I like the Drama of American History. It has multiple volumes like Hakim, but the text is less busy. I find them to be balanced and well-written.

There is no profession that can claim 100% of its members are scrupulous. Government officials are no exception.

If she is writing other days besides the day she does formal writing then I think that's fine. As for spelling, if it's only once a week, I don't really see the point. I would just review misspelled words with her and work on it in the context of her writing. For logic, is she just doing logic puzzles like Building Critical Thinking Skills or is she moving to actual, formal logic? The workbook type thing would be fine for once a week, but I think formal logic would require more time than that. My gut reaction is that once a week grammar is not enough. Personally I would do 2-3 times a week with one of the days being an application to her own writing. But since I don't know your dd, once may very well be fine.

Dd should finish SWR at the beginning of next year (6th for her). We keep a misspelled words list that she reviews periodically. We will keep doing this even though we will be finished with formal spelling. I will also encourage her to look up words in the dictionary.

I forget lots of things. I'm so thankful for alarms on my calendar. I don't know what I would do without them. Recently I did forget to fill out and mail some paperwork for a reimbursement. It's past the deadline now so I can't get the money. It wasn't for a ton of money, but I still felt really bad when I realized what happened. Does sangria count as Mexican fare? I could really use some tonight. My favorite swim stroke to do is the breaststroke. My favorite one to watch others do (because i cant do it well myself) is the butterfly.

I am so glad for this thread. My kids are average, and I feel like I am failing bc all hs kids should be super smart, right? Dd11 asked me today where my sister attends church. I said, "Westminster." She said, "Oh, Westminster Abbey?" Um, no, dear child. That's in London. We are in NC.

There's an attendance form on the DNPE website. You don't have to use that though. It's just the months and days with boxes to check. You could easily make something like it yourself, but I just print off theirs bc it saves me time.

He does do better with bigger print. That's a good point. If he has trouble with smaller print at his age is that developmentally ok or does that mean there is something wrong with his vision. He also does better with copywork if it's just one line as opposed to 2 or 3. How does I help him get a stragety for accuracy in copywork? Does he need to see someone about coding issues if that's what it is? Is there something I can be doing at home for that?

Thank you both so much for the info! I will do some reading and then decide whether he needs to be tested.

I'm not sure if I'm posting this open the right board so if I need to move it, please let me know. I am a little concerned about ds's reading. He is 8 and finishing up 2nd grade. He was doing copywork today, which he hates, and made a frustrated sound. Then he commented that he wished the words would stop disappearing. I asked him what he meant and he said that he will write a word and then look back at the copywork to see that there was a word in front of the word he just wrote. He was frustrated because he had to keep erasing his work to put the skipped word in. I then asked him if words ever disappear when he reads. He said that they do. I have noticed him skipping words when he reads aloud, but I chalked it up to him being in a hurry. Frequently he will correct himself when he misses something so I didn't think it was a big deal. Is he just being an 8 yr kid who is not paying close attention? Could he be dyslexic or something else? I am out of my element here. He decodes well despite skipping some words. He is reading Mr. Popper's Penguins to me at the moment and he understands and enjoys the story. He gets tired when he reads though- like it takes a lot of effort for him. He is a really good speller and he does well with word problems in math. He has trouble reading and understanding directions, but he's just in 2nd grade. I really have no idea whether I am being paranoid or he needs to see someone (and if so, who?). Any advice would be much appreciated!

It's super scripted so if that kind of thing turns you off, best to look elsewhere. I agree with PP that you don't really need the cd. We also do every other year with Shurley because it repeats so much from level to level. Things I like: I like their explanations. I like using questions and answers to find parts of speech. I like the vocabulary and repetition. The jingles are sometimes annoying, but they are memorable. Things I dislike: The writing is terrible, IMO. I skip it entirely. The sentences that you parse do not vary much at all in their sentence structure. I found that dd had a hard time finding parts of speech in regular sentences that weren't laid out in the perfect Shurley way. If you use sentences from literature every now and then, that may correct that problem. I am using KISS in our non Shurley years and the combination is great. KISS used real world sentences, and I am able to use the Shurley explanations and questions to help her with the KISS sentences. It has worked really well.

We had life science in seventh. Evolution came up then, but not in great detail. We had earth science in eighth and talked about the age of the earth. Evolution was taught heavily in high school in my biology and AP biology classes. I went to ps in the 90s.

I had a cousin who did that. With family and friends, she was polite but consistent about correcting people who used the wrong name. As for school, she made the switch when she went to middle school so it was a bit easier to get new friends and teachers to get used to the new name. It was weird at first, but after a few years I didn't even think about her nickname anymore. Dh changed his name from nickname to full name when he was 7. Apparently he just announced to his mother one day that he would no longer go by his nickname because it was a baby name. I have never heard anyone in his family use his nickname so obviously the transition was successful. I changed my name from nickname to full name in third grade when I went to a new school. My older cousin (yes, the same one that changed her name) convinced me it was cool and grown up. It lasted maybe a year. I had a hard time answering to it, and I never corrected anyone who called me by my nickname. Ultimately, I just wasn't that into it and went back to my nickname. I think the success of a name change largely has to do with the degree to which the person really wants to change it.

