I don't think it would be redundant at all. Fix-It is really more editing and learning the dress-ups and sentence openers in IEW (with some added vocabulary work). I know they claim that Fix-It can be stand alone for grammar, but we don't use it that way and I have never felt as if we were doing too much of the same thing for grammar. I think Fix-It is a great complement to any grammar program.

And I may have over 100 scholastic eBooks now. In my defense it has taken several years to collect all of those and I have used parts of all I have purchased (except for the ones I just bought yesterday). Every single time I see some new books that I just have to have!

I do have everything planned out before we start because my goal is to have everything as open-and-go as possible for the school year. For me, if I go week by week my motivation to plan fizzles pretty quickly and we just end up doing the bare minimum. As far as narrations, they only do them with the reading they do on their own. Sometimes it is just an informal retelling of the story and sometimes I have them fill out a narration sheet (like drawing a picture and writing a few sentences). SCM has some great narration ideas here http://simplycharlottemason.com/timesavers/narration/. But our evening reading is really just for fun. I may ask them questions here or there to make sure they are paying attention or to see how their prediction skills are, but nothing formal.

We are using MOH right now (volume 1) and as much as I wanted it to work it is just too much for dd7 (she is just reading through SOTW) and ds9 doesn't like to read it on his own. So we move on:) Here is my plan for history. Sometimes when I am putting it together I find something isn't going to work or something else will work better but this is my tentative plan. Instead of doing one chapter of SOTW a week we are going to do one section a day for three days a week. So some weeks we will get through more than one chapter. So in the time we save doing it that way I am going to add in events from 100 Most Important Church Events. I am hoping to put them together in the most logical matter but it is going to be a bit tricky since SOTW lumps things together by civilization and 100 Events is strictly chronological. But I am up to the challenge:) I have found through our science curriculum that my kids learn best when we do something together to learn about the main topic (reading SOTW/ 100 Events) and then I break them up into their appropriate reading levels to read more about it (ds9 will be reading from Kingfisher Illustrated History and dd7 will be reading Usborne Medieval History). My plan is for each of them to have one history book to read on their own each week (similar to the type of books used in CHOLL- which I would just use but the library has very few of the books used). I will also schedule a family read aloud using All Through the Ages as a guide. Since we have the Yesterday's Classics collection I will probably add in those here and there too. We will probably do a timeline from free clip art on the Internet. I am not sure yet about doing notebooking pages like I did with ancients but I want something hands on for them to do. It will probably be at least a few weeks before I get this done but I will definitely let everyone know when it is complete:)

If you have a decent library you could get the book All Through the Ages. It is a great resource and lists books by time period and tells you which level they are most appropriate for. I struggle with the balance of history too. For next year I plan to have a book for my kids to read independently through the week (something like Magic Tree House). Then for our read alouds in the evening here is what we do. Science reading is one night a week (since they are mostly picture books). History reading is two or three nights a week. Then the rest of the nights we read something fun. I have thought about Sonlight too but at this point I have more time than money:)

I use and am very happy with this free website http://www.worksheetworks.com/english/writing/handwriting.html. The only thing I don't like is that you can't see how many pages the worksheets are until they are created. But you can save them since they create PDFs. I like all of the options they have (connect the dots, trace, fill in the letter, blank line between, etc.).

If you are talking Middle Ages then Biblical history would be over (assuming you mean Middle Ages to be about 500ad). If you mean church history I am working on putting a schedule together to include the 100 Most Important Events in Church History along with SOTW2.

Some great suggestions! I could have posted the same questions. I keep debating combining chemistry/ physics too because there seems to be so much more material in the other 2 years. I will be listening in:)

Mine are in my signature:)

If you want her to work on timed drills you could use www.xtramath.com. If you want to just work on knowing mental math and facts better i would suggest Right Start math games.

Thanks! We only have a backyard garden- nothing huge. In fact, most of our flower beds that are not in the front of the house are actually used for growing vegetables:) This year we planted lettuce, cucumbers, broccoli, peas, beans, several types of tomatoes, and several types of peppers (dh wants to try making salsa this year!). Our biggest obstacle is going to be the dog who mindlessly tramples through the garden without noticing what she is stepping on! She already dug up some of the lettuce while going on a chipmunk hunt:)

Anyone else playing today? Here is From a Tiny Seed.

