I'm using Homeschoolminder.com, right now. It's $4.99 per month, but it has everything I need plus what I will need in a few years. I'm not a huge of how you enter the lesson plan in, but once it's in there, it's very easy to make changes, too. The reports are pretty good, too.

Try spellingcity.com, and see if that works for you. You can save lists and use a lot of the options by creating the free account. Of course, you have even more options if you pay.

PS starts August 1 here and ends the Friday before Memorial Day. I registered our school year as 8/1-7/31. The plan is 6 weeks on, 1 week off, 2 weeks at Christmas, and that would give us 9 weeks off for summer. I plan to do a reduced 6 week schedule in the summer, though, to take care of any catch up or remedial we might need and to take care of nature study that is more appropriate in summer months. I'll probably have them keep up reading logs, but for books of their own choosing, and keep a journal. That should all be only 1-1.5 hrs per day at most so hopefully, I won't win the meanest mom ever award. This is our first year so this is all subject to change, of course. Lol

Well, make that 3 of 3. We'll see how long this lasts. Lol. Hopefully, it's not a one and done.

2nd grade lined paper template at superteacherworksheets.com. Can print it with or without a drawing window at the top. Wide rule looked too messy. Their little letters went all the way up. I think their fine motor skills aren't developed enough to write that small neatly or accurately yet. We'll probably use it through 3rd grade.

My 2 youngers each have their own made from butcher paper. We roll it and stick it on top of the fridge when we are not using it.

I'm in the same boat. We pulled dd11 after finishing 5th. She took the MM placement test and failed miserably despite being in advanced math in ps. She has some snapshots of American history, but that's it. We have been using Khan Academy and IXL to evaluate her math skills and pinpoint where we need review then using MM's free worksheets, Khan Academy's videos, and BrainPOP as needed to remediate. My goal is to have her in MM6 next month. The ladies here really helped me formulate that plan, and it's working great so far. They are a wise bunch. As for history, I started her at the very beginning, and I'm making it grade level appropriate. We are using Oxford University Press's The World in Ancient Times, Kingfisher's Encyclopedia of World History, and whatever topics she finds interesting we'll do additional living books on this year. She really likes being able to choose those. This plan will have her finishing the logic cycle in 9th grade, though. So we'll have to condense a little in high school. I figure they get one year of World History and one year of American History in public high school so she's still getting more.

Well, for me it would be not going back to work after dd11 was born, and homeschooling from the beginning instead of enduring daycare, preschool, and 6 years of public school before yanking them out and trying to homeschool after work. It sounds like your children already have that figured out, though. :-)

Hhmmmm... I am interested to hear others' opinions on this. I would think as long as she is writing correctly, neatly, and not experiencing hand fatigue leave it alone.

So I downloaded this to check out. I looked through the first lesson. It taught them to guess at x instead of showing a logical way of solving for x. What's that about? Am I missing something?

I'm with Luann to a point. I want my dc to be able to do reports, papers, presentations on the pc by high school. It will be a time saver for them at that point. I, also, want them to have a general understanding of how the World Wide Web works and how to operate safely on it, though. They often play games, chat with friends, and google information on the computer, now. They do not spend a great deal of time on a pc, but they do use their iPods quite a bit. They need to understand that privacy is an illusion and what they say or pictures that they post can come back to hurt them. As far as programming and whatnot, if they are interested and want to dabble in that that is fine, but it's not on the curriculum plan for us.

If you have access to one note, it is very helpful. You can add spreadsheets, documents, web links, etc... I have a page for each term then a weekly schedule for each child as a subpage. Super easy to change as you go. I also use homeschoolminder.com. It allows you to enter lesson plans, assignments, grades, booklists, standardized testing scores, chores, appointment, practices... just about everything, and run reports. You can drag and drop lessons and events on the calendar for when things shift. I use the One Note for general overall planning then the Homeschoolminder for once things are nailed down and to print daily schedules for my girls. I can include chores, meetings, and practices, too, so they have a complete view of their day. One Note comes with Microsoft Office 2007 and up, and Homeschoolminder.com is a $5 a month subscription.

We do a tandem read aloud before bed. I don't read it all myself, but we all read it together taking turns.

