Love hearing how everyone is doing! Thanks for sharing! DD had her first Homeschool Spanish Academy class for conversation practice tonight, and she was so nervous!!

According to my friend whose son participated in the RTP pre-cal course last year, it's the same here. We have a large high tech population, and she said that there was only 1 other homeschooler in his class.

Yea, I'm going to get the ToK ones and just build my own course from it. I did like finding some of the sample essays for ideas.

Just thought I'd check in with the other current 8th graders to see how the year has gone. I actually think this is one of our more successful years ever! I made some tweaks along the way, but we've really had a solid year with DD taking more ownership. We have our plans nearly done for 9th, and I'm feeling good about the choices we're making there. It's the first time I built out a weekly schedule, and that's definitely a winning approach for us. I still work with her 1:1 but it's more like 2 hours instead of 4. It's been a nice shift. Quick summary: - AoPS algebra -- surprising hit of the year. We had huge success with BA, none with pre-algebra, but this year has been amazing. She loves it, has stuck with it, and pretty much does it independently. She's decided she'd like to just continue finishing the book (equivalent of algebra II) next year. We're going to do some geometry intro over the summer too. - Spanish 1 -- Still loving Español Santillana even though it's expensive and teacher intensive. We finished it, and she's going to start doing additional conversation practice with Spanish Homeschool Academy next week through the summer. Will continue with Spanish 2 next year. - Culinary Science -- mostly a success. DH hasn't been as good about doing experiments with her as I had hoped, but she cooks a lot anyway and has been doing all the readings and stuff. Pretty much a moderated unschooling approach here, but she's learned a ton. - US Contemporary History (1950-current) -- huge success. I built this one, and we've covered so much in so much depth that I'm a bit surprised myself. Comparisons to current events have been very timely as well. It's been fascinating for me to look at times I've lived with this lens. - English Lit and Writing -- We started out using Oak Meadow 8 but DD really didn't like the books so we stopped after the 3rd and I've added lit that corresponded to history periods instead. She continued doing the reading and grammar stuff in OM 8 though. We also did the 3-series revamp of the Exploring Essays classes with Bravewriter. She's in the last one now, and 2/3 were fantastic, and I've learned that the right teacher makes all the difference. It's been an incredibly positive experience, and we will continue doing BW classes for sure. We've done a lot of extras too, and it's just been a great year too with her activities and more opportunities with her aerial dance life. The big thing for us, which I've talked about in the hs board, is that she really seems set on going to circus school rather than college right away. Not sure yet how this will change our plans for hs in the long term, but I've worked out a pretty solid plan for next year at least. Would love to hear from everyone else!

I'm planning on doing a modified Theory of Knowledge based on the IB course so I've been searching. I did what RootAnn suggested and also found this site: http://www.ibo.org/programmes/diploma-programme/curriculum/ I've also just used bits of their books. Their history of the Americas does a nice integration of history that's more comprehensive for all of the Americas, for example, that puts things in context in less US-centric ways.

We used the entire series in 5th and the following one (Medieval series) in 6th. I personally thought they were solidly middle grade and would be too light for high school. They're fabulous books and very engaging and interesting, but I know they also offer IB level books which are high school level. We used parts of their IB History of the Americas book, and it was good too. You can search for "IB" on their site: https://global.oup.com/academic/search?q=IB&q=IB&subjectcode1=1793239|AHU00010&lang=en&cc=us

We've actually seen a fair number of homeschoolers in our area take this approach and some of their bands are starting to gain popularity. I love that we've created these artistic opportunities for them! His thoughts remind me of DD and her goals too. Good luck to him!

She’s interested in massage therapy but honestly she can make more as a circus performer and if she isn’t going to college, I’d rather she focus on that.

Yes, that's really how I'm leaning now. I know things can change since we're just starting hs now so I'm trying to just keep track of all our options. Mostly I can't believe she'll be here for only 4 more years.

Yes, she really loves teaching too so I suspect she'll do that too, but I've tried encouraging her to consider PT as a career. But, many of the PT we know say you really need to go to PhD now for many career opportunities. We know many PT/circus folks though. DD is really interested in conditioning and A&P.

