Does anyone know who the person is he referred to as attacking him in the lecture circuit in the early 2000's? That is awful!

I love Amanda Bennett units, Curiosity Files (through TOS) and NaturExplorer units. Amanda Bennett has specials often. I've gotten the majority of her units 40% off and got many free with her Terrific Tuesday giveaways on her Facebook page. Her units are interactive and full of content. They can be stretched much longer then a week or you can pick and choose and make them shorter then a week. I find the key with her units is picking and choosing, not doing everything at once. They are very dependent on online links, that bothers some people. NaturExplorer has a quarterly discounted unit and right now Currclick has some on special through the 20th. We haven't started on ours yet. We've been waiting for this lovely weather and for our newborn to grow a bit more. I've printed the units and have them ready to go. We keep an eye out at thrift stores for suggested books. The units are so full. They are not your typical units, they are filled with many ideas, from composer and art studies to experiments but you have to schedule your days, they are not set up for you. You can use the guides sporadically or turn them into a huge study, going down many different rabbit trails. The Curiosity Files are unique and can be had cheap. The Old Schoolhouse has some in their dollar store section. If you google them you can find a ton of reviews, thanks to TOS's reviewing crew. Signing up on Currclick.com is a good idea. They give away lots of stuff. I have gotten many Hands of a Child lapbooks free through them, usually around holidays or on black Friday. I really like the HOAC lapbooks I've tried and looked at. Currclick has lots of specials on them. On HOAC's website they have a freebie you can try out, they also offer a $5 lapbook per week.

There are actually five books in the Indian in the Cupboard series. I read the first two when I was little and loved them. I also loved the Redwall series by Brian Jacques and the Pendragon series by Stephen Lawhead. I didn't read either series fully just a few books from each.

I'm a Canadian married to an American. I would love to teach our kids about both Canada and the US. I am curious if anyone know of something like Road Trip USA but for Canada? Thanks,

Hi, we are on the lookout for a cheap laser printer with reasonably priced toner. I have been having to print a ton for our homeschooling and ink costs are pretty high even with the cheap refilled carts we buy from Ebay. I'm thinking a laser printer will help cut costs. Thanks for your help!

I bought these pouches to go with it. They are cheap and have a pretty good rating. I'm so excited to get this and start laminating our preschool curriculum.

You should be able to put it back in your cart because only 39% is claimed now.

Thank you SOOOOOO much! I've been waiting for a deal on this. I had a $10 Amazon gift card I bought for $5, so ended up getting this for a phenomenal deal. I appreciate you sharing!

My thoughts exactly. I'd rather pay shipping and get the manual sent to me already printed out, rather then pay for the .pdf and then the cost of printing it out.

Hoping the price goes down more. I'm wanting to buy the light blue series but the price is still a bit high for us at the moment, though it is a phenomenal deal!

Is the Christian aspect important to you or not? FIAR makes you buy a separate Bible volume. That rubs me wrong. Whereas in FIAR the Bible is weaved into almost every aspect of it. I was so impressed. You may want to check out the MFW forum and the FIAR forum to get a feel for each. Take the forums with a grain of salt, there are often those who monopolize such boards that may not really represent the curriculums or writers of the curriculums well. FIAR leaves me with an off feeling, but that is just me. The husband of the woman who wrote them rubs me wrong. MFW leaves me with a good feeling. If you are a believer I recommend praying that God will lead you to whichever curriculum he wants you to go to. I had a couple of different curriculums I was really leaning towards in the beginning of my homeschool search that I really felt I was not suppose to do, maybe due to my daughters learning style? I'm not really sure why not but I ended up picking ones I felt peaceful about. I am an eclectic homeschooler and use bits and pieces of different things.

My daughter was very advanced for it when it came to letters and sounds, but I am so glad we still purchased it. There is a lot to it and it is easy to supplement. I got Amanda Bennett units (when on sale, which is often) to go along with it, Hands of A Child and other brands of lapbooks, free lapbooks from homeschool share. I bought extra books. I haven't stuck to it all the way this year but plan on it starting in September with my second daughter. The biblical aspect is phenomenal. I jumped around with a lot of stuff this year as it was are first year homeschooling.

