Just my opinion, but The Giver is not one of my favorite books. It just didn't seem very deep to me. (My 14 year old is currently reading it and has to keep stopping to read me yet another passage that she finds tiresome...). If I wanted that sort of dystopian book in the list I'd go with something like 1984 or Brave New World or Fahrenheit 451 or Animal Farm. Animal Farm is short, easy to read, and with some humor, but there are a lot of deep themes for discussion. To Kill a Mockingbird is great. It seems simplistic (the story being told by a child), but there's a lot going on in it. It can be read on a lot of levels. We found Frankenstein hard to read. It's fairly repetitive. My kids also didn't really go for Poe. It seemed like a lot of gratuitous horror. If it were me, and I wanted to go for this sort of theme, I'd choose Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde. A nonfiction book that might prompt discussion is Next of Kin (Fouts). And there might be some newer fiction books that would be interesting. The one that springs to mind is The Poisonwood Bible. There's some sex in it (if that's a concern). It looks at the differences between cultures which might bring up discussion. You might look at the books How to Read Literature Like a Professor and How to Read Novels Like a Professor for some interesting suggestions.

I recently had a book out of the library that was kind of like Plutarch in that it had biographies of a lot of famous Romans, but it was modern. I'd like to get it again, but I've forgotten the name and author. Can anyone steer me back to this book?

I've wondered about this breast cancer/bra wearing link for some time. I have never seen HOW they did the study, which would make me dismiss it. It wouldn't be surprising that there might be a correlation between wearing a bra and breast cancer, but if one thinks about all the things that might cause that correlation, one suddenly gets very skeptical about the results. I would suspect that older women and obese women are more likely to wear bras -- but are more likely to get breast cancer just because they're older and obese. Suddenly, one has a correlation. But correlation does not mean causation. Here's a link addressing this: http://www.cancer.org/docroot/MED/content/MED_6_1x_Underwire_Bras.asp?sitearea=MED Did the original study even try to control for factors such as age, weight, and breast size? (And even if they did try to control it statistically, it's still very easy to get things confounded with each other if the trials weren't randomized.)

Is it possible someone had the thought that they might be legally responsible if something bad happened to the child attending the field trip? That might be the reason behind this. I'm not suggesting that they would be responsible, but just the thought that they might be might cause them to put this restriction on.

Actually, you can just use the baking soda straight without the cornstarch. You need very, very little. It's amazing stuff. (But all it works on is the smell.)

We just did what the kids were ready for next and didn't worry about what grade it was. My current 9th grader (by age) is doing math and science that's generally 11th/12th grade (precalculus and physics). She scored post high school on the 12th grade ITBS for reading etc. But she probably won't start college early. She'll just fill in her time with other things that interest her. My 12th grader was similar at that age. She's been doing dual enrollment this year and last, but has been using it to explore what she wants to do in college, rather than just starting college. She will be a year into the program she wants to do, as it turns out, but that wasn't necessarily the goal. They've both spent a lot of time on music and drama, so they're glad of the extra time in high school. On the transcript, you can list things however you want -- we did it by subject so there was no question of what the years were. I did list a few things as "completed before high school" (math and foreign language only, because I didn't think colleges were going to believe anything else). But you might want to keep in mind that the math after Algebra gets a little more complicated. My kids breezed through the math until they hit precalc and calculus. Because they were "ahead" they've been able to take more time on the higher math and really get it down. You could also do a year of statistics in high school. Most kids in 12th grade (if they're at this level) do either calc or statistics, but not both. Your daughter might have time to do both, if she's inclined. Or do two years of calculus (and take the BC AP exam).

Are the first RS two levels pretty much the same as what they had before? Or have they revamped those? I gave up on the old Rosetta Stone because I wasn't learning anything but words. I've had a lot better luck with Pimsleur. I was partway through the 2nd level of RS.

