I'm looking for a spelling program for my rising sixth grader. He's very intelligent and does well academically but after three years in a "good" public school that lets kids spell however they want outside of spelling tests his spelling is very poor. I feel like he needs something more than just a workbook and weekly list but everything I'm finding is a set program that requires starting at the beginning. I feel it will be difficult to motivate him to do the work if he recognizes it is well below his grade level. I'd prefer something that isn't super time consuming on the part of the parent since I don't often have blocks of time without toddlers underfoot and making noise. Maybe a computer program?

I really, really like teaching textbooks. I did the placement tests which put three of the kids into one grade level ahead and one (who I knew was not doing well in math after a couple years in a supposedly fantastic public school) into a grade level behind. So far it seems right with the one who placed behind being able to do multiple lessons a day to catch up. Wanted to add that we used them for the kids were in public school as well and liked them then too.

Here's mine: Pencils - Ticonderoga Pens - pilot disposable fountain pens Preschool size pencils - my first tri write for toddler age the tri write laddie Everyday crayons - crayola Everyday colored pencils - crayola twist ups Everyday markers - crayola ultra clean Hi lighters - not picky about these Rulers - the 6" ones from rainbow resource Erasers, cap - the papermate ones they sell by the gross Erasers, big - black pearl ovals White out - the instant dry tape version Liquid glue - elmers washable Glue sticks - elmers blue gel Stapler - the little mini swingline ones Tape - scotch Spiral notebooks - mead wide rule Composition books - mead Binders - Amazon basic Folders - whatever's on sale Printer paper - hp Lined paper - Zaner bloser tablets for handwriting, target brand reinforced edge looseleaf Kid/safety scissors - westcott Regular scissors - fiskars Art crayons - Stockmar blocks Art colored pencils - ferby for preschool age then prismacolor Art markers - staedler triplus Tempra/poster paint - Prang in quart bottles Watercolor paint - crayola or Prang Pencil sharpener, manual - the tiny brass one with the replaceable blade they sell on Amazon Pencil sharpener, electric - Boston glow Printer - brother color laser Laminator - purple cow Basic calculator - we use our cell phone calculators instead Graphing calculator - ti83+

Sorry for all the posts lately but I'm so excited to start in earnest soon after a couple year hiatus from homeschooling. I'm a total nerd when it comes to school supplies so I've been putting off getting anything so I can have one big, fun day of shopping for pencils and notebooks and all those things. I have a good idea what I like but I always like reading what works well for others. I thought it would be fun if those who wish could cut and paste this list and fill in their favorite after each item. Feel free to add more to your list. Thanks! Pencils Pens Preschool size pencils Everyday crayons Everyday colored pencils Everyday markers Hi lighters Rulers Erasers, cap Erasers, big White out Liquid glue Glue sticks Stapler Tape Spiral notebooks Composition books Binders Folders Printer paper Lined paper Kid/safety scissors Regular scissors Art crayons Art colored pencils Art markers Tempra/poster paint Watercolor paint Pencil sharpener, manual Pencil sharpener, electric Printer Laminator Basic calculator Graphing calculator

That book caddy is too cute! I was thinking about a rolling library cart but I'm not sure how to brooch that topic with DH, lol.

We've been doing a few days of light school before moving into a light work the next week or two followed by starting up full school. It's too hot here to play outside so we're getting an early start so they can have an extra couple weeks off when the weather is better. With six school age kids plus a few coloring and workbooks for the toddler there so. many. books. On the shelf the books occupy over a yard of linear space. About 2/3 are used daily with the rest being used at least once a week. That doesn't even include reference books, novels, etc.. I feel like we spend so much time lugging books around. Is there a better way to do this? Break down books into weekly work packets? Although that might get really time consuming. Try to somehow fit in a bookshelf near the table? Put stacks of books on the table each morning and eat lunch on the coffee table?

It's not exactly that but we like the primary journals by mead and the wide and college ruled counterparts. They have lines on half the page and are blank on top for drawing.

I'm a textbook teacher when it comes to certain subjects, history (along with historical fiction) and science (along with labs) in particular. I find it's easier to teach and the kids learn more when we use traditional textbooks. Reasons aside, I'm having trouble finding teacher editions that give more information on how to complete the exercises and assignments. I also don't have any tests to go with the material. I'm not one to give tons of tests but I feel they do have their place, especially with my middle school age kids, and it's time consuming to come up with my own. Does anyone know a source for teacher editions and/or sets of tests to go with textbooks?

