My daughter's done really well with expository and literary analysis essays, but we have never done a lab report or written a paper with proper MLA (or whatever) citations and formatting. I think we should focus on the different kinds of writing she'll see at public high school in 9th.

I just said goodbye to a foster daughter today. It was only meant to be a one night emergency placement, but she needed us and we wanted to help and so I agreed we would keep her so that she could finish out the school year at the same school... And now it's been over a month and I had to keep to our word and insist with child welfare that she needed to move to a long term placement. We have too many summer plans and complicated trips. And we need to take a break -- we're not feeling good and useful, but starting to feel jaded and suspicious and disappointed in the system. So yeah, we do what we can. You gave what you can give to a child. And maybe it helped out... But when the time comes that we can't go on, it's okay to take care of ourselves and not feel guilty.

Apples and Pears has really worked well for my 11 yr old. I started her in book B last year and she's made great progress. She's now starting book D.

Here's our plan: Math - Geometry - Jacobs Geometry 4 days/week (was going to try Saxon, but just learned local high school where DD will go in a year uses Jacobs 3rd edition) - Saxon Algebra 1 day/week (as Algebra review) English - American Lit - Windows to the World - Novels: The old man and the sea, A tree grows in Brooklyn, To Kill a Mockingbird, Of Mice and Men, House on Mango Street, I know why the caged bird sings, The secret life of bees - Short stories and poems from Glencoe American Lit - They say, I say History -- US History - American Odyssey Ch. 22-41 (mostly 20th century) - DBQs for US History - Reading like a historian - Timelines, pictures, writing all in a portfolio - American Experience documentaries - Crash Course US History Science -- General science - So you really want to learn science 2 - documentaries, crash course sciences French - First start French - Duolingo - Concordia language village summer immersion camp Study skills/Current Events (not sure yet about this...) - How to be a superstar student - NACLO prep (computational linguistics) - Possibly some SAT or generic test prep - Newspaper reading

We've used both US and world history (1 & 2) as a supplement to our textbook. Usually we read first and watch second, but sometimes we'll do it the other way.

Yep - we're in it for the long haul too, though underbite and impacted canines and crowding are more our issues. So far it's been oral surgery to expose the canines and attach chains to pull them down and then braces and a palatal expander. It's been a year now with it on and we're wondering when it'll come off.

For slightly dry, I like Menage a Trois. And Cocobon at Trader Joe's is really nice and slightly more sweet. Both are around 7-8 dollars.

I doubt very much that the textbook you choose matters at all to college admissions people. Nor do I think they'd even know that it is a textbook series intended for elementary age. But I still wouldn't use it. My daughter at 12 found it too childish and complained enough that I sold it and bought k12 American Odyssey. It's been a much better fit and still has very readable text.

http://www.amazon.com/Phineas-Gage-Gruesome-Story-Science/dp/0618494782 http://www.amazon.com/Bulging-Brains-Horrible-Science-Arnold/dp/0439944473

Have you looked at History Portfolio? It has the potential to be quite crafty. http://www.homeschooljourney.com

We spent some time in 6th grade on literary terms with the Figuratively Speaking book. At the beginning of 7th, we read "How to Read Literature Like a Professor" together. After that, for every assigned reading, I'd just have my DD write a short literary analysis type essay, or if we didn't have the time, I'd have her write a paragraph-long summary or answer textbook type comprehension questions. We haven't needed a full literature curriculum... I just hand her a book and she gets to work.

I think it falls into the "phonemic awareness" idea. If a child can see a word as composed of separate sounds rather than one complete unit, it's a sign they are ready to apply that to a connection between those individual sounds and certain letters. If a child can rhyme, he is aware that there are patterns in words - that the difference between sat and pat is in the first sound/letter and the difference between cat and cats or lice and slice is an added sound/letter.

