SWR Singapore Math Miquon Sonlight Core K WWE SSL All were great fits for us this year.

:iagree:

:iagree: We did P4/5 for Kindy and Core K for 1st grade. Just started Core 1 and my ds will be 7 next month. Perfect choices so far for my accelerated learner.

About 3 here but that includes numerous interruptions from little brothers, short breaks to play with said brothers, and snack time. It doesn't count read alouds...that's a min of another hour. I recently did a trial run with my middle guy to see how it's going to work with two students and it was a lot longer because ds6 wanted to teach his brother instead of doing his own work. It was cute but resulted in a long day. We're back to the drawing board on doing K and 2nd together. Hopefully, I'll get it figured out before the baby comes (soon) and our new school year (June). 6 hour days won't work around here.

I don't like scripted programs at all and have been happy with FLL so far. I just skip the script and present the lesson in my own way. It's easy and takes us about 10-15 mins to do 2 lessons. I'm really happy with the way it's going through the parts of speech systematically. We also use WWE but the text and not the workbook. The text explains the method and I come up with my own narration/copywork selections. It's working out really well. It's a little more work but I didn't want to use snippets of books we weren't reading. As for spelling/phonics, we use SWR. It's great for me because I get the strong foundation I want and it's completely customizable for my dc. So far, I have an advanced reader and a very advanced reader so the flexibility is pretty important (plus one is a visual learner and the other is auditory). It does require a lot from the teacher initially but now that I've been using it for a couple of years, it's open-and-go. It includes grammar and writing for K-2 but I like the FLL/WWE combo better and just substitute. We use Sonlight's readers for reading. SWR has guidelines for reading which we follow and the SL readers fill the space perfectly. Because of the gap between my boys' reading and writing levels, an all-in-one program just won't work. I am really happy with how all of our programs are going and not switching anytime soon. I do have some tough decisions to make around 3rd grade for grammar and writing but I'll cross that bridge when I get there.

Well, I guess my 2yo is doing okay academically, then. :lol: Our marble run is his new favorite toy. I'm amazed at how long that thing can keep him and his 4yo brother occupied.

It's nice to see so many people using it through Purple. We're planning on it. I have one who's almost finished with Blue and one just starting Orange. It's definitely working here. Ds6 calls it his fun math. We use it alongside Singapore (and Horizons...but that's just because my ds can't get enough math). We don't coordinate it with our other programs. I let ds6 pick whatever pages he wants to do. Ds4 isn't at that level yet. He mostly plays with rods and goes through the book in order.

Sounds normal to me too. I thought it was bizarre when my ds would read long words fluently but stop to sound out hat, can, and, etc. One day it all clicked and he took off. Gotta wonder what's going on in that brain sometimes, huh?

:iagree: We've done without buying any containers because there are plenty in my kitchen and we haven't bought or used any weights. The only thing I'd add is play money (that looks like real $). It's cleaner and cheaper than real money and gets a lot of use at our house.

We have had similar struggles. My dh is on our church council and helps with other ministries. I'm 8 mos pg and have been stretched getting all 3 dc ready for church and there on time most Sundays plus the nights dh is gone on church business. It doesn't help that dh's work was also particularly demanding a for a few weeks and I was feeling very worn down. We talked about it my dh agreed to step back on one ministry until the baby's born. I felt bad but it's best for our family right now. As for the connection issue. That doesn't really apply to us. I am involved in a few ministries myself and spend more time at the church than dh...albeit during the day with the dc. I just stopped teaching Sunday school (due to advanced pg and too many toddlers in my class :tongue_smilie:) but am still active in everything else. Thankfully, our church is sensitive to the childcare needs of moms with young children. Of course, that's tough when you have a toddler who has trouble going to the nursery. Are there any other groups you can attend during the week that would enable you to connect with people outside of service?

CWP or IP. I prefer CWP. Some people use both. EP if you have a struggling student.

Same here. We bought the Quest over 6 years ago when our oldest was about 8 mos old. It is still our most used stroller and it in great condition. We bought a last year's model when the new line came out (still new but colors and patterns had changed) for half price. Best baby buy to date in our house.

Well, I'm pretty happy to see no one's picked 4 yet! Everyone kept telling me that the third was going to be the hardest but it's been pretty easy. My oldest has been very helpful which is nice. Also, the older two became a unit leaving dh and I with either the youngest or the older boys. Pretty easy transition. #1 was the doozy for us. Thankfully, he was/is a very easy-going dc. It took a long time to adjust the how much time and energy parenting takes.

I understand what you're saying about having a primary resource but LA still seems heavy to me. It seems like you have a lot of overlapping resources. You might be setting yourself up for a lot of extraneous work trying to get them to all work together.

We always read the read alouds faster than scheduled so I just add in an extra book here and there to fill in. This year, we're reading through the Chronicles of Narnia after each couple of read alouds. I don't worry about ds being ahead in readers. I just let him pick ibrary books when he finishes for the year.

I use SL without the LA and don't feel like we're missing anything. We do use the readers, though. They are just great books for the dc to read. The readers (and, therefore, the LA) don't even correlate with the cores until Core 3 to accommodate various levels. For instance, we're using Readers 2 intemediate with Core 1. The core includes a 36 week schedule of Bible, history, read alouds, and readers schedules. There are notes and questions for each section including history. The LA would add an LA schedule, activities, and worksheets based off of the readers. Since we use other LA resources, I don't have any need for it.

In my sig. It is hit or miss ATM because I'm 35 wks pg but I'm still posting occasionally.

I spend about 2 hrs at the beginning of the year to plan (mostly SWR) so it will all be open-and-go. After that, it takes me about 15 mins per week to update my schedule based on what we accomplished, make a copy, etc.

We use the SL readers for this. My ds can read at a 4th-5th grade level but he's reading through SL Readers 2int out loud using the schedule. The books are about 2-3 levels lower than his reading level which is working well.

Same here.

I'm in the same boat and need to order ASAP. I had two great ones last time but they wore out and the styles have been discontinued. I know I'm going to need to spend some $$, but would like to make sure they'll be super supportive and comfy. Unfortunately, online's my only option since I'm a 32 band. :glare:

We liked it too. I'm doing it again starting in June and we're going to focus our geography studies around it.

Skip the last lesson? Are you crazy?!? I like the feeling of being done too much to skip that last page. I'd much rather skip the first 20 lessons of a new book. Too bad my OCD won't allow me to do that either.

Oh, wow!!

I'm due with boy #4 in March...4-5 more weeks to go. We are very excited!