Where are the WWS samples? Thanks!

My kids are ages 21, 20, 9, 6. I'm glad that I still have kids in the house!

just adding to my above post..... I attempted to have my K/1 tagalong with ECC with my 9yo son. I had to make significant adjustments to ECC to keep her engaged. Since this will be my 4th grader's only time through ECC, I decided to teach it at his level instead of "dumbing it down" to keep a younger child engaged. Our day has gone so much smoother and he is getting so much more out of ECC without a little sister disrupting it. YMMV She will occasionally join us for the geography game. Remember, MFW 1 is designed to be a full program. Your 1st grader really won't need anything else. IF you decide to let the younger tag a long with ECC , what are you going to drop out of MFW 1? Best of luck!

I do not think that you need to add anything else! MFW 1 is a full program on its own. I would teach the 4th and 8th graders ECC together. THEN....teach the 1st grader all of MFW 1 allowing the K'r to tag along with the Bible reading/science/art/music. THEN....teach the K'r the 3rs. I would not worry about teaching any part of ECC to the 1st or K'r. They will get their turn to do ECC the next time in your family cycle. ( If you ultimately stick with MFW) Adding Sonlight A would be overkill, imho.

:iagree: This was the information our recruiter told us. My ds joined the Navy with a homeschool waiver. Best of luck.

Go for it! I've worked 24 hrs a week for the past 10 years...although I don't work at home but actually leave the house for 24 hours a week. It is doable. I love my job and I love homeschooling the kids. I'm glad I get to do both!

I second getting a 1 yo mutt from a local shelter. We adopt our dogs from a local no kill shelter that fosters their dogs in homes. We are able to get a very clear picture of the pups personality. We have 2 lab mixes and they are great with the kids. They both will let littles crawl all over them. I would be a little leary of having the youngest pup in a home with a baby or toddler....not because I think that he would intentially harm the child but he is a little clumsy and forgetfull and might accidently run the child over. He is gentle enough that I can let the 5 yo walk him on a leash in our backyard but this is after being in our home for a year with daily training that she is his boss. A good shelter will be able to help you find the best dog for your family dynamics. We are big on making sure that the big dogs know their role in our pack. Kids before dogs always. We do daily exercises so the dogs always know that the kids are their leaders. My dogs are not trained guard dogs. We did encourage them to bark at "intruders" and they have a bark that scares grown men. Once a pit bull got in our backyard and my oldest mutt pinned the pit to the fence until I was able to get the kids into the house. He was then ready to play with his new friend. If you haven't had bigger dogs in your home then I would be sure to do some research on dog training and pack mentality. My dogs are great guard dogs! The downside is that we are the house with the crazy dogs. :lol: I'm personally OK with having the neighbors know that if they try to sneak in our yard or house that they are going to have a couple of barking like crazy dogs announcing their arrival.

I'm native american and I have 2 blond, fair, blue-eyed children. I have been asked which adoption agency I used. I have been asked "Where is her mother"....assuming I'm the babysitter? People have assumed that my oldest son (age 21) is the youngest dd (age 5) dad and I'm raising my grand kid. People have assumed that my youngest is my DH's from an affair and I was gracious enough to raise her! :001_huh: I agree that the worst is when they ask the kid the question! My youngest has asked, "Who is my "real" mommy....you know the yellowed haired mommy." So someone has been asking her about the situation. She very innocently refers to me as her "black-haired mommy" and her older sister as "Hannah-mom" but she just doesn't know who her yellow haired mommy is. I carry her birth certificate and have a dear friend who was at my delivery on speed-dail just in case. :glare:

Are you doing all the dictation in AAS? Is there anyway you can get your 9yo working on WWE3? Or at least portions of it? I totally understand wanted to combine in some areas but if you got the 9yo just a little further in the WWE series then perhaps you will feel like he is not a behind? My reluctant writer's stamina improved once I made him to all the dictation in AAS. Once he realized that he could really write more than once sentence a day it has been a little easier to implement writing across the subjects. He just had to realize that his hand wasn't going to fall off. AAS dictation was very non-threatening since he didn't have to think too hard about spelling or punctuation. Just a thought. My ds didn't respond well to writing in science or history until we got over the writing hump with the AAS dictation. If your son is a history lover perhaps introducing a narration/dictation notebook would help him. Look for a notebook page that has a blank part up front for a picture with lines below. You could start the year with you writing his narrations and gradually move to him writing part of it. Drawing a picture is great way to increase his writing stamina as well. If he is willing to do this. If you look at the type of writing assignments towards the end of the year with WWE2 it can give you a guideline how to structure this writing in history. They are the ones that are narration/dictation types of exercises. The Latin roots workbooks I liked were Vocabulary from Classical Roots. I did not use these until my kids were middle school. My plan for the youngers is to finish AAS before introducing these workbooks. HTH!

