LOL! We're going to Florida for our winter vacation - but to escape the rain, not snow! (WA here).

I'm getting one of Dh's favorite pictures I took in Japan printed onto canvas.

4 hours? We have never spend that long TOTing. We're going to have crock pot coconut chicken curry over cauliflower rice.

This is what my ds wrote on his HWOT book yesterday...

I use the official box. The dividers don't fit well in the 3x5 boxes on the shelves. I just like having it all fit neatly. That being said, you could totally do your own thing. I've been using the tiles for 2 1/2 years now. They are still in perfect shape!

So for those of you who have BA, I printed out the samples from the website for 3A for ds to try (so I don't have the solutions). We can't figure out the drawing shapes with the dots (first four problems - 39-42). We got the first one, but the rest? Can someone explain? It's driving us nuts! http://ba-cdn.beastacademy.com/store/products/3A/samples/Practice%203A%20R&G%2015-16.pdf

I don't think so. It starts by teaching all the letter sounds, which helps a lot with decoding words. Then it goes to phoneme segmenting, which helps with reading too. I think after that, I probably would stop until my child can read simple words before moving on as I think it could get hard. But if they can read simple 3 letter phonetic words, they are right where AAS 1 is teaching. I LOVE LOVE LOVE LOVE LOVE AAS. It's the only teacher intensive thing I've never considered dropping. We work through at the pace my children set and I don't worry about getting xxx done every year or anything. I work 2x/week with each child for 15 minute tops and we get done what we do. We usually finish 1 1/2 - 2 levels a year this way. You can make your own tiles if you don't want to buy theirs. But theirs are really nice. It is well worth the expense. The nice part is you buy it once and you can use it with multiple children. The only thing I have in duplicate is the little file box that holds the cards.

Thanks everyone. I printed the sample pages for BA 3A and I'm going to have older ds try them this week to see what he thinks. If he likes it, I'll probably lay down the scope and sequence between it and SM 3a/3b and figure out how to moosh them together (probably throwing in the SM topics that Singapore doesn't cover or something like that). I think overall BA may be a worthwhile purchase even if I don't use it exclusively with my older ds. I can see it being a good supplement for my younger child who is flying through math like crazy, for when I want to slow him down a bit. He's almost done with Singapore 1A and we've been using it for less than 2 months! I basically gave him the workbook and said when you have a question let me know. Then I teach the lessons he needs. He already has all his basic addition facts memorized and can add 4 digit numbers in his head!

Yeah, that is my main concern too. But it looks like they plan to have the rest of 4 out by the end of this school year. So if 5 comes out along those same lines, it might be out in time for us...

redsquirrel - yes, that sounds very familiar! So is BA not enough in and of itself? It seems that everyone combines it with other math...

Thank you. My oldest is actually quite good at math. He thinks like his father, who is very much into puzzle type things. He just lacks motivation. He hates me teaching him, and gets frustrated when I can't explain something concisely. I was thinking that the style of BA (where he could, in theory, read the guide/comic part) might appeal to him do to being able to try to do most of it himself. I think that if he applied himself he would be quite capable of "puzzling out" things himself. When I had him evaluated last year to meet our state's homeschool requirements, the evaluator told me that she would give him a math problem and he'd say he didn't know how to do it. So then she'd give him a tiny hint (like start here) and he could do it, even though some of it was beyond what I had taught him. I think sometimes the "big picture" overwhelms him, and it's probably just something he has to learn to do (break things down into smaller steps).

I use standards and use the HIG, Workbook, and Textbook. I did buy IP, but we just don't find the time to fit it in. I may use it over the summer as review, since we take a couple of months off in the summer from formal schooling.

I hated it too. We did all of FLL 1 and didn't like it. Started FLL 2 and at that point ds was making fun of every lesson and I realized it was not working at all (just too boring). He knows the basics of grammar, so what's the point? I plan to do Analytical Grammar when he is older. And with my younger I can teach the basics like nouns, adjective, etc without repeating the same defintion every day for 3 months! (I also didn't like WWE - we use IEW now and love it).

Ds is working on the end of Singapore 2B right now (he's in 3rd grade). He's not a huge fan of math. I'm thinking the "comic" style of beast academy would be right up his alley. I'm wondering how it compares to singapore standards edition? If I switched to beast academy after he finishes 2B will what he learn line up with what he'd learn in singaprore 3? My main concern is that the upper levels of BA may not be out in time, so we'd have to switch back. I also have a 1st grader just flying through Singapore. He'll probably catch up with my older at some point in the next year or two. Singapore works really well for him, so having the older ds on BA would make it so he doesn't realize when younger brother catches up with him skill wise too, if that make sense.

I really like his response to the Hitler comment, even though techincally he's wrong. PS was mandatory in Germany before Hitler.

That would drive me nuts! If you decide to switch and it's not too far, I LOVE LOVE LOVE our dentist in Redmond. :)

They've always charged tax here since they are located here. Whether or not tax is charged is based on your state's laws, so something must have changed there.

I would look for an ICAN group in your area: http://www.ican-online.org/

This is exactly what dds school has. They offer full day and half day options for preschool (obviously you pay more for full day) and then if you want before or after care you pay more for that on top. They are licensed as a private preschool as well as daycare. I love it because if something comes up and I need more time for something (like field trip days with my homeschooled kiddos) I can add on one day of before or after care for a small fee.

I'm very much pro adoption in most cases. That being said, there are definitely some ethical issues around adoption that can make things dicey. There are kids who could, with support, stay with their own families, but who are taken away (just do some googling and you'll find cases of infants removed by CPS that may not be justified since Caucasian infants are very highly sought after - yes babies are illegally sold even in modern times). I do believe sometimes women are coerced into give up their children too - though I do think in modern times this is less of an issue than it was back in the 1950s. Then there is the whole dilemma that this child has a whole other family out there they do not know about (I have a personal adopted friend who really struggles with not knowing who her birth family is). So while I wouldn't say "all adoption is bad", I would say that there are ethics surrounding adoption that should be looked into that one should consider when looking at adopting.

You take it as far as he will go. :)

Yes, I forgot to mention lactational amenorrhea. That being said, it does not work for everyone to widely space pregnancies. As for the Ingalls, They had 5 live births, though only 4 survived. Now we think of 5 children (or even 4) as a lot. Back then, it was pretty normal.

I find this thread interesting in light that wide-spread use of birth control is a rather modern thing. Look back even 100 years - you could use animal skin condoms (which I imagine were less effective than latex) or insert things like lint "up there" to try to block the sperm. You could abstain or use withdrawal. Or you could have a very dangerous abortion. Most women did not use anything to prevent pregnancy. Poor nutrition probably had more of a bearing on number of children than birth control did. 19 kids, historically, is still larger than most families, but it was a lot less striking in a time when families would routinely have more that 2 kids apiece, which seems to be average today. It also would be less likely for 19 kids to survive into adulthood - which is probably why the Duggars have 19 living children. 100 years ago maybe 11 would have survived...

We bought a k'nex roller coaster for my bil when he was 18. He liked it. :P His dream job would be to design roller coasters. I got 2 different k'next sets for my boys for Christmas! Great deal!

If the pull plus spacer issue is cheaper AND long term will yield the same result as far as adult teeth coming in, then I see no reason to go with the more expensive option that might end up getting infected and fail anyways.