "Knowledge, Understanding, Wisdom" in place of "Grammar, Dialectic, and Rhetoric" I thought shaky at best. Also, I am *not* a better late than never person (my oldest, 3 years old, begs to do school *every *day). I wish I had only paid $27 or less for it. I do refer to it now and again, but I would put something else on my wishlist (WTM, Wisdom & Eloquence, Dr. Perrin's introduction to Classical Ed)

Peter Rabbit is a huge hit here in any incarnation, but this pop-up is fun.

My husband and I like to entertain and have veggies and dip or other such combinations, so the veggie tray was a great idea. And I really don't mind re-gifts or garage sale finds of such things ... as long as they've been cleaned out. I must admit I was kinda grossed out when I pulled the pretty glass dish out of the box and there were little bits of broccoli florets stuck to the glass. Then I ran it through the dishwasher and I've used it for years :)

Schindler's List (Keneally) is a novel based on a true story. Along the same lines as Wiesel's memoirs (highly recommended!) are Primo Levi's Survival in Auschwitz and The Reawakening. Scooting back to the K-8 board, now ... WWII was kinda my "thing" growing up.

Here (http://amblesideonline.org/LivingBks.shtml) is a link from Ambleside Online that has a pretty good explanation. Hmmm ... my link didn't work right the first time

The only thing I use the TM for is the book recommendations for each letter ... there are usually 1-5 books listed at the beginning of each letter's lesson that I can look for in the library (sadly, my library doesn't always have them). Once I went through the TM on the first letter, I had an idea of what else to do :)

Also, evidently you used to have to paste in your own prints (?) but they're now in the book.

Wonderful! I've already downloaded them, thanks!

Hi! My name is dawn and I'm 35. I have three children (as you'll see below). My husband and I have always wanted to homeschool (we talked about it before we got engaged!) and we're now on our way as we're doing some "preschool" with our oldest. I have a degree in Social Studies Education (don't boo ... it was certainly part of what caused me to want to homeschool!) from the Ohio State University. We're Christians and intend to school "classically." Some books I like are WTM (obviously), Wisdom and Eloquence, and Dr. Perrin's booklet about Classical Christian Education. I'd like to like Teaching the Trivium, but it seriously bores me to tears ... I'm sure I'll refer to it often in the coming years. Dr. Perrin's booklet helped me tie ideas from WTM and W&E together. I really like the idea from W&E about scoping and sequencing from 12th to K, then finding curriculum that fits what you want to teach. I'm in the enviable position of being able to work toward a goal like that since I don't have to do "K" for 2 more years. Otherwise, I like to read and play with my kids. I don't like housework (understatement of the year). I like to make parenthetical comments (probably too much ... oops there I go again). We live in Central Ohio where I was born and raised. I've enjoyed reading (particularly the K-8 board) and look forward to getting to know you all better.

It is the "Spanish Kids Songs CD" It doesn't sound too goofy so far, there are a list of songs on the site. The songs are translations of songs we sing or latin folk songs (I'd guess): The Spanish list corresponds with the English (there aren't English songs) ... I don't see how to make columns, sorry. The songs aren't obnoxious in any way (in fact I lost track of them in the background as I was cooking dinner) other than they are obviously not professional singers [shrug] We've only listened once, and I could do without Feliz Navidad, but so far so good.

I received this yesterday, May 6, so the turnaround was pretty good :) Looks good so far, I saved files and played the cd ... my kids enjoyed listening to the songs.