*poof*

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I wish I could have a more set schedule for the kids, but with our current situation it just isn't possible. However, I can't stand mess, clutter or junk so we have a minimalist sort of household. I devised a set of rules that works because it has us mostly clean-as-we-go. My goal is that by keeping the house clean all the time when we find ourselves together, we can be together talking/playing/joking/mathing/etc. Not cleaning up. Because we usually don't have a lot of time together during the day I have to be super-super strict with the boys about chores. Along with any generic minor task that needs to be done, The boys share the following chores: Fold and put away their clean clothes Keep their dirty clothes separated and in the appropriate hamper. Clean the bathroom sink and floor behind themselves. Every.Single.Time (House of men, none of us sit unless required to.) Keep their toys out of the floor. (If someone steps on a toy, it is theirs for a week, they can do with it what they want...including donate it.) Scrape their dishes and stack them neatly by the sink. Keep their water bottles up (Same 16oz water bottle refilled and keep the bottle filled with water and on the counter. Drink at least 3 bottles daily) Round up the trashcans 2x a week so that I can compact it into 1 big bag and clean the cans. Also, they have to keep up with the library books and on Friday they have to make sure they are all accounted for because we go to the library on the weekends. One grandmother thinks that the boys do too much and spoils them every chance she gets :rolleyes: , my mother thinks that they need to be taught to make their beds also :blush: ! (Whats that saying about pleasing the people...). Also, I don't micromanage them when they do house work. I don't distinguish who should do what, I wake them both up if even 1 one simple thing needs to be done because I want them both developing responsibility and responsiveness because we ALL live here. Not just me. Not just Buddy and Not just Pal. The real secret of how I keep my house clean virtually 24/7:: We clean up before we go to bed. Like, no matter what. Scream, holler, cry, whine, yell, tantrum--you may not sleep if any room of the house is messy. You will clean up before you go to bed. I instituted a new rule a couple of years ago: Once you are 5y6mo you can NOT go to bed if the house is messy. If you fall asleep, you will be woken up, no matter the hour. I did this because it was becoming overwhelming for me to keep the house up to par, work outside the home and study for school. Honestly? I think it was one of the best decisions that I ever made. Buddy, my slovenly child, cried for almost 3 weeks straight whenever I made him get out of bed and clean up, Pal threw ridiculous tantrums for a while but after the adjustment phase ended, they both learned that if they don't make it to the end of the day in a messy house then they can drop off when they like. Now they pick up pretty regularly, complete their chores with minimal oversight, do a good job and our house stays clean virtually 24/7. I do the cooking, wash the laundry, wash dishes, vacuum, quick clean the bathroom 3x a week, mop the kitchen and bathroom, keep their school binders in order, keep my own stuff in order, wash the car, sweep the porch, organize the closet and everything else that needs to be done. All of us live here so we all get up when something is amiss. Just a couple of days after New Years the boys had to get up at 2:17 am and help me pick up the living room because they weren't supposed to go to sleep before the house was clean. That hasn't happened again in 30 days and when they start yawning and getting in bed they'll ask one another: "Wait! Is X Y or Z done? Lets just check now. I don't want to see you at 2:17" This summer I am going to fix our rickety sink and give the boys 2 days a piece to wash the dishes. This will be their first individual chore and I think it will be a good transitional step for them. We clean the fridge 2x a month as family simply because I hate doing it as much as they do so the only fair way is for everyone to suffer together. I ditched all paper/plastic dishes and bought 3 complete sets of plastic eating ware. Everyone has a different color and must keep their dishes clean so if I see a red bowl or a green plate I know who to call.

I regret ever enrolling the boys in public school.

So...how does Singapore work? If you wanted to do the full Singapore program for a grade what are all of the components. Are there seriously a minimum of 4 books per grade and a maximum of 8 books per grade? Text book A Text book B Workbook A Workbook B Intensive Practice A Intensive Practice B Extra Practice Challenging Word Problems Does anyone use all of the Singapore math books for a grade? Has anyone used all of the books for a grade at some point?

In Your Opinion: What is the latest age/grade you could wait to start composition with your students? I found out today that I a friend of mine who teaches grade school feels that writing compositions shouldn't be taught until beginning 3rd grade for most students. It could be taught earlier for those who are interested or later (mid 3rd grade) who aren't really interested. She thinks that starting compositions later will not negatively impact their writing abilities in 6th grade. This friend thinks that gradual, systematic spelling (Gr. K-2), handwriting (Gr. K-2) and very basic punctuation and grammar (Gr. 1-2) is sufficient for the average student to prepare them for gradual, systematic writing AND will get them up to par by 6th grade. Does that sound right? What do you think?

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Whats asynchronous about that? I am a grown man and to this day I don't mind admitting that my first love was Ketchup. :D

No, I don't think so. Buddy doesn't curse and he didn't understand the rude gestures until his brother kindly explained them all to him in unnerving detail. It took a lot for me to refrain from shutting them down when they had to talk through what "Mother F#ck3r" meant. Buddy thought it was muddy F#ck3r. They looked up the f-word and determined it means to ruin so it must be someone who is so bad that they ruin their mother.

