SWB, I am so very excited that you are giving your two new talks about burnout and homeschooling the good kids and the odd ones out as part of this conference! I missed the Cincinnati convention last year for the first time ever and was so disappointed not to have heard your new sessions. And when you told me you weren't coming back to Cincy this year, I thought I had missed out once again. (All though I completely understand why you won't be in attendance this year.) This online conference is the perfect solution. And I love the tag line: Giving a Platform to Multiple Points of View, Focusing on Education. That really sums up my ideal homeschooling convention. Bravo! And hey, you found a way to give a talk without being interrupted by noisy babies, obnoxious loudspeaker announcements, and wandering kids with balloons... :D

Thank you all so much for sharing all these options for Japanese. I had no idea there were so many possibilities out there. Once again The Hive comes to the rescue. :-)

Ds13 really wants to study Japanese in high school (this fall) and I am looking for an online class. The Potter's School doesn't offer Japanese anymore, and Landry Academy is still looking for someone to teach their Japanese class. Does anyone know of any other online class options? I would rather he not self-study with Irasshai. I definitely want him to have a teacher to answer questions and provide help with pronunciation.

Son Ball State University Presidential Scholarship Honors Program Ohio University Scholarship

Hmmm... all four schools that my ds applied to (and was accepted at) are on the tier 2 list. Not sure if I should be happy about that or not. I really thought that two of them were stronger academically than the other two, but maybe the difference isn't as great as I thought. But I guess what really matters is which schools are stronger in my son's chosen major, right?

Just wanted to say that this thread has been very helpful to me. My ds17 is trying to decide between his top two schools - one where he would be a big fish and one where he would not. You all have given us lots to think about. Thanks to all who have posted.

You should check with the high school and see if he would get credit for all of the homeschool courses he has taken, and that he actually would have enough credits to be a senior in their eyes.

This is the third year that my oldest son is taking classes with PA Homeschoolers, and we have had very positive experiences with the instructors and the administration. Both AIM and PA Homeschoolers are handling a very difficult situation with professionalism and grace.

We are one of the families effected too as my son was enrolled in Emily Mulvihill's Middle School English A class. I had no idea that Pennsylvania Homeschoolers had not yet notified their students. I regret my earlier post and sincerely hope that no one involved finds out here, from me, before they hear from PA Homeschoolers directly. I am sure that the suddenness of the resignation, coupled with it being a holiday, has made it challenging for them to put new plans into place. I feel confident that they will soon be in touch with the effected students. I do want to add that AIM Academy is handling this difficult situation extremely well, and we were given several options, including a full refund. Happily, Debra Bell will now be teaching the class herself, so it will continue on and my son remains enrolled. Ann, I do think remaining in the class is a good option for your daughter. Debra Bell is a very experienced language arts teacher and this may very well be a blessing in disguise.

I hope, for your child's sake, that you did not choose the class with Emily Mulvihill. She abruptly quit yesterday, leaving an entire AP English Language class without a teacher. (Plus two other English classes.)

I agree with the previous posters. For several years now we have taken online classes with various providers and there are always technology glitches the first week. It will get better!

We had the same situation for ds17's chem class this fall. The publisher actually suggested that students put their pages of notes in amongst the textbook pages, and I think that would be handy for ds for studying purposes. But I do wonder if he is going to lose track of some of the text pages. I would have preferred a bound book.

Thank you all so much! I'm glad to know we can take the subway to and from the game. One more Boston question for you all - where is a good place to watch the fireworks on the 4th of July? We will have a car with us, so we can drive wherever.

Reviving this thread to ask a very important question - how safe is the subway at night? We will be visiting Boston soon and we will attend a night game at Fenway Park. Afterwards we want to take the subway back to our hotel, which is near the Kennedy Library. I believe we would be traveling on the red and green lines. So, would that be a safe thing to do at night?

We decided on Middle School English A taught by Emily Mulvihill at AIM Academy in place of Laurel Tree Tutorials. I think it will be a good fit for my younger son. And FYI - Rebekah is retiring permanently from teaching online, so Laurel Tree Tutorials is no more. :crying:

And to answer the OP, I plan for 36 weeks but we never finish in that amount of time. We always have a few subjects that extend into the summer for several weeks.(Ds13 is finishing his last subject, history, tomorrow.) And we choose to do math year-round. Planning for less than 36 weeks would create too heavy of a work load considering our many extra-curricular activities.

We are going to try block scheduling by default next year. Two of ds's classes are full-year AP courses, but some others are one semester classes at the community college or online, and I am filling in the gaps with other one-semester classes. If it works out well, I will probably switch ds13 to this model once he hits high school. DS17's schedule will look like this: Fall semester: AP Stats AP Human Geography chemistry (cc) Shakespeare Economics Spring semester: AP Stats continued AP Human Geography continued Java Programming (cc) Advanced Research Writing (Lukeion) American Gov't

I am eager to hear price, who the instructors are, and whether the classes will be asynchronous. We have a pretty full schedule already. If Expository Writing meets on a Thursday, we're out.

Remind me never to move to Louisiana! The unannounced visitors would drive me nuts.

She said something like "put down the vacuum cleaner and read a book". I loved that article and printed it out to reread. I need to go track it down. It's probably in a laundry basket somewhere... ;) Edited to add: I just found the article at the Memoria Press site. http://www.memoriapress.com/articles/stop-cleaning-kitchen-and-read-book

We chose to take Spanish through Veritas Press Scholars Academy because the class met twice a week. Ds successfully completed Spanish 1 and 2 through them. Each class was 90 minutes long, and ideally I would have had him tutored once a week as well, but that didn't happen for a variety of reasons. Spanish 1 costs $595 plus books, so similar to what TPS is charging. https://vpsa.veritaspress.com/catalog

I sent you a pm. I want two semesters.

Thank you!

You only have a few years left for family time and family vacations before your oldest goes off to college. I would choose to continue homeschooling and make lots of wonderful memories together as a family while you can.

Leslie, when is the best time to buy the generic semesters from Landry - meaning when do they offer the largest discount?