1) Time. Personally, I'll never again try and teach spelling to a child before 8ish. As much for my own sake as anything else. When the time is right, 2) try color-coding phonemes(?) to create vivid visual impressions of the words. Also, lot's and lot's of dictation, meaning-based spelling when/where you can and so much repetition that you'll long for the comfort of Arkham Asylum. 3) Stay consistent My piss-poor speller would've been better off starting spelling at 8ish and staying consistent. We bum-fumbled our way through many starts and stops. It took us a few years of starting-stopping to develop a mix of strategies that helped him, then a couple of years of consistency to get to where he can (more of less) spell whatever he needs to spell. The color-coding phonic-parts of words was really helpful for him. We drilled spelling shortest-longest words. We started with 'a' and 'I' and then went to contractions and vc and cv words. We looked at the color-coding and mapped words to that color pattern. He traced the words out in thin-air, wrote them on his thigh or arm, chanted them, made up spelling stories, it was insane. So.Much.Repetition. Unrelated, but how is she with memorizing other bits of information? How is she doing with math fact strategies? Can she spell her full name?

No. It was the type of book that you'd find on Amazon, but it wasn't a "curriculum" so to speak. I want to say that the videos were like simple Flash animations. Maybe there was a carnival theme to the videos?

There is a Spanish text I heard of several years ago on this forum that starts out with a focus on teaching the smaller words like "por" "que", "con", "y", etc (Maybe it was focused on prepositions) I vaguely remember there were simply animated videos on YouTube that went over the lessons. Does anyone know this book/series?

What would you do with them all? No deserts.

German We've made it to the end of the trial year! Personally, I love learning German and I hate learning German. The end result from a years work is that we're all really proud of how much we've learned but none of us are particularly happy with the results. The minimal-approach is very frustrating. We're typically "all in, from jump" when it comes to learning something, so this doing a bit each day approach yields pretty small results. In media, we can hear a lot better than in actual conversations. Our conversing level is abysmal and our accents are terrible. We can do all the basic grammary stuff that follows a pattern and we're getting better at the irregular grammary stuff that has no pattern. When I'm trying to think of a German word, my brain constantly throws me the Spanish equivalent. It's annoying. The Boys confer that the same thing happens to them, except it could be Japanese or Spanish that their brain serves up. We wanted to do a year, and we've done a year. So we are taking a break from active study for the Summer--well, they are. They have a lot on their plates and I know that they can use the break. I'm intending to keep up the 10-30 minutes daily. I want to improve in the irregular bits of grammar and I need to increase my mimicking/shadowing media ten-fold. I'll be looking into finding a real life tutor to help me up my listening and conversation skills by a lot. Frankly, I want them to both continue because Germany has free University to all comers and wouldn't it be great if they got to see a bigger part of the world and experience a new culture while getting their (advanced) degrees? But ultimately, I'm going to allow them to decide if they'll take on the obligation of a 3rd language or not. Buddy says he's dropping German because he has a greater interest in maximizing Japanese and perfecting Spanish. Not what I want, but this is perfectly fair. Pal thinks he's planning to continue because German is encouraged for PhD candidates. Since he can afford the slower progress rate he views it as a multi-year head start on his planned-future studies anyway. I'm going to try and find a show to watch in German that's intriguing. It's hard for me to watch screens for long in any language. I have no idea how The Boys manage to sit through so much staring at a box. Personally, I hope to go to Germany one day and would like to be able to function in the German environment, though I'm sure folks will speak English to me at every turn.

No. It might be the same author, but we own and use Linear Algebra and It's Applications (4th Ed.) by David C. Lay.

My university switched from using Thomas to Stewart. I was in the first group of students who were required to use the Stewart text, so I bought a copy of Stewart for the lessons, online access and hardcopy HW problems. I acquired a copy of Thomas calculus for free. I kept both because it's harder to come across extra calculus exercises than arithmetic and I wanted a wider pool of problems to use for my children I find that the majority of US Math books are over-bloated. There is no reason for every K to 12 math book, to be 500+ pages. Yes, Linear Algebra is taught at most US universities. Some advantages include: more time with the material and concepts keeping my kids interested in mathematics gaining more tools in their mathematical tool kit and of course, avoiding several of the disadvantages of waiting until University to study Linear Algebra.

Literature is a wonderful tool for many, but it's not the best tool for us. I'm not interested in using literature for this purpose and am only looking to use books that are more in the vein of the books already mentioned. Please spin off a seperate thread for recommendations for literature to cover this topic. I don't want this topic derailed with literature recommendations because that doesn't fit what I'm looking for here.

