I would say the Wand is mostly introducing writing to a very young child. There is copywork, phonograms, spelling, reading, and lots of snuggle time with mom. It's a really gentle writing program for younger kids and I think would be enough for spelling for me for that age range as well. Becky

I have used Spelling Plus and Sequential spelling for adults. Both programs I used as a word list. I had my child use a white board and spell words that I dictated to him until he came to one word that he couldn't spell. That word was written on a word list. We continued in this vein until we had 5 words in the word list. The next day, he would copy those words and then we would add five more. He would continue to add words until he had 15 or 20 words and then he would copy them (I taught study methods) every day until he was ready for a test. Word missed would be added to the new spelling list. Works pretty well. I think I have more intuituve spellers, though. After they really started reading harder books, spelling started to be more natural (about 11-12 years old). I've done this with my oldest three boys now, and while they aren't perfect spellers, it has worked well. Becky

Re-reading The Writer's Jungle Listen to any podcasts I can get my hands on so I can re-energize for my 12th year of Homeschooling! Making planners that my older kids will help fill out every Monday (proclick?) American History planning for grades 1-7 (history pockets + A concise History of US + ????) Cleaning every room in my house Reading a bunch of books for my own entertainment Lots of swimming and visiting! (And a million other things :lol: )

What about Dictation Day by Day? It's not consumable, but it's really great! The first half of the book has half a year's dictations, the middle of the book is poetry to memorize or copy (grade appropriate) the third part of the book has the rest of the dictation lessons. We are using the second grade book for my second grader, but it is plenty easy enough for a first grader. I love daily dictation! We take our spelling lists from the book (I put them into spelling city) and they practice handwriting and mechanics rules while copying--it's a kill 3 birds with one stone book for me! I found my copy free on google books. I also bought a copy from amazon. We are using grades 2,3, and 5 with my kiddos. I just uploaded the books to my phone and use an app to access to books. Easy!

I have used The Wand. We used it as a beginning introduction to spelling. Each lesson is (loosley) based on a book you read together. We studied some of the words in the lesson, writing them on a white board or forming them from magnet tiles. You make a file folder that contains colored post it notes with the various phonograms on them and use them to practice spelling/reading the words. My son thought it was a very snuggly, special time with mom. He really loved it. I thought it was kind of confusing--having to read through a bunch of material to get started teaching the lesson or to even determine what the lesson was! Nonetheless, once I got the hang of it, it started to go more smoothly. We didn't continue with it after about 3 months. We love the writer's jungle! We use the Arrows and I love their jot-it-down, partnership and faltering ownership writing programs. We do teatime, freewrites, movie review days, etc. I get a lot out of this lifestyle, but was not able to work The Wand into our homeschool. Becky

Thanks for this! There is a lot of valuable stuff here, but I can't see how it lines up with the concise edition of Hakim's A History of US. I'm hoping not to have to plan this all myself, but I usually have to . . . Becky

Are there student books and teacher books (like quizzes, assignments, etc) to go with these books? I'm going to need some way for my son to interact with these books, or he will skim the words and read without comprehension. He's in 7th grade next year, but is a struggling reader, so this is the right reading level for him. Becky

My thought is that mental math comes with practice. I talk about the mental math way to do everything, but let my children do the math in the way that makes them the most comfortable. We've done singapore for a long time and they all eventually get it. If it really bothers you, what about making a "warm up" problem before every lesson and keep practicing the mental math. But my experience says that might just make the kid hate that type of math and shut down. You might just want to lay it aside and revisit it again when mental math comes up with the thousands place in 3A. You know your kid best!

I love Bravewriter! We only school three days a week because of outside commitments, but we use the Arrows and branch off and find our own dictation and copywork from our read alouds. We do Freewrites on Fridays, Teatime on Wednesdays and work on our writing projects from the Jot-It-Down and Partnership writing programs sporadically. My kids love to freewrite! I have plans to incorporate more Bravewriter next year, but I'm tired. . . .

For a cheaper option, we buy these water bottles from Dick's Sporting Goods every summer My kids lose water bottles too fast for me to bother investing in something as nice as hydro flask! Becky

If you like magical stories Heckedy Peg and Elbert's Bad Word by Don and Audrey Wood

I'd say yes to busywork. I use it. Schools use it. It serves a purpose. I use Math Mania and puzzle mania books (by highlights) to help my kids do something productive while they are waiting for me. Also, they listen to the story of the world (headphones) and color the corresponding coloring page (or write a short summary). My kids practice their spelling words on spelling city, and also practice math facts on xtramath.com while they are waiting for their turn with mom. We've checked out books on CD weekly and had kids read those when waiting. We have a large collection of Jim Weiss stories and we used those for a season. I have assigned history pockets projects to assemble in the past. We have a large engino set and I've had kids build one model from the set for busy work. I've set out puzzles for them to work on (required if they are getting noisy) The younger ones I have set up in front of any educational DVD or streaming show for some part of their day. Mostly I'm fine if they go play with each other (somewhere where I am not because they are noisy!) but if they are fighting or destroying, I start directing their time again.

I love this method of teaching reading. I have taught three with phonics exclusively and three with sight words and phonics together. I explained the simple phonics rules as we came across the words in the text and reinforced with word building on a white board and explode the code. I think this method as worked pretty well for my last three kids. I prefer the sight word/phonics combo because it gets kids reading faster and also because I never had the intestinal fortitude to stick it out with intensive phonics instruction.

