My DS worked through the AoPS calculus book on his own and despite my increasingly-less-gentle suggestions that he pause and do some review problems from the Question Bank at the end of each unit, he completely blew me off. Then of course he discovered in mid-April that the AoPS book does not align perfectly with the AP test (JUST LIKE I HAD SAID MULTIPLE TIMES) and he needed to do a whole bunch of additional work to be prepared for the exam. For AP Bio, I was able to force him to do review problems at the end of each unit and it was extremely helpful. He still had to crunch a bit at the end and as I said before, I was not sure that he would pull it off, but he was mildly insulted when I betrayed some pleasant surprise yesterday about his score.

I belong to several institutions that have serious safety concerns and spend a lot of time (and money) on security. One thing to keep in mind is that you can have the most elaborate check-in system in the world, but it's all for naught if the person at the door feels uncomfortable turning anyone away, or people going in and out politely hold the door for others coming in. Actively restricting access isn't just a technological matter, it's a cultural one as well, and it has very real social and psychological costs that everyone needs to be willing to pay. The other thing that I would urge your board to do is to connect with local law enforcement before deciding on new safety procedures. They are the ones who are most in touch with the actual risks that you might face and are likely to give you the most sensible advice.

My main tip is to make full use of the resources that the CB makes available on the AP website, especially the Question Bank.

Yes, of course. And if he is just writing out short answers to questions, say, then we have almost always discussed the material first. Just to clarify, I don't think that DS actually has any kind of major hangup about writing, and I am pleased with the progress he has made so far. What I am looking for are age-appropriate resources for short, frequent writing practice.

Thanks for your thoughts, Roy. I completely agree with you about the importance of thinking (and discussing, and mindmapping, and brainstorming, and freewriting, and discussing some more!) before putting pen to paper, and I do tons of that with my kids. We also spend a lot of time rewriting and polishing, after drafting. But DS15 needs to work on the second part of the writing process -- the "park your butt in a chair and make the words in your head appear on a page" part, and I firmly believe that that simply requires more practice. Whoever suggested journalism upthread was on the right track, I think, even though obviously in a homeschool situation we wouldn't have the pressure of external short deadlines. (I found this collection of intriguing-looking resources, in case anyone else is interested.)

I feel like this, too. Oldest DS has mostly done well on the AP exams he's taken but I really think it all could have been a lot easier if I had known more. Middle son is going to do AP Physics 1 next year and DH and I pulled out the syllabus we used for oldest DS a few years ago; DH was like, "huh, this doesn't seem like the best way to prepare for the test, why did we do it this way with Oldest?" Sometimes I feel badly that Oldest has to be our practice kid.

Thanks for all the great suggestions. I really appreciate it. I want DS to write more because he needs to build writing fluency. He understands the basics of composition and can write decently well for his grade level, but it just takes him far too long. So the idea this year is to just practice getting words on a page, over and over again. Then in 11th grade we will return to more structured composition work. Farrar, this past year he did part of your GPS African and Asian history program. Having to write out all those questions was such good practice for him -- I could really see the improvement over the course of the year - and some of the longer writing assignments were very successful as well. But oy, he was so balky and slow, and we had a LOT of "this is not a complete answer, let's discuss and you can try again" along the way.

Hooray for good scores! DS got 5s on Calc BC and Bio, whew. We did both classes at home and while I wasn't concerned about calculus, I had my doubts about how the bio exam would go. He did a lot of focused prep at the end, though, and at this point he's pretty familiar with the AP exam format, which undoubtedly helped a lot.

My DS15 is a competent but deeply unenthusiastic writer. My goal for this year is to increase the volume and frequency of his writing -- I just want him to write more. We are going to study Shakespeare for literature and I will assign him a couple of papers for that, and we are going to do AP Human Geography at home so there will be some writing there, too. But I'm looking for shorter, less formal writing assignments that he can do more frequently. Maybe some of the NY Times writing contests/prompts? We've used the 826 National books (Stem to Story, Don't Forget to Write (for elementary and secondary grades)) very successfully in earlier years -- I'd love to find more resources along those lines. Ideas?

I agree.

I was going to post something similar. I was diagnosed with cancer when I was 25 years old and I will never forget (nor fully forgive) the people in my life who implied that it was my fault. Cancer is so frightening and people badly want there to be a method to its madness, but that's not how cancer -- or life! -- works. Sometimes you just win the bad luck lottery. I am so sorry about your DH's diagnosis, OP, and am wishing him the very best for a full recovery. The advances in recent years are really stunning and I hope that he can benefit.

It may be worth managing your son's expectations on this score. While I do think my homeschooled high schoolers have more free time -- or at least get more sleep -- than many of their (insanely overscheduled) schooled friends, and for sure my kids have much more input into what and how they learn, they still work a lot. Yes, he won't have piles of homework at night, but there's a lot to learn in high school and if he's working at the appropriate level of challenge, he's not going to breeze through in a few hours a day either.

