Tomorrow we will complete 8 weeks of Mater Amabilis, and I can say I am really glad I changed to this curriculum.  Overall, everything is going very well.  If you do AO, you need to do only AO and not try to add or modify things unless you want to lengthen your school day.  You'll get a lot of wonderful History, Literature, Shakespeare, Poetry, and Bible but not much science, math, or catechism.  And hopefully you will have a child that is either a skilled reader or a patient listener (or both), else you're doomed.  And of course it will have a Protestant flavor, if not an anti-Catholic feel.

MA has a good measure of science not just from nature studies but also from Geography/Earth studies.  A full science program, not just a living science textbook, is introduced from the beginning.  Nature studies, though, is conspicuously missing the wonderful living books AO has.  Religious studies focuses on Bible stories, Saints, and catechism.  Poetry is weak, however; I want to go back to daily poetry reading.  The literature is more age-appropriate with a list of a manageable length (who ever finishes all the books on the AO free reading list!) Shakespeare does not start until Level 2 (year 4).  Even using Lamb or Nesbit, ds#1 didn't really understand it until he was 8.

As for our own schooling, I've been woefully negligent in our nature notebooks and poetry.  Next term, I'll do better (ha! I pray, anyway.)  The schedule over all is going very well, though.  We're all happy with it, and it is flexible enough to accommodate "difficulties" without getting too far off track.

I am using One Small Square African Savanna in place of the extreme environments reading scheduled in MA.  We're really loving it--I have 40 minutes slotted so we can read 2 to 4 pages, and then either do the activities in the book or work on a "savanna field guide."  We also replaced the science program with Noeo Physics I, which is also wonderful.  Ds#1 and ds#2 work on it together.

The one thing we're having problems with is This Country of Ours.  As much as this is supposed to be a living book, it is not capturing the imagination of my children (or me!)  Ds#1 is also reading The American Revolution book in the Landmark series with dad at night, which is more interesting.  I find it especially frustrating because I am reading the William Bennett book which is soooo much more engaging, though won't be the right level for my children until they are teens.  TCOO tries to be for younger kids but gives way too much detail to keep their attention.  Perhaps it is better to use Landmark and Jean Fritz books to cover time periods and people rather than trying to find something comprehensive for Level 1 kids.  I'm going to switch ds#2 to The Men Who Found America to cover the explorers, hopefully by next week.