Ok...we are now two months in. I like the curriculum for the most part...have liked both books...boys like both books. Both boys prefer the unit study idea to the seperate subjects...we really really like the grammar. (as much as anyone can like grammar) The vocabulary is really sinking in. (I have always felt that literature is a great way to get vocabulary.) I don't like...that it is very mom intensive, maybe if I had gotten the workbook that would have been less, but there ya go. I cannot leave the boys with this curriculum so on days I am not available...I have to pull other things. Luckily (or not, depending) because a lot of what we want to cover is not covered we have plenty to pick from in supplementing on boys on their own days. For example...today I was not around 1/2 the day...so they did a unit study from Comom on terrestrial biomes (fits in with Unit study) and read from Viking tales (easier to read than Adam of the Road) also looked at viking books from library. Listened to Beowulf from Librovox. cursive, typing and math...last three not normally covered in unit study. Did try the game that comes with curriculum....and well, frankly I think game the boys made for christmas presents was better. This game board is a series of squares around a piece of (laminated) paper. (ours was serpentine and involved short cuts and dragons and castles and swamps) The questions were pretty good (straight out of curriculum) but they are in books, instead of cards...so you can not just draw a card which means...you got it...the reader cannot play, and the players cannot read because then you would be able to see all the other questions (and answers) on the two pages. SOOO that means the boys cannot play this game as part of a easy on mommy day. ugh. (the game the boys made also had Challenge cards and when you landed on a challenge square you might draw a card that said "an orc married your sister, loose a turn and pay 2 coins" or "you help an old woman across the stream, she shows you a shortcut...go ahead 4 spaces" just to make it interesting.) So Not worth the money (the game) unless maybe you just think of it as test booklets or review and not really a game at all. I wanted to play too. So I am still ok with the curriculum, which because we are adding so much, (Vikings, making ink and paper, etc.) We are doing about 1/2 speed. so easy to tweak...just don't get tied into the whole it is a 180 day program and your gonna finish in a year, because I don't know about you but we take field trips. So I think a generous 6 out of 10 on my part...although I think the boys would rate it higher. They really like the unit study aspect...so may have to work that in next year for American history on my own.
