Do you mind me asking, what level would you choose for two 5th graders with no Latin experience, to be taught by a mom who also has no experience with Latin (that would be me)? And what if you were starting a very bright 8th grader - would he use the same thing, or is there something better for that grade level?

I have twice written long detailed posts on this thread, and twice, I have accidentally deleted them before pushing submit. Grrr! Now I have to make dinner, so this post will be short. I feel for you, they are so different and I have that disparity going on here too. Narration is very tricky for Littlest, 8, and it's been both maddening and therapuetic to work on it. He sighs when I ask him to give a narration after every reading (except bedtime stories), and when he asks why he has to, I tell him he knows - and he answers, "Because it makes my brain stronger." Yup. WWE was a bust here, as the passages out of context were too difficult for him to focus on. I read more about Charlotte Mason's philosophies, and learned that her view on teaching narration was not to get the children to tell back a main point or review the story in 5 sentences, but to spread a rich feast of ideas before the child, and use narration to show that the child is making connections in his learning - and the connections may be the same as or different than the ones we'd make, or he may come to the same conclusions as we have, but only after years - or he may come to some fabulous conclusions we'd never have thought of. I wrote a lot here before I deleted it, but for now, if you'd like to read a little about how narration has worked at our house, this blog post details it just a bit: http://undertheevergreens.blogspot.com/2011/07/giving-thanks.html Hang in there, he will get it!

It's not a bad idea to spread out Preparing over a longer time - actually, Charlotte Mason might have used the materials for a much longer time than HOD schedules them for. If you look at Ambleside Online, you'll see how books are spread over terms and some over years, read slowly, a chapter or two a week, with lots of literature, nature reading and classics mixed in. You could easily take Preparing at a slower pace, and check a list like AO to add in other reading (don't forget to look down a level or two also - AO is very rigorous). If you look at the weekly schedules, they might give you an idea of how things could be set up using Preparing more slowly. We are using CTC with two ds 11, and while I believe they're placed correctly, we're adjusting things also, to fit how we do things around here: we are using a different science book for the first few months, I'm eliminating a lot of busiwork and requiring an oral narration for each reading, and we're using our own LA program (Intermediate Language Lessons). I'm also using books from AO's lists as readers and skipping DITHOR, as I believe reading and oral narration are enough. Just my opinion, FWIW. Whatever you do, try not to worry! Slow down to what feels right, trust yourself, and have some fun with it.

This may not be what you are looking for, but my ds was a 12- 1/2 year old 7th grader last year asking for challenges as well. He ate up the Fallacy Detective quickly, I would like to find something else for logic. The big surprise for me? I ordered the 8th grade Lightning Lit program, and he LOVED it, and begged to do another unit this year. He loved the writing assignments, the reading, the teaching. We skipped most of the busywork, BTW, like crossword puzzles, word searches, etc. Maybe something to check out?

Thanks for the input, I do appreciate opinions on the depth of this study. I received similar responses on the HOD board, and I'll share just a bit for the sake of others reading this who wondered the same thing. On the HOD board, people said that yes, this program doesn't appear to have as many resources as a classical program might, but that it goes deeper and the retention has been great for their kids because of the CM method, the narration, the notebooking, etc. It was also pointed out that the history package of storytime books adds a lot to the study, and The Boy of the Pyramids and God King were mentioned in particular. I hadn't bought all of the storytime books because I own so many classics as well as books from that time period, and planned to schedule my own read alouds, but I'll be ordering the Boy of the Pyramids today (own the God King already).

School doesn't start officially here until next week, but we have been easing into subjects, starting with math and reading over the past few weeks, and doing our first day of HOD's Creation to Christ today (we have appointments with Shriners Hospital next week and decided to try to squeeze in a full week doing it this way). I have been SO excited about starting this curriculum, but as I've been browsing through the upcoming weeks and the books, and as we worked through today, it seems like everything taught is Biblical history. Coming from a background of teaching with SOTW, Biblioplan and Sonlight, I was looking for a change, but I am wondering, where is the other history? Are we going to cover the Egyptians, or is everything told through Biblical history, at least until the Greeks? I like a Biblical perspective and some of the stuff is fascinating, but is that all there is? I know many people here rave about this curriculum and have high standards for education and their materials, so I'd appreciate input from those who've had experience with this. Thanks!

I'm removing this as I've reposted with a more detailed header. Thanks.

Our copy is called The Adventures of Pinocchio, by Carlo Collodi; it says it's translated from the original Italian, so it must be unabridged. Love it!

