I can't sift through all this *$%, but I do have a recommendation... I think the easiest thing to do would be to buy an ICB (International Children's Bible - it's written at a 3rd grade reading level-like 12 bucks online) and just reading through Matthew. Matthew is FULL of famous bible stories - like Jesus walking on the water, John the Baptist, the census of King Herod, the Sermon on the Mount, the crucifixion, etc. It's not preachy or opinionated (if that worries you), it's just the ancient text written as a recording of events. The back of the ICB has an index of all the famous stories like the Ten Commandments, etc. There are also little summaries at the top of each page to let you know what that page is talking about...so you can easily flip through to find a story. That way, you're reading the actual text from the book itself - you don't have to worry about something having an agenda. I hope my post didn't offend anyone, I'm just trying to help. :grouphug:

You're giving up having very clear-cut lesson plans. We're using the Island-level right now and it is very Charlotte Mason-y (in my opinion). Having said that, my daughter is doing very well with it so far.

We use a lot of CLE because of that very reason - when you have several students, you need something they can do independently. :auto:

You're doing more than I am. :001_huh: Are you looking ahead to plan for Kindergarten? A lot of people start planning the fall semester during the spring. If you buy stuff gradually, it will be easier money-wise. :D I would start browsing Kindergarten curricula (I'm doing that right now for Kid #3).

I think -yes. We are currently using WWE2 along with Grammar Island-level.

I have also committed this crime. There is a neighbor-family in MO that now homeschools because I made such a compelling argument one day. :D

That's how my kids were being taught to read when I took them out of school (I didn't take them out because of the reading ;)). It is V E R Y strange and not how I was taught to read... I think some kids probably take off with it - one of my kids was just memorizing what he was supposed to say in class and then couldn't read on his own. :glare: He's very math-oriented and I think he needed to be able to "figure out" how to read words on his own. He couldn't even sound out 3-letter words when I took him out of school. Now, (thanks, CLE-I have to start a CLE fan club) he reads at a 2nd grade level. :D If you don't like the reading program at school, you could always supplement on your own...if you didn't want to homeschool full-time.

I'm currently teaching a 1st grader and 2nd grader, but I will have a K-er this summer... Here's what I plan on doing for K: LA/Reading: CLE Learn to Read and K12 LA (K) Math: Singapore Earlybird Soc St: some selections from Sonlight K Science: some selections from Sonlight K And that's all...we might do some art projects here and there... You can get a lot done while the 2 year-old takes a nap! (I also have a 2 year-old) Kindergarten is basically learning to read (in my book - no pun intended :lol:). 1st grade is an entirely different thing...here's what my 1st grader does: LA: CLE 100 Spelling: BJU Spelling 1st Gr Reading: Sonlight Readers 2, CLE Reading 1st gr Math: Horizons 1, Kumon Workbooks, Mindbenders Handwriting: HWOT Printing Power Writing: Writing with Ease 1 Geography: Map Skills 1st Gr Science: Apologia's Swimming Creatures of the Fifth Day History: unit studies (are awesome) and Sonlight Core 1+2 extras: cub scouts and assorted sports ;) Good luck with your Kindergartener!! :D

Me too! :lol:

Can you visit a homeschool convention and browse through some of the major curricula "in person"?

Our 6 year-old sleepwalks. One time, husband and I were watching TV at night in the living room. Son walks in, walks into the dining room, goes up to the wall, pulls down his pajama pants and starts to pee on the dining room wall. Yeah, awesome. :001_huh: Husband thought it was soooo funny... :lol:

I'm using it with a 2nd grader, but we are going through it VERY slowly so she retains it. She was also being identified as gifted back in ps, so she's not normal...he he :D. Now, the 1st grader will be waiting until 3rd grade to start MCT. It will interfere with his sword-fighting, jedi knight-training and his collecting of those metal soda can tops. I think 3rd grade is probably a good time for most kids - unless your kid is really advanced.

Could you start WWE1 - just to get him doing copywork/writing sentences - and enlarge the worksheets on your copier so the print is larger?

Thanks!! My Wiggly Willy is a horrible writer right now and I was looking for something to help him develop this skill. We are currently doing WWE and some journaling. I was very interested in DITHOR (sounds like an alien planet) to enhance his writing and reading...

