bump... any feedback...please?....🙂

I'm sorry for the duplication. I posted this message in the K-8 forum; but it dawned on me that the High School forum may be a better place... Does anyone have feedback on Mr. Kotynski, Latin teacher at Schole Academy? I'm considering enrolling my 7th grader in his Latin 1 class. Please send me a private message if you prefer. Thank you.

Does anyone have feedback on Mr. Kotynski, Latin teacher at Schole Academy? I'm considering enrolling my 7th grader in his Latin 1 class. Please send me a private message if you prefer. Thank you.

SusanC and Calbear, I know what you mean; and I totally agree with your sentiments. It's very unlike me to refrain from making my displeasure known when I believe my interests are not being well served. I surprised myself by taking a very different approach with this matter. I think the reason I didn't get worked up is because, despite the unruly kid, my son has made forward progress with his writing. His ability to complete his assignments and meet his deadlines has not been impacted. In reality, my son was probably amused by all of it. He would log off and my other kids would excitedly ask, "What did [kid's name] do today?" - anxious to hear the tales of misbehavior for the day. I reached out to the teacher after the first class shutdown, just to be sure she was taking the problem seriously. She said she was going to speak with the dean and devise an action plan. I felt sorry for the teacher and I didn't see a need to escalate the matter to a higher level. Clearly, she was suffering enough. To get things under control, she shut down the chat box frequently and she doesn't always enable the white board. But the chat box and white board are tools that the class uses; so it hurts the rest of the class when she disables them. (The class often types sample sentences into the chat box, and they highlight text using the white board.) In the grand scheme of things, we got what we needed out of the class. If the academy sends out a year-end survey, I'll provide feedback.

My son is in 6th grade and is currently enrolled in Expository Writing I at WTMA. I like the class because it forces us to stay on track with WWS1. If I had to teach/facilitate the class myself, we would never finish the book. As you probably know, the books is extremely word heavy. Despite my 6th grader being bright and an eager writer, he does not have the maturity to independently wade through all of the instructions. The teacher explains the writing concepts during class and walks through the lesson instructions for that week. My son seems to enjoy being a participant in class. He is happy when he gets to serve as class typist (like a secretary keeping notes as the class works through assignments together). He also seems to enjoy the chat box and he hasn't complained that the chatting is out of control (though there is more chatting than I prefer to see). So, to answer your question, I think the class would be fine for a 9th grader if the purpose is to have a teacher introduce the concepts and to help your child stay on track. There are due dates and the work gets done. If your child would be irritated by less mature kids speaking and/or typing then it might not be a good fit -- but, it's hard to say who will end up in his/her class that year. Maybe the class will be filled with 8th graders....or he/she could end up with a bunch of 6th graders. FWIW, I also have a kid enrolled in Preparation for Expository Writing and that class is a nightmare. The teacher and class content are fine. But there is at least one kid who is so disruptive that the teacher ended the class early on two occasions. The kid(s) spam the chat box and draw on the white board despite being told to stop. I've considered lodging a complaint, but my 7th grader has assured me that he's able to focus and it hasn't impeded his ability to learn. (He's really mature; he just happens to hate writing, so he's a level below his younger brother when it comes to writing.) I have more important things to do, so I've chosen to remain silent. But it irks me b/c we pay for the class and I want to be sure my kid is getting the most out of the class. Not sure if that helps you...

Your daughter and grandson are fortunate to have your support. Here are a couple of ideas in response to your "grab him" question... You may want to check out the Life of Fred math books. My 7th grade son reads them for pleasure in his spare time. The books cover math topics with a dose of humor. We don't use the books as our "official" math curriculum. For history studies, my kids liked the Legends & Lies series produced by Bill O'Reilly. We watched the Patriots and the Civil War episodes. Also for history, my kids enjoyed Liberty's Kids. It's a historical fiction cartoon series focused on the American Revolution time period. I think a 7th grader would find it enjoyable unless he already knows all there is to know about that time period (in other words, if the kid is highly adept in his history studies, then he may not appreciate this cartoon). All of my kids enjoy music, so The Sound of Music DVD was a hit when we studied the Anschluss. While it didn't offer much in terms of history studies, it was a good conversation starter on many topics related to that time period. Hope that helps...

