So I've been looking into getting the Motivated Mom's iPhone app. I've never used the system before. Is it basically just a daily checklist? One criticism I keep seeing is that you can't change the list...so I was thinking why not just get a checklist/to do app and write my own? Is there any thing special about the MM list? Looking at the sample she has on her website, it will really annoy me if I keep having tasks show up that I have no intention of doing, like 'work on a scrapbook.' $10 also seems very steep for a to do list. Which brings me to my second question...I know I've seen lists online before of chores that should be done daily, monthly, yearly, etc. Anyone have any lists they'd recommend? Those of you who use MM, do you think if I convert one of those schedules to a daily to-do list that that would be effectively the same thing? Elena

I think that's a good idea. There is a lot of number line and inequality stuff in Year 1. There is also a lot of conceptual stuff that is challenging! It would be a shame to rush through it just to keep up with his 'grade'. I used to teach HS math, and trust me--most of my students would have benefited from going back to Year 1 and building up a better foundation!!!!! Most of them had just been moved along to stay on grade level even though they didn't really 'get' the idea of decimals, fractions, or adding negatives! If he's bored because he gets it all, then by all means jump ahead. But if it is challenging and he's learning, then I'd say disregard the year number. Just make sure like others have said that you do the lesson plans, not just the worksheets. Although, I must admit, there are a few sections I skip in each lesson because they don't seem very relevant to homeschoolers who aren't in a classroom environment. As far as your other comment goes about being unsure of how to explain things, I've found with my son that there is enough repetition in MEP that eventually he has an 'aha' moment on his own if we just keep working on the problems. Whenever I've tried to explain something, he gets really frustrated!! In a sense, a teacher can't really MAKE a student understand something anyway. So even though I consider myself good at explaining math, I've learned that maybe that won't be such a useful skill to have in teaching him. :glare: Good luck!

Just read some of the other answers and wanted to agree with pps that yes, MEP is very time intensive and I can see not liking it for that reason. For me, I decided that math was one of or the most important subjects for us, so I don't mind spending the time. (Although, I have cut out other things to make time for it. I've decided to do a few things well rather than struggle to add a lot of things in.) Also, although it takes a lot of time, I don't have to prepare at all ahead of time. I find the lesson plans easy to follow. I just open it up each day and go, which is important to me. (I don't do well with planning ahead!) But if you are looking for a curriculum where the child is working more independently, or one that does not take a lot of time, then MEP might really frustrate you! Elena

I am in Year 1 with my 6 year old. I really like it. My son likes dice games and things like that, but I wouldn't call him particularly mathy. He's VERY average academically. He is super wiggly. We kept things very short at first (15 minutes) and now I am steadily increasing the time we are spending on math. He only started writing recently and is not a strong writer. He doesn't complain about the amount of writing, but occasionally I worry its too much and I will take over the writing and have him dictate. I think MEP would work well with just about any child. It is multi-sensory and really mixes things up. BUT I think it might not work well if the parent was not confident with math. A friend of mine is having a hard time with it. She said it is making perfect sense to her child, but that she has her husband doing it at nighttime because she doesn't always 'get it'. (He's in year 2 or 3.) It is fairly teacher intensive, so it makes sense to me that if the teacher is not confident it might be a problem. Hopefully some parents who are not strong in math will say I'm wrong and that it is working fine for them! My son does like puzzles, and I try to foster the idea that all math is a puzzle. Elena

My 2 cents...I don't know if he's just turned 6 or 6 almost 7, but it strikes me as a little young to be worrying too much about a lack of focus. Maturity will probably calm him down some in addition to the other things you're trying....

My kids have learned so much grammar from listening to and singing songs. I need to find some new favorites. I'm not sure how best to describe the music we like most. Usually melodic songs, voice accompanied by guitar--I don't like rap/pop/rock. When my kids were younger their favorite was Baby's First Steps in Spanish. Our current favorites are Jose-Luis Orozco and Luis Pescetti. TIA! Elena

Can you give an example of what you mean by a "book about a book"?

