I started SOTW Ancientswith my 1st grader. Like previous posters, my 4 yo dd listened in and joined us. Not because I made her, but because she wanted to. She did not make her own notebook pages, but would draw a picture. I didn't require it, but when I said to my 1st grade ds, "Let's move to the table and draw a picture!" she followed right along. I was consistent with science that year, but was not in subsequent years. We love science, but I had a hard time doing it formally. I agree with previous posters. Don't wait to start history, especially if you are doing SOTW and the activity book. It is the fun part and your kids will remember, even if they don't remember the details.

When my ds was in 5th grade we used Biology for the Logic Stage. He loves science, but this just took the joy out of science for him. It involves managing a lot of paperwork and he had done many of the "experiments" on his own already. I showed this to my dd going into 7th last night. She thought it looked great. She is not a kid who loves science, but is more artsy. I think she will love coloring and labeling the diagrams. My 5th grade son will not be doing it along with her. (Or he will do a very modified version.)

I tried that for 5th with my oldest. I was not able to keep up with checking the work and figuring out where to put it and how he should keep track of his assignments... These would all be good things to learn at that age, but at the time I couldn't handle it with younger kids around. It was just faster to do it orally or on a whiteboard.

My oldest used RS G. We used something else for 5th because I thought that G would be too hard in 5th. He did it in 6th, but I really think he could have done it in 5th. So, I am remembering back several years, but G is nothing like high school geometry. It is using the discovery method to determine geometry principles. This requires that the child do a lot of calculations and measurements. It is very detailed. If a measurement of an angle is just a few degrees off, then the whole thing doesn't work. It can be frustrating. The child is practicing all the operations every day. In fact, almost too much. I made the mistake of not looking at the lessons ahead of time and would check up on my child to see that he had to do 20 long division problems to "discover" a mathematical principle. He needed the practice with long division, just not that much. I should have let him use a calculator for some of that. Even with all that, he really loved the program. We made it about 2/3 through the book. My next two children are easily frustrated and complain about everything, so I went with Math Mammoth instead.

:bigear:

Do you think it was DIVE? http://www.diveintomath.com/science-1/

Thanks. I was really confused after reading the sample transcript in TWTM, then coming on the forums and seeing that it is done in a completely different way. Does anyone count their credits the way the sample transcript shows? History and Great Books study = 1 world History credit and 1 Modern Literature credit. Rod & Staff Grammar = English credit.

Would the amount of hours the child spent on the class determine whether it was 1 or 2 credits?

*My first post on the high school board!!* When planning each year I start with the WTM recommendations and go from there. So, I am a little confused about what to count for an English credit. I thought that it would look like this: English 9: Essentials in Writing, some vocabulary, spelling practice (he is a horrible speller) World Literature: as per the WTM, read, discuss, and write from the ancient book list However, reading through some of the topics on this board, it seems like many people add literature into the English credit. Will I not be doing enough for English to assign a credit at the end of the year?

I did this earlier this year. I don't remember exactly how it is done, but I managed it - which means it was really simple! What I remember: Change the input on your tv so Chromecast shows. It will rotate through photographs. Be near the tv and bring up something to watch on your ipad. (A youtube video is easy to start with.) A new little icon will appear on the video. Tap it. The video will appear on your tv!

I really enjoyed using Five in a Row by Jane Lambert when my children were 4-5 years old.

The questions are very detailed. So detailed, they could only answer a few. It was discouraging for all of us. Dropping them made history fun again.

I don't pay my children much for "extra" chores. For example, I pay $2/hour to mow the grass. That means they make about $5 mowing our grass. But when they mow the neighbor's grass they get $30. I simply can't afford it. My older two have occasional opportunities to make $25-$30 doing extra jobs for other people. If they didn't have this extra way of making money, then I may rethink how much I pay.

I have used IEW and WWS, but not LTOW. I have a similar issue with my DS, so I was going to switch from WWS back to IEW! We are currently in WWS2. I really like the program, however it has made the writing process too complicated for us. If I understand WWS correctly, she presents many different "parts" that could be included in a paper, has the student practice these "parts," then write their own paper by deciding which "parts" need to be included. It is a nice idea, but my son still needs a lot of help with this. I have never had a problem with writing assignments in highschool and college, but this confuses even me.

My kids have been finishing level E at the end of 4th. We will go into the summer to get it done this year.

This week my 8th grader forgot how to multiply and honestly could not remember the difference between nouns and verbs. I voted for 5th grade.

There is a graphic novel edition of the Warriors series by Erin Hunt.

Our local homeschool group has a project fair. Children display something that they worked on this school year. However, we do it at my home just for my family. The kids love displaying their notebooks, history projects, and special compositions and then talking about them with aunts, uncles, and grandparents.

My 8 yo ds used to do this. Studying for the spelling bee is how it ended. In the spelling bee I was worried that he would repeat his letters and it would be considered spelled incorrectly. While quzzing him I would gently point it out everytime he repeated a letter when he spelled the word. If he repeated a letter we would not go back and re-do the word, just move on to the next one.(The focus was on the spelling bee, not the speech issue.) No mention was ever made of his repeated syllables in regular conversation, but gradually that faded away until your post made me realize that we no longer have this issue!

My only involvement with AWANA is helping my children with their memory work and sending them with grandma, but my boys LOVE it. I am not sure why, but they really do. My guess is they love the game time. The game leader is really dynamic and really gets the kids excited. I like the memory work. Especially when they get to T&T. It is definitely challenging, but really cool the way they have the memory work organized. Kind of like a catechism with questions and answers.

I used RS with my children and then switched to MM around 5th grade. My background in RS has helped me to explain the concepts in MM that my children have trouble with. If I had not had the "script" provided by RS, I could not do that. So, while it is possible for some people to take the MM lessons and present them in a more fun and interactive way, I am not sure that I could have done that.

I guess I have just never head it happening. It has never happened to my children or to the children of my friends (that I know of). I didn't think it was so widespread that teasing would be the first thing that came to mind. For a very brief time in elementary school I was teased about my last name, but only on the playground, far away from the teachers. I guess there are all kinds of homeschoolers, but MY kids are rarely in situations like that. I just imagined homeschoolers might be around more adults who would put a stop to that sort of teasing. Where is this teasing happening?

I like it. Do kids really get made fun of for their names because it rhymes with something? Even homeschooled kids? Would you really throw out a name because that might happen?

I was at a conference a few weeks ago and heard Dr. Jay Wile speak. He is the author of Science in the Beginning and some of the Apologia books for highschool. Although his new project is the science for elementary school, he said that the best way to do science at this age is informally. That comment really relieved me of a lot of pressure that I have been feeling.

I don't want to start WWS until 6th either, so my 5th grader is going to try Excellence in Writing. I have never used the program before but is is open and go, has a short DVD lesson and was inexpensive.