We used FFL and WWE for 1st and 2nd grade. Moved to R&S English for 3rd grade and now midway through 3rd are starting W&R rotated with TC.

Another question: - What about instruction in the student book of CLE. The student lessons in R&S seem so complete. I can't get a real handle on CLE based on the samples since it is spiral. I realize all that is presented in each lesson is a small snippet of the big pictures. Over time is the instruction just as complete or is further instruction from the teacher expected?

Interesting you fine CLE more geared towards homeschooling. I do find I cut out a lot of the work in R&S to make the lessons shorter. Can anyone link the spelling rules post? I can't seem to find it upon my initial search.

Well, I have really only had experience with Option 2 (although I have looked extensively into Option 1 for us as well). Option 2 is pretty much the path we followed for kindergarten through 2nd grade and made some changes for this year (3rd grade). I have never regretted the decision to use the WTM path. We have only made changes because of growing learners' changing needs and family needs. I have used FIAR (and BFIAR) for 4 1/2 years now and LOVE it. I recommend it to lots of people as a totally worth while curriculum. I would say you would also find that you can use it with all 3 children (obviously with adaptations for each age). There is some overlap too between MP Story Time Treasures and FIAR literature selections but 4 y.o. might be a little young to use MP STT.

We used FLL and WWE for 1st and 2nd grade but this year for 3rd grade switched to R&S English with separate writing curriculum. After exploring CLE for math I started looking further and liking the looks of their Language Arts curriculum. Right now in addition to R&S English we use R&S Spelling by Sound and Structure and Pentime for handwriting. We also use MP literature studies and MP poetry and are starting W&R alternated with TC. Everything is going well but wow, the idea of having 1 language arts curriculum coving so much is so appealing. Plus, it seems in general DD1 does better with spiral approach. The review in R&S english is great but it is always amazing how much she forgets from year to year (i.e. didn't remember her being verbs that were drilled in FFL2). Yet, she catching onto things initially really quickly. I almost never have to do any extra teaching with R&S she reads and understands well. So, after my long ramble some of my questions: - every thing I read it SEEMS CLE grammar portions are as rigorous as R&S is that correct? It just seems to good to be true that a curriculum with it all rolled into 1 could really be as rigorous. - Does CLE teach spelling rules? We used AAS for 2 years before switching to R&S. I LOVE the theory behind AAS but it just got to be way too much and DD is really a pretty darn good speller (R&S is too easy). Even though she is a good speller I really want DD to know and understand spelling rules. I think it helps with reading and spelling. Is CLE spelling really a good spelling program? - Can I easily cut out writing assignment from CLE? I eliminate poetry from R&S easily since we already study that separate. I would want to cut out writing from CLE as we would be doing that separately.

I have gone over and "drooled" over Wayfarers several times. It just looks beautiful to me. Unfortunately, right now in our lives I don't feel like it is a good match….I am going to keep looking at it though.

I am not all that familiar with ELTL as we haven't used it (only have looked at samples). We used WWE for 1st and 2nd grade and attempted the leap to Writing Strands this year and that was just too much (fine for the first bit but got to be too much). We just started the CAP- Fables samples and are finding it to be a good match (a bit on the easy side). I just purchased TC as well planning to use it after Fables. Although we haven't used it yet it seems so nice and gentle and completely adaptable to be able to meet your child where they are at (taking longer on certain lesson as needed, stopping to bring in other resources, etc.) I have looked at Brave Writing a lot too. I love the looks of it but agree it would almost be too loose for us.

:lurk5: **following** As History Odyssey and W&R are both our current plans.

Thanks to all of your raving reviews here I decided to order Treasured Conversations today. It just looks wonderful and all of your reviews seem like it will fit great into our writing curriculum change of plans. I have it downloaded and will be waiting for my printed copy from Office Depot. I can't wait to read and study it before starting using it.

Artistic Pursuits is very open and go as long as you have all the supplies. My 3rd grader more or less does it all on her own. We also have a Usborn Art book that is really open and go again as long as you have all the supplies.

Thank you! I am pretty much looking for the basics: plot, conflict, conclusion, characterization, etc. She is exposed to some with FIAR books as well.

