I just started looking through Grammar Town (we skipped island level--my kids are 10 and 12) and I was surprised to see in the first few pages two sets of things to memorize. A list of prefixes that seem to be a mishmash (i.e. they're not the most common ones, nor are they ones that kids would be most familiar with.) And then on the first pages, he wants them to memorize the list of d.o. and i.o. pronouns. Is that really necessary for native English speakers who have grown up in houses where correct grammar is used? Memorizing these things would be highly annoying to my kids, and burdensome to me, but MCT stresses their importance. Those who have been through Town, is it necessary to have these things memorized as one moves through Town? Will I regret it if I skip this, or make a half-hearted attempt? More importantly will there be a lot more memorizing of these types of things? I don't mean poetry and so forth, but lists of information? And I get that there are many among us who are big fans of the benefits of this type of memorization, but I was under the impression that MCT was not that type of program.

Just ordered this for my daugther...will be arriving tomorrow and we'll start on week 1. Do you read the chapter first and then do the activities?

Thank you for all of the suggestions! I have found some resources I didn't know about before that I think will really help, and I feel more optimistic in general about our plight. Unfortunately, I posted this question during a time when I have a little bit of extra money for school expenses and have already made some impulse buys <_< I ended up getting Singapore 3A and I'll see how she does with that. I have never liked Singapore when I looked at it before because it had too much explicit teaching for my taste, but maybe it will work for her. Is the teacher guide necessary for the Liping Ma? I got the student book off Amazon for $4 but have not got the teacher guide yet. Thanks, that's helpful, and so it that thread! Would you say CLE works on deepening understanding or is it more for getting caught up in the 'how to do math' area (she needs both, but just wondering.) I thought BA and LOF would have been great, but she hates them both. Granted, she 'hates' almost everything she is told to do at first, but she seems to be stubbornly insisting that she really does hate them, as opposed to when she says she hates something and then decides she loves it. I just picked up CWP (2nd grade) and I'll look into Zacarro. Just looked in to these. Now I'm thinking I need Key to....and Zacarro for my 6th grader who is getting ready to start AoPS Pre-Alg, if not my daughter too! Anyone know where to buy Key to.... ? I was finding a lot of dead links online. Is it out of print? Did you use first or second edition? I have RS A (first addition) and might consider using C with her if I could get a used copy, but got confused when reading old posts about the differences between 1st and 2nd.

I paid for various programs when my kids were younger but eventually they learned with BBC/dance mat typing, and then added in free online games for practice.

Personally I would hold off on duolingo. It doesn't teach language the way young children learn...it teaches it the way older children/adults learn. 7 year olds would benefit more from games, songs, using it in every day life, flash cards, etc, IMO. Duolingo is serving as a good reinforcement for my kids now that they are 10 and 12, but I didn't use it with them at 7.

You can look up Total Physical Response (TPR). It could be a fun add-in to the day. Just a few minutes of activities, and kids pick up on phrases and vocab very quickly. There is lots of info online, either in specific languages like Spanish or ESL, and there is even a TPR Latin book. I think its called I Speak Latin.

Yeah, no kidding. It looks like it can be gotten for pennies on Amazon. We are lucky to have gotten TT from a friend, but I'm thinking I'll get the Liping Ma books (at least the 4th grade one) and see. It also looks like each grade is just 12 weeks of instruction or so?

We will definitely slow down when it gets harder. Did your daughter need more help outside of TT or were the lessons/practice enough to 'get it?' Its one of the first programs I've used that she only complains minimally about ;) She has done I think 4 out of the 6 Miquon books, and didn't mind them too much either. Maybe I should have her finish that up. And I have the RS games still shrink wrapped, somewhere in this house! I will try to find those and finally get over my mental block to actually learn how to use them. ​TY for the encouragement! I think you're right. It is probably better to tackle this now rather than later. I think I was just enjoying the relative calm that came with the computer teaching her math for a while :)

I didn't know Liping Ma authored a program, but that looks like it might be exactly what I need! I will look into Singapore too. I'm never very good at accelerating programs because I'm always scared I'm skipping things, and then I get bogged down. But maybe the programs I've tried just haven't been as easy to accelerate.

