What about Dutch doors for the bedrooms? The top half swings independently from the bottom half, so it's like a built-in baby gate. If dh or a friend is handy, you can convert your own. Failing that, I would go with a combination of strategies. Go ahead and try training, but you CANNOT rely on that alone. I'd replace the baby gate, up a bit higher if possible, train baby to climb safely and with permission, and definitely train the older kids to lock the door and/or use door knob bafflers.

I do follow the four-year rotation - - hope you don't mind if I answer anyway! Starting with an area of personal interest sounds good, but I think studying American history for several years is . . . a LOT of American history! I think a year would be plenty. If you do a typical school year, you could spend a full month on colonies/settlements, another month on the Revolution, another month on the civil war, pioneers/westward expansion are good for a month, so is state history, yet still several months left for everything else! So, off the top of my head, this is what I'd recommend for a middle schooler without much history: A year of American history, including lots of literature and projects. You might want to look at Artner's Readers Guide to American History, History Pockets from Evan-Moor, and the Oregon Trail software (if you don't mind computer use). For 7th and 8th grades, I would do an abbreviated history cycle, going in order but obviously spending less time on each era. Use the WTM as a guide and decide which topics to spend more and less time on. For some topics, you will need to restrict yourself to just a quick read from a good history encyclopedia - - you want him to get a rough overview of the flow of history. If you tie in English (relate his reading and writing to his history topics), you can cover more ground. Then I would do a regular 4-year cycle for the high school years.

I think you'll find that there's just a lot of wiggle room and different thoughts among home schoolers. We started kinder at 5, but by no means did we use a curriculum or have a set daily schedule; actually, I don't require any 'academic' work in kinder. The resources are there, and both my kids wound up doing a fair bit, but it was optional. Third grade is when I have found it becomes more important to try to keep to a schedule of sorts and get some work done every day. Some people are concerned about having easy schedules early on, because of having to 'change the rules' later on, but it's not been a problem for us. School rules change as they get older, just as the rules for chores and so forth do. Long post short, I start kinder at age 5 but don't require academics until later.

I don't even find kinder necessary, so definitely not pre-k. I'm not against preschool at all; my oldest went for two years, her sister for one. But it's not needed at all, and I hate to see 'academics' push aside more important things (that is, I hate to see worksheets replace concrete learning). My two were never *required* to do anything in kinder when we began hs'ing, and very little in first grade. They had no trouble making the transition to required school work.

Just for the record, he was single for a really long time. If I remember correctly, he did eventually get married - - she works and has a kid or two, though, so she's not being all June Cleaver on his behalf :D To me, the importance message of his books boils down to two main points: 1) Kids CAN be passionate, inspired learners. 2) There are no shortcuts. Teaching is hard work; you have to put time and energy into it in order to succeed. While it's important to select good materials, there's no 'magic' curriculum that will do it for you or make things peachy keen.

Prima Latina would be mighty easy for a ten year old. I would probably go for Latina Christiana 1 instead - - the younger one is eight, right? My seven year old does fine with it. She moans a bit about the writing, so I usually let her do derivatives orally, and she does even better than her big sis on vocabulary.

thank you!!

nft

If I went with a boxed curriculum, I'd pick K12. They use the 4-year history cycle and take a sequential approach to most subjects, including art. (I haven't looked at it lately, but I don't think there's been any major changes)

I think that would be quite hard to do unless you're fairly fluent in Latin yourself. Memoria Press and Latin Centered Curriculum both talk about starting Henle as early as 5th grade, I believe, but any earlier than that would be REALLY tough, imo. I think adapting a program designed for younger children might be a better choice. When push comes to shove, I don't think the most common issues with Latin programs for younger students are truly 'fixable.' There is always going to be a great deal of tedious memory work, and the grammar will always have to be doled out bit by bit (if the student is ready to dive into the deep end of grammar, then they're ready for Henle). Edited to add: I just noticed you did say 4th or 5th grade (need more coffee!). A strong 5th grade student could do Henle slowly, if you feel up to adapting it. But like Plaid Dad said, Latina Christiana is based on Henle, so I'd go that route unless finances were a big issue.

There's definitely a learning curve, because the program can do soooo much. You'll want to spend a bit of time playing around with it and entering 'dummy' information to see how the reports and so forth work, before you enter all of your real information. I found that there are certain features that work well with my style, and those are the ones I use and know well. I use the Plus version because of the Lesson Plan feature. You can enter lesson plans and assignments that aren't tied to particular dates (so you can reuse the lesson plans for other kids if you wish). When you are ready to use the assignments, you just submit them to the assignment grid (and give dates at this point). The lesson plans make it very easy to see how long it will take to finish a certain book. For example, if we do a lesson twice a week, excluding holidays, we'll be finished on such and such a date (and it's simple to change it around and see various possibilities; every day, every other monday, whatever). After assignments have a date, it is still easily changed. You can adjust the date of one assignment, or move all assignments forward. You can do a lot with grades, attendance, and transcripts as well. I don't have need of those features yet, but it's nice to know it's possible. Let me know if you have any more specific questions, and I'll try to answer. I know quite a few people on the board use HST.

