krwsmum Posted March 31, 2011 Share Posted March 31, 2011 I have put everything I think we "need" in my cart on the site-it comes to about $350...and of course that doesn't include any books. I have 3 dds, two of which will be LG/UG. Youngest is only 2 1/2. AFter reviewing the book lists on the lamppost site it looks like a lot of the books are not available at my library. So I would think I would have to buy them. This just seems like it could add up really quickly! I downloaded the 3-week sample and can't get ANY of the books at my local library to start that, so I would have to buy them just to do the sample! I LOVE LOVE LOVE the reviews of TOG, it looks fantastic, but cost wise, it looks like MFW might be a better match....HeLp!!!! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kchara Posted March 31, 2011 Share Posted March 31, 2011 For LG/UG, you can substitute the books quite easily for whatever you can find at your library if money's an issue. I buy all of our books, for the same reason. It costs us roughly $100 a unit to buy, which equals out to about $400 a year, if you buy all of the primary resources. That seems like a lot, but you get a LOT of books. And, they're good quality books. I have 4 more coming up behind the two who I'm schooling now, so it's worth it to me. I know I'll reuse them, quite a bit. If I didn't, I'd probably substitute more, and not buy nearly so many. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
frankcassiesmom Posted March 31, 2011 Share Posted March 31, 2011 A, people sell pretty good TOG book packages used B, if you do buy them, in 4 years your 2 year old would be using them again as well. Also, they resell VERY well in packages/lots. To get all the books I need this year for my UG and D children it's around $700. I bought my TOG used for $100. That's comparable to Sonlight or any of the other literature based packages. Lower Grammar books are the easiest to find at the library and easily substituted with other books. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Prolife Mom Posted March 31, 2011 Share Posted March 31, 2011 I'm new to Homeschooling.. and don't know what TOG means or NOEO??? Please Help! :001_huh: Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Clover11 Posted March 31, 2011 Share Posted March 31, 2011 Check nearby libraries, not just your local one. I am just getting started with TOG and having the same problem. I signed up for a library card at one about 30 minutes from me; they have more of the TOG books than my local one (who only has a few). It's worth the drive since we will have the books for a few weeks at a time, and we do other errands while we are out. For the books I had to buy I went to all the used sites and found the cheapest ones- half.com, Amazon, Paperbackswap, ect. I also try to remember that I can resell the books once we are done with them for almost as much as I paid for the used editions. This is only week 1 of TOG...so far so good :D Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
frankcassiesmom Posted March 31, 2011 Share Posted March 31, 2011 Yeah we don't use the closest library to us either. I go to a farther library because it's better. I use that for our errand day where we go to Costco, etc. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
shinyhappypeople Posted March 31, 2011 Share Posted March 31, 2011 I'm new to Homeschooling.. and don't know what TOG means or NOEO???Please Help! :001_huh: TOG=Tapestry of Grace. NOEO is a science curriculum. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SewLittleTime Posted March 31, 2011 Share Posted March 31, 2011 Take this with a grain of salt b/c we are only starting our 2nd TOG unit, but I spent about $100 on books for our last unit. I found someone here that sold me almost all of the UG/LG books. I just added a few here and there. For our current unit, I'm substituting a bit by topics. I'm a little more comfortable doing that now that I have a unit under me. I have $75 worth of books for our next unit in my cart from Amazon. I have found a few books on paperbackswap, maybe not the exact book, but definately something I can substitute with. The rest I'll get from the library. It may not be the exact book, but topic wise it will work. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
plain jane Posted March 31, 2011 Share Posted March 31, 2011 (edited) For LG/UG, you can substitute the books quite easily for whatever you can find at your library if money's an issue. I buy all of our books, for the same reason. It costs us roughly $100 a unit to buy, which equals out to about $400 a year, if you buy all of the primary resources. That seems like a lot, but you get a LOT of books. And, they're good quality books. I have 4 more coming up behind the two who I'm schooling now, so it's worth it to me. I know I'll reuse them, quite a bit. If I didn't, I'd probably substitute more, and not buy nearly so many. This is my experience too. I've been fortunate in that I already owned most of the primary sources for UG and D since I have been keeping an eye out for great history books since we started hs'ing 5 years ago. I wasn't sure if I should laugh or cry when I went through the TOG booklists and realized most were already on my shelf. :001_huh: The rest, I was able to hunt around on the internet for and was able to buy all the primary resources for LG, UG, and D for about $300. Before going through what was on my shelves, I did come up with a rough price of $100/unit to buy the primary resources. It's worth it for me because I have a number of kids to use this program with (not at the same time) and because I have really bad habit of inadvertently providing vast financial support to my local library whenever I opt to go that route instead. :banghead: There were a few of the