As your packages arrive at your door, what are the winners and losers so far?

[Brindee]

Life of Fred Beginning Algebra - my daughter hates math so I thought we'd try LOF. We won't actually start until later, but she looked through the book and was intrigued by it, so I am hopeful this will make math more interesting for her. We will also be using the Key to Algebra workbooks, because I was a little concerned about using LOF by itself.

Can you explain why you're concerned about using LoF by itself?

[beezus]

Can you explain why you're concerned about using LoF by itself?

 

I still feel like my daughter is a little hazy on some of the concepts we've covered so far. Life of Fred is a new approach for us, and I am hoping my daughter gets fired up by it, but if not, I just wanted to make sure she had a little extra to firm up her knowledge of things we've already touched on. Key to Algebra seems pretty succinct, and the books are pretty slim, so I thought a little extra review would be good for us. I know others on this forum have voiced a concern in other threads that Life of Fred might be a little light by itself. Of course, there are others who say LoF is plenty meaty. I guess we won't know for sure what works for us until we actually dig in and try it. I think I was a little hesitant to go with LoF by itself just because it is so different in its approach.

[jpklehm]

The last package that arrived at my door was the right-angle finderscope for my telescope. It's MARVELOUS! And I'm waiting with baited breath to get a second base for my Telrad! Oh...and I want to buy a laser pointer finderscope SO BAD.

 

 

 

We have an awesome Orion telescope that we've had for umm... two years now and have only used it twice! I dust it every week but it's so intimidating to us we just haven't put it on our deck and figured it out. :confused: How did you learn to use yours? Is there a good book or website that we can refer to for help?

 

Thanks!

PAM

[coffeefreak]

BEAUTIFUL FEET!!!

 

I am IN LOVE with this program and ready to go. So is my oldest.:thumbup:

 

OK, I promise that's my last post to this thread. . . .

 

Of course, this is my last box for a while :D

 

Blessings!

Dorinda

[Avila]

Winners

History Odyssey Ancients Level 2 (everything I wanted and more)

Rod & Staff English (trying this again, and I like it more this time)

Saxon math

Wordly Wise

CLE Cursive book (Cute book with animals)

WWE

MP Classical Studies (I am impressed with it so far. Let's see what I think when we start it for real.)

 

Losers

Sonlight Core 1 (I was so excited and love the books, but it is too parent-intensive with the time I will have available. Very sad about this one. Lucky I only bought the IG, and I got it used.)

Classical Writing (Ugh. Don't stone me, but it is not going to be working for me. I think I would rather be hit by a bus. Anyone need it for next year? ;))

 

Still Debating

HOD Beyond or Bigger (to replace the Sonlight; can't decide one way or the other and it is driving me nuts)

DITHOR (same deal!)

[Brindee]

I still feel like my daughter is a little hazy on some of the concepts we've covered so far. Life of Fred is a new approach for us, and I am hoping my daughter gets fired up by it, but if not, I just wanted to make sure she had a little extra to firm up her knowledge of things we've already touched on. Key to Algebra seems pretty succinct, and the books are pretty slim, so I thought a little extra review would be good for us. I know others on this forum have voiced a concern in other threads that Life of Fred might be a little light by itself. Of course, there are others who say LoF is plenty meaty. I guess we won't know for sure what works for us until we actually dig in and try it. I think I was a little hesitant to go with LoF by itself just because it is so different in its approach.

Yeah, there are a lot of things that look good, but don't work for your child, or are different, so you don't know 'til you try it! I hope it works out for your dd!

 

My kids have loved it, which is cool to see them excited about math! :001_smile: After a year of LoF, their ITBS math scores went UP! I was pleased, and convinced it's a complete program, as other programs that are more traditional/better known are. That said, I will use some extras with dd, and move slowly to make sure she gets it well. She does well in math but is not confident. Some people always use more than one program at a time to get the info. from different viewpoints. That's why I'm supplementing (with CLE), to help dd see it from different points, and hopefully help it click better! It's better for it to take a little longer and have them get it, than to just go through it to get it done!:001_smile:

 

Best wishes!

[kalanamak]

REAL science level I Earth science is everything I hoped for.

[Closeacademy]

I have had some great tried and true stuff:

 

Singapore Math--has worked for years, we will be doing 4a/b this year and I've bought ahead to NEM 1

 

Story of the World--will finish 3 off this fall and begin 4 in January

 

For new stuff:

 

Lively Latin--we are 5 lessons in though because I picked it up to start in January.

 

Classical Writing Aesop's B--great program

 

Rod and Staff--Patterns of Nature and Our Father's World both look like they will be nice.

