I love SSRW and I'm using it for my youngest. This year, in Kindergarten, we did the first book only, which goes through each of the letters and their sounds. We supplemented with the pre-Explode the Code books and Handwriting Without Tears Letters and Numbers for Me. She has LOVED the program!!! This fall, for 1st grade, we're going to work our way through the next book, although we don't expect to finish it until the end of 2nd grade (my daughter has autism and she learns best with alot of repetition, so we expect to go through each lesson slowly). I will be using Handwriting Without Tears My Printing Book instead of the handwriting in the SSRW program, as she has fine motor delays and Handwriting Without Tears is working beautifully for her. Btw...this is my 4th trip around the SSRW raceway! All of my children have learned to read with this program.

I can help with the Kindergartener, as we're just wrapping up our school year. Handwriting - Handwriting Without Tears Letters and Numbers for Me Phonics - Get Ready for the Code / Get Set for the Code / Go for the Code Math - Math-U-See Primer And lots of library books for read-alouds :)

Sonlight Teaching Textbooks Apologia Science

Ours varies every year, depending on what has happened in our family that year (i.e., when new babies would arrive, I'd always alter my schedule to accommodate that) I usually don't take a long summer break, anyway, as it's hard to get them back on track and focused again if we take the entire 3 months off. This year, school ends in the middle of July and starts back the first week in September, so 6 weeks off....which is plenty!

My advice would be to seek out homeschool used book sales and conventions! I've found so many great buys there and it's shopping season, so now's the time to hunt them out. I agree with the previous poster that if you know what subjects you want to cover, we can offer additional help.

9th - BJU Geography 10th - Spielvogel's Western Civilization 11th - Bailey's The American Pageant (although my oldest decided to take US History at the community college instead!) 12th - Fraser's The History of Britain (along with a Survey of English Literature class at the community college) -- this is my oldest dd's plan for this fall

My oldest son used MUS from Foundations on and switched to TT PreAlgebra this year, mainly because he could teach himself. (Math is easily my worst subject and I'd rather he had that computer tutor!) He's been very pleased with it and has done very well and I plan to keep him in TT through PreCalculus. But...if MUS is working for you, don't switch!!

Here are some that we've really enjoyed as family read-alouds: Treasure Island The Wizard of Oz Peter Pan The Hobbit & The Lord of the Rings The Harry Potter series The Chronicles of Narnia Tom Sawyer & Huckleberry Finn

My son will be 9 in September. Here's his schoolwork: English - IEW Writing & Grammar / Natural Speller / Handwriting Without Tears Cursive Success Math - Teaching Textbooks Math 5 Science - Rainbow Science Year 1 History - Sonlight Core 4 w/ Story of the World Volume 4 Art - How Great Thou Art's I Can Do All Things He's a Blue Belt in Tae Kwon Do, so he's taking classes there 3x a week. He's also a buddy for the Little League Challengers (baseball for special needs children), so he volunteers there every weekend in the fall and spring. He's also involved in an art co-op with our homeschool group.

I agree with the above poster about trying the MUS Classic version. I believe they still sell it at the MUS website. Try the link below: http://www.mathusee.com/classic.html I did this with my oldest son (he has high functioning autism and it took him awhile to 'catch up' in math). He worked through Foundations (3rd & 4th Grades) and Intermediate (5th & 6th Grades) and half of the Advanced set (7th Grade) before switching to Teaching Textbooks PreAlgebra last year (8th Grade). So he's now working at grade level. I hope this helps!

I've also had to click all three responses! My oldest learned to read when she was 6. My second child really struggled and didn't learn to read until he was 8. My third child learned to read when he was 5. My fourth child is 6 and she's reading, but not what I would call fluently -- we're working on it though!

Natural Speller has brought our family the most success! My oldest daughter and youngest son are natural spellers, and learned how to spell without difficulty, but for my oldest son -- oh, it caused him such trouble!!! Natural Speller was just what he needed. The lessons are short, and he was able to start at the beginning and quickly gained confidence. He started with the 1st / 2nd grade list and has worked his way through the 5th grade list over the past 3 years. I also love the fact that one $25.00 book is all I ever need to worry about for spelling! (The low cost is another reason I love to recommend it to others -- you can't really go wrong for the price and, because it's non-consumable, you can always save it for a younger child or re-sell it, if it doesn't work for your particular student).

I pulled my Kindergartener out of school last week -- long story! She was very frustrated and getting her to even go to school was a struggle. Btw...she has autism and an expressive language disorder (she understands more than she can speak, in other words) I'm now in the process of setting up her curriculum for next year and I have all of my bases covered except for reading. My other three children all learned to read phonetically - my oldest with Abeka, my second child with AlphaPhonics, and my third child with Sing, Spell, Read & Write. They were using the Edmark Reading Program with my daughter in Kindergarten and I was told that she was doing beautifully with it, so I'm trying to decide if I want to purchase Edmark and just continue to use that, since my daughter's familiar with it, or if I should use a phonics program, such as Sing, Spell, Read & Write with her and forget the whole language approach. Any thoughts??

My husband had a brag moment this week! He had to run into Costco with our two boys yesterday. While he was standing in a really long line to check out, he gave the boys some money so that they could get 2 slices of pizza to eat. He said that it probably took at least 20 minutes to check out -- while he was doing this, our boys ordered their food, sat down, and ate it. He said that he headed over to their table and a woman came up to him and said, "I'm a former schoolteacher, and I must say that your children are so extremely well-behaved and polite! They ate quietly and even wiped the table off when they had finished eating!" My husband thanked her, but didn't tell her that they were homeschooled, although he was seriously tempted to do so! Of course, the very fact that they're in the store at 11 o'clock in the morning on a school day probably made it pretty obvious!

