Not which curriculum, but general subjects. Math, phonics, etc.

I'm glad I'm not crazy to be thinking about working on next year now!! lol:) It will be our first official year, with my DD starting Kindergarten. I've been planning on homeschool forever... literally, as I was homeschooled myself and always intended to teach my own children! lol:) So I've been excited about really, truly starting! Good, now I won't feel ahead of myself if I tell DH we need the school budget now so I can start watching for used books!!! lol:)

Do you know what books and curriculum you'll be using?

Thanks for this page! "Sight words" drive me crazy cause I know they all make sense if we just know the reasons for them! I just need to learn the reasons, so I can teach them! lol:) Is your quote above on the page you linked to? I don't see it...

My MIL has wheatberries that she bought in '99 and stores them in the freezer. Every so often she grinds up a bunch for us all to use. It smells very normal and flour-y!

I second the BBC's Planet Earth and also The Blue Planet! My kids have loved the ones we've had from the library and we intend to eventually purchase all of them! Bambi is really cute:) And Cinderella!

Sudden cry while eating... "Did you bite your tongue?" "Noooooooo, my finger!" Hmmmm.... These are all great! Kids are so hilarious :D

Hey, I think we used that when I was a kid! Probably that same 1994 edition:) lol But sorry, I couldn't tell you anything at all about it... I just remember the name! Or maybe the fact that I DON'T remember it helps you???:)

My DD just recently began blending sounds, but balked at reading at first. I made a sticker chart for her, so she gets a sticker after each lesson and at the end she'll get a little prize. I also have told her she needs to smile and have a good attitude (with a smile and good attitude myself!), no sliding down in her seat, flopping her head on her hand, etc. And then of course I keep the lesson short and age-appropriate:) She's gotten a much better attitude just in the short time since we've started actual lessons. Last night she read a Bob book to daddy just for fun!

I love cursive and use it all the time. I will absolutely teach it to all my kids:) It's not at all non-essential to me! There's some good stuff here http://www.donpotter.net/ed.htm I think that if your son has shown some interest in doing it on his own, it might be good to at least introduce it for a year or so. Personally, I would love if we ditched PRINT and went back to all cursive!:)

Thank you for posting this link! I love it!!!:D

My DD is just beginning to read. We recently got Hop on Pop and she was thrilled to have it. But of course, there are alot of words in it that she doesn't know how to read yet, like "house", for example. She's not totally thrilled about reading time so we made a sticker chart. She gets one sticker for each lesson and at the end of a section, I'll give her a book prize (she's highly motivated by sticker charts...). What other books might be as fun as Hop on Pop? Something that is colorful and childish, that she might read to herself at naptime for the pure enjoyment of it. Not Bob books or other little books like that. They don't necessarily have to be ALL words on her reading level, but very close would be nice! The first prize/book would be for Section 3, which is short vowels.

We have Uppercase Letters, Lowercase Letters, Numbers 1-30, Easy Mazes, Amazing Mazes, Tracing, Let's Cut Paper, More Let's Fold, and Let's Color (goodness, we have a lot, don't we?!). I have no idea for your 6 and 8 year olds, but my 2yo DS just loves doing his Let's Color book! Originally I'd thought it was silly - why spend extra on a COLORING book??? But I decided to get it to help his focus on a specific task and to learn to follow simple instruction. He loves doing it and honestly I HAVE seen a difference in his coloring since we started it. That might be coincidence, since that happens anyway, but maybe it's related. DD started Let's Fold and Let's Cut Paper when she was a late 3/turning 4. It think they're a bit much for most two year olds. I'll probably get them for DS sometime next year. If your little one just turned 2 then I'd get Let's Color:)

Wow! What an awesome thread!:)

Thanks so much! This is just what I needed to know:)

I'm looking at Phonics Pathways, Ordinary Parent's Guide, and the free Tanglewood program (http://www.tanglewoodeducation.com/bksrd.htm). Not sure yet which one I'll choose. But what would I use after? How complete are each of these? I got an older edition of The Well-Trained Mind from the library, before OPG was written. At that time, Phonics Pathways followed by English for the Thoughtful Child (or something similar to that... I have the name written down) was recommended. Has that changed at all? What is taught in that book? What other books/curriculum would be good? Is that enough questions?:) I just like to have a basic idea of where we're headed:)

I didn't realize that. I guess I worry that if we switch, we might miss something important and I'll be too clueless to figure it out. Like say we switched in 7th grade and the books we were using didn't teach something until 7th grade, but the books we switched to had already taught it in 6th grade and assumed you knew. But I shouldn't worry about that?

