Math mammoth I started with Singapore for k and 1st, and was really impressed with it. However......I found we were falling behind because I struggled to keep track of all the moving parts. The teachers manual with all of its extra activities and instruction. The textbook. The workbook. I switched to math mammoth after finishing Singapore 1a, and we get a lot more done. I'm better able to manage my 5 and7 year old together in it. The k'er spent the past year very slowly going through MM 1st grade along with manipulatives. My older daughter is almost ready to move on to MM 2

I'd like to start Latin with my nerdy 2nd grader (along with a tag along wild adhd type 1st grader) but my brain has been reduced to a puddle while trying to consider my options. I thought I was settled on prima Latina, but I don't know. And classical academic press looks so nice and shiny. But I can't decide which of their options would work best, or what out of all their product add ons and options I'd really need. And then when I research them on Amazon, bunch of other stuff from other publishers pops up, and soon I'm like "GAH, beer me!" Please, please. Crowd source me your favorite Latin resources for lower elementary. I tried and failed to find a definitive thread on here about it, though I'm positive it exists.

Oh lord. Yes.....I know it's coming. My first two are only 18 months apart, and I've had the baby/toddler dream team of chaos before. Just not while trying to be productive on a regular basis. Help me.

I would totally be planning to do school while he naps, but he doesn't nap anymore. He's at the awkward stage where he still needs a nap, but if he gets one he's up until 10:30 at night and then wakes up early the next morning. So he's either tired and wild in the afternoon and evening because he hasn't napped, or he's tired and wild the entire next day because he DID nap and then stayed up too late. Can't win. The toddler is definitely not helpful with math time. Haha So true. On Tuesday when I was trying to sit next to my five year old to work on subtraction, he was climbing my body and standing on my shoulders while laughing triumphantly. Then he'd jump from me onto the work table. :001_unsure:

OMG. Duct tape has definitely crossed my mind. Actually, my most successful containment tactic so far is to strap him into the baby's car seat in the living room so he can't beat his sisters with swords or stomp all over our books. : / I really like the idea of people taking turns entertaining the toddler, but the kid I most need to do school with (7yo) is the only one who's any good at getting along with him right now. My 5 year old just fights with him. I try to combine as much school as I can too, which means having both girls at the same time. I'm thinking I'll have a school box for him with some special Legos (he loves them), a kumon "school" book just for him, and some special art supplies. That and an endless supply of homemade Popsicles might work for a little while at least. Toddlers are crazy, man.

I've got an almost 3 year old boy who just recently developed a disruptive/destructive streak (new baby in the family, turning three, losing his nap....lots of reasons to choose from). He used to be easy to do school around, but now it's a bit of a nightmare doing anything. Even reading aloud. I'm starting up 1st and 2nd grade with my daughters in August, and haven't come up with any great ideas for how I'm going to handle baby brother. Has anyone had any successful toddler diversions they could inspire me with?

This has absolutely nothing to do with the topic, but I just had to say that your avatar is the best. Hahaha. ^_^ FWIW, I haven't used the MCT vocab, but if my kids weren't familiar with Spanish, I'd find all of the comparisons kind of irritating if they were used too much throughout the book. I'd also find it more helpful to have a few other languages showing the same Latin root.

Omg. I'm laughing over my breakfast at your 2yo curriculum. So true. I've got a rising 1st and 2 nd grader, and your homeschool dreams sound a lot like what I'd want mine to be like. Especially with morning time. We always have an audiobook in the car too. Right now we're doing the Penderwicks, which my super picky 5year old loves.

This is so true. It feels more safe to have someone else dictate your school year to you. I find myself fighting against two homeschool moms in me: the one who was public schooled and wants the familiarity of rigid, predetermined curriculum, and the rebellious anti-most normal things in society mom who wants to make her own decisions about what's good for each of her kids. When I was trying really hard to want to be a CC family a couple of times over the past 3 years, that was most of my motivation. I was trying to tell myself that it might be a good fit for us (which it completely isn't), and that the major expense it would be was worth it (which it wasn't), because I just wanted to feel like I was doing the right thing by doing what the other people were doing. My oldest two are going into 1st and 2nd grade this coming year, and we still haven't really found a homeschool tribe to call our own here. All in good time I guess.

I found a laminator at Costco for pretty cheap. Then laminated all the things.

Anyone who has experience with BW might be able to help me out. I'm looking at the quiver of arrows and the arrow for next year with my rising 2nd grader, and my biggest question about the arrow is whether each "season" of the releases for it follows a sequence of accumulated knowledge. For that matter, is the same true of the quiver of arrows? Like, does the knowledge of each issue build on the previous one, or it is scattered randomly? You can pick and choose issues to use, but I'm not sure if I'd be missing something.

Do co ops not immediately strike you as restful? Hahahaha. Looking at their website, the Schole groups are classical at the core, but with restful learning as an emphasis. At first I just thought they were groups you could start up to have as a support and activity group, but it looks more involve than that.