 

Waiting to try out:

 

Rod and Staff English 2

 

My idea of transitioning from straight child-led lapbooks with my upcoming 4th grader to month-long child-led research projects. I've blogged about what I am going to try to do. We'll see.:001_smile:

[Jean in Wisc]

The last package that arrived at my door was the right-angle finderscope for my telescope. It's MARVELOUS! And I'm waiting with baited breath to get a second base for my Telrad! Oh...and I want to buy a laser pointer finderscope SO BAD.

 

 

 

We have an awesome Orion telescope that we've had for umm... two years now and have only used it twice! I dust it every week but it's so intimidating to us we just haven't put it on our deck and figured it out. :confused: How did you learn to use yours? Is there a good book or website that we can refer to for help?

 

Thanks!

PAM

 

Tell me more:

What scope do you have? (Can you post a link?) Do you have a red dot finderscope on the telescope? Is the scope computerized?

 

How much do you know about the night sky? Can you find many of the constellations?

 

Can you find any deep sky objects with binoculars?

 

This will help me answer your question better :001_smile:

 

Jean

[TracyR]

Winners for this year were: (these we are continuing with)

CLE Language arts- my daughter did really well with this and I'm most sure we are going to stick with it.

 

Apologia science(swimming creatures)- this brought the love of science back for my daughters

 

Homeschool in the Woods, Time Travelers.- we go through a lot of ink printing out this program but its well worth it because my daughters love it.

 

Like it not in love with it:

 

Writing Tales. We do like the program. Just don't like the fact it only stops after two levels.

 

Maps Globes and Graphs-(not jumping up and down) it served its purpose with having to start our homeschool year in January.

 

CLE math- I like it , its a good math program. My daughter doesn't care for it much. She doesn't love it but she doesn't hate it either.

 

Prima Latina- I liked this program and loved the fact it has DVD's. My daughters enjoyed the program up until about the last few chapters. They like it but don't love it. It works well for them though so we're going with LC 1 for this year.

 

Liked K12 K. An awesome curriculum. Just too time consuming for me right now.

 

Bombs:

Calvert - it just doesn't work for us anymore.

CLE Reading- I like the program. My daughter despises it. She much prefers BJU reading so that's what we're going with this year.

 

Cautiously Optimistic about:

Explode the Code, Writing Skills, and whatever new we bring into the house this year :>)

[LanaTron]

Now I've received Children's Art Videos: Monet, Cassat, and Remington. I haven't run the DVDs yet, so I can't say much. I am hopeful--it looks simple enough--and skeptical--will the instruction be good for all the ages of my dc?--at the same time.

[Penelope]

Winners:

 

FLL2 (continuing from 1)

WWE2 (continuing from 1)

SOTW2 (ditto :) )

Singapore math with all the supplements, continuing this

Right Start math games are a recent addition which we plan to continue

 

 

Not sure but not very excited after a look through:

 

REAL Science- Earth and Space. I think the topics will be good, but it looks so overwhelming right now. And the pages are kinda blah. I'm going to try it out, though.

 

HWT cursive-- hoping my son is ready for this sometime in the next school year. Don't love this cursive font, but he has done well with HWT so far, so we are sticking with it.

[Mommyfaithe]

BEAUTIFUL FEET!!!

 

I am IN LOVE with this program and ready to go. So is my oldest.:thumbup:

 

OK, I promise that's my last post to this thread. . . .

 

Of course, this is my last box for a while :D

 

Blessings!

Dorinda

 

I love beautiful feet too...and have used almost all of the guides...except California (I live in NY ) and the Horse one (my kids never really were into horses.) The rest of the were great!!!

~~Faithe (who has and is planning on using History of Composers THIS YEAR!!!!)

[Dinsfamily]

So far, I'm happy with everything we've bought for this year. I started the schoolyear last week with SL's P4/5, SWR, and Horizons Math K.

 

Horizons K has been easy for my ds(5), but I expected that.

 

SWR has been the most suprising. It has been much easier to teach than I was anticipating.

[skaterbabs]

So far SOTW 1 & OPG has been useless for DD. She cries every time I bring either out. :glare: She's technically still a kindergartener though, so we may revisit SOTW in a year or so, and do US history this year with picture books. She's fascinated by Ben Franklin and loves Liberty's Kids. lol

 

Yacko (almost 13) is also working through SOTW, but because he's 6/7th grade we're having to tweak it quite a bit for him.

[Ibbygirl]

:thumbup1:

CLE Math 400 - I sat down and gave LU 402 a trial run with my son and the next day he was asking to do math.

 

Oh I'm so encouraged to hear this!! I just got CLE for my daughter to supplement her Singapore next year. Thank you for putting my mind more at ease.

 

LOF has been a GREAT one for us. My daughter LOVES it! :) She also likes Spelling Power a lot. :)

[Bee]

I can add 2 new things.

