I thought about taking this summer to work through Delta for my rising 4th grader and Beta for my rising 2nd grader... Even if they only got halfway I think it would lay a nice foundation for the next year?

Bumping to see if anyone has any ideas...

What math facts would you say would prepare a child for the math games? Just what they learned in Foundations or all the Times Tables, addition and subtraction facts and...?

We used MUS for the 1st-3rd grade for oldest- Alpha, Beta, Gamma- before switching to CLE to fill in some gaps that I felt MUS had. We love CLE but I also love the conceptual way that Demme teaches place value, etc. I would like to continue using CLE for 4th grade but also 'supplement' with Delta... Anyone have experience doing this? We don't have time for 2 full math programs...

Great ideas! We live in a small town so no Williams Sonoma. We do have Lowe's and Home Depot and they do those monthly build projects.

Oh #3 is a GENIUS idea. We can cook summer meals and get the freezer stocked for fall!! Thank you!

Yes and I remind myself that a year later with a toddler isn't necessarily gonna be any easier! Better to be home and all learn together as we go :)

We are expecting a new baby in June. I would like to let my husband take over some schooling responsibilities this summer and fall. He works very long hours during the week and I don't want his weekends to be 'cracking the whip' on our normal curriculum. Other than readalouds, what are some ways husbands can help with school? Science projects, cooking, field trips, etc are all ideas I have but I'm looking for some specifics... He tends to need pretty clear instructions :) One idea I had was for him to work through Science Chef with the kids on Saturday mornings. But getting them out of the house would be a bonus :)

I'm interested to hear how you will wrap up 1st grade, what your summer plans are and what you are planning for 2nd grade in 2016/2017... I'll go first: Spring 2016 (1st grade)- Finish CLE Math 100 Continue AAR 2 and ETC series Getty Dubay Italic Handwriting Finish SOTW Vol 1 Continue Sonlight LA1 copywork Classical Conversations Cycle 1 Finish TheOlogy Read, read, read Summer 2016 Lots of reading Lots of outside time Art Camp Horse Camp Math and Geography games 2016/2017 CLE Math 200 AAR 2/3 AAS 1 Getty Dubay Intro to Cursive Queen's Language Lessons? SOTW Vol 2 Classical Conversations Foundations Interest-led Science Books, books, books Start some sort of Character Education / Virtues Study (Integrity Time or Our 24 Family Ways) Art, soccer, gymnastics, horseback riding, piano (not all at the same time)

I'm interested to hear how you will wrap up 3rd grade, what your summer plans are and what you are planning for 4th grade in 2016/2017... I'll go first: Spring 2016 (3rd grade)- Finish Abeka LA3 Continue Sonlight LA3 Copywork and Composition Exercises Continue Phonetic Zoo (with some tweaking) Finish CLE Math 300 Finish SOTW Vol 1 Classical Conversations Cycle 1 Start some sort of Character Education / Virtues Study (Integrity Time or Our 24 Family Ways) Read, read, read Summer 2016 Lots of reading Lots of outside time Lots of helping with the new baby Art Camp Soccer Camp Math and Geography games **I'd like to find something for my husband to do with the kids on the weekends... possibly kitchen science or geocaching 2016/2017 CLE Math 400 Phonetic Zoo SOTW Vol 2 Classical Conversations Foundations Classical Conversations Essentials?? Interest-led Science Integrity Time or Our 24 Family Ways Books, books, books Art, soccer, gymnastics, horseback riding, piano and Scouts (not all at the same time)

Tell me more about Science Chef! is it just the book I see on Amazon? My husband is a retired chef and would LOVE doing this with the kids

I'm interested to hear how you will wrap up 3rd grade, what your summer plans are and what you are planning for 4th grade in 2016/2017... I'll go first: Spring 2016 (3rd grade)- Finish Abeka LA3 Continue Sonlight LA3 Copywork and Composition Exercises Continue Phonetic Zoo (with some tweaking) Finish CLE Math 300 Finish SOTW Vol 1 Classical Conversations Cycle 1 Start some sort of Character Education / Virtues Study Read, read, read Summer 2016 Lots of reading Lots of outside time Art Camp Soccer Camp Math and Geography games 2016/2017 CLE Math 400 Phonetic Zoo SOTW Vol 2 Classical Conversations Foundations Classical Conversations Essentials?? Interest-led Science Books, books, books Art, soccer, gymnastics, horseback riding, piano and Scouts (not all at the same time)

We have recently switched from AAS to Phonetic Zoo. I am so glad to be rid of AAS (even though it works great, it was always a chore to get done). I love that my son can do it independently but I have discovered if I just 'let him go', he will do lesson after lesson without much retention. This week I slowed him down and added a dictation exercise led by me. Just wondering how others use Phonetic Zoo, what does a normal week of it look like in your school?

