DD#1 is taking Lukeion's Comp & Research class now. It is a bit scary for both of us since it is more than twice the number of papers she wrote in an entire year last year - and it is only a semester long class. I was going to suggest CLRC for Lit or Great Books as they seem to be a great provider. We haven't taken any of their classes before, so I don't have any Been There, Done That with them, though! Cindy Lange, who used to teach at Veritas Press and Wilson Hill Academy fits your request: "gifted teachers who know their subject in depth; clear, high expectations of students; and fantastic organization." She just started her own online classes this year at Integritas Academy.

madteaparty mentioned it in the Like Lukeion but for English thread. She's posted several times about the class, but this is just one little post that I found quickly. I know others have taken other CLRC courses (Lit/Comp, Latin, etc.). ETA: I always feel like such a stalker when I point out what other people's kids are taking & where (like your kids & math at WHA, yvonne), but :blushing: I'm a curriculum junkie in real life & I play an online provider-junkie on here. I try to keep up with who is taking classes where so I can PM them to ask questions about classes that might be a fit for one of my kids down the road. :coolgleamA:

He might be perfectly happy at the charter school, or he might be more appreciative of you when he asks to come back home. (Personally, I'd talk with my husband about how long he had to go to the charter school before I let him come back home - a semester? the full year? I wouldn't let him quit after just a month or two, unless he was being bullied or something else horrible was occurring. I'd make him stick it out for a set amount of time that I talked to DH about ahead of time - but didn't mention to the 13 yr old right now.) I understand the mixed feelings. Enjoy the extra time you'll have with your older boy.

This seems to happen to my Discover every other year, like Janeway said. It is usually online charges. This time was ITunes. I don't use ITunes. Discover always catches it before I do. I suspect this time was a credit card skimmer at an outside (my town) gas pump. I've stopped using the outside credit card slots except in my little town. I suspect I'll have to stop using them here, too, as it is just a matter of time before the thieves come here. I just cancel the card & get a new one.

A lot of foreign language texts have codes now & that's how I saw them the first time. When you used to have an "audio lab" where you went in & listened to tapes & filled out worksheets, you now have an online website tied to your account where you listen to the mp3 files & fill in the "workbook pages" on the website. (DD's Spanish teacher the past three years started asking them to buy the physical workbook instead of using the online workbook entry. The online system gives you a second try & sometimes hints of what was wrong with your answer (missing a word, for example). The teacher didn't want some kids getting a second try while others only had one try (from a fair grading perspective). The tests were also through the website (with code). It made it easier to submit them than printing it, filling it out by hand, scanning it, and emailing it to the teacher. DD was able to use the same text/code for three years before it expired. (I didn't realize the code was only good for three years!!! Good thing I didn't have another kid coming right behind her that was expecting to use the same text/code.)

When they are younger, we decide. We take it kid by kid & year by year. (If anyone talks about them going, it is me threatening to send them, usually in a two-three week span in the spring when they are driving me crazy and the option enrollment to the district over is still open.) We had dd#1 tour the high school in the next district over. She choose to continue to homeschool. DD#2 is not interested in going to the local high school (where her best friend goes), so she's home for the foreseeable future. It is difficult, but not impossible to transition to high school here after one has already started high school - much harder locally vs. the next district over where they are more flexible & nicer to work with. Will probably let my social diva dd#3 decide when she gets to high school. Her biggest issue is that she's accelerated grade-level wise (because I keep her with dd#2 as much as possible for ease of my schedule), but they wouldn't let her into the next grade up because she doesn't meet the cutoff date (not even close). They don't wiggle on that at all. Her friends are almost all a grade up from where they'd put her, making it not nearly as worth it for her. The social stuff becomes so much more important as they enter 6th-8th grade (girls) and high school. Finding & being able to spend time with friends is an on-going issue.

