My eldest is now reading Socks by Beverly Cleary for "school reading" and is plowing through independent readers though still prefers to read much shorter books by herself regardless of the actual grade level of the reading - I think she just likes to finish them, so will probably try to get her reading the good picture books I read to my 3 year old as they are short but at a better reading level for her. I am now writing them down for her as she was promised a reward but even despite the reward getting her to write them down is just too much of a struggle - she just makes a pile of what she read and at the end of the day I write them down for her.

My youngest is reading book 4b of Ladybird and has also started the McGuffey Primer - I am using this to teach phonics (not introducing any of the words to her beforehand - she must sound them out if she does not know them) as well as using the Ordinary Parents guide to teaching reading.

My eldest turns 7 in September and my youngest is 3 years and 3 months old.
The I see Sam books I printed out from this website: http://www.marriottmd.com/sam/   - They are not what I call great reading, but the pictures amuse my DD and it was extra very easy reading practice.

My 6 year old does not want to write a reading list - she is reading more and more independently now, but I cannot get her to write them down and keeping up with her so I can write them down is almost impossible now (this has happened recently) She is reading Socks by Beverley Cleary now as a read-to-Mom book. I suspect she is capable of reading anything now - its just a case of keeping her interest - reading cooking instructions and menus in restaurants, shop signs and directions in airports and other large buildings also keeps her interested.

However, she likes to grab my computer, get on youtube and type in TV programmes she wants to watch, or use Skype to type to her Dad and I have some fears about her safety on the computer (luckily it is all in full view of me because of where the computer is situated in the house)

My 3 year old is doing very well with Ladybird sight word readers (the key reading scheme), but has started phonics - she is in that phase where she picks up new words very very rapidly because they are in context and somehow she remembers them, but also knows when to sound out words even though she does not know all the phonemes. She is also taking off with her knowledge of science and other concepts although I have never taught her specifically - we do read a lot though - I have a feeling she is also learning from my older child.

I thought I'd update this again for my own information.

My youngest has read:
Ladybird Book 3a, 3b and some of 3c
She has also read to book 20 of I see Sam
And she has started Book 4a of Ladybird - I am now just teaching the words as they come up in the book and she is managing this fine, I do repeat some of the sight words she sticks on
I plan to start phonics with her regularly now.

My elder has read:
  Sophie's Adventures (Dick King Smith)
  Has started Capyboppy
She has also now started more independent reading, though resists writing down the books she has read - I was hoping she would keep a list so we could reward her, but also so that we would know what she was doing and what she picks to read. Trying to figure out some way around this.

My youngest child is now 1 month younger than my oldest was when I started this post so it is very interesting for me to watch what is happening - my youngest has read the following so far:

Ladybird Keywords Book 1b (we couldn't find 1a when I started her on them - we have since found it and she read it independently)
Ladybird Keywords Book 2a
Ladybird Keywords Book 2b
I See Sam Books 1-5 (she does a new book daily at the moment)

Her sight word vocabulary is actually less then my eldest's was at this age and she seems to need more repetitions than my older child to remember a word, however she is able to blend and work out simple cvc phonics by herself. She is still working a lot though with beginning sounds despite knowing to sound out the entire word. She seems able to handle longer passages of reading than my eldest did at the same age.

My 6 year old this year has read a number of books. Some that I remember are:

Sable
Pioneer Cat
Some of Harry Potter Book 2 (we put this away as her stamina was not great enough to get enough out of it - I would prefer she can read an entire chapter in one sitting before trying this again and they are quite long chapters - she is able to read it, but there are other issues to consider with this at this age)
The Children of Noisy Village
B is for Betsy
The Invisible Dog

I still read aloud to both children daily from fiction and non fiction and my youngest "reads" to me from anything by running her finger under the words and saying whatever she thinks fits the picture - and then yelling in delight when she knows a word or can work one out.

There are a lot of changes coming in policies - I would explore it the closer your child gets - the year they turn 7 is when registration is supposed to happen (you do not have to register before that) and after that - well statistics showed that as of the census of 2011 there were approximately 57000 homeschoolers in South Africa and only 3000 of them were registered. I have friends homeschooling who are regsitered and those who aren't - the requirements are that you must show what you did the previous year or show an outline and materials for the year you plan to school - they do prefer school based curricula (like Love to Learn, possibly one of the overseas boxed curricula, Little Footprints etc) They need you to have a table and chair and place for schoolwork.

