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jamnkats

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Everything posted by jamnkats

  1. We live in Mexico but I'm having my kids do Duolingo to get basic Spanish spelling down and vocabulary. I HATE the translations. They are stiff and not how we talk here (Mexico).
  2. If one happened to live in a land of no coconut oil (processed) but surrounded by coconut trees, what would be the best method of acquiring said oil, or would making coconut milk (we just use a blender with coco meat and water) do? Any idea how much coco oil in freshly made milk?
  3. THANK YOU SO MUCH for this post! I've been holding off on ordering anything, just LOATHE to do science after the RS4K fail last year and this looks GREAT for my girls! Thank you again!
  4. My #2 was like this for MANY years - I remember the ENTIRE house was afraid of him - even his grandparents - of this little toddler. About 5 or 6 years of age he began to mellow. Now that he is in puberty, we've been dealing with it for a year or more again and I figure we will be for a while and then he'll mellow only to have it reappear in his 40s (but by then he should have someone else to hold his hand :)). My #3 was like this but in a different way, she cried her way all the way from age 4 to age 6. It was CONSTANT. OMG I thought she'd die of tears. But we kept at it and supporting her and listening and empathizing and it became less. But it really just shifted but then at 9 she kind of "jelled" and now she's just dealing with hormones (and we work through that). My #4 was wicked awful as a baby but sweet as pie (as long as everyone acknowledged she was alpha) until about 8. She's now going through "something" but it is nothing like #3 or #2. My #1 has been the easiest child in the world. ;) Got lucky with that one.
  5. He does the shopping, cooks, takes the kid to school and picks him up, does the laundry, dishes and reads to the girls (I homeschool the boy and girls). It is a bit of a sore point because if it were me I'd be doing MUCH more than he does, but there you have it.
  6. You know I really don't think it is an issue of being "blessed". We parent our kids with respect. We get respect back. It seems pretty simple to me. They are always allowed to say "no" and have a voice in family decisions. I've not had the horrifically rebelling teen nor the destructive teen - IMO, because they dont' NEED to go there. They know they are respected and heard and are not stifled to "obey". I dunno. Maybe I'm really lucky or it is all coincidental that we've raised them this way and they're turning out the way they are. I would tend to believe it is the way they're raised but really there are no guarantees. I'd say your teen needs to be heard. I don't think she's going to be heard by you taking her door off her room, but you probably have very different goals in raising your kids than I do.
  7. You know, I don't have grown children but I do have 4 of widely differing temperaments and I have never punished them nor needed to. We have always treated them with respect (except for a few slip-ups that we admitted to and apologized for) and when conflict arises we work TOGETHER to find a solution. Now it is entirely possible that the 16yo, the 14yo, the 11yo and the almost 9yo will magically change (and the jury IS still out on the girls :) and puberty) but I honestly don't see the need for such heavy handed parenting - ESPECIALLY in our family.
  8. I just wanted to throw this out to you all - not everyone with a physical presence in one country yet a mailing address in another is scamming. Mail simply Does Not Arrive here in Mexico and furthermore the US govn't requires a legal US address. We live in Mexico but all our mail is sent to South Dakota, to a business dedicated to accepting and forwarding mail to those without fixed addresses (mainly RVers but also expats like us). So my ISP might say CANCUN but anything I order from HSC goes to South Dakota.
  9. This is too funny! Yes, I'd put on a bra (if I could find one - if not cami with a shelf bra) and load the coffeepot. No dishwasher here. :) I *might* brush my hair. :)
  10. I am not finding anything that can be downloaded at any of the links in the previous pages. Can someone throw me a bone here?
  11. broccoli and fish um, none? don't wear shoes. Srsly. The thriftstore is our first stop when we get back to the US.
  12. oh baby that's a loaded one for sure. :) They do run the gamut here in Mexico. In ex-pat areas you will find toilet seats and paper but not always. We always bring our own paper. Sometimes running water, sometimes flush with a bucket.
  13. I live with coconut trees and we only drink the water (it is called leche - milk but it is the clear liquid - water) from green cocos. Brown cocos yuck. No water but the meat is good. If you get a green coco and the meat is somewhat slimy (not hard) that is the best of all. But truthfully, the coco water has like NO taste at all. We use the coco water for electrolye replacement down here.
  14. We have done 3, 5 and 6/7 but I just get the books and read them aloud (or assign reading) and as things come up in the books we'll have on-the-spot discussions. But I find no need to test my kids and would rather have a discussion with them than have them answer a page of questions. We are VERY secular and LOVE Sonlight. I just don't buy the "goddy" books.
  15. I saw a huge group of squid on my swim today. Normally it is just tropical fish a ray or baracuda but I don't regularly see squid. We've got a tropical storm (karl) offshore so that could be another reason. Oh and the best thing is yet ANOTHER sharkless day! :) Um, I'm going to have to change my answer. My girls just came to get me to run to the beach for a nest hatching (turtles). Pretty cool.
  16. We've got them here too on the Caribbean. I don't think I've ever seen them here before.
  17. I have ordered from CBD multiple times but never received a code from them. Is it because I live in Mexico and the code could never be used? Any idea how you get on their code list?
  18. We just finished up TT7 here - spent a lot of time on multiplication (of 2-4 numbered numbers), long division, fractions and decimals and touched on geometry, area, volumes, negative numbers, irrational numbers, probability and easy algebra. We're going from TT7 to Algebra 1.
