Any TOG dropouts?

[Tarheel Heather]

Why and where did you go afterwards?

[G5052]

I used it for two years, and it just was too much on many fronts. This was the originial version, but the redesign didn't tempt me. We went back to Sonlight, which I had used for PK-K. I only have two children who are fairly close in age/abilities, so using a single Core has been much easier for me than TOG was.

[MicheleinMN]

Back to Ambleside Online and on to Kolbe Academy (for high school history and literature) and also TWEM (for high school).

 

(Though I'm still hanging on to TOG Year 2 because I can't quite let go!)

 

HTH,

[LisaNY]

I used TOG last year and for the first half of this year. It is a wonderful program. While I did not "drop out", I did stop using it and made the switch to WTM, which best fits my style of teaching. It allows me much more flexibility, and creates a more "doable" plan for us.

[Tarheel Heather]

We made it through 2 units of year 2, but I am not a planner and am beginning to panic because of the planning. Ds will be beginning dialectic, dd is lower grammar and then a three year old for fun.

 

I just do not see myself keeping up with it all. Evertime I look at the binders I get anxious. I love it, but it has become so overwhelming. Then lets toss science, latin, grammar, and math on in there. I am ready to pull my hair out.

 

I thinks the paint fumes are getting to me.

[Baseballmom]

I am taking a TOG break this year. We just finished up three years of using it and year 2 just wore me out. We are trying out Winter Promise in the fall. Dorothy

[Tina in WA]

Didn't even make it through year 2 unit 1 (had 1 in 7th and 4 1st grade and younger). Moved on to unit studies, MOH, and co-op classes.

[Sixmeadows]

for 2 years. We used classic at the time and the group was great. I found I was not utilizing all the different components of the program and that seemed to make my mind feel messed up. By the way, my oldest, Jeremy, is a genius. He even looks like Einstein.:lol:

[Sixmeadows]

I was in the middle of writing my post and the phone rang. I got up to talk a bit and my son sat down and finished my post. Isn't he helpful?:glare:

 

The part about my mind feeling messed up is accurate I guess even though those are his words. Anyway I have liked the ease of MFW and what is covers. A real blessing for my family.

 

Cheri

[VaKim]

I was in the middle of writing my post and the phone rang. I got up to talk a bit and my son sat down and finished my post. Isn't he helpful?:glare:

 

The part about my mind feeling messed up is accurate I guess even though those are his words. Anyway I have liked the ease of MFW and what is covers. A real blessing for my family.

 

Cheri

 

:lol::lol::lol: I love it!!

[Baseballmom]

I was in the middle of writing my post and the phone rang. I got up to talk a bit and my son sat down and finished my post. Isn't he helpful?:glare:

 

The part about my mind feeling messed up is accurate I guess even though those are his words. Anyway I have liked the ease of MFW and what is covers. A real blessing for my family.

 

Cheri

 

:lol::lol::lol: I went back to the previous posts trying to figure out why you wrote that your son was a genius.

[profmom]

I'm new to TOG and reading this thread with interest. A big draw for me is the discussion helps for dialectic and rhetoric (history, literature, philosophy, worldview training). Is there anything else out there that comes close to TOG for this? This aspect seems to set TOG apart from other literature-based curricula. Am I wrong?

 

(Just asking as I set up TOG2 notebooks for the fall! I don't want to be overwhelmed, and I'm going to try not to be! Here's the thing: my definition of an educated person includes that they are able to consider and discuss important issues with "wisdom and eloquence." Have you found anything better than TOG for this kind of training?)

[Closeacademy]

I love TOG but I tried it last year. We did Weeks 4 through 13 and then we were just overwhelmed. It was too much. It's all great stuff and we wanted to do it all.

 

Where did we go from there?

 

Burned out on history we took about 4 months off of history. Since then I have drawn back into just teaching math and language arts. The rest we are doing through independent research units (lapbooking, notebooking, etc.). I am reading SOTW to my oldest but she likes it.

 

Pretty much, I reevaluated what I felt was important.:001_smile:

[Susan A.]

We started with year 4 classic and did year 1 classic last year. We are not using this year because years 2 and 3 just don't mesh with what we need to do the next 3 years. We will have 10th, 7th, and 5th dd's this fall and the high schooler really needs a whole year called "American History" and a whole year of government/econ for our umbrella program. I called the guidance office to discuss TOG with them and they told me how I could make it work with their requirements, but I just felt it would be easier to use a more traditional approach. We did not try to use every part of TOG either - just too much, even though we all liked the program. The kids will still somewhat be doing the same time periods in history - 10th will use Streams of Civ. 2, the 7th will use BJU World Studies and the 5th will use WTM.

