If you find that your ds still does not get Geometry through TT after trying the great suggestions above, my recommendation would be to try Mr. D Math-Geometry. You could choose the self-paced option which can be started at any time. There are many sample videos you and ds could watch to get a feel of the program. Here is one of the samples:

Okay, I going to be the odd one out. I don't think it's a puberty thing; at least not all of it. My DD has math anxiety. She always has had it. She does the exact same things you describe OP. I tried all the things everyone is advising here. Nothing worked She just has math anxiety and probably always will. She even tells me she lashes out at me because she is frustrated with herself for not being able to grasp Algebra and so on. Last year, using CLE, she got up to book 6 before she started having problems, then the same old math "issues" showed up in force. We never finished it during the school year because I slowed everything down and we routinely redid problems she didn't understand. Nothing stuck. Over the summer I hired a tutor. He was good and I immediately noticed that DD relaxed and concentrated more. She did well with the tutor, but when we started back up this fall to finish CLE, she got a "D" on her second quiz. She blew up. All the anxieties returned four-fold. The conclusion I came to was I couldn't be her teacher for math. I needed to remove myself from the equation. I also decided we were not going to proceed to Geometry this year (even though she was on Book 8 of CLE). I want her to have a good grasp of Algebra before moving on. So, even though I bought everything for Geometry, and after discussing the situation with her and DH, we purchased Mr. D. Math-Algebra and DD started it last week. So far so good. The best part is that Mr. D has two weekly live help sessions she can be a part of if she's having difficulty, or she can feel free to email his staff whenever she has a problem. Not only that, but grading is done automatically as well. YEAH! I now have nothing to do with her math other than checking her records to see that she's progressing and doing the assignments. I also check her grades regularly. I haven't heard one complaint so far, but it's only been a week and a half. The thing I liked most about Mr. D. when I previewed some videos was that he presents things several different ways. One thing my DD, as a linear thinker, had problems with was that the text would tell her one way to do it, but then when someone else showed her, they did it a different way. That totally messed her up. She HAD to do Algebra only one way, and we all know there are different ways to get to an answer in Algebra. When I showed DD a sample video in Mr. D., at first she got all huffy because he was explaining a certain concept a certain way and she was like, "That's not right; it's not how I learned it; now I'm confused again. However, then Mr. D. showed how to get the same answer a different way (the exact way DD learned from CLE) and then it was like the light bulb went on. "Oh, now I see. He actually explained it much better than CLE." Mr. D. then went on to show it a third way. Now DD understands that there are many ways to solve a problem. This was a revelation to her despite my telling her the same thing repeatedly. Hopefully, this program will be the one that makes Algebra stick. I'm cautiously optimistic, but it's too early to tell. All I know is that I now realize math is something she needs to learn from someone else. Sometimes that's all it takes.

Who is this girl and what did she do with my DD? DH and DD just got back from the library and To-Shin Do. So, what did Jordan pick up for some light pleasure reading material? How about: The Age of Invention An Into to Haiku (in Japanese) Hippocrates The Lost Art of Healing A Popular Guide to Medical Language Anatomica: The Complete Home Medical Reference Geesh, we've created a monster...in a good way... I guess...? :blink: 😳

Well, since we grow and freeze most of our own veggies and DH hunts wild game, we have two chest freezers: one for veggies and one for meat. They are kept in an alcove in our basement.

Ask your dc what they would like to learn. I tried to have my DD learn Spanish due to the popularity of it and the fact that I could help her quite a bit. It started out okay but ended up a huge failure because DD really had no interest in learning it. In fact, she told me she really didn't like learning other languages. Last summer I came to the conclusion that she needed to have a vested interest in whatever language we chose. So, I asked her which language she really wanted to learn or should we go with ASL (the default option). Based upon her love of Anime and desire to someday visit Japan, DD immediately said she would love to learn Japanese. Oh great, that leaves me out, and where am I going to find a class like that where we live?! Online classes are too expensive for us so that wouldn't be an option. However, despite my concerns, that's what she's doing this year. I bought her a language book to work with, several cultural books to read, the GCP Japan course to watch, and I actually found a native Japanese speaker through my time on Grand Jury Duty who volunteered to be DD's language coach. Hallelujah!!!! We've set aside one class per week to work with her language coach to review her book chapters, learn phrases, and just chat in Japanese. Plus, some of her assignments include watching Anime she loves in Japanese without English subtitles. Let's just say DD is learning quickly and loving her homemade Japanese class. I just hope she keeps up the momentum.

