Hi! We tried it with dd8, but it wasn't a good fit for her. I was all gung-ho and bought nature books, a field guide, good literature, lots of living books, coverstock paper for a timeline, etc. I made a weekly schedule, allowing about 10-20 minutes per subject. We started the day with reading and narration. Then did copywork, math, history, nature walk, and other subjects on alternating days. We kept the afternoon for handicrafts and other relaxed things.
After a few weeks, J wanted to skip things on the schedule. She started hating copywork - I think she thought of it as the tedious busywork she did in school. Narrations were a waste of time for her because she just didn't see the point since we both just read the story and both knew what it was about. The nature walks were fun but she never seemed to get around to drawing anything. She was too busy gathering specimens or looking things up in the field guide.
I finally tossed out the schedule and decided to let her "deschool" a little more. This was what she needed and it had eventually allowed her to focus more on her own interests. I had also changed my mind about "twaddle". J's love of learning was crushed by structured school and spontaneous reading has become unheard of with her. If she picks up a comic book or a Judy Blume novel I would be thrilled. I now believe that anything can set the spark for further learning no matter how silly it seems. Deschooling led us to unschooling which is more J's style. I love the CM ideas, though, and try to continue the nature walks and I think making a cool timeline (100 years per page in a binder) is something J would love to do with me.
I had high hopes for it to work, but J had other plans. You are going to have to just try it for a while and see if it works for your family. I believe it's a good, flexible, relaxed education method when it's a proper fit.
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