Samples can be found on the top, left side of the page you linked; it took me a few minutes to find them the first time, too, because you would think the samples would be listed with the actual products under each grade category instead of off to the side like that.

We're using the Memoria Press literature guides. This will be our first year using these, but I am hopeful, because as of yet, I have never been disappointed with anything I have purchased from MP. There are a lot of great guides out there, but these happened to look like they would meet my goals and expectations the best - and I happen to like their literature selections, too.

The list looks great. I agree with other posters about tossing out the dates and dividing the list into smaller lists by importance. I am having my sons work on five books for "literature" this year, so they will have time to really sit down and analyze them. Everything else is considered free reading for them. For example, we devote two days per week to literature, two days per week to free reading and one day per week to poetry. For literature, they will be independently reading Wind in the Willows, As You Like It and Robinson Crusoe and completing a detailed literature guide of each. I will be reading The Iliad and Odyssey to them during our read aloud time, and they will be completing guides on those, too. That's our literature. For free reading, I have a list of books I would like for them to read, and they choose what they like and read it. When they finish the book, they complete a light evaluation and move to the next book. No time restraints - just do the next book of their choice. On Fridays, they read poetry. Additionally, I will be reading books from my read aloud list throughout the year, after we finish The Iliad and Odyssey. In all, my boys will be reading through three different books at varying paces at the same time for most of the year - their independent reading "literature" book, their free reading book and the read aloud. We will complete their literature books during the year, but everything else is on a "just do the next thing" schedule - no big deal, if we don't get to everything on those lists.

My DS11 will be going into 7th grade this year, and here is a peek of what I plan on having him do for writing. 1. He will complete Classical Writing Aesop and Homer for Older Beginners four days per week. I think I read somewhere that it amounts to about 30 minutes of writing per day. 2. He will be reading from a primary source every week for history, and he will be expected to complete a primary source evaluation each week according to TWTM. I would expect this would take 20-30 minutes once a week. 3. He will be reading two biographies of scientists he encounters this year. He will be expected to complete an evaluation of them per TWTM. He will also be expected to complete simple lab reports for science. 4. He will be expected to complete evaluations of books he reads for literature per TWTM. 5. On Fridays, I will have him working through Writing with Skill for an hour. The last few weeks of WWS will have him completing a major research paper. He'll have most of his writing coming from Classical Writing and Writing with Skill, and light writing across the board for his other subjects.

I have the DVDs, and I agree with Shawna that it contains more advanced drawing. My sons already completed the Beginning Drawing series in their co-op two years ago, and I was pleased with the results. I have only previewed various segments of the DVDs, but from what I have seen it looks good. I like how he shows the viewer how to combine various colors to make colors similar to those found in nature. There are six, hour-long segments - they cover trees, flowers, landscapes, the four seasons, insects, birds, treasures in nature, journaling for all of these areas, and I may have missed some of the other topics - but for our purposes (nature study using The Handbook of Nature Study for co-op), we're only going to have the students watch the drawing portions for the color combinations (to make notes for future reference) and the drawing (to learn how to replicate shapes found in nature) - we're not going to watch the journaling segments, but I may have my boys watch them on our own time.

My sons attend a small co-op, and we are planning on doing a combined nature/art/music study this year. We're planning to use the Ambleside rotation for our artists and composers. We'll do a brief study of the artist's/composer's life and find their geographical location on a map the first week, and we'll listen to their music and study their paintings over a six week period. Then, we'll switch to a different artist and composer. For nature, we'll spend the first few weeks watching segments of Barry Stebbing's Nature Drawing & Journaling DVD. He teaches how to blend colors to make colors similar to those found in nature. Then, we'll choose a topic for each week that coincides with the time of the year from The Handbook of Nature Study, and the students will study and draw and journal about the select topic for the week. We've decided that combining these three areas will present plenty of opportunities for field trips year round, too...the zoo, the botanical gardens, art museums, the symphony orchestra, planetarium, etc.

There is a book called Grammar-land that your daughter might enjoy. It covers grammar in a story fashion. It takes place in the courtroom of Judge Grammar and has characters like Mr. Noun, Dr. Verb, Serjeant Parsing, etc. It's available for free online. There are even some worksheets available online that coincide with the chapters of the book.

Here are our plans for the upcoming school year: History - Dorothy Mills' Ancient World/Greece/Rome (we'll get as far as we can) + Peace and Peril (for extra church history). We'll read these books and do some WTM outlining/summaries/timelines from them. Math - Rod & Staff 5 English - Rod & Staff 5 Science - Apologia Astronomy + Tiner's Exploring Planet Earth Reading - WTM recommendations + Shakespeare and poetry according to the AO schedule Writing - WWS Spelling - Abeka 5 Latin - Latina Christiana II Logic - Mind Benders Music/Art/Nature Study - according to AO schedule Bible/Character - Truth & Grace Memory Book/Boyhood & Beyond/Read through Bible

I would suggest Shepherding a Child's Heart by Ted Tripp. It does not deal with simply correcting outward behavior, but rather, it shows parents how to deal with the root cause of the behavior - sin.

Thanks for the link to the other thread and for your input. I had originally decided to go with Lial's BCM, but when I looked over the Redwoods text, I saw that it covered graphing - which my son has not touched on at all through the Rod & Staff math series. I may just go ahead with the Lial's and add the graphing chapter from the Redwoods to it for my peace of mind.

I recently saw on the Memoria Press Forum that they will be using (or are currently testing) a pre-algebra text from College of the Redwoods for their 7th grade packaged curriculum. I found the book available as a free pdf download on the college website. Has anyone else looked at this book? If so, what are your thoughts on it? I don't know what to look for in a pre-algebra program, so I'm hoping someone can tell me whether this would be considered a thorough program or if it has any glaring gaps that would need to be addressed. Thanks, Joy