Are you perhaps thinking of teleology?

Is he happy at his current school?

I have a 13"; my husband and oldest son have 15" laptops (my son's is inherited from DH). I find 15" cumbersome and heavy to carry around, plus it doesn't fit in my preferred bag. However, DH and DS are perfectly happy with the added weight as a tradeoff for a larger screen and have bags/backpacks that fit them comfortably.

My son is a rising senior and I have been looking closely at distribution requirements at various colleges and universities. So far I've only seen one school that actually requires students to take a class in the arts. Much more common are humanities requirements, which can be satisfied with arts classes but certainly aren't limited to those.

For what it's worth, I would first ask your attorney the following questions: (1) My STBX struggles with mental health and I fully expect that he will continue to file contempt motions against me, especially with respect to the children's religious upbringings. Given that, in your experience, what sort of language would be best to include in the final parenting plan? Should I be very specific or keep it vague? (2) In your experience, how do judges in this jurisdiction handle post-dissolution disagreements over religion clauses in parenting plans? Do they ever enforce them, and if so, when? (3) My kids are teens and while i don't expect them to push back on going to Mass, etc., obviously you never know. How worried should I be about including something in the parenting plan that ultimately I can't/won't enforce as my children get older? (4) Is there anything else we can do to make it more difficult for my STBX to harass me through the legal system in the coming years? Best of luck to you, OP. I am so sorry that you and your kids are going through this.

Same.

LOL, I believe DH said the same thing the last time we bought a physics text. Good question about the labs. We have no requirement beyond what we should be doing for college application purposes (DS is a rising senior) and of course for pedagogical reasons.

Thanks, this is extremely helpful. I assume that the edition of any of these doesn't matter? I am sort of perplexed by what to do about labs. The CB has really good guidance for labs in other classes but there's almost nothing for either AP Physics C course.

Oldest DS will be doing both AP Physics C classes at home next year. DH has the background to supervise but I need to choose a textbook and figure out labs. DS did AP Physics 1 and 2 at home in 9th grade, using Knight et al and a version of regentrude's syllabus. We used the introductory physics lab kit from eScience. He has completed the AoPS Calculus book and will be doing linear algebra next year. If it's relevant, DS tentatively plans to be a math major. It is very unlikely that he will go into engineering. Any suggestions?

Are any of the current board members willing to head up a broader fundraising campaign on behalf of the organization? Or perhaps you can bring someone new onto the board who could help identify and approach potential donors? Are there institutions and/or foundations that you can approach as well? Establishing scholarships, especially named scholarships (e.g, The Robert and Eugenia Cricketloop Award) can be a great way to raise larger donations. Bequests are another low-hanging fruit -- you can solicit people to name your organization in their wills. That won't bring in money right away, obviously, but over time it certainly can. IME, publicizing your organization through social media and the like can help you raise small amounts of money -- $50 here, $100 there. But to raise tens of thousands of dollars year after year you will almost certainly need a more targeted strategy.

Are you trying to raise $30,000 through individual small donations? That seems very challenging to me, especially with such a small mailing list. IME, the most effective way to raise that sort of money is to personally solicit wealthy community members. In many of the nonprofits I've been involved in, there are certain board members who are there for that very reason -- they make substantial donations themselves and/or are willing to reach out to their friends to solicit. What does your board look like?

I am the chair of a local community organization. We do several events every year that need a lot of volunteers. What I have learned: (1) Two weeks out is the sweet spot. Most people won't commit many weeks -- let alone months -- in advance, and those few who do often wind up cancelling. (2) Break a long event into shifts, preferably of no more than 1.5 hrs. (3) Have people sign up by shift, not by job. People want to know what time they have to be there and when they can count on leaving. They mostly don't care so much whether they are working the ticket booth, setting up, or washing dishes. (And the few who do care will tell you.) So fill your shifts, assign them to jobs yourself, and then tell them what they're doing when they get there. (4) Remind people multiple times what time they need to show up AND where to go. (5) Be prepared for a couple of volunteers to cancel at the very last minute. (6) After the event, thank everyone profusely and make them feel appreciated however you can do so. For one of our events we hold an afterparty for volunteers; for another, I send individual thank you emails. Volunteers also often have great suggestions about how to make the event even better, so keep a document or file with those notes.

I have never sold a house myself. However, FWIW, when we bought this house the seller's agent was someone who did not normally represent either sellers or buyers in this particular neighborhood. The house was markedly underpriced and our immediate offer to pay listing price was promptly accepted. (I didn't even see the house first -- only DH did.) We would have been willing to pay tens of thousands of dollars more for this place, and others might have been willing to pay even more. But the selling agent didn't know what she had.