My six year old third grade level reader really enjoys the books that go with the American girl dolls. We have the original ones, not the new 'beforever' versions. They're historically accurate and although some of the themes go over her head it works.

Have you had a good experience with instant ink? We had it for one year included with a printer that I reviewed (I 'work' as a products reviewer). The printer was great but we were printing very little at that time and didn't even use the cartridges it came with in the first year. At the year mark it wanted our pay,met information so they could charge us by the month to use the ink that was already sitting in the printer. Ridiculous and wasteful! We threw it away and got a color laser printer and copier since we're back to homeschooling and will be printing much more now.

Sorry, just saw this. This is the us one. Now that I think about it I think I was the rainbow resource booth I purchased it from. They've gone up in price by about $1 but are still inexpensive. The white board quality is good, they don't get shadows even when we leave our marks for a couple days to add to them before erasing. http://www.rainbowresource.com/product/sku/013390/

White board blank maps. They're maybe 11x18" and are just outlines of either the us with state borders or the world with country borders. I got them for all of $4 or so each at a convention and we've been using them for years. I can ask the kids to label state capitals, draw where rivers are, mark mountain ranges, label battles from particular conflicts, draw routes of things like the Oregon trial and trail of tears, and so on. It's one thing to see it on a map but the kids retain so much more when they start with something blank and write it in themselves. We use the world one less since the countries are small. I wish they had one for each continent or, better yet, a dry erase outline globe. We also use paper tablets of blank maps but that gets expensive to use all the time, especially when I want to focus on one thing at a time.

At first it was just weird. Like I would walk around the house just sort of trying to figure out what to do. Then, once things had settled down and normalized, I found that some days I was lonely and missed them but other days I was glad to have some time with just the new baby. It was wonderful to bond one on one with the baby plus I was able to quickly and easily get errands, appointments, phone calls, emails, etc done during the week so we had our weekends to do fun stuff and relax. Plus the house stayed much cleaner so there was both less housework during the week as well as minimal time trying to play catchup on household projects. We're back to homeschooling now but in many respects it was a nice break. Wanted to add that I was in a similar position in that we put the kids in school just after our sixth child arrived. I think it would have been a weird family dynamic for some of the kids to be homeschooled while others went to school. I could see resentment building up on both sides of that fence. Just wanted to add one more thing. Our oldest was nine when we started our few years with schools. She's now nearly 13 and I feel like I'm coming out of the fog. I can leave her in charge (even with our seventh and eighth children here now) while I take a shower or work with the other kids. Between her and our second oldest they can prepare and clean up after full meals. Not just heating up soup but making real food. They're also old enough to do work on their own without the intensity required to, say, teach reading. Not that you'll necessarily want to but of you choose to return to homeschooling it will likely look so much different for you in a year or two or three than it does now.

Not just private school but public schools were expensive for us. Cafeteria or brown bag lunch instead of leftovers. Field trip fees at $15 each per child times 2-3/year. Super specific supply list plus replacement items for the community supply bin during the year running $40 or so per child per year plus supplies to keep at home for homework. Donations of cleaning supplies from the classroom wish list, around $15 per year each. Materials for required projects and costume items for plays, maybe $100 per year total. Gym uniforms for $25 per child. Dress code appropriate cloths we otherwise wouldn't have bought, around $75 per child. Gas money for drop offs and pickups when they miss the bus or are carrying stuff. Copays and medicine for then they sick for the umpteenth time. Yearbook fee. Cupcakes for their birthday. Charges for lost or damaged library and textbooks. School picture day. Dances and fun nights. T-shirt the whole class is wearing on field day which will make you feel like a horrible parent if you don't buy. Chipping in for teachers week gifts. Fundraisers that you feel guilty of you don't at least give a little bit to. The worst one of all for us? The fundraiser where a company comes in and frames your child's artwork then sells it to you for $50 a pop. How can you tell your kids that no, we're not going to buy the special framed painting they did?

This year I have two middle schoolers, two elementary age, and two preschool/kindergarten age plus a toddler who will want a few things so as not to be left out. I don't budget. We're 'buy what you need when you need it and it costs what it costs' sort of people. So far for this upcoming school year I've spent right around $1000 but $300 of that was a new printer which is a sort of household/sort of homeschooling expense. I have approximately another $250 of items that I know will need to be purchased up front. Yet another $250 or so for ongoing book purchases, random math manipulatives, and replacement supplies throughout the year. This is curriculum, curriculum required books, and other homeschooling specific materials only. Classes, lessons, field trips, etc are extra. We only have access to a small, not very kid friendly library and the kids have been in school for the past couple years so we've gotten rid of just about all the materials we had. We also use teaching textbooks which add up fast.

