It's not that I don't like it. I just don't think it's the right fit at the moment for us. In a couple of years, I may pick it up. I really would want DD to be able to get the most out of it. I don't think we're at that point yet.

You know what? Someone else mentioned these in another thread and I was totally thinking ...Pockets as in pocket charts and glazed over it. But, after your enthusiastic post, I got to thinking that maybe I wasn't thinking right. Nope, I wasn't. LOL! You're right...I think these may be good fit for DD's age. Going to look into them more. Thanks! :D ETA: Just checked them out some more. They do look fun. Wish they had some less popular/common/traditional stories. DD is already familiar with a lot of them, but I think they may be a good place to start. Going to add them to my short list.

Well, that's discouraging. :sad: Bummer. Thanks for posting, though. :001_smile: Good to know.

Never heard of Great Books. I'm intrigued. Researching it more as I type. :001_smile: Thank you for the suggestion! We have read regular ole picture books, chapter books, non-fiction books, etc. to DD from day one, which has served it's purpose. She's a book hound for sure! However, we don't have a lot of what I would consider true literature that promotes deeper thinking. I've actually kind of avoided a lot of it since so much of it really is pretty dark...a lot death/violence. However, I've downloaded some children's classics by AppleTree Books onto my iPod for her (The Little Mermaid, Peter Pan, Emperor's New Clothes, The Goose that Laid the Golden Eggs, etc. + fables) and she absolutely loves those. We also have this DVD story set, which has things on it like the Five Chinese Brothers. Anyway, she really enjoys them, so I'm hoping to find some kind of age-appropriate program that's separate and different from the picture books we typically read to her to round things out a bit more.

Totally with you there. Maybe I need to re-think the title/subject. Officially, Missouri home-school law states, "Reading, math, social studies, language arts, and science," but history is a part of social studies, as is geography, etc. I bought this to use as a brief introduction for social studies, but it's at least 85% unusable for us. A lot of it is talking about feelings and what a family is, careers, which to me is all very pre-school. I can't imagine using up class time for it. (Loved the Thanksgiving section of it, though.) I've looked at Harcourt Horizons online and I like the sample chapter, which is about America's symbols, but of course, that's all I can see of it. :sad: Barnesandnoble.com carries it, so I could order it and then return it, if the rest is horrid or too simplistic. I was thinking social studies now and then honest-to-goodness history in a year maybe. (Anyone use this?) Blah, still trying to figure it out, which is why I'm looking for suggestions. LOL! Thank you for yours!! I will definitely check into all of them. :D

Can anyone suggest secular social studies, literature and/or basic grammar/LA curriculum for approximately grade level 1? (Not all together, individual subjects.) DD likes flashy, colorful, hands-on and fun. :tongue_smilie: I like curriculum that is well-designed and fairly complete. I've been cobbling together science and social studies, but that's getting a little labor-intensive. I don't mind some supplementing and having to pull some things together, but not for every single lesson. We're home-schooling pretty much year-around, so we'll be rotating these over the next year or so. DD is still developing her handwriting skills and stamina, so nothing too writing-intensive. Thanks so much...I'm loving this forum! :001_smile: PS - I know a lot of people here love The Story of the World, but from the online samples I've looked at, it doesn't look like a good fit for us at the present time. Also, we use Hooked on Phonics for our reading program, which explains a little about capitalization and punctuation, but that's about it.

No, but I bet there is all kinds of good stuff there. DH and I both graduated from Mizzou, couldn't wait to get out of dodge and now realize as adults with a family that it's a great place to live. Enjoy! The park system is wonderful. We miss it all. We live about two hours away now.

I've been thinking about the holes in DD's curriculum and stuff I would love to teach her but currently would have a hard time fitting in due to her age and attention span. Before someone turned me onto this board, I would never have thought of including logic or Latin into her curriculum. What else do you all teach that would be atypical for most...something that is different, unique or just plain nutty fun? I'm particularly interested in the 5-7 age range, but I'm open to hearing about anything.

