Memberships to zoo, aquarium, science museum, children museum and art museum have been the best investment for my kids.

Free online "Japanese Lessons" by NHK World http://www3.nhk.or.jp/lesson/english/learn/list/index.html

I am using Primary Standards 1A and LOF Apples now. I'm saving IP 1A & 1B until we finish Primary 1B. We're reading a chapter of LOF a day or two and talking about it. It's going pretty well.

:iagree: I absolutely love my Kindle Paperwhite, too. I love that I can read books with it in the dark at night and it doesn't tire my eyes like my iPhone does. I love that I can borrow most new and popular novels from our local library system for free and read them right away only with a few mouse clicks. I love that many classics and educational e-books for kids are free on Amazon. Most of all, the built-in dictionary is invaluable and so convenient for a non-native speaker like me. I love that it is only for reading. Kids would not get distracted by other game apps or internet surfing with Paperwhite. The downside is that it is hard to see illustrations or pictures in the e-book clearly with Paperwhite.

Some of my FIAR books were backordered and two of them took over a month to get here. And one of them even took longer than... (I don't remember for sure... 2-3 months?) that I totally forgot about it until I saw it in the mail. Other times, delivery usually took about a week or so. I only order from RR if the items are not listed on Amazon Prime.

I got the light blue series. And then I saw 35% off on Pandia Press there so I also got RSO Life and HO Ancients. Today is my shopping spree day! :D

I should've read this thread before I bought 100EZ, lol. Mine is still brand new and I don't know what to do with it. I don't even want to sell or give it to anybody. :thumbdown: We also hated Explode the Code. Building Thinking Skills Primary and FIAR manual were expensive bummers. And I didn't really need to buy Singapore Earlybird Activity Books.

I meant early "structured" learning. Sorry if i was wrong. I haven't been on this forum for a long time. I just meant to say I don't discuss my son's academics with friends or family because I want to avoid any quick, judgmental reaction like "Let him be a kid!" I'm also glad I found this forum so that I can discuss these thing with other parents who understand.

This is what I do with 1A standards now. While moving ahead, I supplement it with various math apps, flash cards, fact drill worksheets and other math texts to reach memorization. Think I used 10 cheerios for number bonds.

Well, it may not be helpful but I'm not even a native speaker. I'd spent 90% of my life in my home country and everything I'd learn at school was in my native language. I knew nothing about phonics until I taught my DS. I basically have to learn everything all over again in English with my DC step by step, side by side. And I'm very excited about it. I was at the Science Museum with kids this mornig and thought to myself "It's like I'm reliving my childhood!" LOL As moms, we tend to underestimate ourselves. I'm sure you are a very good mom and superb teacher to your kids. :)

Oh, I agree with you. If our local library had all the LOF books, I would've not even bothered to buy them. My son loves it as we go through the chapters but LOF is not something he would read over and over again.

I saw this sale in late May. It was $136 for 10 LOF elementary books including free shipping. I'm kicking myself for not buying then. Instead, I recently bought the A-D set from RR at a higher price for each book. We started with Apples this week and my son fell in love from the first page.

My son is also 4 years old and I am in a similar boat with you. We followed his lead and started early at 3.5yo from tracing, 123s and ABCs. If we were not busy with moving overseas and he was not going through a speech delay and language transition from my native language to English, he could have probably picked up things even faster. Still, he was soon singing number songs and trying to spell words out on the writing board all the time. And then he begged me to teach him how to read so I bought HOP K and started a lesson. After 3 months, he is now almost done with HOP 2nd grade and starting to read fluently. We're also doing 1st grade math and handwriting. There is no lesson plan or schedule. We just do a little bit a day at his pace. I see that many parents are against early learning, even on this forum. I don't talk about what we are doing to anybody but my DH in real life. I have no desire to brag out or push my DS to be what he's not. What's most important to me is that this is what keeps him happy and satisfied, and he is getting so much out of it. He feels proud of himself and loves my full attention during my demanding 2yo's nap time. And I do not have the same kind of plan or expectation for my younger DD at all. I was gifted as a child but did not grow up in a happy home so I truly understand what matters most in childhood. Your plan sounds awesome to me and I strongly recommend you give it a try. Don't worry about labeling; just focus on your son. This forum has been a great place for me to learn about lots of wonderful resources to keep mine challenged. Good luck! :)

I totally agree with this. We loved the literature included in FIAR as read alouds but some of the books in the same level were too easy or too hard. Even B4FIAR was like that, too. There's definitely not much sequence. And the lesson plans in the teacher's manuals... well, I can't imagine those units as a whole curriculum at all. You'd definitely need to add a math curriculum at least. I'm using the manuals to find some fun ideas for book projects in our spare time.. but that's it. My kids would revolt if we read the same book for 5 days in a row.

