:laugh:

Doesn't quite fit here, but nonetheless... DH joins the rest of us at dinner. My 2 dd's are discussing some fine point of chemistry. (Older dd had ap chem last year, and is helping younger dd who is taking regular chem now.) So they're going at it about who knows what: acids/bases, balancing equations, whatnot. DH sits down to dinner while all this technical discussion is going on and he says, "I feel like I've signed up for Honors Family," meaning, like if our family were a class, it would be honors level. Then I joined in with, "Man, I really need an easy A. I'm going to drop this Honors Family class and sign up for Regular Family, or Remedial Family or something."

You may also want to look at his CV and recent publications and see what his research interests are. You may find some interest in overlap...or not. But that's good information to have if this person will be teaching the bulk of her classes.

You've received good responses. Now think about what your student's goals are, what do they want to study, where do you see them attending college, if at all. Backtrack to what coursework will meet those goals. Now start with freshman year and decide which subjects you want to cover that year. Research those classes and see how you want to address them: cc, online, study at home, etc. Every step in this process: tap the WTM forum and ask lots of questions. My student wants to attend University of so-and-so and major in whatever. What should she be studying freshman year? My student needs a solid French 1 online class, what do you recommend? Good luck! Break down this challenge into small pieces and use the knowledgable parents of WTM.

My kids don't take math tests at home. I assess by watching them solve problems while I sit next to them. You don't necessarily need to test them if you can assess them with observation. If you can, sit with her while she does her problem sets and give her Socratic instruction (aka hints) if she gets stuck. Hopefully this will also reinforce the idea that learning is more important than a score. Best of luck.

Could you elaborate on this a bit? What is keeping these sorts of students out of the Ivies?

They may be using the Mathcounts definition of a common fraction: A "common fraction" is to be considered a fraction in the form +/- a/b, where a and b are natural numbers and gcf(a,b) =1. A simplified "mixed number" is to be considered a fraction in the form +/- N a/b, where N, a, and b are natural numbers, a<b, and gcf(a,b) = 1. It's described on page 47 of the MathCounts handbook.

Relativity Visualized

Whew! I just got mine this afternoon. I was worried when the UPS guy came and went, but then the regular mail arrived. Good luck on Thursday! I'm wondering how these tattoos are going to work out!

Have you considered Indiana University? My dd and I were just finishing up AoPS precalculus where they mentioned that an AoPS student had come up with a novel proof of Heron's formula. After a bit of stalking, I found him at IU.

Has anyone else received their exams yet? I received the t shirts, certificates and scantrons a few weeks ago, but no exams.

Don't forget the universities in the UK. I've heard of mathy kids heading there, and sometimes American students enroll their because it's cheaper.

Dd made up her own flash cards as the class went along so she could review cumulatively. We used the Barron's and Princeton Review, for review of old material from 1st semester as she was learning new material. We ended by using the blue/yellow College Board old exam. And we continued using the Holt Biology textbook, the edition with the polar bear on the cover, but I think any edition would be fine. It's a great book that aligns well with the SAT subject test.

No, I don't, but I do know that if the exams are taken in middle school, you do need to contact them and tell them to keep them on the record for high school.

My kids love preparing for and taking tests, so I let them take the SAT subject tests as soon as they are prepared for it. If you are taking one before high school, you'll need to notify the CB to retain their scores or else they will wipe them from the record for some reason. Some people argue that it's better to take the SAT subject test after you've had the most advanced course in that field, like the AP exam. But we like to get them out of the way, especially if they are prepared. There's no harm in signing up and just taking a test for practice.

Compared with the AP, the SAT subjects are a breeze: an hour long, all multiple choice. There is the official blue and green college board book of old exams, as well as books published by the usual test prep publishers: Barron's, Princeton Review, etc., of varying quality. Thought your student should be aware that there may be topics covered on the SAT subject test that are not covered on the AP. This came up a fair bit in chemistry. If you are taking AP chem at PAH, the teacher is very good about preparing for both tests.

I agree, if your dd interested in vet med, UCD is a great place to be! Congratulations to her!

Science kits from Home Science Tools.

This is pretty much lifted verbatim from their website: Introduction to Geometry Topics covered in the book include similar triangles, congruent triangles, quadrilaterals, polygons, circles, power of a point, three-dimensional geometry, and transformations. Text: Introduction to Geometry by Richard Rusczyk, Art of Problem Solving (AoPS). PreCalculus Introduction and evaluation of trigonometric functions, trigonometric identities, geometry with trigonometry, parametric equations, special coordinate systems, complex numbers, exponential form of complex numbers, De Moivre's Theorem, roots of unity, geometry with complex numbers, two-dimensional and three-dimensional vectors and matrices, determinants, dot and cross product, applications of vectors and matrices to geometry. Text: Art of Problem Solving, Precalculus by Richard Rusczyk etc.

