Thank you.

Is this available new somewhere? I'm seeing various versions and I'm not sure what's current.

I will look at it. Thank you.

This is for an average student who neither hates, nor loves math, but he does well. Basics. AoPS seems overkill for us. He's done Singapore Primary Mathematics since Kindergarten. He likes short lessons and short explanations. I like uncluttered pages. I did Saxon with older students, and although it covers everything very thoroughly, it was just way too long. Any suggestions? Nothing too different. Just basic and secular. Thanks.

Thank you for this. I've never looked at Fix It Grammar; I'll have to check it out. We've used Rod and Staff, Easy Grammar, Evan Moor, and Grammarland (which I'm just reading to them). I was using Writing With Ease, but after starting Barton I put it on the shelf until after Level 4. I have an opportunity to attend a workshop for writing which uses the Institute For Excellence in Writing's writing intensives, so it's good to know that will be worthwhile. I had started to use Evan Moor Daily 6 Trait Writing, but again, I'm waiting to finish Level 4. I liked how short those were, and very step by step. Right now I'm reading every subject aloud to them. I'm trying very hard to follow her advice to not require any reading. I think that is helping. I love Barton too. I should have done it a lot sooner, but occasionally we would see some progress, so I'd get some false hope. But better late than never I guess.

I'm using Barton for 2 children who are now 12 and 11. They are both currently in Level 3 and are almost finished with it, so the extent of the language arts so far has been making sure to start a sentence with a capital and end with punctuation, and also marking Who, Did What, and Where phrases. On Susan Barton's website it says that Barton is a complete language arts program, except for writing, which I assume to mean grammar. Has anyone completed enough levels to verify this? It would be great to use just one program for reading, spelling, and grammar. They've had some grammar exposure, so they aren't completely in the dark. BTW, I love the program. And I watch all the training videos. From what I read I thought they'd be boring, but I really get a lot out of them. But watching for just the upcoming lesson is much easier.

My son gets it and we plan to continue, but if you don't have someone who knows electronics or the basics of programming helping the child I don't think they would learn it from the kits. My husband does it with our son, so he fills in the gaps. It is fun to put together and see it work, but you really don't know the why.

I found this: https://www.creationcrate.com/ We've subscribed, but haven't received our first kit yet. We should be getting it this month. It's a subscription that teaches electronics using a project each month.

I pay my kids. $1 per school day for no complaining or grumbling. It helps a lot. When they've earned enough, they can buy whatever they want. If $1 is too much, then quarters add up pretty quick to satisfy most kids.

https://www.amazon.com/Ultimate-Book-Inspiring-Quotes-Kids/dp/1512330132/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1500343953&sr=8-1&keywords=the+ultimate+book+of+inspiring+quotes+for+kids We use this one: The Ultimate Book of Inspiring Quotes for Kids.

Thank you for the replies. Every other week, or the textbook sound like good options. I need to look at just the textbook. I like the skills taught, but I didn't want to do it 4 days a week, every single week. We were going to add 6 trait writing too, and I didn't want to overwhelm him with too much.

For anyone who has used Writing With Ease 1 or 2, I was wondering if the lessons get harder as the weeks go on? Or is it about the same difficulty from week 1 to week 36. I would like to use this with my son, but not the whole book. Maybe half one year, then move the the next level the following year. But if the lessons get more difficult each week I'm not sure that I could use it this way.

Flashcards of frequent words helped my son, but he still reads very slow. A reading specialist I am consulting with has suggesting reading and rereading the same things over and over. He says it helps to build speed. They anticipate and then recognize what is coming next, and they get used to common words combinations within sentences.

I hope everyone out there realizes that some of these badly behaving children might actually have developmental disabilities and are much harder to parent and control in public. The parents choose to take them because the child really needs to learn how to interact in a group setting, or because the parent actually thought they could handle it that one time. I would hate to think that all parents would have to disclose a child's private disability to garner a little understanding from parents who seem to have it under control because their own children are typically developing and respond to typical parenting techniques. That said, if a parent really isn't even trying to parent then yeah, stay home with your kid.