All the colleges we've had contact with have given placement exams for foreign language. If a student places out of the highest level course that they would have been required to take in college then they don't have to take any college courses in it. Or they might place out of a semester or two. It's pretty standard. These colleges do it for everyone. That may be all that this parent ran into. Maybe they just misinterpreted it? If the homeschooled students were denied admission because they "didn't have a foreign language in high school" then that would be a different matter. But even that I would find hard to believe. If a student is someone the college wants, they usually waive requirements. Well, unless it's certain state schools. Odd things do happen there sometimes. The bottom line is: I wouldn't worry about it. And I'd be more willing to take my chances with a college placement test then an SAT II. Usually the college placement tests are more geared to the speed of courses at that college, although I suspect some do use the SAT for this. (When I took the French placement test when I went to college, I was pretty sure it was the SAT subject test, or at least a lot of the questions off it -- only difference was, I didn't have to PAY to take it as a placement test.) Even if your student does take the SAT II in a language, the college may still require their own placement test.

Road kill? It's all I see them eating. In our neighborhood they follow the cats around when the cats are hunting. They know the cats will just leave their prey behind once it's dead.

We've always gotten positive comments from just about everyone. The only exceptions are public school teachers. They mostly worry about "socialization". Although my older daughter's 1st grade teacher (before we pulled her out) thought it was really the best thing we could do. He confided that he wished he'd done the same with his kid who was having a lot of problems right then. He thought it might have saved her a lot of grief. The only really negative comment we've gotten (actually it was more of a thesis) was from one odd guy who does substitute teaching. He was appalled we didn't have our kids in school. He suggested that, at the least, I should "allow" my kids to do the last semester of high school so they didn't miss the prom. The sad thing is, this guy is socially inept. Um, actually, he stares at young girls and sets off warning bells in my head. He's about the only person to have ever done that for me. Just about all the non-teachers we run into are so happy to see us homeschooling. The only exceptions seem to be people who are jealous that they didn't do the same. They missed their chance and it makes them grumpy.

Does it show up when you do a search on the computer? I had taken all of Norton Utilities off my computer (or so I thought), but it still kept popping up and reminding me to send in my money. I finally did a search and found a couple files. I was able to uninstall then. Just putting it into the trash didn't do it. But maybe you're way beyond this stage.

Claritin doesn't work for me. Benadryl kind of works. What works best for me is doxylamine succinate. It's the ingredient in Unisom (a sleeping pill). I only take HALF a pill. And that really knocks me out. However, if I take it at bedtime, it works through the day afterward. My daughter tried it because her allergies were just awful this year. It worked like a charm, except she could hardly keep her eyes open all the next day. It seemed to finally get out of her system around bedtime. Still, if you're desperate, it's something. When I've accidentally eaten something I really shouldn't have, it's usually better for me to sleep it off anyway. I used to take Chlortrimeton. I don't even know if that's on the market anymore (?). It was supposed to make one sleepy, but when my allergies were really bad it would actually make me more alert in comparison to my unmedicated state. My kids live on Sudafed this time of year, with maybe a Benadryl at bedtime.

Colleges that I've looked at generally give credit for a higher level language course for an AP test. It may be only one credit (for some schools), but will place the student higher than if they had only taken one year of high school language. It may fulfill their entire language requirement. But a lot of colleges also give placement tests, so taking the AP test might not make any difference if the student plans to take any more classes in that language. Language courses seem to vary a lot. My daughter did roughly 3 years of Spanish at home (high school), but did not get all the way through Destinos. She still placed into the 5th semester of Spanish. She took one semester of French at one college and placed into the 3rd semester at a different college with no extra studying. And she's currently taking ASL at college. She feels the ASL course moves at about half the speed of the French course she took. Reports I hear from the local high school suggest that not much happens in the language classes at that particular high school. They don't take the AP test until after 6 years of a language, while other schools may do this after 4. And their Latin classes take 2-1/2 years to get through the first book of Cambridge Latin, while other schools I hear about on the web get through this book in less than a year. So there's a lot of variation out there. This is on the AP French wikipedia page: "The AP French Language test is widely compared to a final examination for a French 301 college course. " But "301" isn't a standard term either. I think I've seen colleges giving credit for a class in the 2nd or 3rd year of their sequence -- so if it takes 4 high school years to get to the AP test, then a high school year would equal approx. a college semester.

Yeah, they're really pricey for what they are. If you really want to own them, they do have sales now and then. We've always gotten them at the library. They're quick enough that you can get through them before they need to go back. The library doesn't get the DVDs -- they get the CDs because they're cheaper (unless it's something visual like art). The audio alone has worked fine for us. Or you can do lectures from Berkeley or Yale or MIT or any of those other places that offer free courses online: http://ocw.mit.edu/OcwWeb/web/courses/courses/index.htm http://oyc.yale.edu/ http://webcast.berkeley.edu/courses.php

On the other hand, my parents would never wash new clothes because they figured the chemicals in them would make them stay clean longer -- they liked to take them on trips so they could go longer without laundering.

