We just finished A Beka 4th grade math and spent most of the year with a whiteboard. I drew a million pictures of pizzas, cakes, pies, groups of people, fruit, legos, and on and on and on and on. I thought I might lose all my hair but finally one day while learning about dividing fractions the lightbulb came on! It helped a lot to make it real-world, e.g., for your birthday you have a cake. Your guests eat 2/3 of the cake. After they leave, you and your 2 sisters eat the rest. Your portion is 1/3 of 1/3... all this while drawing a really hideous looking cake.

I really, really wanted to do Atelier Art level 2 this year but my budget won't stretch that far. Is there a comparable program that isn't so pricey? I'd really like to learn some techniques and do pictures studies of famous works. I'm am NOT talented artistically, which is why I liked the DVDs, but I can read it out of a book! Thanks!

I don't know how they'd match up, but I happen to have a 3rd edition student copy of the tests and speed drills. There are maybe 12 of the speed drills filled in and some marks on the cover, otherwise it's unused. If you decide to stick with it and find the student worktext, you can have it for $5 ppd. Good luck!

We're doing the same time period with my 3rd grader this year and I found a book called 'Colonial Days; Discover the Past with Fun Profjects, Games, Activities and Recipes' on Amazon. I'm using that as our project source. It was only about $12.

Funny no one else mentioned it but I really liked Lady Susan. Still, IMHO I wouldn't buy them at all. :) Any decent library will have several copies of each. I'd only buy if they were REALLY cheap.

Yes! In fact last week it dawned on my that my kids are so smart because they took my brain.

I read an amazon review that said the workbooks are redundant. Can I teach WWE without them?

I would absolutely pause to master her times tables. My kids love Timez Attack - it's a free downloadable computer game. I can't remember the website but if you google it you should find it. There's a pay version, too, but the free version has all the facts up to 12 so I've never purchased it.

This is completely off topic, but I had to post. When I first read your thread I mistook 'dbf' for boyfriend. Made the first sentence really interesting! :) Gave me a good laugh!

:iagree: It's hard and it sucks and you'd rather practice some choice words but in the end how do you want your kids to see you? Besides, you being nice really will get to her.

This fall I'll have a 3rd and 1st grader. We've never done a formal writing program, but have done handwriting and grammar (A Beka). I'm looking at starting WWE but I'm not sure which one to do. Should I start them both with WWE 1 or use 1 for my 1st grader and 2 for the 3rd grader? What would you do?

We use Rosetta Stone and to be honest I don't think my kids could hold a conversation in Spanish. That said, we've only used it for a year part time and I think the real key to fluency is conversing with a Spanish speaker. They do use some words and phrases they've picked up though.

I need some input! Right now I have a DD8 who is finishing up 2nd grade. She's done A Beka grade 2 math this year and pretty much flown through it. Next year I'm switching to Saxon because, um, well I can't remember exactly anymore, but I think I thought it would be more challenging. :tongue_smilie: So I bought Saxon 3 but now that I have it I see that a lot of it is a repeat of A Beka 2. I went through it and picked all the lessons we'll do from it (things that we haven't already covered) and it looks like we'll do about half the curriculum. That'll take us halfway through the year, then I'll start her on Saxon 5/4, I guess. Is the middle of 3rd grade too soon for that? Should I just go back to A Beka? I also have a DS6 who is finishing K right now. We've started going through A Beka 1st grade math since he likes it and gets bored if we don't do anything. My thought had been to ditch it and do Saxon 1 next year with him, but now I'm thinking maybe just finish A Beka 1 then move right to Saxon 3. Is this workable? But that would put him starting Saxon 5/4 at the start of 3rd grade... My kids have never been tested for giftedness, but I know they're bright. I just don't want to jump into something they can't handle, and I certainly don't want to skip anything. Help!! Thanks, Brieana

Thanks! I'm going to have her take this. Luckily I can just hang on to the curriculum and use it for ds next year if I have to!