We did a 6 week review this summer then took a week off. We resumed our review this week, and I have started adding in a few new things here and there. I'm using a classical/ Charlotte Mason approach as you all know requires ALOT of reading. My kids didn't really read much in public school. They had reading group and then were supposed to read 20 minutes a night and log it. Most everything else was on the computer, in a worksheet, or the teacher told them. So all this reading has been quite a change in their learning world. The complaints were often and loud in the beginning. They have become fewer and quieter lately. Today, I discovered 2 of the 3 independently reading books that they were not assigned! I'm shocked and thrilled. It's these small victories that make my day. :)

I'm looking at this. http://www.learning.com/easytech/ Not a bad price, seems to cover the basics, and has keyboarding integrated.

Tandem reading is doing wonders for my girls. It's simple and effective as long as you ham it up. They will mimic you. We have books that they read quietly themselves, books I read aloud, and at least one book that we tandem read going all the time. We just pass the book around and each person reads about half a page. As they get older, we will stretch that out to a page or so. The public school timed them for fluency so the first thing I had to do was slow them down. Then I told them to take a breath at periods which makes them pause. That has helped with skipping ahead and mispronouncing words.

Had typed a huge response and lost it. Gaaahhh! I'll just say thanks instead. The links helped. Ravin, yes, I am able to see where she needs review: graphing, measurement, and Fractions/decimals multiplication and division.

We are reading Tales from Shakespeare and started A Midsummer Night's Dream last night. My 8 and 11yos are LOVING it which thrills me to death. My 7 yo not so much. She thought it was boring. Oh well, 2 outta 3's not so bad, right? Lol

Okay, ordered the free worksheets for grade 5 from MM and LOF fractions and decimals. We'll work on those. Next question, if you don't mind, is are MM6 and AoPS Pre-algebra on the same level so we would do one OR the other or would MM6 come before AoPS pre-algebra? Thanks again ladies!

My daughter finished grade 5 in public school. She was an A/B student in math and scored well into the exceeds category on the CRCT (GA testing). They placed her in accelerated math for 6th. For a variety of reasons, we have pulled our girls from public school. I had her take the Math Mammoth placement test, and she failed miserably. However, she did well on the Art of Problem Solving placement test for pre-algebra. I don't really understand how that can be. I'm a little torn on how to proceed. Are the curriculums that's different? Should I slow her down and redo 5th grade math before moving on or just go with AoPS with LOF supplement? LOF put her in Fractions. Thanks for the input.

We use Sundays, too. We do project work and/or experiments and any catch up work from the week. Usually, it's just dd11 that has catch up as she is a dwaddler which drives me nuts! We take Fridays off. Mon- Thurs: Math, ELA, Literature, Copywork Tues & Thurs: Science Mon- Wed: History I am hoping to add in Technology to include keyboarding(M-R), Geography(S), Artist Study(S), Composer Study(S), and Nature Study(S) in September. I have dreams of adding Spanish, but for now, I am just teaching them a few words here and there. We just cannot afford a full program or tutor. :-( Maybe, next year.

My 7 and 8 yos do 30 minutes of sit down math per day and are provided with a plethora of mathy games to play at later times in the day. I would be afraid that that much sit down math a day would make him revolt. I know my girls would! It's ok to stay on a topic for more days or weeks to master it. He still has plenty of time to get it all in. Just my 2 cents for what they are worth. :)

Our schedule is a bit different. I give her about 4 hours of work to do from 1:30- 5:30 pm. If she finishes early then good for her, she earned some free time. Then we have another couple of hours in the evening after dinner and/or practice, usually 8:00-10:00. She has cross country 2x a week plus meets Saturday mornings and Scout meetings 2x per month plus 1 monthly field trip or camp out of some sort. I work from home so it's working out best, right now, to let the girls sleep in and do afternoon and evening schoolwork. As they get older and the workload increases, their days will start earlier. It drives my dh nuts that my littles do no start any work until 5:00. He thinks I should give them worksheets or something. I don't see the need for busy work just so they are doing something earlier.

We are using Usborne Encyclopedia of World History with the links. We made fossils with plaster of Paris and plastics bugs. We read Magic Treehouse Dawn of the Dinosaurs and are about to start the Dinosaur Cove series. Since we read the portion about evolution, dd8 has been trying figure out what everything "used to be" or how everything is related. It's pretty funny.

Ignore her... He's 5, and you're doing plenty. My 7 & 8 year olds will only be doing 4-4.5 hrs once we're fully ramped up in September. My 11 yo will be doing about 6ish. I feel bad for her kids. :-(.