:iagree: There are also some math operations board games (Totally Tut is one that comes to mind), and you can modify card games such as War to say that whoever has the winning card has to multiply the two card values before they can take the cards, stuff like that.

It definitely takes some patience to find it used! Sounds like you have a good "in" already since somebody said they will be finished next month- i would jump on that if I were you lol. If not, you can try posting "want to buy" ads here and on vegsource and browsing the "for sale" ads in both places, too, and be prepared to keep checking/bumping regularly. They seem to sell fast when they are listed! Good luck!

Did anyone ever get through the whole program? Did it "work" and get your kids successfully reading? We had two false starts with it over here but stopped both times because my son really just wasn't ready. He'd get too wiggly and distracted and wasn't interested enough and I'd lose patience, and I just didn't want to bother because I didn't want to push an academic K to begin with and only wanted to stick with it if he was enjoying it and it wasn't causing stress for either of us. Anyway, we started again this year. We've only completed the first 15 lessons so far- which is the farthest we've ever gotten- and it seems to be going pretty well so far. Just wondering how it ended up going with you all.

My daughter will be 11 tomorrow and I don't know if she's ever used a calculator. Maybe I should teach her how to use one and call it a life skill. :lol:

My oldest daughter took ADD meds starting at around age 7 I think. She took it until around age 16. (She's 19 now). It did what it needed to do for her, and I have no regrets about the time period in which she took it. There were three different meds she tried during that period. I found Concerta to be the best in regard to side effects, etc. The only ongoing issue was that she was always a little too skinny while on the meds- it seemed to affect her appetite mainly at lunch, because she did eat breakfast and she ate huge dinners, but she was always in a very low percentile for BMI until she came off the medicine (now if anything she's a little overweight).

Wow, Z isn't the brightest crayon in the box huh? I'd invite them at this point. Ten more (assuming they can even all come) shouldn't make a difference at this point.

Cover the kitchen table with a huge piece of paper and lay out markers, crayons, stamps, and so on and just leave him to it. Mine likes board games, computer games, K'Nex, legos, play dough, TV, dress up clothes, dancing around to music, simple mazes (I bet he'd like tracing paper with simple things to trace, too, I should try that!), and so on, but he can definitely be challenging at times in this regard, too.

haha- re the dictionary, I will say that when I was a pre-teen, I got a bit of a thrill out of thinking up what "dirty" or "slang" words I could look for and try to find in my mother's dictionary. What can I say, we didn't have the Internet back then. :lol: I remember owning/reading Sylvester and the Magic Pebble as a kid and blinked when I saw it on this list. Read on as to why and had to roll my eyes. Silly reason. Who even thinks like that? Anne Frank? A downer? Really? YA THINK?!?! I love Harry Potter. But I guess I really shouldn't have set up that stake in my backyard.... Bah. I guess whoever wrote that list never heard about that How To guide for pedophiles that caused such an uproar on Amazon a while back. Sylvester and the Magic Pebble indeed!

My special needs teen and my about to turn 11 y/o share one as of last year around this time. But I do think I need to get my 11 y/o her own. I always said that when the time comes that they are spending time away from our view without access to a phone, that's when they need one, because I want them to be able to get in touch with me and me with them. Because we got to the point with my 11 y/o where she's allowed to ride her bike "around the corner" or "to the park" with her friends from time to time without an adult, as opposed to always being right on our block where I could look out and see her, I want us to be able to get in touch with each other at times like those. Likewise my special needs teen has a friend a few blocks away that she sometimes gets together with, and sometimes they like to walk to the park or library, and I want us to be able to get in touch with each other, too. Once in a while it comes up that they each want to do something simultaneously and then I'm like uh who do I give the phone to... so I think they each need their own at this point. Would I have gotten her one just so she could stay in touch with friends? No, I'd have told her she could use my phone to call a friend. Do I think you are wrong if you give your daughter one for that reason, though? No, that's up to you!

Welcome to the group! I'm sort of tempted to go write on my counter with permanent marker just to write over it with dry erase marker and see if it really works. But I am going to pass just in case. Not that I don't trust you but :lol:

I wish! :P Welcome, and good luck!

You should look up "Young Eagles" and then you can search from their site to see if there are volunteer pilots in your area. Someone here on this board actually told us about it in a different thread a while back (sorry, I forget who!!) and I called and made arrangements for our group. We haven't actually gone yet but I'm really looking forward to it. They will be giving the kids in our group (aged 8-17) free flights, they've arranged a tour of the airport that will include the control tower and so on, and they'll do a walk around of the plane and talk about the controls, the hangar, refueling and so on. It is going to be so cool! :D We also have a tour of our county courthouse coming up, and once we've done that, we're going to make separate arrangements to go back and sit in on a case (they said they can check in advance what's coming up on the dockets to make sure it will be something suitable/educational for kids).