  19. I unschooled from beginning to age 14 or 15 with #1, age 12 with #2, age 11 with #3 and age 8 with #4. Both the older boys decided they were getting concerned that they were unprepared for the future (we had had various talks on this theme) and #2 started with his first math lessons ever. He is now finishing up probability and will start Algebra soon. Son #1 just couldn't get motivated and finally at 16 he decided he wanted to go to school. So he is now jumping into writing essays for the first time, doing math (he's on fractions now and I expect at this rate he'll be in Algebra by December), learning French (but the kicker is he's learning French in Mexico so all instruction is in Spanish, which is a new language to him also), etc. Right now we're writing an essay on Homer - but it is in Spanish. But he is totally rising to the challenge. I'd go on but I really can't do this and help him with Homer anymore. At any rate, thats a quickie on our experience.
  20. Here is my experience with my 4. My 1st, I did Dr. Suess books at about age 6. He quickly jumped to Harry Potter books by age 7 or early 8 and has had no reading problems since. He is 16 now and we're starting to work on spelling as HE wants that now. He is doing beautifully and actually jumped into Secundaria 3 (age wise he "should" be in Prepa 1 but since all his classes are in a new language we are being flexible) with no problem. #2 could read at 8 but hated it. again, Dr. Suess. At 10 we started working on it more (did Headsprout) and by 12 he was reading well. He now reads VERY well at 14 and is reading adult books as well as all his other subjects (Algebra, Ancient History using Bauer's Ancient History text, Sociology, Geography, Literature (novels and other Sonlight Core 5 books), Lively Art of Writing, etc.) #3 is 10. She started Headsprout at 8. She is now reading at a 4.5 level (just tested her yesterday). She is doing ETC and we're just starting LA now. She reads chapter books no problem. #4 is 8. She started Headsprout at 6 or 7, but it has just been the past 5 or 6 months that it has clicked for her. She is doing ETC 2 now and is sailing through it - we started 4 days ago and she is a good 75% done with it. All the kids started learning to read on their own but the last one probably started earlier than she naturally would have due to older siblings.
  21. I used the test on Don Potter's site - googling reading test or grade level or something like that. :) For now I'm just going to keep going with ETC and will get McRuffy but she has also expressed an interest in school also so we'll see what happens there (as she really does not yet speak the language fluently enough to go to school here but the school is used to that). Well, I can't find Don's right now, but google led me to the exact same test here http://homeschooling.gomilpitas.com/articles/060899.htm
  22. Thanks. I have FLL1 and we do 3-4 "lessons" a day and for some reason I thought you HAD to do it sequentially. Hmmm.. So I'm thinking for LA for her to do GWG3 (as she has done NO grammar yet) and WWE something and I guess I'll get FLL something also? Or would that be overkill - FLL OR GWG? AND, is that enough for LA? We already do copywork daily and she reads books (Sonlight Core 5).
  23. My 10y reads at a 4.5 grade level and before I tested her I was thinking McRuffy level 3 but now I'm thinking maybe she doesn't need that much phonics after all. Any secular ideas for LA for her? I have FLL1 and ordered WS2 (maybe that is too low for her?) but maybe WWE or LLATL? Ideas?
  24. I'm trying to figure out what to do with my 8yo and 10yo girls. They were hs'd by Dad last year and, well, it didn't work well. The 8yo is flying through ETC 2 right now and Singapore 1B no problem. She sounds out each letter in a word right now and has few sight words. I'm looking at McRuffy for her - maybe 1st? Singapore is working well - he did basically no instruction with her so she pretty much learned Singapore 1A on her own. I've been doing 1B with her and she seems fine with understanding. That said, I'm looking at MM for math. Any ideas for LA? Would McRuffy 1 be about right? I think she just needs more 1:1 and reading practice - she's not stupid, just not challenged. She loves cursive and I've been working on that for her. I got FLL and we just started that with she and her sister. Her 10yo sister is having very little problem with ETC 6 and is at the same math level as her sister (middle of 1B singapore). I'm not frantic, trying to get them up to "par" as that is the beauty of hs'ing - you're never really "behind" but this can't continue obviously. I've redone my work schedule and will now be hs'ing the girls. I was looking at LLATL Yellow and Red but would McRuffy be better? Any other ideas? We have lots of Sonlight 5 core literature for reading and that is what DH will be doing - reading literature and I'll work with them on reading, maths and eventually writing (thinking WWE there?). Ok, now that I have perused MM I'm decided. I'm definitely doing MM with both of them. Just need to figure out Reading/Writing. Doing copywork with 10yo and 8yo does lots of writing (cursive) on her own and in ETC but I'm thinking I need copywork with her too. Still thinking McRuffy for 8yo and thinking LLATL yellow for 10yo? Just ordered writing strands 2 for the 10yo and TT4 for her also but it may be overkill depending on how MM goes. Not going to worry about grammar for 8yo, might consider it for 10yo but will wait and see. Ok, I just tested the girls and the 8yo tests at 1.1 and the 10yo at 4.5. So it looks like DEFINITELY grade 1 material for the 8yo but now I'm lost wrt the 10yo. McRuffy ENDS at level 4 - would it make any sense to do it with her? Maybe go with LLATL instead?
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