We use Early Bird. DD was a couple of months shy of 4.5 years old when we started it. Given her age and personality, I was drawn to its color, design and numerous extension opportunities provided in the teacher's guide. Ultimately, I bought it because of the teacher's guide. Being new to home-schooling, I love that it tells me exactly what to say to my child and have her repeat, if I desire. It wouldn't naturally come to me that I should have her repeat something like, "Five is one more than four. Six is one more than five," while completing a lesson. That kind of thing. Also, while there is at least one activity geared toward classroom use per each lesson, I found many very easy to adapt. A lot of times, I will act as another pupil in the class and do certain activities with DD. Having said that, Early Bird provides so many different activities in the teacher's guide for each lesson that I can very easily choose a different one or two. Rarely, if ever now, do we complete all extension activities. There are just too many. Both DD and I love SM Early Bird. The activities in the teacher's guide really make learning math a lot of fun. DD also loves all of the little songs in the teacher's guide. Like "Two Little Dicky Birds". She sings them all of the time. I haven't used Essentials, but it seems too incomplete (and, not enough fun) for us. DD loves hands-on. Early Bird is very hands-on.

How fun...thank you! :D

LOL! Probably. ;) -pitterpatter ;);) PS - And, thanks...I love it here. So much great info.

The first one went up a bit, but it's still pretty cheap. All are from Amazon. Learning Resources Primary Bucket Balance by Learning Resources Buy new: $18.99 $8.22 Learning Resources Cross Section Human Brain Model by Learning Resources Buy new: $18.99 $4.49 Learning Resources 12-Inch Inflatable Globe by Learning Resources Buy new: $9.99 $4.59 Learning Resources 12" Inflatable Globe with Light by Learning Resources Buy new: $9.99 $3.99

How does this work? Do you choose two that cover the exact same concepts and then cover the concept in one one day and then cover the same concept in the other the next day? :confused: Two ways of doing the same thing?

My DD is 4.5 years old and we just started our second "workbook" of HOP Kindergarten. I know others have said that they wouldn't have your DC reading sentences, but that's what my DD loves and excels at. Each HOP lesson goes as follows: - Watch a short skit on DVD that introduces the word family. - In the HOP "workbook", your DC sounds out the word family, then all of the new word family words first. The next page is three rows of single words to read (about eight per row maybe). The first row is usually all or mostly the new word family words. Then, the next two rows are words from previous HOP lessons. The final two pages of the lesson are a real story with short sentences and engaging pictures. Unless it's the end of a unit, then the child gets a little HOP reader to read (separate from the "workbook"). Again, short sentences and engaging pictures. My DD loves HOP. She's loves books and stories, so she really, really loves reading the little HOP stories. She is not so found of the word lists. She struggled with them for a while (had to do A LOT of sounding out), but she is definitely getting better. By the way, we also use this book to break up HOP. Star Fall phonics lessons too. Lots of little craft-like activities in here. Cut and paste activities worksheets too. All are age-appropriate. I know a lot of phonics users don't seem to like sight words (called helper words in HOP), but I think they really propel early readers through sentences. We've been using The Best Sight Word Book Ever in conjunction with HOP and DD does a pretty good job of reading most sight words with little effort. Thus, she'll only have to sound out a couple of words per each sentence, if she doesn't know them right-off. HOP repeats a lot of words per story, so she gains confidence because she may have to sound them out a time or two, but by the end of the story, she remembers them (usually ;)). When she's really slow sounding out a sentence, I have her go back and read it again, but faster. Sometimes, I'll even have her read it a third time. We also take time to see how the sentence is reflected in the picture. She loves that. After we read the entire story, we either read it again together (her and I read at the same time) or I'll read it with her repeating each word after me as I point to the words. Anyway, DD definitely is still in that sounding out stage, but I also see improvement. She's getting faster at the sounding out/rhyming and even does some of it in her head. Just depends on the word and the day. Sometimes, she can get a word right off, but then the next day we're back to sounding it out. I see little clicks, though, and I'm happy with that. She knows she getting it more and more too. She's very proud. :D ---------------------- As for the Best Sight Word Book Ever, you can see it's entire contents here (click on "Look Inside"). http://www.carsondellosa.com/cd2/Products/CarsonDellosa/PID-804038.aspx?CM_VC=10001 For each sight word, you copy (or print out, if you buy the eBook), cut out and staple a little booklet together. There are fun little activities to do for each word. We divide the booklet into two days. The first day, DD rainbow colors the word and then the next two pages. Then, we do pages 4-6 on the second day. On the activities where the child is supposed to write letters, words, etc., we don't do that. DD spells out the words with Scrabble tiles, strings letter beads onto pipe cleaners, uses letter cards, puts magnetic letters onto a cookie sheet, sticks letter stickers...whatever I can think of. I mix them up. We do three or four of these activities instead of booklet page 3 on day one. On day two, we use letter stamps to complete any written activities for booklet pages 4-6. All of the while, I constantly ask her what word she stamped or made or whatever. My DD loves the little booklets...she eats the activities right up. Retention is very high when we spread the booklets across two days. (I did find retention isn't as good when we do one booklet per day, so we're sticking to one booklet per every two days right now.) We also have a word wall (ok, word closet door :tongue_smilie:), so we review all words daily as well. PS - Bought our copy from B&N with a coupon.

