I would like to know about a group as well. I started last year. Still in Don Q., because our lives experienced major changes this year. DH and I are currently reading through Pilgrims Progress together.

Mine are all still young, but here's what it looks like this year with 3rd, 1st, two in preK, and newborn (haven't tested how it will go with newborn yet!): 8:00: memory work with Dad; theoretically I do preK now with littles, but actually I do chores, etc. 8:30: skills subjects with two older boys, bouncing back and forth between them. Get 1st going on seat work while I explain math lesson, grammar lesson, and listen to 15 minutes reading with older. Then while older does seatwork, do phonics, FLL1, math lesson and flash cards, and reading with 1st grader. Haven't started spelling with 1st yet. 10:30-11:00 ish: break. On Wednesday, we try to do poetry tea now. This is my second theoretical chance to do preK if I haven't yet. 11:00: morning meeting. MFW ADV (Bible, history, science, art, music) and writing, some memory work. If I have time, I'll do spelling with 3rd grader before lunch. Should be done with all school by now. 12:30-1:00 ish: have lunch. Read aloud during lunch. 1:30: pick up. Read to preKers. 2:00 or 2:15: nap time. Finish school with third grader, or older boys read quietly then play quietly. Now with newborn, I'm sure we will struggle to finish by lunchtime, if I have to stop often to care for baby. But that's the gist. Sometimes I switch the morning meeting block with the skills subject block.

I'm using the Scripture box app. I have Living Memory (the PDF) as a memory work resource, and every year consult the different categories in Living memory for ideas for memory work that corresponds with our history, science, and geography, then pick out our Bible memory and poetry for the year. I made a binder according to Living Memory's instructions, with daily, weekly, and monthly sections, using differently colored paper for stuff specific to a certain child (though most of it is together). Then in the middle of the year we suddenly had to homeschool on the road for two months. I didn't want to take my memory work binder along and almost dropped it, but my husband thought it was important to continue. I found scripturebox app, and put all our memory work on there. They send an email every morning that you schedule to do memory work with that days work. It's been very helpful while on the road, and very cheap, only $5 for the year, which is all I'd really be willing to pay. But for someone who likes automated stuff, not paper, it's perfect. Now that we are back home, my husband has taken over memory work for me, which is very nice, because it was my least favorite part of the day, and I needed help with something since I just had a baby. Before he starts work in the morning, he takes a half hour with the boys doing their memory work emailed straight to his inbox, plus some modern language memory work. The scripture box app was created to correspond with SCMs scripture memory, so if you want to use any of those verses or creeds, they are already in the system for you and you can just "activate" their verses. Otherwise, it can take a bit of time to input all of your memory work. I'm still figuring out how to organize it all. I made several "boxes" for different subjects, but in my old Living memory system, I didn't have an "every other day" even or odd category, so now with those extra categories plus all of my boxes, we have too much memory work coming into the inbox every day; but you as mom can just skip it if it's too much. So it's not as flexible as simply having paper that you can move around whenever you want, but it is still flexible, and a great price.

Xtramath.org is a wonderful, FREE online program to help drill math facts. If you do include a math supplement or online supplement section, xtra math would be great. The iPad app is $5.

