I've been listening to the same Great Books series! Definitely interested in a group subscription.

YOW! Thanks for taking the time to post a heads-up for those of us new to all this! (We still have a year of high school to go, but I've started taking notes for 2018-19!

nm

PAHS = Pennsylvania Home Schoolers. (AP courses online)

In 8's signature, there's a link to two of her books. I love her Homeschooling at the Helm! Wish I'd seen it back when my kids were in 4th-8th, or so.

But does it matter? I would argue that way too much time is wasted and way too much resentment and division among home schoolers is created when any attempt to draw a line is made. I would also argue that there is no need or productive reason to draw a line among home schoolers themselves in forums like this. Sure, different states have different legal definitions of "home schooler," as some jump at the opportunity to point out. But, when talking to other home schoolers, when bouncing ideas around about what worked best and what didn't, it doesn't matter to me. If I home school through a public charter, I can't use some of what's out there, but I still like to hear about it. People saying they used x, but x can't be used in a public charter is one thing. People saying they used x, but you can't use x bec "YOU'RE not REALLY home schooling" is meant to convey more than basic, factual information/advice.

The idea of a combination of one day/week classes + online support is really interesting! I haven't seen that before. If you have time, I'd love to hear how you implement an online class aspect. I've been thinking about this sort of thing for a while, too. One of the big issues with one or two day a week programs that I've seen and heard about locally is that there are often students who don't do much on the non-school days. The whole idea of a hybrid is that students go to "school" one or two days a week and then work on their own or with their parents at home the other three or four days. Some families do this, some don't. If students aren't doing work at home, it drags the level of the class down. One solution is to be super careful about the families & students one chooses to work with. Maybe another solution would be the online aspect that you're doing? Is that why you're planning an online piece?

looking at the tutors in my own community (Foundations/Essentials) and the several communities around us (which include Challenge groups), I see dedicated mothers and fathers with college and graduate degrees from top schools across many fields --science, music,drama, art, theology -- including ivy leagues; several are successful business owners, two three that I know of are published in their field; :iagree: I've seen some very dedicated "tutors" with a strong background in their field who are also excellent teachers, passionate & excited about teaching young people about their area of interest! It can be a hard combination to find anywhere--CC, community colleges, co-ops, online, etc. I'm all for making use of such resources, wherever I happen to find them, if I can find them at all and if we can afford them! There are also mediocre "tutors," just as there are mediocre teachers out there. That's why it's important to know whom you're "hiring," whether they are a CC tutor, a college professor, a community college instructor, a co-op instructor, etc. Just bec a person home schools and just bec s/he is willing to be a "tutor" at CC does not automatically mean that they are a great/good tutor. ETA: And regarding the idea in other posts that people become directors or tutors just for the money or just so they can get "free" CC classes for their kids..... Someone who tutored figured out just how much she made by tutoring. It was something like $2/hour, including the time she spent actually working with her group on the one day/week CC met and all the time she spent on preparing to tutor. Sure, some tutors might not do much prep at all, but they are still not raking in the bucks! I really think most local campuses are a serious labor of love for most of the tutors & directors involved. It has to be. They could make a whole lot more working at the local grocery store if they were "in it for the money."

I used a proxy to access scores, but it only shows last year's scores, not this year's. I hope that does not mean my son's scores are in limbo somewhere! (To undo the proxy server setting, do I just uncheck the proxy boxes in Settings, where I entered the proxy server address? Thanks!) ETA: Sniff! Site says that, if you took the exam outside the regular exam date window, those scores won't be available till late July/early August. My boys had to use the late test date. Guess that answers my question.

I used a plastic, portable file box like these, for each child's books and notebooks. Each child had one, in a different color. I put a few hanging file folders in to keep workbooks (like Rod & Staff's) and spiral bound notebooks from sliding down. (Each child used a spiral bound notebook for different subjects so I wouldn't have to deal w/ random papers everywhere.) There was a small spot on the lid to keep pencils, eraser, ... I kept all my manuals, standing upright in a smallish cardboard box for easy access, whichever child I was working with. The file boxes were big enough to hold all the stuff each child needed to use daily. When we worked at the kitchen table, each child brought his box and we were ready to go. End of day, all the boxes were stacked up in a corner of the back room. Worked well for us, but I only have three children!

