Fabulous :D

I wrote this earlier and I think it bears more discussion: I want to say that this topic, Teaching Textbooks being a little behind, was a teaching point with me. It helped me to finally grasp the greatness of homeschooling and letting go of life-long ideas of what we do without thinking. Let me explain. I am 46 years old but I'm sure that moms of all ages have come to this realization too. I had some pre-conceived notions about school when I started. I actually took me about 4 months to figure out that these notions were put there by my previous life (public school) and that I was one that knew nothing about bucking the system. Some of those notions were: 1. School is from August to May 2. Tests are the only way to know what a child knows 3. Textbooks are filled with ALL the information there is on a subject 4. A child progresses from grade to grade over the summer and at no other time 5. A child is in grade 5 (for example) in each subject - Math, English, Science, History 6. Summer school is for the dumb kids Now, I have totally bucked the system and I don't follow those notions at all because they're all antiquated and false. Thank God for enlightenment and encouragement from others that have been there done that. I feel so free and love it that I'm a rebel.

I want to say that this topic, Teaching Textbooks being a little behind, was a teaching point with me. It helped me to finally grasp the greatness of homeschooling and letting go of life-long ideas of what we do without thinking. Let me explain. I am 46 years old but I'm sure that moms of all ages have come to this realization too. I had some pre-conceived notions about school when I started. I actually took me about 4 months to figure out that these notions were put there by my previous life (public school) and that I was one that knew nothing about bucking the system. Some of those notions were: 1. School is from August to May 2. Tests are the only way to know what a child knows 3. Textbooks are filled with ALL the information there is on a subject 4. A child progresses from grade to grade over the summer and at no other time 5. A child is in grade 5 (for example) in each subject - Math, English, Science, History 6. Summer school is for the dumb kids Now, I have totally bucked the system and I don't follow those notions at all because they're all antiquated and false. Thank God for enlightenment and encouragement from others that have been there done that. I feel so free and love it that I'm a rebel.

Awesome post above. Thank you!

So many folks have recommended the Audio version to me because I want to run SOTW & MOH at the same time over 4 years. I may do that. I agree, I don't like to skip anything either. Or could you use the first volume as a bible study? Run it along side volume 2. I've considered that myself. Some have said that Volume 1 is higher percentage of bible stories than the others. I don't know that from personal experience though.

Howdy again :) We are half way thru Core E. We've done B+C, D & now E. I just found Classical Education and TWTM & SWB's book 2 months ago. To say I've found a new comfortable place is an understatement. I am excited to have a new guideline for my daughter's education that will include Sonlight as our History. I didn't grow up reading any classics so I'll share how I'm going to move forward with that and hope it inspires you to develop your own NEW way of doing homeschool. First off, I'm jumping forward to Core G then H in order to get our history in line with SWB's suggestions. I will stretch it out over 3 years because I plan to add in Mystery of History too. She will be 10.5 years old when we start Core G and many have advised me to not skip Core F but getting inline with the Trivium History sequence is very important to me and I know my daughter will be fine. We'll still throw in lots from Core F too. We read all Read Alouds to her and she reads all her Readers to me while I'm driving. She's not mature enough to do independent work because she daudles too much. When it comes to the fabulous books in SOTW lists and some recommendations from others (I'm always stalking future SL Core's forum threads looking for books that are recommended NOT to miss) and MOH lists, it's a lot. I'm choosing to add in 3 classics into each of the next 4 years as assigned by me books but if it goes well, I'll add in more in 7th & 8th grade as personal time reading. I am also choosing to do Literary Guides with at least 1/2 of them. There is wonderful advice on both forum boards (here and SL) and it's overwhelming to think you'll do all if it. I've chosen to takes bits and pieces from so many experienced moms but I won't do all of it. There are some classics that I will choose not to share with my daughter due to my Christian views but we've learned thru using SL how to discuss topics as a family instead of shelter her from them. This is one reason why we chose SL. Plus I LOVE all of the old patriotic stories that are on their booklists. Have a great day! Michelle

I'm in exactly the same boat. I'm in my 3rd year with Sinlight and instead to purchase more but wanted to ramp it up a bit. I feel kind of "over cautioned" on the forums because I want up do more. Glad to see another SLer wanting to add more Classical into thier education choices. I may check that book out. Here's one that I just bought "Homeschooler's Book of Lists, The: More than 250 Lists, Charts, and Facts to Make Planning Easier and Faster" by Sonya Haskins ISBN13 : 9780764204432. I have also purchased the VP History Cards to see if they'll work with us but they had what arrived yet.

I'm thrilled beyond excitement. It feels like Christmas with all those boxes arriving. My biggest problem is that I click "submit" too fast and them find something else I wanted he next day. Last month I made 4 purchases from rainbow Resource and each time I had to meet the $50 Free Shipping requirement. Yep, always ended up with more than I originally wanted but it forced me to look and buy some great EXTRAS :D

In the age digital everything, how do you store their work and what do you keep? Do you allow them to re-work a rough draft and then save it as a FINAL document? Or do they have Title of Document rough draft.doc then Title of Dicument.doc? Also, I am a photographer and that means I store my images by (year-month-client name) in a hierarchy fashion. Do you do that? Do you have a portable hard drive for each student for highschool? That's what I want to do because I use my Macbook Pro for photography and I want her stuff seperate.

Ok, now I feel like the oddball with just one and that's gonna be it.

