An amazing thing is to look at media through the ages and how the relationship between men and women is portrayed. Until recently, most show an extreme lack of equality or assertiveness when it comes to women. And it isn't because men have changed, but that, yet again, their behavior is at the forefront and this time are starting to be held accountable. Even so, women are too often told, "he didn't mean it that way." "He was only trying to be friendly!" Or, my favorite, so very recently, men wonder if hugging a woman is still okay. The answer is, no, it never was to get in someone's personal space uninvited - but we teach little girls from a young age to ignore their guts and give so-n-so a kiss because they're "family". And you wonder why women were not empowered to speak up 30 years ago? Look at the victim blaming 100 years ago when women would use their hatpins as defense. Laws were created to protect their attackers. Do you know when women got equal protection in the workplace in this country? 1986 - women can finally say that a hostile or abusive work place is discrimination and sue. 1993- she doesn't have to prove physical or serious psychological harm in order to prosecute for harassment. 1998 - workplaces can be held liable for harassment even when threats aren't carried out. 2000- women are finally able to sue their rapists in court. 2005 - prohibiting punishing those who complain about sex-based discrimination. We are lucky that we are starting to recognize the destructive imbalance and empower women to speak up. Every inch is hard won. I wouldn't think blaming those who came before for not having the resources we currently have would be something we would have to defend against.

I would do one of these: Life of Fred - simple to read to him, throws out lots of different math topics in one book, and short questions at the end of each lesson. Gattegno - all hands on, uses c-rods, introduces all four operations in book 1 and continues with larger numbers in book 2. Beast Academy 2A, done orally

A library makes things cheaper. So do good friends. :) We tend to purchase most of our read alouds just because we're slower than library due dates. My list for 3rd grade language arts is at $165 this year: ELTL main book ($45) $10-20 per hardback read aloud (6 of them) notebooks for copywork and dictation (I want them separate this year) Elson reader 3 - $13 That will be our core. I am hoping to find nice copies of some of the read alouds either used or on sale and I think ones we won't use more than this year will be paperbacks. That'll shave about half the cost off the books, bringing us to right about $100 for language arts.

Disney has a fun Presidents app and set of dvds with the same information. The app is set up like a scrapbook, going through each president in order. And you might check out the Animaniacs. They have songs for the presidents and U.S states/capitals.

I don't correct spelling at all outside of spelling lessons at this age. That's free writing, narrations, none of that. I had to separate the goals in my head: yes to learn proper spelling, but also to learn how to put thoughts down on paper in a coherent manner. As we get through elementary I start introducing things like the concept of a rough draft and learning to look at it again with fresh eyes. Free writing is still free writing, though. I'm not touching that with 'school', but I may use it to decide what needs to be worked on during language arts.

If your kids like coloring they'll like them. For us, it is overwhelming. The only good use I have found for history pockets is when you have a class to divide the work between and create a book together. Or spending a lot more time on each sub-topic.

Tonight is steak with a ginger sauce, rice, and a bok choy/mushroom side where they're cooked together with shallots and a chili pepper.

This isn't really helpful, nor is it an accurate view of the program or testing. Testing shows mastery. A student who hasn't been exposed wouldn't have mastery, but a series of tests would consider to show an upward score as the student covers the topics in a different order. So a low score in 3rd would only indicate non-exposure, and a jump on the next test would show that the material has all been covered. Even states that use these scores as benchmarks for homeschools are simply looking for progress from a student. Also, hearsay of a complaint without knowing exactly what the problem was is rumorlike. That said, it did prompt me to break out my old MUS manuals and look at the Elementary Mastery page in the teachers' guides and compare it to the list of skills taught on IXL for grade three. Nixpix, if you do the same when your son gets closer to testing time you can see which skills he definitely will have/will be covering before the test and what to expect in each category.

We don't do a timeline until the second time through, just to minimize what is done for history. First rotation is when we concentrate on cultures, projects, maps, language, and beginning narration. The maps, paper projects, and narrations are compiled in a notebook. However, when we do introduce timelines we like Pandia Press. They fold up accordion-style and have sticker packages available to make it look clean. The bands across separate people from wars, scientific achievements and the like. http://www.pandiapress.com/publications/timeline/

:( All good things come to an end. We'll still shop there because we get a fabulous discount at the outlet, but it does make me sad. OTOH, I've never returned anything to LL Bean, but now I'll be more leery of the quality.

Neither do I. Dh eats only flour tortillas, the kids and I like our corn ones lightly warmed or fried. I tease him because flour tortillas aren't exactly Mexican food. They were an invention of Jewish Spaniards who settled there during the Inquisition. They didn't consider the corn to be kosher. So I guess they're really Span-Mex? :laugh: But I've never liked them and ds, who doesn't eat hardly any breads, won't touch them.

It's normal. She recognizes the shape as being important, but hasn't learned position yet.

Anything with 140 lessons or less. Those will get done every time.

The only time I hear it met with disdain is when people confuse the two. When dh and I met he had only had a very limited experience with what he called Mexican food. It was very jarring for him when I took him to a restaurant owned by a family from southern Mexico. And when he saw cactus being sold at the market he just about fainted. :lol: It was a far cry from what he was used to. BUT, there are regional differences all over Mexico. The food from Chihuahua will look different than that from Veracruz, just like coastal California favorites are much different than southern Alabama. Both American, but much different food. And if I go overseas, the only "American" I'm likely to get is a burger with local flavor - like one with an egg on top. Not bad, but different.