I have taught Singapore math 3A for 4 different kids and I've got 2 more coming up. My first piece of advice is to take a break and do something else for a while. Perhaps with a MM section? Or take a bit and review clocks or skip to the geometry or measurement sections of the book. There is something gained sometimes from waiting for maturity/understanding. But also, some of the understanding can come later. On some level I am okay with just learning the algorithims for long multiplication and division and not worrying about "what it all means." I know that my daughter has a lot of time with me to understand what exactly she is doing. Not all of my kids needed to understand the "why" before they started the algorithm. Some of them were very frustrated and just wanted to know what to do and never even retained all of my careful manipulative demonstrations that I carried out before and during the lessons. They were focused on the what to do, and now that they understand the what, they are more receptive to the why behind it all. Depends on the kid!

Thank you, everybody. I didn't even get that they were talking about the value of the 4 in the long division algorithm. That helps immensely! I still think it is complete waste of time and energy to talk about the problem in this way. It's so confusing! Why are schools wasting their time teaching this when kids can't even DO the standard algorithm for long division? It seems like this problem is geared to teach the children what long division means, but it is only confusing the issue. . .

My friend's son just came home with this math problem as homework: John found that there are at least 400 14's in 6371. What will be the next question in solving the problem below? 6371 divided by 14 = a. how many 14's are in 4971 b. how many 14's are in 1371 c. how many 14's are in 771 Now, I get that the answer is c, but what is the point of this problem? How does knowing how to work with mulitples of 14 help you? It sure isn't one of the facts my kids memorize. Isn't it just faster to do the long division? Why is common core so focused on approaching multiplication and division from such complicated methods? I don't see this helping any child.

I've dealt with a lot of different types of math learners in my homeschool. My first was a very VSL learner. The second two were intuitive. The fourth is math phobic. I keep using a math curriculum that I like (Singapore--it speaks to me) and I keep tweaking it to fit the different learners. Two of my kids have required a lot of help to get through the word problems (lots and lots of repetition--we do the really hard ones together and I don't even worry about it). I've slowed down, stopped math for a season, made my own worksheets, required memorization of math facts to move on added extra reviews, skipped reviews, handed over the multiplication facts chart to struggling students, etc, etc. Some of my kids are very parts to whole, others are the opposite. I think what really helped my kids was emotional support. If they feel supported and that "we're in this together" they can continue to work on it. Keep trying different things. Something will eventually click. Try to have your child focus on what they are good at and tell him that everyone struggles with something. Math is just his "thing." If you can get him to believe you and believe that you will help him and that he can help himself and that he will be able to do it, eventually, you will make it through. There really is no secret formula. Okay, so the secret sauce for me is: the al-abacus from Right Start. I taught that program to my kids for a few seasons (too time consuming for me) and I fell in love with it. It really makes math visual when they are having trouble visualizing it. math on the white board is more fun than on paper math where mom writes and tells you what to write gets you through those hard days. base 10 blocks demonstrate numbers very easily, too. Fraction circles help me teach fractions in the beginning, but I don't use them very much Multiplication facts should be memorized at some point. We are still working on this with my 6th grader (for automaticity--he skip counts the big ones over and over), 4th and 2nd graders. Right now we are using xtramath.org We have also used flash cards, calculadders, sidewalk chalk, copywork, skip counting songs. . .

If I had to do it all over again, I wouldn't abandon picture books too early. All of these books mentioned are just as good or better at a bit older ages.

yes. it's crazy. Do you read these boards? do you know how often people switch math curricula?

I have a struggling speller and reader. He is 12 and in the 6th grade. He is currently reading on grade level (yay!), but his spelling and writing and mechanics are way behind. I am considering AAS, but I am concerned about the teacher time. I have 3 other kids younger than him who need my time, too. Plus, he would really like to be more independent with his work and rely on me less (I'm usually busy and then he has to wait and gets distracted). What to use for spelling? We have used Spelling Plus (going through the word lists, only practicing words he doesn't know), spelling workout (used only as a workbook--it's useless),Apples and Pears a long time ago--it was good, but it was hard to speed him up when it was stuck on words he knew. AAS would be a good fit, right? How much time will it take me? Becky

I had my 7th grade son enrolled at the local jr high part time--science, orchestra, pe, I think. I just went in and told them what I wanted and they said okay. Becky in Mesa, AZ

Another anecdotal opinion: I've seen this with all my kids. It goes away eventually. It is an annoying way to add, though. For my kids, it went away some time in 1st grade material.

The video quality was so horrible, the search interface was terrible, too. Lots of videos but they were do poorly categorized as to be almost useless. Looking for a video was a bit like flipping through a poorly alphabetized dictionary. Plus, I bought it through HSBC, so when I decided I hated it I couldn't get my money back. I would never waste that money again.

"There is no crying over schoolwork" Because I have learned to put my relationship with my kids first before the expectations and also because learning stops when the crying starts. Also, Just keep swimming, swimming, swimming.

My 8th grader is studying helping verbs at the local academic "advanced" charter school. My 10th grader still doesn't capitalize I every time. I think it has something to do with texting and the internet. He's getting in trouble for it at school, so he's starting to intentionally remember--he's been going to public school for 3 years now! My 9 year old girl sounds just like your daughter. She remembers, she forgets, I remind her. She remembers, she forgets, I remind her. She is where she is--I really don't think public school would be the magic bullet. She goes to "public school" two days a week for a homeschool enrichment program and there are lots of challenges like--when she forgets, the class moves on and then she's behind. In subjects where she is not working on grade level, she feels "dumb." Grammar isn't that important, in my opinion. I can teach an 8th grader in 1 month what it takes YEARS to teach an elementary student about grammar. It is a very abstract concept and doesn't really apply to those concrete learning years, I think.