So, DS is starting 5th grade and has been doing well with TT 5, but he did terrible on his math portion of the CAT test :( He did great on everything else. He had no problem with single digit multiplication but multiple digit and division not so well. He has learned these before but... We have used Singapore math through 3A but he hated it. Suggestions please.

We have been using Heart of Dakota the last few years and there are studied dictations in the back of the guide they use for spelling. It has been great for my ds, he is a natural speller. My dd on the other hand takes after me so she needs a little more help there.

What worked well...finally able to combine the 2 oldest!!! Teaching Textbooks Apologia elementary series (using in MFW) AAS Switching... Couldn't continue to combine with HOD so we are moving over to MFW which makes me happy because I can finally use the audio of SOTW :) Fails... DITHOR. I've tried this a couple times and just can't stick with it.

I struggled more when I took Greek. The language and writing are too similar to english for me and caused me issues. I had a great time with Hebrew though. The characters were totally different and reading right to left. There is something with Greek that had a harder time clicking. We have another friend who had the same problem. His Hebrew was great and even got to work on the dead sea scrolls, but with Greek he still struggles some.

I'd vote Exploring American History too :)

We're doing MFW Exp-1850 ILL AAS TT5 and then probably some Life of Fred TKD Maybe French, we will see about that one :)

So besides math, what should we do. We've finished world history cycle. Oldest kinda wants to do some American history, but I'm Ok starting another cycle too. We will also have a K student but she will just be tagging along and continuing on reading, math, etc. You guys always come up with better suggestions than I have on my own :)

Thanks I will check those out :) I agree with the whole world history with american history too. We did SOTW 1&2 then we are doing PHFHG with CHOW since my younger one wasn't quite ready for SOTW 3. I guess I could just pick up with SOTW 3 then add Am history extra readings in for my ds who is older.

So we are finishing up World history and I wanted to add in some extra American history for DS since he wont be hitting it again for a while and we never really did just Am. hist. Any good recomendations for a spine or even something that my 5th grader can read to himself, he loves history.

Your plan is very doable, and truthfully doing 2 guides for HOD for me is easier than 1 with SL :) CTC your dc will be doing a lot independently. Bigger will require more time, and Little hearts takes maybe 30 minutes a day depending on how long math and reading take. One great thing with HOD is that you don't have to go "full" speed through the guides. There are some days that we do 1 page instead of both pages if we have a busy day or want to spend a little more time on something. You will notice also that CTC is just 4 days a week also so you can stretch stuff out a lot easier if you want to do it over 5 days. I can't remember exactly how long Bigger takes, but Preparing takes about 3 hours to get everything in. Usually math and LA is what is the most time consuming so I would guess Bigger would be less than that. We haven't gotten to CTC yet so I'm not sure. There are some great FB groups also for each HOD guide that are very helpful too you may want to check out.I will say that to me HOD feels a little better with flow of history and more managable with time to, we went through Core C them switched all the kids over to HOD.

Heart of Dakota's been great for us in that respect. We use R&S they recommend and Teaching Textbooks.

We are using Preparing for 4th, Beyond for 2nd and I try to get in LHTH with my PreK in but we added a new baby to the mix so we will see how that goes :) We are trying to do DITHOR but I have a tendency to not finish each unit. I think if my ds liked reading a variety of literature it would go smoother, he tends to stick to nonfiction so it stretches him.

I can't seem to link it on my phone but if you stick Heart of Dakota Creation to Christ in the search box it should pop up. It's a closed group so you have to wait to be approved as a member but the group has pretty good activity so it usually doesn't take that long.

We aren't in CTC yet but Preparing is more demanding than CTC. I do about 1 1/2 hrs with ds and that's for everything. CTC has a lot more independence. CTC has a great Facebook group too if you don't get many answers here :)

My kids actually really like it. I am not a big fan of nursery rhymes either way, but I think it is cute when my 9 year old reads it to my 4 year old. It definitely has a strong slant biblically, but I don't recall anything offensive, just not a regular mother goose book :)

I send them home right away, I have my own kids to deal with and don't feel like mothering my neighbors kids, I let my kids play with the neighbor boys and to have to send their 8 year home too :)

I've kinda had to distance myself from my parents with the kids because my moms attitude. I asked her twice to watch my little ones while I go for my midwife appointment and this last time she ended up taking a Valium and calling my brother and father to my house because "they just don't mind" I was so not happy when I got home. She just retired and says she can't wait to spend more time with the kids and wants to help out some, especially when we have this next baby, but my dad then tells me they've planned a long vacation during my due date. Thankfully I have a great MIL who sees the kids 2-3 times a week and loves playing with them. I think what bothers me the most I these situations is when you are being told they want to c the kids but their actions are total opposite. I would rather honesty :)

We're on book 4 and still do most of it orally. He does do the writing assignments though. I would see no problem doing it orally. When we were in 2 I only had ds do 2-3 sentences a lesson.

Alice in wonderland and the little house books

Have you looked at the books from the extension package of Bigger from HOD. If you plan on doing Bigger you may want to wait on the Eggleston book since it's used in Bigger. I was thinking about using A Child's Story of America for my ds since we've done a lot of world history and very little american and since were in the middle of Preparing it will be a while till we hit american history again.

I really like both programs, I would say R&S if you needed writing too, but since you already have that covered I would probably lean towards FLL. We did FLL 3 then moved into R&S 4 since ds needed more work on learning to write with paragraphs.

Thanks, I printed off some reading comprehension pages I found on line so I will try those and then I have some Encyclopedia Brown books and just have him read over the summer :) Hopefully he will learn to slow down and pay attention ;)

So my ds is reading well, but when he reads to himself he reads fast and doesn't really remember anything he read. I will sometimes make him read aloud to me, which he agonizes over :) or have him reread stuff and ask questions. Sometimes he will reread a chapter 2-3 times before he can even answer my questions. When he reads it out loud he can narrate beautifully back to me and answer almost any question I ask, so how can I help him to translate that to his independent reading? I know in January he will suppose to be starting HOD CTC which has independent history reading and that really concerns me as well. I don't want him to just skim and not learn. Thanks :)

Have you looked at www.homeschoolshare.com they have free studies like FIAR that you could do if you aren't ready for BEyond yet. As far as approval, I submitted my request a month ago and just got approved yesterday ;) We've really enjoyed FIAR when we have used it :)

We spent about $700 for curriculum but most of what I buy can be reused for my little ones. We do pay about $100 a month on top for piano lessons for my 2 oldest :)