History. I know basically nothing and am aware of that constantly. I am intimidated by the thought of teaching my children and so I've planned and planned and yet have done nothing. Grammar. We were never taught beyond the basics: nouns, verbs, adverbs, and adjectives. I had never even heard of subjects and predicates until I failed questions on a college entrance exam and looked them up myself afterward.

We had over $16,000 in credit and maxed them out in a year when starting my husband's business. We paid them off from refinancing our home and but them up over 5 years ago and have never owned another cc since. We've contemplated getting one for emergencies, but I'd worry DH would spend too much.

(Just read your other thread) As for using it with those who struggle with math, I think it's ideal. In fact, I became convinced it was for us this summer when planning to use it with my step-daughter, who we later decided to put in public school for other reasons. The ideal part of Math on the Level for those who struggle is that the child can't really tell they're struggling. There is no workbook moving on to the next concept making the child aware they still haven't grasped the last concept nor pages and pages of frustrating problems of concepts they aren't ready for. You can break it up into non-frustrating bite-sized pieces for the child without a set pace to move at. For example, my son forgot subtraction with regrouping over the summer from Singapore and today we spent some time on it. He didn't grasp it. We put it away after some one-on-one time working on a white board casually with it. We went back to fractions equaling one whole from yesterday just to solidify it and have some fun with the fraction magnets we have. He missed his 5-a-day problem on the fraction concept today so I knew he needed some more work with it. Within a minute, he had an "A-ha!" moment of why he missed the problem but kept playing with the manipulatives a bit longer. If he misses the concept's problem again tomorrow, I know I'll need to go over it again and probably use a different approach. Then we'll go over subtraction with regrouping again a different way for a little while. Meanwhile, no pages of subtraction problems in a workbook to have his lack of understanding glaring at him frustrating him to tears (happened often with Singapore). This method has been surprisingly effective, too. In 6 days of lessons, we've solidified 7 forgotten concepts, learned 3 new concepts, and are working on those two concepts. SIX days!! I'm sure the pace will slow down greatly, but I'm extremely happy with what we've accomplished and that's compared to Singapore's notoriously quick pace we used last year.

We use it and are loving it. It's has a great Yahoo group also. It teaches you how to teach each concept and it's up to you to do it. No assigning pages of problems, which is a crutch I'm still getting used to living without. The review system is smart and is saving my son a lot of time he would waste on concepts he's solid on. I especially love that I'll know within 3 weeks if he forgets anything. This was the biggest math frustration while using Singapore last year. Plus, the one-on-one non-paper based lessons are much more fun and effective for my sons. It's 100% flexible fitting any child's learning style. My younger son doesn't do 5-A-Days yet, this being only his first year at learning math, yet I've found I really can teach him at a lower level of what I am teaching his brother. The site claimed this and I was leary, but it really has worked out often.

Good luck. We just had to come up with our 5th boy's name to go with a single-syllable last name that starts with N. I swore, no first name ending with N, again...yet our newborn is our 3rd son to have a name ending in N. We're doomed if we have a 6th son. The next boy's name idea we've come up with is Saxon, again, an N.:glare: Are people naming their daughters Killian now? I swear, we have no luck. We have a Kit, no not Kittridge, he's a boy. We have a Haden, not Hayden since that's now a girl's name and he's a boy. We have a Killian, also a boy...which we swore no one would ever use for a girl's name. Now if girls start getting named Brodin, we'll be at a loss.

I schooled 2 last year (10 and then-6) and am schooling two this year (7 and 5) but it's not going very well. I really don't know how I'll be able to hs all the little ones when everyone gets to be school age.:confused: This is so hard since I've advanced the work expected out of my 7yo and now both hsers need to be walked through everything. I'm feeling like a failure and it's only the second week...then again, it's only the second week.

I know what you're going through since I'm going through it here too! The oldest goes to school so no putting her in charge. Two more hsers and 4 little ones causing chaos. The two hsers also seem to take hsing less seriously now that their sister is in PS, so my 7yo has replaced her as the household complainer and dawdler. My newborn is colicky and I have to hs between his screaming fits when all I want to do is de-stress. Also, my 17mo is finding he has opinions and he and the twins get into it full force. There are times where all three are screaming and fighting each other. What fun.

Thanks for starting this thread! My 7yo son struggled with this all last year and the b/d confusion is already annoying after only our first week. I am desperate to get him to remember these.

Greek and Big Love. I even get embarrassed if DH catches me watching Greek. I shamelessly announce I love Big Love but tell DH "and no, you don't get a second wife.":lol:

I am also having a really chaotic beginning to our school cycle. I have lots o' kids (as is apparent by my sig) and little ones at that. The 10yo is in public school so it's just the 7yo and 5 1/2yo hs'ing thankfully. We start our day by me announcing it's time to start school and the boys race to get their bins with supplies inside and we sit down together...then the twins start messing with stuff in the bins...then the 1yo starts wailing and the newborn starts up (he's gassy and cries around the clock) and I can't get through the first directions before the boys and I are annoyed. Today I put the twins and 1yo in front of a movie at the onset and just lost the older boys to distraction from it. Then 30 minutes in the twins were invading again and the 1yo had eaten food all over the house. Did I mention the entire time I dealt with the fussing newborn in my arms? :ack2: This is non-stop through school every day this week. My plans have gone to hell (tossed asside PLL and copy work after Monday and only managed to listen to my 7yo read aloud from a book once - and only for 2 of the 13 pages he read:crying:) and my 5yo has been lessened to 1 subject per day before I tell him to go play because he's not reading and can't get through any solo work. I feel horrible and he feels shoved aside by the little ones' needs :crying: more than the 7yo who got used to the chaos last year. Sorry, just letting you know you're not alone and hoping to find some ideas on this thread also.

