My daughter is finishing AP Latin with Amy this week. There has been NO busy work. Feedback has been timely and well thought out. Assignments are rigorous yet not onerous. There is a clear nexus between assignments and what the student will be required to do on the AP exam. My daughter could not be more pleased (or impressed) with the level of instruction and meaningful feedback she has received. She's loved this class and had a great time. While I cannot report results at this time, I am confident she is more than equipped to handle the AP Latin exam, as are all of the students who have taken Amy's class seriously.

DD is also enrolled in this class, and the amount of prep/materials made available to the students is outstanding. The students do have to avail themselves of the wonderful resources, though. ;)

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Foerster Algebra 2/Trig book Foerster Precalculus

Two of mine have taken SAT and finished all sections/answered all questions. DD had plenty of extra time left for all sections. Same for DS except for math, where he took all of the time.

With some students, unless you go considerably above grade level, all you will see is "greater than 99th%" across all measures. So it's not helpful from a planning standpoint, but any exam that is at least on level will meet state requirements. For high ability kids, EXPLORE, SAT and ACT may be better measures of where they are and provide guidance in ways to direct their development, though middle school kids ceiling out of those too.

His surgery went well. They discovered that the plate that had been placed to hold the reset tibia had broken in two. They are hopeful that the infection will respond well to the IV antibiotics and wound care. Cultures will come back in three days. Since his tibia is broken and now has nothing holding it in place, he will be completely immobilized for some time. The risk was much too great (with the infection) to put in a new plate, so he can't put any weight on his leg. We are so grateful for the hope that the infection is not as bad as the surgeon anticipated. I stayed until he woke up, and it was such a joy to see his smiling face! He has been through so much in his short life, and today he was such a brave little guy heading into his third surgery. He's just amazing. Thank you so much again for all of your prayers.

Just got a text from my SIL. They are heading back to surgery, and I am headed to hospital. We greatly covet and appreciate all of your prayers.

Surgery is scheduled for this afternoon. Provided surgery goes well, the doctors said the leg cannot be recasted. So he will be carried for however long it takes to heal. Prior to the surgery, he was able to walk on crutches despite no feeling in his legs. So I'm not sure how long things will take to get back to that state. All that matters to us is that they can repair the damage to his leg and heal the infection. We'll be most grateful to carry that little guy for as long as it takes his leg to heal.

Thank you so much for all of your prayers! Right now surgery is scheduled tomorrow to determine extent of damage. We are praying fervently that the infection is not in the bone. If things go well, the rehab will be very long term, but we'd gratefully take that any day to the alternative. Thank you everyone for your kind prayers. It means so much to all of us!

My nephew had surgery (tibial osteotomy) to repair his legs from damage due to paralysis caused by the cancer he was born with. Something went wrong with the correction in one of his legs. There is serious infection, and the plate to correct the torsion is exposed. Please pray that he doesn't lose his leg. It has been such a long road through hell on earth for this precious little boy and our family, and we thought we were coming to the end of at least some of it. Please pray for him.

DD and I studied these together during her freshman year. We really enjoyed it.. so much that she has been translating some of them from the original this year. I will go through my files to locate the other things we used. Generally speaking, though, we each read the material, discussed it together, then watched Vandiver's lecture. After that, my daughter wrote a variety of response papers. Since we prefer to read complete texts rather than from anthology, we spent more time on it than others might care to. But all three of my kids study the ancient languages extensively too, so it's of great interest to us! :)

I love this post. Thanks for sharing! Understanding the practical realities of life (college, jobs, finances) does not mean we have to resign ourselves and our children to a means-end education model.

DS will be attending Stanford OHS full time this fall. I am so relieved and he is so excited! I hope, hope, hope he will find like-minded kids at last.

We have done the same here. Oldest DD has been asked to do prep with kids after parents have paid $$$ for classes that were minimally helpful. Working one-on-one with someone who can get a baseline and help your student figure out where s/he needs help can make a significant difference, and it provides accountability.

Jacobs Geometry with the Enhanced Teacher Guide.

David Chandler at mathwithoutborders has video-based lessons that support Foerster texts through Calculus. We used Foerster through Precalculus. We didn't use his Geometry materials, so I cannot speak to that. The Foerster texts for Algebra I, Algebra II with Trig, and Precalculus are solid. Chalkdust also have video based instruction that you can purchase through Calculus level, I think.

Juggling the workload gets interesting some weeks. Regan is great about setting expectations for the week's work so that students can plan accordingly. He is also incredibly talented at unpacking difficult concepts- this is from the perspective of all three of my DC who are all very different in personality and learning style.

For Attic Greek, the NGE; for Latin, the NLE; for HS math,reading and writing the SAT I with writing; SAT IIs following each course in relevant subject. When core areas are completed, DC take the relevant tests. If required to retake down the road by a particular uni, they will. That said, they prefer to take the exams after the content rather than waiting (like with SAT I) until Junior year when they're 3+ years beyond the content. Since they continue with course work throughout HS, it's not an issue in terms of schools asking why they don't have more recent scores. They do have them and will have them, but they will be APs and SAT IIs, etc. Others on the board accomplish the same through dual enrollment, another great option.

For us, it is a matter of showing progression throughout course work. My DC take substantial HS level work prior to HS but don't want to graduate early. As a result, their credits will far exceed state reqs. That said, we will transcript the progression and supporting scores subject to individual schools' preference otherwise. Wherever possible, supporting test scores are in place. Though I'm not a fan of norm based testing, scores have removed a lot of obstacles by eliminating my need to explain what DC have done and can do.

I couldn't possibly like this post enough. Regan is the single best "outsourced" instructor in our homeschool experience for my three kids. My oldest daughter is with Amy now in AP Latin too and thinks she is GREAT. Lukeion is simply a cut above the rest .... in my opinion, of course. :tongue_smilie:

All three of my kids transcript HS course work taken in middle school. We keep grades for them and also use standardized tests (where possible) to substantiate the work. They also continue their course work through HS.

Will pm you.

Miss Effie http://mseffie.com/ has some good English resources. There is a lot to wade through, but it is a good site. She requests a small donation, but it is not required.

I think what will work best is going to be based on what you and your son's expectations are in terms of what a writing class should be like. Just a few things you may want to consider: does it matter whether the teacher requires re-writes, evaluates work critically, requires peer review? Does the level of the other students' writing matter (in terms of peer interaction and peer-to-peer development of skills)? You can determine that, at least in part, based on class entry requirements. People seem to vary widely in their opinions about what a good writing class is like. I have read reviews by parents regarding teachers and programs I personally would not recommend based on our experience which, of course, is based on our expectations of what a writing class should be like. I would encourage you to get as much detailed information as possible to find the right class based on what you and your son want to accomplish.