Jump to content

Menu

Cabertmom

Members
  • Posts

    179
  • Joined

  • Last visited

Reputation

51 Excellent

Contact Methods

  • Website URL
    http://www.Catholichomeschool.com
  • Biography
    Mom of 6, ages 18 to baby
  • Location
    Arizona
  • Interests
    spinning, weaving, singing, writing
  • Occupation
    medical transcriptionist, editor, owner of CatholicHomeschool.com

Profile Information

  • Gender
    Not Telling

Recent Profile Visitors

The recent visitors block is disabled and is not being shown to other users.

  1. I came across this thread while looking for something else. I just wanted to mention a university that might fit the bill so to speak. University of Dallas is a Catholic liberal arts university with a great English program, though the focus is much more on literature than it is on creative writing. I don't think it is possible to graduate from there in any major without becoming at least a decent writer as the number of essays required far exceeds your average college. They also have a semester abroad in Rome that most students participate in, which is why I decided to mention this since you said that is what your daughter longs for. Our oldest two are there, and my husband and I met and graduated from there as well. It is strongly Catholic and one of a handful of colleges that is faithful to what the Catholic Church actually teaches for the most part. Nonetheless, there is a significant percentage of non-Catholic students (I don't know what your background is), and a non-Catholic student wouldn't feel weird there I suspect. Also, don't be toooo afraid of the tuition. They give big merit scholarships and lots of financial aid.
  2. Thanks, everybody. He will be installing Linux as part of the process. It's good to know (in a way) it isn't as involved as previously thought to build a computer. I was thinking of adding some networking component to add to the course after hearing from all of you that it takes less time than previously expected. Honestly, I wanted him to have another course for his junior year as it looks a bit sparse compared with his freshman and sophomore years, and he wanted to build a computer, so it occurred to me that this could be a good way to kill two birds with one stone. I'm sure we can add enough to make it a legitimate half credit.
  3. Regentrude, this is not something I know much about. My son made a rough estimate of 60 hours. Does that seem over the top to you? He'll be researching components, deciding on cost versus value, etc. I was thinking of adding some sort of networking credit as well perhaps and planning for a half credit. Does that seem reasonable or over the top to you? Julie, those are both great title ideas. Thank you!
  4. I have a question for everybody if I may. My son is finishing his junior year, and he would like to build his own computer this summer (with his own money thank goodness). I think that sounds like a great project, and I would like to include it on his transcript, but I don't know what sort of name to give it as a course. Computer Building or Building a Computer just doesn't sound "professional." Any ideas of what a good course name could be for this?
  5. He's actually pretty active socially, but it is possible. As I mentioned, she's not sick now. They are quite busy helping others in the community, at church, and with extracurricular stuff as well as work for him, though it is possible he feels lonely when actually homeschooling I guess. Regarding the GED, I think if he does really drop out (which isn't the case yet), that would be a good thing if and when he is ready for it. As it is, though, he's still a homeschooler but one at risk of dropping out. My ideal would be to help my friend with suggestions for making homeschooling easy, straight-forward, and doable for a young man with little academic motivation. Thanks especially for the info about military and GED. Hunter's Moon, that is exactly the question. He's not thinking about the future and doesn't get what it will cost him not to finish high school. His mom is at her wit's ends trying to get him to do his work. Thanks to everyone for these great insights.
  6. JanetC, I think you have a good point about the problem of an independent currlculum. FWIW, I think they have been to a family counselor who really did more harm than good, sad to say. To his credit as I mentioned before, he is a very hard worker when it comes to anything outside of school. I think we on this forum tend to be used to kids who are pretty self-motivated, but not everyone is like that. He just doesn't seem able to make the connection between success in his "book work" and success in life. He is in a volunteer organization with my kids and does fine. He does woodworking and yard work very happily. He cooks well. He's a really nice kid whose company I enjoy, but he is sneaky when it comes to avoiding what he doesn't want to do, which is his homeschooling. Above all I want to be able to go to my friend with some solid suggestions for ways to help him through this. I'm worried that he'll just fall between the cracks and never finish high school. He's working part-time now, which is probably a good thing in a lot of ways, but I worry that he'll just sort of stop his education altogether and regret it in years to come. I don't honestly think dual enrollment is a good fit for him right now unless it was in a subject of great interest to him. I'm not sure about an independent study course as he might just pretend to do it and get nothing done.
  7. A friend posted this article on Facebook: http://fillingmymap.com/2015/04/15/11-ways-finlands-education-system-shows-us-that-less-is-more/ It's the story of an American Fullbright scholar who worked in a school in Finland. All the way through this article and several others on her blog, I kept thinking how very much like homeschooling the things she mentioned were, most especially the fact that they have the same teacher all through elementary school who knew each child very well.
  8. Wow! How awful. You have to wonder how high the pressure was for these kids to succeed in college that they were willing to go to such extreme and insane lengths to hide the fact that they couldn't or wouldn't graduate from their parents.