These may be beneath your DC's ages, but there are some here. Each concept is presented in a variety of ways, so I can even use some of them in teaching my DD who is 4.5 years old. The worksheets are more advanced. The concepts are fairly basic, though. http://www.superteacherworksheets.com/index.html Thought I'd throw it out there...might help someone one day.

Thanks for the insight! :001_smile: Can't imagine DD not getting to a point where we'll need to tread water for a bit. If/when we get to this point, would we just take a break from that subject (can't imagine taking a break from a core subject, would be afraid of regression) or find some additional resources for that level?

First I've seen of this. Definitely is nicely designed, which is always a huge plus in my book. I don't care how wonderful something is, if I can't stand to look at it, I probably won't be using it. (Majored in journalism: magazine design. ;)) Having said that, I can't stand comic book style and from looking at the online sample (and, well, the name of the program), it leans boy. Bummer. DD's all girl. It does look fun, though. Off to check out AoPS...

DD and I started our home-school journey together this past fall. She's 4.5 years old and working on the kindergarten/first grade level. We are planning to home-school year around. We don't take many breaks. We save them for when DH has vacation time. We do take weekends off and will take most of the month of July off. Among our curriculum, we use HWOT, Singapore Math (Early Bird A & B) and HOP. All of these are leveled. We will be finishing up HWOT Kindergarten in a couple of weeks. We will likely finish up HOP Kindergarten by March and the entire Singapore Math Early Bird program the first part of April. Do you all just keep on trucking, if you're using a leveled series, or do you stop and practice or something in between? It blows my mind to think that DD could be working on the second grade level (according to the aforementioned programs) by the time her peers are just entering kindergarten. I assume there will come a point where she just won't be ready to truck along, but I don't really know for sure. This is all new to me. She's done very well so far.

I keep thinking there should be more. I try searching for "grade 1" within the e-textbook section of Amazon, but the results are not Kindle books at all. :001_huh: I can't figure out an effective way to search for them.

Amazon sent me a $10 credit in my e-mail this morning. It's good on Kindle textbooks only. Anyone know of any "textbooks" for about $15 or under that would be appropriate for grade level 1 or so? Thanks! :001_smile:

Oh, absolutely! DD's 4.5 years old...I don't leave her to do any work on her own. Having said that, if I have to get up to grab a tissue or something, she likes to surprise me by doing whatever while I'm gone. Oddly enough, it's usually some of her best work. :tongue_smilie:

