I had heard people talk about LOF for a good long while before actually purchasing Apples.. I wished I hadn't waited so long because it has really helped my oldest son, who was having issues with Math. And.. since you do not write in the books, you can use them with younger children. We are now going onto Farming and going strong!

I do want to add that we use LOF in addition to Horizons Math for homeschooling. I am not quite sure it would be considered enough by itself.

I keep trying to think of a way to best describe the book Apples in the Life of Fred series and why I would recommend the book, but I everything I come up with falls short. The book primarily focuses on mathematical principles/concepts, but in story form. Many of the stories are funny. This book makes learning mathematics fun by following the life of two characters, Fred and Kingie (Fred's doll). With many of the public schools across the United States adopting the Common Core Curriculum, if you are choosing to home school, I would suggest using a home school curriculum, plus workbooks that focus on the Common Core Curriculum (if your state follows the CCC), and add in some Life of Fred Books from the Elementary Series to break up the monotony of mathematics . In the Elementary Series of the Life of Fred, the books are titled in an alphabetic order (i.e. Book 1: Life of Fred: Apples, Book 2: Life of Fred: Butterflies, Book 3: Life of Fred: Cats, Book 4: Life of Fred: Dogs...). I hope I was helpful. My children are too young yet to read the book on their own, but they are not too young to start hearing the stories for enjoyment or to start developing an understanding in basic mathematical principals.

My daughter loves these books! She is in 4th grade and has been using them since 3rd grade. She can't wait to read the next one. She reads and does the exercises on her own. We don't use it in a conventional way. She homeschools 3 days a week and goes to a private school two days a week. Because she can do this material on her own, I have her do Life of Fred on the two days she is at private school. We have a separate math curriculum that we use at home. This has been a great way for her to get math done at the school, and I don't have to work on coordinating with her private school on her math curriculum. My daughter just loves the character Fred and she likes to share the stories with us. She finds the books very funny. The book is unique in that it presents advanced concepts early, and in an engaging way since they are part of the story of Fred's life. The way Life of Fred provides a fun environment to learn math is really priceless. Even though it's full of math concepts, Life of Fred doesn't make math feel hard or tedious. But, it doesn't really drill basic concepts the way a traditional curriculum would. I use the Spectrum math workbook at home, which is inexpensive, and she enjoys doing a math software program. I think all used together she is getting a good math education.

I had heard many good things about this series. Our library doesn't have them so I purchased the first book just to see what it was all about. It's too easy for my kids but they really love the story and read through it like it's a regular novel! I plan to buy the rest of the series since my kids are so interested in it! Even though the first book is too simple, I am glad I bought it so we can start at the beginning of Fred's story. It does have a preview of higher math as well, just to introduce concepts so when the kids reach that level it's something they have already been exposed to.

I've seen a lot of reviews on homeschool groups about using LOF, and I've been pretty skeptical. We tend to keep a traditional attitude towards our course subjects.

Anyway - my 1st grader loves LoF and he's sped through it pretty quickly. We've only been working in it for a week or so, and he's already about finished. I went ahead and ordered Butterflies today.