My just-turned 6 year old son can curse in 2 languages (3 if rude gestures count as sign language) but can't pronounce 'Please' correctly. :lol:

My kids are pretty young still. 6 and 7 now but I regret not teaching them Spanish organically. I was fluent in Spanish once upon a time and I'm taking it to fulfill my own college requirement so we are all going to work at it together. We're going to be really focusing on Spanish for these next 2 years and then re-evaluate from there.

I would try copying out his Saxon problems on a page for him and if that doesn't work then I would definitely recommend that you try out Math Mammoth. There are 100s of sample pages available on the website so before committing financially you can try some of them with your son and see how it goes. Just so you know, we are Math Groupies and my boys have a serious interest in math and enjoy doing it. That said, here is how we feel about MM: We use and love Math Mammoth at Gils Academy for Wayward Boys (still trying out unofficial school names!) I used to tutor math pretty successfully and have always wanted my kids to know and love mathematics. Well, we really, really lucked out with Math Mammoth--it was the first formal math curriculum that we tried and it clicked for my boys and they love doing it! My boys are younger than a lot of other kids doing elementary math so we have had to finagle a bit to iron out the logistics of writing and such. We used everything from dark coloring pencils and label makers to inkpens. At some point, I wisened up and got them individual dry erase boards. Now they are able to work out any trick problems on a white board and write just the basic steps or the solution in their work-texts. We make extensive use of our mini-whiteboards and dry erase pages to do Math Mammoth. If there is a short coming in Math mammoth, let me think....I don't like the fact that there isn't any long division with 3 digit divisors. It isn't an "essential" topic I guess since it is much the same as division with a 2 digit divisor, but still I'd have liked it if there was more long division practice. Also, there was a good bit of Stats in Grade 5 and for my boys they were a sticky point for us in a couple of places but we slowed down and took our time with those sections. I asked my sons what their advice would be and this is what each one of them said: Pal: Make sure you use a whiteboard and check it again before you write it down if you have a pen. Do Puzzle Corner first. Buddy: Read closely to understand, always do Puzzle Corner and if she says to stop and think about something then stop and think about it. That is the advice from our family.

Some more Italian stuff. Also look through your kids DVDs and see which ones have an Italian language track. See about purchasing some Italian media online. I regret not starting Spanish lessons earlier and more in-depth with the boys. We are starting up only now and while they have some background knowledge, I hate to just now be starting with them.

I've been thinking about this a lot. I have decided to make our core subjects for first and second grade: Reading --My boys are solid readers already so we just read, read, read. I'd like to be more organized so that we hit History, Geography and Science in our reading, but if they read all the kids fiction books the library has to offer, I'm just as cool with that for 1st and 2nd grade reading. Writing --maintaining book log, copying out a Quote of the Day 3x and writing any word they don't know from their reading. I'd like to try and do one composition a week. Math --Math Mammoth and Keys to Math Series. We supplement with Algebra Readiness Made Easy and Sunshine Math Spanish --We are just starting this. I am looking for a conversational Spanish course we can do as a family. I think I'm going with Learning Spanish Like Crazy. We will shift our core as we go up in grades but this way we can continue to make solid, measurable progress each year.

I'm :bigear: while I try and figure out 1st-2nd grade composition for my boys. They can write but I have no idea whether what they do is normal, behind or ahead. I almost never ask them to write compositions but I did last week just to figure out what their writing skills are like and I am no closer to knowing where they are at or where I should start than I am to understanding Swahili. Gil wouldn't know Swahili if it walked up and introduced itself...in Swahili.

It has been decided that we will begin learning Spanish this year because we can do it for virtually no cost. Once upon a time I spoke fairly fluent Spanish and since now I am taking Spanish 1 this spring at college (easiest A I'll ever make) I wouldn't have to do much extra stuff. For our homeschool we want conversational Spanish. Not "tourist Spanish" and not "school Spanish" and we need it to be PC-independent for now. Plus our library has a great selection of Spanish and English-Spanish kids books. For what its worth, the boys know the alphabet, numbers, colors, greetings, shapes, body parts and about ~200 random nouns. Because I am taking the class at college I have online homework & a textbook so we'll be working through that as a team. (ie the boys will be with me when I do the homework so we're covering formal, sequential grammar that way.) I'm taking Spanish 2 this summer and Spanish 3 in the fall so we'll be working through a standard text also. I would prefer something audio based. If you don't recommend Learning Spanish Like Crazy, what do you recommend? I have been on Amazon.com and our library website all morning and can't find anything that looks 'right'.

Final count by subject and grade? (Because you're never truly done organizing until you have a spreadsheet) ETA: How big is it? How many GB?