 

A winner, I hope, is The Study of Music Part I from Oak Meadow. It's a high school level course but I'll be using it with an 8th grader so I'm changing the term paper requirement a little. I really like the variety of assignments in the syllabus. If this is an indication of how the rest of their high school courses are then I can definitely see us using more in the future. I hope oldest dd likes this and doesn't approach it with her usual "I'll just do the minimum to get by" attitude.

 

I think Spectrum science grade 3 is going to be a loser. Many of the lessons ask the student to try to guess what will happen. It consists of reading and answering questions. The lessons honestly don't look like they're any fun at all.We'll try to do it but I can already hear the groans. I also have The Big Book of Science for grades 3&4 and this looks much more colorful and fun. It's filled with fun and easy experiments which are dd's favorite part of science.

[coffeefreak]

I love beautiful feet too...and have used almost all of the guides...except California (I live in NY ) and the Horse one (my kids never really were into horses.) The rest of the were great!!!

~~Faithe (who has and is planning on using History of Composers THIS YEAR!!!!)

 

How exciting! I kind of want to do California history with my kids. I lived in CA for 1 year during 4th grade and that's what we studied. It was the one year of history I remember enjoying in elementary school. If they don't come out with their Westward expansion guide, I may just do that.

 

Blessings!

Dorinda

[TraceyS/FL]

How exciting! I kind of want to do California history with my kids. I lived in CA for 1 year during 4th grade and that's what we studied. It was the one year of history I remember enjoying in elementary school. If they don't come out with their Westward expansion guide, I may just do that.

 

 

Too funny!

 

I'm a CA native, and our schools did CA HIstory in 5th grade. Well, we MOVED in 5th grade - so i got NM history.... then moved back to CA for 7th grade.

 

All these years i keep hearing - well, you learned that in CA HIstory. Ummmm, NO i didn't people! LOL!!

 

I have CA History for us to do - i'm just having issues getting the stuff i need to go with it. :tongue_smilie:

[coffeefreak]

Too funny!

 

I'm a CA native, and our schools did CA HIstory in 5th grade. Well, we MOVED in 5th grade - so i got NM history.... then moved back to CA for 7th grade.

 

All these years i keep hearing - well, you learned that in CA HIstory. Ummmm, NO i didn't people! LOL!!

 

I have CA History for us to do - i'm just having issues getting the stuff i need to go with it. :tongue_smilie:

 

:lol: That is too funny!

 

We moved so much (Army Brat), my sister took Sex Ed 3 or 4 times and I never had it once. My parents laughed every time they had to fill out the permission slip. I did have to read "To Kill a Mockingbird" twice.

[TXMary2]

So far I bought Animals and Their Worlds for 5 yo ds and Quest for the Middle Ages for 13 yo ds, both from Winter Promise. They look great.

 

Also, Sonlight Alternate 7 Language Arts is on the way. I love SL LA so I expect the same of this one too.

 

Edited to add: I am also excited about the Composer study I ordered from www.homeschoolinthewoods.com It is a great lapbook project on the Composers from the Middle Ages to Modern Times.

[Wendy in ME]

We won't be trying very many new things but I am very excited and pleased with all of the TOG Y2 U3+4 books that I have received for UG and D level. I have also received WWE level 1 and I love what I see despite the binding issue. My oldest ds is very anxious to get started on his Kym Wright Microscope Adventure and Botany Adventure science for next year. These were his choice because he really wanted to focus on botany next year. I love the looks of both books as well.

 

As for things that I sent back or resold: MFW Ex-1850 and MFW 1st. I thought I could give up TOG for something a little more streamlined but I couldn't.

[SBP]

Not a "loser" at all - just something I wish I'd researched more thoroughly:

 

I got a shipment from RR yesterday with Critical Thinking Book 1. I ordered a student book for each child, plus the Instructor's Guide for me, and once I looked through it, I realized that I easily could have gotten by with one student book and just let them look on together. It seems to be extensively discussion-based, and I'm not sure they'll write in the book at all. I'll probably go ahead and use them both now that I have them, but I won't order two copies of Book 2 when the time comes.

 

Live and learn :).

 

SBP

[Granny_Weatherwax]

After a first look -

 

Winners -

Apologia Physical Science

History Mysteries - Royal Fireworks Press

Philosophy for Young Thinkers - Royal Fireworks Press

 

Possible trouble spot - Cartoons for Thinking: Issues in Ethics and Values (RFWP)

I like it but some of the topics are a bit mature for my DS. I might have to use this book when he is a little older.

 

I will be looking through the remaining RFWP materials through the weekend.

[RanchGirl]

Definite Winners:

-Apologia Elementary Science Botany - we were so excited we put astronomy on hold to start Botany during the summer. We are planting a bunch of things this morning for our experiments

-Life of Fred Fractions. My oldest ds can't put this down and is on the final section after just a couple weeks. I realized he has been held back by what I thought was already a fast pace in Horizons so he is going to move even faster now and just take the tests in Horizons (to make sure he doesn't miss anything) so he can start LoF Decimals.