Is Kilgore close by? There used to be one in Kilgore called Shekinah Cellar. Or something like that. They had very limited hours but this was years ago. Google search and see if they are still around.

I used the Keeper for 20 years. I'm about to purchase my 3rd ....and hopefully last one. So, you really replace a Diva cup every year?

We just finished up a great 3rd grade year: MFW Adventures MUS FLL/WWE AAS We kept it simple and he made great strides this year!

One of the biggest differences betwen SL and MFW is scheduling. Many (if not all) of the SL books are listed in the MFW book basket. SL schedules each and every book. MFW gives you a list and you choose the pacing and the books that you read. What is your preference? Both SL and MFW will give you the basic structure of your day for history/science but then you get to add in the particulars for LA/Math. SL is more structured and more expensive than MFW. You can always do MFW but purchase the extra books from SL if you prefer. I used SL for 5 years with my olders and then planned out the rest of their school years. SL wasn't the best fit for my oldest son but my oldest dd loved it. IF she had been an only I would have kept using SL. I'm currently using MFW with my younger kids. I would use MFW regardless of how many children I was homeschooling. I really like having a pre-planned curriculum! Some people really enjoy the lesson planning aspect of homeschooling. I don't. I like having a good portion of our day planned out for us but I also want to be able to use my own choices for LA/Math. I found the micro-scheduling of SL tiresome. I don't really want each and every book I read to be schedule to the paragragh. I also want the option to combine kids so MFW is the winner for us. Both SL or MFW would work for your book-loving child. I wouldn't hesitate to buy either if you would like to have something planned out for you. HTH

I have focus the early years on developing good habits. Forming good habits was more important than making school fun. :svengo: Now that he is approaching 4th grade, he is SOOO easy to homeschool. He works diligently and isn't afraid to work on hard subjects. No whining or dawdling! I have found a pre-planned curriculum that works well for our family. No more tedious lesson planning! I can add in LA and math for each individual child but 95% of the lesson planning is done. This means when school is done for the day for the kids then I'm done with school for the day as well. I actually get school breaks too. Makes me happy! Since we can focus on school in the morning and I don't have to spend anytime planning for school, we have our afternoons free! :hurray:

Looks like a great plan! You have writing, grammar, spelling and reading covered. You have found something that works, your ds has improved and you seem happy with your choices. :hurray:

Our core: MFW ECC Math: MUS Grammar: FLL Writing: WWE with a little bit of WS 3 Spelling: AAS Latin: LfC A

My fav is Charlotte Rose. My eldest dd wanted her sister to share a middle name so we have a Charlotte Michelle.

I thought perhaps I was the only one who felt this way. Thanks for posting this, Mergath!

I own Vol 1-3. I bring my booklist to the library and typically check out 8 books at a time. 1 book per week means I only head to the library for FIAR books once every 2 months. The booklist is still on the website. I print it out and know exactly which book is at my library. I skip the books that are oop or not available. HTH

I just finished this pass year with MFW ADV with a 8yo and 5yo. It was a fun year. ADV is easy to have a K/1st grader tag-a-long with without being a burden. There is a grid for Math and LA and they do have certain recommendation BUT they are not pre-scheduled. This makes it super easy to sub in your preferred math and LA. That is exactly what I did. The science in ADV is fun and tied to the study of the names of Jesus a bit. Super easy and fun. Science in only schedules 1-2x per week with another day as a nature study day. Again, very easy to add in a little bit more science if you want. The music study was well done but easy to sub out if you prefer. We also did our own thing for art. I enjoyed our year and was glad that I decided to go with MFW ADV. It was just enough history/science so we could really focus on reading. Another thing that I really like about MFW is the schedule. I also tend to like to do my own thing and have a dh who encouraged me to go with a prescheduled package. MFW has just enough schedule but not overly scheduled....if that makes sense. I can easily add in a little here or there to their basic program so that I feel like I'm personalizing it for my kids without letting lesson planning take over my life. When I don't feel like it then I can stick with the basic grid and know that I have all the basics covered. The Bible study portion of ADV is really well done and easy to do. My son is very proud of his Names of Jesus Poster. It is precious! HTH