We only used it during this summer as a shoring up of fundamentals & keeping the Spanish fresh - so we haven't actually used it for actual credit. With that in mind, they do NOT assign enough homework for your plan. DD had maybe 30 minutes of homework after each 50 minute session and could have spent an hour reviewing before tests. I'd plan on at least two live sessions a week. They tell you how many sessions is generally worth a level. Some kids work quicker & some slower. They check your level during the first real session by doing some testing. (You might find she starts further along in Spanish than you thought -- or further back.) Then, they go through their standard syllabus. You can ask them to try to go through review material quicker, but it really depends on your kid & the teacher on whether that works. They say you need about 30 sessions to go through a semester of work. Being that it was all review (although obviously there were some gaps & things she didn't master the first time), I asked them to go quickly and assign a lot of homework. DD made it through 25 "classes" of material in 17 sessions. (Six of the classes were to review & were assigned, instead, as optional homework.) To finish that semester, she'd need one more lesson, two reviews, a quiz, and a semester exam - so probably 3-4 more sessions, realistically. They build in plenty of informal & formal conversation practice, but take four levels (years) to cover all the grammar where most high school Spanish programs cover the grammar in three levels (years). DD liked her teacher this summer. It was difficult to get in at a consistent time with a specific teacher unless you were booking WELL in advance - and even then, it was sometimes hit or miss. They switched from skype at the end of the summer & she hasn't had a session since then, so I don't know how it works now. Google plus? Google Hangouts? Some sort of Google format. Make sure you get someone's referral code before signing up - to help them earn credit for more classes. (There are several people on here who use HSA regularly & would really appreciate the referral credit.) Also, if you are a HSLDA member, there is a decent percentage off discount, but you have to email Homeschool Spanish Academy to ask for the code. Edited to add: You might get more replies if you cross-post on the high school board.

DD#1 has background in Latin, though not the same extent as your DD. She found that at the beginning it gave her a leg up on the other students, but she also found that being as closely related as they were, she would sometimes use the wrong endings, spell something in the other language accidentally, or not be able to think of the correct word because all she could think of was the other language's same word translation. She ended up picking Spanish over Latin, moved faster in Spanish, and dropped her Latin progress eventually. I know there are other kids who are able to keep them straight, but she chose not to put the extra effort in as she just loved Spanish so much more. Just let her be aware that even though they start at the beginning, DE generally moves twice as fast as a high school class! If she wants to dip her toes in without making a full time commitment to Spanish before DE, I recommend Getting Started With Spanish. Adding 5-15 minutes of Duolingo a day once you are about 1/3 of the way through the book is also helpful. She could easily do both of these in 30 minutes or less a day.

If you have the Chrome browser, I suggest trying the links through the incognito browser window, too. (I don't know other browsers well enough to know if they have a similar mode.) Amazing how often something works in incognito, but doesn't work through the regular pages. (Wal-Mart, for example, tells me items are out of stock when they know it is me. In incognito, the items are in stock. Crazy.) I've gotten other things to work this way, too.

:grouphug: Hugs as you go down this path. I remember being in the hospital with #4 when they came to take him away for his blood draw(s). I insisted they wait so I could go with him. They couldn't figure out why I would want to be there when they were poking him & he'd be crying. I gave them my best Mama Bear stare and said, "Why wouldn't I want to be anywhere else when my baby is in pain and needs comforting?" They didn't understand & just shook their heads, but they let me come. Kudos to you for being a great mom and being there for your baby when he needs you tomorrow. Best of luck in getting helpful results.

I admit that the van needed a car wash & I was in desperate need of gas, so I stopped for both. The station was in the Big City, so I went in to pre-pay (since I don't trust the credit card slots outside anymore after 2x of having my card # stolen at what could only be out of town gas station outside credit card pump readers). The station had a car wash special on Wednesdays bringing the wash down by $4 ($5, but I'd have gotten $1 off for gassing up). So, I spent my $4 savings on two tickets. The kids were amused. I don't believe I'll win, but the process and discussion of the odds & taxes were good educational fodder for the drive home. Good luck everyone!

If you want a definitive answer, send an email (or mail through Canvas) the teacher. Mirabillis - Can you update on what your son said?

. . . And, they have started publishing the classes onto Canvas. So far, all the classes note that the content won't be available (or you can't participate - something like that) until August 31st. But, DD got at least one email from a teacher so far, so things are starting to fall into place.

I live in a state that wants home schoolers to meet a certain number of instruction hours per year. A certain number are required for K-8 and more for 9-12, but they don't require you to turn in your records. I plan out enough days to more than exceed the minimum (except for Kindergarten- no way do we do that much "school" - but I've always filed a waiver for K so I don't have to promise that many hours). I do count lunch as instructional time. In my house, it is home ec!

In general, honors courses are weighted .5, AP is 1.0 and University courses are 1.0. However, this varies! (Here's just one College Confidential thread on the topic.)

