I don't have any experience with Lial's. My son is at the mid-year point in the HS level Algebra I course from Thinkwell. I wanted to love the ease of video tutorials and bought the full-year online subscription. We will not be continuing on with Thinkwell once he finishes this course, however. To be frank, it simply lacks challenge, requiring very little analysis or problem-solving. Hope that helps.

Emubird: After reading your post, I searched my intra-library system for both Michel Thomas and Pimsleur--they had both and I reserved them. Thanks for the suggestions! I do love free resources. The library has Destinos, too, but I don't think we're ready for that yet. April and Lisa: Other I've talked to have mentioned La Clase Divertida as a great option for family learning, too. Thanks for your replies.

of diagramming. Each chapter deals with a single general grammar topic like sentence parts, nouns, adjectives, adverbs, etc. The first couple lessons of each generally contain a brief review of how to diagram that part of speech. R&S 7 moves very quickly though and introduces some pretty advanced grammar subjects, such as phrases and clauses used as adjectives, adverbs, etc. Aside from diagramming, does your son have a pretty good grammar foundation? If he doesn't, I'd be concerned that this program as a whole may be a bit heavy. If he does have a good grammar foundation, then I wouldn't be too worried about the diagramming in particular. You can always fill in any gaps in his diagramming knowledge with other resources if the review in R&S doesn't suffice. I'm assuming that your son is at least 7th grade. Hope that helps.

I'm looking to form a new homeschool team in Portland to compete in Mathcounts for the 2011-2012 school year. If you have a mathy rising 6th grader who might be interested in helping build our team, please PM me. Blessings,

I placed an order with RR recently and thought I'd lost my mind. Wishlist disappearing, reappearing--my patience was pretty thin by the time I was finally able to check out. :glare:

Though my son will compete as an individual if need be, we'd rather he compete with a team. As you said, Laura, it's really much more than math. The camaraderie and excitement of the competition are so important. Thanks to everyone who replied for the information and inspiration. I will look into building a team in my area.

writing instruction alone, or grammar along with writing instruction. Essentials in Writing looks great but wouldn't work for us. DS11 finished R&S English 7 this past school year and is far beyond (grammar-wise) his ideal placement level for writing in the Essentials program. We'd have to wade through too much grammar review to get the writing instruction he needs. I considered WWW, too, but it's just not quite challenging enough for my 6th grader, I think. In other words, it would take too much time to do all the lessons, but he'd actually not acquire much more writing skill than he has now, even if I accelerate a couple grades. I'm thinking IEW SWI B for our fall term and then going with WWS for winter and spring. Writing curriculum is a difficult choice, isn't it? It's hard to get just the right fit especially when you can't preview the entire course IRL.

I work part-time from home--about 20 hrs per week--in our family business. I honestly could not homeschool if I worked 50 hours, even from home. You obviously have an accelerated learner, so you might want to Xpost on the Accelerated Board with your curriculum question. It sounds like you need a truly independent learning method--K12 online or something like this? It also sounds like your son has a good base of skills. Does he really enjoy independent work? Is he motivated to work well on his own? I think an independent program can work, even at your son's age, but it really hinges on learning style and personal motivation. If he can work well on his own beside you as you work and then consult you with occasional questions, a self-guided online program may just work. I'm sure others on the Accelerated Board will have some creative ideas for you.

You mentioned that you registered him in PS. If this means you're planning to have him attend full-time, there's no doubt that a gifted IEP would be worth the time and effort it takes to have him tested. IMHO, general ed is no place for a gifted learner. We applied this year for our DS11 to attend a PS option school for the highly gifted. To apply, DS had to re-take the TAG benchmark testing for our state because his previous qualification was more than 2 years old and from a different school district. I'm so glad we retested him--it helped us understand our son's needs much more clearly. Ultimately, the gifted school only took one 6th grader out of more than 100 qualified applicants. I felt that the testing process had value for us nonetheless. It helped me understand how to meet his needs better in our homeschool. I agree with previous posters that $$ is most likely the real issue with the district's hesitation to test your son.

I appreciate the carefully selected books, the scheduling, map assignments as well as the convenience of unpacking our box at the beginning of the year and filling our reading shelf. I do supplement our literature because my DS11 is an avid reader, but it's easy to fill in books where needed. We're finishing Core 6 and are planning for Core 7 in the fall. The convenience of "mostly in a box" curriculum is very important for me because I work part-time in our family business. Frankly, even if I didn't work part-time, I would still choose SL. We do two foreign languages, as well as accelerated math and science, so I rely heavily on the structure of SL to keep us on track for the year.

It was the perfect fit. It was our first full homeschool year (after removing DS from PS partway through 1st grade) and by far the best. My son will be starting 6th grade this fall and we'll so Core 7. We've done each Core one year before the earliest recommended starting age. It works beautifully for us. The concepts will undoubtedly be beyond your K twins, but the books will be there when they're ready. One thing I'd like to recommend for your 7 year old that we greatly enjoyed as a hands-on-activities supplement to Core 3 is the American Revolution notebook/lapbook project CD from Homeschool in the Woods. It's all you need to have a bit of hands-on alongside all those amazing books. Enjoy your year.

We did three years of it after completing Miquon in the early years.

Usborne Encyclopedia of World Religions. We've found this book a useful resource alongside our culture studies.

. . . all over my youngest son's first Cub Scout camp. I love the Pacific NW, but there many summer days when I wish I lived in the SW.

To be honest, he'd give you a mixed review. He enjoys the program overall, but thinks the presentation isn't logical or sequential enough. For example, he's used LFC A-C for Latin, where the verbs are conjugated using tables of the person, number and tense. It drives him crazy with Tell Me More that, when verbs are introduced, there isn't explicit instruction on how to conjugate it completely-person, number and tense. So, he's taken to making a notebook and creating a table of each verb. He uses a Spanish dictionary or infers from the TMM program each verb with its proper conjugation. He creates the same tables for each noun with its case, number, gender. I suppose he'd find Rosetta Stone equally frustrating for the same reason. We've been thinking we need to combine TMM with a traditional textbook Spanish program to facilitate more efficient learning. Tell Me More generally gets great reviews, so perhaps our opinion is more a matter of my son's learning style than anything else.