We used and loved TT5 last year. We are using and loving TT6 this year. My daughter's test scores went up, not down, and she has a new found liking for and confidence in math. It works for us.

I am reading A Dance With Dragons by George R.R. Martin (book 5 in the Game of Thrones series) to myself. I am reading "The Apprenticeship of Lucas Whitaker" with my daughter (who turns 11 in a couple of days). We are also still working on The Inheritors which I confess we're sort of plodding through. And I am reading "A Treasury for Five Year Olds" with my son. :)

Thanks for your feedback! Would you prefer "restricts their ability to..." rather than "probably hampers their ability to..." ?

Love this!!

I've been a fan of Stephen King since I was probably 13 years old. 25 years later, I am still buying and enjoying his books! This is really neat, thanks for sharing!

I would recommend looking into Getting Started With Spanish. It's a book that introduces one new concept per lesson, and there are audio clips you can download online for free to hear one of the authors, who is a native Spanish speaker, pronounce everything. My daughter (6th grade) and I are doing it and liking it so far.

How close to 6 is he? Last year my son was a young five and when I attempted K, it just did not go well. I tried for nearly 8 weeks but he resisted, wiggled, refused, said he didn't like school and never wanted to do school, and I found myself getting stressed out- over Kindergarten of all things. That was not what I wanted for either of us and I definitely didn't want to perpetuate an I don't like school attitude at that young age! So, we just stopped. I told myself that down the road when I looked back on his earliest years, I wasn't going to wish I had pushed more academics - I was going to wish we had just enjoyed each other more. We had another very informal "preschool" year (in which he learned lots, by the way), and a year later I have no regrets about having "dropped" Kindergarten when I did. Earlier this month, with him two months from his sixth birthday, we started k again and it is going MUCH better. He's less resistant, more focused and more engaged. I'm not stressed, and he isn't saying he doesn't like school. It was worth the wait, and no harm done. Just something to consider!

Ah. Well, email me anytime if you want to talk! (PM for email addy if you don't still have it)! :)

I know you didn't ask about this, but have you considered Teaching Textbooks? I think it is GREAT for a non-mathy kid and does a fantastic job of patiently showing and telling step by step how to do each problem. They don't overwhelm a kid with tons of problems every day but they use lots of repetition from lesson to lesson to reinforce concepts, the animation makes it fun for a lot of kids, it keeps a gradebook for you, it can be done pretty independently which frees you up for other things...it's been an absolute lifesaver here. I have a more detailed review with some pics etc on my blog if you are interested in taking a peek (and it also goes into detail there about how my daughter's math scores have improved and her confidence and everything). Love love love it! http://nancextoo.livejournal.com/124221.html

I MISSED YOU!!! Where have you been?! :) :grouphug:

We didn't actually have an archery class near us- we asked the dads in our homeschool group if there were any hobbies or interests they'd be willing to share with the kids in our group. It was up to them how casual or formal it was, if it was a one time thing or an ongoing thing, if it was related to their job or their hobbies, and so on. We lucked out that that particular dad (who is an environmental scientist) hosts that class at his house from time to time where he teaches them about bows and arrows, helps them all (even the preschoolers) shoot at a target with a child-sized bow, and takes them on a nature walk to look for animal signs and so on. It's a really neat opportunity and the kids have fun with it! I'm sorry you guys are having trouble leaving comments! I'm not sure why that would happen. If you are able to let me know exactly what happened when you tried, I can email livejournal's tech support about it and see what they have to say. Not offended at all! In fact, I have changed the wording in those sections already based on your feedback. I appreciate it and I see your point! :) Oh my goodness, I didn't know there was anyone here from ITNO!! Did you use the same name there? And no, I don't mind if you share the post, I appreciate that you want to do so! Thank you, everyone else, for your comments here, it was really nice hearing back about it from so many of you! And if this doesn't come across as too self-serving or anything, if you guys enjoyed the "What About Socialization?" post, you might also like the "What Does A Homeschooler Do Every Day?" post I made a while back which also incorporates the same style of text with pictures weaved through it to make a point: http://nancextoo.livejournal.com/175611.html Thanks again for taking the time to read my rambling, all! :)

socialization. http://nancextoo.livejournal.com/200156.html Let me know what you think? :)

My daughter is currently using Typing Instructor For Kids Platinum, and so far it seems effective and enjoyable. Lots of games for practice, progress charts, goals and challenges, etc. It always knows where you left off and the practice games will never include letters the child hasn't yet learned. We really like it.