MathCounts comes up a fair bit on these boards, try searching old posts. Here's one.

I misread the OP and thought it was bubble gum. I was expecting a nice WTM debate on the pros and cons of chewing gum in schools.

Hard core BFSU user here, all 3 volumes. Loved it.

Ah, this rings true for me. I returned home from college to find out my bedroom became the cat's bedroom, lol!

Ask lots of questions. People love to talk about themselves and their research. Express admiration and enthusiasm for their work.

Follow his lead, by all means. Is he interested in electronics? Take a look at my link in my signature for ideas on electronics, raspberry pi and arduino. You can also find broken appliances for him to take apart.

Take a look at Thinking Physics by Lewis Carroll Epstein. Lots of thought experiments, heavily illustrated, not a textbook, not a curriculum. I used his books with both my dd's last summer. Great stuff and we learned a lot.

A couple of ideas: First I would ask your daughter if she feels like she needs or wants more than you are able to give her. Ask her if she would like to devote more time to a particular subject area, and work with her to see how you can make that happen, given your limited time because of her 2E siblings. I was recently reminded on these boards about how much my kids enjoyed the logic puzzles in the Critical Thinking series. Perhaps some puzzles that she can do independently will satisfy her need for intellectual growth. Maybe there is a MOOC that would be appropriate for her age. This one about animal behavior sounds interesting and may be appropriate for a younger child.

Would a STEAM type project, one which combines engineering and aesthetics, the kind you might find on Adafruit count as fine arts?

My dh attended a small private school with excellent academics: highly educated teachers (nearly all with PhDs), courses that far exceeded my own public school education in depth and rigor. But their students who by any measure should be getting admitted to tippy top schools just weren't. The reason: they graded harshly, with no grade inflation in comparison to other schools. A recent Stanford admissions PR announcement reiterates the importance of grades: "More than 80 percent of them [accepted students] have a high school grade point average of 4.0 or above and have demonstrated excellence in fields ranging from the arts and humanities to Earth sciences, natural sciences, social sciences and engineering."

Python Programming for the Absolute Beginner.

What a horrid experience! I'm a fan of James Tanton's solutions to AMC problems. He always begins his solutions with "Step 1. Read the question, have an emotional reaction to it, take a deep breath, and then reread the question." I think he's right in that it's okay to begin by saying, "Whoa! I have no idea what this means or how to solve it." If you aren't having this reaction, then the problem is too easy, lol! And for the record, I often need to look twice, or count zeros to the left of the decimal or convert to a power of 10.

Well, I'm a little put off by her admitting to doing poorly in her science class, while excelling in her stage make up class. She was excited to move to a street where there are parties from Thursday to Sunday. If you watch the official USC virtual tour videos, the students interviewed seem so normal, who are taking advantage of different USC programs, research, overseas studies. We don't see men producing youtube videos like this. This is what bothers me. I feel like it reflects badly on women as a whole. Maybe I just don't know or see people like this in my own life, that it was rather shocking that someone like her could be admitted to a high ranking university.

I feel bad about this, but this bothers me. Dd and I were watching some college virtual tour videos and having fun. We stumbled on this USC FAQ, and I can't shake my sense of disappointment, especially in my gender. Are we surprised that women don't have income equality when they/we put out videos like this? I can't help feeling that I wouldn't want my dds attending a school like USC if it's full of students like her. I know that these students abound at all schools, even the tippy top name schools, and of course the ones who are serious about academics aren't making videos like this. But I still need some reassurance. I should just put her out of my head, and repeat the different strokes mantra to myself. Right?

Yeah, I saw they posted the questions this year! We missed the photo of Sherlock's corgi, so we had to look it up on the internet ourselves. Seriously, I know nothing about producing TV, but if I were at the controls, I feel like I could do so much better. ("Camera 3...now!") There was a moment when they were announcing the finalists, and the camera was on Lou the whole time! We never got to see the students. Amazing that kid who got a perfect score on the written round. Bad news for the rest of us...that means they'll be making the tests harder next year!

He's right. You do not like RPN enough. :rolleyes:

I have one installed on my android phone that is called a41CV.

Yes, this. Here's one woman's story about her adderall addiction. You can buy candy with caffeine, making it easy to eat large quantities. Thank you for the reminder to have a talk with my kids about this.

If you are doing multiple operations on multiple operands, the calculator will keep track of your intermediate quantities for you in its stack of memory. With a regular computer you would need to write down all the intermediate quantities in order to reuse them. Here's a good explanation. There's a bit of a learning curve, but not as steep as you would think. Once you get the hang of it, you'll never go back.

This is one I bought a couple of years ago. This manual has a detailed tutorial.

Congrats to your ds! What did he think of the AP Bio from PAH?

The problem with watching the streaming version is they don't display the countdown round problems as the students are solving them. I was just talking with Lou DiGioia who is the emcee at nationals (and executive director of the board), and he mentioned that a few weeks later they are posted on the MC website and formatted in such a way that the viewer can play along in the countdown round.

I forgot to mention you'll want to take a look at this year's MC handbook which has all the details and more practice problems.

Another coach (4 years) and MC fan here. They are very friendly to homeschoolers. Other math competitions to consider for middle school students is Math Olympiad for Elementary and Middle School (MOEMS). Those exams are shorter and easier and are taken once a month. You can also use the as preparation for MC. To prepare you can meet as often as once a month to several times a week, whatever you have time for. You can review old exams, or use the MathCounts minis which combine a written problem set with a video by Richard Rucszyk. When parents ask about their students who are younger than middle school by age, I tell them about the 3 year eligibility rule, and they usually opt to participate when they are actually in that age range. It's better competitively to have as much practice and math experience as possible. You can have anywhere from 1 to 10 students participate. If there are fewer than 4 students they will likely only compete as individuals. If there are more than 4, then 4 of them will compete in the Team Round, and the rest will compete as individuals (Sprint and Target Rounds only). You can spend the summer getting your materials ready, and then in the fall registration begins. It's a lot of fun and worth all the work you put into it. Your students are fortunate to have you as a coach!

I suspect the only reason people buy and use graphing calculators is for standardized tests. We just purchased a graphing calculator for AP statistics dd's taking next year. Heck, if you want to see what a hyperbolic paraboloid looks like, open up google and copy/paste in: z = x^2 -y^2 . Seriously, do it. It's beautiful. Why would I use a graphing calculator IRL when I can use google? My kids didn't start using calculators until they began competing in MathCounts and then my dd went on to use one in AP chemistry. (Not a graphing calculator, but a regular one.) I can't remember now, but there was a time when they used a calculator in AoPS...I think it was for calculating compound interest. The text makes it clear (most of the time) when a calculator should be used. If you do buy a regular calculator, I recommend one that uses RPN. It's much faster, easier, and less frustrating.