I'm intrigued by the scholé groups thing, but not sure totally what to make of it. Is anyone part of one? It looks to me like you need a director, and the group is actually a co op that does classes together. Is that right?

We did two open house days in two different groups when my kids were 5 and 6, and I just couldn't see how it would be beneficial for Them. It was very hard to sit through. None of the random bits of memory work had any meaning to the kids aside from being a piece of information to master. Most kids in the class looked like they were just getting through it. I get that having the community is a major draw, but the benefit of that was far outweighed by the price and methodology for my family. Cc would have ruined learning for my younger daughter because it goes against everything in her. She was physically freaking out by the end of the class. My oldest probably would have done fine with it, but fine is not enough to justify the price for me. I think I'm just way too Charlotte mason to do CC. Haha. I really wanted to love it too, because I wanted a community and to feel like I was doing "the best" for my kids. It just wasn't us though.

I really liked Consider This. Great book!

Thank you for that but of info! Ok so since you're a BW person, have you had any experience with the partnership writing stuff? I'm planning on doing jot it down with my 1st and 2nd grader in the fall, but partnership sounds like it might be good for after that.

Have used any of the arrow issues before? I was considering working a few in with my 2nd grader, but feel like maybe I have to just buy one before I can tell if it's something that would work for us. She's used to doing copywork at this point, but I don't know if the other parts of the arrow are going to be too much.

I've been tryyyyyying to get through A Philosophy of Education by Charlotte mason. But I keep getting distracted by all of the other books in my towering piles of things to read. I also wanted to learn to bullet journal to keep my brain more organized. And, not educator related, but I discovered that my library gives free access to Lynda.com and I was poking around their graphic design section! Has anyone else read How To Read A Book by Mortimer Adler? I just picked it up at a book sale yesterday because I've been wanting to read it. I never really learned much about how to write well, logic, rhetoric, or anything else classy like that in my awesome public school experience. So I've been wishing I could begin teaching myself before teaching the kids, but I totally don't know where to start!

We were going through child's history of the world this past year, and I figured I'd pause that when we started up MYstery of history this coming cycle. But now that you mention it, I could totally add in some appropriate chapters along with what we do in MoH

Oh, wonderful! Thanks!

Anyone want to share what they have planned for each of their kids during this coming school year? And maybe what they're keeping/ditching from the previous year? I thought I had a pretty good idea of what I wanted to do, and now I'm swimming around in a sea of curriculum options for now and the distant future, and feeling confused. Nailing down what works for us as a family seems like it will be a multi year adventure. As of now, the things I *think* I'm settled on (ha. Might change by this afternoon) 2nd grader Math mammoth (finish 1st level, start 2) Story book of science Mystery of history ancients plus read alouds IEW poetry memorization Bravewriter jot it down projects Bible reading from the Message Prima Latina Lots of read aloud time I'm going back and forth on what to do with the rest of language arts. She's a very advanced reader, and likes writing her own stories and poems. I'd like to help her spelling and writing skills catch up to her interest level. Considering starting michael clay Thompson island level, but I'm not sure. I'm also looking at rod and staff spelling. I'd also considered bravewriter partnership writing, but will probably hold off on that. We did a variety of things this past year, including first language lessons and copywork from simply Charlotte mason. For art and artist studies, I haven't really decided on doing anything in particular. She loves to draw. We do art hub sometimes, and are using meet the masters over the summer for free. 1st grader (turns 6 in the end of August) My younger daughter tends to tag along disruptively during whatever I'm doing with her older sister. She learns through osmosis a lot of the time, and has a hard time staying still for anything. Tends towards adhd type behavior, but is very bright. So I don't want to saddle her with too much to do that will turn her off of learning. im pretty much planning to have her join in on all of her sister's stuff as she's interested. She loves poetry, and I'm mostly doing jot it down for her. She's already doing 1st grade math mammoth. And I'll give her her own copywork selections. Please share your plans too!

I don't have a lot to add after all of the great advice above, but I can just give you a virtual hug and say that sleep deprivation, wild kids, life swallowing you whole....those are all things I can completely relate to. We have 4 kids, and there are days where I just feel like shutting down and sinking into the reality that I obviously was not cut out for this. It's hard when you're deep within exhaustion and nothing working right. You need some form of rest to allow you to power through the rest of life. Find some way that you're comfortable with to enjoy some time where nobody needs anything from you (except the baby). It helps just to get a mental break from playing referee to all of the craziness constantly.

I tried to use it at the beginning of this past school year with my 6 year old 1st grader (and K sister tagging along), but I realized that I was substituting so many things that I might as well not bother even trying to follow the schedule anymore. I like the idea of CM and Classical inspiring the curriculum, as well as the usage of modern books, but it just didn't work for us this year. The reading selections were getting way too long for my kids to sit through. I even had to abandon ELTL partway through, even though I LOVED it to start with because the reading was getting too long every day, and I didn't have time for other read alouds.

Thank you for your input! I'm looking up the Rod and Staff spelling for consideration.

I feel more motivated to do spelling of some sort, just to expedite the process of my daughter being able to get her thoughts onto a page. She has such amazing stories!