What age or skill level would you start Level 1 of LTW?

Still making decisions but right now looking like... DS, 4th grade: CLE Math 400 Phonetic Zoo SOTW Vol 2 Classical Conversations Foundations Classical Conversations Essentials?? Interest-led Science Books, books, books Art, soccer, gymnastics, horseback riding, piano and Scouts (not all at the same time) DD, 2nd grade: AAR 2/3 AAS 1/2 Queen's Language Lessons Getty Dubay Intro to Cursive SOTW Vol 2 Classical Conversations Foundations Books, books, books Art, gymnastics, soccer, horseback riding, theater and piano (not all at the same time) We are also going to focus on character building and home/life skills. We will have a new baby and it is a good time for the big kids to take on some responsibility. For Bible, we mostly read aloud from one of our Bibles or devotionals and discuss.

Ugh I'm really not any closer to a decision. We are in CC and trying to decide if we want to do Essentials next year, or a different LA program at home. I know I would like to at least try Essentials but will have a newborn and 2nd grader as well and Essentials seems so time consuming. But maybe the accountability will force us to get it done? Idk... Thanks for all the feedback!

We like ETC but we use it alongside AAR. Not sure how it would work as a stand alone. But CLE seems like a lot of work and I think my 1st grader would burn out… We use CLE for Math and really like the user-friendly format but it is a lot of busy work so I cross out about half the problems every day. You may be able to do the same with their LA? Edited to add: somebody posted recently about a BJU Phonics review workbook that looked great for a child that was reading well?

This was very helpful, thank you. I do not know yet who our tutor will be but I do know it will be a 1st year tutor (at least first year tutoring Essentials) because the current Essentials tutor is leaving. I do feel that the group aspect will be a great motivator for my son! He is very social and loves to share his ideas with others, and he absolutely thrives on verbal encouragement and affirmation.

I am also wondering about the possibility of just participating in the IEW portion. We would of course be in class for all of the instruction but I might only require IEW work at home… I have heard really good things about this program and I like the idea of a the SWI DVDs when I am unable to do something teacher intensive...

I am really struggling with making a decision regarding CC Essentials for next year for my rising 4th grader. I keep hearing great things about it from other CCers but I'm just not sold on the program. It seems like a LOT of time and work- it needs to be really effective for me and my DS9 to put that much effort into it. I understand that there are really 3 parts to the program- 1) Essentials of the English Language (grammar); 2) IEW (composition); and 3) Math games and drills. I'm not concerned about the math portion as really I just see that as an extra bonus. But I'd like to hear honest opinions about the EEL and IEW portions of the program. I will add that I grew up a natural writer and never saw much merit in sentence diagramming, charting, etc. I am not sold on that method of instruction but I am not wholly opposed to it either. My goals for my students' language education is to produce writers who can effectively communicate in both written and spoken language, in multiple writing formats and with the ability to perform well in high school and college level classes. I would also like them to enjoy writing. My application leans toward more organic formats- Charlotte Mason really but I worry about retention with purely CM methods. Help! :)

I should add that I have several CC friends who do CC along with very rigorous curricula- Sonlight, Abeka and Veritas Press. I don't think that MFW at those ages would be too much. And if it is, you can always cut back to focus on reading and math and stretch out the other MFW work.

I think it is doable depending on how you approach it. We do CC with other curriculum. We have combined it with Sonlight in the past but that proved to be too much. Right now, we enjoy CC for the memory work, community and brief exposure to science experiments and fine arts. We listen to the memory week CDs through the week but that is it. The rest of our days are filled with our other studies (which are pretty eclectic).

I am not sure exactly how to implement the above with non and semi-independent writers. For example, this morning we are doing a journal entry entitled, "This morning I woke up to two feet of snow outside my house!" (we live in mississippi so this is fun to pretend :). My 3rd grader will write out his entry on his own and then we will edit together, look up spelling words ,etc and he will write a final product later. My 1st grader will dictate to me what she wants to write and then copy it later. My question is, how much do I correct their work? How much do I help the 1st grader form sentences, start new sentences, etc as she's dictating? I cannot find anything that tells me EXACTLY how this exercise should be done :)

Well I can't speak for everyone but when I say grammar- at this age- I mean punctuation, capitalization, basic sentence structure, learning about nouns, verbs, etc.

I started looking at Language Lessons tonight- specifically LL for the Very Young Vol 1 for my rising 2nd grader and LL for the Elementary Child Vol 1 for my rising 4th grader. I like the looks of it but am looking for others' reviews of the program… Is it relatively independent? User friendly? Effective? Any gaps, other than phonics and spelling?