So far, I've used Primary 6A/6B for two kids, and I plan to follow the same path with the third kid. We used the textbook and workbook plus two add-ons (Intensive Practice and Challenging Word Problems). FWIW, I think the IP and CWP books are what set Primary Math apart form other programs. I realize you are not using the add-ons, but you may want to take another look at them. Have you checked out SingaporeMathLive.com? The service provides parent videos and kid videos for Primary Math US Edition, along with videos for all word problems in the IP and CWP. With this service, I haven't needed an HIG.

We're using Rainbow Science now and spreading it over two years; so I'm not sure my feedback will be helpful. The lessons are very short. It takes my son about 20 minutes to read a chapter and answer the end-of-chapter questions in writing (albeit, my son's written answers are generally the bare minimum number of words a kid can write and still manage to answer the questions). A lab generally takes about 20 minutes also.

We used Primary Math TB and WB, and supplemented with Intensive Practice and Challenging Word Problems. IP and CWP can be ridiculously challenging, but there is great satisfaction when we master the most difficult problems. We also used this service: www.singaporemathlive.com. Brenda Barnett's explanations of the problems in IP and CWP are clear and concise. You can view sample lessons on her website. Well worth the money; one of the best homeschool purchases I ever made.

I used the 4 Square program aimed at older elementary kids. When I used it, my kids were in 2nd, 4th and 5th. I think there is a version for early elementary too. Background: During that school year, we were using WWE - so we wrote lots and lots of summaries. But when it came to writing a simple paragraph on demand, my kids were stumped. For example, during a meeting with our educational facilitator (EF) for our umbrella charter, the EF asked my kids to write a paragraph describing either their piano lessons or their golf lessons (i.e. tell about a skill they learned or describe what happens during the lessons). IMO, it was not too much to ask of my kids. Yet, two of my kids struggled; one fared slightly better. My oldest kid had learned the structure of a paragraph in traditional school (using the "hamburger" method), but he still choked over the assignment. Initially, I did some mental gymnastics to convince myself that it wasn't a big deal. So what if they can't write a paragraph on easy topics relevant to their lives?...After all, they were doing fine with WWE... they could summarize short excerpts from Homer Price and Nurse Matilda! But, I was bothered by my kids not being able to write one paragraph on easy topics. My EF recommended 4 Square. We used only the first section. There was an example about spaghetti being the writer's favorite meal. We used that format to write about our favorite holidays, vacations, toys, and more. We incorporated the "time" words (next, then, later, after -- and first, second, finally). It worked out really well for us. The 4 Square program provided a framework for writing a paragraph that we were not going to get with WWE. I was happy with the result, but I wasn't interested in completing the entire program. The following year, we moved to IEW. For the part that we used, 4 Square was user friendly for the kids and for me. I hope that helps.

I understand exactly what you mean. We're almost finished with Book 1. I don't use a patterned schedule. Rather, we take it as it comes; and I move the pages from my stack to the binder as we go along. The method bugged me slightly at first, but after a while it wasn't a concern. Latin is not a core subject for us. When there are busy days, I'm okay with letting Latin slip. I pick it up again when we're ready, and I don't feel guilty for not keeping up with schedule pattern. My kids don't seem phased by the lack of a schedule pattern. I stopped doing the history portions of LL. After a while, the details got a bit tedious - my kids' eyes would glaze over. I'm satisfied enough with Book 1 that we will do Book 2. I haven't looked at the Memoria Press Latin materials. One of my kids used Latin for Children in traditional school. It had a regular schedule. He liked it.

For pre-algebra, my son is enrolled online with: www.highschoolmathlive.com His teacher is Mrs. Ellis and she's been great.

