How much writing does he do, on average (weekly? monthly? per semester? however you do it)? Perhaps you should have him write less, in terms of the number of assignments, but have him write longer, more meaningful assignments. Yeah, he got that particular format down - awesome. Now, with a good student, you move onto more elaborate and more complex formats. This is a good problem to have, by the way. :D It is comparatively easy to work on stilted, when you consider that it is much, much more difficult to work with a child who just lacks conceptual clarity and cannot present the concepts one flowing from the previous one into the next one. I think his major issues are not being stilted, though, but as far as the format is concerned, I suggest the above.

I have clearly spelled out content / coverage expectations. They self-schedule when they are older so they can meet those at their own pace, in times of the day they find they learn the best - so they have a lot of freedom within the structure. A few times a week we have discussion sessions and go over things together.

Yes, though we do not necessarily eat all at the same time.

I have never used a writing curriculum nor do I intend to.

We have in some cases both the exit exams - to qualify to exit high school - and then the entry exams - to qualify to enter a particular course of university studies.

Last year (all are .PDF files): Math, for students of scientific lycees Design / architecture, for students of artistic lycees (this one is taken over a period of several days, candidates take it for six hours daily) Foreign languages, for students of linguistic lycees (they do not all take all languages and the tests are not of equal difficulty for all languages; for English, you can scroll down to pages 6-9) - All of the above are so-called "second tests", which are orientation-specific (first test is shared, Italian, which I am ignoring here as it is not terribly relevant; further tests depend on the type of school - second test is in one discipline only, and the third test in which a lot of subjects are mixed and which depends on the school so you only find simulations online, not official exams) - For the third test, there are various types of questions, so you can see examples of math in three different typologies: Typology A, dealing with the arguments synthetically Typology B, open-ended questions - to translate one: Explain Euler's theorem and provide an example of a solid for whom it is not true (in the section Geometry of space, 1st question) Typology C, darned multiple choice English typology A, B, and darned C I thought math and English were good to use as examples because they are pretty universal, I do not have to translate stuff :D, but the same things exist for art history, law, Latin, sciences, etc., depending on which subjects are meshed together. After the third exam, there is an oral exam. Second exam gets picked every year on a national level, so for example classical lycees had Latin last year, but Greek this year; scientific lycees get math (legally they can get Latin too, LOL, but it does not happen in practice) and linguistic ones get languages. ETA: Oh, and if you ask me... Both the first & the second tests from the last year are too easy; the third test would depend on the combination of subjects and typologies and how it is done.

I am not touching politics with a ten foot pole. :D Mine was a general statement. I do not have a moral problem with money and with the accumulation of the wealth. You sent your child to an international school / went to an international school yourself (a foreign school on your own national territory, e.g. a French lycee on Manhattan), or went to school abroad (e.g. a French lycee in France)? Sorry, it is for some reason not clear to me what you are referring to. :) You mean I could possibly be wrong?! :lol: Of course. But I am sharing my own experience because I am too ignorant of the topic on a "scientific" level to quote numbers, know what the numbers mean, etc. So I am having a "caffe discussion" with y'all, with all the limitations and superficiality of a caffe discussion. :) Same here. Not upsetting at all, I am in a good mood. :tongue_smilie:

And here. :D ETA: Guys... let's show it to them? I know for sure current versions of the new graduation exams from the previous years ARE online. Maybe we could make a s/o and post examples, maybe even translate some specific open-ended questions, to show the format of those tests?

Yes, I agree with all of this.

Personally, I have no moral problem with the rich getting richer per se, but I insist that a "segregated" education *is* a part of the process. I do not know personally anyone whom I would consider wealthy (from upper middle to just "plain upper" class) who, in this generation, sends their children to regular public schools. If they do, those public schools are extreme outliers in the public school system. In my generation, on the other hand, the education of those children was not that "segregated" - or so was my impression. I definitely see a shift. My generation was still largely trusted to regular public schools. There were exceptions, but sometimes even a solid, good public school was okay for parents. Our kids' generation, very few kids' educations are trusted to regular public schools. Either they are in extraordinary public schools, either they are in select private schools, often international ones (can you imagine what a drastic step that is - to decide you are going to educate your child in another language and culture? Okay, some of those people do not even live in their primary culture, but still, they opt not to send the children to the local schools). I know people who went into the private sector after being thoroughly disillusioned with the work conditions in the public sector (overcrowded classrooms, being "dictated" too much what and how they can teach, etc.). In all of those cases, we are talking about competent teachers. I am not speaking of any region or country in particular, because my own network of family and friends spreads over several countries, but everyone seems to be aware of this great shift towards the private education. I had some bitter conversations with some PS teachers lately (not in the USA). They claim that they miss them. They miss the good teachers who went into the private sector, and they miss the kids of the wealthy, educated people who are now more than ever before being educated in de facto separate societies, which was still not the case a generation ago.