This may be an impossible request, but I'm hoping someone can help me! I have a 10 yo daughter who, for a variety of reasons which I will not get in to here, has had an inconsistent and inadequate education in math. So this year and next I really want to get her to the point where I feel that she has a good conceptual foundation in elementary math, before moving on to pre-alg, etc. This year what we are doing so far is: Teaching Textbooks, 4 + 5. We are doing these because they are painless so far, she will do them without complaint, and it seems like an easy way to make sure that she can at least do all the basic kinds of problems and fill in any gaps. She's started on 4 and is doing two per day. I should probably up it to 3 because they're very easy for her so far. I want to get through 5 by the end of the year. Dreambox. At first she complained bitterly about this, but now she is starting to get into it I think. I'm hoping this will supplement the TT with some more conceptual problem solving strategies. She finds it difficult but I think it's helping her. Xtramath for facts and prodigy for fun/practice. So after we get through TT 5, does anyone have any advice for how to build the conceptual skills of an older student? I will basically have one year. (To give you an example of her weakness, if we are subtracting three digit numbers, she might do it and get the right answer, but will not be able to talk about different ways to solve the problem. She doesn't seem to have a very deep number sense, and is not really able to talk about manipulating numbers.) I'm stuck on what to do because to use the programs that I feel are strong in this area I would have to start her way behind her grade level, and then we'd never catch up. Ideally there'd be a program out there that was for older/remedial students that aimed to deepen their understanding of arithmetic. Anyone?

What great timing, thank you!!

Thanks for the rec. What age ranges would you say ? ETA: also is there a way for multiple kids to play from the same app?

I was a catechist for a while and we used Faith and Life. I really liked the teachers guide, with the lessons and discussion questions, but I did not care for the student books. It was lots of fill in the blank, word search, and other activities that weren't very engaging. The readings were long but we did them as read alouds.

It looks like we'll be closing September 1st so anyone interested should PM me or join the FB page for instructions on how to join the buy ASAP :)

i had no idea! thank you!

I'd buy all the Beast Academy books just to have around for the kids to look through. Also all of Beautiful Feet levels. And I'd pay for frequent skype language lessons.

I'm not familiar with this program, Math in Focus Singapore Math but it looks like it is available in Spanish as well.

Yes, we loved MEP! We used it in Spanish for a few years, can't remember which ones.

I'm skipping to the end, but OP I think you hit the nail on the head in the middle of this thread. If it were me I wouldn't do any literature analysis at all and just try to find things he enjoyed reading. If you can manage to build a love for books that will serve him better in the long run. Reading aloud is also a great option and something that should probably never stop even with older kids. I'm also coming back to this thread later when I'm on a computer to copy and paste all of these great book suggestions :)

I'm all ears. So far I'm looking at this: http://ubdavid.org/kids-world/kids.html

I find her annoying when I hear her plugging her books for those reasons...it seems like she's just riding his coat tails rather than having anything new to say. But I did like her presenting in the video I saw. I'll look into MUS. I'm looking for something anti-debt. Are they?

Has anyone used the new Dave Ramsey Foundations Middle School Edition? My kids and I watched the sample video and thought his daughter did a great job presenting to this age. Its on HSBC for $70 which is a lot for us for a non-core subject, but if it inspires my kids to avoid debt (in particular my son who has very bad spending habits) it will be money well spent. Any experience with it?

After my experience with my son who was very similar at that age, I would not mess around with those other programs and go straight to Barton. Completely transformed my son. Expensive, but worth it and high resale value. For marh I don't have a lot of advice. My son is 12 and still to this day the only way we get through math is by me sitting with him and keeping hm focused. I also have him do xtramath and dreambox everyday just to give us a break, because it's the only math he can do independently.

Bumping this up and spamming this board to try to get the last 10 people we need to move forward with the group buy :)

I'm organizing a group buy for homeschoolers for the prodigy math game. The price will be $13.50 per child as opposed to $60 which is the price without the group rate. If you're interested join this FB page, or PM me if you don't do facebook. ​We still need about 10 more memberships to qualify, so feel free to share this with other groups you're part of :)