I haven't read through this whole thread, but has anyone recommended Mr. D. Math? He offers high school math from Pre-Algebra through Pre-Calc w/Trig. In addition, he has classes in: SAT and ACT Math Bootcamps 11-Week full Math summer intensives 6-week Life Skills 4 Teens I just enrolled my DD in the self-paced class for Algebra I. She's had a very rocky road with CLE Algebra in 8th, even with taking it slow, and is extremely frustrated and math phobic at this point. At first I was going to finish CLE during the first few months of this fall and proceed with Geometry. After her last quiz, I've decided to have her repeat Algebra completely. I want to make sure she has a firm foundation before going into Geometry and higher maths. At first I was happy with CLE, but the TM skipped several steps in the equations, and I actually found several errors in answers. Instead of repeating CLE, I went on the exhausting search for something with online instruction, but self-paced and gentle. Whatever program we chose needed to help DD build up her confidence with math. I narrowed it down to either TT or Mr. D. After researching a great deal, I found several negatives for TT, but absolutely no negatives for Mr. D. Today I had DD watch several of the sample videos. While she wasn't thrilled with having to do Algebra again, she told me she thinks Mr. D explains things better and she was willing to give it a go. Anyway, if this math course hasn't been mentioned, I just thought it may need to be added to the master list. Thanks!

We have 14 hens and sell the overflow of eggs. The sale of the eggs pays for their feed over and above their foraging. When we do have extra eggs, we make quiche, homemade pudding, meringue for pies. We do make our own bread regularly and that calls for 2 eggs each time, and we, basically, eat eggs every other day.

At that age (6th grade) DD absolutely loved the book, Two Miserable Presidents. She also enjoyed reading selections from Yesterday's Classics, American History Stories III (leading up to the Civil War) & IV (the Civil War). In the evenings, as a family, we watched The Civil War series by Ken Burns. If you don't have Amazon Prime, you can also watch it through Netflix Streaming. I'm also pretty sure you can watch all the episodes through YouTube. DD also read Behind Rebel Lines, which she enjoyed. DD has never really been a fan of hands-on projects. She'd rather read and watch videos. Therefore it was disappointing for me that we didn't use the History Pockets Civil War book that I had. If your DC like "hands-on" they may enjoy that. Another option would be to visit a Civil War museum in your state. Here is a listing of such museums by state. HTH

How about GCP's World History: A Global Perspective and match it up with something like Human Odyssey's World History.

Do you add a gas stabilizer to your stored gasoline? If you don't, the Ethanol that is added to gasoline will separate over time which creates bad fuel that is detrimental to your engines. This may cause your engines to not operate correctly.

Yes, really they do. Even when the ashes are cold, they are so fine they stick right to the ice. We only use salt with severe ice storms. Most of the time it's too cold in our area for salt to work, even during the rare times when the sun is shining brightly, the constant northwesterly winter winds keep the temps in the negative 20-30+ below range. Therefore, we save all our ashes in a large trash can in our well-house. Then DH and I can shovel-scatter it onto the driveway directly as needed and/or dump some into a wheelbarrow for the driveway to the barn.

Well....they're not hideous. That's the best I can say.

I'll be going to a farm to pick elderberries sometime this month too. I went to the same place last month and picked a winter's worth of blueberries because our bushes don't do very well. I think I need to feed them some acid....however, we did pick 75 quarts of strawberries from our own plants, so we have plenty of those. In fact, we're a little sick of strawberries at the moment. :thumbup1:

GCP has a course called Understanding the Human Body: An Introduction to Anatomy & Physiology, 2E. This is what we will be using when DD finishes Chemistry & Biology. I plan to pair it with the following books: Atlas of Human Anatomy (suggested by the course professor) Human Anatomy & Physiology I may also get her an anatomy coloring book and flash cards when the time arrives. Anyway, just an idea for you.

