Great. Now if I could just figure out how to update the signature! Anyone know how?

Hi, Just testing to see if I still have a signature. I had surgery and have been away from the forum for a while. So glad to be back and love the look, but I need to get used to it! :)

Wow, great responses, thanks. I'm hopeful that my daughter's motivation sticks and we can prep at home. The time/length of the PSAT came as a sort of surprise to her so doing an entire test one morning sounds like a wise idea as well as reviewing math and timed writing. We have never had an emphasis on timing writing in our home school but I am hearing more and more from my neices and nephews that this is status quo for the public school and of course for the SAT. I guess we have our work cut out for us. Breathe...... Thanks again!

Our local district does them as my son returned to the high school in grade 10. We had already done Apologia Biology at home the previous year and he made a point to let me know that while they have the students do them, some students opt out. That is allowed. It wasn't here as I thought they were mandatory and did the whole "document with photos" bit. We are planning for our two other daughters to continue all the way to graduation here. The next runner up will graduate next year. She is watching a few youtube disections as science is really not her thing. Our youngest daughter loves science and plans on going to school to be a Vet Tech. She plans on doing them and all the science she can get her hands on. I truly don't think they are absolutely necessary and for some students, they are even upsetting or against their growing values. I just kind of go with each individual kiddo here now. Best of wishes to you all in this.

While our daughters will probably start at the county college, we are really eager to even get small awards or scholarships that may help toward books. We learned just how expensive they ramp up the tuition bill with our son who will graduate from The College of NJ this spring. (Thank God he will soon be done..lol!) Thanks for all of these ideas. My oldest daughter loves to write and is going to look into Poetry Outloud and a few others.

My daughter who is a junior just took the PSAT at our local high school this fall. We have yet to get the scores, but she feels she did well on the language portion and struggled some what on the math. I'm curious. Do all of you prep your students for the SAT? Last year we began Barron's Prep books out of the library for a few practice tests. We are also going through the book Hot Words for the SAT's. I know SO many public school students are taking courses to prep that are hundreds of dollars. Our daughters are more than likely going to have to at least start their college days at our county college, unless they can get scholarships. Any comments or in-put? Do you prep or put your kids in a class? Also, I am thinking to have her take the SAT this spring and then that will allow another chance to take it in the fall of 2013. Makes sense?

We knew that we wanted to learn Spanish early on, as that is the most prevalent second language in our geographic area and can really assist a person in locating a job in our nearest cities here. We simply did not have a great budget to afford many of the best language programs. So, we began at a young age borrowing cds and dvds from our library and purchasing a few. Our children loved even hearing the music in Spanish and I think that helped to get them comfortable with it and find a certain familiarity. For us, we just did The Learnables as our first program. It is not comprehensive in my mind, but there again, we supplemented with this and then waited until high school years until we really did a formal program. Foreign language is not any of our children's major interest, so we felt fine taking this route as years are not counted until high school. Currclick classes online have several different languages to take. A huge help. Wishing everyone all good, however your family handles language in your hs.

I totally hear you about trying so many math curriculums and needing the children in fairly independant one in time. We used at least 5 here on our 3 children (one has graduated) until we found Teaching Textbooks and they were old enough for that. If I had it to do over again, I would start out in Kindergarten and first grade again the same way: very hands on with manipulatives such as coins, shells, felt board pieces, math bears and rods and make it fun along with the Rod & Staff texts. I would do that as they are dry, but get the job done quite well. Then I would put them in TT. It is expensive, but so worth it. My daughters are both independant in it and only have a few times during each year that they need further explanation from me or my husband. Wishing you all things good there in your home school!

Hi Janice, Congratulations to you and your family from another NJ family. :) That is great. My son is a senior now at TCNJ. We have 2 daughters up and coming for college who we want to be more prepared for. May I ask is the reduced rate due to scores on the SAT? I am seeking out colleges now for my oldest daughter and having difficulty finding scholarship opportunities that really add up to a realistic amount. Again-wonderful job!