Th title of this may be off-putting but hear me out. The Boys are being tasked with 3 books a semester that they should read and develop their own take-aways for their own Adulthood. The books are meant to cover a range of soft-skills and ideas that I think many more adults need. Social Skills: How to Win Friends and Influence People Personal Growth: 7 Habits of Highly Effective People Financial Education: Rich Dad, Poor Dad Can you all please recommend more books for this project?

We used what we had on hand for both, so Lay's Linear Algebra and It's Applications 4th. It's a highly readable text, good examples and was very easy for self-study. For Calculus, I taught it directly but used Thomas' (12th? 11th?) and Stewarts (7th) for problem sets.

The JLPT doesn't align with their language goals for Japanese, so we don't prioritize around it. They wanted to be able to converse and consume Native media in real time. They'd like to travel to Japan and be independent in socializing and working/studying, so the #1 skill they need is conversation (so the subskills of listening comprehension, vocabulary, and speaking) are our priorities. Ideally, they'd like to be able to work for an international corporation in their early 20s and be eligible for international positions. Once they achieve their goals for Japanese, they'll be likely to score well on the JLPT anyway, so no biggie. I prefer (and now that they've experienced it, they also prefer) to push and prioritize Functional Language. Our work is always in learning not studying a language, so for us, CEFR and JLPT aren't really "spine-able". Aside from the fact; we study/use American Spanish, and most of the Spanish speakers that we know and socialize with regularly are from Central and South America or the Islands.

Japanese We've entered our 4th year of Intensive Japanese. I realize that I don't document nearly enough of what The Boys do to develop Japanese, nor do I record what they can do. To be blunt, it's hard to monitor their progress/abilities in Japanese as I do not read/write/speak or understand Japanese myself. So, the week that they integrate several new phrases/words into their speech, I'm unable to notice. When they're not working from a concrete resource, then it's nigh on impossible for me to know exactly "what they're doing". My biggest worry is that I do not want The Boys to study Japanese; the only acceptable outcome is that they learn Japanese well enough that they can functionally converse, read and write the language like an educated young adult. To this end, I'm picky when it comes to published resources and have tried to use the most effective resources and materials that I can find. I do allow The Boys to find resources on their own and help them to set up their study schedules to make it through material in time. Fortunately, now that we're 4 years into this endeavor, I can now share that there are some things that they are currently able to do. It's hard to tell that they're inching forward on the day-to-day level. However, when I look back at the month(s), seasons and years, I can see huge growth. 1) The Boys are conversant in Japanese. --They have extended conversations about their hobbies with other Japanese speakers. --The Boys use a cellphone to look up certain words in Japanese in real-time. --They can make small-talk in Japanese --The Boys can ask for clarification in Japanese, about something that they heard in Japanese when speaking to Japanese speakers. 2) According to The Boys, their active vocabulary is just over 6,000 words. The goal for this year is to grow their active vocabulary to at least 8000 words known fully and automatically. 3) The Boys are semi-literate in Japanese, and improving steadily. --They've mastered their Kana, and for reading purposes, have grown beyond Kana picture books for literacy practice, but still benefit from the exposure to native grammar patterns and vocabulary --The Boys are making good progress with learning and knowing Kanji and are going through a Kanji course with a tutor to steadily learn and improve their Kanji knowledge, and the ability to orally read. --The goal is to automate their ability to accurately read/write 2500 Kanji by the end of 2024. They're confident that they can get there. They learn and exercise Kanji daily. 4) They can hear and aurally capture Japanese! I absolutely credit their early work and the fact that they've sustained listening to Japanese for 4 years. They continue to mimic Native Japanese audio and learn phrases using mimicry. 5) I'm constantly told that The Boys have amazing accents in Japanese. 6) It's Purging + Purchasing Season, so we're getting rid of materials that they've used and don't need any longer, and are looking to purchase some materials that they can get much use out of for the next couple of years.

I'm looking for 2 Science Handbooks; 1 suitable for Japanese elementary students and the other suitable for Japanese middle school students. I'm also looking for a series on World History that's suitable for Japanese elementary students. I'm hoping that @JAYY and @Elastimom and @maize can help me out with the correct terminology to use when browsing.

I'm a little confused. Since you work at a WWII Museum, isn't explaining to folks about the war (and the Atom-bomb) which played a pivotal role in both ending that war, and also in preventing a lot of would-be-wars since then, a part of your job?