That was my experience, too. The local groups and the directors I've known have been wonderful! Foundations and Essentials definitely filled a need for us at the time we were involved!

Yes! That's the thing! It goes both ways. People who want to do, or who do, or who have to do everything completely on their own can get discouraged to the point of giving up if they feel like they're doing their kids a disservice by not using outside resources. By the same token, people who use outside resources can get just as down on themselves and what they're doing when they're made to feel like they're doing something "wrong" or like they aren't "really" home schooling unless they do it totally on their own. Regarding ideals.... I wonder if that's the case for many people who home school... that they start out with that ideal... the self-motivated child, learning for the sake of learning, interested/curious about a plethora of things, or so completely excited about one topic/area that they can't get enough of it, etc. Those kids exist, and I really, really wish I had one! LOL (This is where my own insecurity comes in.... WOULD I have had one if I'd done things differently?! I don't know. I know I've been much more relaxed with my dd, and she loves writing and spends hours and hours on it. Is that because she had time to figure that out bec I was more relaxed with her? Did I cheat my sons out of finding their passion bec I was so focused on doing the best I could for them? Is that ironic, or what?! Fortunately, in spite of my possible mistakes with my oldest, they've found a passion for speech & debate, so maybe kids can overcome their parents' mistakes.) Like you, my approach to home schooling has changed over time.

I was hoping maybe she'd done online French lit courses from some university! I'd have jumped at looking into that opportunity for my kids!! It is seriously impressive that she had the stamina and perseverance to self-study to the level of French that she did!! Congrats to her for doing it! Congrats to you for supporting her in finding a way to achieve her goals!

Isn't this the daughter who did university language classes in high school? I know she completely self-studied to a certain point, but didn't she eventually take university classes as a high schooler, too? Or were those online?

:iagree: Just as there's sometimes a cult-like feel to CC, there can also sometimes be just as much a cult-like feel to the "old-school" idea. With CC, a family tries it, feels like it's better than sliced bread, the be-all, end-all solution to home schooling because it fills a need they've felt, maybe for a few years. Of course they tell all their friends about it! They think EVERYone will love it, and they'd love to be having that experience with their friends. They don't do it for money. There's clearly money at the corporate level, and maybe the state level, or they wouldn't do it, but the money at the director and below level is pretty insignificant, or was when I did it. They do it because they are "true believers" in this new thing they've discovered! I don't think there's anything wrong with that. Most of us go through at least one thing or one experience that we just have to tell everyone we know about bec we're so sure they'll love it, too. With the cult of "old-schooling," I think it's more a nostalgia on the part of those who did home school with no co-ops, no outside classes of any sort. Doing something like that, completely on your own, is HARD! It was before the internet and there weren't even many books with advice on how to do it. When you make your own way, successfully, through something hard, you look back at it with great satisfaction. It really was a good experience for you and your children because everyone learned something about hard work, beyond whatever subject matter content you studied. You wish others could have that same end result. So, any model of education can become cult-like. I can understand a person's excitement over this or that or the other way of doing something like home schooling. It worked very well for her, she wants to share it with everyone out of love for others and out of excitement about something that filled a significant need for her. What really bothers me is when a person says or implies that THEIR way is the single BEST and ONLY way to do something for every parent and every child out there. I hate threads that devolve into "YOU aren't REALLY home schooling (if you're doing it differently than I did it), you're ...." fill in the blank. "You're public schooling." "You're doing school at home." "You're outsourcing everything." "You're....." Then the rest of the thread is people feeling like they have to justify why they outsource one or all classes or why they use a co-op or why they use a class at a local hybrid.... Basically, why they do anything at all other than do every last bit on their own, at home, independent of any other home schooler. ETA: I should add.... I think any of these different approaches to home schooling can work out successfully, but I don't think there is any ONE method that will work out successfully for EVERY parent, or EVERY family, or EVERY child. That's why it's so important that advocates of all the different variations are engaged and available to talk about their experience. It's only unproductive, and damaging even, when an advocate of any particular method states or implies that if the parent does not use her particular method, the parent is failing, or not providing as good an education or her child, or not REALLY home schooling.

Neither have I. I'm not even sure if there's anyone on these boards who's home schooled completely at home, without using outside classes of some sort. (I do know there are plenty of people who have not used co-ops/CC/community colleges/etc.)