I don't know what kinds of names are typical... Are these too cute? Chesscake, strawberry chesscake Chessters, jesters Chessnuts, Jr. chessnuts Chessmongers, apprentice chessmongers Chessburgers, fries

I play on a 40+ tennis team and most of my team mates are considerably older than me. My doubles partner is 74, for instance. As active interesting older women, they are all awesome role models for how I want to be at that age. One of the 70+ yr olds is particularly pretty with a great figure and the others are attractive in their own ways, but not stunning. In 30 years, I'm sure I'll be in the latter group.

Glad to help! You might mention to her that a few of them are kind of.... naughty. Personally, I think it adds interest. It also seemed to surprise my daughter that people over a thousand years ago would have such a dirty sense of humor. The animal and birds should be fine. It's when the answer is a key or a sword or anything remotely phallic shaped that they start getting salacious.

We used Pentime. The grade 2 book is their transition to cursive, so the focus at the beginning is printing. Pentime 3 is all cursive.

Just the copy books. I actually did all 5 of them - a page each day while my daughter was working... It took a few months. They're a little tedious at first, but I began to take pleasure in the repetition, and my handwriting looks like grown-up writing finally!

I used the old fashioned Spencerian workbooks to improve my handwriting. Invest in a nice fountain pen to make yourself feel like it's calligraphy you're practicing. My writing is so much better now and it all goes the same direction at the same angle. http://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/0880620951/ref=pd_aw_fbt_14img_2?refRID=0BH744CYKJM947P8BY9F

If you like early medieval, how about Anglo Saxon riddles? http://en.m.wikisource.org/wiki/Anglo-Saxon_Riddles_of_the_Exeter_Book

A hundred times agreeing with this! I want the disclaimer t-shirt too. There is nothing like the looks I get when my kids give big smiles full of black broken nubs of teeth from baby bottle rot.

It's pretty Christian, though, being Mennonite, in a slightly different way from Abeka or BJU or something. It's less about particular beliefs and more into obedience and having a cheerful countenance and such. My kids have trouble taking it seriously... Instead, I'd choose something secular. It looks like you'll have a second grader? I like Apples and Pears for spelling. Writing Skills A by Diana King (EPS) is a good workbook for writing mechanics. Easy Grammar is... not inspiring, but is easy to implement.

My daughter did French 1 with online G3. They did not use galore park last year. It claimed to be a high school level course, but at one hour of instruction a week, it certainly was not.

I'm not entirely convinced that privilege is even 100% about money. I could lose all my money today and I would still have privilege. I am educated and speak the majority language with the standard dialect, I am white, articulate, not old, healthy, free of mental illness and addiction, well-traveled, I grew up in a stable home with loving parents who had the same privilege as I have, have no family with a criminal history, have a world-view that does not involve a sense that the world is out to get me, have skills, ambition, confidence, etc... These are all hallmarks of privilege in my community and probably yours too. Sometimes, especially around election time, you'll hear politicians try to pawn themselves off as being "average Joes" who came from a background of noble poverty and rose from the dirt. I could probably spin my life like that too if I wanted to make myself feel as if I am somehow deserving of my success more than other people. But in truth, just having periods without money doesn't change that I am essentially privileged... that the playing field is unequal in my favor because I was born to a stable family who knew how to access resources and opportunities and support. I could lose everything and move to a homeless shelter and I'd still have those benefits of privilege given to me at birth that would give me more choices and opportunities than people without privilege.

I was also going to recommend God in America. It's from frontline and American experience. http://www.pbs.org/godinamerica/ We've seen the first three and they are really quite good.

The story of the world isn't particularly religious, so you probably could work with it if you wanted. If he's a pretty good reader, you might choose a middle school series like K12 Human Odyssey 1. http://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/1931728534/ref=mp_s_a_1_1?qid=1433272269&sr=8-1&pi=AC_SY200_QL40&keywords=human+odyssey+volume+1&dpPl=1&dpID=51HtRLELKdL&ref=plSrch. I believe you can pick up activities that go with it also. I think these are the ones but you'll want to double check. http://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/B001BKJ6XU/ref=mp_s_a_1_1?qid=1433272452&sr=8-1&pi=AC_SY200_QL40&keywords=intermediate+world+history+a&dpPl=1&dpID=31OIYf1lW4L&ref=plSrch