I knew that it was a sincere question with no judgement or negativity behind it. My reply was meant as a joke, but depending on the size of your social circle, and the degree to which you socialize with the people in it, you might actually be able to say, with certainty, that you don't know anyone with more than enough dishes for their family.

LOL, why do you assume that everyone that you know has more dishes than they need for their own family? I mean think about it how do you know, that you don't know someone who only has enough dishes for their family? 😏 When we've had 1-2 guests eat with us, the guests use our dishes and we (The Boys and I) eat from tupperwear. On the occasions that we have 3+ guests, we all use paper-plates and disposable forks/spoons. We've had the same pack of paper-plates since The Boys were in early elementary school. I don't allow random, I-barely-know-you-type guests in my home. Casual acquaintances aren't welcome in my home either. We meet up with people at a 3rd party location.

It's not so much that they have to pay for their dishes, but that, as adolescents*, they have to pay to replace things that they destroy by doing dumb, reckless or dangerous things that they know better than to do. Amazingly, my accident-prone children have become a lot more careful as they grow up. *For their 10th birthday, I acknowledge (and treat) them as an "adolescent" and not a "child". A part of "being an adolescent" in our household is that they gain new privileges, but also responsibilities.

Frisbee would work out with a plate, but they did something to their fork and cup. Each of The Boys owned a bowl plate cup fork spoon *shrug* I sincerely have no clue how you never thought of this. Seriously? I definitely played Frisbee with plastic plates as a boy.

I offered the terms as I did because 1) replacing the dishes will cost me $1.93 after taxes, where as Extra-Strength Excedrin Migraine will cost me $18.57 after taxes. 2) prolonged exposure to the "WTH-ness" of the situation was going to have me in need of Extra Strength Excedrin Migraine for an indeterminable amount of time and 3) eventually, when the embarrassment or sting of whatever they've done wears off, one of them will tell me. My sanity (and my liver) are worth the $1.93.

The better question is WTH actually happened that they managed to each break a plastic cup and a metal fork? A deals-a-deal, so I won't ask. But I promise that I'm feeling curious.

So, thinking better of who I am dealing with, I went and asked them "Hey, did you guys accidentally break your dishes doing something stupid that you don't want to own up to or explain?" They both laughed it off like "crazy-old Gil", but again, thinking about who I'm dealing with I told them if they told me the truth in the next 3 seconds, I'd replace the dishes at my expense (normally I make them pay for things that they break via stupidity/recklessness), close the investigation and never say another word about it. They immediately said "yes". except Pal said "yes, but it wasn't my fault." and Buddy said "Yes, and it was his idea in the first place." I told them to stop talking before they say self-incriminate any further. Case closed.

We have plastic dishes. They wouldn't shatter.

Each person owns 1 set of dishes, so there are limited dishes in my home at any given time by design. Some kind of way The Boys have neither a fork nor a cup in the house. We've been drinking from water bottles as it gets warmer, so I didn't realize that The Boys didn't have cups until I asked my kid why he was standing over the sink and drinking from a plate like a crazy person, and he informed me that he doesn't have a cup anymore and his water bottle broke so he put it in the plastics. This has been the case for going on 3 weeks now. Where have their dishes gone off to? The Boys swear that "they don't know" where their cups/forks went and at this point I'm starting to believe them. We don't eat in the bedrooms. We clean up the house twice a day, every day to prevent any mess from taking hold. We don't have a ton of furniture anyway. To be sure, I've had them clean their rooms and bring out any and all dishes! This unearthed a single Silly Straw (again: we don't eat in the bedrooms). I've had them search the yard and nothing! Checked in the car--nothing. Checked a relatives kitchen--nothing. Looked in the work shed space where they've been doing a lot of work--nothing (so far). We sort trash (recyclables, burnables, food-waste, etc) and would've noticed if they'd been thrown away by accident. What am I missing and where the heck are their dishes? 🤔

The best writing to reinforce his phonics lessons is one of those K-1 writing tablets from the dollar tree, where you and he write the words he's learning to read during his phonics lessons. For reading reinforcement, go to the library or use book store. You now have him track with his fingers as you guys are reading together and have him read the words that he can read.

While you are right that a degree does not determine (or even exactly limit) your job prospects, obtaining an Engineering License can be very dependent on having an Engineering Degree. You have to check by state what the requirements for obtaining an Engineering License is. We have to be careful to not mix up working with an engineer and working as an engineer for anyone who is interested in working in engineering. I work with a guy who makes mid-6 figures. I most certainly do not make the same salary.