My son is 8 almost 9 and has a history of speech and language issues. We did 4 years of speech therapy. My ds is reading at about a early 3rd grade level. My oldest dd was also a speech/language issue kid with early reading issues. She is a Junior in college doing quite well. She did not start reading chapter books until age 9 (or 10) but by age 13 was on the same reading level as her brother who was reading chapter books at age 6. She was not reading AT ALL at age 7/8. So hang in there. Speech/Language kids are going to need more time during this early phrase of reading. If you are concerned about auditory processing then look into that. Chances are these types of issue were explored by his speech therapist while working on Speech. Of course, I'm assuming that he had ST at some point. If not, then certainly look into this. I approach reading from several different angles. First, we work our way through a controlled vocabulary basal reader. We are using Pathway readers but any one will do. I like Pathway because they give us a list of new words for each story. Before we read the story, I list the new words and we "mark them up". We break them into syllables, find all the consonant and vowel teams, determine if the vowels are long or short, etc. Whatever he needs to do to read the word. Then we read the story. I've found with my ST kids that controlled vocabulary is key for these early years. They get so frustrated if they have to sound out each and every word. Once they start reading chapter books on their own we drop reading from Pathway. Second, I use All About Spelling for spelling. Lots of good review for phonics. We re-read the word cards a lot. I like AAS because it is very systematic and easy to teach. For an OG program it is very inexpensive. Also it is easy to teach! I did mention that, right? No need for a Teacher inservice like many OG programs. I have my son read ahead in the program. We review a phonogram and he reads the cards. We keep reading the cards until he can do them with ease. So he is reading at a higher level but working on spelling at a lower level. Hopefully this makes sense. AAS wasn't around for my oldest dd but I sure wish it was! Third, we do a phonics drill. We were doing a pg from Phonics Pathway but we are recently switch over to doing Reading Pathways. We could probably drop this at this point but since it only takes a few moments each day and he finds the sentences in RP funny we will keep it up until we finish the book. Fourth, I have him re-read easy books. I have a basket and I have him choose books from it to read each day. These are really, really easy books and usually a book that we have already worked through. This is a big confidence booster for him. I honestly do not care if he picks up a 1st grader reader during this time. This is a fun reading time. Fifth, I read aloud from high interest read alouds. My goal is to choose books that well get him excited about reading and putting forth the effort to learn to read chapter books. For my son, Narnia has been a hit. For my oldest dd it was M. Henry's horse books. Sounds like a lot but it really isn't. We spend about 15 minutes with Pathway, 15-20 minutes on Spelling. 5-10 on reading the AAS cards, less than 5 on Reading Pathways, and he spends about 15 reading from our easy reading basket. So we spend about 60 minutes a day working on reading skills. We break it up throughout our day so it never feels like a burden. He spends part of each day reading at an easy level, part of the day reading at a more challenging level and part of the day reviewing phonics. Hope our story helps you feel encouraged! You are not alone and he will get there!

:iagree::iagree: This is my fourth time teaching K and FIAR is by far my absolute favorite for this age group. FIAR + your picks for phonics/math/art/handwriting would be a great K year.

:grouphug::grouphug: This is very, very sad and breaks my heart. What part of your day goes well? What resources are you enjoying doing? How much time per day are you spending homeschooling? How much time are you spending organizing or planning for hsing? Obviously you need a major change. I just don't know if SOS is the change that will bring joy to your life. At the very least, you need to break from school and reconnect with your dd. Praying for you!

This is what my son had to do to get a homeschool waiver for the Navy. My first conversation with the Educational Specialist covered all the questions in the first requirement. Specifically, he asked me 20 questions. How many hours a day did he do school work? What resources did you use to teach x? Who issued this diploma? etc. Hopefully this study will be a little bit more favorable for homschool grads than the previous one.

It is important to note that the process of being declared a "homeschooler" was different then. I believe anyone who declared themself as a homeschooler was part of this study. So if a dropout checked the homeschool box....they were considered a homeschooler even though no actual schooling occured in the home. The process for a homeschool grad to get a waiver to be tier 1 is different now. If you get a GED you will have to have 15 college credit hours so don't get a GED and expect to get in via a homeschool waiver. The same for virtual schools. My son joined the Navy via the homeschool waiver. I had to talk to an Educational Specialist about our homeschool program, my son had to score at least a 50 on the ASVAB and he had to take the AIMS test. I suspect the study would be different now that they are a bit more selective about how they determine if someone was actually homeschooled. My son at no point felt that he was being discriminated against during this process. I think that homeschoolers need to make themselves look attractive to get a recruiter to go through this process for them. My son talked to the Coast Guard and they would not return his calls once they found out he was homeschooled. The Coast Guard in our region is only recruiting people who have earned Associates degrees. The deciding factor for our recruiter to try to work on a homeschool waiver was the fact that my son was an Eagle Scout. The Educational Specialist told me that one thing he was trying to determine if my son could function well in a traditional school setting. I wish we had Pretty in Pink's dh as our recruiter. We had to figure out the process as we went!