I have already said how we're doing it this year in the other thread, but to go further, one of the best things I learned was not to rely on a textbook if I don't have to. A textbook is very limiting in most subjects. It creates the work for just one year, but leaves you looking the rest of the time. I own them, but I prefer to build using them as resources. This year, two of the freebies I found were science texts. One being an actual second grade textbook, the other the workbook to go with the first grade textbook in the same series. After looking them both over I realized they followed the same scope & sequence, the second grade one going just a little deeper than the first. Well, then. Okay. Each week I mark whatever lesson corresponds to what we're doing in the 2nd grade book. I look it over, highlight words, and then build a lesson using all the resources we have. When we started out, the only thing I had was a Saxon 5/4 kit. LOL and that didn't work for us at all. It was torturous. The rest of the subjects I broke down by what I wanted to cover that year...then that month...then that week...creating my own scope and sequence and praying our podunk library had something. If not, well, we were going to create our own lesson, weren't we? Saxon fell to the wayside when I simply looked at the sequence and created our own math until I could save up for something different. I make my own gap curriculum. I make unit studies that bring in primary sources, I make grammar pages, I make math...I've lived in some wacky places where I can't rely on internet (including a few weeks out in the woods) I like to be able to pick up and go, cheaply. I can't always print, nor do I want to, but I have Notability on my Ipad and a stylus, and both suffice for even the littlest to use. We notebook, but not every day. Notebooks are reserved for one lesson a week, after a lesson is learned thoroughly. In the meantime we use whiteboards or chalkboards, easy to erase mistakes and try again. I keep in mind the whole child when I design a lesson - feeding his brain, eyes, ears, hands...giving him many opportunities to apply the material as he learns. We take advantage of all the FREE our area has to offer. Free museum days, free use of art supplies, free field trips....I combine our days so that we don't use more than one tank of gas every two weeks. It costs nothing to use our legs, so we take a lot of walks and do nature study. If I buy, it is a reusable resource. Something we can continue to go back to at different points in our lives. A kindergarten book does me no good. A book I buy for a kindergartener that enchants a teen is worth it. I bought a copy of Anno's Math Games for $1. The book has been read so many times it's not even funny. To me, homeschooling for cheap/free is an opportunity to be creative. :D Who doesn't want that?

The only textbooks my son has are the ones we bought for his dual enrollment classes. He doesn't have books to bring home for the rest. They're handouts or class copies only.

Khan Academy? Their lessons usually explain the why behind it all.

Nope. Ours is pretty simple: Ground meat 1 onion, yellow or white jalapenos, hatch, or other green chilies the market has 5-6 tomatoes 3 cups of beans, usually kidney. 1 cup of the bean water garlic, cumin, chili powder, and a bit of cayenne. touch of cocoa powder for depth smoked paprika or spoonful of adobo sauce to round it all out.

We're enjoying MEP. Some of the activities make my husband do a double-take, lol, because they're not how he is used to seeing math presented. But I love how it's both challenging and gentle at the same time.

There's a short synopsis in DPAN's Waiting On The World To Change. The names listed in it should give you a good idea of a timeline of research.

Add more peppers to your diet. When I have something with a bit of heat, I tend to feel sated faster than if I eat plain fare. And the flavor compound helps. We up our diet of homemade Chinese, Mexican, Tex-mex, even spiced nuts...things that will fill us up or at least meet our need for that belly warmth. Find your good fats, too. Use them more. We have a running joke here because when I want dessert I'm really saying I want fat. It's not enough to have a sweet. My dh is fine with a handful of candy corn. I'll eat the candy corn, the candy cane, the poached pear, the cookie...and so on down the line until I get a spoonful of peanut butter or bit of soft cheese and honey in a date. I have to have the fat. If I don't, I can eat all the sweets I like and not feel like I got enough. And if I'm going to eat it, good fat is better than bad. Up your olive oil or your coconut oil, whatever helps you round the meal some.

Something from thinkgeek.com :D

Just chiming in (though your kids' real life application is totally more of a test than a written test is!) :) You may want to look up the 3-part lesson. Step 1 - present the material. "This is _____" Step 2 - ask for the material. "Which of these is _____?" (discerning between 2 or 3 words/items) Step 3 - ask about the material. "Tell me about ______." (focusing on that one again) You're presenting the information in bites, circling back to it, and requiring more of the student each time you come back.

One more thing - avoid the cutting-down-to-justify-choice trap. There is a mom here who sends out little cartoons and makes statements about how terrible public school is while putting homeschooling on a pedestal. Things like "Contrary to popular mythology, the average homeschooler has no problem socializing with other children, as long as he remembers to use shorter words and smaller vocabulary." It's icky. And, more to the point, you never know where life will take you. Remember that you can celebrate education and personalized service without cutting down someone else's situation.

Saturdays are my library days. I make my list during the week and grab them during that hour I get alone. I also check to make sure we have all the science supplies we need. We don't start new weeks on Mondays, though. We do new material on Weds, so Mon/Tues I look through the books, pick out copywork, create a cohesive plan (we're working on time changes right now, so memory is days of the week poem, science is about seasons, music is Vivaldi, and art is drawing the same piece four different ways this time), and just make sure I'm ready with minimal disruption.

