I would check to see what your state's regulations are. We only have to keep a portfolio which is described as 2-3 examples of the child's work at different times of the year in each subject to show progress. Based on that I will only keep a few pages from each workbook. I will even tear their spelling work out of their composition books and then get rid of the book. I would rather not be faced with many workbooks to discard in the future. For me, the real proof is in my children's head. I did think about keeping all of one year's work "just in case" but our state doesn't require us to do so so I would rather not. I like using filexec presentation books for the portfolio as opposed to three ring binders because they take up so much less room and the papers won't be accidentally torn out. We only have to keep the portfolio for two years but I think I will keep them for much longer so that our children can see their progress since they take up such little space. In front of each book I do put our list of workbooks completed, etc.

Just looked at my email. No coupons for reams of paper. I also looked at next week's flyer--no coupons there either. Sometimes they do have sales in the store that are not advertised. . .

I would find out what really interests her. Does she like books about friendship or does she like books where animals talk? Does she like a certain kind of animal--dogs, cats, horses? Once you know what interests her then you can help steer things in that direction. My daughter was a reluctant reader too and she was stuck on picture books for a LONG time. She was capable of reading chapter books but she wasn't comfortable doing it. So I figured out what she enjoyed reading and then I kept bringing home books a little above her comfort level. When she would ask me to read them to her I would have her read them to me for a bit or I would tell her that she could read them to herself or to her dog. She would complain about the fact that there were too many words on the page, not enough pictures, etc but her curiosity did get the best of her in the end. I also noticed that she would reread the books we read together to herself or to her dog. So for her, I really do believe it was about comfort level. Another idea, which I also implemented, was to find an author who writes different levels of books. Jessie Haas comes to mind. She writes about horses (a topic my daughter loves). On her website she has listed her books according to grade levels and even has what she calls "transitional chapter books". I love that concept. Anyways find an author who writes book on the topics that interest her and start with at the level she feels comfortable with and then work your way up. The fact that she knows the author and the author's style may make her feel comfortable enough to move to the next level. Above all, be gentle.

Have you listened to SWB's lecture "What is Literary Analysis: When, Why and How Should I Teach It?"? It's on the Peace Hill Press website under audio lectures. I think that lecture will answer your questions. I also listened to her lectures on how to teach writing in the grammar grades and the middle grades. Her approach made sense to me and works really well with my children (who love to read). I was worried, like you, as to whether I should be doing in depth literary analysis. To make matters worse, I had all those books that you wrote about because my mother is a retired fourth grade teacher so I almost felt obligated to do that sort of literary analysis. After listening to her lecture I realized that I didn't need to keep those books. I hope this was helpful.

Here are some of my suggestions for you. I'm not really sure what reading on third grade level would entail. My aim was to get my children to love reading and then the skill level would go up from there. My daughter who will be starting "third grade" next year just started really enjoying reading chapter books on her own in the past couple of months. This is about when my son also started enjoying chapter books on his own (age 7 1/2). I'm not sure if that is the same situation for you. My son was easier to bump up to chapter books but my daughter clung to all the picture books. She said that there were too many words on the page. . .hmmmm. Anyways, if you daughter is in that situation I would not start with Misty of Chincoteague or The Borrowers (no pictures to break up the words and lots of words per page). Even now I think my daughter won't pick up Misty of Chincoteague although she knows the story and loves horses. Has your daughter read the animal books by Avi and Dick King-Smith (smaller chapter books with pictures)? Jessie Haas has wonderful books about horses and her books are great--she has written long picture books, shorter chapter books and more advanced chapter books. She even has some books in series (Beware the Mare comes to mind). My daughter liked to read a bunch of books by the same author and it was another easy way to gently bump up her reading level. Fun, feel good horse books are The Pony Pals. That is a long series of about 35 books and my daughter worked up to those too. Sorry for such a long response but you did write that your daughter hadn't caught on to "the love of reading" and I just thought I would share how I helped my daughter see how reading the "bigger" books opened up a whole new world to her. So, in short, my opinion would be to get her to see how great reading is and then add the books at the third grade level.