:iagree: I agree with every sentence written here and want to add my words of profound thanks for TWTM and the forums you host for us. They have changed my life and my kids' lives. I also want to emphasize a disclaimer that I am only in my fourth official year of homeschooling, so I have a lot to learn on so many levels that I feel inadequate to address your book. I will however, dare to throw out some quick bullet points, obviously all my opinion: I agree that you need to emphasize somewhere near the beginning of the next edition that you host these forums. I had NO idea until three years after I read TWTM, and these forums have been so incredibly helpful! I join the vote to remove SWO and replace with AAS (and/or R&S spelling for more independent explicitly phonics-based spelling and maybe for those already using R&S grammar). On my blog I reviewed some spelling curricula I bought or tried. I concluded that SWB must have been a natural speller (I am, as well) and thus couldn't relate to the struggling speller. Perhaps I was unfair, but until my ds1, I didn't stress about spelling. I used ABeka, since that's what I used for phonics. He needed something more explicit. A natural speller could use any spelling program, but the struggler needs something O-G. Maybe remove or replace the Spelling Power rec as well. I also felt a bit like a failure when none of my children have learned to read at 4. You mention that they should be starting to read by 4 or 5. My current 4yo doesn't even have all her letter sounds down yet. I have been busy lately... But I do understand that you were trying to reduce the intimidation to teach children to read. I however felt very little intimidation in teaching my kids to read because I picked it up easily as a child; but then I realized that while it may be "easy" to teach, it isn't always easy for them to learn. I never knew until this year that there also might be vision tracking issues involved. Like others mentioned, how do we know when a child's struggles are "normal," and when to seek help or further evaluation? I wrote some of my angst and questions here on the forums. I respectfully disagree with the experienced math advisor Spy Car on two matters: first, that you don't emphasize conceptual thinking in grammar stage math, rather, fact memorization. Your 3rd ed clearly emphasizes teaching with manipulatives first and understanding the concepts that way, then adding fact memorization, which I agree is very important. You also recommend living math on Fridays, like Kitchen Table Math. I have tried three of your math curriculum recommendations and feel them all to be very good. I also have the Rightstart Math games. SM was too abstract for us at times, exactly as you said, and I felt a maturity gap for my son, as well as that SM leaves fact memorization completely up to you, and we needed more help than that. We love MUS, and I also like ABeka, though I think it emphasizes drill over concepts too much. Secondly, I do not feel Beast Academy deserves mention, certainly not as a main math program, but perhaps as a supplement. Even for my advanced math kid, and we did love the comic book style, the workbook was too advanced in parts and doesn't provide enough practice in real nuts and bolts getting the facts down. That was my impression of BA, but we haven't used a full grade level. I am also not in love with MM. You have to stop the curriculum recommendation list somewhere, and I feel your math list is pretty good, though I suppose the debate on that could be endless. TWTM doesn't defend very well why grammar is important from first grade up through 10th or 12th. I'm doing it, cuz you said to :coolgleamA: , but it did seem unimportant in 1st, probably 2nd, and I wondered if we would be better off just starting in 3rd or 4th. You recommend Beechick's book A Strong Start in Language, but on the subject of grammar, you two have different philosophies. If you don't edit TWTM on this subject, perhaps you could just weigh in on this thread where I asked for some more help in understanding why it's so important to good writing to start so young on grammar instruction. Please do mention the audio companion for FLL. It's so cheap, and it is really cute when your toddler sings the state of being verbs along with your older student. Your times spent on reading (total) do seem excessive in TWTM. The "average" child couldn't do that much IMO. Finally, I can't seem to internalize the LA recommendations in TWTM, specifically teaching writing across the curriculum and reading organically with history, rather than using basal readers with comprehension workbooks. I have repeatedly asked on the forums for advice in an attempt to get it through my thick head how to do WTM reading and writing. Links are below. I got answers all over the place on what expectations people had of their children--all using WWE or WTM methods! When I read your introduction to the WWE textbook, your system of writing made so much sense to me! But when I actually try to implement a reading journal, a history notebook, a science notebook, with narrations, dictation, and copywork in all, it just seemed like a LOT! And it seemed to squelch whatever fledgling love my son felt for those subjects to connect writing with them. If I just used your WWE workbooks however, I felt like the subjects were so disjointed, and I really wanted them to be interrelated and to save my own time. The WWE workbook dictations were too difficult for my struggling speller, and he disliked reading snippets of stories. I felt like a failure while using the workbooks, because some of it was too hard; but I also felt like a failure when I stepped away and just used the textbook writing across the curriculum, because it was so much more work for me, and I wasn't sure I was getting the results I would with the wkbk. HELP, please! What are appropriate expectations for how much to expect per day when writing across the curriculum, and what to do if the child is struggling with dictation, but not necessarily with narration or copywork? These are examples of my questions, but the links below flesh out the struggle more. How to Transition to WTM reading and writing How much narration per day/week? ds7 says he's "not good" at history (or my failure to figure out writing across the curriculum per WTM) How important is it that I write the narration down for my child? WWE2 dictation struggles: what do I do? Help me: appropriate expectations for 3rd grade reading and writing? Thank you so much for TWTM and these forums!

I loved them as a kid and thought Ramona was hilarious, and yes, sometimes naughty. Now as an adult, I do not censor them, nor other cleary books with th exception of Mitch and Amy and Dear Mr. Henshaw, the latter being too "realistic" to be helpful to anyone IMO. I reviewed Henshaw on my blog. My main conflict over these books as an adult is that I disagree with some of the parenting methods and thought the parents spoiled Ramona at times. I don't remember specifics, but I also remember being more uncomfortable with the tone of Ramona and Her Father.

