just wondering if someone has used both and really likes one or the other, and why. thanks!

the only summer that we didn't do math, my girls really forgot a lot. so we keep on in math year-round. i think it really helps to keep going with it.

AudreyTN-can you tell more about that combo? I've purchased Song School Latin. Do you think it is worth it to get the others and combine? What was the benefit and how do they mesh? thanks! (I had thought I'd finish Song School and then move to Prima Latina, keeping all of my kids together.)

btw, if you decide to try AAS, it seems to help to get a material packet (but not tiles) for both students. that way you can keep your cards sorted by student for practice. if one girl knows a word, it goes in a certain place in the index card box. but if the other needs to practice it then it goes in a different place. so it is just easier to have 2 sets of that I think.

We tried Sequential Spelling to no avail. I too think All About Spelling might do the trick. I bought megawords and from your description think you would do better to start with AAS bc/ megawords begins at 4th grade spelling and AAS teaches all of the rules carefully. I asked for a comparison of AAS and Apples and Pears here recently and people who had used both prefer AAS. That helped me. HTH! Oh, and I too think we could help you if we headed over there for a week or two ;)

thanks 5sons! I wasn't sure if we needed to back way up! i'll check out D and see how she does with that.

my son loves to draw and i am inept at anything art. he is 6. he can see things like really neat ships in his head and draw them. but if i ask him to draw a picture he sees in a book, he says he can't. any ideas? i really want to help encourage his obvious talent and wonder if giving him certain kinds of books will squelch it by teaching him certain ways to draw certain things instead of just helping him draw. he doesn't draw the way i'd think. i.e. once he drew mickey mouse. first he drew the overalls. all i could see was an "H" and then it slowly became mickey mouse and the H became his outfit. maybe that will help some artist out there understand more about his way and help me know what to do now to further it. thanks!

My dd is finishing up 3rd grade BJU math. We've previously used 1st thru 3rd R&S, but when we got to multiplication and division she really struggled. I switched her to MUS and had her start at the beginning and work up just to help her get the concepts. It just didn't do it for her. So this year we used BJU Dvd's. She still isn't really getting it. I just read the new WTM and realize I really shouldn't have pushed her to finish, but should have taken the time to teach her the concepts carefully I think. I am using RS A for my sons and thought I could try her in RS. But, if she doesn't understand multiplication, division, and carrying in multiplication, then where would you suggest starting her? (She does know her addition/sub facts very well.) Thanks!

i tried mus with my girls, now am using rightstart with my boys and my 6 y.o. seems to be understanding it and I like it more than I liked mus, for whatever that is worth! i really think the abacus makes sense and my ds's love, love the games each day. maybe you could do a search on rightstart or rs and see what others have said about it. my girls never really undertood place value with mus even though i really thought the way he taught it should make sense.

sonlight has one in their core 1 with a reader grade level of 4, read-aloud grade 1. here is a link http://www.sonlight.com/1H18.html

this is sort of not answering the question (although we too plan to use Leading Little Ones this year for our 4 and 6 y.o.) but for scripture memory we are using Hide 'Em in Your Heart cd's by Steve Green. The videos are the same songs too so reinforce them. I tried using the SL scripture cd's and didn't like them quite as much as these. Once they can read at a 2nd grade level I like them to use the R&S readers for their own devotion reading aside from what we do together, or the Beginner's Bible. Both are pretty easy for them to use. They just move on through each year of the R&S readers for their reading time since that keeps it on their reading level.

i just told my dh tonight that i want to order it and do it when the cd is ready, so I can't stop you. it looks great! Do you have something with info about each composer or do you plan to just use the internet, or what? (Did you see that Amy said it doesn't include that, just the projects?) We have Story of the Orchestra and all of the Beethoven's Wig cd's, but that is all. We've never really studied composers. I am excited!

We've switched things up this time around! we are loving the SL read-alouds and I Can Read It, Rightstart Math A, and we just started Ordinary Parents Guide to Teaching Reading (I've done SSRW 3 times and am working through grade 1 with the 6 yo and think we'll keep reading the readers, but I think I'll enjoy the change to OPGTTR myself!) My son loves BJU math so we sprinkle that in some, play the math games from Rightstart and the phonics games from SSRW, and listen to fun music each day like Beethoven's Wig. We loved the Kumon workbooks and the R&S workbooks before this. And we just started doing memory work with Linguistic Development through Poetry Memorization. They are loving that!

we use this http://www.mathusee.com/drill.html#top every day for at least 5 minutes to practice anything they've already covered. for a while we used R&S speed drill books but haven't in a while.

i found that i love the SL read-aloud choices in the early years (k-2) but didn't absolutely love the history choices bc/ i really want a history program with more hands-on choices. So, we continue to use SL for book recommendations and to read all of the readers and read-alouds, but not the history choices. I also ended up labeling the edges of all the books by core year and just grabbing the next one off the shelf when we finish one, instead of following the TM. This works for us since we aren't reading the history, just the fun lit. I think I'll be using the Childrens History of the World that I bought with SL this year with SOTW 1 using the schedule on Paulas Archives and still enjoying some great SL recommendations too. So, we just figured out what we did love about SL and what we didn't and made it work for us!

for those of us just starting, can anyone tell how you go about finding a good enough pair of binoculars for each kid? Oh -- my ds (6) saw his first purple finches this week. He said, "They are so pretty, I can't keep my eyes off of them"! (((I think this nature study thing is working!)))