But increasingly, some educators and other professionals who work with children are asking a question that might surprise their parents: Should a child really have a best friend? “I think it is kids’ preference to pair up and have that one best friend. As adults — teachers and counselors — we try to encourage them not to do that,†said Christine Laycob, director of counseling at Mary Institute and St. Louis Country Day School in St. Louis. “We try to talk to kids and work with them to get them to have big groups of friends and not be so possessive about friends.†“Parents sometimes say Johnny needs that one special friend,†she continued. “We say he doesn’t need a best friend.†Should a child really have a best friend? We say he doesn't need a best friend? Who do these people think they are?! :eek: It's the kids' preference to pair up because that is HUMAN NATURE. We are all looking to form bonds and relationships with other people. Why is there this idea that having a best friend means you can't be nice to everyone else? My dd8 has a best friend she's known since birth. Those girls have lived in different states for 2 years but are still besties and will probably stay that way if they can. DD8 doesn't have any trouble making other friends or engaging in groups, but she and her friend just 'click'. I think it's wonderful. I am SO GLAD I have the ability to keep my kids away from these 'experts'!

I just got next year's Saxon math in the mail (thanks Aoife!) and after thumbing through I'm feeling a little let down. This is grade 3 Saxon and it looks like pretty much a repeat of grade 2 Abeka, which is what we used this year. I thought Saxon was supposed to be more intensive. I really want to use it because I really want to keep using Saxon through the next few years when I can use their teaching DVDs. I don't want to spend the whole year repeating stuff dd already knows. I'm also very nervous about just skipping up to the next level, but have considered that also. Has anyone else found this to be the case with Saxon? :glare: Brieana

I have to disagree with this one. I used to feel the same way, but I realized that by shopping frequently I can buy things on sale intead of paying full price when I have to have them. Target and Walmart often have toys on clearance, so if I see something that's a good price I'll pick it up and toss it in the closet. We always have birthday parties to go to! I've gotten Barbies and Nerf guns for $5, bubbles, puzzels, etc for really cheap. Then I just pull them when a birthday comes around. Same with clothes and food; buy when it's on clearance. The key is having the self control not to buy stuff that's NOT on clearance! The Dollar Store is my favorite place. :001_smile: Greeting cards are 50 cents, so I go and stock up on birthday, anniversary, baby shower, wedding cards, etc. and pull them out when needed. Gift bags and wrapping paper are $1. Ours sell school supplies, too, like poster board for much cheaper than anywhere else. Hair ties, combs, toothbrushes, Windex and Comet cleaning products, disposable table cloths, the list goes on and on. Although I wouldn't buy food or anything with moving parts there. :D

Hmm. I have no information or advice, I just wanted to offer my condolences. I know how sad I'd be if my chocolate cravings went away. :)

Congratulations! This may sound odd, but I'm not sure I would schedule a complete break. I've found with my kids it's harder to do nothing - they get antsy and bored and are harder to deal with. I'd look for some independent curriculum that the 2nd grader can do on her own for an hour or two a day (handwriting, workbooks, online math or typing games) and schedule an hour or so for reading aloud too (you to her and her to you). That doesn't mean you always do school from 9-12 every day, but it gives you both something to accomplish. Get some good educational videos (we love Bill Nye, for example) at the library so you can snuggle with her on the couch and sleep while she watches them. Just sitting in the same room nursing while she does worksheets will give you time together, which she'll probably want, and make you feel you've done something. I always feel good at the end of the day to be able to look around and think, hey, the house is a wreck but we did math, science and reading today, and that's my priority. Instead, schedule a break from housework for a month. :D Make a month's worth of meals and freeze them so dh can do the cooking. And I'll pray for a baby that sleeps 18 hours a day!

