Well, I was resisting for a long time...... All of these thoughts expressed here have been sorted out before in very logical fashion by previous great thinkers and they are available for us to learn from. The book that most affected my spiritual thinking (converting from agnostic/atheist and one who tended more toward eastern religions) was C.S. Lewis 'Mere Christianity' This is a very DEEP investigation of why God exists and why Lewis himself came to accept Christianity. Another great book examining religions is: Dean C. Halverson 'The Compact Guide to World Religions' This book is excellent for catagorizing religions according to World View, ie, montheism, competing dualism, polytheism, balancing dualism, monism and atheism. Once one understands the underlying world view, then that world view can be examined for rationality. I do think we all need to understand in a logical sense what we believe and make sure it has validity. All of our actions are based on what we believe to be true, and this affects others in the world. Hitler most certainly believed he was a helper of mankind! Penny

Julie and Julie, Thank you! I am very excited about finally beginning this. I wish we could do a seminar with Marcia but I don't have a group big enough interested. But then again, maybe with the World View it will be nice to have more time with my kids alone to explain why we believe what we do. Since you mentioned it, maybe I'll look into getting the novels also. (I bought the entire Tool Kit which does not include the novels. I also bought the timeline and I'm hoping this is our answer to finally doing a continuous timeline. I don't have wall space for one, so the scroll idea may work for us. Just keeping a timeline in a notebook is nice, but I don't feel like the kids are understanding how things integrate.) Thanks and Blessings! Penny

Hi Beth, I searched the forums and noticed that your children either are currently or have done the Brimwood Press seminar. I am just about to begin going through the entire 'Tools for Young Historians' with mine. It looks like it is going to be FANTASTIC. How did you like it? Thanks!! Penny

Two of my kids are in R&S 5 and I can tell you that they STILL do speed drills with multiplication, addition, division, and subtraction. So, don't expect perfection just yet. Also, my 3rd grader just memorized her upper times tables (6-9) in less than 2 days using 'Times Tales'. It is a goofy but wonderful resource that works. Blessings, Penny

WOW!!! Thanks so much for posting this. :001_smile::001_smile::001_smile::001_smile:

Thank you. Is there no way to pre-order? Penny

Will Tapestry redesign year 4, digital or no? I am hoping to pick this up to begin next year but the production calendar has evidently been removed. Thanks, Penny

I would so love to do Otter's! We just can't find the time. http://www.ourlosbanos.com/homeschool/science_human_body_books.html Blessings, Penny

I taught my children to add and subtract from left to right. It is MUCH easier to do mental math that way. In fact, for larger numbers it is virtually impossible to do it mentally from right to left. It also encourages getting realistic numbers for the answer (ie estimating). Subtracting is no problem. You must just borrow from the higher number after you subtract it. Also, we multiply the same way, and this very much encourages estimation of a realistic number. Long division is performed by everyone from left to right. My kids are in 5th and have NO problems understanding the base 10 system and what they are doing. Blessings, Penny

In Search of Honor was too gory for my 11 year old. Be sure you pre-read this before you read it to your child. Penny

Wow!! I came to the right place with the questions. Thank you so very much, all of you!! :D Penny

I'm looking on Amazon for a recorder and I have the following questions: Should I get baroque fingering? All the Yamaha ones seem to have this. However one review suggested it was too difficult for children to master this. Also that the german fingering was better prep for a band instrument. What do you think? Which fingering do the books teach? When I look inside various books, I can't find which fingering they use. Do you have a recommendation for a good recorder to purchase? Thank you very much. Penny

What are you currently using? It sounds good to me! I'd like to look at it. Penny

I don't have exp with Lively Latin but unless you have a 3rd grade language genius, I wouldn't recommend Latin Prep. Even if you make it reasonably through book 1, it just gets harder. Then you'll have a 4th grader in book 2 and still be chanting all the info from book 1 to remember it, while learning book 2. I think the kids will just be getting too far ahead with too much time on Latin. My fourth graders (now 5th graders) made it through book 1 last year by spending about an hour a day on Latin for 12 months. Now I have them enrolled in an outside Latin Class. They are WAY ahead of the Cambridge Latin class they are enrolled in. I had to enroll them in a class because I realized that if they were to continue in Latin, I would not be able to keep up with them. Sorry for this incoherent post, (it's early) but just a thought. Your child may be much brighter than mine are as far a language is concerned, but it is still true that Latin Prep is advanced. Penny

SUPER COOL!!!! Thanks!!! Penny

Correct. Let me get my notes together. They are hand written. I will also get the book list. Please give me some time....I usually work very early in the morning when my kids are still asleep. I suggest you call or e-mail Marcia. She is very accessible. She will give you ideas of the books she likes, and will send you the Conversations from the Garden I mentioned. Blessings, Penny