I looked at Teacher File Box and at Evan-Moor and to be honest, I can't figure it out. What would I do with the TFB site? Is there a teachers manual that would walk me through using all of those things? I have no idea how to go about using tens of thousands of vaguely grouped worksheets. I guess that personally I am hoping for more hands-on and guidance for me. I can teach math because there is a definite and concrete point at which the answer has been found and verified. I don't know how to do that with composition type stuff. The boys are capable but "meh" about writing. They don't love it and would probably get mad if I made them do a lot of it daily. I am hoping for something that helps us work on a small-to-medium amount of vocabulary, spelling, grammar and punctuation every day throughout the week and guides us to write 1 composition a week. Each year/level increasing the weekly quota until they are writing 1 a day for middle school. Does that exist?

I had to edit it because the 2nd picture was upside down. Sorry about that.

We are going to begin a slightly more formal writing program, but I have no idea what. Also, the boys have always done their "school" together and love working with one another so is there something that is appropriate for both of their current levels or, in your opinion, would each boy benefit more from different programs? I was never a very good writer and I don't profess to know much about grammar but I'd like to begin working on something that will get them writing decent compositions by next Spring. Here is a sample of both of their work that they wrote yesterday at my request. Pal is a good speller--in isolation. I have noticed that often, when he writes something he will misspell a lot of words that he should know or other wise does know how to spell. Also, I could use feedback about his handwriting legibility. (ie, can you tell what it says?) It took him 7min12sec to write this so *I*, knowing what he can do in the handwriting department, feel that it could/should have been neater. Pal is 6yo. The Writing Prompt: Write about how to do something that you like. (Pal chose business) Pals Composition: If you want a Shop then you need a loan problee Also you have to get utilitees and som mercshandise products and shelving. Register with the city and get to clean your building. Get a sign for the [drawing of a door] *Door *(I told him he needed to write, not draw so he added "Door".) My evaluation of Pal Random use of capital letters (i.e "Shop" "Door") His grammar is choppy--Only two periods. malformed sentence fragment "...and get to clean your building" Misspelled a few words. I don't think he could figure out the spelling for 'merchandise' Buddy is also a good speller usually and he has fewer issues with spelling + writing, however his grammar isn't that great, his letters "scrunch" in size and he struggles with writing a little more than Pal. It took him 11min3sec to do his writing prompt. The Writing Prompt: Write about how to do something that you like. (Buddy chose pets.) Buddys Composition: If you get a dog you are lucky. Super lucky because I can't have a dog all because my dad Gilroy said "No Pets Ever!" I would setle for a fish even but Not with my dad. No way. If I had a dog I name her Phaye or him Scoot er. My evaluation of Buddy Composition isn't very focused on topic. (He wrote about wanting a pet. Not how to do anything for or with a pet.) Weak sentences or sentence fragments (No way) Punctuation issues: No Pets Ever (3 capital letters in one sentence) Misspelled "settle" Based on where we are at, where do I need to start? I'm not great at LA type stuff but I didn't need a remedial class at it, so I think I probably write on a 7th-9th grade level in general. I do NOT produce collegiate level writing. Something with teacher guidance for me would be great. Also, I don't want it to be a time sink or costly. If it is a PDF/eBook that I can print at my convenience than that would be great. I looked at KISS grammar but couldn't figure it out...

I believe it is Understanding Geometry by Critical Thinking Company that the other guy was talking about.

My tactic is to keep my own vocabulary up and purposefully use words that are 'big' and 'uncommon' with the boys. I have been doing this since Pal was born because I read that kids with big vocabularies do better throughout school and enjoy reading more and I was trying to get Buddy hooked on books instead of deadhead baby shows like Teletubbies and stupid crap of that ilk... I do word of the day, read from the dictionary sometimes and make a show of looking up words that I don't know when I read. (I had a pretty lousy vocabulary when I started 5+ years ago, its gotten somewhat better since then). *I* keep a word book and have started the boys on keeping one also recently. A word book is simply a list of unfamiliar words you come across (in reading/tv/internet/conversations/etc...) and your best context guess. I look words up mostly on the internet now but I still use my collegiate dictionary from time to time. *I* write the real definitions when I find them, right now the boys just write their best context guess (most of the time anyway. Pal has been writing "I don't no/kno/now/knw" because apparently he can't remember more than 3 of the letters in that word at a time. :huh: ) We're going to be studying word roots/prefixes/suffixes alot this year using the web and when we're done I have several Test Prep books (GRE/SAT/ACT/FDLT/GED etc...) almost all of which include some great vocabulary sections. I look through their word books from time to time and try to incorporate their words into my speech through out the next few days and I encourage them to use their words also. Oh, and a heads up. Many words you can hear the pronunciation of just be searching "define: word" in Google.

If I recall correctly, Ma's philosophy boils down the teacher needing to understand and know what is going on.

How do you find the format of Discovering Math for a young child? I have 2 little guys Pal just turned 6 and Buddy will be 7 in a little while. They finished 5th grade with Math Mammoth and are plowing through the last of Keys to Measurement. We're polishing off the last of our grade 5 supplements and We're set to start MM6a on Feb 1.