Yes, we do Wet, Dry, Try and also the songs. We do Wet, Dry, Try to learn each letter and we do it until she makes a couple-to-three pretty darn good ones. That usually amounts to filling up the front and back of the lined board. Sometimes, we'll need to clean and then use one more side. I know she is just learning and that is takes a while to develop coordination. Part of HWOT is checking your work, so that's where I get stuck on corrections. I do have DD choose her best and worst letters. She explains why the best is the best and the worst is the worst. Then, we erase the not-so-great one and she makes it better. (Well, that's the goal anyway. ;)) Unfortunately, sometimes, there's another one that really bugs me and I have her correct that one too. Then, sometimes, the correction isn't any better, so... I think I just get frustrated because she'll be writing along...she'll be doing great, then bam...it's like an alien abducted her or something. She'll do something totally off the wall. I'll calmly mention that she needs to do this or that on the next one. Or, I'll say that one's pretty good, but let's make the next one even better. At times, they'll just get progressively worse. That's when I get irritated. Maybe her hand is just getting tired or something. Thanks for the input, everyone. I'm going to try to chill a bit and see how it goes...try not to get so wrapped up with the letters looking exactly like they do in the HWOT book. I think that's part of it. I personally could care less if her lowercase e has a point on the corner (DD makes hers curve all of the way around), but I feel as though I'm supposed to be true to the curriculum. (A bit of an internal battle there, I guess.) Like I'm not teaching her adequately, if they aren't as close to their letters as possible. :rolleyes:

Back in September, when DD4.5 and I first started our home-school journey together, I had no real expectations. I really didn't know how it would go. Since DD was still somewhat young (but, totally ready, I thought), we were just giving it all a try. So, when she wrote her very first honest-to-goodness letters with HWOT (Kindergarten level), I was over the moon happy. As we continued along, I was totally awed by everything she was learning and doing. Was simply amazed. Roll forward a couple of months to now. Overall, DD is doing wonderfully. She really is, she's doing great. I'm so proud of her. My problem is that my expectations have gone from zilch to through the roof, I think. I don't know how picky I'm supposed to be with her handwriting. She's capable of making straight vertical lines and straight diagonals. She knows she's supposed to bump the lines. She knows her magic c letters are supposed to be be round and plump. She knows straight letters are supposed to be straight, no curves. And, curvy letters are supposed to be curvy, no points. I remind her constantly. I'll even say, "Ok, we're making a lowercase l or t (or, whatever), remember to make it nice and straight." So, when I just remind her to do something and then she totally does it opposite...a slanted t instead of a straight one, or she totally doesn't get close to bumping the lines, or she makes a letter super skinny when I just told her to make it fat, I get irritated. (She's not making mistakes intentionally, but she's just not listening well enough or paying close enough attention to what she's doing.) When we erase one of her mistakes, she has a real problem of tracing the indentation (and, of course you can still see it a bit) in the paper and doing it wrong again...and again...and again. Irritates me to no end. Thus, some of my irritation has been showing through lately. Anyway, I need to stop getting irritated. It only happens with handwriting. I feel as though if I settle for imperfection (I use this word loosely, because heck, I can't even write perfectly on the lines/in the boxes every time), she'll develop bad/sloppy habits. My question is, how picky should I be? When should we erase and try it again?

Is this one of them? Never heard of FlexBook, so I decided to look it up. Just wanted to mention to everyone that there are several on Amazon for free Kindle download right now. Can always download their free PC viewing software, if you don't have a Kindle.

DD4.5 is using HOP Kindergarten right now. We actually started the second half of it today. Already bought Grade 1 too! She's doing very well with it and enjoys the little skits the animated children put on before/after each word family. To mix it up and for extra reinforcement, we also use The Mailbox: Word Family Helpers. It features some fun, age-appropriate activities for the most popular word families. We also download and print out little phonics readers from readinga-z.com for extra reading practice. I've purchased some of the books recommended by HOP online for extra reading as well. Since Explode the Code is so popular, I considered using it in conjunction with HOP, but could never figure out how to make it work. Plus, ETC seems writing-intense sometimes. We are just now finishing up learning how to write our lowercase letters (already finished capital letters). I may look into it again when we start HOP Grade 1 as her handwriting will be better then and she'll already have had that first exposure to phonics via HOP. Before originally starting HOP, we spent a month or so learning and reviewing letter identification and sounds. That was invaluable to DD's success with HOP, I believe. We also practiced rhyming a bit. We use this in conjunction with HOP Kindergarten. Used the four workbooks above, plus Star Fall the month before starting HOP to cement DD's letter identification and sounds.