[momee]

We dropped it. I'm still unsure what method will be best for us from this point but for now it's Sonlight Core 200. I am flirting seriously with the idea of doing WTM/WEM but each time I'm drawn back to the religious education ideals not being met with that and the fact that I've tried twice to read the books (Agamenon and Don Quixote) and not gotten very far.

 

My ds was very frustrated by the lack of questions matching what he read about in TOG. We used classic and were about to ditch it when redesign came out. We started fresh with year 1 redes. in January.

Unfortunately he still experienced a frustrating lack of "flow". He often had trouble matching what he read to the questions that were asked. He wanted a basic textbook - read this chapter, take this test and be done I think. There was also a distaste I think that stayed with him because the literature was sooo history based - my kids love to read but historical fiction can only be called great so long.

 

SL is a closer to what he was looking for especially in terms of literature. I don't quite feel as though he's doing enough written work sometimes but I think I just need to get over that.

 

With TOG I also felt I spent quite a bit of time planning our weeks each Sunday afternoon. Whether it was working out the daily reading assignments for my children who weren't old enough to do so yet or finding books from the library. SL does all that for me and I love having my Sunday afternoon family time back!

 

Downside of the switch? We don't have the writing aids or great mapping assignments we had with TOG but I'm using IEW and SOTW maps so I think we're okay.

 

Guess nothing's perfect.

[Heather in Neverland]

I used it for one year...it was just too much. Too much planning, too much to try to "gather" together, too expensive, too much Reformed viewpoint. Just too much. We have since become LCC in our philosophy and everyone is happier!

[HollyinNNV]

I dropped it after a year. TOOOO much! I had done SL for years, but I was seeking simplicity and this was NOT it for me. I didn't like the huge amount of material. I really didn't like the book selections. In many cases they were very dull. I thought that the samples online were the best of the year and the rest of the weeks were not quite as good.

 

Finally-too much history for our family. After SL, TOG and Winterpromise I have come to the conclusion that we need a KISS approach to history. Thank goodness for WTM and SOTW.

Holly in N NV

[mamato4]

Just curious........

 

Anna

[gardenschooler]

Well, I'm not dropping out, I'm just getting started. I'm having a very hard time, though - to the point that everytime I sit down to try to plan something out, I end up spending a whole day on just one thing. I may be too an*l retentive to be happy with TOG!

 

I did read one thing somewhere that said, "If you alphabetize your homeschool catalogues, TOG may not be for you." I thought pshaw, I can do anything. But I'm having real issues with some of the details, and it's nothing really to complain about, it's just that's not how my brain works. I need to see everything in one place.

 

I'm not dropping it, but I'm having to gather everything, put it in one place, and then look at it and decide exactly what we're going to do. While the actual content of it is very good, the set up of it makes it so very hard for me.

 

For the main thing I was looking for - literature discussions at the rhetoric level - it looks fantastic. Actually, the whole R level looks great. Waaaay over our heads, but great.

[Chris in CA]

I tried it TWICE! TOG year 2 with the classic, but only made it through the first two units, and this year TOG year 1 - again only using units 1&2, - this time at least I had the hindsight to only purchase those units.

I've used Sonlight K, 3 & 4 - but now we are just reading history (Guerber). I'm at a loss about what to use for hs, maybe SL but not TOG -

[Jumping In Puddles]

I was in the middle of writing my post and the phone rang. I got up to talk a bit and my son sat down and finished my post. Isn't he helpful?:glare:

 

The part about my mind feeling messed up is accurate I guess even though those are his words. Anyway I have liked the ease of MFW and what is covers. A real blessing for my family.

 

Cheri

 

:smilielol5: Your son has a great sense of humor! :lol:

[Kathie in VA]

I sooo loved the idea of TOG but was a bit worried too. We got year 2 classic (B4 redesign came out). My kids were 6th, 5th, and 1st grades. I thought the main problem was that we started both TOG and Classical Conversations-Foundations at the same time. But as I look back I think TOG was/is just more then we needed. I do like how all the subjects tie together but frankly we don't have time for all those subjects in addition to math, science, logic, music, etc. Perhaps if they assigned less each week or day and bounced betweent the subjects it might have been more doable. My kids kept looking at the schedule and were just blindsided. We didn't make it out of the "fog" (or first month). We dropped it and just did Foundations and read history.

 

The next year we just read Guerber books as we went from Foundations history sentence to the next one. When that got too much we just read for each history sentence... kinda skipping stones thru history.

 

Next year Foundations works on Am History. My youngest will read on each history sentence. My older two (8th and 7th grades... not in CC) will do Sonlight core 100 Am History in Depth. We'll see how this goes. I think just reading a single spine all year with other related history books and related literature is just what we need. No extra projects unless we want to go and add them in. This will also leave me plenty of time for my CW prgm.

