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KinderSafari

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    Female
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    Rhinelander, WI

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    kindersafari@yahoo.com
  • Biography
    We have 6 kids, 2 cats and a ferret. Busy with hockey, soccer, baseball, music & school!
  • Location
    Beautiful northwoods of Wisconsin, home of the mighty Hodag
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    Bookaholic

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  1. Don't be afraid to ask if people are willing to take less! Especially if you take a few of their items. I know when I sell, the more items people are willing to buy from me, the more I'm willing to lower the price! Saves me time and effort packaging things individually! I love to shop at the homeschool convention used curriculum sales too. We don't have one close to where I live, but I'm able to get to one every few years. You need to be "the first" one there, bring lots of small bills, and make quick decisions to get the best bargains. Also towards the end of the day, there will be more and more free stuff as vendors decide they don't want to bring stuff home, so I keep checking back in the free pile. The online sites (here and the FB site) have varying prices and the best deals are snatched up quickly. But if I was going to buy it new anyway (and I also recommend Rainbow Resource), then it's still a good deal to save even a few $$.
  2. Another plus to buying the Life of Fred series, is that even though it might not work for you - it does work for many people so the re-sale value is very good. :)
  3. Ideally, you could browse through some copies at a conference or store (we live in a small town, so that's not usually possible) - or from another homeschool family? I have invited a lot of families to our house to browse through materials. I find it so helpful to actually see the books in person because when you research every curriculum online they all talk about how wonderful they are. Well, for SOME people they are - but is it for ME? If people are still considering buying it, and I trust them to keep my books in good condition ( :) ), then I'll loan it to them for awhile to try out.
  4. Right now we're using it as a review and will probably use it as an introduction to other concepts. Once I feel they need a little more practice in some areas, it will move to a supplement and we'll probably pull out our other math curriculum (through 4th grade, I like Mathematical Reasoning books through Critical Thinking Company or Rainbow Resource). But I'm pretty sure my younger ones will be reading the whole series now! They're hooked!
  5. We started a few years ago with the older kids, and *I* loved them, but for the older stuff after doing our regular math for so long, it's just what they were used to so we went back to them. I thought we'd try again once I saw the elementary series, and am really glad we did!
  6. My kids are LOVING the elementary Life of Fred series! We started with the first book, which is a little younger than they'd need, but I thought we could work through it a little faster then. I'm afraid of missing something. My kids keep asking if they can PLEASE read another chapter! We are on page 80 of the first book after just 4 days. Not sure if this will keep up or not, but for now, we're just enjoying it! :) Love hearing their giggles while reading math!
  7. If you haven't researched "vision tracking" I strongly encourage it - it can't hurt! We were thinking one of our kids was dyslexic as well for years. Even though we enrolled that child in the school part-time to get help, they said they wouldn't test or help children until at least 3rd grade if they were really behind by then, because most children get caught up by then. We kept trying and researching until we found out he had vision tracking problems. He could track things fine enough, but he could not SUSTAIN his tracking and his eyes would quickly jump around if he was trying to focus on something and his words would get all mixed up. After a few months of us working with him with some exercises we found online, he was doing much better. A year and a half later, he was all caught up to grade level for reading.
  8. Just stumbled upon this, and have to leave in a minute, so just want to post quickly so I can find this again! We finished: Mathematical Reasoning Language Smarts Both from Critical Thinking Company. We use these for K - 3rd grades and it has worked VERY WELL for all my kids no matter what their learning style has been. Pricier than I'd pay for a "workbook" - but it's more like a whole curriculum in one book. Independent learning style. The kids rarely needed me to sit with them, they could figure it out without me hovering over them. Worth it. Nearly Finished Apologia Astronomy with Notebook. Worth it. My kids LOVE science and I fall asleep on the first sentence of every science book I've read until this one. The kids RETAIN the knowledge and are EAGER to do it. This is the first thing they ask for every day. We could have done more this year, but I was working 40 hours a week until March, so this was the first thing we set aside since it is more teacher directed. Older kids: Saxon math WITH SAXON TEACHER CDs. I wouldn't do it any other way! 3 of my kids are awesome at math, and 2 of them struggle. The CDs work for all of them. They can go back and "rewind" and "replay" the day's concept. They REVIEW past concepts every day by adding a few random problems from past chapters. The CDs have the answers for EVERY SINGLE PROBLEM in the book - explained to them - if they are struggling with an answer. Pricier than I'd normally pay, but to be used by 5 kids - definitely