Add me to that curriculum junkie list. I have a problem with constantly reading and researching….thankfully the budget has its limits so I don't buy everything. Favorites include R&S grammar, MP lit. studies (although we haven't tried any others), Beautiful Feet Geography (although we aren't far into it yet). Elemental science has been a solid constant for us for 4 years. Some years I love it more than others. I want to love Math Mammoth but it isn't a perfect match for us right now. Hopefully with the few changes we are making in the new year we will have more to add to our favorites list.

For my independent working 3rd grader we are using R&S grammar (obviously not secular though). It is really a great match for her being able to do things on her own. For writing we have been using Writing Strands. It is really a good match for someone wanting independent creative writing but it isn't the perfect match for my DD so we are going to give CAP- W&R Fables a try (thanks to the 3 week sample).

Will either of these curriculums introduce various literary elements? I am trying to figure out "best use of our time" and questioning if literature study will be necessary if we use a stronger writing curriculum.

I agree to check out History Odyssey. We like SOTW but have a hard time with the jumping around. History Odyssey by Pandia Press uses SOTW as one of its spines but organizes things my region instead of strictly chronological.

Good idea. I am a little nervous that right now TC will be overwhelming for her. I can see certain parts of the grammar being easy and other parts she would get a little frustrated with. Give her another couple of months with R&S and I think she will be right there and ready for it. Overall it looks great and really a direction I want to go. CAP Fables looks like it is exactly where she is at right now but also lacking in some of the things I see that I like with TC. In the end the both seems to have things that are the missing link in our writing right now.

I am really struggling with what direction to go next in regards to writing for my DD (3rd grade). WWE (along with FLL) served us well for 1st and 2nd grade but it was obvious she was needing a change that would allow for more creative writing. We switched to Writing Strands 3 for this year and are about 1/2 way through the book. In a lot of ways it has been a good match and has helped her stretch her creative writing skills but now I feel like we are lacking in the basics. I also see her attempting less creative writing in her free time compared to when we were usingWWE. After all of the reading I have done around these forums I am considering TC and/or CAP W&R Fables. I guess I really don't know what the best progression would be or if trying to do them both would be better. I see it mentioned a lot that people are using TC after Fables or Narration I. FWIW we use R&S Grammar (and spelling) and MP literature study so language arts is pretty heavy already. DD also does much better with student lead curriculum versus teacher lead. That is concerning to me with trying TC. Maybe after using WS for 1/2 the year she will appreciate a more teacher lead curriculum again. As much as I love these forums they get me discovering new curriculum and finding out there might be better solutions to some of the struggles we are having.

I guess I wouldn't care if she had the conversions perfect but 100ft in a yard and 24 cups in a quart (she did say 3 cups in a pint and 8 pints in a quart so at least there was logic going on :thumbup1: ) Good point about break.

Well, after taking the CLE placement tests it became glaringly obvious my gut was right that we should try a spiral approach curriculum again. The 100 level was no problem but 200 she forgot lots of things including borrowing in subtraction which we did earlier this year. She did figure it out with 1 little hint but can't count them in her score since she didn't initially do it on her own. She did poor on the geometry section (some things she just guessed good) and totally bombed the measurements section (not measuring but converting). These are both areas she touched on last year but hasn't done anything with yet this year.

Thanks.

This might be a silly question but where do you purchase Simple Solutions? On the website is says it is only sold to schools and in classroom sets not single books.

Pronghorn- Good to hear that jumping around was well worth it for you. That does give me encouragement.

Thank you for the information on SS. It does sound like a good complement to MM. I can't imagine my DD getting all of that done in an hour though. Not that she isn't capable she just drags her feet SO much with math. She can only handle doing 1/2 the problems in MM and even then some days are a struggle especially when you add fact work on top of it. I guess that should be a good sign I need to see what else is out there.

hmmm…I have never heard of Simple Solutions. I will have to take a peek. If it doesn't work on facts and computation I think I will need something else but its worth the look. It is interesting, just by printing the placement tests of CLE, my DD is saying things she likes compared to what she is using/has used. Things I never would have thought about (i.e. no color, clocks being more clear, boxes instead of lines for writing etc.) Strange how it is easy to overlook those things and only look at the deeper things with the curriculum.

Thank you OhElizabeth! I really appreciate the suggestions!