But I was talking about excellent private schools (the very top of the education in the country), not "just" private schools. :) Those can allow themselves to "buy" the quality in terms of people who work them and offer them better working conditions. So, when we talk about excellent schools, it is not that they do not exist. But for many people, they will never be a reality because a part of them are in the private sector, and the access to the private sector follows the lines of parental wealth (esp. at younger ages). I agree that $$ per se is not the problem. Kansas city, LOL.

There will always be excellent schools, no doubt about that. That is not the problem. The problem is that we are rapidly losing what used to be solid, average, good schools as they are undergoing a transformation into subpar schools. Another problem is that the money gets in, of course, so most of those excellent schools are private, i.e. they "bought" the quality (in terms of teachers, resources, etc.) into the private sector, so there are less such public schools. This puts additional strain onto the system and furthers down the educational stratification by coinciding it with the economic stratification of the society (something you do not have in some European school systems which do have tracks and all, but the stratification is still in public schools due to academic accomplishment, rather than parental wealth - a MUCH more transparent system, in some ways), which then furthers down the vicious cycle of the poor getting poorer, the rich getting richers, the educated getting more educated and the undereducated getting uneducated. A healthy school system would have a good, solid average school. It is not the outliers that matter. There will always be oases of excellence in particular districts or in the private sector, and there will always be failing oddballs which, while sad for children who end up there, are not statistically significant. It is that the average school must provide solid academics, the average which drives the system must be solid... not that kids should be doing college work, but they should also not be doing middle school work portrayed as high school work. Those average schools are merely a statistical function nowadays in many places, because they simply do not exist. You have a shocking number of failing schools, and a handful of beyond excellent ones which up the average, and a bit of schools in the strata between those, but the average as such no longer really exists in reality in many places.

Siesta? :tongue_smilie: Have a LONGER lunch break? In some school systems / cultures they tend to stop working for an early afternoon break of *several* hours - it includes not only the time to lunch, but also to chill, change activities, and then go back to work.

Yes, I would.

1. In order to teach it, you have to know it first. Do not put yourself into a position of a blind person leading another blind - you HAVE to be (significantly) advanced compared to your student for teaching to make sense. Alternatively, you can choose not to teach, but to facilitate - in that case, be sure to facilitate via high quality materials and contact with people who do know what they are doing. 2. Grade exclusively concrete, demonstrated knowledge. I completely ditch anything else; even more so, I consider a grade based on other criteria (repetitive daily work, "participating", "engagement", etc.) to often be borderline intellectual fraud. Grade *knowledge*, concrete testable knowledge, not those other aspects of one's work. 3. Incorporate oral exams amongst your evaluation tools. You may be surprised... for the good and for the bad. 4. Clear expectations - preferably black on white - with equally clear standards (D-level is this and this, C-level is this and this, etc.). Do not be vague about what you expect and what is to be accomplished. 5. Schedule *content*, not *time*. As concrete as possible. This leads to much greater efficiency on the side of the student AND keeps you from falling significantly behind (allowing, of course, for some flexibility when needed - I incorporate flexibility right away by planning a full week or two of studies to compensate for life that will come up more drastically at some times). 6. Adapt expectations to the student if they are advanced - never allow them to sink into complancency of having met the "typical" standards.

Awww. :) (Bumping this up for you, we need something loving, awesome and positive amongst all those bleak threads about crazy middle schoolers and organization struggles. :D)

$.62 or $0.62, either way is perfectly fine. The latter perhaps adds some clarity.