Stuff by Shannon Hale (I've read two of Princess Academy series and The Goose Girl--exciting and romantic and can be humorous) and Robin McKinley (I LOVE Beauty, her version of Beauty and the Beast!)

I would definitely not use FLL1&2 for writing only. That would take you through very little time, and much of it is based on the grammar lessons, which you have covered with CLE. Go with WWE.

Thank you! It still works!

ABeka is scripted daily, with workbook assignments. Or CLE.

I also think it looks like a lot, especially when I read your second to last paragraph about outside activities. But I'm a couple of grades behind you and I can see how it adds up. What do you cut? I think I'd try to multi-task your subjects more. For example, choose one book for her to read every day, not two. Take the vocab from that (ABeka does this in third grade, don't know about beyond that. Only problem is that it might force you to skim ahead of her and pick out words. Or you could have her write down one word that she doesn't know per day in a notebook and look up the definition with sample sentence from the book. This doubles as copy work. ? Stop when you have a good list and just review those until she knows them.) I thought many spelling programs get into Greek and Latin roots (excellent for vocab) around level 6 or 7. So maybe just stick with R&S as it will get into that soon, don't remember which level, and that will cover vocab. Or use both ideas in conjunction. You could consider doing some Latin instead of IEW Fix It AND the vocab program, to cover your grammar and vocab for the year. Then cut Spanish as well for the year. Just a thought. :) I don't like the idea of teaching Latin. To be honest, it seems like a lot of time for Bible. Can you get Scripture memory, catechism work, and BSGFAA all inside 20-30 minutes? Cut geography. Learn it with history. Missionaries, too. Or pick two missionary or Christian hero biographies to use as your read-aloud for the year. Have them narrate. Do almost everything you do in your missionary or geography study, but just in your read-aloud time twice a year or so. Next time a missionary reports at your church, ask to be the family to host them for dinner! That'll be a more memorable missions and geography focus. (I have a list on my blog of good questions to ask missionaries if you're in the dark on how to talk to them.) :) Only one math per day, right? See if one is is sufficient for the year, if she's learning fine with one. Cut Reading and Reasoning. Start one lit discussion per week as per WTM or TTC. Sometimes have her write it, some sort of essay or whatever, and cut W&R for that day or week or. however long it took. Again, can no vocab come from history or science? See what you can do to combine things more. For iutside lessons and activities, consider if you could cut either the art class, piano lessons (if she's not showing much talent and has already taken a few years), or the field trips, or some of the involvement in homeschool group?

I am using MFW and was wondering to myself how block scheduling could work with it, but I haven't tried it nor really needed to yet. It does sound like something that would work better with older, more mature kids who don't need the 15-minute time period CM talked about. My initial thoughts, with the disclaimer that I'm not looking at a TM right now and that I haven't actually done this, are the following: With MFW, I think block scheduling would mainly apply to history and science. You could perhaps put art/music into another block, but that might be harder, and art seems like it should have more consistency and practice. ? As for geography, MFW kinda already block schedules that into its own year on the history cycle, so I guess you wouldn't necessarily need to put that into a block schedule every year. I also like tying it in with the history. I think the only year where block scheduling wouldn't work with MFW would be ADV, because the science is integrated more with the Bible that year. Perhaps ECC would also be difficult to separate the geography and science, but not necessarily if you used shorter blocks as Lori described, e.g. do all the cultures and countries of North America, then go back and do the habitats or ecosystems of N. America for science. MFW usually schedules only 4 days a week. I wondered if shorter blocks of time like doing 2 weeks of history at double pace, then 1 week of science maybe would work. For the historical cycle, the science is very loosely tied to the history, sort or like SWB suggests in TWTM, so you don't necessarily need to keep them together. In CTG, you could go through a certain time period, then go back and do all the science connected to the first day of creation, then back to history, etc. I'm not sure how much time would need to be spent on each subject? But it does appeal to me not to be so "busy" as the TM sometimes looks with history and science scheduled 3-4 days per week, with multiple books for each subject.

How do you find local homeschool sales?

In year one of Biblioplan, SOTW is quite a bit out of order. I don't have my MFW manual handy for year 4 of SOTW, but they mess with the chapter order for SOTW 2-3, but that's because they add other books and change the year plan for year two (starting with Rome). Also for year 4, that's the only year MFW includes the Activity guide. :) I have the feeling they may stick more closely to the chapter order that year if they use the AG, but maybe you could get a good feel by looking at the sample for that year, at the topics for each week, and see how they line up with SOTW 4.