I have thought about doing Spanish first since it is so much easier to read than English. But he is not bilingual. English is definitely his first language and Spanish is definitely second, so I thought it made more sense to do English first. I'm hoping that since Spanish is so easy to read the transition will be easy once he is a strong reader? That's my game plan at least. He has no problem doing the vowel sounds so far...we go through the alfabet and do 'ba, be, bi, bo, bu' with each letter. He doesn't get confused, but I do!!! When we are doing English, it takes me a few seconds to say what sounds the vowels make--which is weird, because English is my first language. I guess little brains are just made to handle this better than us old folk.

Oh really? I thought it was the Spanish equivalent of their grammar program? Thanks for saving me $30!!! And thanks for the other links...I'll look into them. Elena

He can read syllables, and words if he concentrates. But I haven't been having him read because he is not reading in English yet, and I wanted to focus on that first. I was going to do reading in Spanish next year once his English is (hopefully) stronger. I just snatched Juguemos a Leer used off of Amazon for $6 plus shipping. It was by Ahumada Rosario--is that the same one? I did see one other title of the same name by a different author--I hope I bought the right one! Is Mi Libro Magico a handwriting text? I've found it for $15-$20 but I already have a few things I use for HW (including HWT in Spanish) so I'm disinclined to buy another. Thanks for the help! Elena

I've been using it this year with my 6 year old and love it. It focuses on critical thinking and observation. Other science books that I looked at either dogmatically teach 'facts,' or focus on a lot of experiments which, in my opinion, aren't very effective for teaching (though they are lots of fun.) I would definitely recommend going through all the lessons, even if you've already covered the topics before. I find the book has an eye opening approach even to common subject matter.

Thanks for the info everyone. I'll look into all the links you gave me. For now I've decided to do Homeric (although at this stage what he's learning won't be any different than Attic or Koine). You're right that I can just do alphabet/reading for a while. As far as knowing what I'm doing, I really don't! 10 years ago I may have been translating Plato and Herodotus, but today I'd be lucky if I could recite the alphabet. Use it or lose it, as they say.

Alright, in the half hour since I posted that question, I've been thinking maybe Homeric would be better to do first...so any recommendations for Attic OR Homeric would be greatly appreciated! Elena

I'm spending some time going through old threads tonight, but so far I'm having a hard time finding sources for teaching ATTIC Greek to young children. I had planned on starting the alphabet after the holidays, and doing transliteration in the spring with my 6 y.o. This I can do on my own but was hoping to find a kid friendly curriculum for the fall when my son will be 7. Any help? I really do not want to have to use the books I used in college with a 1st grader! :confused: Elena

I personally think that's dangerous territory...there is a long history of poetry and art that is lewd, lascivious, bawdy, obscene, vulgar, etc. Now whether we want to allow our children to listen/read/view it is another question, and probably an easy one for most parents (no!). But a lot of great poetry/writing had been called trash in its day on the basis of lacking in morals. I submit to you this line from Romeo and Juliet (which may have been edited out of your version by an offended editor!): O Romeo, that she were, O that she were An open-arse, and thou a poperin pear. A poperin pear, apparently, was a penis shaped pear which was used as a euphemism for penis, and as a pun on 'pop her in.' Now that's vulgar enough that I felt uncomfortable typing it--and its Shakespeare! I have no particular opinion on Eminem and his ability or lack thereof as a poet. I for one do not let my children listen to any popular music--Miley Cyrus, Taylor Swift, High School Musical, none of it. This may get harder as they get older, so we'll see how it goes, but that's the line I've drawn for now. But I just thought I'd speak up to offer another perspective.