Hello Ladies, I am planning for next fall and need to simplify our schooling due to chronic illness. I'm also looking for ways to put fun into our days, rather than me just sitting and facilitating learning so much. I'd like to incorporate music lessons further (lessons outside home) and art at home. I'm thinking of Calvert's Discovery in Art course that comes with 6 vhs or 2 cd and a teacher's manual. Has anyone used this and are there any opinions on it? Is it easy to implement and if I purchase used, can I pick up supplies for 2 daughter's easy enough...we have lots of basic art pencils, watercolors, ect in the home, but uncertain how involved gathering supplies would be. I need fairly easy! Any opinions/help would really be great. I'd love something that my daughters can watch or a dvd that they can "see" and then do, if that makes sense. Thanks so very much!

Thanks so much Peela and Beth. I think I will give this a try and having the two levels would be good at any rate as my younger daughter would have full use of Basic as she is still young. Perhaps I could type out the sentences or use the white board for some of them and do them together even. Much Appreciated!

Hi, I am wondering about a more hands on approach to grammar for my daughter whom is having difficulty and feel like Winston could be good for her. My problem is that I cannot afford to purchase both Basic and Advanced and she probably is nearing the need to go into Advanced soon. I was offered a used set of both, though without student books, but am uncertain the correct number of cards are contained in the sets. Anyone like this program? Could I used the Teacher books and copy the sentences out myself--or have her do it for penmanship at the same time? Anyone know the approximate number of cards that sounds correct? It seems about 50 of the little size cards and 2 sets of bigger cards 108 and some tricky cards...maybe 2? Does this sound like it contains cards for both? I know it's a crazy question! Thanks for any information as we need to keep our costs down!

Thank you both.....that was helpful. Can either of you tell me if the Steck-Vaughn books are full of experiments every day? Just trying to figure out how teacher intensive they are. And now I have to decide what grade level to get my daughters being it's midyear.........ugh. How I'd love to go through just one year without changing one book/curriculum. Oh well! Change can be good..........

Just wondering if any of you use or have seen this book. I am in need of some thing easy for science, grades 3 and 7....unfortunately a book that my children can basically read and that has comprehension questions, but limited experiments as I am struggling a bit with chronic illness. I cannot keep up with all the experiments in our science this year and need them to be a bit more independant. Also wanting some thing that meets national requirements. Is this a black and white text? I checked out Spectrum and it looks dull and tedious even for grade 3. So, now I am searching for info on this and can't find any samples really....... Any information would be appreciated....thanks!

Thanks so much, Karen, I will check into that and I'll try not to stress out quite so much too. :) I only do very gentle yoga but I do find that and stretching to help me, especially in the neck area which is so effected. I sip water all night long too......ugh. I had much hope for Evoxac that I began last week, but am coughing like crazy and feel as if I am drowning in the night propped up high. I just read the side effects and one seems to be increased coughing and infections. More stress, right? Trial and error I guess, along with a big heaping of trust.

Karen..... I was wondering if you use a warm or cold air humidifyer in your home and if it is a large one? I have a small unit next to my bed at night, which is cool and I was told to use that as to not encourage mold growth in the home, but it is getting really uncomfortable at night. I am assuming you are using a warm one, but thought I'd ask. Also we have stopped using our wood stove for a year now, but I am wondering since it is an air tight stove, perhaps I could get an iron steamer pot and fill with water to be able to enjoy that again. My family is really upset that they miss their fires.......you know, as I sit and try to swallow some what normal and put those drops in my eyes every hour like you. Amazing what you can give up easily if it make you better, but others just do not adjust as well......... Anyways, curious about that if you don't mind.