When my husband's brother in law died, my husband got there so late he almost missed the funeral. But he stayed for a week afterward. Everyone else had already left and that was the time his sister really needed him. She appreciated having him around afterward. She would barely have noticed he was there if he'd only been there for the funeral.

That balance of core curriculum courses looks fairly standard to me -- and the science and math professors always gripe about it. The science professors have a valid point too: as much of today's public policy decisions need to be made on the basis of a solid understanding of science, it's very important that all college graduates understand science. They are our future voters. A couple courses in somewhat fluffy science classes isn't enough.

I think if the request about the Christmas decorations had come in to our church, people would have found it odd -- but only at first. After the initial reaction, it would have made them think about the fact that they were ignoring certain needs in their church community. It could be that the church you're in is responding the same way, but that it may take some time for these thoughts to work their way into the "system". I also found that it took, well, probably 3-4 years in our church before I felt that I had friends there that I could call on. It just takes a lot of time. However, I've been involved in things like choir, where people just naturally get to know each other. I don't know that that would be true of the nursery, unless the nursery was staffed by a rotating team of people who got to know each other. If it were me, I'd look at the the relationships I had already developed in the church, and I'd consider whether there might be more relationships just about to "blossom" before deciding to leave. The pastor did sound like he treated you badly, but there is a lot more to a church than the pastor. Still, I would try talking to the pastor, telling him what your needs are, because he might not be aware of it. The one thing I do see that's odd about your situation is that you aren't getting invited to a lot of the family events. You really should be getting invited. That sends up a red flag for me. However, it could just be that people are being stupid. When I first joined our church, I pointed out that there were lots of jobs that new people found it difficult to "break into". About a year after my mentioning this, sign up sheets suddenly appeared and lots more new people got involved. Sometimes it's just a matter of letting people know, and then giving them the time to believe it's their own idea. The old timers at the church often don't see things from a new person's perspective. But you're in the situation. You'll have to make your own decisions about what seems to be going on and whether it's worth staying for.

My daughter is getting offered about 2/3 tuition scholarships at the several schools she applied to. She got over a 30 on the ACT (30 seems to be the cutoff for these schools). She also has a 4.0 in the college classes she's taken in high school. The average ACT scores at these schools is somewhere in the 23-28 range. She's been taking classes at the college with the highest average ACT scores of the group she applied to. There were a number of further scholarships at that school that she applied to, but she didn't get any of them. She finds that a little odd, as she's discovered that she really hasn't run into any intellectual peers at this school, so we're not sure who's getting the scholarships. She must be in classes with kids who got them in previous years, but, well, the level of intelligence and motivation being displayed by her fellow students is remarkably unremarkable. All we can figure is that they're awarding full tuition based on things other than the student's ability. It's probably not so much extracurriculars that they're looking at (i.e, they're probably not awarding these to oboe players because they happen to need an oboe player as these scholarships were strictly for science students and I don't think the committees awarding them had any input from the rest of the college). If they were just looking at extracurricular activities, I don't think my daughter would have been at any disadvantage in that area. Right now she's leaning toward the school with the lower average ACT scores. Not only did they give her a bit more money, but her interactions with those students at scholarship weekends impressed her a lot more than the kids at similar weekends at the other school. They just seem more engaged. Also, I happen to work at this school in the dept she wants to go into, and when we compare notes on students abilities and intellectual curiosity, it does seem that this lower ACT school actually has more kids in the dept she's interested in who seem to get what's going on. And the professors seem pretty similar between the schools (about the same number of really good teachers, the same number who lecture by just reading the textbook to the class, etc) I don't know why the "lower" ACT school seems like it has the somewhat more involved, smarter kids. I wonder if the dept she's interested in (physics) just attracts all the smart kids in that school. Or maybe ACT scores don't tell very much of the story as to how kids do in college. If the school with the higher ACT average is just trying to get their average up, they may be attracting in a lot of kids who only have high ACTs going for them and nothing else. Or the school might be cooking their averages by not including a lot of groups in the scores they report. I'm just coming to the conclusion that looking at the average ACT or SAT scores at a school probably isn't very enlightening. It may tell you something about how much scholarship money you might hope for, but it may not say much about the intellectual ability of the students.