The reason I am not registered has partly to do with timing of schooling - they expect a parent to be with them during traditional school hours and I school year round and work when called in when I have someone watching my children who does not educate them. We are not at home schooling during traditional school hours and often can be found shopping or going out if school is done for the day and we take holidays whenever we feel like it. This can clash with authorities and it is not a legal requirement to register here. However things may change and there have been worrying documents going round about registration and what it can entail so we are all watching and waiting and complaining.

No, we are not registered with anyone.

And what about after kindergarten?

What do you guys have in mind for keeping a high quality education?

My elder DD was due to start grade 1 in January this year. She is homeschooled - we went to a private school as the public schools here are really bad and asked what they would do with a child (then 4) who could read and was expected to be more advanced by the time she started grade R (kindergarten) - they said she would remain in her age classes and could get extra work - this would never have worked - my child is very very busy - she likes to play - she never learnt anything in a formal manner and to expect her to sit and be bored all day and then do extra work in the afternoon would have driven her mad.

I do now follow a slightly more traditional curriculum although simply at an advanced level - we use multiple Math curricula to make sure that she works both deeply as well as drilling the math facts - we do a LOT of word problems and logic puzzles. We are still working mostly on the 3Rs (she still reads aloud to me daily so that I can check her pronunciation and also make sure that she is fluent as the difficulty rises - but also so that I can insist she reads more advanced works which she may never pick up by herself - simply because there is not a pretty picture on the front of the book) Spelling, writing, grammar etc are just more advanced than for the normal grade level.

We use and will continue to use BFSU for science - I really like this curriculum as it allows for rabbit trails and I can use whatever books or videos I want to but still cover the topics that need covering. We use SOTW (2 this year) and add to that whatever fits in also - I will have to look further as history is not my favourite subject and it still needs to be taught - at the same time, history is also about now and we do talk about international news and let her read child friendly news articles - she gets into things she shouldn't every now and then and then we have to explain things in a child friendly manner that perhaps I would have preferred to wait to cover. Geography we use various resources and again try to link it to all the other subjects - I do want her to have a good overview of how the world fits together.

I have however not thought into high school or beyond. I need to make sure now that she has a good education - can read anything and can get the information she needs, knows how the world works and that things change often, knows how to acquire new information in multiple ways (not JUST the internet either) and that she can think and express opinions, communicate well with people - orally and in a written form, but also that she cares about other people and that she knows she lives in a community no matter how far removed that community sometimes can feel. After that I need her to know that there are ways of getting what you want or need - that you need to know what it is you want though - that high school itself falls in that category - what is it you want out of high school/college/university/adult life and are you on a path that will make that possible. This is a tall ask for a 12-13 year old so I will teach that she needs all the time to keep as many options open as possible and this includes when it comes to education.

My elder child started grade 1 this year. We are fortunately homeschooling her.

This is what we have been using for her:

Reading: She reads aloud to me daily from various books (many are the Sonlight grade 4 choices as they are suitable for this age) though I continue to choose books that will challenge her vocabulary also. She can read pretty much anything and has been able to for a while, so now it has to do with keeping her interest while still extending her vocabulary at a rate that does not overwhelm her or put her off the material.
           : We have started silent reading - my DD does read anything and everything, but is very busy so to get her to concentrate for a more extended length of time and read a proper book I have had to give her time to do this as a subject.
           : She does reading for the gifted child grade 3 comprehensions and I make her write out the answers as handwriting practice too.
           
Other Language Arts: we are doing our own thing for spelling - I am making sure she knows how to spell all the Dolch words this year based on their phonetic spelling - so she is learning the phonics and associated words too. Will see where else we head when this is done - she already has a very good spelling ability and knows it works with both phonics and sight and that she should try various combinations and then "see" what looks right - her reading is advanced enough that she always knows when it looks wrong.
                             : Creative Writing - she still does some copywork, but also writes her own stories - as her handwriting stamina improves (it has a lot in the last few weeks even) then we will work more on this
                             :Grammar - we have been reading grammarland and doing the worksheets - usually I teach the part of speech before reading it in the book though.
                             : I am using some of the choices from Easy Peasy Grade 2 curriculum and Year 2 curriculum as many of the non fiction passages on there have been a suitable level for her to read by herself.