Thanks so much! :)

Good to know thanks! I'll have to think on it a bit more.

I bought some more too. Eek. Scholastic sales are too addicting, lol.

I am curious if anyone is doing or has done HOAC's super membership? How do you/did you like it? We like lapbooking so it is tempting but I am not quite sure. The one year Super Membership is on HSBC right now. https://www.homeschoolbuyersco-op.org/index.php?option=com_hsbc_epp_order&Itemid=1683&c=1

I don't know much about Math Mammoth. My daughter will be in first in September, would we need to buy the light blue package? I hope they get enough buyers to make it super cheap!

Wow, thanks for sharing! I realized I had three doubles. I just wrote them to see if they'd exchange them with some I've been eyeing.

They finally ended the sale. I was kind of relieved because I had some more books tempting me. Thanks for sharing! I love these resources. I am printing them all and putting them in binders.

Thanks for mentioning this series. I've never heard of it before. I think it will go perfectly with the Animals and their Habitats Winter Promise curriculum we are starting in September.

Thank you SO much! I've been wanting some of the "Teaching With Favorite" books they have. Those books get really expensive fast. I bought the Leo Lionni, Arnold Lobel and Patricia Polacco ones. I already own Bill Martin, Jr. one.

I shop thrift stores and used book stores obsessively and have never found a FIAR book for $0.25. You may have a place you can get books cheap like that but most people don't have that option. I've been looking for months. My gripe is with Steve calling it a ministry when it does not include the Christian content. Sorry but how is that a ministry? Now I think BFIAR and the fourth volume could be counted that way but not the rest.

The husband of the author has called their curriculum a ministry but they do not included the Bible in their volumes, you have to buy the Bible portion separate at an extra expense. I am not a fan of this, as it seems as if Christians are being penalized. Most Christian curriculums I know of have non-Christians buying them too, they just skip the parts they don't believe in. I am not sure why FIAR felt they had to not include it. I use them more as a book list. They also are unwilling to update their manuals although they release them with new covers and I find this a little dishonest. People buy the curriculum thinking it will be easy to acquire the books and this is not the case. I've heard of people looking to find Andy and the Circus for years. The Giraffe walked to Paris goes for $50+. Cowboy Charlie is very hard to find. I think they should at least have a disclaimer that many of the books in the curriculum are out of print and may be hard to find.

Most books I've found fairly easy to find but there are some I've been looking for for a couple months and I am not sure I'll find them. A library is not convenient for us so we mostly buy used. The hard ones to buy: The Giraffe That Walked to Paris by Nancy Milton (None of the libraries in our big city have it). It costs $50+ to buy. Gramma's Walk by Anna Grossnickle Hines. This costs usually $30+ used. Andy and the Circus by Ellis Credle is about impossible to find. I've heard of people that looked for years. The Wild Horses of Sweetbriar by Natalie Kinsey-Warnock. This sells quite expensive $20ish and rarely comes up on ebay. Cranberry Thanksgiving by Wende and Harry Devlin usually sells for $15+ but can be found sometimes at thrift stores and used book stores. I bet most libraries have it. Babar, To Duet or Not to Duet based on characters by DeBrunhoff is hard to find and sells in the $25+ range. I personally don't care if I find it though as it is a book based on a movie and not written by the original Babar author. On the Five in a Row forum there is a link to the movie the book is based on. This is the booklist for all four books if you want to see it: http://www.fiarhq.com/FIAR/FIARBL.html

I love http://www.confessionsofahomeschooler.com. She sells tot curriculum in a zip file but you can also download most of it free from her blog posts. She charges more for the convenience of having it bundled together in one file. She offers most free. I have a Lexmark printer and get the ink really cheap off of sellers on ebay. They refill carts and sell for cheap.