Ladies, Wow, I just got a minute to check back today and was shocked at all the responses. Thank you all so very much. I guess I just hit a really low point over the weekend. I had to whisper due to my voice and had to close my eyes a lot they were so painful. I began to think about how I would cope with this and continue homeschooling and really just needed to touch base with a few others.....which really helps me. I know every day is not the same, so I need to keep that in mind. It's really frustrating not to be able to carry on conversation, answer the phone some days or read. We really have done a lot of tweaking of homeschool that I would never have dreamed that I would consider a few years back! But, I gain hope from others continuing in this/similar positions. We do have a good private school nearby---well practically in my backyard, but is too costly and considering what happened in sending my son to public highschool I'd like to avoid that for now. I think it can work, but just wasn't a good thing for him. My daughters SO want to remain together at home, so I am fortunate even though it feels too much some days, like one of you posted about your husband making sure you get out of bed, my daughters sure do! Some times I think stress really aggravates my symptoms, even the physical stress of cleaning house in little increments, let alone emotional stress. And, besides my stretching and a bit of yoga I am not exercizing like I used to by walking our property each day. Perhaps you all have encouraged me to start. I seem to rather sit and eat as it eases the pain of sjogrens in my throat and keeps my weight on which is a battle. I will certainly think on all of you as I go about pressing on with teaching here each day....and thanks again for sharing.

Please forgive me as I am bringing my own topic to the current page again hoping some autoimmune disease moms will be around over the week rather than the weekend. Thanks!

JoAnn--if I may, can I ask also about this? I've started a blog recently and have followed all your instructions here. I got as far as choosing a megatag, but I just cannot seem to figure out where they are telling me/how they are saying to copy and paste it onto my blog. I'm a bit computor challenged! Is there an easy way to clarify that as all it says I need to do is verify now. Thanks so much if you see this.

I just had a moment to check this out and put it in my favorites. This is excellent....just what I've been looking for and best yet is free. Thank you so much for sharing!

Ladies, A while back we had an autoimmunde disease thread going and there were a couple of women that had spoke up who had Sjogren's Syndrome. I'm wondering if they are still here. I was definately diagnosed last spring, but just this September initiated treatment finally and seem to be getting worse in many ways, not better. I've gotten through a major tweaking of our homeschool, which I usually don't do until after the holidays in that drab time of year, but feel the need to change how we hs even though I do not want to change, in order to save it as my voice pain is such a major issue as are my eyes. Just curious if any Sjogren's people have pointers or ideas on how they pace themselves and keep hs working for them. I also began a blog on my chronic illness experience as I've really been ill for about 18 years now with fibro and other things prior to sjogrens. The blog is on my journey, hs and a bit of faith. Thought I'd leave the URL if anyone is interested in communicating. Bless you all who carry on......I love to read when I am able as you all are so encouraging and have a wealth of ideas to share.

Wow, thank you So much ladies. I had a bit of trouble at first locating my thread since I could not return yesterday. These are all helpful answers and I've printed them out as I know it is some thing we must add to our school. Thanks again!

We did to back to this LA curriculum a few times through the years with our 3 children. I guess I simply liked the idea of all areas of LA to be incorporated into one and wanted it to work so badly. The truth is, it did work---and could, but I ended up supplementing so many areas with more that I realized we were being very eclectic despite my desire to have a focal point. The other problem was that my children are advid readers. So, each time we tried this the book studies would be books my kiddos already read. They could still do the study, but I found that redundant and not as joyful, etc. so I would stick in my own. I guess what I am saying is it CAN work....it is definately on the light side of grammar being delayed and in other areas, but may be a good fit for some. Everyone is individual. We are probably too much of free birds here for it to have stuck.

Ladies, I am very curious how necessary you feel Logic is in your weekly home education and what some of the best resources are out there as far as ease of use as well as quality. Any advice appreciated.

Thanks so much for the further thoughts. Since I forked out so much money for this and it should last us a good long time, I've decided to continue giving it a further try for now. I like the idea of going a bit slower and allowing a creative paper every now and then. I appreciate you ladies!