primary resources books that I chose to skip because the titles really didn't interest me but I did was go through the units and see which books were included in the literature studies and made sure that I purchased those titles so I would have them on hand. Edited March 31, 2011 by plain jane Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mrsrevmeg Posted March 31, 2011 Share Posted March 31, 2011 Our first year we bought everything from Bookshelf Central and spent about $1000. (LG, UG, D) For year 2 we wised up and bought most of them from Amazon. If you buy 4 books at a time that qualify for the 4-for-three promotion (which a lot do) you save money. Buy $25.00 at a time you qualify for free shipping. Let 2 kids share a book here and there rather than buying 2 of almost the same thing kind of books. If you already have something pretty similar, just use it instead of buying something new. This next year will be our first time to buy high school books. We already have a lot of the literature books. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Posted March 31, 2011 Share Posted March 31, 2011 I have issues with finding many of the titles at my library and I live in Canada so I am uneasy about buying used from the US with shipping costs factored in. I have set a budget for the books of $300 not including the cost for SOTW which we will be using as a spine again next year and some other items that I am keeping separate. All in all for books it will come to just over $400 so I really really need to figure out how we can get the most out of the resources we will be getting. I am adding books like the Kingfisher World History in order to cut back on some of the History books and we already own the Usborne World History. My goal is to get the literature titles our library doesn't carry since those are tied to the SAP's. Other than that and the activity books, I will probably exclude all the History in-depth books (unless it is something I really want) and maybe substitute with books my library does carry. That's the beauty of TOG, the value is in the curriculum. You can then choose to substitute in areas with books you prefer. The literature books on the primary list are those you want to stick with though. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gooblink Posted March 31, 2011 Share Posted March 31, 2011 Yep, you could spend a bundle if you buy everything new. I'd buy the multi-unit books - it's nice to own those because you'll use them throughout the year. Whatever you can't find in the library, substitute. Of course, that also means some of the worksheets in TOG will be useless to you. Buy used when you can. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RobinF Posted March 31, 2011 Share Posted March 31, 2011 I bought just the de version so that was $170. I currently have about $550 of books in my cart at Rainbow Resource. That is for all our curriculum not just TOG. I also will spend about $100 on math for next year. So if I bought everything on my list I would spend about $820 but before I buy any books for TOG I put my list on PBS and I have been getting books off there at the rate of about one per week. (My RR wishlist started at about $630 and so it has dropped down $80 so far.) I expect that I will spend a total of $500 on curriculum for next year. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jewel7123 Posted March 31, 2011 Share Posted March 31, 2011 There are ways you can save.....combine your LG/UG students as much as possible. Subtitute similar titles you may already own. If not, then buy USED, search local thrift stores, talk to your local library about their policy for book requests for purchase, search bookfinder.com for the cheapest price, join Swagbucks and start earning towards free Amazon gift cards, etc. You don't HAVE to purchase new or every single book either. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tgag624 Posted March 31, 2011 Share Posted March 31, 2011 I think most have mentioned the ways that I have saved (right now I only have a LG): *Interlibrary loan - my local library is TINY and hardly ever has any of the books I need, but it is part of a library system in Illinois. I can search on our library system and a lot of the books are on there. I just "request" the book a week or so before I need them and pick them up at my local library. *I buy the DE version and I hardly ever print anything at this point. *I usually buy the DE version when it is on sale. *I take a look at the book list and see which ones I cannot get from the library. I see whether there is an alternate book listed that is available. I also look to see if it is just easier to substitute with something from my library. When I have LG and UG, you can sometimes just pick a book from either LG, or UG and use it for both, saving you from getting an extra book. *Whatever is left that I feel I need, I will search for used or if I can get a better deal on Amazon. I have also been using the Swagbucks toolbar to save up gift cards so I can use those from Amazon. *Sometimes our local TOG co-op ladies sell their used books too. *Definitely more leg work at the beginning, but does save money. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tracy Posted April 1, 2011 Share Posted April 1, 2011 This was my first year, and in addition to buying Year 1 DE and MapAids, I also purchased the ancient history atlas and the Bible atlas, both worthwhile purchases. I bought a few books that were used for multiple weeks--maybe $40 worth. I purchased a binder. I made the mistake of purchasing a timeline. Although dd really wants to do it, it proved too much work for me. So we will save it for our second rotation. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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