If you use WWE, do you use something else for grammar, or are the grammar concepts woven in to WWE enough?

Life of Fred will be our math "spine", and we will be using Right Start activities and games, computer games, and board games and activities for extra practice. For Language arts, all I am certain about is sticking with AAS (Level 3), and letting him continue to read to his little heart's content. We will be trying WWE when it arrives next week, and will be trying to play catch up with grammar and composition over the summer. That has been a hard area for him. For History, Geography, Literature, and Bible we will be doing Sonlight Core C, hopefully weaving this content in with what we come up with for WWE. Science will be Sonlight Science C, and a couple co-op classes as this is his big area of interest. He's dying for me to teach him cursive, so will probably use HWOT for that. And I want to start Spanish and ASL lightly with all the kids together. Hoping to encourage him into a co-op music class, but not holding my breath. And of course, he will keep me running all around town for sports. Oh my goodness. Three boys in this house! I feel very good about our plans except for LA. We are feeling that out. Not sure how to help him with writing. He just seems stumped.

I would say French and ASL. ASL is so natural for kids to pick up, fun to pepper in with your lessons, and in our experience, helps reinforce learning for visual and kinesthetic learners (like finger spelling during spelling lessons, etc.). You can use entertaining programs like the Signing Time series to learn effortlessly, and it makes a lot of sense as it is (more or less) one to one correlation with english. French sounds potentially useful for you, and probably most enjoyable with your background. With your background, you will be able to incorporate French into daily activities more easily, which will help deepen the learning experience. We will be doing ASL (more formally) and Spanish beginning next year, for the same reasons.

My little one who is learning to write, and is left handed, has a unique pencil grasp he prefers. When we are practicing writing, I make him use the tripod grasp, but if he is up to his own devices, he uses his other grasp, and he is actually much more controlled. I have been watching him, and I can see from a left handed writer's perspective that his unique grasp is functional. It helps him to see what he is writing, where the tripod grasp covers what he is writing, and he is essentially "flying blind". Us right handers get the benefit of immediately seeing what we are producing with our pen as we cross the paper. So, what is the consensus of forcing a left handed student to use the traditional tripod pencil grasp? Should I require that? Or is there benefit to him to using what is more comfortable, as long as he is able to make the usual progress toward neatness and control in his writing?

I have a fun question. We homeschool my 10 year old son who has Down syndrome through a charter. Next year the only thing we will need to buy new is handwriting workbooks, as we are still whittling away at his his math and reading curriculum, so I essentially have his entire curriculum budget to spend on enriching extras! I feel like I get to have a shopping spree! I have already decided to purchase the Signing Time series. What other enriching activities do you have on hand that you consider essential, fun, really useful for helping to develop skills like literacy, number sense, addition operations, fine motor skills, life skills, problem solving, sequencing, etc. Thanks!

Our catalogue arrived as well, and now I am drawing out plans on how I can do two different cores and still keep the kids studying the same general themes. They changed their approach so you do not need to also purchase the LA program withe the History/Bible/Lit, and now it is all the more wonderful sounding to me. I do enjoy it so much, and receiving that box this summer with all our supplies was a very special day for the kids. Stupid catalog. ;)

We use Life of Fred. That is a good question. I don't know what the author recommends. Each book has 19 chapters. If you did 2 chapters per week, starting in 1st grade, you would be doing long multiplication by the time you ended 2nd grade--which I think would be pretty ambitious for most kids. So I would say 1 or 2 chapters a week if you start in 1st grade, with plenty of practice reinforcing what is learned in fun, exciting, hands on ways. That is what we are doing. We did not start off that way. We started this year, my son's 2nd grade year, with Apples so we could get the whole story, and we blazed through the books until we reached Goldfish. In Goldfish the material was new (multiplication), and it was clear we could and should slow down. So now we are doing 2 chapters per week, and on days we don't do a chapter we do Rightstart Math games, Mathtacular Kit projects and DVD's, money math games, practice solving for area, review LOF concepts we've put onto flash cards, computer games, apps, etc. to reinforce and extend what we are learning in Fred. It seems to me to be working very well--my kids LOVE Fred, and they beg for math. I think we will get through Honey, and then maybe it will be good to have a summer break, and a chance to mature a little more before moving on to the next big steps in Fred. :)

I'm wondering similar things. We use Sonlight, but that was what we chose when we were starting our first year homeschooling with just one child, now we have two very different levels, soon to be three. We don't cut things out of our program, but if I have to start adding a lot in (and we already add quite a bit), then is it worth it to buy an all-in-one that I'm having to add on top of? Wayfarers looks really awesome, and the layout is very visual-dependent-mommy friendly. You can down load a very generous sample from the Barefoot Ragamuffins website. I printed a portion of it out to sit down yesterday and "pretend plan" it. I found it very easy. There is plenty of room on the actual schedule grid to write in your own choice of what you are using, for math or science, for instance, and since you are not buying everything as a bundle, you are not laying those unused things aside. I like that a lot. I am heavily considering it. I LOVE Sonlight, and might use it one more year until it starts jumping in maturity level past what my littlest is able to keep up with, then switch over to Wayfarers, and bring along some of the books we really cherish from Sonlight. I think there is definitely room for doing that kind of thing with Wayfarers--at least from my experience "pretending" to use it. ;)

Okay, just curious. My city sounds more laid back than yours. :) I think we are pretty non-gifted, regular folks in this household, but we're feeling pretty alright about that, thankfully. My oldest has Down syndrome, so I'm no stranger to waiting for kids to be developmentally ready for learning skills before we sweat over it. We've got very strong family histories of dyslexia and ADHD on both side of our family, and this little guy definitely has some interesting things going on. Just waiting for it all to come out in the wash.