My 4th grader just finished JAG and loved it. I wish there had been more practice actually. She maintained a 93% average so in very pleased with the product. I chose JAG & then JAG Mechanics because I don't believe she can do too much. This gives us Grammar instruction from 4th-8th grade using a product that she loves. I was looking for something long-term.

Great quality. I just like the covers if the Erin Condren better. And the size.

Here's my video :)

I used Horizons for 3rd, 4th and part of 5th and never even used those sheets. I don't time my daughter but she wants to time herself sometimes. In my opinion, timing a child at this age maybe counter-productive. It might be adding pressure when none is needed. They are learning brand new stuff at least half the time and it may possibly make them dislike it. On the other hand, if you have a competitive child, create something for fun but don't count it against them.

This may seem like a no-brainier but what do you use and how do you store your narration notebooks? Spiral bound? OR Loose leaf in binder? Each subject? Binders for each subject with multiple grades in them? Storage? How do you do that with multiple children? Please advice and creative ideas to those us just starting the narration process. My daughter is in 5th grade and I have lots or spiral notebooks but they haven't been organized at all and they are just a jumbled mess. I want to move forward with a process of organized storage. Thanks, Michelle

My daughter is 9.5 and is finishing up JAG tomorrow. She had 3 years of LifePac LA and then about a year and a half of Sonlight LA. I wouldn't call either if toes string grammar programs but laid a solid foundation. We hadn't done any sentence diagramming prior to JAG. I chose to do JAG now versus wait until next year to attack AG. We had room for it in our day and I bought the videos. They are the first video schooling we've ever used. The creator's of the product are the instructors. They merely read out of the workbook BUT I wanted someone else to teach her. I have her watch the video and do all 3 exercises in one day. It just works better for us that way but it's meant to be done over a week's time. I have her watch the video again before the test and then take it. It's more important to me that she gets it clearly and that we have no tears. She actually told me yesterday that it was fun and that she loved it. I never really thought about someone loving Grammar. I only have one child so the cost for the DVD was high BUT I have her watch it more than once. It's worth it to me. I would definitely recommend it because the instruction is sound. I haven't used the Grammar product you're talking about so I can't answer whether or not you can just go into AG. Hopefully someone else can speak to that. I chose JAG because I wanted to start as soon as possible and thought that AG would be too difficult even though it's the same info. The sentences are written on a lower level (3rd grade, I think) with JAG and I figured that we'd do well with that. She's going to finish the first 11 units with a 94% so I'm happy.

I have Apologia Anatomy but was looking into Sonlight Core F Science which is Anatomy & Physiology. I haven't even liked into WP though. We gave done Apologia Astronomy, Botany and Flying Creatures but I'm ready for a break and read more good books. I'm going to hop over and check WP out. Thanks. Sorry, I wasn't much help.

I'm going to go out on a limb but I just read my very first parenting book and I want to recommend it. My daughter is 9.5 and she is so much like me that I've cried about our relationship falling apart. I'm strong willed and so is she. The book "You Can't Make Me but I Can Be Pursuaded" by Cynthia Tobias has changed my thinking forever. I don't have to give up my authority just need to change the way I communicate what needs to be done. Disclaimwr: I have not read ANY parenting books before his one. I'm stubborn and I never wanted anyone telling me what to do. I'm strong willed to the core. It has changed my thinking.

Yesterday, during Unit 8, my daughter hollers out, "I love this. It's so much fun." Ok, really? Grammar? JAG has been a huge hit here. We'll take a month off between JAG & JAG : Mechanics.

I have ordered the Deluxe package and didn't have issues last December with shipping. My comment is this though. NO MATTER how much you spent - $25 or up over $400 -, customer service should still be taken seriously. The ball got dropped by the original person you spoke with. I find that when someone merely dismisses my concern because "oh well, it happened." That just gets my goat. BIG TIME!!!! By the way, we are truck drivers and the actual shipping of an item should only be affected by snow storms but I can tell you from experience, we can get from Los Angeles to New Jersey in 65 hours. The amount of UPS and FedEx trucks out there driving during the bad weather times proves to me that it isn't the drivers. They chain up to cross the Rockies and go thru hellacious thunderstorms because that's what they do. It's the picking up the item-taking it to the distribution warehouse-then the truck picking it up-then the truck driving it-then the distribution center on the other end reviewing but-then the local truck taking it out. This process is time consuming BUT if te product didn't go out when it was supposed to in the first place, then IEW customer service should be trained how to respond to upset consumers.

Anyone else have experience returning products?

www.creativelive.com Sorry, can't create link using my phone.

We are truck drivers and we only go home every 9 weeks. This leads me to purchase lots of goodies so that they are all there when I get home. I've looked at PDF's and samples of everything I've bought and scoured the forums for advice and recommendations BUT what if I don't want it after I touch it, feel it, see it? I've ordered from MCT, MP, CAP, Logos Press (NOEO Science), Amazon (I'll probably keep all those used books though), Rainbow Resource and Barnes & Noble. Anyone have any problems with any of these companies in returns? Thanks, Michelle

I don't want to hijack the thread but are Joy Hakim's "Story of Science" Textbooks? For public schools? I just ordered them with the student guides AND teacher guides.

This thread has cemented my desire to use MCT's products. Well be starting in March and I look forward to it. Thankyou to whoever brought it to the thread for recent newbies like me.