I am helping to start a local homeschool book club for middle school aged kids. The kids would like to do the Hobbit and LOTR series this year. Do you have any suggestions on discussion questions or where to find good ones online? Thanks!

Thank you so much ladies! You are so right. I know my child and am very familiar with the curriculum I that I think would be a much better fit for her. In fact, I already own all of it so I can just pull it off the shelf and go. I am always so thankful to this community during these moments.

I decided to try using only Memoria Press this year for my 2nd grader. This is a first for me and I am wondering if I made a mistake. I went to their conference the last two years and felt confident in my decision that this would help make my life be a little easier. However, we are just finishing week 2 and I am panicking. I am thinking about stopping their Latin and switching to English from the Roots Up which I used with my older kids and really liked. I am also considering dropping their English Grammar Practice book and going back to FLL 2 and WWE 1. So I would basically be taking the Latin & Grammar row out of the curriculum manual and replacing it with those three items. I feel like the Latin is way to hard for my DD and the grammar is not strong enough. I am thinking that she would get a lot more out of the EFRU, FLL2, and WWE1. Thoughts? I hate switching but I feel like I would regret not switching. Help!!!!

Thanks everyone! This has been really helpful. I think that I will drop WWE for now. I'm not sure yet if I want to use their grammar/latin program and I really liked using FLL with my older kids. So I am thinking that I will leave it in the line up. I already have it too! I am thinking that just by dropping WWE it will lighten the load enough to make it a good balance. :)

I am working on plans for my DD who will be starting 1st grade soon. I am planning on using Memoria Press for a lot of it. However, I am questioning if I should add WWE 1 and FLL1. I really liked using those with my older kids and am questioning if there is enough of that covered in MP curriculum. I am also wondering if the overall load is to much. Take a look and at what I am planning and give me your honest opinions. Thanks! WW1 FLL1 Memoria Press Phonics and new Traditional spelling MP Lit (1st grade level) MP copybook MP recitations MP enrichment/ crafts Rod and Staff math 1 SOTW 1 Behold and See 1 (science)

That is good to know that Mango is passive. My girls already use Duolingo and enjoy it.

Has anyone ever used Mango languages? I am trying to decide if I should use Mango Languages or Rosetta Stone for my DD going into 4th grade who wants to learn Italian. I also have a daughter going to be a 9th grader and would like to try and use the same for both (if possible) to save money. Help!!!!

I am looking into hiring a tutor for high school Italian for my DD. The first person I found charges $30 per hour. Is that the normal rate? Thanks!

I have a DD who will be starting her freshman year this fall and would like to learn Italian. I don't think that I can swing the cost of a tutor this year and am looking at options for doing a home study that would count for high school credit. I am thinking about having her use the Italian Espresso (textbook + DVD) along with the Italian Grammar In Practice book this coming year. Has anyone else used it without a tutor? Is this going to work? I would love feedback from anyone who has went down the path already. Thanks!

I am looking at RS 1 to finish out the end of K and going into first grade.

I have been trying to use Saxon Math K for my 3rd daughter. I am just not thrilled with it and not motivated to actually use it most days. I use a lot of MP materials with my older girls and saw that they use Rod and Staff for math. I really don't know much about RS math but am wondering if I should try it. I would love to hear your thoughts if you have used RS, especially if you switched from Saxon or vs. Thanks!

Thanks Kat w! When using WWE I would pick out the books of interest to my daughter and we would check them out from the library and read the whole thing as well. I appreciate your insight since you have used both.

This might sound like a dumb question, but I am going to ask anyways. I have used WWE for my daughter going into third grade for the last two years. I am thinking about not using WWE 3 but instead using Memoria Press's literature guides for grade 3 level. It looks like there is over lap and I don't want to do double the work and both of us get bored (plus I have 3 other kids and don't have time). Would that cover what WWE covers plus add a layer of of lit to it as well? Thanks in advance for the advise!

So I started EFRU vol. 1 with my girls. I am just getting to card 21 which is jacio jactum. In the teacher notes it said that the j was pronounced as a 'y' sound. At the beginning of the book it didn't say to pronounce the j sound in any special way. I'm not familiar with Latin so I am really confused. How do I and my girls, pronounce the 'j' sound? I want them to continue learning latin after this and don't want to confuse them. Thanks!

I did try to limit it to an hour but it was taking still taking two or more days to complete one lesson. After a week of it I decided that was not the answer for her.