Early signs of dyslexia in your lefties? I've got concerns with this one, and a family history to boot.

May I ask what HWT is?

Just curious is there is a recommended handwriting font for students who are left handed? My 5 year old has not started formally learning handwriting yet, but looking into what I want to get him for next year.

Thank you. We used SOTW Student Active Book, event though we did not use that spine this year, and it worked well. I really love the layout of this. The author's brain must work similarly to mine. And the book suggestions look really great, too. Blessed to have three boys who beg for "just one more chapter". This curriculum really does look like it's up our alley.

I went and checked it out. Thank you! I really like the way that is laid out, and I like the combination of the spine to bring everything together, and the other books to enrich. I like the full color (sad to say just how important that is for MY learning style--or maybe I should say my teaching needs). And the art. I am not seeing any worksheets? That is something that, believe it or not, is important to my kids, but I could improvise like I did this year. I am going to look at this very intently. Thank you.

Sonlight is so enjoyable! We have used the P4/5 a long time ago, and this year we used Sonlight Core B for our first year homeschooling grade school age kids. Next year we will be using something that is already designed to integrate different age levels as we will be adding a Kindergarten brother, and a brother with an intellectual disability. With Sonlight you can make it work to span age levels, but our needs are extra complicated. ;) Core B was not too inappropriate for my 5yo (who listened in), except for one book, but I have heard the Core's have quite the jump in maturity level of content, so even though we were purchasing Sonlight for my 2nd grader, I went with Core B instead of C which is what would come with their full grade package for 2nd grade. If I was buying for someone in 1st or K, I would get Core A. :) There is so much good stuff. You will really enjoy it. :)

Thank you for your reply. I've had a lot of TOG recommendations, so I actually decided to get one Tapestry of Grace unit to try for the rest of this school year. I was able to find books on half.com, and I just got the digital version for sake of cost, which is a bit confusing, but I have been duly warned it just takes some getting used to. I like it. I can see how they will all get something out of it, and I like all the levels being side by side, so I can kind of go up or down with the grammar levels for book choices and activities. We'll see how it goes!

Oh my goodness, they LOVE being read too. Who would have thought, 3 wiggly boys begging for "just one more chapter". :) My 2nd grader, going on 24, reads to his brothers a lot for me. I think it is one reason why I just can't split us up into different groups for history. Or science, at this stage. They all just participate at their own level of understanding and ability, but that is life, right? Thank you for your insight.

I don't have advice, but I could have written your post word for word. First year homeschooling, gifted child, reading level WAY above average, ability to comprehend very complex ideas, memory like a steel trap, poor spelling but AAS is working wonders for him, talks my ear off, can dictate paragraphs, stories, ideas, etc, but put a pencil in his hand, and it is as if there is a concrete barrier between his brain and paper. Pretty interesting. One idea I had that I have not implemented yet, is to get him a recorder to record his ideas and play back to himself. He is an auditory learner anyway, and actually does better at writing from oral dictation than from written copy work, so I figure it's worth a shot.

Hmm... I hadn't thought of that. As varied as their academic levels are, they are their own little pack of boys. Quite inseparable (they insist on all three sharing one bedroom in fact), so it's hard for me to think about doing anything separate with them, but amount of work for me is a major consideration with the special needs we have--including mine. :) I will add Memoria to my list of things to google. Thank you for your insight. :)

Thank you for your perspective. I am thinking of trying out one unit to start to see how it sits with the crew--I like that it is available that way. The teachers notes seem intimidating to me, but I had the idea to have them bound separately than the rest of the program for night stand reading material. I like the multi-level writing assignments. We are not a crafty family, but my boys love worksheets and maps, and TOG appears to have plenty.

This is our first year homeschooling. We started with just my 2nd grader this fall. In February, we added big brother (3rd grade) who has Down syndrome. Next year, little brother (age 5) will also formally join us. We have been using the Sonlight Core B program this year, which has been an extremely enjoyable survey of Ancient History. Unfortunately, with a precocious 8 year old on my hands, a big brother who is at a Kindergarten level, and an actual Kindergartener, next year would mean doing two separate cores. I just can't justify that with the intensive demands of schooling my son with Down syndrome, and also adding little brother, who has some very challenging developmental quirks (not full delays at this point). We need to find an equally enjoyable program, that has a little more in terms of activities and learning retention for visual/kinesthestic people, but still has all those wonderful living books. So, my wish list for a program would be one that includes History and Bible. If it has LA, like Sonlight does, the LA needs to be adaptable. It needs to be for multiple levels of students, it needs to have worksheets or other practical hands on activities that bring home the material for my kinesthetic/visual learners. It needs to involve living books. And it needs to be easy for me to plan. I've looked extensively at My Father's World, and Tapestry of Grace. I like My Father's World TM's grid that I can see at a glance and check off boxes. I'm not a box checker, but I am very scattered, so it helps keep me accountable. I don't like the science with MFW, only because my middle son is a science guy, and we've ready all those books already. I would have to choose another science program. Sonlight science is working for us in that area. I like Tapestry a lot, but you guys, it is SO much. Like I said, I am really scattered, and as I was looking at a sample week on their website, it just lost me once it got to the teacher pages. I don't know if I could do TOG justice for my kids. I've looked at Biblioplan briefly, but their website was not visual learner/ADD mommy friendly. Just lots of reading, not enough showing me what's involved. I think that is why Sonlight was so accessible--it has the check boxes on the TM to see at a glance, it has brief descriptions (at least at the level we are on), and the living books capture your imagination. Anyway, I don't know what else is out there, but I would love your opinions on what works for you and why. Thank you in advance for your ideas. Moms are the real experts. :)