I will be new to homeschooling my third grade girl/boy twins. They will tun 9 next week. I've narrowed our secular science choices down to the following and would love some opinions if you've used the elementary levels. Building Foundations of Scientific Understanding Moving Beyond the Page Real Science Odyssey Real Science 4 Kids Thank you!

I want to make sure that I am understanding the language arts curriculum correctly. I have rising 3rd grade twins that I want to homeschool next year because of COVID-19. They've been in public school thus far. I am researching curriculum but from my list I am trying to weed out if I have any overlap because this seems lengthy. I will likely have to do placement tests so my questions aren't really about choosing levels at this time so levels mentioned are mostly placeholders. Reading: All About Reading, having them read from readers appropriately leveled for them, read alouds Phonics: Explode the Code Spelling: All About Spelling or Spelling Workout Vocabulary: Wordly Wise book 3 Copy Work: Copy Work for Young Ones - Animal Lovers Handwriting/Cursive: Zaner-Bloser 3 Writing: Writing With Ease level 2 Grammar: First Language Lessons level 3 So, too much, not enough or just right? Missing something important? Thanks!

What are my options for a secular history for third graders. In todays climate where I have come to understand that I was basically taught US history fan fiction in public school I am very interested in fact based history. Not Christopher Columbus was a great guy and the Native Americans gave their land freely type rhetoric. Thanks!

Pros of having a physical set? How much do your kids use them? Why do you encourage it over Google? Also, if you have the 2013 set can you tell me the height of the volumes? Thanks Erin

They are girl/boy :) so I know they are fraternal... It will be interesting to see if they are on different reading levels etc. Erin

I have always known I wanted to HS my children when I had them. Turned out we adopted twins last summer. They are still babies lol, but I LOVE reading about homeschooling in my free time. I have been wondering though, what is it like HSing twins? A friend told me it is ideal. Is she right? Thanks Erin

Interesting, thank you. Erin

http://homescool-ed.blogspot.com/search/label/sonlight I just came across this book list, is this a list of books that a child would read if they were to use Sonlight for their education k-12? If it is, Holy long and impressive Batman! Can someone tell me if that is a correct assumption. Thanks Erin

That's a good suggestion, I will look in the library for 100 Easy lessons, I already own OPG...which seems to be what most like. Thank you Erin

to Teaching Reading? WTM recommends The Ordinary Parents Guide, but I've heard good things about 100 Easy Lessons. Is 100 Easy Lessons considered to be part of the Classical approach? Thanks Erin

Thanks everyone for all the suggestions! I will keep reading from their book shelf at night (I LOVE children's books, and since my husband and I do the routine together I love that he gets to hear all my favorites too) and add more talking (gotta get better at one ended conversations) and I will add more singing too. I have read Jim Trelease's book, last year...but perhaps I will reread it. I loved it. I probably won't really have a lot of questions until my kids get older but I may pop in if something pops into my head before then. I hope this board is still here when I need it in a few years. Erin

I don't know what to think. I love message boards and if I decide to homeschool I will definitely want to continue posting here. It seems like a really active board and also seems to be a really great place to get information and opinions on curriculum. So I don't want to be turned off, I will stick around despite the unwelcoming posts. I am legit. I can tell you exactly how I got here... I was on a scrapbooking message board where people were talking about homeschooling, so I started googling and reading some blogs of people who homeschooled. It looked awesome but I had no kids lol. So I marked some blogs and added The Well Trained Mind to my Amazon wish list. Then I adopt these wonderful babies and the pastors wife at my church throws me a shower last weekend. While looking at my amazon registry she looks at my wish list and sees the book. She homeschooled her kids until very recently and so at my shower she gives me the book. And I see that there's a website and a forum. And that's how I ended up here. BUT in the defense of some of you guys, I have been known to be an obsessive over planner before and this is likely no different. :) my babies are sleeping so well I have lots of time to read for myself and have been enjoying the book so far. Erin

Thank you so much for all the replies. I am definitely not stressing about it but I know how important it is to read to them. I read the Jim Trelease book last year while waiting to be matched with a birthmom. I couldn't remember specifically what he suggested. I will definitely start singing more, I have a hard time remembering lyrics sometimes but that's what google is for :) I'm sorry some of you "smelled something" and felt the need to pop popcorn for my first post here. I've been on boards like that before and wasn't expecting it here. I'm not so sure what was so fishy about asking how much I should read to my babies. Is there some history here that I unwittingly stepped into with that question? I didn't mean to open a can of worms. I'm honestly just a new mom looking to enrich her new babies lives. Thanks again to all the people who made helpful suggestions, I really appreciate it. Erin

Hi there, I am brand new to this forum. I'm Erin and I just adopted newborn twins born in August. They are almost 8 weeks old. A friend gave me a copy of The Well Trained Mind the other day, I read the beginning of it and I am so inspired. I think I definitely want to homeschool my kiddos. I've been a nanny for 17 years and have a lot of favorite children's books from many years of reading. I made sure my kids had an entire book shelf full before I even brought them home. We have been reading bedtime stories since they were 2 weeks old. I am thinking that may not be enough. How much should I be reading to them at this age, and going forward how much time? At this age can I just read or should I be attempting to show them the pictures in books that have them? It's hard with twins, I want to read when I feed them their bottles, but alas, both my hands have bottles in them lol. Thanks for any advice Erin