:hurray: Good for you! It is ALWAYS a challenge to keep the workload manageable. So happy for them & you. :party:

It was fairly easy to do light schooling after about two weeks, depending on how much baby & you are sleeping, how many kids you have, how old they are, how independent they are, and how much help you have. (How's that for variety?) I could do couch-schooling: - me in the middle w/nursing baby, one kid on either side with a math book - me doing read alouds or content subjects that just need me to read (like Story of the World) and ask questions - kid reading aloud to me while sitting next to me Etc. With my late fall baby, we added a subject each week until we were up to full schedule. I don't have any late winter or spring babies. If you have lots of help, I'd make sure I got at least one nap a day & help with house cleaning before I went back to full-time school. I don't know how old your other kids are - and that makes a big difference! Also, anything can happen near the end of your pregnancy, so play that by ear, too. You might end up doing less the last week or three depending on how you are feeling. I generally tried to keep up with math & reading when possible.

Everytime she visits, my mom points out that the best way to clean a micro is a dish of vinegar heated to steaming and then you just wipe it out. So, yes, I've heard this before. Friends of ours have heard this story of my mom so many times that when they saw " ," they bought me one. I pulled it out special for today's cleaning. :lol: (These methods don't work as well as they do on the infomercial and it stinks up the house. But, we all get a kick out of Angry Mama anyway.) I thought of the previous post on this thread about how some people are happiest complaining and don't we want our guests to be happy? That's my mother, except she's never happy unless she's snickering over someone else's misfortune.

My sister called this morning when she was 30 minutes away and let us know she had my mom with her (along with nieces that we knew we're coming). I ran to clean the microwave (see my previous post in this thread). DH cleaned the kitchen floor last night, so since the micro was clean, mom complained that the kitchen floor was dirty. (All outsiders trampled through the kitchen from outside with shoes on all morning.) If we knew she was going to bring my mom, I would have told her we wouldn't be open for visitors for the eclipse. Oh, and my mom complained that our guest toilet was "made for children." It was installed for an 80 year old farm couple. Yep, definitely made for young pups. . . ETA: one niece knew exactly what an ideal house guest should bring to our house: math homework to get help with!! Best part of the visit was pre-eclipse when I got to explain Alg 2 problems. (They were really Alg 1 review.) It was a gift to the engineer hosts!

I have a friend whose kids are the kind who thrive with delight-directed schooling. Most of mine are NOT that way. (I have two that are, including an Ancient-Egyptian-lover.) The rest just have to deal with our "learning moments." The elder two have found their interests and still dislike anything that doesn't focus on just those one or three topics. Hang in there. It'll be a long ride.

And please do not open the microwave door as soon as you enter the house and start lecturing us on how to clean the inside.

I went to their website for the schedule - but the link is broken. I printed it out for my DD, so I just grabbed that. Meet the Teacher is August 29th (Tues/Thurs classes) and Aug 30th (Mon/Wed classes). First day of classes for Tues/Thurs is Sept 5. First day of classes for Mon/Wed is Sept 6th. They haven't even "published" the classes on Canvas yet, so I'm not too worked up yet. I know there are a handful of Pre-Calc kids (Morning Glory, mirabillis). I think rdj2027 and yvonne might have one or two kids taking Calc through Wilson Hill. ETA: Forgot about dereksurfs's ds! DD#1 is going to be taking Spanish 4 (Convo) this year. She's a bit nervous about the native speaking teacher, but crazyforlatin's dd is also in the class, so I'm less nervous. :coolgleamA: DD#1 has four other online classes (through three different providers) which start this week, though. She's been busy getting the pre-work done for those. Omma's ds will be taking GC1+4. At least, that was the plan.

I'd go back to CLE. She might need to start back in the 500 level. . . And, please, for her sake, stop skipping around to different programs for a bit. You don't have to use CLE for Algebra and above (and it is fine to use different publishers for Algebra, geometry, and above), but elementary publishers have hugely different scope/sequences. It is hard for a kid to skip around without significant gaps or frustration.

Art of Argument. When I've used it, I prefer to teach my kid and a small group of 3-4 others around the same age. It is more fun to do as a group, IMO. We do not use the video and we cover it in a semester. The CAP web site has suggested schedules for different lengths of the class.

I don't know anything about the bundle! Sorry! Hopefully, someone else 'in the know' will chime in!