Answering your second question: We started with Standards, which is the version my kids used in a traditional private school. For the first year of homeschooling, I stayed with Standards and used the HIG, Extra Practice book, and the test packets because those are the resources that our public charter umbrella provided free of charge. In my second year, I discovered SingaporeMathLive.com (SML) and began using US Edition. We also began using CWP and IP because those are also taught by SML. All I can say is: You haven't lived until you've worked through CWP and IP at the 5th and 6th grade levels! The workbooks for both editions were super easy for my kids....but CWP and IP were where we met our match. CWP and IP contain very challenging problems, but SML walks students through answers to all the word problems. It's a great service. SML has videos for parents - to help parents teach the subject matter; and videos that speak directly to the kids for each lesson. In short, our move to US Edition was solely the result of having chosen SML as a resource. It was one of the best homeschool decisions I've made. SML taught my kids to think through the difficult problems in ways that I could not teach on my own. My kids are strong in math, so the addition of CWP and IP was a good fit for us. Those books may not be the best choice for kids who struggle with math. If you think CWP and IP would be a good fit for your kids, then I highly recommend using the US Edition and subscribing to SML. (When using SML, we often tackled the CWP and IP books on a one-week delay from the given schedule.) Quick comment on the Standards version: I like the tests. Even though we use the US Edition, each semester my kids take a unit test from the Standards testing pack provided by our charter school.

I felt the same way as you about IEW when I began homeschooling a couple of years ago. Many people raved about IEW (including our pediatrician!). In my first year of homeschooling, I could not bring myself to attempt it. Every time I went to the website, I stared at the pathway and was overwhelmed - maybe all of the abbreviated names for the programs are a turnoff? In our first year of homeschooling, I used WWE with three kids and it was a bust after one semester. While reviewing other programs, I couldn't shake the fact that IEW is so well respected. I got lucky when I found the $250 set of IEW videos in our charter school's library. I was hooked after the first DVD, but I must admit that I haven't gotten past the 4th DVD yet. For our second year of homeschooling, I used IEW's SWI-A on loan from our charter school (kids were in grades 3, 5 and 6). SWI-A includes a set of videos that speak directly to the kids. It saved me time - I was able to learn along with the kids. My kids found Pudewa to be entertaining and the program was effective while we used it. Key word outlining was a tool that my kids took to immediately and we deployed all the dress-ups (even though Wise Bauer has said to avoid them in one of her books). About 3/4ths of the way through the program, things got busy in our household and I found that I could not keep the kids on track. The program required heavy oversight on my part (okay, I acknowledge that any writing program is going to require the parent to teach); and it seemed particularly hard on us during the busy times. I found that if I could not finish a writing assignment before we had another busy spell, then the assignment would languish. By the time we got back to it, everyone lost enthusiasm for what we were doing and it was difficult to reboot. But I had three kids to juggle so my situation sounds different than yours. I'm sure you already know, IEW is not an "open-and-go" workbook like W&R. For the upcoming year, I've decided to outsource writing to WTMA for my two older kids. I'm a fairly decent writer, but I've concluded that I lack the discipline to keep the kids on track with writing when life gets hectic. I'm hoping that these online classes will keep us on pace while I coach from the sidelines. The IEW program is comprised of several units that can be repeated grade after grade, with increasing levels of complexity (of source documents) and expectations. My point being, just because your child misses IEW in 4th grade at the new school, I don't think that's going to hinder him when he enters in 5th grade. I'm guessing that the school will repeat those initial units for several years to reinforce the concepts. To sum it all up, I'm a fan of IEW. It deserves the rave reviews. The DVDs are extremely enlightening and effectively communicate the IEW "lifestyle." However, you said you need something streamlined and not time consuming. Given those constraints, I would lean toward W&R. I think W&R will provide satisfactory writing instruction without being too burdensome. (Full disclosure: I haven't used W&R, but I considered it on multiple occasions.)

We did a heavy emphasis on US History during SOTW 3. When US History began part way through SOTW 3, I paused and spent about 9-10 weeks on US History. Then, we resumed SOTW 3 and our world travels. When SOTW 3 would occasionally bring us back to the US, we would pause for a week or more to explore those topics. In order to fit everything into the school year, there were some SOTW 3 chapters for which we only read aloud and did the mapping. For those chapters, it was more of a "sit back, relax, and enjoy the SOTW story for today" -- no questions, no summarizing, no activities. I'll sound like a slacker when I reveal that my "spine" for US History during that 9-10 week period of US History was the Liberty Kids video series (and I think a few episodes were sprinkled into later parts of SOTW 3). I bought the LK video series that included access to a set of PDF worksheets. My kids would watch the videos and then complete the worksheets. Those worksheets helped us to distill related areas of interest; which would launch us into internet and library research on those topics. Being that I knew the episode line up in advance, I also had books on those topics at-the-ready; so the kids could immediately do some reading (and I would not feel as guilty about using a cartoon series to teach US History). The LK videos were a hit; and we actually learned quite a bit - from both the videos themselves and from the research that we were compelled to do after watching the videos. We also use the Veritas Press history cards. I integrated the cards with SOTW and Liberty Kids.

