An island populated only by males

I immediately thought of Beyond the Book Report, though it’s not one I have used

No, really it is very dry... Even though drinking (even when you are >21) violates honor code and could get you kicked out there are still some who drink, but no, it’s *really* dry. Each year they get the award the school creamery has special chocolate milks on sale to commemorate 🤣

Alcohol for many is a social lubricant. In the age of anxiety it doesn’t surprise me that you observe fewer people who don’t drink in college. My caveat emptor: I went to the school voted “driest university in the country” every year I think they’ve had that category 😂 so my thoughts on the subject are hypothetical rather than practical.

Remedia Pub outlining book https://www.rempub.com/outlining

I’m not sure what you are looking for in a curriculum, are you? Having those priorities helps decision making for sure. In 4th for my DS I wanted something that engaged him (he hates writing), the tasks were varied (not just narration, copywork, dictation, repeat), that explored the good, true, beautiful, wise (that wasn’t pedantic, authoritarian, or staid), that was compatible with his learning style, and that I felt happy using. My thoughts on TGATB - it didn’t work for long because we needed different levels of writing, grammar, reading, etc. If you don’t have that issue then it might be a great option for you. I didn’t like the tone in the books either - that’s a quality I can’t elaborate on well, just a sense or feeling about it that put me off, kind of pedantic. My thoughts on Write Shop - I don’t know which level you are considering, we at one point used Write Shop Jr level C. We used it for less than a semester. It was sooooo school-ish, in the sense that it had activities and materials(with lots of prep!) to teach with that would be good in a classroom setting but were too cumbersome at home. All things could have been taught in a much more streamlined way. Writing projects were fun for my kid, but lots of work and craftiness for little writing learning. My thoughts on W&R - this was the best for my DS who needed a variety of activities, stories that interested him (so many homeschool curricula are written by women who aren’t able to draw in boys as well as they do girls), shorter dictation passages, and also cultivated the heart and values (in the Talk About it Section) without being “religious.” Plus it excellently illustrates, type-set, and published and that made it all the easier to work with. We started Fable half way through 4th with him (he used the first 5 levels, then we did LToW). My youngest ddwill start it half way through third. We use MCT grammar alongside. It wasn’t perfect, we did bring in some outside resources to teach outlining, but overall I really loved it.

You’ll be hard pressed to find a classroom this small! As to other issues of motivation, sometimes kids work better for others. My kids do 🙄. However, don’t completely eliminate the possibility the student actually does not remember the thing you’re asking about. Kids don’t always know how to express their struggles and sometimes, out of uncertainty or embarrassment, it comes across as silly. Best wishes!

We still have 8 better binders 😂 that I bought 8 years ago! I really want the Frixon 4 color clicker pen for taking notes. Because I take notes😳

If I were prepping for WWS I would work on two main areas: reading research articles/essays and breaking them down into sections which you then categorize into the topoi; working on persuasive writing. Those are the two elements I feel WWS is lacking in. My kids struggled because it was so focused on the component parts first that they didn’t understand or see the point and went through the motions without learning well how what they were doing would fit into the bigger writing form (eg academic paper). And WWS failed to focus on the persuasive essay. I think the persuasive essay form, in its basic form, should precede the academic research paper. ETA I agree 7th or 8th is a more appropriate time to start WWS

Yes, this happened when each of my kids went back to public. It is frustrating because you want them to get THE GOOD STUFF, not just lots of stuff. But we all have to choose which trade offs we are going to accept. 😔

We loved his Ancient Greek tales (the older version, title eludes me). I very much disliked The Wind in the Willows reading. We enjoyed SOTW 1 and 2 readings. SOTW 3 was meh. So I can’t make a blanket recommendation. ETA: I prefer to not read abridged classics and wait until they are ready for the language. But I’ve found they are ready far sooner if there’s a good audiobook reading.

Oh, oh, I know, I know!!!! Anton Lesser reading Great Expectations or A Tale of Two Cities. He is amazing, and I think he won awards for Tale of Two Cities. He brings so much to his characters - both men and women. It’s not just voices (although Ms Havisham and Mdm Defarge are two voices I can still hear), he also brings life in his inflections, pauses, fluidity, and command of Victorian English. And his general narrating voice is pleasant, not pedantic; passionate but not overly dramatic. I’m so glad you asked because I recommend these two readings again and again to people (and have listened to them multiple times). Hope you find what you are after, but definitely sample these!

