Some(if not all) testing centers allow snacks. Bring water, multiple small bags or individually wrapped smacks and fruits etc, so she can grab a bag, eat and throw away quickly during breaks. Remind her to drink just enough but not too much water.

Your plan looks excellent! I can sense your son's enthusiasm from your description :) I'm sure both you and your son will enjoy the extra math time for the coming months :) I hope we'll hear some good news from you soon!

Based on our experience, College Board doesn't provide special arrangement for talent search kids in order for them to skip the writing section which is at the beginning of the test. If the testing site provides separate rooms for younger kids(if they have enough younger kids), then they put all the kids under 13 in those rooms. They don't differentiate them based on whether they register through CTY, TIP etc, or directly through CB. If you put CTY or maybe other talent search schools' codes as the recipients of the scores, Those schools will receive the scores even if you didn't register through them. The only difference I see is if you register through CB, you won't get school specific statistics from talent search schools, and you may miss out the ceremonies. But at least for CTY, you can always fax the scores afterwards (if you haven't already put CTY as the recipient of the scores) and pay the registration fee, and then be eligible for ceremonies. Also, CTY starts SAT/ACT in 7th grade. I read somewhere that Center for Bright Kids offers SAT to 6th graders. HTH

Even if you register directly through College Board, most likely she will still be put in the same room as other talent search kids, that is, if the testing site has enough younger kids to have a separate room.

Melissa, you may ask them to send you links to sample videos of similar courses currently offered in Spring. That might give you an idea of the course format and homework load (you get a glimpse of the webpage of the current week's homework at the end of the video) We're also interested in Witty Wordsmith. From what I've heard, Witty Wordsmith is relatively easier compared to their other regular classes, Alpha has heavier workload. This is not our first-hand experience, just what I've heard. I'd also be interested in hearing what others would say.

Thanks for the info. Musicmom! Really helpful!

Is there any difference in the grade reports provided through PAH or through ChemAdvantage? Thanks!

Maybe there's no huge benefit to joining SET, other than Imagine magazine, cogito.com membership and maybe grand ceremony(all of which are nice but may or may not be very beneficial). My thinking is, if the kid is to try out talent search anyway, and doesn't mind either format (SAT is longer and has essay section, but he could choose to sit through it without writing something. ACT has science section, but it's probably more like scientific reading), I would probably go with SAT, with the add-on benefit of SET. Or maybe eventually take both if he's up to taking standard tests. Of course, if he prefers ACT format, then maybe go with what he likes first.

If she felt it was easier than she had expected, the test probably was indeed easy for her :) . My kid didn't use a calculator either on a test (not explore) and did just fine.

regentrude, Thank you for your insight! Really helpful!

As wapiti linked, AoPS has lots of information, tutorials and links to LaTeX. It's convenient to have basic knowledge of LaTeX if one takes AoPS classes, or post on their message boards. I'm not sure if it's worth it if you are using their books on your own. AoPS recommends some software to download(at the bottom of the page wapiti linked). I tried it myself a while ago, didn't feel it was very easy to use. DS actually doesn't use the software, he memorizes the markup coding he uses a lot (or refers to the reference page somewhere on their website if he doesn't remember) and just directly types them in the homework submission box, message box, and sometimes during class session. He mentioned even Word recognized it (I'm not sure how) when he types the code directly in the doc, instead of clicking through the buttons to find the right notation. Again, it's useful for AoPS classes. If typed solution is not required, I'm not sure if it's worth the effort typing it out instead of handwriting on paper. I guess it's up to the child.

For my son it's worth it. His handwriting speed is decent, not super fast not slow either. But for AoPS courses, I felt handwritten solutions would add extra work load to the graders. That was why I let him submit typed solutions. (I think for the new format, everything has to be submitted online anyway.) He started typing math at a fairly young age (a bit younger than your son), but has improved quite a lot over time. Learning LaTex was definitely helpful. His overall typing speed is quite good as well, for a kid. Posting on message boards, occasionally using Typing Instructor and real-time typing race games helped too(He learned about the game from other AoPSers). He prefers typing to handwriting if possible, but there are still plenty of time that he needs to write on paper, and he's fine with that. HTH

About erasing. For AoPS courses,they instructed the students to cross out (not erase)the section with mistakes, and rewrite that part of solution, that is, if they were submitting handwritten solutions. For DS, I typed what he wrote on the paper for him for his very first one or two assignments. After that, he managed to type his solutions directly in Word using built-in math symbols. Time consuming, but he got better gradually. He then learned more about LaTeX, so he was able to do it faster for later courses.

Congrats to your DD! Great job!

I don't have years of experience :) .Last year (probably this year too), our local AMC proctor used 5% on AMC 8 as guideline to let kids from grade 8 and under participate in AMC 10 that they organized.

Their website posted this, and it's supposed to be updated daily. Choose 2012 AMC8 http://amc-reg.maa.o...ralReports.aspx

quark, There are past years' blank forms on AMC's website under Archive. For example: http://amc.maa.org/amc8/2010/AMC8-AnsForm.pdf As for your question, we haven't experienced anything similar. So hopefully someone else could share their experience. If it were me, I probably wouldn't feel comfortable going backward, since all questions carry the same weight. But again, We've never tried it that way. Does he have the same correct/answered ratio if he starts backward?

Thanks Kathy, quark and everyone else for sharing the resources. DS also needs more geometry books after taking AoPS geometry class. Gardner and Bradley's Plane Euclidean Geometry is now back in stock on AoPS website, in case anyone wants to order it. Much cheaper than Amazon. http://www.artofproblemsolving.com/Store/viewitem.php?item=ukmt:plane

Yes, he can take AMC10 or AMC12 regardless of whether he has done AMC8 before. They provide two testing dates. AMC 10A/12A are on the same date same time, and 10B/12B are on another. He can choose to take one test on either date, or he can choose to do 10A/10B, 10A/12B or 12A/10B on both dates. Note that he cannot take 10A/12A since they are on the same date and some problems overlap. Same for 10B/12B. HTH

Lisa, thanks for sharing! Well planned! I'm curious about K12 World History A online access as well. We have the book, but I've been wondering if the online course is worth the money. Did you buy the whole year or by month? Thanks!

AoPS website mentioned Basics as "excellent preparation for the AMC 10" (see under their AMC10 Series course description) and the easier problems on AMC 12. Beyond is a good source for AMC 12. We have both books, and my impression is Bascis pulls different subjects from their introductory series, and Beyond goes with their intermediate series. They are like review and summary to prepare kids for AMC 10/12. I think Basics and Beyond were written before they published the subject-focused books. HTH.

Thank you so much regentrude! That's super helpful!!

Thanks so much regentrude! This helps me with my planning.

Thank you Kathy for sharing with us your own story, very inspiring. After reading your recommendations from a previous thread, we bought the Aha and Gotcha books (separate volumes) around Christmas and DS devoured them. Thank you! This career discussion is interesting. All the ideas are good to consider. DS has wanted to be a mathematician too since he was little(recent interests also included programming). So it's good to know about various options.

Thank you so much for the resouces Mathwonk!