Agreed. I was once told that one should study humanities which do not have much opportunities of practical application (something which many foreign languages do, for example - but history, not really) in three cases: 1. You are rich. You can allow yourself to pursue a "hobby degree" as your main one because you have the material means to fall back on when needed and even take another route, when / if needed; 2. You are pursuing that "hobby degree" alongside another, main degree, something that you not only can, but are likely to financially profit from once you get into the field, and you are good at that; 3. You are self-confident. Crazy self-confident. You lack material means and you lack another marketable skill as a probable source of income, so all of your eggs go into one basket, and you are willing to bet, as statistically unprobable as it is, that you of all people are going to be that sought after expert in that field, or simply somebody who can secure themselves a decent living off that alone. Think about it. I am NOT, God forbid, talking you out of pursuing your passion. But there are ways of pursuing your passion, and an academic degree is not necessarily the only way to do it, the only framework within which to do it, and it is not necessary to do it in a way that you also opt professionally to go into a passion. Yes, in an ideal world, you do what is your passion. But for many, many people, the world is not ideal, and you perhaps do not need to make it even less ideal by taking upon yourself a financial and time burden which may on the long run complicate your life greatly. So, think about it. Are you willing to bet on being that good, or you would like to tie a hobby degree with a more applicable degree / another career? Of course, if the option 1) holds true, then you are essentially good, at least until the current monetary system crashes. :lol:

I was raised with the exact opposite attitude. Even if we were good - and often we were truly good - there was a general tendency, if anything, to downplay that and to pass as "ordinary" what were extraordinary accomplishments in a wider context than our class. We were graded on a scale which included an equal number of positive and negative grades. That meant that not only you could fail, but that there were levels to failure: there was a distinction between insufficient, and gravely insufficient, just like in positive grades there was a distinction between a C-level work and an A-level work. To make it even better, the highest grade was rarely given. To the point that it could happen that some years in some classes in some subjects nobody had that highest grade. Can you imagine that, if all you have ever known is the system with a severe grade inflation? If anything, we had something which was the opposite of the grade inflation. The "status" of a professor had a lot to do with how little people managed to successfully meet the highest requirements and those who were more stringent with the grades were respected more, thought of as more discerning, more nuanced and just plain better as teachers and evaluators of what has been learned. The emphasis was on the latter component: the primary responsibility for learning was on the student, not on the teacher. The teacher's job was to provide cohesion, a meaningful framework, but there was an implicit assumption that the learning is in the student's own hands, while the teacher was to evaluate what has been learned and sign a grade. A grade that he felt was right, upon his scrunity, not the grade which was "politically correct". The evaluations were not reserved for formal exam sessions, although those existed as well. But something else also existed: interrogations. Oral examinations throughout the year which were typically not announced. Because you were supposed to be prepared for every lesson. You knew you could be called out, in front of everybody, right then and right there, whether for a grade or not, to demonstrate your knowledge. Few, if any, of our high school professors cared much about homework, "assignments", "projects" - it was not included in the grade, most often. But all cared about concrete demonstrated knowledge, no nonsense. Few ever "collected" homeworks to grade them, but every one of them had interrogations upon the assigned material. Grades which would be considered average - heck, even below average, in this climate of grade inflation - in the US, were actually considered to be really good grades quite often: a student with mostly Bs, some Cs and some As was often a very good student. The logic behind the grades was roughly: "an average student with an average effort has to get an average grade". Which is most definitely not supposed to be an A or a B. In the US nowadays pretty much everyone is an A or a B student, but in such a system, distinctions are lost. Now, as the trends of economic inflation, so the trends of grade inflation are coming to reach us, too. But when I was a student, some distinction was still preserved and appreciated. I was thought of as a very intelligent, very intellectually sharp girl, who perhaps lacked some icing on the cake in terms of work put in her studies, but who still pulled very distinct results in terms of concrete accomplishment. And I never had an equivalent of a 4.0 GPA in high school. Why would I, after all? The highest grade is supposed to be reserved for exceptional accomplishment, not merely "excellent" accomplishment. And who could be exceptional in all areas? And would that even be a worthwhile goal? Not really. And when everyone can reach that level of recognition, something is wrong with the system. Our professors, instead of misleading us about how good we are, misled us about how inadequate we were for the big scary world out there. :tongue_smilie: The results were pretty much that we rocked that world once we got there. I am probably amongst less formally accomplished, in terms of having a "career", from my class. And I still have advanced degrees completed with academic distinction, have still worked professionally with several academic areas, and it is by choice, not a lack of ability to make room for myself in that big scary competitive world, that I came to a more relaxed lifestyle, privileging children and family over many other things and working only occasionally, with more flexibility. My mother raised me on a mantra that "the capable ones will find their way in the world". I agree with that, and I absolutely hold that the ultimate responsibility for everything is on each individual, while their starting circumstances should be recognized, but nothing can make or break the person as much as their own volition, will power and work on themselves can. However, it would be hard to claim that the atmosphere of one's education does not have a tremendous impact on what their standards are going to be, what level of nuance and distinction (intellectual and otherwise) they will appreciate, and to what extent will they be able to assess their own skill. We were criticized openly as a part of the educational process, because how else is one supposed to learn if not through their mistakes?, and often sent away when we were discussed amongst adults so that we would not hear all the wonderful things our parents / teachers / etc. had to say about us. But we would overhear them anyway from time to time. And sometimes they knew that. ;) And overhearing that, combined with very rare, but actually meant public praise and recognition of how good we were, did more than enough for our self esteem to be healthy... but not inflated. I do the same with my children. They totally light up when I praise them... and I am able to put them down to Earth and honestly show them their mistakes and say that no, it is not good, and it needs significant more work to be good, without it breaking them in the slightest. Praising them too much, even when they are good, ruins their character by putting too much effort on things that are "done" rather than "in the process". Many successful people have told me that one of the crucial things in their self-growth was also learning how to block too much praising they were surrounded with... and how to focus on the continuation of their growth, rather than on the complacency of the current state. Praising them when they are not good... now that is something I am very, very against. I cannot make myself do it. I refuse to do it. I even refuse to do it for pseudo-psychological, "modern pedagogical" reasons of having Johnny feel good. If it is not good, it is not good. Telling the opposite, and continually so, is morally wretched and setting up a child for something very dangerous - a place of comfort... and every true intellectual should, ultimately, be slightly uncomfortable. Comfort of complacency is a sweet poison, intellectually, and morally, and as far as the strength to continue in life is concerned.