worth it, and actually it was so successful for us, I'd have probably paid that much every year for each child, because before this math was a HUGE time consumer in our house with explanations, backtracking, repeating concepts, etc. Also big spontaneous purchase this year for the older kids were the APOLOGIA science Red Wagon Tutorials. My older kids were bored out of their minds with science, and having a less-than-enthusiastic teacher like me did not help. I just required it of them and we all dragged. The Red Wagon Tutorials are from a teacher who taught the Apologia science classes online and then gave the rights to re-sell his broadcasts. He is 1. Enthusiastic and 2. Organized and 3. Interesting. He adds a lot of interesting side notes and connects more things than are even in the book. The hardest part was figuring out how their schedule/dates/assignments would correlate to our school year. That took us a little while, but since then has been easy and even my student who dislikes science as much as I do has retained a LOT more than previous years. Anyway, I kind of went off like writing a review or something! But these were the things I was very hesitant about mostly because of price, but ended up being very happy about! Things I was disappointed in: Mathtacular - cute and fun, but I can't put it together with a curriculum, so just watching math concepts can grow old quickly. It would be nice if it correlated to a curriculum. Drive Thru History - interesting and fun, but again, hard to tie in with other things we are doing. If you have the extra money to spend - those are nice extras, but they won't stand alone as any sort of curriculum (at least they didn't for us.) More to come!
  9. In WI there are virtual school programs available to anyone in the state, or individual districts might offer their own students a virtual option - each district being different. In our district we can currently either choose one of their pre-packaged curriculums, or submit a wish list of curriculum and they will choose what curriculum they approve. They do NOT approve Christian materials. So, for example, they will not buy our Apologia textbook or workbooks, but they WILL buy the Apologia science kit. We are also required to take the reading and math tests that all WI students take in November starting in 3rd grade and up. Other than that, we are pretty much left on our own. Neighboring districts approve more than our district, but open enrollment is not allowed except to the specific state-approved virtual schools. The state ones I checked into require a lot of regular checks, using their curriculum, and sticking to a strict curriculum/assignment schedule. Not for us at this time anyway!
  10. Question was too general - I'll try again later and break things up into more specifics. :)
  11. I like the books listed above, but most of them did not work for US. My number one suggestion to new homeschool families is to find someone who is even a year ahead of you, preferably someone who's been homeschooling awhile, and set up an hour to sit and browse and talk books and curriculum. Browsing vendors at a homeschool fair is fun too, but everyone will tell you their stuff is the best! :) For younger ages we love: Mathematical Reasoning (k - 3rd grade) through Critical Thinking Co. Language Smarts (k - 3rd grade) through Critical Thinking Co. Apologia Elementary series for science (my two boys FAVORITE topic, and my least favorite, but THIS series I find interesting) Explode the Code series for handwriting/spelling Then we add a lot of reading books that they are interested in. I am not a fan of books that require a lot of teacher intensive preparation or reading to understand the concepts that program is trying to teach. Maybe because we have 5 kids right now and I need each one to be as independent as possible. Not that I don't LIKE teacher-directed curriculum, I just found I was skipping too much and feeling too guilty with a lot of that type of curriculum. Good luck!
  12. :tongue_smilie: I still don't know how to use this quote thing!! I'll try again.
  13. For me, I guess it definitely is boiling down to personality. And we've told her this whole year our decision will be based MOSTLY on her behavior (personality) and how we can only GUESS that would play into a decision like that. And we told her WE will be making the decision, not her. If we could switch mid-year, I'd be making the decision much quicker. The problem is once she starts playing for a high school team, she has to play for that team the rest of her high school years, or sit out a year to switch (Wisconsin high school rules). WHICH we have told her WOULD happen if we sent her, and we made a decision to bring her back home because of any poor behavior on her part. She "plays down" to a different level because in the past her coaches have told her she needs to slow down her passes because the other kids can't catch them. They also told her she needs to slow down her skating for the same reason, and she needs to pass and share with the other kids and not be a puck hog. Okay, all good things - work as a team - but then, how is my daughter supposed to improve when they're telling her to play down? I also DON'T like the idea of her being the superstar, that's not right either. Last year the high school game was played like this: pass to the 2 kids who can score and let them take it. I don't like seeing that in any sport, or any activity. Feed the superstars? :tongue_smilie: Our problem with her staying here would be to keep her humble!! :) (Also a good learning lesson). Good lessons everywhere! My pros and cons list is getting bigger! Grateful to have some black and white idea, this will NOT just be an emotional decision!
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