My son does an online course in Latin (the Middlebury one that is part of the K-12 curriculum). He has been taking French for a year and has a private tutor, plus we have the French Bouquet package on Dish, so he watches French cartoons and other French programming. He doesn't seem to get the two languages mixed up.

So far I have spent: $1300 for curriculum, including books and supplies $ 275 for a microscope and supplies $ 100/mo for piano and French tutor $ 300 for additional supplies/books $ 38 for education.com for printable worksheets for the year $ 113 for Elenco Snap set with battery saver

Considering that our curriculums contain different vocabulary words, I thought we might exchange some, or some we have added on our own....kind of like a cookie exchange :drool:, just not quite as tasty. Words we are doing this week: stabilizer (from Club Penguin) stability (added as a discussion of abstract vs. concrete nouns) Russian caviar (this was in a Rick Riordan book AND A Wrinkle in Time, which we are reading this week) Caspian Sea Arctic Ocean Pennsylvania slough plus a few more....

Have you checked Pearson Math? I have a lot of great algebra books. One I really like is called Algebra Know-It-All, Math, like a foreign language, must be used and practiced. This seems simple, but you can learn it by rote and immediately forget it, just like French or Spanish.. If you do a little every day, one day it will make sense and you will LOVE knowing how to do it and being able to move on to something harder. Just start at a point you totally understand, wherever that is, and go from there. For inspiration, there is the movie,Stand and Deliver. Jaime Escalante, the gifted teacher that the movie is about said this: "I'll teach you math, and that's your language. With that you're going to make it. You're going to college and sit in the first row, not the back, because you're going to know more than anybody."

I think we only need to look around us to see the need for math. Everything designed and manufactured, every scientific advance we appreciate and use, including every medication and medical technology, the computer keyboard, the mouse...simple or advanced, it all required math. The doors that are closed because we don't learn/teach/require math, will be closed forever. What if that 95% knew math? What then? To teach math, we need to know math. Math has to be learned sequentially, which makes it a discipline worth the time...it helps with reasoning, with logic, with organization. As you can tell, I am rather passionate about this.

Sorry, I didn't mean to post this twice...but I am thanking everyone more than twice...maybe a thousand times?? for your help and encouragement. Love to all of you.

Thank you to everyone for your hugs, encouragement and great ideas. I appreciate them more than I can say.

After a one day good start with my (rather) difficult 10-year-old, I noticed something was really wrong with my right eye....it turned out to be a detached retina! After a major eye surgery and TWO WEEKS face down for 90% of the time, I am now able to get up. I did continue to school him as much as possible, but he has now gotten the idea that this is mostly play. I am so discouraged right now...I would appreciate any encouragement or ideas. I really missed being at the computer and reading about everyone's experiences. What a wonderful group to be part of. Sorry if I am kind of whining about the eye thing, but it was scary and difficult..

After a one day good start with my (rather) difficult 10-year-old, I noticed something was really wrong with my right eye....it turned out to be a detached retina! After a major eye surgery and TWO WEEKS face down for 90% of the time, I am now able to get up. I did continue to school him as much as possible, but he has now gotten the idea that this is mostly play. I am so discouraged right now...I would appreciate any encouragement or ideas. I really missed being at the computer and reading about everyone's experiences. What a wonderful group to be part of. Sorry if I am kind of whining about the eye thing, but it was scary and difficult..

I never heard of those kits before you mentioned them. I just looked at some on Amazon and Ebay. Which do you recommend? They look really interesting.

I started the morning with the pipes solidly frozen. I had planned on a full day of school, but ended up with a half day. This was my first day ever of homeschooling, so I was already nervous. Kevin spent the day on a quest for the electronics (which I hid). However, we did manage to: read a child's version of Romeo and Juliet, do long division, handwriting, and a little spelling. He also worked on a power point of Greek Mythology, and did an Art unit in K-12. That's all I could manage...I think it took about three or four hours. He also plays classical piano, so I counted his practice time as music. I really, honestly, don't feel like I know what I am doing, despite having taught college students. This just isn't the same, since I have a 10-year-old little boy to discipline who is addicted to MineCraft. Any suggestions? Other than hari-kari?

Well, I am prepared, but I am not really ready. Tomorrow is my first actual day of REAL HOMESCHOOLING. I am kind of terrified! What if I, myself, am bored and just want to read and drink tea? What if I can't get my son to pay attention? What if I get really frustrated? What if, what if..... I think I am really scared! Maybe I only think I can teach him and have no idea what I'm doing?