I used Big Book 1 it this past year with three kids who were in 3rd, 5th and 6th grades. All three kids had previously finished Song School Latin 2. My older kid worked through Latin for Children A when he was in 3rd grade at a traditional school. I decided to keep them together in BB1 in order to make it easier on myself. My goal for Latin prior to high school is to make steady forward progress; but we won't be setting any speed records. They'll get more serious about Latin in high school. So far, we are about 2/3 of the way through BB1. Most of it has been review for my kids. But, looking ahead in the book, I can see more challenging material on the horizon. I knew it was going to be a review going into it. I wanted a Latin course that was not going to be a huge burden because we have other priorities. The program is open and go, other than having to print the pages from the CD. We tackle it 4 times per week. We watch the video lessons and listen to the vocabulary pronunciation when there is a new list. When we started, we read all of the Latin history lessons that are included in the book. Toward the end of the year, we started to skip some of the history lessons. Some of them were tedious - lots of names of people and they all blended together after a while. We use Quizlet for flashcards; and we use the tests that come with the book. Overall, I'm pleased with the program. There are occasional errors in the worksheets and answer key. But they are minor and we know enough Latin to get past them. I think the author and/or SWB in TWTM made recommendations on the next courses of study after completing the Big Books. I'll see what looks best for each kid when the time comes.

We used singaporemathlive.com last year. It's not an online class per se; rather there are sets of pre-recorded videos for each grade. I highly recommend it, particularly if you choose to use the Intensive Practice and Challenging Word Problems books.

I’m considering enrolling my 6th grade son, who is an advanced reader, in an online literature class at “Center for Lit.” Before I commit to the class, I’m exploring other options in case there is a better fit for him. In addition to Center for Lit, I also looked at Veritas Press, Open Tent, Brave Writer and Wilson Hill Academy. WHA’s class called “Don’t Miss These Books” seems ideal because of the weekly format and the book list; but the 9:30 am start time will be too early for us on the west coast. Center for Lit meets only once per month, after reading each book. The sample video classes look great, but I don’t think my son will appreciate having to wait weeks to discuss the book. By then, he’ll be onto the next book and the discussion of the past book will be anticlimactic. (I realize I could prevent him from reading the books until the last minute; but that’s just one more thing for me to orchestrate. Another downside of this class is that he's already read four of the nine books.) I’d prefer a class with live online verbal discussion only – no writing or project component. I just want the kid to enjoy the books and to engage in thoughtful discussions and analyses. I’d appreciate your suggestions… Thank you.

I think a 10 year old can manage Song School Latin on his own - with you checking his workbook and available if he has any questions. The program is so basic that you should be able to answer his questions without much effort. SSL is a nice way to introduce young kids to Latin. Four years later and my kids still remember the songs.

We use Hake Grammar (also known as Saxon Grammar). I'm pretty sure it was recommended in a past edition of WTM. We do not use the writing portion of the program - we only use the grammar portion. The grammar book has a soft cover and students are supposed to write their answers in separate notebooks. My kids write directly in the workbook. There is enough white space on the pages to write directly in the book and to diagram sentences too. The formatting of the grammar book is ugly. You need to take a deep breath and look beyond the formatting in order to appreciate this program. The lessons can be self-taught by the kids, or the parent can review the lessons with the kids. Beyond the basic grammar lessons, there are vocabulary words, dictation passages, and journal ideas. (We don't use the dictation or journal ideas - mostly b/c there is not enough time in the day to do it all.) My kids are strong in grammar. They are using the book numbers corresponding to their grade levels (Level 5 for 5th grade; and Level 6 for 6th grade). I think the levels are appropriate. Not too hard, not too easy. My kids would probably have done fine in the next higher level, but there are so many other priorities that I didn't want grammar to become a major headache. There is a lot to like about this program. It's too bad the author/publisher did not spend more time creating an aesthetically pleasing workbook format.