The best way to learn history, in my book, is the one that allows the child to both enjoy and retain it. For some children, SOTW straight-up, read aloud and discussed, is the ticket. I have one of those. For others, they have to read it themselves; I have one of those too. For some (I have a few of these), reading SOTW in order is confusing - they need it grouped by civilization or topic. For most, adding in great historical fiction makes the learning richer, deeper and more fun. We love it. For all, using whatever you have along with narration - having the child tell you what they remember about the story, not necessarily bullet points you might have chosen, but their observations - makes the history stick. If the child isn't able to understand well enough to narrate, you will know whatever materials or methods you have going on may not be the best for that child, at that time. One thing I've found is that most of the plans I've used (Sonlight, Biblioplan)are overly ambitious in the amount they schedule; slowing down and savoring the books a bit more slowly is really allowing the kids to enjoy things, and learn more too. It sounds as if you have chosen great things - add in some historical fiction as suggested, and have fun!

There are a few scattered characters who might use a bit of bad language, but my husband, who does the nightly read-alouds, edited on the fly, the same way we have for books like Cheaper By the Dozen, in which the father has rather spicy language. I don't necessarily know when he's editing as he reads, so I'm not sure how much language is involved, but we both feel the character-building aspects of the stories, and the history, make these books winners. We're rather particular, but we love them and intend to keep reading the rest of the series, if that's any help.

Just wanted to second the recommendation for Moccasin Trail. We loved all the books mentioned, but when I asked my guys which book they liked best last year, it was Moccasin Trail that got their vote - it helped us to more clearly visualize and understand the trials of western migration, and had great story that really captured their interest.

We just finished Pinocchio, and are wrapping up Cameron Townsend. Just before those two, we'd read in turn the first three books of the Little Britches series, and the boys are begging to read the fourth next. Mary Poppins is in line for Littlest as well. Great books!

I've had the same experience, and have actually found the most help regarding HOD on this forum. I am so thankful for this place and all the open, helpful input here!

This is one of my favorites: http://www.wildflowersandmarbles.blogspot.com/ I love her learning space posts, and her how-tos regarding CM style LA.

I love the morning basket idea! We have a few things that seem to help with mornings at our house. One is routine: after breakfast and chores, we take a bike ride/walk to get the wiggles out before we begin. Another is the schedule: ds8, more than any of them, really needs to know what is happening when, and it helps to have things fairly predictable. Math is his least favorite, so we do it first every day, while his brain is fresh, so we can move on to things he enjoys more. The most important element of keeping our mornings (and days) running smoothly is habit. Several of mine have started their home school careers by working hard on developing the habits of whining, procrastinating, dawdling and complaining. I realized this could never be tolerated at school, and what is sort of passable but annoying at 5 would be intolerable in a few years. So I really focused on that habit, moreso than even advancing quickly in the work they were doing. If the child could give me 15 minutes of focused time of getting a lesson done without theatrics, that was work well done. I've been thinking about this again and actually blogged about it yesterday if you want to hear more on this (see link in signature).

I love Charlotte Mason and continue to learn so much from her writings. I'm not sure what she really espoused regarding phonics, but we have used the Explode the Code products from the beginning in our home school, and don't feel they interfere with CM philosophy. The lessons are short, the children's interest is high, and they get the job done. We follow with Pathway Readers and then real books.

Thanks, Donna, for your input on both the notebooking and ILL. I had a R&S 4 set in my cart last night, ready to buy, but I just couldn't do it! Instead I sat nearby with ILL until 11pm, reading through it, trying to make up my mind. I really do like the way ILL covers skills, even if it's not a traditional (school) scope and sequence, and I do like the varied poetry and artwork. I will give it a go, and if it really doesn't mesh well, we can order the materials scheduled in CTC for LA - I do see they are very carefully planned to work together, and are likely wonderful parts of the program Thanks again.