Guess again. :tongue_smilie: In several different countries, no less. True, not for EXTENDED periods of time as of yet (though one child went to school now, and the other one will probably, starting next year), but peer group and school experience nonetheless. And my kids are 14 and 15 (and 1.5 :)), so the overall amount of time they have spent in some institutional setting, adding up all of those experiences has most likely been greater than that of your Ker (assuming you have no older children and the quote above was related to your personal experience).

Are you a classical philologist? Professionally dealing with Latin? I am not, but I totally sympathize as I had the same fears... My own Latin beginnings in lower / middle school were so very distant from me, while my high school and latter experiences were much clearer, that I was worried how on Earth would I get my daughters through the grammar stage. I had not one, but several possible follow-ups, as far as the fleshing out of texts was concerned, but we had to do morphosyntax first, right? :tongue_smilie: I still never used one program in particular. I also exposed them to a lot of Latin via original texts I liked which I then paraphrased, one small syntactic chunk after another, into our native language, and that way they acquired quite a bit of passive understanding. I did this with easier "stories", such as parts from Vulgata, but also with works like Ovid's Metamorphoses, LOL. Also exposed them to things like Carmina Burana, and started much of the first grammar observations by translating those forms of Latin into Italian. Then I meshed together lots of curricula - much of it "adult" (the only English-language one which I seriously incorporated, more or less, was Wheelock, though), some European school anthologies from various countries - and then improvized in systematizing grammar. Found lots of things online too. They finished syntax with regular Italian school materials, and we did logic analysis of Italian at the same time, so they learned to analyze sentences grammatically and logically in Latin and Italian side by side. It was a wild ride :D, but I have always felt MUCH more free than had I committed to a single definite curriculum. So, if you know and LOVE Latin so much, I recommend the same. They will feel your love ;), and you will know how to improvize. Just my $.02, sorry for the off-topic.

If you know Latin, you can always mix and match all kinds of stuff to your own progression and taste, rather than commit to a curriculum. Just reminding you of that option. ;) I took that route and pretty much taught Latin without following one set curriculum.