LOL....With my first I pigged out on pizza and Mounds bars constantly. I gained 40# with DD1. With DD2, I craved fruits and veggies. I didn't gain any weight until towards the end. Total weight gain was approx. 20#

Ooh! I forgot. One of the things I must do before winter is go to the Amish store about 45 mins. away. I get all my bulk herbs and spices there. We also get a huge tub of coconut oil, dried chicken and beef stock for soups and stews, and a 50# bag of golden wheat berries to replenish our stores. Now that we have a grain mill, we grind all our own flour as we need it. It's so much better than store-bought flour because it retains the germ and hull (for fiber) which helps mitigate the effects of gluten.

Drain cleaner is a new one for me. I literally never think about it. If a drain gets plugged I use the plunger or DH takes the drain apart. However, I can relate to lightbulbs. DH seems obsessed with them. I always have to drag him away from that aisle in whatever store carries them. It's maddening :toetap05:

We use the wood ashes from our wood stove. They work really well. Sometimes we will go to the town garage and get pails of salt if we get an ice storm.

We start getting ready for winter as soon as spring hits. Our gardens get planned, and I start planting all cold weather tolerant crops as soon as the ground thaws. Sometimes that means with snow still on the ground. I start most of our veggies in a cold-frame and transplant as the weather becomes accommodating. We have three, 60' x 40' gardens. We grow almost all of our own veggies. The rest of the summer and into fall is maintaining and harvesting the gardens, fruit trees, & berries; then we preserve the produce by freezing, dehydrating, and making jams, jellies, etc. This constitutes the bulk of our fruit and veggies over the winter. The only thing I end up buying at the grocery store is broccoli because I can't stand dealing with the cabbage loopers hiding in the broccoli. Nothing ever really gets them all unless you're willing to use commercial pesticides in your garden. I'm not willing to pollute our gardens, so I buy it and wash thoroughly. That way, the rest of our veggies are pesticide free. We usually have a load of tree-length logs sitting in the yard from the fall beforehand. As soon as spring hits, DH cuts those down to 18"-20" logs. Then together we split those and toss them down into one of the six bins (58' x 11') of our huge barn. Once the wood is all split, we stack what is in the barn along the walls of that bin. Since the floor of the barn is concrete, the wood is stacked on pallets. This way, every 3 days we can fill up the bucket of the tractor right in the barn and drive it up to the house deck and unload it for the woodstove. DH also cuts down one cedar tree and trims that up for kindling for the year. DH cleans the chimney (which, ironically, he's doing right now, to prepare for our first fire of the season). It's been getting cold here in the evenings for the past couple of weeks. Every other year we raise two pigs. This happens to be one of those years. This fall, before steady freezing temps, we'll slaughter the pigs, butcher them and fill our freezer. We do all the work ourselves. I've also just made 4 lbs. of soap to get us through the winter. It's curing in the upper part of our barn and will be reading in two months. Berry plants and asparagus will need to be put to bed using straw. Since the farmer who leases some of our fields just baled some straw (hugh round bales), DH just took our tractor out and collected two bales for this purpose. It will also be utilized for additional bedding for the pigs until slaughter time. The potatoes in our fields will be harvested within the next couple weeks. As soon as that is done, we will take the tractor to the fields and gleen potatoes for our winter/spring stores. Root cellar will be cleared out and ready for this year's potatoes, onions, carrots, and beets We have made the appointment to get our furnace (back-up heat source) cleaned and ready for use. DH also started up our generator and let it run yesterday a to make sure it runs soundly in case we need it. Chickens will have their flexible fencing taken down and we will severly curtail their huge yard with chicken wire before we get too much snow. We will need to get their water heater in place as well. DH will dig in flexible fiberglass reflexive posts lining our driveway and roadway down to the barn so he can snowblow with the tractor. We will pick up any larger rocks/stones from those roadways so they don't break a shearpin in the snowblower. DH will put chains on the tractor tires as soon as the ground freezes. Switch clothes from summer to winter (this means a trip to the attic). Drain & store the two riding lawn mowers, weedwhacker, log-splitter, hand rototillers; grease & load summer tractor equipment into middle barns; get snowblower greased & ready to use; get XC skiis & snowshoes ready & accessible in the well-house. I'm sure I'm forgetting a ton of other miscellaneous things we do to get ready for winter, but it's just so routine after 20 years in VT and now 10 in ME, that it just gets to be a habit and second nature.