I do get & agree with that... that it really would be a loss of an important niche. I think it's important that those who've been able to do it completely on their own remain engaged w/ the home schooling world/forums so that they can pass on their experience to others looking to do it.

I don't know if that's the case, though, Tibbie. Don't you think there will always be a variety of home schoolers out there who choose different paths? People who home school seem to be a very eclectic bunch. The range of approaches to home schooling is hugely varied. As people home school over they years, they try different things. They find from experience that there are things they like and don't like, things they wish they'd done differently, things they'd love to try, things they could have done better, things they shouldn't have wasted their time on, etc. The desire to do things better/differently inevitably drives the creation of new options. The "new" stuff may or may not pan out; we don't know until it's been used for a while. I think there _will_ always be home schoolers who do things completely on their own (ie, no outside classes at all) and they _will_ look to those who have btdt for encouragement and advice. There will also be home schoolers who feel that there's something missing and who look for it in the available options. Sometimes those options can provide it. Sometimes the option does not provide it, and the parent tries something else that seems like a closer match or s/he tries to create the missing piece. Sometimes what the parent creates appeals to other, like-minded parents and it gathers momentum. The new option fills a certain need that certain families are looking for, like CC does/did. We home schoolers today owe a lot to the home schoolers who started out. However, I don't think that whatever might be considered the way "old schoolers" did it is necessarily _better_ simply because it's the "old" way of doing it, just as I don't consider the latest options (CC, CAP's Schole, MP's cottage schools, etc) to be _better_ simply because they're newer. Things seem to move like a pendulum.... Maybe home schooling is the same... Maybe it will always swing slowly back and forth between the two extremes of completely independent (no outside classes at all) and completely outsourced (all online/local classes.) I don't know. Everyone has to find their own way. I do know that nobody, "old schooler" or home schoolers using more recent options can say that their way is THE best or THE only way. (ETA fixed formatting. Don't know why my paragraph breaks are always messed up!)

Yes! Me, too! As CC directors & parents age out of CC bec their kids have graduated high school, I think we'll see some of the really dedicated, passionate ones look to help new home schoolers create the sort of communities they wish they'd had when their kids were young. When your kids are young, you just do not have much time to spend beyond doing what you specifically need to do that day or that week or that year. It isn't until your children get older and go off to college or start taking some outside high school courses that you have time to really look back at the big picture & think about what you'd do differently. (At least that was my experience.) The possibilities are exciting! i don't think I'd say the majority of home schoolers need outside accountability. It can be nice for some of us, though. There are tons of options out there for home schoolers..... live online classes, async online classes, community college classes, university classes, live local classes, part time at the local public school (in some states), local workshops put on by different hobby/professional groups,.... Each family has their own, specific needs/goals/desires. The great thing about home schooling is that each family can pick and choose from all the available options to meet their own particular needs. Some families successfully home school their children without using any of those outside resources at all. I don't think there is any one model that could be held up as the best single solution.

Those models for education existed long before CC; the communities I mentioned (MP, CAP) did not. There's a difference in feel/philosophy between a "school" and a "community." Perhaps the biggest is the involvement of parents and families in a "community" vs the drop-them-at-the-door approach of a typical university model or brick & mortar school. It probably all looks the same from the outside, if one has never been involved with a small group of families with the same desires/goals whose children enjoy learning together.

:iagree: :iagree: I think when CC came out, it met a real need/desire for a "community" for many, both students and moms. Better models are already starting to sprout up. MP's Cottage Schools, CAP's Schole communities, etc., may meet the community desire but also have better academics and better instructors. When we did Foundations and Essentials, my boys LOVED the peer aspect. It was definitely something we did not get on our own at home nor in other peer activities like park days. I'm an introvert, so socializing w/ other moms wasn't a driving factor for me, but it is for many more extroverted moms. In hindsight, I see some real advantages to group learning, for SOME subjects and assuming the children in the group are at the same level, interested in the same subject matter. I would not dumb down just for social interaction. We used CC purely as a supplement, an extracurricular. It was something fun for the kids to do one day a week. CC corporate made it easy to start a campus. They provided the infrastructure & the PR. It was plug-and-play simple. I think people try it and love it at the beginning, but then find that it's not an academic route they want to follow. They grow disenchanted with it as they discover that the corporate restrictions on it (can't hire the best tutors, tutors have to teach all subjects for their level even if they have no interest in one or two, tutors have to have kids in the program so every campus loses its best/most experienced tutors right when they have the most time and experience to tutor!...) The CC restrictions benefit corporate's bottom line, but they hobble the local communities. At some point, the benefits of ease of set-up and ready-made PR will be outweighed by weak academics, lock-step academics, and inability to bring in the best teachers. I think it's reaching this point and, for this reason, other types of communities are popping up. It remains to be seen how successful those will be.