This is a good idea too! Also, watching films with subtitles OR EVEN watching films with audio off (just like on TV you have the options of subtitles for those who do not hear?). Israeli TV subtitles a heck lot - you hear Hebrew plus you get to see it written and have all the visuals of the show to help you - so the whole package somehow exposes you more to literacy. I even had my DD watch several shows in Hebrew with audio off, trying to follow it from subtitles and visuals only. It was fun - but it probably also contributed at least a bit to her reading speed, LOL. If you could find shows in English subtitled in English on something that interests your son, you could experiment a bit with that.

Yes, absolutely. At least give it a try. Reading aloud has never been very successful in our home past certain age, as my daughters have always preferred to read on their own. At the same time, however, I never quite managed to get my middle daughter to the level of age-appropriate, reasonable proficiency in Hebrew - my eldest daughter caught up, but my middle daughter, somehow, did not. We had a third child and decided to attempt OPOL this time, with me speaking Italian to her and DH speaking Hebrew to her. Soon, as it somehow became natural, DH switched to speaking mostly Hebrew, when one on one, with our middle daughter too, who was 12/13 years old at that time - and I decided, against my instincts and experience, to go back to the technique of reading aloud with her taking turns. I have no idea WHAT happened, but SOMETHING happened. She is fresh 14 years old now and over the past year her Hebrew went up several grade levels. It is still not where it "should" be, but I have been very pleasantly surprised. Our older daughters grew up Italian / English bilingual, so Hebrew has always been the neglected language which was just not getting done. I was quite shocked as to how much something as simple as reading aloud has helped, especially having HER do that, and having her paraphrase it back. First we paraphrased it orally, then she started to paraphrase what we were reading in writing, and I allowed her the use of the text alone. I threw in some copywork too, mostly for things she liked - basically, I went for elementary school *methods* (of copywork and narration) on middle school *content*. She has really improved a LOT. We read aloud anything and everything, from very, very easy chapter books for kids only beginning to read, to regular middle school materials for areas she was interested in and for Bible / language. At the same time, I started her on about 3rd-4th grade level regular Israeli school textbooks for language and literature, and built it from there, allowing her to jump ahead where needed and stop by at the things she struggled with. She is still a bit behind, but the progress has been immense. I think it is not so much important which materials you use, but that you put your son back to track using such techniques. Ah, sorry. :) I thought that InterHigh was your "translation" of media inferiore (I always find myself "translating" the system when I write here), so I was wondering how come you only intend to homeschool him for one semester. Once you enroll him in a virtual school in English, it is going to be a lot easier due to mere exposure. Another thing you could do would be note-taking in English while following some lectures or documentaries in English on what interests him, and then expanding those notes into shorter pieces of writing. I would be careful not to overwhelm the child - stick to a paragraph or two at the beginning. Does your son use any ESL materials from school? I imagine he is doing English there as FL1 or FL2. You can look into those for summarizing exercises, but for the most part, I would not use ESL materials with him, but materials aimed at native English speakers, only several grade levels below + expand that with these additional techniques (of reading aloud, copywork and oral and written narrations from read alouds, note-taking, etc.). Another thing to keep in mind is that the *emphasis* on writing in the school systems is far from equal. I am not familiar with UK, but in the USA, there is a LOT of emphasis on writing from early on, formal writing program, etc., none of the things we had in Italian as children, and none of the things I did so very formally with my children. If your son can write decently in Italian for age-appropriate standards, and express himself well, he probably got down the mechanics of writing and as he *uses* the language more and becomes comfortable with more and more registers, much of his skill will transfer naturally. So, I would invest in THAT more than in formal writing instruction. Sorry this is so disjointed and general (rather than specific recommendations), I spent several hours earlier dealing with bureaucracy so I am a bit scattered. :lol: Good luck!

Do you speak English to him? Do you use English exclusively with him, while your spouse speaks exclusively Italian? Do you read aloud to / with him English books and have you done so since he was a young child? Does he lag behind in *general* English language skills (speech, oral & written comprehension, etc.) or specifically in writing? What I would do would depend on the answer to those questions. In any case add as much reading - and reading together - as possible. Can you add more English into his life by tieing it to what he studies in Italian (thematically)? That is how we did. If I gather correctly, you essentially intend to homeschool him only through this year and have him go back to media next year for second year?