Could you cut out the copywork at tape/paste it at the top of the page in her exercise book?

Just a thought - is it possible it's just her metabolism? As a kid, my sil used to drive my mil nuts with constant snacking and eating little at meals - but she is now in her 40s and still has to eat the same way. If she doesn't eat small amounts frequently, she will get cranky and woozy as a result of hypoglycemia...it's just how her metabolism works. Any chance you're dealing with the same thing here?

I just read "The Last Policeman" and "Countdown City". Fun reads. The last book of the trilogy isn't out yet, though it's only a month away.

Free or not - caveat emptor, baby! Once he's chosen to accept the freezer and has taken it home, its functionality or lack thereof has nothing more to do with you.

I have to say that I don't think it's a US thing. I really think it's a people thing. I'm an Aussie ex-pat, and when I go home to visit friends and family, I get two types of reactions, and both are related to who is doing the reacting. One reaction is as you're describing - not necessarily the denial that your mom seems to have, but more a of a "put in a box" type of reaction...hard to describe without being a bit uncharitable, so I'll stop at that. The other reaction I get from friends and some family members is genuine interest in how my life runs here in the US. Honestly, I think the same people would react the same way whether I'd moved to the next state or to the moon. As mentioned by PP, I think a lot of it has to do with how I have changed due to "life" while I've been away. Some people can cope with that, and some people can't. I'd also add that living away from your home country, and having to "assimilate" in a new country, really gives you a good perspective on both places, and I think you come to see more objectively the strengths and weaknesses of each culture. Maybe that awareness adds to the difficulty. Anyway, :grouphug: and good luck for your trip!

I still don't think you have to spend a lot of money on it. Honestly, find a cursive style (or printing, if your child isn't up to cursive yet) that you think appropriate/like the look of/suits your needs and print out a sample alphabet. Have your child practice it for a set time each day (it doesn't have to be very long, just be consistent doing it daily) and also incorporate it as much as possible into your day. (Narrations, dictations, writing greeting cards for friends, etc.) Done and dusted. The main practical advice I took away from that article, apart from keeping up the daily practice, is not to hurry too much in getting them onto the keyboard.

I'm so sorry for your loss. Praying for you and your precious children.

We used Saxon Phonics 1 & 2, though not K. The flashcards (letter, affix, picture, sight word, and spelling cards) I think are important for the program and for full retention, but I wouldn't worry at all about the games cards. I have probably only touched them the one time I arranged them in a box for storage! That said, I love Saxon Phonics. It might be a bit dry, but dang, it does a good job! Both my kids are reading well above "grade level" and are pretty sound spellers, thanks to the program.

Another vote for "English From the Roots Up" - our kids loved it, too.

WWE3 was too hard for us immediately after finishing WWE2, too. My dd needs lots of practice summarizing, also, even with the SOTW summaries each week. So we moved into CAP's Writing & Rhetoric (Fable) to bridge the gap, and we're really enjoying it. I think it helps with the summarizing skills better than WWE, as to my mind, it spells out the process a bit more clearly. (It also teaches lots of other skills, obviously.) So that would be my recommendation. And yes, it's open and go. Good luck! ETA: We do plan to go back to WWE3 after W&R, as dd should be able to handle it better by then, I think.

Great motto! And kudos to you and your dd! I love that line about "invert and multiply" - thanks, I'm adding that to my bag of tricks! :001_smile:

Rosie, I'm so sorry for your sad news. Praying for you and your daughter. :grouphug:

I think we need more words to describe "love"...I love pizza, I love my football team, I love my kids...all very different ideas!

This is pretty much what we do, too. I have two doing it at once, 6 and 8 years old. I read aloud no more than one section a day to them. I ask them the AG questions on each section, and they take turns answering. The 6 yo does the coloring (or a History Pocket) while the 8yo writes down her narration and does the map work. (We also use the globe a lot while reading, so 6yo gets the geography pretty well.) At the end of the chapter we spend time reading some of the literature, and if I'm in the mood for it, or if we have time, we do a project. The projects are not a big deal for my kids, and I find they are retaining a lot anyway, simply because they enjoy the story of history! For review, we are (rather slowly) compiling a lapbook. I'm not sure we'll get it finished this year, but again, it's not a big deal, since they are already retaining a lot just from reading and the AG questions and narration.

Ditto ditto ditto to everything everyone else already said!! I absolutely love my double oven!

Crayon. Every time my kids say it sounds *exactly* like "crown". Drives me nuts.