Cuddly, affectionate, no odor, good with kids, no shedding? Standard dachshunds. We have two standard dachshunds along with a Bernese Mountain Dog. The two doxies are my children's dogs. We got our wired haired doxie for my daughter when she was 4 and the short haired doxie when my son was 5. GREAT DOGS!!!! I cannot say that enough. Please note I said standard doxies, not the minis. Nothing against the mini's but the standards are much more stable temperament wise. Our doxies are about 17 pounds each and extremely affectionate. Our Berner is too big for your requirements plus Berner's have an undercoat that does shed. The wirehaired does not shed at all. Technically you are supposed to strip their coat instead of letting it go like we do. I take the clippers to him about once a year (a real no-no in the show ring but he is a family dog so it's ok with me). He does not shed at all. Just a bit of hair from the short haired doxie. They like to go on walks, hikes, remain active but enjoy being a couch potato too. My daughter's wiredhaired would be an excellent agility dog too. That dog is athletic! I love these dogs even though I was not a fan of small dogs. We searched and searched for the right breed. My daughter wanted a smaller dog and the doxie is essentially a small dog with a big dog personality. My advice would be to go to a knowledgable breeder. They are great at matching people/situations to the right dog of the litter. Good luck!

I am most excited about the fact that this will be our second year and it is no longer uncharted territory for me. It is a relief to know what to expect and that we can make this work. I love the freedom that homeschooling has given our family and that I no longer have to justify our reason for homeschooling to the grandparents or close friends.

I will always remember what one friend told me in college. He had gone to a prep school that was well known for its academic excellence. He said that he worked as hard there as he did in our college (an excellent, small liberal arts college where the work was intense). He said that by his junior year in college he was burnt out by working so hard for so many years. He was tired of all the expectations and the work load. It's like training for a race--do you want to train so hard that you peak early?

We love our chickens and our ducks too! For those of you in cold climates, our naked neck chickens lay through the winter. Our first flock were araucanas and they were rather whimpy and particular even though they laid pretty eggs. Our naked necks will eat all the table scraps we send out to them and they are very hardy. They come out of their house to greet me, even when it is 10 below zero! I love that breed. They are great and meat a dual purpose--good layers and meat birds too. We don't raise them for meat but when our bantam hatches out too many roosters, well, we only keep a couple of those and the rest will go in the freezer. I really enjoy our ducks but I do agree that they are messy. I change the water 2x's per day b/c of the ducks! But they are wonderful to watch. Our horses enjoy watching them too when they are in their stalls. Good luck and have fun!

I thought videos might be a nice addition to SOTW, especially with the Greeks and Egyptians. My children (7 y.o. and 9 y.o.) were not interested in the videos (I was surprised, especially since we don't watch a lot of videos here). They thought that the books were more interesting. It was OK with me since I was getting the videos through the library or netflix so I didn't invest in a series. So before you try to search out a bunch of video references, make sure it's something the kids will be interested in. Michelle

I like YamSlam. It's like Yahtzee but it's in it's own tin with chips instead of keeping track on a score card so it's easy to pack and play anywhere. Another great board game if your children like horses is Herd Your Horses. I don't mind playing it over and over and the children learn to make interesting moves. Also we like Labyrinth by Ravensburger. Not a great game to take camping but lots of fun and is different every time.

Thanks for all the suggestions! We will definitely be incorporating Legos into history now. We did the pyramid activity from the SOTW AG but I never thought to do anything else. . . I always ask myself why I spend some time every morning on this forum going through the threads when I could/should be doing something else. . .this just reconfirms that it is really time well spent. I also got some great links for art lessons too so this has been a very productive morning.

