I am a bit of a traditionalist. I did buy "readers" from A Beka, but if you don't want to go that route yet, go to the library, get a stack if the easy reading books and have her read a page aloud, then you read a page aloud. At the end of a chapter, ask her a few questions to make sure she understood what she read. That's all. And do plenty of read aloud with all your kids. IMO, reading aloud quality literature on a regular basis is one of the best things you can do for your kids educationally. At her age, I'd have her do copy work for writing. Get some paper lined for her age and copy some short sentences that she can read herself. Maybe start with one sentence. Then have her copy underneath. Continue to add sentences daily as she is able.

Welcome to the wonderful world of homeschooling. You've gotten some great advice. I'm not sure what kind of person you are, like if you're thinking.... my kids had a horrible time in ps, we need to take some time, regroup and heal a bit or whether you're feeling like you want to pick up and make share your kids don't miss a beat. KWIM? If it's the former, then I'd take some time, read TWTM, make sure you're reading a lot of quality books to your kids, do some writing and math every day and just regroup as a family. If you're in the latter camp, I would still read TWTM, but I'd probably finish the year with a math and LA program from A Beka or Bob Jones (if you don't mind a Christian curriculum), supplement with science and history books from the library. Take the summer off, explore your options, decide if the boxed curriculum is what you want to continue with or what you want to do. Oh, and visit these forums every day. ;) I did mean that kind of tongue in cheek, but there is a lot of information to be gleaned by moms who have btdt, used and love curriculum, or used and discarded curriculum (although you do have to take that with a grain of salt, some of us here love A Beka phonics, for example, some hate it, and we all have our reasons)

Morning Ladies! Well, I slept in (7:30 is sleeping in for me) and got breakfast finished. Kids are doing their usual Saturday chores, boys have extra chores for sloppiness in cleaning up their room and general disrespect. It's been helping that I make them lists and schedules. They tend to work much better when things are mapped out for them, they can check things off. Today... ** work on Children's church lessons ** do some yardwork, including dormant spraying our two fruit trees before they start blooming. With this weather we've been having spring has come a month early. It's very bad. ** grocery shopping ** fold laundry

We don't have a party where we invite other people, but I try to make it special. We have nachoes and rootbeer floats.

It used to be popular for wedding cakes about 20 years ago, I think. I just remember going to weddings a long time ago and "everyone" had champagne cake. It doesn't taste like champagne. It just tastes like wedding cake.

We do Spelling workout. This is our schedule: Monday - pretest, read the little blurb at the beginning of each chapter, say-spell-say each word, do first exercise, write words once Tuesday -Thursday - say-spell-say each word, write each word once, do one exercise each day Friday - spelling test It works well. My boys generally get every word wrong in the pretest, but by the end of the week they pass the test with 80% of above.

No, I've never liked February. Don't know why. Just don't.

Morning Ladiies! Well, it's almost 10:30am here. Got Bible done, spelling test done, reading/writing withDS10. Having lots of problems with my second DS today. He's just been a royal pain in the patootie. More than that, he's just been plain mean to his sisters and disrespectful to me. Ugh! It's going to be one of those days! ** finish school ** no co-op today! Very glad of that, ** work on rocketry plans! as I am doing my rocketry class for co-op in February.

Cheap and thorough sounds good to me. I'll check it out! Thanks!

Awwww Melissa! I can see how you wouldn't be able to get a thing done. She is so precious. On another note of Praise, it is really raining. We celebrated with hot chocolate and a toasted thanksgiving to God.

So, we bought Rosetta Stone for our 5th grader to start Spanish and he hates it. He does it because we make him, but he's not learning anything. I was thinking it was because he's just not trying, he's very smart, but would rather skateboard or shoot baskets. But then I started suspecting something, which was confirmed by his remark yesterday as we were watching his First Form Latin DVD. He said, "can we get a Spanish program like my Latin program?" I realized that he is a very linear, systematic thinker and that's why he does so well with MP's curriculum. It is linear and very systematic. So, the question is.... Can anyone recommend a Spanish program that is grammar based and systematic, rather than conversational, like RS?

Good morning ladies! I'm up early, but not walking because it's raining. A little, but it is. And we are rejoicing and asking for more. We are in such a serious drought situation here in California. There are towns nearby who are counting the days before they run out of drinking water. So, even though the weather report is saying this "storm" won't amount to much, I am choosing to believe it is like that little cloud in the Bible story of Elijah and the prophets of Baal. It was no larger than his hand, but he went running anyway, believing it would be a gully washer. So, today.... since I am not walking I will spend more time in devotions. Then...the troops get up and we start our day. **school *** friend coming over for lunch ** clean up my "zone" *** fold some laundry *** prepare for co-op tomorrow *** dinner at my parents' house

** school - done ** zoned clean up (happened to be the dining area, I cleaned the hutch with wood oil, swept the corners, cleaned the sliding glass door) ** got some laundry done! but not folded and put away ** now gearing up for the big dinner, clean-up, rush the kids out to door to Awana time. Ugh!