We have had a pretty good year (and will continue through the summer :001_smile:). Here are our hits: -Math Mammoth blue series -Right Start math games -WRTR for spelling -a mix of IEW and WWE for writing -finally having the confidence to put my own curriculum together (thanks to SWB!), knowing it will get done that way, and not having to feel guilty about purchased curricula that isn't used -finally taking the time to use MOTH and put a workable schedule together (this has been essential in keeping behavior problems and school interruptions to a minimum) Here are our misses: -MOH (we started out the year really enjoying it but dd7 just wasn't able to keep up or follow along, and ds9 is getting a little bored with it) -MEP math (I love this math program and it really is great, but teaching 3 and soon to be 4 different levels was just too much- no fault of the program) -MFW (I had great hopes of teaching the kids together but ECC was too monotonous and the books were either under or above their level) That is all I can think of for now. I will have to come back and edit if I remember more.

I could probably have a nice list, but here are the top 3: WRTR for spelling WTM 1st edition for putting things together on my own Getting Started with Latin

We started WRTR in the fall and are still happily using it. My kids have soared in their spelling and reading. I can confidently say that I no longer need to curriculum shop for spelling ever again. Now every other subject... that is a completely different story!

That is fine with me:) You are all welcome:) I am always happy to share what we are doing in the hopes that it may help someone else!

If he likes games I would suggest RightStart math games. I can't say enough good things about them! They have really helped my kids with their mental math, and they don't even know they are learning! ;)

Here is a free one that was written for VBS but I am sure it could be adapted for homeschool. http://ministry-to-children.com/free-vacation-bible-school/

After a couple of months off of blogging I am ready to get back into it, but my blog is bugging me right now and I am not sure why. I can't get it to look the way I want it to look. I think it just looks too generic and I would love to customize it. So those of you that customize your blogs, how do you do it? I have to assume people use tools others than those provided since I can't really seem to get a custom look doing that. Any suggestions are greatly appreciated!

Do you already own PAL? If you don't and you are pretty sure your children are beyond the first 2 parts of PAL then I would suggest going with their new Bible Heroes instead. I haven't seen it in person, but it looks to me like it is similar to the 3rd section of PAL. I bought PAL and used it for mainly the 3rd section, but if Bible Heroes had been out I would have purchased that instead. That being said, if you do own it then it can be an easy way to introduce several of the IEW units. Anything from IEW that is written by Lori V. is very teacher friendly and easy to follow (we are using All Things Fun & Fascinating right now and even though I have not gone through the TWSS I am still finding it easy enough to teach).

I just finished writing our science (earth science/ astronomy) for my 4th grader. For our spines I used the Visual Factfinder books (Planet Earth & Stars and Planets) and added in the Kingfisher science encyclopedia. I added in books and some notebooking. You can check it our on our blog if you like.

Just bumping this quick in case anyone missed it. *I do also plan to add any applicable books from Yesterday's Classics when I get the time. I just ran out of room in the "extra reading" section:)

I finally finished our Earth Science and Astronomy Curriculum for next year! Here it is http://wateronthefloor.wordpress.com/earth-scienceastronomy/. It is based on WTM with some added extras:) Enjoy!

I am teaching science to my 1st and 3rd graders (plus a preschooler added in when he is up for it) using our Magic School Bus curriculum (on our blog-link in siggy). With the age differences I try to bridge the gap with books. As I am planning for science and history next year I look for books that each of the kids can follow and understand at their own level. So even though we may study the same topic, they each have their own encyclopedia (Usborne for younger and Kingfisher for older) and their own library books to read (I should have our earth science/astronomy posted on our blog within the week). Beyond that, they do the same experiments and/or projects.

Alpha-Phonics! So simple, yet so effective. I love that the kids are practicing reading sentences with only those words and sounds they have learned. It has worked well for 3 kids so far:)