I have the Brimwood Press Tools for Young Explorers, the entire set. I am so looking forward to going through this with my kids. I am an avid Christ follower who believes in the Bible as God's written word. Now, that said, Brimwood Press's World View curriculum made me think. It does not give all the answers. It explained other world views and I became very challenged (and quite a bit fearful). How can I discount the other views? Why is the Christian world view correct? Can others be correct at the same time? Brimwood Press does not tell you what to think, it does challenge you TO think. The answers are not simple! The answers cannot be simply placed in a teacher's manual to be contritely presented to the child. For example, I don't think the author could present her reasons for a Christian world view better than C. S. Lewis. You just have to go to the source. With my insecurities I called Marcia, the author. She suggested many books (for me to read) to help me in my search. She sent and offered many ideas and books to use to present the material to my children (one book is 'Yellow and Pink'). She is an amazing resource and went beyond what I expected in helping me. After my call she wrote a beautiful study entitled 'Conversations from the Garden, 40 days to Build a Biblical World View' in which Gen 1-3 is studied as a foundation to a Christian world view. The study is meant to be done with teenagers, or possibly tweens. It is a Bible study but really contains mostly questions. Marcia wants folks to think for themselves. It is the only way to truly learn. (Note that she sent me this wonderful booklet free of charge, simply as a service to a mom who was digging in and a little bit afraid of challenging the foundations!) However, the bottom line is I had to invest hours reading books and taking notes on books such as Mere Christianity (for possibly the third time). I also have another book comparing world religions that was extremely helpful. I can't off the top of my head remember what other books I used, but there were many places to research. In the end I came out much more confident of my faith, and much more able to speak of this to my children. However, the topic is so deep that I will have to regularly pull out my notes and review as I teach. This material has to be absorbed, reabsorbed, and regurgitated many times before it sinks in. So, if you find a quick and easy way to present World View to your children, watch out for the years as they grow older and their questions deepen. I decided I may as well prepare now, and I have grown in the process. Bottom line is that Brimwood Press encourages the parent to think it out. If everyone really dug into their world view in a logical way, then Christ really would be glorified. After much research, the Christian world view is the only one that makes sense. If Marcia presented this curriculum as only Christian, then that would turn off others and therefore they would not be challenged to investigate their world view. I hope this helps. Brimwood Press is a fantastic find, not only for the world view, but for all the other historian tools. Blessings, Penny PS If you are interested in what I studied and my notes, I'll share.

I know you didn't ask for this and I really don't want to reply but I feel obligated after having so many of the same problems and trying MUS, Saxon, Singapore, Rod and Staff and Right Start. To really show the base 10 system you will need Right Start. The abacus shows wonderfully how when we count (or skip count, or count backwards, or count over 100, etc) we get another 10. The RS way of counting teaches this also. It seems to me that your child has memorized counting the way one memorizes the ABC's. This makes it very difficult to figure out what comes next, whether forward, backward, or skipping. RS shows the base 10 system beautifully, ie how 10 tens makes 100, 10 hundreds makes 1000, 10 thousands makes 10,000 etc. The games reinforce skip counting and clock wonderfully. One of the games is to make a clock and simply put numbers around it in turns. For example, near the 9 on the clock the child would put 45. What a great idea! For the skip counting game the child memorizes the ending to the even/odds or whatever pattern as the game is played. Of course there are many skip counting games and many clock games. These are just two of the ones we played consistantly. Also, at my house we eliminated all digital clocks. The clock on the oven I would offer as earning potential. If a child set it to the correct time (by reading the analog clock) then the child would earn a nickel. So, RS is a good fit. It worked wonders at our house for the K and 1st grades only. After that, the program did not fit us anymore and now my fifth graders use Rod and Staff and my third grader uses horizons (but I have intentionally slowed her down.(Not her fault.) I think Horizons is too advanced for the age. She is in the second grade book. I don't believe second graders should learn multiplication unless they are natural geniuses.) Penny

I'm pleased to have been able to help! Blessings! Penny

Jenny, The insulation is OK. To make an electromagnet, you can just wrap the wire around a nail. I just got out my book and it recommends three layers of wrapping. So, wrap around your nail from close to the top to the bottom three times with no space inbetween. Then hook up to the battery (obviously no insulation between wire and battery connection) and start picking up paper clips, etc. You've just made a magnetic crane. To make the solenoid, wrap three layers around a short straw from top to bottom. The needle is attracted to the center. Penny

We wrapped a wire around a straw. Put on plenty of turns. A needle will be pulled into the straw very gently if your battery is small. We used a 12 volt battery (I believe? Maybe 9V) and made a solenoid to raise and lower a railroad crossing gate for our toy train. We used a nail to be attracted into the coil. The gate was attached to the nail so as the nail went up, so did the gate. This is how solenoids work. Solenoids are critical to all industries. From my Engineering days, I remember 'fail safe' valves. The solenoid was designed to always have a current during normal operation. When power failure occured, the solenoid attached to the valve (the electromagnet) would stop, thereby leaving the valve either in the open or closed position (whichever was decided upon for safety reasons). No power, no electromagnet, valve left on its own to fail in the appropriate position. It is early. Hope this helps. Solenoids always work if done properly. Penny

Would you please comment on which concepts she is not getting? Some concepts are somewhat optional at her age, and some would be greatly beneficial if she mastered now. I remember doing RS with my Ker and going over and over counting backwards and showing on the abacus the base 10 system. I didn't give up until she got it. All concepts related to learning the base 10 system I stuck with no matter how long it took. The problem with some other programs is that one will never know if their child understands the base 10 system or not. If the child does not, she faces problems throughout math for all time until she gets it. I believe that it can be understood early to avoid such problems, and RS is the absolute best program to teach it. That said, some concepts (like multiple ways to subtract) were not necessary at the young age at which they were presented. My son needed only ONE way to subtract until he could master it. All those different strategies scrambled his brain. Blessings, Penny

To make an electromagnet you need a coil of wire. What exactly are you doing? Possibly we can figure this out. Blessings, Penny

I needed this. Thanks! Penny

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