I also have a rising 4th grader....here's his list: English - IEW Writing & Grammar / Natural Speller / Handwriting Without Tears Cursive Success Math - Teaching Textbooks Math 5 Science - Rainbow Science Year I History - Sonlight Core 4 w/ Story of the World Volume 4 Art - How Great Thou Art's I Can Do All Things He's also a Blue Belt in Tae Kwon Do, and has classes 3x per week

I was born in the US, in 1962, and breastfed. My mother also had natural childbirth. My mom was a real radical! ;) In fact, my mother was a member of one of the earliest LaLeche League groups in the US (they lived in Indiana at the time, and LLL was founded in Illinois .. and not that far away from them). And...years later, I was a LLL Leader myself for 10 years. :) Just a little bit of family trivia!! Oh! Forgot to add...I breastfed all four of my children. My 1st for 2 1/2 years, my 2nd for 2 years, my 3rd for 3 years, and my 4th for 4 1/2 years.

You never know what to expect, after your first! All of my subsequent babies didn't follow that 'standard procedure'!! For instance, I had the bloody show with my 2nd child about 20 minutes before he was born -- so it's a good thing I wasn't waiting for that to head to the hospital! I didn't remember losing a plug at all with my 3rd child, but I did with #4 - about a week before she was born. I would recommend taking a bath. If you're in labor, it won't stop the contractions, and it will make you more comfortable. If you're not in labor, it'll relax you and you can then try to get some rest. Best wishes for the upcoming delivery!! :)

We're doing our CAT testing this week as well, and here are some suggestions that work in our family. Just fyi....My 1st and 3rd children do well on testing, so they don't have any issues. My 2nd and 4th children are on the autism spectrum and testing isn't something they excel at without assistance. More background...we moved to Virginia 3 years ago from a state where we didn't need to give standardized tests, so I was as anxious as my children at first!! When you have a child with any kind of 'issue' / 'disability' / 'anxiety', etc., if they were in public school, they would be given accommodations for testing (i.e., no time limits, frequent breaks, etc.) I've even heard of schools going as far as pointing out the right answer to the child, if they still don't understand what's being asked of them. So I give my oldest son the following accommodations -- no time limits and he's allowed to use a calculator for the math portions (he's an 8th grader this year) He's done extremely well with these accommodations -- usually scoring in the 80th percentile. For my youngest, language is her big stumbling block and I will rephrase the questions, to make it easier for her to understand it. For instance, today's section was vocabulary. My daughter didn't understand when the test said, "Point to the vehicle", but she understood it completely when I said, "Which one can Daddy drive?" She didn't understand, "Point to the insect", but she did understand, "Point to the bug." (She's a Kindergartener, btw...so I don't even need to send hers in to the state this year) For both children, I give them LOTS of breaks!! I try to complete one 'test' per day -- each test has 6 'tests'. At the end of each page, I give them a break (meaning, if there are 4 pages in that one test, that's 4 breaks, 4 different times that we come back to the table and continue). I also don't do school during the testing week -- so all they have to do is the test. It would be too much to add this on top of their regular schoolwork. I hope this helps a little...

It's been raining here in Fredericksburg for what seems like days!! Now the winds are picking up!

For my oldest, she started music lessons at 7 and I dropped her off without hesitation (her teacher went to our church and she was a lovely woman and I trusted her completely). My second plays baseball and my husband is the assistant coach, so he doesn't attend practices or games without his dad, so it's not really an issue for him. My third is in Tae Kwon Do. He's 8, but he attends with his oldest sister, so she's always with him -- but I trust the instructors, and wouldn't hesitate to send him alone without her. My fourth just started gymnastics lessons, but I wouldn't drop her off alone. She's only 6 and the gym is very crowded on Saturday mornings. (It's not really the coaches I would worry about, as much as it is the older kids and the parents)

My oldest is an upcoming senior and will be starting her second year at the community college this fall. She's hoping to receive her AA degree and then transfer to a 4-year school. (It's less expensive to do the cc route, at least in our state, as she'll be guaranteed admission to any 4-year in-state college or university). I highly recommend it and will be doing the same thing with my younger children, once they're capable of college-level work.

I will be praying for your little boy!!!

I'm trying to think!! Ummmm.... We went out to eat as a family during our last vacation twice -- once to an all-you-can-eat seafood buffet and once for breakfast at Denny's. That would've been in late March. My husband and I went out to dinner on a 'date' several months ago, but I can't remember when! (lol -- that's a bad sign! -- we need another date pronto!) As far as fast food goes, we have a 'fast food night' on Fridays, and we'll get tacos or burgers or pizza or something, because Fridays are hectic, as we have our homeschool co-op during the day and Tae Kwon Do classes at night, with gymnastics lessons at 8 o'clock in the morning on Saturday.

This is an off-the-wall question, but I thought someone might have an answer for me! My son's baseball team is hosting a tournament in our county this weekend and we're renting a cotton candy machine, so we can sell it during the tournament and the proceeds will go to our Little League chapter. My son's team is the Reds, so the coach has asked if we can make the cotton candy red, rather than the traditional pink or blue. Does anyone know if this can be done? The place where we're renting the machine is also where we're picking up the cotton candy 'ingredients' -- so not sure if this is something they could do, or if we could make it happen with some food coloring? Thanks in advance, gang, and GO REDS! :)

My oldest graduates next year! She'll be 18.