I think I may have succeeded in avoiding corn for about 5 days straight. And then I gave up and just went back to antihistamines (which also contain corn). Taking yesterday as an example, I think I did pretty well until dinner when I had a little piece of steak that I suspect had some corn sprayed on it somehow. The prevailing wisdom on meant is that it tends to have citric acid sprayed on it to keep it "fresh", and citric acid is generally made from corn. It's not listed on the label because it's not classified as an ingredient, but as something used in the processing. There is one brand of yeast without corn. I believe it's Red Star, but you have to get it in the little expensive packets. The jars have a preservative that's made from corn. BTW, a couple of other things that people don't generally know about are white rice and milk. Both often use corn as the carrier for adding vitamins (corn starch for the rice and corn oil for the milk). I've also been told that the vitamins themselves are made from corn. It is possible that you'll find that only some corn products are a problem. So the corn oil in milk, for example, may not be an issue. (Oddly, I can eat tortilla chips -- it's all the other corn derivatives that bother me.)

The corn list someone posted is helpful, but by no means complete. This group is very helpful: http://forums.delphiforums.com/AvoidingCorn They have a more up to date list that you can ask about. For crackers, I think Wasa crackers are safe, or used to be. Most mazto is also safe, as long as it's not flavored. There's corn in a lot of products where they don't bother to list it on the label. The above group has been pretty good at tracking down a lot of these foods. If you're going to be making your own bread, be aware that most yeast is grown on corn sugar, so there is some contamination (at least in the US).

We use All Free and Clear liquid because it's the only one that doesn't cause too much skin irritation here. I used to use powder, but had to be sure to put the powder in first, then some hot water to dissolve it, then fill with clothes and the rest of the water. The powder didn't dissolve in our water which tends to be about 32 degrees F a good chunk of the year (how they keep it from freezing in the pipes is mystery to me. Is it because it's under pressure?). And then the scent free powder disappeared from our store. And what is the recommended amount? I love how the detergent comes with a cap for handy measuring -- but the bottle in small print informs you that you're really only supposed to put in less than half a capful. But they don't have any markings on the cap to guide you. Very sneaky. I currently put in a little less than the recommended, but I'm working my way down to using even less, if we can get away with it. The problem is getting my kids on board with this as they seem to think a capful is the right amount.

1. One hypothesis that I've heard to explain the polio-clean house link is that filthy houses allowed kids to be exposed to polio when they were infants -- when the disease wasn't as bad. In cleaner houses, kids and adults didn't get the disease until they were older, when it can be much worse. But that's just another hypothesis. 2. On the "evils" of sugar, here's a youtube video: If the link doesn't work, you can google sugar the bitter truth lustig. (or if you don't have an hour to watch the video, you can google robert lustig and see if there are any print versions of his theories). The take home message of his talk seems to be that too much sugar without fiber is a bad thing for your body. Fruit is ok because the sugars in it come with fiber.

That first year of "high school" looks to me like an 8th grade year for an honors student. I would do it, but not list it as a high school year, except that I would list the math and foreign language courses as "taken before high school". That would be perfectly reasonable and in line with what public school kids are doing. It's pretty much what we did, and colleges were more than fine with it when it came time for applications. I would probably add more math, history, writing in the later high school years. My daughter made up her own history courses based on what she wanted to study. She got through Calc III (and would have done differential equations if other things hadn't attracted her interest). She read a lot of literature and we turned it into classes on her transcript. I wouldn't plan on so much time for SAT prep. There's only so much you can do of actual studying for it. It's better to be up on math in general and to have read a lot over the years previous to the test than worry about studying for the test per se. There's no problem with having extra foreign language on a transcript, we discovered. I wouldn't worry about that. Emu

I have noticed that when I've tried to avoid corn (food allergies) that I tend to lose weight. It may just be that I eat a lot less pre-prepared food, or eat out less. Or maybe there's something about corn. I still ate a ton of junk, but I had to make it all myself. Maybe cooking burns a lot of calories?