Are these going to be read alouds or will these books be read silently? Do you have to purchase them ahead of time or will you be getting them from the library? The reason why I ask is because your son's tastes may change over the next few months so if you don't absolutely have to purchase them ahead of time you will have the greatest flexibility. Keep the whole list and go from there. Also, your son may really like a particular book and some of the books have sequels such as My Side of the Mountain and Shiloh. If he is reading silently then you might want to take advantage of his enthusiasm to let him continue in the series. He may tear through those books and really surprise you. You may also find that while there isn't a series, there may be several books by that particular author and he may want to read a bunch of them. If you're reading them aloud then you may have a different type of agenda than sparking his interest. But then you will be giving him an incentive to read some of the books on his own. . . Also, for my children I choose the read aloud based on what else we're learning at the time and this particular read aloud is part of our school day. I let my children choose their own silent reading books and that seems to be working out well. It is interesting because their tastes in subject matter can change rapidly and their book choices are often affected by the medium in which the book is presented (read aloud, silent reading, book-on-tape).

I looked for a good "survey" book in our Library and settled on Lives of the Musicians by Kathleen Krull. We'd read the section on that composer (lots of interesting facts as well as a brief discussion of the music) and then we would listen to the music (easily selected from the library as well). We would do a notebook page on each musician (with simple info like date born, number of years lived, place of birth) and then my son and daughter would write about the music they listened to--anything they wanted. My daughter who is 7 would of course write lots and lots and my son, age 8, would just write a few words. I would slip this into a folder that already had page protectors in it and that would be it. This approach seems to be effective because I actually get requests for different composers at math time. I do not know a lot of about music so this was very simple and straight forward for me. And it gets done every week. I have a similar approach for art except that in addition to the notebook page we also do an art project.

My 7 y.o. did not like it. . .she thought it looked too young. I thought it was pretty but more as a crib set. My daughter's bedding is a combination of brown and a pinkish purple. Sophisticated, yet girly. I expect that she will get use out of it for many years to come. She has polkadot curtains that are cute without being very young girl. I would figure out what color you're going to paint the room and then go from there. Benjamin Moore has a great selection of historical paint colors where you can pick a pink or purple without it be overwhelming. We used Antique Pink and it goes beautifully with pink, purple, even greens. This way she can change her room in the future without the need to repaint. TJ Maxx often has girl bedding at great prices--complete sets--sheets, duvet covers, shams. . .

We are going to be in Denver at the end of April and it turns out Lego Fest will be there then. Is it worth going to? My son is 8 y.o. and he loves his legos. My daughter who is 7 y.o. likes them, but they are not her favorite thing. It will be over $100 for our family of 4 and the grandparents to go so I just wanted to be sure it was worthwhile. . . Also, any suggestions of other things to do in Denver while we're there. We love being outside so any interesting hikes would be appreciated. We live in rural NH on our own little farm so petting zoos, etc wouldn't really be of interest. If there are any places for great trail rides (with well treated horses) my daughter and I would love to experience that. She is an experienced rider with her pony. Are any of the museums more interesting than others? Any out of the way places worth considering? And one more thing. . .any suggestions of gluten free restaurants would be appreciated. Thanks in advance. Michelle

I would start with SOTW 1. I did that with my children who are in 2nd and 3rd grade. By December I decided to do 1 chapter/day because they were enjoying it so much and did less of the activities (but still did the narration questions). Sometimes we did the supplemental reading together but most of the time they did that on their own (especially if they were done a subject early--both children work on the same level except for math--my son is ahead of my daughter for that. And of course reading, my son is ahead of my daughter in that too but that doesn't affect our school time).

I would definitely start with volume 1. Then you can take the history of the world chronologically. Perhaps you can start SOTW now or over the summer. I am sure it would go quickly if you use the audiobook (it really reads like a story) so the SOTW books can set the stage for US History. My children try to place books they read or events they hear about in context to the history that they have learned (is this before or after __________? How much before/after?) I think that it is good that they already have a timeline in their mind. I feel that the SOTW books have really helped with that. Good luck with your decision!