When I had them all at home we used milk crates. You can even put a magazine box in the milk crate for loose paper and other floppy things. Now with only one home full time we just use the book shelf.

I can understand. But I have to tell you: Stop looking for opportunities until you’ve determined what you want. Decide what the single most important thing that you want your children to do outside of the home is and then find it. Best wishes! I was always the kid who wanted to do everything, and for some time I was the same way as a homeschooler. I have tasted the peace of doing less, and it’s beautiful, and I’m much more content and less worried about missed opportunities. You can do anything but you can’t do everything 😉

Weekly meetings to work together to plan the week's work and to assess the past week's work. We used to meet with my 8-14 year old kids on Sunday night. We would plan out what needed to be done, which days to work on them, and how much time we thought it would take - all this went on a weekly checklist. Then when we reviewed the week we would see if we over/under estimated. The checklist helped with independence and reduced my needing to remind (or remember). I'd just say "have you finished your checklist?" or "where are you on your checklist?" Not perfect system, but it helped a lot. And that was for three kids with ADHD/executive function difficulties.

Michael Clay Thompson’s Grammar Island and Sentence Island. This is gentle yet rich grammar, and the writing is flexible but conceptually solid. Another option might be to do Grammar Island with something like Jot-it-Down from Bravewriter or even just copywork. Honestly, when you are focusing on decoding writing composition can be a struggle. But you can strengthen handwriting, proper grammar, usage and mechanics, vocabulary, and sentence structure through copywork. And then when her fluency for decoding and encoding increases you can work on composition.

Well, writing is still a hard thing for them. We used MCT grammar and writing books in 3-7th ish grades. The writing books gave us the global, big picture ideas about writing. We did a very few select writing tasks from these. We did creative writing projects, oral projects, projects that used some writing but also visual elements (eg slide shows or Prezi, posters, acting things out, coloring and writing captions, etc). We also did copywork, read/listened to great literature, and tried to have conversations about things (all ways of getting ideas INTO their heads so later we could get ideas out). When it came to needing to organize writing for academic writing we used graphic organizers a lot. As far as materials that helped (not perfect, but helped), MCT, W&R, Remedia Press Outlining book, LToW, Wordsmith Apprentice. What did NOT work were WWE or WWS, IEW, WriteShop, or 6-trait daily. Haphazard answer to your question, but that reflects well on the way we had to go about writing. My kids actually have a lot of great writing elements - voice, vocabulary, sentence variety, imagery, logical reasoning - but carrying a narrative without losing the reader and sticking to organized arguments is still tough.

Narration did not work for my ADHD kids or my ADHD/ASD kiddo. One of the kids could tell back nearly Word for word, but summarizing, main idea, outlining - soooooo hard and so many tears we changed approach. I love WTM but classical pedagogy and neoclassical (like WTM) favor certain learning styles and neurobiologies. Auditory, sequential, analytic, verbal.... these are highly favored and not what most ASD kids are.

How about anyone used any of the LL elementary curricula? They have 1st-4th finished. Im actually looking at it for the composition portion.

Has anyone used this? Thoughts? Was it your complete language arts? Did your student enjoy it? Any reservations or complaints?

I would say the AOPS placements are a *minimum* for success in the program. However, if you haven’t covered four arithmetic functions with integers (I’m assuming you haven’t covered negative integers) then cover it and take the placement again. If you want a good idea of how your student will do in AOPS then work in Alcumus for a while and see how it goes.

Rainbow Resource Christian Book Classical Academic Press Timberdoodle (their games/logic picks are usually really neat and fun) And directly from publisher/author (eg Logic of English, Singapore Math, Pandia Press, etc)

North Rim has some great cabins

These are things to work towards during logic phase: Working independently, time management skills (especially using a planner or task manager), critical thinking skills (moving up Blooms Taxonomy is a reference point), You should also realize there will be times your child’s brain melts out the ears and not much new learning is possible. The focus of growth is physical, and that is not under the control of the child. Have patience.

Notgrass histories are like this.