There's Bedknobs & Broomsticks. An oldie, lol, but set against WWII. And Meet Me In St. Louis, about a family in 1903 waiting for the 1904 World's Fair.

We do copywork with ELTL, too, but Rainbow Resource has several copywork books if you want to browse through those: http://www.rainbowresource.com/prodlist.php?subject=Language+Arts/4&category=Copywork/8090

And it might be silly, but have you thought about Pathway readers? They're heavy on farm stories.

I'm here! Today was a day off from school, but that's normal each week. :) It's the day I catch up on things like laundry, cleaning out the fridge, grocery shopping for the weekend, planning lessons for next week.. I got most of that done today, the grocery shopping will get done tomorrow morning. This weekend is full with play rehearsal and a special Olympic event with ds's group. They're all super excited, especially since tomorrow is the opening ceremony for the real Olympians. I must ask, what is an herb walk? I'd love to send you some rain, Scrap. Half the time we're promised snow it turns to rain on this side of the bridge. We're up for more on Saturday.

I want to go to dinner at any of y'all's houses! :D Tonight was to be juicy lucies on pretzel buns with jalepeno sweet potato rounds and a cole slaw. Unfortunately ds8 was a mess while we were out today and we only got half the shopping done before it was too crowded for any of us to be comfortable. We're having pizza delivered instead. And I'm slightly worried about him. It turned out he was exhausted (was last night, too, and went to bed early). He fell asleep in the car on the way home which is unusual for him. I'm hoping he's not getting sick - 7 of our friends have had confirmed cases of the flu and we've been lucky so far. He's gotten the shot, but man, this weekend is going to be a hard one for him to miss if he is sick.

While I do think a child should be interested, there are times when I'm not going to let a child's attitude influence what he will/won't do when it comes to my minimum standards. You talk about your son moaning and groaning, how he hated actually going to a brick and mortar, how he doesn't want to do anything so you're basically unschooling. My .02 - don't let attitude influence a necessary education. If *nothing* is acceptable to him, then it's not the work that's the problem and it's time to leave that off the table. Don't take attitude into account or give it any mind. Where will he learn the skills needed in order to have a fulfilling life later? If not home, then virtual or brick and mortar. If home, then a daily routine and clear expectations are needed. Let him know he is welcome to come up with his own ways/pick a curriculum to learn x, y, z, but he will learn it no matter what is chosen.

Hmm.... Strawberry Girl (Southern Florida) Blue Willow (Doris Gates) The Velvet Room (Zilpha Keatley Snyder) (both of these migrant workers in California's Central Valley) Charlotte's Web I read all of these as a kid and loved them.

Hawaii is so beautiful! I'm a little envious! Whenever we've made large moves, we've sent rubbermaid tubs full of immediate necessities ahead through the postal system: towels, air mattresses, a few school books, etc., anything we'd need the first week but would be more expensive to buy than to ship. Plus, dh's job had us save the receipts and submit them as part of the moving claim, so we were reimbursed for postage. As far as schoolwork, our main school focused on learning what we could about our new home. What is the history? What kind of plants/animals are indigenous to the region? Where will we be living? What is nearby? Historical fiction set in the area? That, along with math, became school for the duration of the move.

That's hard. Math gets less "fun" as you work up the levels. I'll assume yours is past Hands On Equations. The Dragonbox app hits on algebra 1 skills, and the This Is Not A Math Book art-based book from Usborne hits on a lot of basic algebra/middle school skills. AIMS has activity books, too, for the 6th-9th crowd. https://store.aimsedu.org/category/activity-books_math-69/activity-books/math-activity-books-6-9/1.html Life of Fred? MUS's algebraic blocks? ETA has their own version of books/blocks that are cheaper than MUS. http://www.hand2mind.com/item/working-with-algebra-tiles/4796?gclid=Cj0KCQiAh_DTBRCTARIsABlT9MYtjOn5s2ErAzYszgv0r-WgnL8HKhRrmIchoAQ8Vx5sAiwbRWnmq-4aAq2GEALw_wcB&gclsrc=aw.ds

Children can be just as mean in homeschool circles. At our last home, there was an air of "not our kind" within certain groups and it was well displayed. In fact, the one thing I see consistently is the more idealistic a group is, the more it tends to shun those who don't conform. It can be religion, philosophy, parents' jobs...as long as people use various traits as a defining factor of what they want to associate with, the outcome will be a rejection of people who don't conform to their ideal. The one good thing about public school is that many of those ideals don't have a stronghold. A child who is rejected by some classmates may still find friends, and the years can change what is important to the group as a whole. Even so, kids still may be rejected. But small+idealistic is never going to work long term for the child who just doesn't fit. I would never put my child in a school like that, one that expected more than I could give and wasn't willing to hold up their ideals on the other end. At home, I do have more control over social settings. It works well for my youngest, was terrible for my oldest in high school. He needed more than home offered and went to a small public school where he thrived.

In that case, I'd love to say Dolphin, but honestly, it's going to depend on the day. We do strive to do a lot on that checklist, though, as I'm sure most parents do/think they do.