We use Singapore Math here with great success. We also use an abacus which helps avoid the use of fingers or counting the pictures. The HIG helps tremendously to present the concepts. I have MM as a back up to go over more information but if I could do it all over again I would probably have not purchased MM because it seems to me that it is mostly repetitive worksheets. I have to say that for both of my kids I have been reducing the volume of math required and they both seem to be benefiting from that approach. Liping Ma's book is a good resource for me--now I can understand better how my children approach math. Very, very helpful. I also let my daughter use the white board. Being able to teach my daughter math in a way that makes sense to her has been one of the best benefits of homeschooling for me (and wasn't even one of the reasons--we started all this for my son!). She is such a good, quiet girl that tries hard and I think that nobody would have caught her issues with math until it was too late. I am so grateful that I was able to see what was happening in the beginning and meet her at her level. I don't think that would have happened if she had remained in a school setting (public or private).

I recently bought the 1st edition used for less than $5.00 on Amazon. Our library did not have it but I get a ton of books from inter-library loan and they do buy some of my requests so I thought I would just buy this one myself. I am glad that I bought it. Yes it is a bit dry but has lots of great info. I love the idea of composing and decomposing numbers. That concept has really helped my daughter. I have an even deeper understanding of Singapore math now. I will see if the library wants to put it on their collection once I am through with it. That way it's not taking up space on my shelf but I'll have access to it in the future. I plan to do the same thing with my Life of Fred books. . .

We do a chapter/day 4x's per week. I started doing that b/c I wanted to "catch up" in history and be on track within two and a half years instead of 4 (we started homeschooling this year, with my son in 3rd grade this year). I do the reading comprehension questions and usually pull books out of the library for the week on the topics we are reading. I never make a formal request for the kids to read those books but they always do. I spend a few moments relating that day's info to what we have read before (an informal review). We used to do some of the activities but that ended pretty quickly. We never do the coloring pages (no interest) and we do some of the maps. We have laminated maps for placemats and those get used A LOT and my children probably know more geography from using those maps at meal times than if I had formally taught a geography this year. They show their dad the regions they studied during dinner. I used to tie our read alouds with history but that didn't fit in well because there are just so many other books that we want to read (our public library is amazing and it is so hard to go in there and just pick out the books on The List). But somehow most books end up being related to our history lessons. For example we are reading Watership Down right now and there are references to some of the things we have studied in the past (like Odysseus) and I think it's great that the kids pick up on those references right away. The rabbits tell stories of their own history (myths) and my children were quick to notice that. History is not being spoon fed to my children but they are still creating the hooks that were discussed in the WTM. I want my children to love history and get a rhythm for what happened when all over the world (which I think SOTW really well). So, while we may not be that formal I think the information is really sinking in. Our history lesson takes about 20 minutes per day 4x's per week. I do it at the end of our school time because the kids enjoy it so much--they look forward to it and it is like the carrot at the end of the stick. Math is always done first in case you are wondering. . .

Why don't you have you designate a "reading buddy" for your son like a stuffed animal, the dog, the cat, etc.? My daughter loves reading to her dog--she even purposely picks out books at the library that she thinks he will like.

I listened to SWB's lecture on Literary Analysis and you might find that helpful too. She presented this info is such a great and approachable way. The lecture is available as a download on the Peace Hill Press Website. I would love to paraphrase the info but I know I wouldn't do it any justice. She's just so reassuring and I walked away with feeling like less is more. . .it really stayed with me that she spoke of not wanting to have the student feel like a book is a puzzle to solve. . . I hope that helps.

Depending on your printer, it might be just as cheap to print it--then you will only print as much as you need. .. Here is a link to Donna Young's website that has a bunch of different options. I prefer to do this because then I can have a wide variety of kinds such as the top half blank, full sheet, horizontal vs. vertical, etc. Good luck!

First of all, hand her your copy of the WTM to read (if she doesn't already have it). That of course is the best place for her to start. If she doesn't want to read that then maybe the whole thing will not work. She also really needs to make sure that independent work would work for her husband and her kids-- 9-2pm is a long time for a 2nd grader and 4th grader to work independently. What kind of work does her husband do? Can he be interrupted? Will he be working in the same room as the children? How well do the children get along? I have no doubt that she could pull of putting together an inexpensive but quality educational curriculum for her children but the main piece that I would focus on first is how to manage the "independent study" at her husband's work and how committed he is to having that work.