We make all our own jam too. DD's favorite is grape. Right now our Arctic kiwis are ripe. We've been picking some each day. I wonder if we could make jam out of those. Anyone ever try that?

Have you looked at the history selections at ?

At that age I would definitely ditch any curriculum and go with interest-led topics. Find some age-appropriate, short books in the library about any topics he's interested in. Snuggle on the couch and read to him or watch a short video, then do a hands-on if possible. Examples: (If you do each subject once a week that would be fine. He may even ask you to do more!) If he likes secret codes & stories about spies, tell him about Washington's spies during the Revolutionary war. There are many children's books relating to this topic, some are the which/way books where the kids can choose a scenario to follow. For a hand's on project, you can ask your dc to come up with his own code and write out a secret message as either George Washington or one of his spies. See if you can figure out the message. Short science (can't beat Crash Course Kids!) and history videos (5 mins. or less) for kids about something they're interested in (Dinosaurs, cars - Henry Ford, astronauts, Mohammad Ali, Liberty Kids-fantastic option, etc) and then a coloring sheet would be sufficient. YouTube is your friend! Does your child like mysteries? Why not read about the unsolved mysteries of history and science? My DD LOVES any historical or science mysteries. There are a plethora of books available for either. You could then ask your kid to come up with possible resolutions to these mysteries. Get messy with science! Purchase or research some simple, but fun, science experiments you can do at home. Make an exploding volcano or silly putty & slime, etc. YouTube has tons of videos for kid-friendly science experiments. Here's another series of experiments for K-3rd. Grade. Trust me, if I had to do it all over again, this is how we would have done history and science.

I did mention up-thread that we will go ahead and do regular Chemistry based upon the excellent advice on this thread. Any Chem I planned would definitely be done with GCP. DD absolutely loves all of GCP and wouldn't want to do a regular curriculum. Therefore, I'm planning to proceed with Chemistry, 2E over the summer of 2018 (this is a "math for Chemistry" lecture series) and then proceed with Chemistry and Our Universe (that was my go-to if the consensus was not to do GCP's Organic Chem course.) I've already got the recommended text according to the GCP study guide in my wishlist and ready to purchase. I'm also going to purchase the following to flesh out the course: Chemisry: Concepts & Problems Illustrated Guide to Home Chemistry Experiments DD also wants to explore the science of Toxicology as well as the history of it (which we are integrating with Ancient History this year), so I'm thinking it would be a good elective for DD to take along with Chemistry next year. There are several excellent resources and texts I can get through Amazon. GCP has given this kid such a love of science that she's like a totally new student. She hated all science before I introduced her to The Joy of Science out of pure desperation to get her interested in Science. What a change....now all she wants to do is science! Thanks for reinforcing DD's belief that the GCP courses are much better than any standard science curriculum. Thanks to everyone else who chimed in and helped me decide which was the best course to take. I knew you all would help to steer me in the right direction :thumbup1:

DON'T CALL. He sounds like a classic stalker.

Thanks all! I will go ahead and pursue GCP's general Chemistry class instead using the text recommended by their study guide and including experiments. I will still plan to have her take the GCP Chemistry, 2E math course over next summer to prepare her for general Chem. Depending upon how she does with that (she really HATES math) we will either pursue Physics or Biology next. I really appreciate everyone's input. :001_smile: