I agree. I experienced the same dynamic when I was in grad school at UVA: people who lived or went to school on grounds tended to look down on "townies" and vice versa. My dh noticed the same thing in law school 9 years earlier.

Jann: Your story gives me hope. What Algebra II curriculum would you recommend for my DD, given that we will take a plodding approach? So far we've used Jacobs for Algebra I and Geometry. Thanks, Gina

I hope DD will finish Geometry (Jacobs) in 10th grade this year, but she is progressing slowly while complaining greatly. She is extremely creative and eschews the idea of math. What are some Math options for 11th grade next year, given that Algebra II is NOT viable?

I've been studying investments, reading many authors over the past few months. It's become a passion and I've become our family's financial advisor. In November, I will start to study Latin with my daughter.

Rain and wind in Northern VA, but power is on at 8:39pm!!!

I agree with the poster who observed that prosperity is relative. While we fit your criteria, we made financial hits and misses throughout our 24 year year union. Here are some hits: DH has a JD, was an established lawyer when we married, and had no student loans. I had just completed my MA. I lucked into becoming an actuary in year one of marriage, participated in employer match, and rolled over a nice 401k when I quit after 11 years to stay home with kids. The year I quit was the year DH started his own practice. He has never updated his office decor, and replaces equipment and furniture due to need rather than trend. He finds quality suits at places like Marshall's, and converts suit jackets to sport coats when suit pants wear out, and always looks great. We buy used cars and drive them until repair costs exceed their value. We live in the same house we bought in 1990. We pay ourselves first - contribute to IRAs and savings and live off the rest. Here are some misses: I spent too years trying to "keep up with the Joneses" before I embraced DH's value approach to life. I lobbied to use student loans to finance my second MA, thinking it would "help" us by not reducing disposable income. We only started our kid's college plans when they were in elementary school. What is uncontrollable: We have been healthy, not been sued, not been in terrible accidents...

You have almost described my dd14 to a tee (minus video games). She asks, "what's wrong with being anti-social"? DD14 has only 3 identified friends, 1 of whom she sees at most once a year, one she sees twice per month at Girl Scouts, and one with whom she communicates via email multiple times a week. The latter friend is the one with whom DD14 has most in common. The second friend is her earliest remaining friend, but their interests have diverged greatly over the years. She has fun with all three girls at birthday parties, but sees none of them often. She interacts with other people in an online model horse forum and participates in a weekly high school Sunday Class. Yet she resists all efforts to connect with other homeschoolers - except for her biology lab co-op. DD14 is intelligent, articulate, and comfortable interacting with adults. She takes weekly riding lessons and guitar lessons (individual, not group at her choice). Because she likes to go to church and on outings with DH and I, I do not consider her preference to be pathological. She just marches to the beat of a different drum. Actually, DD14 is a lot like DH!

1 co-op twice per month for Biology lab.

... TWTM paradigm has been a saving grace for us. I had big hopes for History Odyssey Ancients level III (Hist/Lit/Geo) this year, but the packaged formula did not work for my out-of-the-box 9th grade thinker. Midway through last fall, I tossed it and pulled out TWTM and developed a 4 year plan for history and literature in one weekend: I divided the chapters of our history spine to correspond to the year breakouts in TWTM. I gave DD an assignment sheet for outlining the spine text for this year, indicating an average number of pages to be read and outlined daily. For each high school grade, I selected a challenging number of books for DD to read. I gave her a list of books to be read for the rest of this year. I used guidelines in TWTM to write up descriptions of assignments she can choose to do before and after she reads each great book. I also followed TWTM recommendations to create a plan to complete the study of rhetoric. I completed the history spine reading for this year weeks ago. I look over DD's outlines each weekend, and I read the great books ahead of her. (I'm getting the classical education I've missed). DH grades her compositions and will grade future research papers. Maybe this works for us because we love to read, and we have only one child in homeschool. We are also Christians who think differently about some key points. I think TWTM paradigm offers flexibility to all types of families. I don't think any curriculum developer can plan anything better for my child. My biggest time commitment is to reading. Basically, I've given my pleasure reading a huge upgrade in quality and my TV viewing time a lovely and long overdue downgrade.:001_smile:

We have decided to use Conceptual Chemistry next year because DD hates math. I received an email response from the author, and read another one posted somewhere on this forum, which convince me that CC will prepare her for the future. At 14, DD seems like a budding artist. If she needs a more rigorous chemistry class to realize her evolving dream, she can take it in the future. Meanwhile, she can have a happier learning experience in the present. She's also going to read The Skeptical Chemist, and we have Chemistry: A Self-Teaching Guide to use as need or interest indicates.

I've used Dr. Bronner's Liquid Soap (Lavender) as as shower gel, shampoo (in a pinch), floor cleaner, and most often to hand wash delicate clothing (instead of Woolite). I even use it in the machine for items I machine wash on the gentle cycle.

I was really put off by Ken Ham's personal attack on Christians who accept the theory of evolution. As a result, I checked out http://biologos.org/resources/books and decided to read Saving Darwin: How to be a Christian and Believe in Evolution. It gave me a great perspective on intelligent design, creationism, and evolution, and the interesting history of each. The author especially draws a distinction between biological Darwinism and social Darwinism. Darwin's pure data support the descriptive nature of the former, but indicate nothing about the prescriptive nature of the latter. I enjoyed the book because I accept its premise.

Aubrey, I share a desire to participate in a community in which homeschool parents accept and learn from differences of faith, educational goals, and politics. We homeschool one child because she asked for it two years ago. Although we are a Christian family, we do not include religious instruction as part of academics. When I showed my proposed curriculum plan for this year to an experienced member of my local homeschool support group, she admonished me to add Bible and to make that class my DD's top priority. This academic emphasis was presented to me in a way that made it seem like an inoculation against bad moral choices in DD's future. I have observed too many counter-examples to accept this reasoning. Anyway, I'm surprised to discover how hard it is to locate homeschool curricula choices that are not explicitly Christian - especially if one desires a package plan. It seems even more difficult to locate support groups and conventions which appeal to non-fundamentalist Christians like my family - or which welcome the differences we bring to the table.

I would like to participate!

I voted "Other". We only use text books for math and science. I do not teach, but rather act as a facilitator as DD works independently. However, given her aversion to algebra, we are taking a break from the text and using another non-text source to strengthen skills.

My daughter spends 50 minutes or less per day on Apologia Biology. She's in a co-op lab which meets on Fridays every other week, and she easily completes all work /activities for a module in 2 weeks. Often she has biology-free days because she wraps everything up early. Every other Friday, she completes the module's experiments with her co-op peers. All her studying occurs within this schedule.

I fell in love with math in college and earned my B.A. I was not motivated to enter any profession, so I applied to grad school and earned my M.A. Afterward, I became an actuary for an auto insurer: my years of study prepared me for the actuarial exams. Passing 7 exams (back then) enabled me to become an ACAS (Associate of the Casualty Actuarial Society), but having babies inspired me to retire before commencing to FCAS (Fellow of the Casualty Actuarial Society). Actuarial work was fun and impressively remunerative. We entered the actuarial department with bachelors or masters degrees in math, and we could move up through corporate management. Financial incentives were earned with each passed exam (in addition to merit increases), and we were given over 100 paid hours to prepare for each exam sitting. I recommend exploring the actuarial profession.

AngieW: Thanks for the artsy suggestions. I will check out Hot X tomorrow at my local Barnes and Noble. The author's claim may spark her interest. All: Thanks for providing much food for thought. Gina

I have offered to stop Algebra and pick up Geometry, but she claims that she will forget Algebra if she has to pick it up in the future. I'm reluctant to hire a tutor when I have successfully taught and tutored both university and high school math students. Monday I will put the text aside, and work through some problems with her to see if I can jump start interest.

She started Algebra 1 in 8th grade using SOS in an online curriculum. The fit was not good and she earned only 1/2 credit in one year. I thought we could complete SOS at home this year, but the online or pc format does not fit her learning style. She asked to start the Jacob's text from the beginning as a review this year. Problems occurred with factoring polynomials. Getting her through Chapter 10 was a painful process.

What does one do if one has a strong background in math, but one's child resists Algebra 1 60% of the way through the curriculum? I am willing to explain, but dd14 refuses to fully engage and claims that she cannot understand the Harold Jacob's text. An artist acquaintance recently told me that she felt as if Algebra was a foreign language she could not learn in high school. Dd14 is incredibly artistic and highly intelligent. Dh steered clear of Algebra in high school and graduated from the Ivy league using a Logic course to satisfy a math requirement. I wonder if I should permit dd14 to abandon Algebra 1 as she desires. Perhaps I've been trying to push a square peg into a round hole. Has anyone else had a similar situation?

Cindy and Angela: Thanks for recommending this book. I just ordered it from Amazon.com. We already have Warriner's, so I hope we are good to go. Gina

Martha: Although this year marks our first entry into classical education, my dd entered 9th grade with a strong grasp of both grammar and syntax. Since we entered the study process late, she is studying both formal logic (using Cothran) and rhetoric (using TWTM recommendations) this year. My mil, a former Latin teacher, will be our Latin mentor during the next 3 years. Thank you for reminding me to view the study of rhetoric as a process. I also appreciate the recommendation to start where we are and move ahead at our pace. Your comments also challenge me to surrender the search for a homeschool "formula". Glad you jumped on the soapbox! Gina

Per TWTM, "grammar is the single language-skill that you should study every year through senior high" (p. 482). This was my plan until I was challenged by an editorial written by Martin Cothran in The Classical Teacher (Winter 2010 edition). On page 2, Cothran asserts: "most parents - and most classical educators - are completely unaware that the study of Latin is in large part the study of grammar. And if, in studying Latin, you are studying grammar, then why would you want to spend additional time and educational resources studying grammar in English?" Next year (10th grade), dd and I start Latin I together using Wheelock's text and my mother-in-law as a tutor. So, do I require dd to study Latin with Wheelock and study English grammar with another program? Or do I trust Cothran, who argues that "the best way to study grammar is in a language other than your own" (p.2), a language without many grammatical exceptions, a language like Latin? How many of you agree with Cothran? If you disagree, would you share your reasons?