The let down.

You know how it is when you buy a curriculum for your kids and you are excited about it, they are excited about it, can't wait to start it. Then the let down comes when it isn't all you expected or it just doesn't work with your child or your children.

I have had a few of these this year. The main one has been Story of the World Vol. 4. My ds and I used SOTW Vol. 1 last year, it was okay. We didn't love it but it worked. Volume 4 has been horrible. My ds doesn't like the reading. He isn't interested in most of the subjects and the one's he is interested in are so generalized and shallow. I know it offers novels and other works to supplement but most of those cannot be read within a short time frame before we would move on to something else.

The activities in Vol. 4 are not our cup of tea. Many of them are long memorization lessons, or recipes. The recipes would be fun once in a while but our time and resources are limited.

I am planning a unit study of the Civil War to begin in January. Then we can finish up the year with some SOTW and other resources. I am looking towards next year and I may look at BJP or Abeka. We have been happy with BJP for the most part, although the Reading 6 is not that exciting.

As for my dd we just started SOTW Vol. 1. She doesn't find it that interesting. I wish we could do Vol. 2 since she loves the whole knights, kings and queen format, but alas I cannot buy anything else right now.

I am hoping to purchase Teaching Textbooks 6 for TT to supplement Math U See. I feel that he needs exposure to other subjects other than just fractions at this level. Plus, some of the teaching strategies in Epsilon have not clicked with TT. I have ended up teaching several of the lessons in a totally different way. That is fine but adds to the already long time it takes to complete our math lesson daily.

I dont' think I will be using Math U See with Poogie next year unless something majorly changes. It is just to slow for her.

Science is another area that I will have to make major changes in next year. TT's Harcort book is great but I wish it had more to go with it. Poogie will need a more structured curriculum. This year we have mainly used unit studies.

So many decisions and only one me.