I have a hard time with things that are scripted... maybe I need to just practice with it more?? lol:) I feel like I'm always losing my place! Then I get thrown off when she doesn't answer the question the way they expect the child to. But we're gonna do the sample lessons for RightStart and see how it suits us. I like how it looks, and I like how the lesson time went with the one we've done so far. I just have to see if I can work out the wordy teacher part to suit us!:)

I love it, love it, love it!!!! I am soon going to have one room to devote to school so I'll be working on that over the next year or so. Your room really does look so warm and... academic! Like I just want to snuggle up on that couch and read one of those wonderful books!! Thanks for sharing!:)

Thank you! I hadn't looked into RightStart before now. I downloaded the sample from their website and am looking at tonight.

Okay, I'm starting to stress myself out about math! Totally silly, I know! lol:) My daughter is only 4! So here's the thing... She is a fairly auditory learner with visual being her next-in-line strength. She has begun to read simple words so I'm going to start a phonics book in the next month or two. Looking at the various kindergarten math books, I believe she is ready to start one. I have a strong desire to just choose one math curriculum that will take us from kindergarten through graduation, UNLESS we find it's not working for us. I just really don't want to PLAN on switching, you know? I stink at math. Algebra is lost on me. I was homeschooled myself (K through 12) and ended up going through Saxon Algebra 2 twice, then taking a remedial and whatever the first regular Algebra course is called in college a few years ago. But now I still couldn't look at it and figure it out. I'm slow with the basics too (still carrying in multiplication, doing long division, etc). I just don't GET it. So I'm freaked out about teaching it cause I'm afraid that I will screw up my kids!! My husband is good at math so he's just going to have to take over at least once we get to algebra. I learned with A Beka for the earlier grades, then Saxon starting around... oh, 76 or 87 or something like that. As I mentioned, my daughter is definitely a more auditory learner. I just have to explain stuff to her, and she's got it. My son (who is only 2) definitely is not oral (like talking to a wall sometimes...). Time will tell his learning style better, but I'm sure it will be mostly kinesthetic (he always has to "do it myself!"). Obviously we don't know about the baby:) So.... in an effort to not spend a fortune, I would LOVE to find a math curriculum that will work well for both of them. "The Math-Ignorant-Moms Book of Math for the Auditory and Kinesthetic Learners from Kindergarten through 12th Grade". Doesn't sound TOO complicated, does it?? lol:) What would you recommend?

My kids are loving the BBCs Planet Earth and The Blue Planet that we've borrowed from our library:) We plan to buy both series eventually.

I like Kumon too:) And, even better, my kids like Kumon!! My 2 1/2 year old is always happy when I take out his "Let's Color" book:) And my 4 1/2 year old has enjoyed her Kumon books for almost a year now. We've also used Developing the Early Learner, which is nice, but kinda pricey. I haven't decided yet if I'll buy it for my DS or not. Agree about the Letter Factory DVD too. DD knew some of the letter sounds, then we borrowed that from that library and within a week, she knew them all!

Page 36, bottom paragraph. Their library cards allowed them to check out 7 at a time, so she had them choose "one biography, one science book one history book, one practical or art-and-crafts book, and three book of their own choosing - stories, poetry, or nonfiction." I just started reading the book yesterday, so I still remembered where to find that... lol:)

Thank you for all the suggestions! The Tanglewood Really Reading Program looks good, especially for being free! I picked up the Original McGuffey's Eclectic Primer today from our church library, and she read most of the words to me (hen, top, hat, rat, cat, pot). I'm sure the big pictures helped:) But she was whispering the letter sounds to herself and then whispered them faster, then said the word, so it was still totally reading! Thanks again for the suggestions and for the encouragement to keep moving along:)