I think the lower scores (4-8% scoring a 5) for AP physics 1/2 tell you more about the quality of the students taking the class or the quality of the instruction and less about the difficulty of the course. (Around 30% get a 5 on the AP physics C.) A similar student selection problem can be see in the SAT subject test score distribution for Level 1 and Level 2 math, which stronger students generally taking Level 2. Scoring 710 on the Level 1 test puts you in the 77th percentile, while it is only 50th percentile for Level 2. Roughly half of the students taking Level 2 are scoring above 700, while only a quarter of Level 1 students are. I wanted to compare Calculus AB (24% score a 5) and Calculus BC (48% score a 5), but that could also reflect the number of students who take AB one year, and then follow up with BC the following year.

This article might help with your decision. Come to think of it, I did a bit of conceptual physics informally with my kids when they were in middle school, using Thinking Physics. It isn't a curriculum, but a fun book full of thought experiments. "Will hanging a magnet in front of an iron car make the car go?" "A rubber bullet and an aluminum bullet both have the same size, speed, and mass. They are fired at a block of wood. Which is most likely to knock the block over? Which is most likely to damage the block?" "Mighty Mike weights 200 lbs and is running down the football field at 8 ft/s. Speedy Gonzales weights only 100 lbs but runs 16 ft/s. Ponderous Poncho weights 400 lbs and runs only 4 ft/s. In the encounter, who will be more effective at stopping Mike? Who is more likely to break Mike's bones?" Each thought experiment has a detailed solution, and it was a lot of fun. Other than that, my daughter has had not high school physics, but she wants a STEM career, is pretty good at math, and really wants to try AP physics C. We've had good luck so far with the previous AP classes and no prior high school level course work, and she's very good about making sure she has complete understanding of everything. (Ask me how I know.)

Since no one else has posted, I'll share. Keep in mind I'm stronger in math/science, and not much of a language arts person. Also, it's been a couple of years, and my memory is foggy. Grammar We enjoyed the grammar island, town, and voyage, though analyzing so many sentences gets tedious, it did drive home the lessons which they've retained. I used Magic Lens with my daughter, but we just managed to scrape by. I think there was a lot of information to process (present perfect? plu perfect? I can't really remember all the terms), but not a lot of practice using them. Anyway, our thought was kind of "huh?" And a lot of it was review from the previous books. I didn't end up using it with my younger daughter. Vocabulary We loved loved the Caesars English books. Both of them. So very excellent. In contrast, WWW is such a disappointment and so annoying for so many reasons. You are buying a gorgeous book that contains lots of color photos of greek and roman antiquities, and there are essays about various aspects of greek and roman history. But we skipped them for time. Which is weird because I am in fact teaching ancient history to my younger daughter. If those essays had been packaged into a separate history book, we would have used them. But in our vocabulary book they are ignored. Another annoying thing? All I need from the parent manual is a copy of the exams and an answer key so I don't have to create my own tests and it's easy to grade. They provide that along with the entire copy of the student's book. I don't need a second copy of the student book. We already own a copy. And MCT insists on printing the answer key on the sheet opposite of the exam, right there for all to see. Would it have killed him to put it somewhere else in the book so I don't need to cover it with another piece of paper? And when I get "lucky" and the answer key is printed on the back of the test page, now it's nearly impossible to grade without having to flip the page back and forth. Yeah, I know, first world problems, but I'm paying first world prices, right? Final complaint: some of the words are obscure. Dd complained that she now knows 3 synonyms for tightrope walker. Yeah, that'll come in handy. Poetry We don't really like poems, so we skip that. (Did I mention I'm more into math/science?) Writing By middle and high school we had switched to a writing tutor where they have thrived. Academic Writing I was fine, but hard for me to implement. My tutor used it a bit, but then I just trusted her to do what she wants with my kids, and they seem to be writing well.

Our science sequence for high school was: 9th: AP chemistry 10th: AP biology 11th: AP physics (next year) 12th: dunno! Reiterating that calculus is either a prerequisite or a corequisite (should be taken at the same time) for AP physics C. Since we school year round, dd is getting a head start on ap calculus bc this year, studying with me from the AoPS textbook. I am under the impression that each AP physics (mechanics and e&m) is a semester course. They can be taken in one year or you can choose one or the other. AFAIK, you can take AP physics from PAH or more independently using Physics Prep or self-study.

Do you read them while they are having lunch? I've given up on read alouds except at mealtimes.

Don't buy anything that you intend to use "in a few years." Don't even take it if it's free, unless you have definite specific plans to use. How did I learn this lesson? When my kids were in elementary, a local hs mom announced she was giving away test tubes. Test tubes! That's homeschooly! Surely, my kids will need test tubes in their homeschooling careers! I have like 30 glass test tubes. Both my kids are taking high school science, including chemistry, and we have had no use for these. Another hs mom was giving away a Thames and Cosmos chemistry set. And I took it off her hands, even though it was used, and probably the reagents were gone, but surely I'd need this in a few years. Whenever you catch yourself saying "in a few years..." that's when it's time to say no. Likewise with a physics text book I bought a few years ago, used, from another homeschooling parent. Turns out, it was the right book for what my dd will next year...but the wrong edition. So I'll need to buy another one anyway. If you do not have specific plans to use an item, do not buy it, do not take it. And for god's sake don't buy high school materials when your kids are in elementary. ETA: Been homeschooling for 10 years.