I would definitely take her to a GI, and I would take her to get her allergies tested. My dd is also struggling with stomach issues right now. She recently had to drop out of gymnastics because it got so bad. The GI found signs of inflammation that the ped did not, and we are currently following up with that. A specialist can really make a world of difference at times.

I am a Christian. I do not homeschool specifically for religious reasons. Frankly, I would "pass the bean dip" with the pastor as much as possible. The salt and light argument is so flimsy that it smacks of someone who wants to prove that the way he has chosen to do something is the only biblical way. If he pressures you, I would reply that ps is one area where one could be salt and light, but there are many other options for fulfilling this directive. Where else must everyone be salt and light? Should everyone go to college? Get a job? Get the same job? Why is it ok for adults to be salt and light in many different ways, but children are confined to ps? One of the beauties of God's people is that they are such a diverse group. Forcing everyone to minister in the same way limits the influence of the very kingdom the pastor seeks to expand.

Baby Bjorn bibs have saved my little ones' clothes time and time again. They are pricier than some other bibs, but they hold up so well that it's worth it. At one, my littles usually stayed in the same clothes all day. I didn't fuss over little stains unless we were going out somewhere.

Your dd sounds just like my ds when we first started WWE. He had a hard time with the questions and complete sentences, but we kept plugging away and his abilities have grown by leaps and bounds. Even though those passages are short, the sentence structure and vocabulary are difficult for a lot of kids. And remember that just because your dd can speak in complete sentences, that doesn't mean she really knows what a complete sentence is. This process will help her see, in time, that "the pear" is a fragment and "Tommy picked the pear." is a sentence. It will take time, but she will get it. It sounds like you are doing everything right. Don't be discouraged- just give it some time. I think you will be pleasantly surprised when you look back on the progress made in a few months.

If you must go to school to learn to deal with bullying, then it must not happen outside of school. If it doesn't happen outside of school, it's not exactly a necessary life skill and you shouldn't need to learn it. If it does happen outside of school (which we all know to be true), why would you specifically have to go to a school to learn to deal with it? Also if we are sending our kids to school in part so that they can learn to deal with bullies, why are so many schools cracking down on bullying behavior? If we want our kid to sink or swim in some kind of Darwinian social setting, we should tell the teachers to back off and let whatever happens happen.

I feel the same way. I don't think I could give up a baby that I had carried whether it was genetically mine or not, but I am in awe of those who can give such a beautiful gift.

This made me think of the time an angry parent burst into my English teacher's room accusing her of being a racist because of the Confederate flag on her wall. The situation was taken to the principal's office where he explained to the distraught parent that the teacher taught British literature, and the flag was actually the Union Jack, lol. My 11th grade chem teacher calculated in class the amount of ice chips you should consume to lower your internal body temperature so that your body would burn calories to get back up to the correct temperature. Basically, he taught us the best way to be anorexic. Same teacher made us stand behind the door while he taped a lit match to a yardstick, stuck it out of the crack in the door and created some kind of explosion. He was always complaining about various flame-throwing devices that the school had taken away from him.

That last paragraph is me to a T. It's not that I can't see other alternatives or realize that other things might be fun. It's just not what I have in my head as what is "supposed" to happen. I've gotten much better over the years. It really is a maturity and time issue. Also if I have to see another view point when I already have something planned out in my head, it's good for me to have some space to get used to the idea. In other words, someone changing my plans and expecting me to be fine and excited 30 seconds later is too much for me. I need to mull it over and get adjusted to the idea. Maybe when you need to change your daughter's plans, give her some space to think about it a bit. Expect that there will be an adjustment period as she changes her thinking, and don't push her to be fine with the new plans immediately.

In Horizons I believe adding and subtracting fractions is in 4. That is reviewed in 5 and then multiplication and division of fractions is introduced.

I don't think my brother picked up a book voluntarily until he was in his 20s. My mom read to us all the time, and my sisters and I are avid readers, but he just wasn't interested. I don't know why the switch flipped, but it did eventually. At 30 he now has stacks of books in his room. Something I never thought would happen. On the other hand, my father is not a big reader. I have a lot of admiration and respect for him. He is great with people and has many wonderful qualities. I would be thrilled if my kids took after him. It is possible to be a fulfilled, caring, wonderful person without being a reader. Since books are very important to me, this is hard for me to understand, but I know it's true. I would be disappointed if one of my kids disliked reading, but I hope I would keep in mind that there are some pretty great people out there who also don't like to read.

I used super scripted stuff when dd was in K. I was terrified of messing up her education and of her being illiterate or something. As I got used to homeschooling, I didn't need the crutch and I relaxed and became more confident. I am glad the script was there in the beginning though. I might not have had the nerve to try homeschooling otherwise. Now I use some scripted stuff, but I rarely use the script. The only thing I really follow the script for is WWE. I have used scripted stuff for grammar, but I glance over it, get the gist of how to explain the concept, and then do it in my own words. I like the progression of those programs and their explanations so I continue using them even though I don't use the script.

Could you get the audio CDs for SOTW for the older girls to listen to sometime during the day? I would let them listen to that while you do something with the youngers and then get a narration from your oldest. Then at nap time you would only have the fiction read aloud to do (let them draw a picture or something while you read if you want some kind of output) and then hopefully some down time for you.