I am just starting down this road of memory work with my kids. we bought linguistic development through poetry memorization and fll and plan to buy wwe. do we need to buy living memory now and begin now with it too or is there enough memory work in these other sources for us this next year? tia!

We used grade 3 dvd's this year. We were in the middle of a big move to another state, had things in storage for 4 years to weed through and unpack, were away for 6 weeks mid-year, and so on. So, for this year, it was the perfect solution for us! My dd's really loved it and asked to do it again. One of them cried on her last day of English because she said she'd miss the teacher. I really loved the Bible curriculum. They loved their teachers even though some of them had little quirks that sort of bugged me. My kids couldn't see the quirks. Here are the cons that I saw: There is a bit of fluff. but, my kids like the fluff like the cheesy character puppets that come in and chat with the teacher. I missed our SL so have added that back in. It is a longggg day (think they are in school all day just as if they went to a school). I think my daughters need hand holding in math. They didn't get enough with the teacher alone. I'd have to sit and work with them after math class. Math is not their strength though and I am sure this is not true for others. You really have to watch the mom's minutes for all of the classes and check their work. I didn't do this almost all year. We had a very, very busy year. As life settled down and I began to watch classes with them and check their work from the year, I found that they had skipped things, had things wrong (I had asked them to check their work with the TM and come to me if they needed help), and really didn't get some concepts well. So, I think if your son needs hand holding, you'd really need to be checking each class and walking him through any trouble spots each day and it will take more of your time than you think. But, at least while he watches the teacher you can be helping the younger ones. That has been great for me. I just did the older ones a disservice by not overseeing them more at least at some time each day. I think my kids got more out of it than they would have gotten from me this year. But I think we may try to go back to our hodge podge of WTM/SL/whatnot next year. I am still debating! If I owned it once we were done, I'd be more tempted to do it again.

I didn't end up using mine if you want to email me. you are welcome to buy it. i have annotations, the rods, and a full set of the workbooks. people told me not to get the diary or notes, so i don't have them.

:iagree: Keep them together with very different expectations for them. I have a desk in the room for my 4 y.o. with a stack of puzzles, hwot capital letter blocks and magnadoodle, and that sort of thing. When he wants he can sit there quietly. That way he is still listening and I think gleaning something. With my older 2, I taught the one during the other's nap. Now I think that was a BIG mistake! The younger didn't glean anything from what I was doing with the older! Silly me. My 4 y.o. doesn't get much of RS A. When I ask him what comes next after 4, he says "8!" But then I remind him to count and he gets to 4 and says "5, 6, 7" and I repeat it and show him that 5 came next. So I try to help him too, but the 6 y.o. is much farther along. I bought 3 abacus so we have one for each of us. He does all of that with us. I think he likes it!

I've never used either. I just got fll to use with my ds for 1st grade. i thought fll had the copywork and narrations in it, so exactly why is wwe needed? Why two things? If you use both, do you skip anything from fll? my ds is not good at handwriting yet either, so I wouldn't want to begin dictations yet. But I don't want to miss the boat. Should I be getting WWE? thanks!

I'd think B would be ok if you want it to be all print. But you could print check a sample from each and then decide. My dd's did B and we have C for them too, but C is the transition to cursive. Also, somewhere I read that it is fun to do it yourself with them. I am tempted to do that this year.

We've done 1 and 2 and I'd also say to do core 1 alone. It is so rich. Like one l michele said, the readers aren't linked to the history. So my dd's just read alternate books at a time. The older one is a much faster reader anyway, so she plowed through her year and then I had to find more books for her. The other needed the whole year. You could always have them both read core 1 readers at a pace that suits each, then have the older read core 2 when finished. We loved those readers! We read core 3 after and now are on core 4.

another vote for rightstart. i think the rs card games are a worthwhile addition to any math program. my girls like to do my son's rs with him! and i like that he is really starting to "see" math.

I had my dd's practice with Getty Dubay italic last year so their print would be "pretty". It did the trick and I really like the look of their print. This year we switched to BJU handwriting bc/ we were doing the DVD's, but I really like the GD look better and it is a very "quick" print to write, which I think helps them in later years to take quick notes. BJU teaches calligraphy in 6th grade I think. I'd like my dd's to try that soon also. It seems to me that I'll need to keep them practicing for a few more years! You can see samples if you scroll down on amazon's page http://www.amazon.com/Italic-Handwriting-Book-Barbara-Getty/dp/0876780966/ref=sr_1_5?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1242699116&sr=8-5