I had had a lot of "me" time when my kids were a baby and a toddler because full day public & private childcare (day cares & preschools) for all 0 to 5 aged kids (whether mom is working or not) is free of charge in my home country. Babysitters are also partially subsidized by government, so it's very cheap to hire a help. This national childcare support system has been enacted in the recent years since the country's birth rate has fallen into the lowest in the world. Here, the "me" time happens only during the kids' nap time or after their bed time. Very little... can't even find time to go exercise or just sit down and read my books. Schools in this city are either ripping off or scaring us. This transition to a total lack of support system has been really painful and challenging for me. However, I have somehow gotten used to having my kids around me 24/7 and started to see the huge benefits of keeping them at home and consider homeschooling.

Have you looked at Rainbow Resource Center(rainbowresource.com)?

LOL, that is so me! Both of my parents are quite tall but I'm shorter than average... even at this age my mom is at least 3 inches taller than me that it has bugged me my whole life!

Oh, no one does this more openly than East Asians do... we are obsessed with brand names, Ivies and titles, lol. I'm just saying two smart parents don't always guarantee a smart kid. I'd seen many kids of low intelligence and maturity with very well-educated scholarly parents at my middle school that I became no longer envious of such background and started to look at it as an individual thing. Like I said, I think parental involvement does make a difference and there seem to be too many other variables besides genes that determine one's academic success.

I'm sure both of my parents' IQs were below 105. (Average IQ score of Koreans is 106 in 2014 btw. http://www.statisticbrain.com/countries-with-the-highest-lowest-average-iq/) I know many other irregular cases like mine. If otherwise, the very first question a person would ask his date would be "What's your IQ?" And the smart would only get smarter and the stupid would get stupider in this world. :)

:iagree: I've seen too many cases of this growing up. My middle school was located in a STEM town in my home country like Silicon Valley and in my class, about 80% of the parents of my classmates held a Ph.D. or two. Many of them were nationally-renowned scientists, professors and scholars. But their kids were... well, all different in terms of academic levels and IQ figures. Yes, the average standardized test results of my school were better than other middle schools' and there were a few exceptionally smart kids at my school, but I think it's more due to the fact that the parents at my school in general were more interested in their kid's academics and put more effort into providing a nurturing, academic-rich environment. And FWIW my official IQ was over 140 (I don't know what's the standard of giftedness in the U.S.) but the intelligence level of my both working class parents was below than average. So I'm not sure if intelligence is inherited; it seems more random. Meanwhile, I think acquired and environmental factors play a bigger role in academic achievement and future success than genetics does.

Oh, I thought we were only talking about school curriculum. In Korea, most picture books by famous authors such as Eric Carle, Anthony Browne, Maurice Sendak and simply too many to list (Yes, Winnie the Pooh, too.) that you see at a local library here are all translated and published. Many families with little kids have a number of world-renowned picture books in their home library. And for middle and high schoolers, most award-winning international classic literature are also available and being sold as a set of 60 books or so.

Oh, I'm so glad I found this thread! Thanks, Snickerdoodle. :) I'm a tiny (well, used to be tiny) Asian woman who had hardly exercised for all my life. I moved to the U.S. last summer and I've gained about 15 lbs. since then... just in a year! Probably because of different foods... I'm recently feeling tired all the time and not happy that I need to buy bigger-sized clothes... so today I decided to put an end to my laziness and get down to business! I hate running so I started at home with the workout videos I found on Amazon Prime streaming. I tried NMTZ of Jillian Michaels but it was too much for me so I moved on to her Yoga Meltdown video. Well, it was ok but still hurting my knees. Does Billy's Bootcamp or Bob Harper better for a novice than Michaels? I might just try Ballet Beautiful on Amazon tomorrow...

It is not to show to others; writing down the math work in a clear and organized way is a very useful skill which can be especially beneficial from middle school mathematics when the problems become more complicated and drawing graphs and geometric figures are needed. In elementary years, it may not be so necessary though. Please take the pics I posted with a grain of salt.. they are written by Korean students and in general, Asian students' handwriting is insanely neat. ETA: Guess solving math problems by writing it out was important to us because we were not allowed to use a calculator in any K-12 setting, even in high school advanced calculus exams.

I would suggest you go with the one you 1) have a background in or at least basic knowledge with, 2) are willing to self-teach and speak with him as he learns the language, and 3) both have interest in its culture so that you can continue to practice and improve the language throughout your life. IMO foreign language is like math in many ways... it's built on what you learned before and you lose it quickly once you stop using it. Therefore, Spanish.

I don't wish for more contents in SM TB... just wish it were cheaper. ;) Think TB and WB could be combined into one book for the cost of TB alone. Maybe I shouldn't judge its price only with grade 1 TBs... IMO books in general are comparatively more expensive in the U.S. anyway.