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Thanks, Julie, that does help. If it were up to my ds, we'd read the whole book in one day! :D I think as long as I can read the whole chapter, my ds will adjust to only reading a smaller portion of the story. (I've had to be firm about the stories in "Stories of the Pilgrims," as well, as he's want...

We're using Beyond, but we're in a similar situation, in that I chose "Sword in the Tree" for our adventure storytime and there are only 14 chapters for the 20 days. Last unit, I chose Helen Keller, but since we read a chapter a day, we were done in 10 days and I ended up finishing with Louis Braill...

You might also want to check your local library, as I found many of the suggested books available at our library. In addition, A First Book in American History and Stories of Great Americans are both available on-line, for free.

I am trying to turn his paper a little more each day (to match his arm), but I don't know that I am actually achieving anything in that department. It seems like his body & arm just move further around. 'Just thought I'd mention that Zaner-Bloser actually instructs the child to have the paper direc...

Great! Thank you!!

From my state's homeschooling regulations: "The following courses shall be taught at least once during the first eight grades: United States history, New York State history, and the Constitutions of the United States and New York State." I know US History is taught in Beyond and Bigger, and I'm assu...

My girls still use the lined paper for 2nd and 3rd grade so I don't know if I can find a comp book with such large lines. Thanks to everyone for the insight. Actually, you might find good success just using the normal bound composition book. Up until recently, my son also was only using the 2nd gra...

Another question if you don't mind. How much of the poem each day would be acceptable for an eight year old? I have been having them do a stanza each day and have been met with a tiny bit of resistance. Do I push through this or lighten the amount of copywork? Again, thanks My ds is 8 and we're als...

Wow! Julie's post about doing R&S Spelling and how hard it was to put the spelling book away was like ME talking!! Okay, so this question is for someone who can help, then. Where do you start a child in dictation who literally struggles to spell common words correctly? Should I buy Bigger (since I ...

Good handwriting has always been one of my goals for ds, but I've recently realized my emphasis on proper letter formation has resulted in him being extremely meticulous when printing anything. I love his handwriting, as it's very neat and well done, but I also don't want writing to be so laborious ...

There was a similar thread to this one, back in May. I don't know how to link to a post, so I've just copied and pasted Carrie's and Julie's responses from back then: Re: A First Book in American History Postby Carrie on Thu May 13, 2010 11:14 pm Summer, I'll paste a past post of mine below that wil...

I'm just explaining this badly! :oops: I never cut right through the middle of a word - either horizontally or vertically. You are doing this right already! :D The idea is just to make it a puzzle type project to put back together using a model to sequence it properly. I sometimes cut vertically th...

We did Zaner-Bloser Handwriting K in Kindergarten, ZB 1 in a K-1 year and ZB 2M in 1st. The first year, we just concentrated on letter formation, but since then I've always alternated copywork with handwriting practice. Often I'll do one day of handwriting (one page in ZB), followed by one day of co...

Good question! :D The skill being taught within this activity is for children to be able to sequence sentences using a model for guidance. I cut apart by lines first and let him look at the model to put it back together. Later, I cut it apart more, like down the middle vertically to divide individu...

MistyP wrote:Great! Thanks! So, there is not spelling in Bigger??

Bigger has two choices for spelling, either a spelling list (which is the same as the 2nd list in Beyond) or dictation passages. Once a child has mastered the two spelling lists, any further spelling instruction is via dictation.