Has anyone tried Drawn into the Heart of Reading? Would it be a good reading program for a 2nd grader Wiggly Willy? :confused:

We just went through this... We NEVER could sell our house. It was cheap, in a REALLY nice area and we had poured about $15,000 into it. It sat on the market for a couple of months. We did get an offer and they wanted us to show up at closing with $10,000. :glare: We couldn't come up with $10,000 (we had just been unemployed for 8 months). Our realtor was so mean and negative. We ended up listing our house for rent on craigslist and the next day, we had a tenant moving in. We pulled up the For Sale sign and didn't look back. We're actually making a $300 a month profit on the house by renting. Fast-forward to buying...because of the housing crash, buying a house right now is NOT what it was a couple of years ago. NO mortgage company would allow us to buy another house until our old one sold. ONE mortgage company would allow us to buy another house IF we were renting the old one out for a certain amount of money. So, we went through the whole buying process - put down escrow money, did the inspections, dragged the realtor to all the *** - the apprasial, etc. We were supposed to close on Friday and on Tuesday, the mortgage company called and they denied our mortgage at the last minute. They said it was just all too risky because we were unable to sell our last house. I also have to say that we were approved for a $300,000 mortage several years ago (but we bought a house for $187,000) and this time - we had a higher credit score, less debt, exact same income and we were approved for a mortgage at $100,000. The mortgage companies are SCARED. I'm just saying, be prepared -don't make plans you can't get out of. I'm currently renting with neighbors on either side of me who went through identical experiences this year. In fact, my tenant still owns his house in KC.

We bought one of those calendar systems from the homeschool store. The kids change the day and record the weather. There is also a giant "month" calendar included. This has really helped the kids with their concept of time.

CLE is very thorough - information-wise... It also uses spiral approach (constant review). It's Open and Go - workbooks can be done independently with older kids.

Howdy! :cheers2:

Cahokia Mounds is incredible. Middle school is the perfect age for that too. Go on a semi/warm day. You can go to the Interpretive Center (kind of an indoor museum) and they have a bunch of interactive displays and a movie. You can also go out to Monks Mound, which is the largest man-made Cahokian mound - and you can climb up to the top. There is also a stonehenge-type-thingie made from logs...and they said the Cahokians used it to tell seasons. If you are looking for something like Lewis and Clark - there is the Lock and Dam in Alton - not too far from Cahokia, I guess. You can take a tour of the Locks and watch boats pass through. There is also a museum where there are displays about the river, a little Lewis and Clark stuff, the history of riverboats on the Mississippi, the ecology of the Mississippi, etc. I thought they had a riverboat replica that you could "drive" interactively, of course. When it gets warmer, you could head out to Fort Du Chartres and Modoc. That's off Route 3 south of Waterloo. I had heard about funny hours for Fort Du Chartres, but you can check online first... Fort Du Chartres is supposed to be really haunted - and they used to have the big Rendevouz there (not sure if they still have it). Lemme know if you have any more questions. I lived in that area for years (Columbia, Waterloo and over on the MO side).

We are schooling all year. Relatives thought we were weird. Oh well. Somebody told me that the first 6 weeks of ps is a review of the previous year. :D

That looks similar to our 2nd grade also... And, like the other poster said...science? What about Map Skills or a little lite geography?

We're in Sonlight Core 2, so I'll try to help you... The K Core is unlike the other cores. I don't plan on buying Core K this fall, but I am going to snag bits and pieces of it. Generally, you have the Read-Alouds (which are read by the parent out loud to the kid), the Readers (which are awesome after Core 1 - they are a selection of books that the kid reads on their own), the History selections (which are basically read-alouds but cover the history theme)... You can add LA (which for K was nothing - I thought there was a collection of small reader "booklets"), Math (choose between Singapore, Horizons, Miquon and Saxon), Science (the science for K looked pretty cool, but expensive - I'm going to buy some of the science books), Bible (optional) and Handwriting. Keep in mind that you can buy everything on their site individually - which is what I do. I get all the read-alouds and some of the history selections from the library, buy all the readers (those are hard to find) and I use my own LA, math, handwriting, etc. If you order their paper catalog, it's a little more self-explanatory. Also, you choose the Readers (the books the kid reads on their own) based on their reading level. There should be a description of the readers versus the kid's reading level on their site. As far as LA for K - I think learning to read is LA. I wouldn't do much else until 1st grade. Also, there is nothing wrong with you getting a jumpstart on the read-alouds from Core 1 (the silly ones like Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle or Gooney Bird Greene). As far as the IG, I only used mine twice. I pick the books I want to go over and schedule it myself. I do use some of the comprehension questions from the readers' IG, though - but this is core 2 that I use. I hope this helped you a little. Sonlight was very confusing for me at first too. Once the IG went out the window, though...:D Like I said, don't forget you can do the library thing and buy the books from sonlight that you can't get from the library - that probably saved us $600. I'm no expert, but here is what I plan on doing for K this summer: LA: K12 LA, CLE Learning to Read, some SL read-alouds Math: Singapore Earlybird Soc St: (Sonlight K) Living Long Ago, Wild Places Science: (Sonlight K) Caterpillars and Butterflies, Eggs and Chicks, Tadpoles and Frogs, Under the Sea The future-2nd grader will be doing Oak Meadow, so the K-er will participate in some of his curriculum (like art). I hope this helped you! Good luck! :auto:

It starts on page 80 in Singapore 2A. That's exactly where we are right now. It's pretty much the last topic until 2B.

Doesn't Drawn into the Heart of Reading do literary analysis?