Maths: We are doing Life of Fred - we started late last year and are now in Edgewood and plan just to continue as we are and see what happens.
         : She is still in Singapore 2a - sometimes we go fast and sometimes very slowly through this, we should start 2b very soon - with this she is also learning her multiplication facts
         : We continue to do maths in real life like we did when she was much younger but now working at a harder level - money is still a big motivator to be able to do maths.
         
History: We are working through SOTW2 and associated books.

Geography: much of this is covered through BFSU and we are reading A Life like Mine as well and will move on to a proper geography book later (one written specifically to teach geography)

Science: We are almost finished BFSU1 and when we are will probably continue on to BFSU2

My husband does a world map testing with her once a week - he picks countries that have been in the news, shows her where they are in the world and we discuss the most recent "history" or news with her in a child friendly manner.

Bible: We are still reading Leading little Ones to God and other devotionals and she attends a good Sunday School.

Music: My DD has a great interest in movies and also musical and is now learning songs from these though I play all sorts of music for her. We have not done any formal studies though mention musicians and link music at times and include it as part of history too. I would like my DD to start an instrument, but may leave that for next year.

Because many of the books we read together are written in countries other than our own we also often look up and read about various things found in those books - so have learnt about various plants, animals, mining, how thread was made and how it is today - anything that sparks her interest in a book we read we quickly look up - if she shows more interest then we will look deeper into it.

She does gymnastics once a week, chess club once a week and goes to a homeschooling group to play also once a week though is with friends a few times a week. She still prefers children older than her (and for some reason she prefers boys too).
                             
She still plays with blocks and climbs walls and digs in the dirt, she writes things in her own time and requests baking when she feels like it - she's still very much a child. Education where I live is really shocking which means when she is performing ahead in her grade compared to countries overseas then she is performing even further ahead of the children here - I am not sure what would happen if we were ever to send her back to school)

My daughter has recently turned 3. I am homeschooling my older child who is 6 and so the younger one has to fit in with that too which means she joins us for many science experiments, watches many of the youtube videos I show my elder for whatever we happen to be studying. Mostly with her individually though I focus on reading - both sight word reading and phonics - this child actually likes more formal teaching than I did with my eldest but the achievements are about the same for their ages despite this.

We are using Easy Peasy getting ready 1 as well abcjesuslovesme.com 3 year old curriculum to cover the more general preschool tasks. She has started MEP reception and we do counting daily - since my eldest often leads this we usually count quite high for the younger and she has picked it up well. My 3 year old loves to draw and paint and has excellent fine motor skills (much better than my elder at the same age) and we do cutting as well. She does also operate the computer a little.

She is in gymnastics as well and since she is well behind where her sister was in gross motor skills we do also practice these things daily. We also have a lot of free play in the garden and also with blocks and other toys that are not as educationally classified though many times serve as better educational toys than those that teach letters and sounds. We do a fair amount of music - mostly just listening to and learning songs (my younger loves music more than my elder did at the same age).

My priorities for age 3 though are to get the reading going well and read to her from everything and anything. I also want her to have a lot of time to form relationships with her siblings and other people.

I have been using this book for a while now. I am in a science profession and so is my husband so it is relatively easy for me to point out what is important to my child. What I normally do is go to the library and choose a few books on the topic I plan to teach - I go to the baby section of the library first and choose at least one book there as my 2 year old does join us for these lessons and I want her to get something out of it too, but also because these very easy intro books tend to give the absolute basics of the lesson very quickly and with bright pictures which my 6 year old enjoys. It is then easier to move on to the more detailed books.
We do not do much writing but when I have finished a section I will often print out a colouring page or worksheet or we will build something and she copies one sentence that sums up the most important idea in the lesson. Sometimes we do experiments or even have a field trip, but this is not often and only when I can it it in.
I also try to find things that link to the lessons later on - for example we are now on holiday and have found the exoskeletons of various insects lying around so we collected them and will use them to add to this lesson in the book (my daughter thought that was disgusting but still learnt a lot by seeing them)
I do not follow a set plan for the order - I basically chose a lesson I wanted to do, checked what the prerequirements were and did those lessons first and then later when we had done the whole necessary series I picked another that looked fun and repeated - doing all the prerequisites first.