Phrasal or multi-word verbs always make me stop & think. The only rule of thumb I've found for deciding whether a verb + prep is a phrasal or a multi-word verb is 1) to look at whether the two words (verb + prep) could be replaced by a single-word verb and 2) to look at whether the prep makes sense as part of the rest of a phrase. So, for example, "turn out" could be replaced by "extinguish" ("extinguish the light"), but "out" would not make sense with "out the light." And "work out" could be replaced by "developed" (a plan), but "out a plan" would not make sense, so there's no way "out" could be a preposition in either of these two examples. "Thinking about" could be replaced by "pondering" ("pondering what his wife had just told him"), but it would make just as much sense to say "about what his wife had just told him." So, I think it could go either way.... "thinking about" could be a participial phrase with the noun clause as a direct object, or "about what ...him" could be a prepositional phrase modifying the participle "thinking." Personally, I tend to think that "thinking" in this sentence is a participle, modifying "cob." The sentence could be reduced to "the cob stood quietly, thinking." Because it wouldn't make sense to say, "The cob stood quietly, thinking about," I don't think that "thinking about" is a phrasal verb. I think "about" is more attached to the phrase, "about what his wife had said." After a certain point, grammar becomes more of an art than a science and there may be more than one way to label something.

Those are some tough sentences! I'm not an expert, but this is what I would make of them.... 1) I'd agree that "about" is a preposition. "What his wife had just told him" is a noun clause acting as the object of the preposition "about." That whole section, "Thinking about what his wife had just told him," is a participial phrase describing "the cob." "Thinking..." is not a gerund phrase because a gerund/gerund phrase acts as a noun, as Ellie pointed out. In this particular sentence "thinking...him" is not acting as a noun but as an adjective describing the cob. Therefore, it is not a gerund phrase but a participial phrase. I'd also agree that "to work out a plan for his son Louis" is an infinitive phrase. "He was beginning to work out a plan for his son Louis" is an independent clause. He- subject was beginning - verb "to work out a plan for his son Louis" - infinitive phrase acting as a direct object. Within this infinitive phrase, "plan" is the direct object of the verbal "to work out." 2) "Turned out the light" I would say that "turned out" is a two-word verb. It could be replaced with one verb, "extinguished" (although nobody ever says that anymore!) It would not make sense to say that he "turned the light." Nor would it make sense to say "out the light." So, I think the most likely conclusion is that "turned out" is a two-word verb, as you thought. 3) "It has just about every creature..." I'd agree that "it" is the subject, "has" is the verb, "creature" is the direct object. "Every" is definitely an adjective, modifying "creature." The sentence could have said, "It has every creature..." I would say that "about" is an adverb, modifying the adjective "every." It doesn't have EVERY creature, it has ABOUT every creature that exists. Then I would say that "just" is an adverb modifying "about." It has very close to almost/about every creature. I guess I'd say "just" and "about" are both adverbs of degree. (ETA: I can delete this if I quoted too much. It's hard to explain without quoting the sentence parts. )

Redwall Freddy the Pig books on audio, if you can find them

That's true. A big advantage to a charter is that the charter will pay for approved vendors' classes. Hm. I know OG had some non-a-g vendors, and it was fairly easy to get a vendor approved if the provider was up for it and was non-sectarian. CW may have other providers who are not necessarily a-g approved but who offer classes that your girls would like more than what's available on the a-g vendor list? You mentioned, for example, that they were disappointed w/ the level of their English class this past year. That may be more of an a-g thing than a Moodle thing. Is PAHS is on CW's vendor list, by any chance? If so, your girls might be interested in PAHS's AP Eng Lang/Lit class?