 

I also like Veritas Press's Omnibus, but I think it's too much for my kids for next year. So we may start it the next year. It kinda follows the cycles in CC-F, so that's helpful also.

[Rhondabee]

What a hoot! Tell Jeremy thanks for the laugh!!!

[LisaNY]

I was in the middle of writing my post and the phone rang. I got up to talk a bit and my son sat down and finished my post. Isn't he helpful?:glare:

 

The part about my mind feeling messed up is accurate I guess even though those are his words. Anyway I have liked the ease of MFW and what is covers. A real blessing for my family.

 

Cheri

 

ROFLOL!!! Oh, a kid after my own heart. :D

[TraceyS/FL]

I was in the middle of writing my post and the phone rang. I got up to talk a bit and my son sat down and finished my post. Isn't he helpful?:glare:

 

 

I'd like to point out that there doesn't seem to be any self-esteem issues at your house. Good job mom!!!

 

:lol:

[Quiver0f10]

We tried TOG a few years ago and dropped it mid year. I have the new redesign planned for this fall, but I am seriously considering switching to textbooks and doing some good family read alouds in addition to it. I also have considred using SL 2 year world history and dragging it out over 3 years.

 

I think TOG is going to be too much for us.

[langfam]

What is TOG?:001_huh:

[mommaduck]

Tapestry of Grace ;)

[Beth in Central TX]

LCC stands for Latin-Centered Curriculum . It's a book written by Andrew Campbell (aka Plaid Dad). Here's a couple of websites with more information:

 

http://www.memoriapress.com/descriptions/Latin-Centered.html

http://www.latincentered.com/

[CarynB]

We dropped it and switched to MFW for this upcoming year. Following that we will be using the Veritas Press curriculum (almost entirely) with SOTW. My kids are very young and it was just way too much for me.

[Pensguys]

Us!! We went to History Odyssey and because they won't have the time period we want for next year, we'll be using BiblioPlan.

[Tarheel Heather]

Thanks everyone! I love the concept and with the spacing of the kiddo's it would be wonderful.. It is so much more work not having a co-op, and I get very anxious when I open up the binder.

 

Pre Curriculum Stress Disorder? Planning Curriculum Anxiety Disorder, that's it!

 

Thanks everyone!

[happygrrl]

I used it for one year...it was just too much. Too much planning, too much to try to "gather" together, too expensive, too much Reformed viewpoint. Just too much. We have since become LCC in our philosophy and everyone is happier!

 

Well, I am not an official drop out yet, but i did just read LCC and i *know* it is right for us. My dd loves TOG, but it is too much variety for my ds. I am toying with the idea of doing LCC in the a.m. and letting my ds do TOG on her own in the afternoons (she is just that kinda gal). I think if I set up quarterly notebooks she can do it independently. I already have this year's plan and the books for both LCC and TOG (ack!) so we will try it out and see how it goes.

[FlockOfSillies]

:lol:

[siloam]

Well I am not a drop out, but the more I am around TOG and other options, the more I think it is just personal preference.

 

While I love SL it can't do it. The kids don't do well with it because they are so hands on. I don't do well with it because I love it and become obsessive about trying to finish the programs in a year even if it means cutting out other more important subjects. :001_huh: The only way I could see coming back to SL is if I had the kids do the cores totally interdependently, but that even bugs me. What if they never get to 200? And I have serious doubts about 400, from posts I have read about the difficult level and some of the...points of views that I am not sure I would agree with.

 

TOG, for me, is just a bunch of tools, options. I would make what every program I used what I want it to look like, so I just need a base to start from. TOG works as a better base. For instance we will probably take closer to 6 years to do a history cycle, and I can live with that, better than I can live with the idea of doing SL then having to drop one of the High School cores. I know the kids will have gaps any way I go, I am just more comfortable with the gaps I see in TOG than with SL. :D

 

But for those who are not as picky as I am about how things are done, what we cover, ect... I can see why TOG would become more of a burden than the answer.

 

Heather

 

p.s. Who will admit I haven't read the Teacher Notes for the last 3 weeks and it doesn't bother me one bit! There are there if I need them.

[LaMere Academy]

Too overwhelming and we went back to Sonlight. I was using TOG 3, the older version. I've looked at the new and while it does look more organized, it's still too much choice for me. I like things laid out.

[Julie in MN]

By the way, my oldest, Jeremy, is a genius. He even looks like Einstein.:lol:

 

ROFL~! I don't think I've ever used that acronym before -- but finally I am really laughing! I think I have your son's competition here at my house -- he would definitely type the same thing if given a chance at my keyboard :o)