Ha ha...I wish we could! I just priced 4 tickets to Uruguay and it is over $5,000. Those would turn out to be some expensive books!! :tongue_smilie:

I suppose mainly because I'm not really a 'textbook person.' I don't really want to use traditional textbooks for history, science, math, etc. (Especially sight unseen.) I have found so many wonderful, creative sources for teaching (in English) and I was hoping to find equally fantastic sources in Spanish--books or curricula that would appeal to a 'living books', CM, or classical type... Also, I had previously been looking on some Mexican websites for grammar textbooks, and they were so expensive to ship to the US, so I decided to go with R&S (though I haven't bought it yet, so I still have time to change my mind...) Your suggestion reminds me though that I should probably look around more on the amazon libros en español section...

OK, here is Dr. Nebel's answer from the Yahoo group: "My aim is to have kids learn through through their own observations and rational thinking. I see the role of the teacher as guiding kids toward making the observations and keeping their thinking on a rational course. In short, this is what learning how to learn and the habits of mind for life-long learning are about. Coming specifically to evolution, I do not mention it in the current volume of BFSU for K-2 nor do I address it in upcoming volumes for 3-5 or 6-8. You might say that this is sidestepping the issue, but I do not feel remiss in this. Evolution is a complex theory based on numerous lines of evidence, i.e., observations. Again, I focus on making the observations and rational thinking, and letting that take one where it will. I hope at the very least, it leads to appreciation, awe, and wonderment as to how much is "out there" to explore, learn, and attempt to understand."

If that question was directed toward toward my recommendation of BFSU, then no...there is no mention of evolution in either the K-2 or 3-5 or upcoming 6-8 books. (There is no mention of creation, either.) Someone asked him that question on the yahoo list and I just asked him if I could paste his answer here, too, so hopefully I'll be able to do that after I get his consent. But in the meantime, the short answer is 'no'. There is no conflict with what you teach whether you teach evolution, creation, neither, or both! HTH, Elena

I agree with the other posters that the K book would probably be good for him. The first half of the book is upper case, the second half is lower case. You're right that they're in a different order, but since he already knows the capitals, maybe you could start half way through and go in order of the lower case, but then jump back and do the corresponding capital on the same day? Just a thought... Elena

I highly recomend "Building Foundations of Scientific Understanding." In addition to being a curriculum and outline of topics to cover, the author also has some great sections about how to go about science education in general. He makes a good argument that neither drilling for facts nor exclusively hands on activities are effective methods of encouraging scientific understanding. It seems like he has really thought through the little steps that kids need to make in their thinking for true understanding to occur. The curriculum promotes inquiry and thinking (rather than learning facts), which I think is very important. (I hope that isn't sacrilegious to say that on this forum :tongue_smilie:!!) He also is very active on the yahoo group devoted to his book, and answers questions that parents have which is a great resource as well. I know the book's a little pricey, but it is well worth it in my opinion. I looked for a long time for something for science since I love science myself. The book I have (which I linked above) is K-2. It has 41 lessons in it which can be done in greater or lesser depth, so I plan on going through them all with my 6 year old, and then going through them again as he gets older but in greater depth. He recently came out with a book for older elementary too, I think 3rd through 5th?

Hi All, I'm looking to expand the subjects that my 6 y.o. does in Spanish. So far we use MEP in Spanish for Math and I'll be adding Rod and Staff Spanish for grammar next year (after he has a better handle on reading in English.) Any other curricula in Spanish that you have liked for elementary aged kids? Also any read-alouds that were originally written in Spanish, as opposed to English books translated into Spanish? Gracias! Elena

I'm just curious....where did you get the 40% stat? Elena

Thanks for all the responses and advice! Now I have some research to do... Elena

Also I forgot to mention...the other indispensable thing for us has been music. My kid have picked up a lot of grammar from from listening to Spanish music. We listen to them every time we're in the car and the repetition has helped. Also sometimes we will play a game where my son has to try to hear 20 words that he recognizes. (We do this while watching Spanish cartoons, too.) This gets him actively listening to the words. Hth, Elena