I like Easy Grammar, so far, for my boys. Crossing out the prepositional phrases really simplifies the sentences. It's also a pretty quick lesson.

I've skimmed some of the other responses, so you've seen this already, but honestly just have them do even or odd. It's less overwhelming. They will get enough review of the material as you go through year after year of Saxon that they really will not miss anything.

Daniel Tiger is the new Mr. Rogers. My 4 year old loves it. He also really likes Kipper. No obvious lessons, but very gentle and entertaining.

I didn't read all the responses, so forgive me if I repeat something. I hesitated to read poetry to my boys but I did anyway and here are a few benefits I found: analogies- poetry is huge with analogies, and homo- words (nyms, phones, and such) which benefits... vocabulary- they come across vocabulary they wouldn't otherwise come across repetition- because most children's poems are so short it's easy to memorize, and so they hear that vocabulary over and over again which helps with retention variety of subject- again, because of the short poems you can introduce short subjects, or moods, or ideas, without much time investment, unless you want to And they are really liking the silly ones. Those are a lot of fun for younger boys.

He could sound out words, but it just wasn't becoming automatic for him, so I didn't think a new program was really necessary, just extra practice seeing the words. So I gave flashcards a try, and it really clicked. I just wanted to share in case someone else's struggling reader was having a similar issue with needing extra practice. It was also more economical for us to go that route.

I wanted to let others know what worked for my 9 year old. I tried several different approaches and he was learning the phonics for the most part, but was continuing to sound out every single word even after reading them dozens of times over and over again in beginner books. We were running out of beginning readers and he was getting frustrated and discouraged reading books obviously meant for young readers. So I got sight word flash cards. He could slowly sound out most of them, but I wanted him to read them without having to sound them out. He has worked really hard and can now read all the words in the first 2 box sets. Yay for him! Anyway, I wanted to share this because it helped him. He knew his phonics, he could spell phonetically and do a great job with that, but recognizing the word automatically during reading was just not happening. He needed to read those words several times per day and beginning readers just didn't give him enough repetition. Who knew, flash cards worked.

I did. My older two were very literature based, Charlotte Mason style, and me reading way too much to them (Sonlight). My younger ones are workbooks mostly with me reading to them a reasonable amount. It's easier for me at this point, and it gets done. We're also concentrating more on skills subjects than content subjects. Something I think I overlooked while trying to concentrate on so much history.

I'm done. So are my boys. They'd be done a week into the school each year though, so they don't count. We have a week left then we go on vacation. There are a few subjects that didn't get finished, one being math, so we'll be doing some summer school, but it's nowhere near a full schedule.

I used to spend a lot of time looking at curriculum, but hardly any now. We've homeschooled a long time so I know the main ones. I have some favorites that I'll always use too, so I'm not really interested in changing or in even thinking about it. I keep my eyes open for when they are older, but that's about it. I'm probably set for the next 2 grade levels. We also went from Christian based to completely secular, so it narrows things down quite a bit.

A book that I read and really found helpful was Why I Became an Atheist by John W. Loftus. While it deals specifically with the Christian religion and Bible I think some of his points can be extrapolated and applied to a variety of theistic beliefs. I am not an intellectual or really deep thinker, so the more academic authors are really over my head. This book wasn't too hard.

I'm using Phonics Pathways, the reading program, as a spelling program too. I dictate the words and when the sentences come up I dictate those too. But I have them sounding each letter or letters as they write it, so they are aware of the sounds that are associated with what they write. Phonics Pathways covers phonics rules that can be spelling patterns too. So far it's working. Things can get complicated, like the long e sound being spelled with ee and ea. But I listed the homophones that are in the book that use those spellings and we covered them with sentences for a while until he could spell the right word just by hearing it's use in a sentence. This was an easy way for me to cover spelling without adding another purchase that may or may not be needed.