  9. Regentrude, I am not familiar with them either but will look into it or tell my friend about the American School. Tibbie Dunbar, I tend to agree, and she did look into a charter school for him last year, but they had a waiting list and he didn't get in. I agree with a lot of what you said (of course it's not my call), especially about having a good relationship between mother and son for the next 50 years. Regarding a GED, this young man would likely grow up and excel in the military, but it's my understanding that they no longer accept people with a GED. Does anyone know if that's correct? It would be unfortunate for him to miss that possible path by virtue of going the GED route. Otherwise, that might be the best option. Regarding missing diagnoses, he actually does have some diagnosed learning disabilities from years gone by, and his mom is very tuned in to helping him through those. Any specific suggestions for curriculum that would be in line with this idea? I was thinking of Joy of Science as a science curriculum and Mathematics: A Human Endeavor for math (though he's doing TT now). My heart just goes out to my friend and her family. She has another daughter who is doing just fine with her homeschooling in spite of everything.
  10. I have a dear friend whose son is now 16. She has been seriously ill but still trying to homeschool for the past couple years. Her son is really not at all interested in becoming an educated human being and fights her every step of the way, using every method at his disposal to get away with doing as little as possible, which is affecting their relationship to put it mildly. He is, however, a talented chef and a hard worker. He just does not like book work. I want to go to her with a suggestion to make it possible for him to get through high school in a way that is legitimate but is as easy and simple as possible. He is not likely to go to college unless maybe community college for a trade. He just needs a way through, and at this point if he were to go to a regular high school, he would probably have to start back as a freshman and would be so likely to drop out before finishing. A big part of the problem is math. He has some learning disabilities but has actually gotten farther than anyone ever thought he would. Nonetheless, I believe he is doing prealgebra at this point. As for English, he probably has enough for 1 solid freshman credit. He was doing Rosetta Stone Spanish, but I think that might have fallen by the wayside. We're in a state that has minimal requirements, so that's not really an issue. Ultimately I have two questions: 1. If you were trying to help this young man get through high school and help the mom not have a nervous breakdown, what would you recommend as a curriculum/course of studies to (hopefully) make it possible for him to do pretty much all of high school in the coming two years since very little happened due to his mom's illness during the last two? 2. Are you aware of any resources or websites that I could point out that might help her? Thanks a bunch!
  11. Well, unfortunately it really didn't work out for him at all. It was way over his head and, despite the name, very theoretical. I think it would be a great text for a college engineering student. We ended up getting a different book after realizing it was not going to work for him. This is the book we switched to: http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0596153740/ref=pd_lpo_sbs_dp_ss_1?pf_rd_p=1944687622&pf_rd_s=lpo-top-stripe-1&pf_rd_t=201&pf_rd_i=0071771336&pf_rd_m=ATVPDKIKX0DER&pf_rd_r=1JR3W538H47JPCRYGZ1B Even that, though, was not as fascinating as he had thought it would be. It was okay, and he got through it. When he started it, he had planned to do the followup book as well but decided not to. I am counting it as a 1-semester elective, by the way, and not as a science.
  12. JanetC, he loved the LOF prealgebra and both algebra books, but he did not do well with the Geometry book, and I suspect the same will be true for Trig. I'll check out your listing, Myra.
  13. My son is using their college physics course. Overall he's pretty satisfied, but occasionally the tests and quizzes seem to have errors according to him, and in the case of this particular child of mine, he's probably right.
  14. My 15-year-old was really enjoying the Life of Fred sequence through Advanced Algebra, but he was struggling mightily with the Fred Geometry book at the end of his 9th grade year, so this year we switched to Teaching Textbooks for Geometry. It has its problems, but overall it's fine. However, now I'm in a bit of a quandary regarding what to do for next year. Any suggestions regarding LOF Trigonometry versus Teaching Textbooks Pre-calculus versus another pre-calculus program? This son would do better with something that teaches directly rather than the LOF/AoPS approach, and it really needs to be something he can do on his own with occasional help from his math-professor grandma or mathy older brother who will be off at college. Also, having the same program for him for pre-calculus and calculus would be handy, though it is by no means necessary.
  15. Jenny, you make an interesting point about the purity of the author's message, but let me put forth an analogy. Suppose you go to an art museum specifically to see the work of a particular artist and this artist is the only one in the world who paints in this particular style. You want your teenagers to see and understand his unique style of art, yet your only opportunity to do so means looking at an amazing work of art that contains little miniature images of child pornography on one end. The artist included it not to glorify child porn but to show how wrong it is. Nonetheless, you deem it too raw and horrid for your teens to view. Do you harm the artist by deciding to suggest to your teenagers that they learn from the entire work of art but avoid looking at the one end with the child pornography? It may be that your teens fail to grasp some small portion of the point that the artist is trying to make, but I would suggest that the cost-to-benefit ratio is in favor of steering the teen away from the child pornography yet letting them experience what this artist has to say overall. Now, nothing that John Griffin writes is in any sense the equivalent of child pornography, but it is pretty raw in places. It's raw with a purpose, but I am making a choice as a parent to have my teenage sons read the work as a whole in order that they can better understand the ugliness of racism, but I am also choosing to leave out one disturbing scene as well as the use of the Lord's name in vain because, while it is so very common in our society, that doesn't make it any less wrong. I had no idea this thread would stir up so much discussion!
×
×
  • Create New...