Our public schools here make their sugar-filled breakfast mandatory for all students. The lunches aren't much better. My one child in school would rather bike home and have a hot lunch or bring his own than touch anything they make.

And interestingly, in the Dallas area near Irving is a street called White Settlement Road. Always makes us scratch our heads a bit when we go.

"Talk to me when you can tell me 5 good things." Then walk away. If he really needs to say something, he'll come up with 5 good (and true) things. The goal is to redirect his thinking to be more positive, and that's not something that's easily taught with just consequences. The active push to do it helps with some kids.

Our plans this year were thrown for a loop. My budget and savings for homeschooling went out the window. It is totally possible to do it for cheap/free, moreso if you have a good support system in place. This year my kid is using: MEP - mostly free. I print the workbooks. Wee Folk Art/Art Express - mostly free. I get the books at the library, spend a few cents on art supplies. Copywork/memorization - free. Spelling - $.05 for the textbook at the thrift store. Reading Comprehension - free copy of Reading Detective I found at our annual curriculum sale (free table) Reading - free Mystery Science - nearly free. I print lab sheets and spend a little bit on supplies that we don't already have. Art/Music study - free, thanks to youtube and Google. I have a really good community. We have that free table at the curriculum sale, we have thrift stores with $.05 books once a week, and we share resources. We're allowed and encouraged to get free school supplies for our kids annually. It's a nice place to be. Alone, we could still do it, but we'd have to really define our philosophy. Charlotte Mason works well, Classical works well, using Gutenberg textbooks work well, making task cards works well. I can get unit studies from Homeschool Share. I can get workbooks free online to go through in different manners (etext, orally, copy text) The fancy stuff is nice, and can be helpful, but yes, it can be done for free easily now.

Go to gym Volunteer at Bountiful Baskets laundry grocery shopping trimming the yard clean bathrooms

People don't cook here. There are as many restaurants as there are churches (and as many churches as there are in Rome, nearly). Most families follow a pattern of activities: Sunday/Weds - Church. Tues/Thurs - kids' activities. Friday - football. Saturday - games on tv, travel ball, town activity, evening church. People don't cook. My neighbors pick up the kids from school, do homework, and head out again to that day's activity, getting dinner on the way there or home. As a family, we eat out about twice a month. The 5yo got a special treat yesterday going to McD's for lunch because I had a lunch meeting myself (he went to a caregiver). We've found the food isn't up to par at most places. It's certainly not better than what we make at home, and definitely less fresh/more salty. Our diet has changed immensely during our marriage. The first time I had my blood drawn at the hospital here I ate like a local. My cholesterol was through the roof! 10+ years of slowly getting rid of processed foods and adding more herbs to draw out flavor, and I was just praised for how amazing my numbers are now.

And this is a deliberately obtuse argument. The school knew it was just a clock, otherwise they would have evacuated, called the cops immediately, and had a bomb squad look at it. There is no question that things should have been looked at closer. But you simply cannot argue that the school thought it was a threat when they behaved in an opposite manner.

Mystery Science and AOPS are like that. Same with Jackdaws (for older kids). I don't know of anything that combines all of it into one project based curriculum, though. Edited to add, Mysteries In History is project based. That's good for about 4th and up.

They do sell it. I don't remember what it's called. We use it to spray around where the toilet meets the floor during potty training. It really works in removing any and all smell.

I second the Flylady suggestion. It is easily adaptable to the home school. Start with one thing, do it consistently, and then build from there. Flylady starts with a small routine in the morning and builds to focus on one area per week of the rest of the home + a weekly overview one day. I'd start by printing and putting into a sheet protector a planning page for each kid. Give them the pages and dry erase markers. Your new little daily routine is to sit and develop the plans together. Get that going for a week, and add in focusing on organizing a subject for the next week. Take an hour on Saturday or Sunday and go through each subject, 10 minutes on each one, putting together plans for the week, printouts, supplies.. You won't hit everything and that won't matter. You'll still be better off than you were.

I think it depends. I will say I don't think a book needs to be shocking and have explicit content in order to talk about literature, how to read, applying it to current events, or relating to the students in the class. If the book was, say, Lolita, I would have an issue with the content and the idea that a child needs to read it, and only IT, to develop a thought about the underlying theme. There are very few books I won't present to my kids - that is right at the top of my list. I haven't read The Book Thief, so I don't know. On the other side, I think it would be a shame for a student to miss out on the wonderful discussions Huck Finn could bring, and I don't think another book could fill its place. Content should be something that is examined carefully by the teacher to make sure that the book is 100% worth it.

E. She didn't evacuate the school, but sat there with it for hours until the end of the day. Obviously not threatened.

I think you can use just about anything for early readers. Don't knock lovely picture books once they get past the "Fat cat sat on a mat" stage. We prefer those over any basal readers since we can enjoy wonderful stories that haven't been rewritten to fit a step in a curriculum.

The relationship is the most important thing. It's not about you teaching your child and reading from a script. It's about you reaching your child, and sharing the highs, the lows, the excitement and curiosity. Planning is good, flexibility to meet your child where he/she is is better.