-Critical Thinking Co Mind Benders... always a hit here.

Losers for us this year:

-Diana Waring What In the World's Going on Here? Ancient Civ. -- I love it but the kids weren't into it.

-Apologia Elementary Science Astronomy.. just putting this on hold until fall. I tried to do too much (all the experiments, adding extra reading, etc.) and got overloaded. I plan to start again in the Fall after Botany is done, using the new notebooking journals and trying to take a more streamlined approach.

It's not here yet but I really want to love it:

-Mystery of History 1

-Apologia Elementary Science Botany Notebooking Journals

 

Haven't made up my mind:

-Critical Thinking Co Editor in Chief 1 (just haven't put it into the computer to try, waiting for eldest to finish his Language Smarts workbook C)

-Critical Thinking Co Latin Roots 1 (ditto)

-Critical Thinking Co Organizing Thinking Skills

-Introductory Logic

 

And I still have another order coming soon and tons more on my Rainbow wishlist. I may need to start selling things to make room for the new goodies!

[Guest inglenooks]

Very interesting topic!

 

My winners this year were:

 

Math U See Gr. 1 and 2

Story of the World 1

First Language Lessons

Writing with Ease

Starfall.com

Spelling Workout

The Library!!!!!

Classical kids series

Music IQ-this is piano

 

 

Losers were:

 

Rosetta Stone French( I may try this again when they are older)

Usborne Science Encyclopedia (maybe later, too complicated!)

Saxon Math 1 YUCK-I quit this in the first month, I have heard past grade 3 is pretty good though

Evan Moor Spelling books

 

 

I am still struggling with science curriculum, I need a secular program. This year I made up my own which was a lot of work. Anyone found a secular program they like for the elementary grades?

[LND1218]

I haven't ordered a lot, but so far they are all hits - here are our highlights

 

Teaching Textbooks (6) is a huge hit!!

I bought it for next year, but dd insisted on starting it NOW. (we do school through the summer. But I was going give her a rest for the text book in math and do drill.) But she is on lesson 7 already! She is my reluctant math student, so I couldn't say no the ONE time she's excited. Saxon has about killed her LOL! She's done well but has hated it since we got to 5/4. So yeah!

 

Phonetic Zoo

She also wanted to start Phonetic Zoo C NOW too. We love Phonetic Zoo (she's done A and B.)

 

FIAR

My 4 year old is loving this - it's completely not my style. But I found it cheap. He was so mad that I bought it he threw it across the room, but man he loves it now. Boys!

[freeindeed]

:thumbup:

After much trial and error, we are all thumbs-up this year:

Five in a Row

Trip around the World books

Saxon math

Draw Write Now

Phonics Pathways

Primary Language Lessons

Winter Promise Children Around the World--actually for 2010-2011 school year; just got it early;)

[sweetbaby]

:thumbup:

After much trial and error, we are all thumbs-up this year:

 

 

MFW Creation to Greeks - new

everything else is previously used from the past year

[lovemykids]

DWN is the only loser so far. My kids hated it, and it was less than I expected. I thought it was more of a copywork notebook, and my children say they like to draw stuff their own way! :glare:

We already have several unused drawing books sitting on the shelf, duh.

 

Does anyone want to buy book one?:tongue_smilie:

[Granny_Weatherwax]

I have read through all of the Royal Fireworks Press TMs and I am pleased to say that they are definitely winners. This program is exactly what I was looking for.

 

I went through and developed preliminary lesson plans and I am excited to see how they will be realized this fall.

 

Now, if I could decide on math and social studies I would be set.

[muffinmom]

Is it bad that I haven't even ordered one thing yet?? :o

[mama2cntrykids]

I love reading the responses (I'm not done yet, lol). For us, here's the scoop:

 

Love the looks of:

MFW Adventures

MFW 1st Grade

Spelling Power--Looks perfect for us!

Writing Tales 1--My ds8 is very excited about it.

Singapore Math--We're starting my soon to be 3rd grader in 2A, but we're starting the last part of the book and quickly moving into 2B.

HOD-LHTH-My dd3 is moving through this. We are only on letter "G" so we will do it next year too.

 

Things that I'm caustiously optimistic about:

Reason for Handwriting--The lines for writing look too tiny for a 3rd grader. We'll give it a go though.

Lamb's Book of Art 1--Again, we'll give it a try, but I may supplement with something from the Library as well.

 

I plan on starting school around mid/late July, but I tihnk I may start ds8 on Singapore (very lightly) before then. His math skills need sharpening after being in PS for the last year and having a icky math program (in my opinion). He reads TONS already on his own, so not too worried there. He's currently reading the Hobbit and really likes it.