Are you doing the DVDS for IEW or themebased book etc? If you are doing the dvds, it will take longer than 20 to watch that. They are usually 30 minutes, but not always. Twenty minutes is fine for the rest of the week to do the assignments. As for AG. it takes my ds longer than 20 minutes to do one exercise, but you could just have him work for 20 minutes each day and have him stop wherever he is. That is what I did last year (except he worked for 30 minutes) and we still completed everything.

For a first grader I wouldn't read the whole thing. If they start getting that eyes glazed over look skip to something interesting or do a project, or even just look at the pictures and discuss it. I found that the Zoology books are great for younger children if your oldest is 3rd or 4th and they are just listening in in an informal way. But if you just have younger children I would adapt it a liittle. You could also get some easy non fiction books from the library to go along with the topics.

We have used Writing Strands and IEW in the past. I liked WS but my children didn't. We are going back to IEW this year because my children love Mr. Pudewa. They don't complain about writing with IEW. Now that they are junior high they appreciate having other teachers besides me. I like the fact that with IEW I don't have to teach writing, just give help when needed. They are doing SWI B now and I hope to get the continuation course after that. I have 3 more children that will use it so I think it is worth the investment.

The latest edition of Saxon 87 includes prealgebra so if they do well with that book you can go directly to Algebra 1 the next year. My ds is using Saxon 8/7 with the DIVE cd and it is going very well. He can do it independantly and likes having someone else teach the lessons to him besides me! Saxon has a placement test that you can take.

Once of my children struggles greatly with spelling. I also heard Mr. Pudewa's discusssion of this and it made so much sense. I have used Spelling Power with my other children and just started this son with it this year using the auditory method. It has worked great!

I've found that the Review and Reinforcement book in between seasons really does keep them from forgetting what they have learned. The High School reinforcement books look great too!

No, just the workbook is sufficient. It has the teacher's section included. The guidebook is an overview of SWB's philosophy for writing intruction and samples of all 4 levels.

This does seem strange to me too. My son has wanted to read some of the books after hearing an excerpt from WWE. I would have thought that authors would like that.

I already ordered mine from Amazon and my ship date says Sept 4th. Why the discrepancy?

We have completed one week of school. So far we have only done the 3 Rs but they are all winners! WWE 1 and 2 for 2 children 5 stars FLL and FLL 3 5 stars Saxon 8/7 with DIVE cd 5 stars ds is doing math on his own Yea! Singapore math for other children 5 stars IEW 5 stars My dc love Mr. Pudewa and don't groan anymore about writing Analytical Grammar Very thorough and concise 5 stars Next week we will add Spelling and Apologia science. History after that. Lori in MS

Thank you for this information. What are you going to do after you complete SWI B? My children love the dvds. My preference would be to get the SICC if I can. I thought about doing a themed book, but didn't know which one to use. I wanted one on the B level. We are doing 1850 to Modern times this year and that time period was listed as Level C which I thought would be too hard.

bump

I am switching my son from MUS Alpha to Singapore. We had been doing both but to save money I am just doing Singapore this year. I plan to teach him some MUS tricks as we go along if needed. Also, you can use the MUS blocks to teach the concepts if they get stuck in Singapore. The only thing Singapore does not teach is the memorization of the math facts. Timez Attack is a great free game to teach the multiplication facts. Also if you teach them to skip count the 1s to the 12s that will help as well. 3 of my children have switched from MUS to Singapore this year (6th grade, 4th grade and 2nd grade) and so far it is going well.

Does anyone have an opinion of whether the dc could watch the TWSS or is the SICC that much better?

I need some help with this. Thanks.

Hi Everyone, My 7th and 6th graders just began SWI B this week and they really like Mr. Pudewa's teaching on the dvds. I would like to get SICC after they complete what we have but we do not have the money at this time. Could it work for them to watch the TWSS dvds instead? We already have those. I do not what to teach writing myself as I already have a lot to do with 5 children. Do they have lesson plans for TWSS that are similar to the ones for SWI? I have appreciated knowing exactly what they needed to do each day. What do you think?

I am starting at the beginning of FLL and WWE 1 for my 2nd grader. If it is too easy I can always quicken the pace.

It took us 2 years to do RTR and we didn't even add in MOH.

I found a kit for General science at http://www.christianbook.com for $74.99 from Nature's workshop. I wonder if it is worth it, but it has practically everything you would need except for perishables and large items. I am so busy teaching 5 kids I doubt I would go to the store to find all of the items. I was just wondering if you bought everything you needed for the year at one time would it be more than $75? If you had to buy packs of everything when you only needed a small amount I think it might. Has anyone done that? I would love the convenience of a kit, but wondered how much cheaper, if any, it would be to buy everything yourself.

My preorder on Amazon says Sept. 4, 2009 for 3 and Jan 25,2010 for 4.

I use MUS and Analytical grammar. If my 6th grader does not score 90% or above on the tests he does not go on to the next lesson. He reviews the material and retakes the test. But this is much easier to do on a lesson by lesson basis.

I haven't used Adventures but I did the supplement of Ex1850, which has a lot of the books/state sheets etc of Adventures. Exploring American History isn't the only book used. My kids loved Pioneers and Patriots and all of the other books. They also enjoyed the states and Presidents sheets. There are so many wonderful books in the book basket, you could read some of those on the same topics as the EAH book.

Latina Christiana 1 Music cds and biographies of composers

I got SOTW 2 AG to use with RTR as my children were young. We used a few pages but I ended up selling it. It really wasn't needed.

Schlessinger dvds, especially the ones for History and science Rosetta stone for multiple languages, but particularly Spanish and French. Unabridged audiobooks.