Well for my 1st grader, this is what I am looking at: Little Angels Phonics (finish B,C and D) FLL (maybe adding WWE) All About Spelling Abeka Math 1 Faith and Life 1 Apologia YE Zoology 1 (with her older sisters) Sonlight Core 1 (with her older sister) or some other unit study approach Ballet, gymnastics and YMCA homeschool PE, alternating AAS and Sonlight will be new for us next year, but the rest is pretty much what I have done before.

Former user here. I used it with my then 2nd grader, and we used 2nd and 3rd grade in one year. Pros: Really good, clear and thorough presentation of the material Cons: A lot of writing to complete the exercises, a fairly "pastoral" bent It turns out that while that DD loves English, she also loves workbooks. This child would spend an hour on her cursive handwriting book but complained about all the writing in R&S. I did try the little workbook they sell and doing some of the exercises orally, but we found that awkward and ended up using Seton English, which is similiar but Catholic and in workbook form. We were also a little annoyed at the whole ruralness of it, but we could have gotten past that. I think it is a great program -- advanced in content, but easy to understand, and very economical -- but I would hesitate to recommend it for kids who are reluctant writers. Shelly DDs 9, 7 and 5 in our third year homeschooling