I had tried to let her work by herself but that did not work for her and we ended up having to go back several lessons and restart this way. It was suggested on here that we do it the way we are now. I should have posted this link so you could see her struggles and why we are doing it this way. http://forums.welltrainedmind.com/topic/540612-do-i-switch-from-saxon-76-to-what/

It is taking my daughter 2 hours to finish each lesson of Saxon 7/6. I am in the same room and she tells me her answers as she does the work so I can help her if she needs any help. She is scoring 80% and higher on every test and averages a 90%. She is just a really slow thinker when it comes to math. As you can imagine, we are both ready to pull our hair out! I have three other younger kids who really need my attention. I can not afford to spend 2 hours each day doing this. Which is why we are still trying to finish it two months after our school year ended. I had posted back in January about her struggling. Here is the link to that post. It might be helpful. I had planned to use Saxon 8/7 next school year, but I am worried that it will be a big time sucker too. This was our first year homeschooling so I am not sure if I should switch math or tough it out. I think that the constant review of the 30 questions has actually been good for her. It has forced her to really know how to solve the problems unlike in the brick and mortar school where they did not have review questions. Which is why she has fallen so behind on math (and why we brought her home). So any suggestions to keep my sanity and hers would be appreciated! Emily

Thank you so much for everyone's feedback! I wanted to post an update for anyone who might be interested. The first thing I did was go from lesson 61 back to lesson 37. This time around I have her do her math with me. She tells me the answer and if it's wrong she then orally explains her steps to me. 99% of the time she fixes it on her own b/c of hearing it out loud. We are know past the point that we turned around and she is still doing amazing. At most she only gets 1 or 2 wrong on her tests! It is night and day. She is also enjoying it a lot more too. I really appreciate everyone taking the time to help. You ladies are the best!

My DD in 1st grade just finished both Hooked on Phonics 1st and 2nd grade this year. She really is doing well w/ reading. I was thinking about just letting her read books from the library out loud to me for the rest of the year instead of adding another level on. But I was not sure if that would be okay. Also, is she done with phonics? What do we do next year? I'm a newbie to this. :) BTW, she is also doing explode the code online. She completed book 1 and is about 2 weeks away from finishing book 2 level. She really does NOT like this and I am thinking about stopping it once she is done with book 2 level. Thoughts?

Thanks for the feedback! She does do every question in the mixed review and we use the DIVE dvds. I think that instead of switching textbooks half way through I will go back to where she started to struggle and be more hands on with even the mixed practice. Let's say that by doing that I am able to help her finish the school year using saxon 7/6. Do you think that I should use saxon 8/7 next year or switch to something different? I was not planning on using Saxon for high school math but want her to be prepared for it.

This is our first year for homeschooling. My DD in 6th grade placed into saxon 7/6. I'm not sure if it is a good fit for her or if we should switch. She is on lesson 60. At first she could keep up just fine when it was mostly review. After that she started to struggle. The best way I can describe it is that two things are happening. One, she does the lesson practice and will almost always get everything right. Then when she moves on to the mixed review she gets half wrong and I have to help walk her through the corrections. On the tests she went from the first 6 being all A's to the last 3-4 being all D-F's! The second issue is that it is taking her around two hours each day to do the one lesson. For a child who is going into this hating math, this is a big problem. I went into Saxon having high hopes that the spiral method would help her with the retention b/c that was a problem with her math in the brick and mortar school. I guess that in my current frustration I need some outside opinions on if I should switch half way through or wait until next school year to switch. AND what would be a better fit for her? Thanks so much!

Anyone? I'm interested to find out more too. :)

I did. I find it very useful. It has all the answers to the textbook chapter review question, sample test questions and answers, additional activities and a list of dates/ events to create a timeline (which are not included in the textbook).

I see. I have an older (maybe original) copy of All Ye Lands. It doesn't say "Geography" like the newest version does. I just read the description for the new version and our copy does not have the maps and map activities like the newer one. Nor the geography section at the beginning of each chapter. The older version that I have is all history. So I guess that it ones opinion on over lap might vary depending on which edition of AYL you have. I might just have to try to contact the publisher directly and ask if I can't locate a local copy to review.

Oops! I meant Light to the Nations. We use All Ye Lands and it is NOT a geography program. It is ancient world history. The chapter titles have lots of over lap but not sure how the text is different (or not).