Okay, I figured out the photo, but what about the signature?

E. H. Gombrich A Little History of the World. This is a wonderful book, written for children . Listening to a series of Yale lectures on the American Revolution(on ITunes University) awakened an interest in the early history of our country. I listened to the lectures and then told them as stories to my son. I have taught him to try to create a timeline in his mind and then "store" the history he learns in about 500 year increments. That is what I do when reading history, so hopefully it will work for him. We all enjoyed listening to the BBC History of the World in 100 Objects. Just some history ideas, for whatever they are worth.

As an additional use for Kindle, I downloaded it to my PC. I downloaded Treasure Island (free) for my 10-year-old. What happened next was really fun: he opened the highlighter and began highlighting some content; then he opened the notes and began writing a side story for each chapter. I helped with some vocab words like "vivid" from the first couple of chapters (the only ones he has read so far). This seems like not only a wonderful free resource, but some great integrated learning as well. The feminist in me rebelled at the idea of mentioning that there are no females in this story (only a brief mention of a mother cooking), but that made it all the more appealing a read for him :).

Congratulations! That is really wonderful news.

Has your daughter expressed interest in any particular area of science? My son, 10, is interested in space, so that is where we started. There are many top quality sites devoted to this subject; I'm sure you have seen them. I like the Hubbell site, which has a link to Amazing Space. I teach "hard" science; that is, evolution, not "intelligent design" or any variation of it. Because I majored in biology and nursing and eventually taught both subjects at the college level, I lean toward biology, myself. I bought a nice microscope last month, but we haven't used it yet. I have the K-12 science books and workbooks for fourth grade, but they are way too easy, I think, plus the Harcourt Brace books, and Glencoe Science. What I am planning to do for spring is adding a biology component, probably starting at the cell level; we'll see how this works out. I am interested in what you decide on this. I taught my son all last summer, then we did one last semester in public school, where I afterschooled him in areas that were seriously neglected there. Science was definitely not taught...they were still planting seeds in fourth grade. So, finally, I decided to just homeschool him altogether, and science was a big reason.

I am using K-12. I love the math books, especially. I supplement with Prentice Hall Lit books and use Rosetta Stone and a tutor for French. K-12 for Latin. I am not in a state that supports K-12 at no cost, so I bought the online and physical materials minus teacher support.

I just bought a wonderful microscope from AmScope. It's a 40x-2000x Professional Biological Compound Microscope + Slides. Check out their website. The total cost was $264.48 with free shipping.

We did a week in London and a week in Paris a year ago. We rented an apartment through Air B&B. It was comfortable and relatively inexpensive. We did the usual stuff, but I have seen Westminster Abbey for the last time. We took the metro everywhere. One evening we went to Notting Hill and had dinner and window shopped. Outside Buckingham Palace there is a nice park and playground. I should have brought a picnic. We took the Eurostar from the Paris side. Beware if you do that. There are pickpockets everywhere, especially right after you go through security and have all your things slightly disarrayed. A story for another time. Our fav trip, though, is to Ireland. I think we have been five times now. If anyone is thinking of going there and needs tips, let me know.

I am way more computer savvy than this; at least I thought so until now! Any suggestions?

Have you tried anything like Barron's Math Wizardry for Kids, or teaching him to play chess? What about T-tiles, fractals, tangrams, golden triangles? I have always told my son that math is magic, and he simply believes me and sees it all as a wonderful game. I, myself, decided to retake college algebra last semester and am signing up again next semester (I audited but did all the work and went to almost every class). My goal is to take calculus. There is a quote taped to our school desk: "I'll teach you math and that's your language. With that you're going to make it. You're going to college and sit in the first row, not the back, because you're going to know more than anybody." Jaime Escalante Multiplication is important, but it is just one tiny piece of math. The important thing, I think, is to show him that math is fun. And that it is MAGIC. Best wishes to you.

Hello, I am new, also. I have a 10-year-old son and a 9-year-old foster daughter. The foster daughter is required ato attend public school, but I am going to begin homeschooling my son for the spring semester. Let's keep in touch and see how we are both doing with this. We live in Missouri in a rural area. I was born in Texas, though, and was one of the first women at Texas A&M.