Wow, I'm kinda surprised at how expensive the Paragraph book from Killgallon is. Why not just get WWS, right?

Lori D., you are awesome! Thank you so much for all of your help, especially the many tips and links for paragraph construction! I figured out why my pdf has so many pages. It has the whole entire thing in there twice (just Apprentice). I was wondering why so many pages (258)! I just wrote another thread asking about Kilgallon sentence composing, so maybe I'll just get their paragraph book as well. Your links are very helpful! I also have just the TWSS video course and corresponding syllabus from IEW, so when I get a chance I'll look at that and see if it's something I can implement on my own without having to buy one of IEW's official programs.

Thanks, Silver Moon! We already have R&S, so I wasn't really looking for a whole 'nuther grammar program, just the sentence composing aspect to help connect grammar and writing. How long did the Paragraph book take you? Was it helpful?

Is the Paragraph book good?

I picked the pdf version up cheap last year. It says it's for 4th-6th graders. Wondering which end it's better for? How long does it take to complete? What did you like or not like about it? It has three parts, with the first two addressing grammar and playing with sentences. The third part is supposed to be about teaching paragraphs. Kind of reminds me of what many were saying about Treasured Conversations, which would make me happy since I can't get TC internationally, and it would be nice to know I already had something similar, if that were the case. Did you think it does a good job teaching how to write a paragraph? I also have CAP Fable and Narrative 1, so could cover Wordsmith at different potential times. Just looking for basic reviews and advice on using it, as also wondering if I could do this in a half year or if it needs a year to cover it well. (It has over 250 pages; seems quite long.) Or wondering if it gets bad reviews, if I should continue on with CAP, WWS, or CW.

First, what do I buy? (I have a third grader, but don't really want to start this until 4th or 5th grade.) Do I get Story Grammar for Elementary, Sentence Composing for Elementary School, or Sentence Composing for Middle School? How long does it take? Can I add this as a quick, occasional supplement to other writing and grammar programs, or do you use it as your sole grammar program? Where do you purchase it? Best place for deals? Is there another program out there that rivals Kilgallon in strength, but is cheaper or in e-book form? Thank you!

Actually, I know someone like this. Isn't that annoying?Come to think of it, she does have five elementary math programs on her shelf right now (some for different grades though.) but her confidence level would make you think she knows exactly what she's doing. ;)

I haven't because I didn't want to pay $5 a month, and wasn't sure how much more I'd get out of it than just reading her blog and listening to the podcasts. Words like "printables" made me think "more busywork" for me, and I certainly don't need that (especially to pay for it!) lol. However, I joined the FB group for free, and I've enjoyed some of the discussions there.

Anything with scripted TMs, like... ABeka phonics or math FLL WWE SOTW (with out any activities) Even AAS can be get'er done, except that now that we have so many kids, I want something more independent, like R&S spelling and grammar Not get er done programs include hands-on heavy programs where I have to compile ingredients for experiments or crafts.

My experience with ABeka readers has been a lot like "Kateincali" above me here. I don't have the teachers manual for the upper levels, just through third grade, and I haven't gotten the teachers editions for anything. Usually the TE is just the text with answers, from what I've seen. As far as BJ vs. ABeka, I much prefer ABeka. I grew up with BJ reading, and while I loved the stories, I hated having to fill out the workbooks. BJ has fun stories on the upper level, but they are all written by BJU Press writers, nothing classic, so the student's store of literary knowledge consists of stories that no one else knows (unless they also used BJ.) ABeka uses snippets of classic stories. For example in third grade with my son this year, he's read snippet from Paddington Bear, Little House in the Big Woods, poems by Robert Louis Stevenson, etc. With BJU in upper elementary, if your child spends 1 hour 15 minutes on the reading program, say, 30 minutes will be reading, 45 minutes answering comprehension questions with teacher or in the workbook. No thanks. I'd rather my kid just spent all that time actually reading. I got the BJ readers for free from someone on the shelf here in case my kids ever want to enjoy the stories, but I won't be using their reading program. Even with ABeka, I only use their readers while we're practicing phonics. Then we move on to real books.

When we were finishing MUS Gamma last year, it did take a while to solve those multi-digit multiplication problems. Vast difference between those and the Alpha single-digit addition my son whizzed through! I would think that any math program working on the same concept would take as long. MUS is not known for overdoing the amount of problems on a work page. Not saying you shouldn't switch though! Just thinking aloud...