This year, I combined my 3rd, 5th and 6th graders and used IEW (we primarily used SWI Level A, and worked in some passages from the US History Theme book when it made sense with our history studies). We watched the DVDs together. The kids enjoyed Mr. Pudewa - thought he was funny - and they easily absorbed his teachings. When possible, I try to get ahead of the kids by watching the "full" IEW DVD program designed for the parent/coach. But when I couldn't get ahead, it was convenient to learn along with the kids' program. When life was hectic around the holidays and during weeks when we had outside appointments, we used Killgallon Sentence Composing for Elementary. Killgallon is easy for me to pull off the shelf and assign. Killgallon allows me to slip in some writing instruction without having to provide heavy oversight. We also do a periodic "freewrite" in journals (a la BraveWriter) - again, just to be sure we accomplish some writing when we can't sit down and focus on IEW. (I'm not sure if it's just me, but I find that when I assign IEW, I want to have several days to focus on the assignment - in other words, not splitting up the writing of a story with a Christmas holiday in between. When we have a scheduling distraction, the momentum is lost and, when we return, we have to spend time refreshing ourselves on the state of our rough drafts. At that point, the kids are less enthusiastic and the end result is less favorable than if we were able to complete the assignment without the break. My scheduling method results in a longer timeframe to finish this particular IEW program, but it doesn't concern me because I've embraced IEW to be more of a way of life than a curriculum that needs to be finished during a certain period of time.) I've looked at WWS repeatedly for my 6th grader (soon to be 7th). I have a friend who uses it, and I want so much to like it. But I don't think my kid would respond well to the text-heavy format and difficulty of some of the reading passages. He was a kid who hated WWE and did not perform well with it. This kid excels in math. I think that's why he responds well to the formulaic approach of IEW. I'm keeping WWS on the back burner and will look at it again for 8th grade. Hope this helps.

We've used Science in the Beginning and Science in the Ancient World. I'm using it with 6th, 5th and 3rd grades - taught together. LIKES: Overall, the content is perfect for us (love the chronological approach and the Christian worldview), length of each lesson is on the shorter side (we average 45 minutes to read, experiment and journal), the number of lessons is manageable for the year (we do it twice per week), the experiments are good (easy and they generally work). DISLIKES: I find the text too wordy at times (I will edit as necessary in order to keep the lecture/conversation moving along; if I asked every rhetorical question in each lesson, we'd take forever to finish b/c my kids would jump at the opportunity to answer every question), the end-of-chapter questions are sometimes difficult for my kids to answer (my kids understand and can explain the concepts well, but they sometimes have a hard time answering the Older kids questions as they are framed - but maybe it's a problem with my kids and not the books). We started with the "Beginning" book and I'm planning to use the entire series. Next year, my 6th grader will continue to listen to the lessons when I read, but he won't be required to journal each experiment because he will have a separate science curriculum for 7th grade (aimed at moving him toward more independence for middle school). Because the books move through the science chronologically, I think you should consider using the series in order - starting with Beginning.

I'm not too far along in the series, but I hope this information helps a little. We finished Science in the Beginning and we're about a third of the way through Science in the Ancient World. I have a rising 3rd, 5th and 6th - all boys. We haven't noticed an increase in difficulty - in terms of language, content, questions, experiments. My kids can usually answer the chapter questions with little problems, and occasional prompts from me. In our history lessons, we just finished the Renaissance, so our history studies are not aligned with the Ancients book. However, I've found the Ancients book to be a nice review of the philosophers/mathematicians who we've previously read about in our history studies. So far so good. I'm intending to finish this series of books.

I searched for exactly the same thing a couple of weeks ago and ran across Paula's Archive. My Google search returned an obscure link to Paula's Archive and I managed to find this SOTW-3 line-up. This is my first post to the forum, and I don't know how to paste a link. I hand typed the link below, so you may need to copy and paste it into your browser if the link capability doesn't work. http://da1.redshift.com/~bonajo/sotw3vp.htm I used the list as a starting point and modified it to work for us. I had already covered VP cards 1-6 during the end of SOTW 2. And I'm planning to spend more time on cards 17-27. Good luck.