No. I'm a night owl, so I'm up at midnight most nights. My husband and kids will be asleep.

Every stage is like teaching a new kid for me, and so it looks so different. Early elementary? Middle school? High school (gulp)? What the child needs and what is expected generally is different yet again each time. I bring a more mature and experienced but still with a similar underlying strength/weakness set me. So I do my best knowing it won't be the ideal I wish it could be. I think that's the biggest way I've changed, though. Truly accepting that you work with what you have--in child and in teacher--and that means X and Y may not be realistic or best for child B and teacher me. So I guess a mindset of flexibility and grace? If I had a big age gap in kids, though, maybe I would feel different? I think I could do each stage better if I had a re-do. But then every child is so different from the last. So, maybe not.

It takes through 8th grade to cover all of the grammar sequence, if that's important to you. I think it's some of the verbals, maybe infinitives?, that are introduced in 8th. You could look at the scope/sequence to see what you think.

I agree with mlktwins, I'd love to have your recipe.

My kids have closed doors and always have. This was for fire safety primarily, but also because still awake people are less likely to disturb a sleeping person with a door closed. I have always slept with ours open since we had kids, though, so I could hear if they call out in the night. I always figure a child needing me is less likely than a fire.

Given some volunteering I do, I come into close contact with women whose children have been removed from the home by protective services. In our area of the US, most children are removed due to drug use in the home. And in my volunteer work, these are the families I see almost exclusively. I just finished reading the Glass Castle. And the thing is children are generally removed when mom has contact with authorities due to drug use. However, often these women have other issues that become apparent after removal--mental health, domestic abuse history, and often generational poverty. Many of them that I work with have homes that DCS won't return a child to even if the drug use is handled. We try to find alternate housing, and sometimes this is hard due to drug convictions and just generally how the system works here. And the patterns that come from this life that make it hard to maintain housing--pay rent/utilities--even if programs or protective services steps in to try to help and we get placement. Often these women have housing without electricity or water, for example, and other issues with cleanliness and major disrepair. Some are living in vehicles. The descriptions in that book---I've seen similar. All of it due to poverty, and the long standing mindset and lifestyle patterns that can bring even outside the addictions. But I struggle. What should happen with a child whose parent can't maintain housing for whatever reason? Here it's neglect....it's poverty though! Most of these moms want to give their kids the world. I'm struggling. (my volunteer work has nothing to do with deciding what kids are removed or returned...but I think about these kids a lot, and their moms. All of it is traumatic and sad for everyone). Thoughts? I'm sort of a muddle. I found that book hard to read, given the families I see.

CLE's grammar is definitely more thorough than most schools. Their 8th grade will cover all grammar I think. So it doesn't surprise me at all that your kids are struggling. I would stop the program while you decide. Tell them they are placed incorrectly, and these light units are meant to be levels more than grades. Do the online placement test and decide whether you want to start the kids at whatever levels they place. If you want in depth grammar, select this or Rod and Staff or Analytical Grammar or similar. If you don't want this level of depth, there are other options.

I use a light box. and recommend that. Get a good one. Sunbox is a good brand, if pricey. We sold mid-winter. I would get a new agent, make absolutely certain I'm really priced correctly, and keep it listed past what you think of as "buying season" if the listing/showing itself isn't terribly stressful.

We had them right after we moved in. They literally ate their way in through the wall. I really felt it was overnight--a hole in the wall and ants. We talked to an extension agent for ID and he recommended two different poisons--one was sweet and the other savory maybe--and both for Carpenter. I don't know. But they eat different things depending on their life stage. They ate all of one and disappeared. They came back about a month later, ate some more, and I guess died.

I feel a bit hesitant to post this. I hope it doesn't come across that I think all Christians need to hold a certain scientific belief. There are sincere Christ followers in all the camps--young earth, old earth, evolutionary creation. I'm good with all my fellow Christians who are holding different beliefs and teaching those to their kids. I fall into the evolutionary creation understanding of this. I put my answers in red, but hope anyone threatened by evolution won't read my replies below.

I would just focus on learning to read well and lots of enjoying read aloud books together. What you have sounds fine. I don't even think you need AAS if reading isn't solid yet.

Thank you--looks like a great resource!

I had a similar experience judging essays for a scholarship. I often wondered how kids with such weak writing skills would make it in college. That was in my pre-homeschooling years. I'm curious about what formulaic writing program you're talking about--if indeed you have a specific one in mind.

Is there a good, and maybe even enjoyable, way to work on keyboarding skill (speed, accuracy) after a child has learned the basics. He can touch type to the point that he doesn't even want to look at his hands when keyboarding for papers and such, but I'd like him to be faster.

My middle schooler hasn't done any standardized testing. When should I start preparing for the PSAT (or SAT) and ACT? Are there good ways to do this in middle school?