Thank you for your input. I have looked at TOG, but not for high school. My oldest loves historical fiction/non-fiction, too. We have read so many good books (together this year, i want to improve my education, too) and it's just been a great year in history for us. I feel like we've really just immersed ourselves in Ancient culture (now we're doing the Greeks) and i just want to keep this up. I never knew education could be this way. I know that sounds strange, because my kids aren't really all that studious.

I'm here. Just got back from my walk. I am so proud of myself. I am finally getting back into a regular habit of walking. I quit for the longest time, just couldn't drag my sorry rear end out of bed. But now, for some reason I am able to wake up a little before 6:00, and while it is not easy to get up, I can do it. So, I went walking this morning. Now, it's coffee and devotions and shower before the kids wake up. Then..... ** school for the kids ** laundry ** clean my zone for the day (and I'm not sure which one that is) ** work on curriculum for next year ** kids have Awana tonight Have a great day, ladies!

Jean, thanks the the encouragement. It is nice to know tantrums are not only for 3 year olds. Dd has been much better this afternoon, and she fell asleep in the car on our way to the basketball game. Perhaps sleep is becoming an issue.

Well, school's done. Had a pretty lousy day with difficult children. Lots of disrespect and rudeness. Dd7 threw 2 enormous tantrums. I can't figure out why she's doing this at her age. Anyhow, she's at tumbling class right now. Dinner's smelling good in the crock pot.

I didn't want to hijack that other thread, so I'll start another one, but I'd really like a little input on Omnibus. We're doing the 4 year history cycle, my 5th grader is doing round two of the Ancients. I love the idea of the Omnibus, I've paged through some borrowed copies and I want to do it, but that would mean my son would do Ancients this year, Middle Ages next year and then back to Ancients in 7th grade, completely skipping two periods in history, and I really want the kids to get more American history as it is, not less. So, my questions are.... 1) if you were doing the 4 year history cycle, did you just drop that and start Omnibus in 7th grade? 2) could you start Omnibus 1 in 9th grade? I looked at Omnibus 2 and it's a challenging curriculum. I really want to do his, I'm just trying to figure out how to get it worked in with what we're doing now.

I have two like that. It is frustrating. Narrations are a nightmare because you have to listen. For my oldest child like that, I try to have him read along as much as possible, so he can visually see it. And he just doesn't do narrations. He's more of a look up the answer in the book kind of kid, so we go with that. He hates to be put on the spot in anything, actually. Little league made him so nervous (going up to bat, everyone looking at you) that he had to go to the bathroom at least 5-6 times every game. It was so sad. We did make him finish out the season (he had a good coach and we like to finish what we start), but he's never played baseball again. Some kids are just like that. They blank when they're put on the spot.

You sound like me. I'm an introvert and too much goings on exhaust me. You probably have a little added stress (that you may or may not realize) with DH gone. I'd also look at your diet. For me, when I went low-carb, i felt like I had more energy. I don't need my afternoon coffee anymore. You might want to try that for a week or two and see if it makes a difference.

Good Morning everyone! Well, no cold for us. It's supposed to hit 70 again. But, there is a chance of rain on Thursday. We are all praying hard. I have never seen the landscape so dry in my entire life. It is actually scary! On the docket for the day..... ** school for the kids ** housework for me ** work on the budget. January has been an ugly month. Gotta figure out if prices really are going up that much (our energy bills sure are) or if we just had some unusual spending this month. Usually we are pretty good about living within budget. ** dd has tumbling this afternoon ** DS has a basketball game this evening Have a great day, gals!

Yeah, I saw that! I was reading it, not knowing it was you, obviously, when there were some tell tale signs and that moment when I realized, "hey, I 'know' that woman!" Good job!

All right Impish. I didn't know you were famous! Maybe everyone else does, but I didn't. I got a link on FB to your blog via Classical Academic Press. I don't always read blog links, but this time I did. And I was reading it, and came across "Tazzie" and I thought, hmm, that sounds familiar. And then I kept reading and I realized... I "know" this woman. Great post!

It's normal. I taught jr. High for 11 years and I don't know how many parents complained about this exact fact. Their kids were straight A students in elementary school, get to jr. High and can't get an assignment done. I also noticed it in kids going through trauma. The kids whose parents were splitting up when they were in jr. High really wigged out. A lot more so than kids who went through this at a younger age.

So, if one is using Omnibus, would history supplementation be necessary? I'm looking at Omnibus for 7th grade and I'm wondering.....