I've been where you are, this time last year! :001_smile: I was at a loss for where to go with spelling in particular, after the sound basis that Saxon gave my dd. We have ended up using WWE and CAP's W&R (starting with Fable) for writing. For spelling, I really wanted a program that would build on all the rules learned in Saxon, so we got AAS. We flew through the first couple of levels, thanks to Saxon, but started slowing down a bit in level 3. We've also used R&S Spelling. And for grammar, after a false start with GWG, we are now using R&S English. Not everyone likes it, but it works really well for us at the moment, and she is learning and retaining a lot. These are all very sound programs to follow Saxon, but honestly, I think a lot of it, as with any curriculum, comes down to what works for your particular kid. (And I'm not totally confident that everything I've worked out with my dd is going to work out with my ds in a couple of years, though hope springs eternal!!) HTH!

Yep, I've seen that video before. Totally hilarious! Honestly, if it were me, I would have been holding a long-handled, hard-bristled broom in one hand, and a sturdy shoe in the other! Suffice it to say that one of our stories involves a bathroom...another involves Close Encounters of the Spider Kind inside a car at night...!

Haven't bought or used this one, but I've had it on my wish list for a while! http://www.amazon.com/dp/B002KAOOXM/ref=wl_it_dp_o_pC_nS_ttl?_encoding=UTF8&colid=24CHHT4C9MI1F&coliid=ITJE7TNZ015MH

OK, now that would freak me out. Not super keen on spiders, and even less so in large numbers! And my dh and I have some pretty entertaining stories revolving around his first few encounters with rather large huntsmen in Australia. :)

I do hate spiders myself, but how poisonous they are has less impact on me than their size and hairiness! I'd rather deal with a red-back than a huntsman, for instance. My mum used to catch and release huntsmen in our house. When we got big enough to handle them ourselves, those suckers were flattened!! Snakes don't freak me out so much. But I did grow up absorbing the principle that any snake = deadly snake (this was true where I lived.) So shortly after I moved to the US, I totally freaked out when our cat caught and brought home a small snake. I rushed off to my dh, in hopes of locating a shovel or something, but he was totally unfazed, and assured me that it was just a harmless garter snake. That was a complete paradigm shift for me! You mean, most snakes around here are harmless?? Whoa, that's weird!! :laugh:

This thread is giving me a good laugh. :lol: Honestly, having grown up in country Australia, I'm torn between saying, "Yep, we're all bad a$$es" or telling the truth, which is that it's not really that bad! You just grow up knowing how to be safe. Always shake your boots out before you put them on. Don't go grabbing through a wood pile without some gloves on. Make a lot of noise when you're walking through tall grass. And if you're my mum, when you walk into a huge spiderweb slung between a couple of trees, just wave your arms about, mutter "Bloody spiders!!" and continue on your way!!! (Those webs are not made by poisonous spiders, in case you're wondering!) And keep a feisty cat. We had a cat that found a nest of baby red-bellied black snakes (poisonous) and caught one or two a day for several days. Saved us the trouble of dealing with them after they grew up! We were just impressed that he had managed to avoid the mama snake. I think giant earthworms are way cool, as are fruit bats. My American dh's comment when he saw them flying around Sydney: "They're freakin' huge!" I was all, "What do you mean? That's just a regular old fruit bat!" :laugh: As pointed out by PP. I'm sure the same kind of case could be made for many areas of this country, too. Scorpions and tornadoes...<<shiver>>

I didn't like it at all as a kid, and having read it once, I studiously avoided it afterwards. But, I recently read it aloud to my kids and finally realised why I hadn't liked it as a kid. I did enjoy it more this time around - and my kids seemed to enjoy it, and wanted to finish it. At least they don't "hate" it as I did, but I wouldn't say it's their favorite, by any means.

My dd is like this too. For a while, we let her read until a certain time, at which point we would go in and remind her to turn off her light. The problem we found was that the reading or the light (or both) stimulated her, so that she would be up for another hour or so, playing in bed. Which made a very late night and a cranky kid the next day. I tried having her be more active during the day as well as getting her up earlier, but that just resulted in an even crankier kid! So we finally decided to take away the reading light altogether. She goes to sleep at a much more reasonable hour now, and we are all much happier. She gets tons of time to read during the day.

Lots of freebie printouts with coloring and basic copy work (or letter tracing) on just about any topic you care to Google! :) For my 1st grader's independent work, he gets to practice his handwriting (I print out a sheet a day for him from one of those create-your-own-worksheet sites) and do his geography workbook (Maps Charts & Graphs)...I've also printed out various pages of coloring/copywork to help him learn the continents and oceans, and I know there's oodles of stuff available on other subjects. If either dc has a particular point of interest, you could focus on that.