Okay, this is hilarious! I've never met another homeschooling mom with such a similar kid! Mine does silks, rope, stilting primarily and is a troupe currently. I'm going to send you a message!

I made the mistake of pre-reading about struggles kids have with long division and had all sorts of things ready, and DD didn't have any issues at all. We still joke about that around here.

I'm pretty sure that DD wants to go to circus school instead of college right away. I'll admit that it's taken a lot of deep soul searching for me. DD is gifted 2e, and we have an academically rigorous approach to school. I've been preparing for college for sure. But, she's very physically and creatively gifted, and if she wants to this, the time to do it is when she's young and physically strong. She has put together a very strong case for this approach, including concerns about debt, acknowledgement that she can always go to college later, etc. I'm still torn about whether she should do DE and earn AA before high school graduation, or if we should just keep doing what we want. I can't help but continue to meet basic guidelines for college, but I am likely going to be customize things even more. Like, we'll do physics but probably focus more on how it applies to rigging and other circus things, biology will be A&P heavy, I'll do a class on circus history, and I'll do a writing course on grant writing. I'm also much more interested in creating courses she wants to do--9th grade lit will be focused on LBGTQ+ modern YA literature, for example. I doubt we'll bother with AP tests and perhaps not even SAT or ACT. Her 2e issues will require additional test time which will require us to do another neuropsych eval which is a lot of time, money, and stress (on her) to update the last one we did in 3rd (which clearly outlined need for additional test time, etc.). This point is still weighing on me a bit.

This is amazing--I had no idea they had these courses. Thank you!

Same! We did culinary science (nearing the end of 8th now).

Have you tried the Danica McKellar math books with her? It kinda kills me to recommend them because I'm not a fan of the stereotypical female examples that she uses nor the titles themselves, but my DD has really enjoyed them. We've used all of them except geometry so far, and the math is solid, in a narrative form, and has just a few practice problems, but it was entertaining and informative!

What about learning how to finger spell? Might lead to an interest in ASL. https://www.signlanguageforum.com/asl/fingerspelling/alphabet/

We haven't taken any of their classes, but just a comment about the math. Saxon and AoPS are two very different approaches to math. You might want to get a preview of them both before choosing if you haven't used them before.

If he likes hiking, what about combining the pirate idea with some outdoor and survival skills? My daughter (8th) attends two different outdoor programs, and they learn all sorts of survival skills, fire making, tracking, shelter building, compassing, etc.

Same as it's always been--in our homeschool room. We do 1:1 stuff together at table in there or in my office, and she does her independent work wherever she wants. We've worked out a system for keeping track of her work, what needs to be filed, turned in, etc. Storing things hasn't changed for this age, just who's more responsible for finding it has.

For whatever it's worth, we're on the tail end of 8th grade here, and I honestly think it's been one of my favorite school years in a long time!

My DD has been able to do AoPS algebra 1 mostly on her own AFTER completing Foerster's algebra with me. Foerster's was fine, but we found it conceptually lacking and motivated us to come back to AoPS. There's no way she'd be ready to move on to Intermediate AoPS algebra after Foerster's algebra 1. I think we'll finish the Intro book and count it as algebra 2 like others said.

We’ve also used games and interactive notebook things from Teachers Pay Teachers. Riddles from Algebra Math Pizzaz too.

Been there, tried everything including all of Foerster’s algebra and still not being happy. Came back to AOPS Algebra this year (so a 2nd year of algebra) and everything suddenly is working for her now! She’s in 8th so we had time too to just do a 2nd year.

9th grader: - Math: AoPS algebra 2 or geometry (likely the former; still trying to decide) - Science: Oak Meadow Environmental science (possibly combined with a local class) - English: Braverwriter classes + LBGTQ+ literature studies (I'm designing) - Foreign language: Spanish 2 with Español Santillana (I'm teaching) with additional conversational practice with Homeschool Spanish Academy - Oak Meadow geography Still trying to work out academic electives and history. Her history this year (8th) was at a very high school level so I am giving her high school credit for it even if that's not typical. She's worked incredibly hard, and it's a very intensive course with high input/output. Non-academic electives: aerial dance/stilting (training, teaching, and performing), outdoor programs, chorus, preschool volunteer