BUMP! :001_smile: Such an important reminder needs to be read regularly! Love all the feedback on this, too. TFJ ~ doing 7th grade again with my youngest!

Hi Sue, Last year he did send out an email explaining what was going to be covered for the year. This was how I determined what supplemental materials to get! Hopefully Mr. Powell will send this out to us soon. I will express my interest in having this info on the list, too! :001_smile: TFJ

My daughter loves HAOH. :-) She participated 1X per week last year. I think participating helped keep her engaged in the program, but she still enjoyed her other days, too. When we were on the fence about the program, the teacher allowed us to try it out and listen to some lectures and see how the program worked. This maybe a helpful way to "test drive" the program and see if it is a good match for your child. The teacher has always been very responsive, kind and quick to answer our questions. We will be doing JH European History this year, participating daily. My daughter is excited about it! Best wishes, TFJ

My daughter worked with teachers being trained for work in special education and tutoring this summer. There were many very experienced ladies who have taught for many years. They recommended Diana Hanbury King's books. http://www.epsbooks.com/dynamic/catalog/subject.asp?subject=66S EPSbooks. The books are called Writing Skills. They "chunk" out the material and provide graphic organizers and ways of "framing" writing. We have ordered ours, so don't know totally how I feel about the books yet, but I can say my dd said it made writing easier during the week she worked with these ladies. I liked the teacher manual and suggestions. It is also a LOT cheaper than IEW, which I was trying to save for. HTH. TFJ

Does anyone have a list of these and why? I think we want to memorize some math formulas and grammar terms, but would love to know what people have found the most useful and important. We are memorizing scieence terms with Lyrical Life Science and work on all math facts, but I feel like other formulas would be helpful. TFJ

I haven't used this, but I did consider it for my dd. friendlychemistry.com It seems to have a lot of fun ways to learn. We may still try it out for the younger dd. We also used Cyber Ed's physical science through the homeschoolbuyerscoop.org. It has been a good supplement. There are a lot of chemistry games online. http://www.freeworldu.org/static/chemistry_collective.aspx One I have bookmarked, but have not tried. "Located on the Carnegie Mellon Department of Chemistry Web site, the Chemistry Collective's main task is to make chemistry visible and functional to users, particularly high school and college chemistry students." We use the freeworldu for some drills. Including chemistry, but this is with our 11 y.o., I haven't tried the high school materials. HTH TFJ

My 11y.o. dd loves these, too. She and her friends spend hours on games and related conversations. They met the author, etc. I tried one and found it ok, but not good enough to get me to rad a gazillion more!:001_smile: TFJ

Thank you so much for the very, very big laugh... and then, for the possible answer to this thorny situation of graphic organization!!! :D Looks like the Four Square books would actually teach me what I am supposed to do with these organizers! That could definitely help!! Thanks again. You all are such a fantastic resource! TFJ

Thank you both! I will Google the software and check out the links. I found some for free, too and printed the writing ones. I never used these that I can remember in school and somehow they are not all that intuitive to me! I will see what my 11 y.o. can make of them. Thanks again. TFJ

My dd worked with a tutor last week and she suggested we get a book of graphic organizers for writing and have dd try a different every week until she comes up with one or two that click. I have been to a teaching supply store and B & N and so far have not seen anything great. Does anyone have any suggestions? Thank you! TFJ

My daughter participated in a program for a week as a student for student teachers who work specifically with language arts. Many of the student teachers are homeschooling moms who started this training to help their own children, with or without learning challenges. These are the books they use and suggest because they go through things so clearly. I found a lot of good information in the teacher guide (good for all levels). They did say not to use everything in the book, but to work with the concepts my dd needs help in. One mom suggested these books over IEW products. The author is certainly a person who has done a lot of terrific work. I was struggling to find something that offered my daughter clear structure and parameters. DD liked the way that it explained concepts. This seems like it will work and the price is right! I have placed my order and we shall see how it goes! TFJ

We have tried a lot of things over the years... with our advanced speller and our challenged speller. What is really working well for us right now is using Phonetic Zoo from the I.E.W. folks along with espindle.org. I put the Phonetic Zoo words in her espindle word list and add them again if I want her to review the words. I also add the other levels of Phonetic Zoo, so she is getting a lot of practice with whatever rule we are studying. She is doing a summer program with Orton-Gillingham multisensory trained teachers and has gone from several years below grade level (last years test) to above her grade level (per this years test). I will know more at the end of the week, but so far this is working great! I will look at some of the other programs for a weekly change of pace... Sometimes it takes some effort to find what works best for a particular child! :001_smile: TFJ

Small world. :D I was born in Fairfax County, Va. Weaverville is rather like Mayberry still, although it is growing.... Talk to you soon! TFJ

Linda, We are in Weaverville, just north of Asheville. Email us when you get in! :001_smile: TFJ

We liked Times Tales a lot. Also, Memorize in Minutes: The Times Tables. These use stories and pictures to help a child remember the facts quickly. For basic practice and speed we are currently tracking my daughter's speed, etc. with flash card magic, but I am sure lots of other programs can duplicate this. These are not math curricula, they are methods to help memorization of facts only vs. Math U See or Developmental Math, both of which have books devoted to multiplication. TFJ