I haven't used it, but it looks like fairly standard unit studies stuff. The excess of educational jargon on the home page is enough to turn me off :glare:

Absolutely. Reminding her to buckle up isn't making a big deal of it. Safety issues aside, YOU will get a ticket if stopped.

Ikea bookshelves and a custom built school room aren't the only two choices, though, right? :D I would probably discourage my mom from spending more than is needed, but if she offered seven grand initially, I'd get something much nicer than Ikea bookshelves. Look at furniture stores, educator stores, etc and get some different ideas. I'd probably go for a mix of built-in shelves and moveable pieces.

Gender wouldn't affect my decision. I'd have some concerns about them witnessing the pain, blood and general mess that go along with a problem-free birth, and I'd worry about them witnessing it if something went wrong. When my two were born, if I wasn't cursing or screaming, it was only because I was throwing up. I wouldn't want to feel like I had to put a good face on things in order to not upset them, and I know I wouldn't be able to take off my 'mama hat' and not worry about looking after them. And I don't WANT to look after anyone while giving birth :001_smile:

yay, several choices! all of which look fairly good. does anyone know if the calvert cd can be used by a 2nd child? not at the same time, but the following year?

There are several lower priority subjects that I don't want to give 'prime' school time or effort to, but don't want to ignore completely. What I do is try to keep easy-to-use resources on hand that the kids can use on their own, either during free time, on long car drives, or on those days when my planning goes to heck. Things like software for various subjects, Which Way USA puzzle books for geography, games, books, etc. I will say that my 4th grader has been reading constantly and fluently for YEARS, and it has not improved her spelling skills in the least. Poor child. If we had a spelling program that seemed to be working well, I'd probably find a way to continue using it (especially if it can be done independently, and without a huge time investment). So I'd probably keep P Zoo on hand, and have him use it on his own or during light periods (summer time, holidays weeks with a light schedule, etc). Which reminds me, I must go look at my "software based spelling?" thread!

Carmen, I'd be really interested in hearing why you would say Powerpoint!

My dd is finding the SOTW 4 outlining examples to be very helpful - - it starts off by giving an example outline of a chapter, then it gives the main points and the student fills in the sub-topics, and the student is gradually guided toward doing it independently. I will say that I have always found outlining an encyclopedia, especially a youth encyclopedia, to be a rather bad choice to start with - - it is so close to outline form to begin with that I think many students find it difficult to see what they are supposed to do. The difference between an outline and a story or topic told in narrative form is much easier to explain. You might also try teaching it the opposite way around (creating an outline to write from). Even though that's supposed to be the more difficult task, it makes the purpose of an outline much clearer to many students.

Your kids are young - - at 7 and 5, I'd have no qualms about using the supplemental reading and crafts in place of, rather than in addition to, many of the chapters. I also agree with those who say to keep it quite short (break up the chapters), and focus more on exposure rather than retention.

what are the choices for computer based spelling programs? any thoughts or reviews?

30 more lessons? like st_claire, I think I'd simply have her finish the book at the end of this school year. math books in general have so much review that the last 30 lessons probably have much of the new content.

No, of course not. Would that still hold true if it were a private evaluation? Is getting one done in the states a possibility? (can't remember where in canada you are) I know that many people in the states bypass evaluations offered by the school system because they don't want anyone else to have that information. As far as dance and swim are concerned, I would seriously consider pulling my child out. It sounds like the situation might be going downhill, as far as peer relations are concerned, and no amount of exercise is worth him being taunted or bullied. The difference in ability is going to become even more pronounced as he approaches the teen years. I'd look for things that he can do on his own - - exercise dvds might be a good choice, and there's tons of variety (walking, pilates, tai chi, all kinds of dance). A fun option is the Wii gaming system; you jump around quite a bit, and some of the games are EXCELLENT for coordination.

Has he ever had a full evaluation done? That would be my next step. I know people, especially home schoolers, are often hesitant to slap a label on kids who march to a different drummer, but the added knowledge can be very helpful. It seems like it's becoming an issue for your son in terms of his social life and self-esteem, and I don't think a 'label' is any more harmful than that. When a child seems unable to learn certain things in the usual way, a professional who is trained in evaluating and supporting kids may be able to suggest specific techniques to help improve certain skills. The advantage of being a home schooling family is that you can use the knowledge and disregard the label.

Well, I assumed that the evening time would be spent with dh AND the teens, with of course her dh going to bed earlier. I'm assuming they would have a couple of hours after dh gets to work, and before he goes to bed! Enough time to eat together and have a pleasant conversation or play a game, whatever. And like I mentioned, she might have to work harder in this scenario to have regular date nights and chunks of time with dh on the weekends and holidays. I'm also assuming that, while she enjoys the alone time with dh, getting up at 4.15 AM would not be her first choice. Personally, I only know what that time looks like from the other end (staying up that late, not getting up that early). My dh has the lovely gift of falling asleep quickly, and being able to fall BACK asleep quickly, but I would never be able to get up, make breakfast, talk, and then go back to bed. If she can do that, I agree that would be great. I guess I just zero in on what the OP states - - those kids are going to be gone, gone, gone before she knows it. Because their bedtime is so reasonable as it is, I would hesitate to go to bed super early in order to get up with dh at four in the morning.