1. Music lessons and instruments 2. Telescope 3. More bookshelves, cabinets with counters, and tall cabinets with doors 4. A computer for each kid 5. Grass (all we have is sand) and indoor playground for P.E. 6. Tell Me More language software for German, Russian, and French

We did 1, 2, and 3 last year with my then-6yo and we also progressed from 2 up to 4 pages per day. My 5 1/2yo started book one and is only doing 1/2-1pg per day, so it's all in the child's ability.

We have chalkboard paint and I'm going to paint it on 4'x8' MDF boards from the hardware store. I want to be able to lean it against the wall, mount it, or use it on the floor depending on the age of the kids using it. It covers 100sf so I could probably paint a few (even cut down 1/4" thick sheets into small sizes) then make custom templets by adding colorful glossy paint to parts for writing lines, graphs/grids, games, etc. I have dustless chalk coming from Rainbow Resource this week.

Beautiful room! I wanted to mention a couple of things I notice that haven't been talked about by others yet. First of all, the higher stools for the younger ones. Also, the island's cabinets are uppers, not lower cabinets, which are 12" deep. Perfect for curricula and easily fit two back-to-back under a 24" deep counter (probably about 28" flattened). Brilliant idea flattening those out, by the way. That was actually my biggest point of envy...how you got a nicely finished edge on both sides of your counter top. We also have a school room with brown counters and white cabinets below, but now I can see how much cooler I could have planned our room. I might move ours up to the playroom and would try something more similar to your layout. I love how yours is two-sided.

I had them until I was 10 or so and two of mine also have them, my daughter more so. I've read that they are caused by an immature nervous system. Mine tapered off to only occurring when I had fevers and my son's are only when he gets overheated, so I suppose that supports the nervous system theory. My mom would just guard the stairs and let me do my thing. With my daughter what works is singing the song I sung to her as an infant. It's the only thing that snaps her into recognizing me and her surroundings.

Today was the first time I contemplated buying the audio CD...I guess I'll pass. Thanks for the reviews.

We're doing 4-day weeks and only 28 weeks of lessons. We work better doing more intense study less often. So I do M/T Th/F and Wednesdays are outings and life-applied math days. We also don't do History and Science during those weeks. Those are done more as unit studies on the non-lesson weeks. This way the more intense study times of the basic subjects aren't overwhelmed by Science and History. Plus we do those as a family and it's more stressful on me and I like them separated out.

He has 8, 6 are ours and we raise 7. We're going for 2-3 more.

:lurk5: I've been looking also.

During the day we send the older boys out to the trampoline for 5 minutes of getting their jitters out if they need it. My 7yo has no problem getting through a day's worth of work in one 90min sitting. This will be the first official hs'ing year for my wild 5yo son, though, and I planned accordingly. He will be doing 5-10 minute workbook sessions between manipulative activities and play time with the little ones. I've tried to gear entire subjects or practice times for subjects as manipulative, group, or oral activities. ETC and copy work are his only sit down activities. I hope his attention span grows as his need for more structured lessons grows.

I'm due with my 6th hb'ed baby on the 8th and I am the same way. This will be our 2nd unassisted and I feel less obligated to have the house clean. With midwives I felt that they were company and even felt guilty every contraction like I was taking up their time waiting for me...it's worse when it's time to push and I feel like I'm on display holding up the main event...at least by then I no longer care if the house is clean! I do need the house clean for my sanity, though and I want it to look clean after I'm tucked into bed with baby. It's like unfinished business that makes me anxious if it's cluttered. I'm the same way about showering and having my hair blown dry before labor. I actually had my husband brush and blow it dry during contractions with our twins. We all have our quirks.:blushing: I just got our bedroom spotless and felt so content. I told my husband it was a great time to have a baby...now I just have to keep it that way until baby shows up. DH knows his first labor job is to scrub the tub. I love him.:001_wub:

My 10yo dsd sounds a lot like your dd. Even her spelling is just as creative! I am planning on using SWR, but I've never used it before. Good luck.

My ds did 2-3 exercises a day, which is why we're switching him to Math on the Level which will let him go as fast or slow in whatever concepts he's ready for. We had the Singapore CDRoms that give the extra practice they'd need. We also would do activities with the lessons after the exercises instead of needing extra pages of practice. He learned far more in just a few minutes of one-on-one practice instead of pages of problems.

This looks awesome. I was planning on getting a few VanCleave books but wasn't sure they'd get the use I'd like for the investment. This would be perfect if: it's easy for children to use on their own and it explains why the experiments work. Does it do these things?

Math on the Level. It teaches you how to teach every concept from Preschool through Pre-algebra with one-on-one instruction and real life activities. You move as quickly or slowly as your child's capable of and you choose the concepts he learns, skipping over what he's not grasping.