This turned out to be pretty long, but I hope it's helpful. This past year I had a 4th grader, 2nd grader, k'er, 3 prek'ers and 1 year old (some owned, some borrowed). Here's what our day looked like: 9:00 Pledge of Allegiance, prayer, calendar, chore chart, all together. Then we do Bible reading and memorization together as well. My 4th and 2nd graders did the reading aloud and lead the memorization for the littles. I held the baby. 9:30 Baby goes to bed. Older 2 do independent handwriting, grammar, spelling, math pages, Spanish (Rosetta Stone) and typing. I do read alouds, worksheets and projects with the littles. 11:00 Littles go outside to play, or I pull out games/puzzles/activities for them. I go over morning work with older two, setting aside anything they needed help with. Baby wakes up. 11:30 Lunch, they all go outside for 30 min. 12:30 Silent reading. Except for the baby, they are all required to look at books quietly for 30 minutes. I clean up/play with baby. 1:00 I read aloud, they all color/draw/write in their journals while I do it. Baby runs around grabbing their pencils. Many interruptions in reading. :) A playpen full of toys can work, but I found it causes lots of screaming. 1:30 History or science, depending on the day. We did this all together during the project part, then I'd let the littles run and play while the older kids did reading/narrations. Most of this done with the baby either being held or wreaking havoc. 2:30 Baby goes to bed. One on one math with the older kids (15 min. each, both are great independent learners). Go over any work they had trouble with in the morning. 3:15 Done! I found it really helps to have toys/games/activities available for the little guys that I'd chosen in advance. I could say "today we are doing this floor puzzle, this game, or go outside and blow bubbles." It helped with the mess too because then I only had 3 things to pick up. Movies are great, I tried to find 'educational' 30 minute films for a few days a week. And just learning to be okay with the idea that you'll be interrupted frequently. That's the hard part!

WOW. I had no idea there was this much out there! Thanks everybody! P.S. I tried searching the boards but I just end of getting sucked into threads that aren't what I meant to be looking for... and 2 hours later... :lol:

I'm making a list of all the free programs I can find to post on my hs network's website. These can be curriculum packages, resources, websites, anything. You don't have to be using them, or even like them. :D The goal is to show those who feel they can't afford to homeschool that there are options for them. Thanks in advance! Brieana

Love this thread, it's so interesting to see everyone's POVs. I agree with the PPs who say the rise in autism is connected to a better dx level. (Better? Hmm. You decide.) I took my 18 m/o to his check up the other day and they had me fill out an autism questionnaire. Never had to do that before and he's my 4th, so clearly the docs are looking out for it more. I noticed that many things on that checklist were things I wouldn't have mentioned if he had been doing or not doing them. I do have a nephew who is autistic. I don't know much about the spectrum, but he is not one of the 'quirky' ones, I have a feeling 20 years ago he would have been labeled retarded, as a PP noted. Something to muddy the waters :tongue_smilie:: I read a study a few years ago linking early onset autism to excessive TV viewing during the first 2 years of life. The study claimed that spending too much time watching a 2 dimensional image messed with the development of the part of the brain that registers 3 dimensional images and somehow that was a trigger... I found it to be a fascinating study (but only preliminary). If anyone else has heard of this and knows a link to an actual journal article or study, can you post it? Otherwise just ignore me because I have no facts to back myself up. :001_smile: However, the rise of autism could be linked to the rise in early TV viewing and the rise in availability of cable. Having said that I think there are many causes and triggers, and no child is the same as any other.

I think the real question here isn't with science in general, but with biology. We've only used secular curriculum thus far for science, but I don't think there would have been any use inserting Christianity into a chemistry or physics book anyway. It's easy enough to make a comment like "Wow, I'm glad God thought of gravity" and make it Christian for my kids. When it comes to biology, and especially evolution/creationism, my plan is to use both secular and Christian materials in jr. high and high school. Give me the most secular text out there, completely tilted toward evolution, and the strongest YE Christian text as well. We'll read both and compare. I am a YE creationist, but I know enough to realize that my little brain just might be missing something and since there's no way to be SURE, I don't mind if my kids agree with me, or decide God used evolution, or something in between. Discussion is key.