Preparation time varies according to how much time I have and what I want to accomplish. I can spend hours when I have the time, but when I am very short on time then less than an hour can get a section done and it will be fine - not as detailed or as busy, but she will get the point.

I have had to order them online - while it may be possible to get a few of them in bookshops, the bookshops in South Africa are generally not doing to well and I have had to move to online ordering for most books - even South African ones. I use South African online bookstores however to order my books as it works out cheaper for me because of the heavy import duties on overseas parcels. Sometimes I will order with a bulk order that our homeschool web of people organises as this decreases postal fees. We have a very large group of homeschoolers in this country who look after each other so that helps.

It is Building Foundations of Scientific Understanding.

I have a just turned 6 year old and a 2.5 year old.

We start the day with singing and watching some stories or educational videos on youtube as both children can do this - some will be for the younger child and some for the older though they usually both watch each others videos. We may also eat breakfast while youtube is on.

We then do Bible study - a quick story for the toddler with a worksheet or colouring page and then she can play or she continues to colour/draw (my youngest loves to write, draw and colour unlike my eldest at the same age)

I then swicth from one child to the next all morning.

The eldest does two lots of Math (we are using a mixture of Singapore 2a, Horizons and Life of Fred), reading (she still reads aloud to me from books I have chosen for her), SOTW2, BFSU1, spelling (I am not using a currculum for this - I just dictate a sentence with whatever we are working on in it and she writes it), handwriting, creative writing, grammar and then I still read aloud to her from a number of books about whatever we are interested in as well as fiction.

The Math she does partly independently (with me there but seldom helping), I am reading Life of Fred to her, but just because she likes the time with me, SOTW2 I read to her also for the same reason - she needs to really love the books to read them so I seldom force her to read something that doesn't thrill her a lot, BFSU is very teacher intensive. Basically most of it I have to be there - there is nothing really independent where I can leave her and turn to my toddler - the elder goes out to play outside inbetween her subjects and that is when I deal with the toddler. Does she interrupt us? Of course she does - she's 2! We just work around it.

The youngest does reading with flashcards as well as phonics and also some reading from early readers, we play with numbers and shapes, she does jigsaw puzzles and we have started early handwriting with her as she enjoys it. I also try to play with her with legos and blocks and other construction toys as this seems to help her language development more than other things I have done with her.

I also make sure both children spend time outside and we discuss things we see out there (this is mostly for the youngest though we have done more indepth studies with the eldest) They also are swimming daily at the moment usually in the afternoons and the eldest has gymnastics and dancing in the afternoons - my toddler comes to these classes and draws pictures or plays with toys - they do have some educational toys there and also jungle gyms that she can play on.

We do not do everything everyday and if pushed I can finish with both children in 2-3 hours, though usually school takes from 08:00 til 13:00 with many breaks inbetween.

My 6 year old is not independent - she can read the instructions and follow them and I rarely have to say much, but she needs me there sitting at the table with her else she will waste a lot of time or get up a thousand times. She is very busy and does not sit still easily (never has - she would be diagnosed ADHD in a school though she does not have it) so we move from place to place all day - she'll read in the lounge, do Math in the schoolroom and creative writing in the diningroom and so on. I have been working to get her to at least do one or two pages of math by herself and I can now get out the room and expect something to have been done when I come back, but I cannot be gone more than a few minutes.

My 2 year old has not napped since before she turned 2 so she has always just taken part with us no matter what we are doing.

Lol, who knows what he'd expect then... I told him three would be the end of it - I have bad pregnancies and he really thinks stretching to three might be too much. This will have to be the last.

My DD2 is starting to learn the periodic table now - she's learning it how she learnt to count - when I say hydrogen she now says helium, say lithium, she says "bellilium" - working on that one I'm getting better now too and DD(nearly 6) is along for the ride and may learn it before any of the rest of us.

Great ideas - thanks guys. She needs to know the periodic table in order though - I found The New Periodic Table song on Youtube and think we could learn it with that one, but using a placemat would probably speed things along.

Twins are being mentioned a lot around me lately - I am a twin myself but really can't afford to be having twins (and not from a financial standpoint - from the pregnancy side of things - one is difficult enough for me) so I think I'll skip the periodic table in Japanese

Will look at making periodic table blocks too - bl;ocks work well with my kids, or even just flashcards might work for her - that are cut out separately.

Thanks for the ideas.