Math mammoth has tons of downloads, many just individual books and not big sets. It would take a few minutes to search for the correct page but they're well indexed.

We did it several years ago and while my oldest girl really enjoyed it the boys were less than thrilled. It might depend on the boy. One who likes the little house books might have fun with it.

We do lots of picture book type read alouds but chapter book read alouds aren't something any of us enjoy. The little ones get bored after awhile just because of their age and become a disruption. We've been working on staying quiet but the baby especially is nowhere near there yet. I need nap time for housework so there isn't a ton of time for it and what time there is isn't enjoyable.

Short stories is an awesome idea, thank you! For those who use audio books how do you handle babies and toddlers who make noise? We've tried audio books in the past but no one could keep up because of the chatter and playing of the little ones. I don't feel right putting on headphones when I need to be interacting with the kids.

There's a lot I want to write in response to this but I won't since I can't be sure you intended it to come off so rude and nasty. My kids *are* getting something better. They were in the local schools and read virtually nothing. Even if we did three books a year they would be coming out ahead. They excel at reading and I want to feed their appetite for new books but I need a way to do it that doesn't mean the other kids (or the housework) will be consistently neglected. In no way, shape, or form can I 'not even keep up with the books' as you imply. It's that's it's very time consuming to do so and with eight kids I'm looking for ways to keep up my personal education standards while maintaining a healthy life balance. Outsourcing is easy to say but isn't something that is realistic for everyone. We live where classes would be upwards of an hour drive each way. Online classes have to be monitored and I would need to know something about the books anyway. Then there's the expense involved. Reading something here to the effect of 'your kids deserve better than what you can do' is like asking a question on a car seat forum and being helpfully told that what the kids deserve is for us to purchase a new vehicle and drop $1500 on new car seats.

I know how awful this question sounds but I need advice on teaching literature without reading the books myself. I've always been a slow reader (I've tried to improve but I'm still slow) and I often need to reread sections to truly understand them. While I enjoy reading so far I've been selecting books I read as a child so I only have to brush up on them. This plus a literature guide and I can get by. Now I'm not only running out of books I remember well enough to teach but I'd also like to use books I haven't read. The problem is that with eight kids (including an infant), a husband who works long hours, and no family nearby I just plain don't have enough time to read the books without sacrificing in other areas. We're not really a big read aloud family so what read aloud time we have isn't enough. I generally fall asleep when I try to read after everyone goes to bed plus that's the only kid free hour or two of the day to talk and go online and write emails and set things up for the following day and I can't give up all that time to reading. I'm not someone who can pick up a book for a few minutes at a time and be able to remember any of what I read. So my question is how to pull this off. I'm hoping someone knows of lit guides that not only offer comprehension questions but also a synopsis of each chapter or section. Maybe a teaching guide for books? I'm not sure. The older kids are at an average to advanced middle school level and the younger ones are at an average middle elementary level.

I'm not strong in math and we use teaching textbooks because of it. I'll be honest, I let the computer teach it. With six school age kids no way do I have time to sit and watch the lessons with them let alone relearn math in order to teach it. I have to be realistic about what I'm able to do and how much time I can devote to math. When someone doesn't understand something and I don't readily remember it I just brush up on that subject.

We used spelling workout and it worked fine. Then I felt guilty about it and we went whole hog into aas. No one liked it. I didn't like teaching it. It was overly complicated and way too expensive. I'd use it if I felt it was really needed but now we're back to basic workbooks and it's great. We're currently using the building spelling skills books.

This year for us it's 8th grade, 6th grade, 3rd grade, 2nd grade, kindergarten, preschool, a toddler, and an infant. Quiet time doesn't exist. Chores happen on weekends and when I stay up way late, day to day there's only enough time to do the essentials. The older kids play outside on their own with neighborhood friends. Read aloud time happens when we're all in the mood for it, it's not a big part of every day for us. We don't have a set schedule, just a routine and even that is loose. It's so stressful trying to keep up on doing things a certain way when there's a lot of people.

We're using real science 4 kids for our 8th, 6th, 3rd, 2nd, k, and prek kids. The older ones do the middle school level, the younger ones are doing the elementary level, with the little ones joining in wherever. We like the program but the older kids especially really enjoy science and will be done with all five middle school level subject sets in under a year. I'd like to space it out a bit and add in something else as more science work. Any suggestions for a general science course, not necessarily with lab work, at an average to advanced middle school level? I prefer secular materials. We don't mind regular textbooks. Thank you!