Good. I'm sort of sick of Robert Frost and I don't really like some of his poetry, but we do love the watercolor that goes with them. It'll be nice to see someone other than Robert Frost.:) A suggestion? What we've done in the past with poetry (and I think I learned of it here), is to have Tuesday Poet-Teas, where we each chooose a poem or two, and meet over a boy-baked treat and grandmother's dishes at snacktime, and we share our poems in turn as we eat our snacks. It's been fun to hear the older enjoy Tolkien poems from Stories and Poems for Highly Intelligent Children of All Ages, the middles share poetry from Favorite Poems Old and New (our all-time favorite poetry book), and youngest proudly read poems from When We Were Very Young, or Child's Garden of Verses. It takes all of 15-20 minutes once a week, we don't analyze but do discuss if they choose, and it keeps learning poetry fun and light. And they don't know that four boys sitting around the table drinking tea and reading poetry with their mother would be considered highly uncool at school, LOL. I'm thinking we'll continue that even though we're doing CTC with the two ds11, as we'd miss it too much. Your thoughts on the Robert Frost poetry lessons reinforce that idea...

Thanks so much for the great input! I guess maybe I will spring for the notebooking pages...my other option was to buy these neat, black, hardbound books I found that had blank pages on the right, for drawing, and lines on the left, and use those as the notebooks. But that wouldn't take care of maps. For clarification on the LA - and maybe you already knew I meant this - if I used ILL, I would use HOD's dictation, we would do copywork as written and oral narration with one written per week, and skip the R & S and WWTB. Would it still be overkill? Guess I'm just having pangs over leaving ILL, we love it so. Thanks!

"I suppose you don't NEED the notebooking pages, but the prophesies and fullfillment are all in the beginning and it ends up to be a scrapbook of information, filling in certain boxes. If you keep your Units together, as it says "in Unit 1 box # put ___ here", and keep the separate units as 1 page, it should be okay. It may be confusing in the directions though if you can get past that." Ok, I get what you're saying here. But tell me, is there a good reason it all has to be on one page, or could there be separate pages for these things that are just filed as they are done? Thanks!

We will be starting soon, and are just doing math and reading every day as a sort of warm-up for the next two weeks; something we've been doing on and off during the summer anyway when we haven't been travelling. I am so excited to start the CTC history books, but am piecing together the read-alouds and readers from the ridiculous library I accumulated the last time I did this history cycle, as well as books from Ambleside Online. Still trying to decide whether using Intermediate Language Lessons along with CTC's dictation, copywork and narration would be overkill, or whether I should give in and do it as written. A question for folks: do I need the notebooking pages? I have been thinking we will do it more traditionally CM style and use blank notebooks, where they can record their narrations and drawings without as much step-by-step instruction. Would this work? Is there anything I really need in those notebooking pages? Thanks, I love hearing how it's going for everyone!

Amy, thanks. I've never used a writing program to teach my kids, and have had good luck with having them start written narration at about age 10, increasing my expectations when they get older. That said, the LA programs I've used in grades 2-6, Primary Language Lessons and Intermediate Language Lessons, do introduce writing gently and incrementally, but not in the same way as a more packaged program in which you'd learn more formulaic writing and terminology. I'm not sure which camp WWTB falls more toward. We may just use the CTC poetry and dictation as well, adding in ILL and narrations. I'm also still debating whether I need the student pages, or whether I can have them do the sort of work suggested in hardbound blank books, which leave lots of room for illustration. Hmmmmm.

Thanks for sharing that. I wish I'd been able to pick up a used copy of R&S 4 so I could get a better idea of what it might look like. We are pretty committed to a CM way of doing things, and I don't know enough of what the R&S will look like as scheduled in CTC, or anything about what Write With the Best would incorporate, to know whether this would totally clash with the way I like to "do school." I can imagine that you're right about the duplication; in years when I've tried to add in formal grammar or other writing programs with ILL, I did feel we duplicated efforts at times. Might you be able to share a bit about what the WWTB program asks of kids? Thanks for helping me think this through!

I finally bought the HOD CTC instructor's guide and most of the materials, but I'm still undecided on the LA. I like that the guide has dictation and poetry built in, but I'm not sure I want to use Rod and Staff and know very little about Write With the Best. We've used Serle's Intermediate Language Lessons for three years with ds13 and for one with the two ds who will be using CTC, and I hate to give it up; love the gentle instruction and great writing practice. We also require written narrations for writing practice. However, I'd like to instill some more formal grammar this year, and R&S might be a key - but I know nothing about the writing program CTC schedules and don't want to toss out something that works for an unknown. Does anyone have experience with CTC's LA, who can chime in on this? Thanks so much!

Twoxcell, I have seen a guide, but not for CTC. I bought Bigger for my youngest ds, but ended up returning it when I realized it's not a good fit for him. I didn't have issue with that guide, in particular, but the online samples for CTC looked as if they were doing a lot of fill-in-the-blank type copywork, though my impressions could be wrong. Thanks for your input!