I have often been baffled by the "10 + hours per week." I see it noted often: Lukeion Latin, AP courses, WTM Biology pop immediately into mind. At most, my 9th grader could manage ONE class like that.

Bump! Anyone?!

Thanks for all of the great ideas :) We will go through them together over the holidays.

I'm surprised that that happened in Colorado. I would have figured that in snowy states, cancellations would be super rare.

If your college student secured an internship, how did he or she find it? I would especially love to hear about methods that did not involve (1) the college helping out or (2) personal contacts. His field is psychology BTW.

Can anyone review AP Comparative Government with PAHS? I have tried searching, but came up with nothing. Thanks :)

Any preliminary thoughts? Has she enjoyed it thus far?

We dabbled in a Physical Science textbook during 8th grade, and DS had zero problem with the Miller Levine text in 9th. He is ready now to move up to a harder book. He also did very well on the science portion of the ACT in 8th.

We have also enjoyed it. Do you have any idea how long the trial will last? I haven't seen any notices or updates since we began.

Parent of a prospective student. We are interested in the class for next year.

I bought the first edition of WTM in 1999. My oldest was in K at the time. I did post of the original boards a little bit, but not much. I wasn't a homeschooler, but I used WTM to afterschool. At some point, I drifted away. Came back when we started homeschooling four years ago.

All of our literature is not coordinated with history, so keep that in mind when you read what I have done. We have to count hours. 90 hours = 0.5 credit We keep track of everything we do, and hours are kept to the 0.25 hour. It might sound tedious, but it isn't once the system is up and running. And I love the running record of what actually got done. If DS spends 1.5 hours writing a history paper, we can divide that time between History and Composition. The split doesn't have to be 50/50 - we just can't double dip. At first, I didn't like counting hours much, but I have grown to love it. It is hard to argue with the clock. :tongue_smilie: We also have course objectives to meet, so just clocking hours without making progress doesn't cut it. ETA: DS has seven credits.

We really like the Smart History videos that focus on a single work of art.

Yes, but I am not sure how to do that without seeing it. It would be a lot to ask the LOC writer to go through those steps. Not to mention the fact that in my experience, most people overestimate their written English skills, and would not deem a translator necessary.

My son's community service leaders and foreign language tutor would be ideal sources for non-teacher letters. I'm not sure how strong their written English is, though.

I am sorry, elegantlion. I know from some of your posts that both you and your DS were close to him. :grouphug: :grouphug:

Bravewriter classes are so short (4-6 weeks) and big, that you would probably have to have the same instructor multiple times. My son has already needed a letter for a summer camp prior to high school. It is something I have to keep in mind.

Do you have a link or ISBN for the Modern World History Teacher's Guide? We love unique assignments here, and will do Modern World History next year.

At the risk of sounding like Goldilocks, limiting him to schools that don't need LOR is too limiting.

It is super-super-duper unlikely that I have to worry about Yale. I wonder if there are other schools with the same bias. What about face-to-face private tutors? I am paying them - does that lessen their recommendation? How about mentors that are not teachers? Are their LOR valuable? But I doubt that they can replace a teacher recommendation. Does no live classes = screwed?

ETA: The original question is below, and I asked about LOR from online providers. But now I am asking about experiences with online providers, tutors, and mentors. Really, any source besides a live teacher. I changed the title to broaden the question. Of course, I want to choose awesome classes and awesome teachers. But we will need letters of recommendation, and if we aren't going to outsource a ton, I would prefer providers that are open to letters of recommendation. What about PAHS? Bravewriter? I feel like both of the above have such big classes, that a recommendation might not be possible. I would love to know about providers who do give letters of recommendation, as well as any that you know have a policy against it. (I realize that specific instructors may have individual policies.)

Does anyone have a review for this year? I think the teacher must be new -no reviews are posted on the site.

Our drive back from the Thanksgiving weekend was atrocious. Nine hours through wind and rain, and we got home around midnight. We got up fine Monday morning, did our work and then our volunteer gig. Yesterday we crashed and slept in. Hopefully, we both will feel recovered today (Wed). Our umbrella school requires that we count hours, and 90 hours = 0.5 credit. I did a tally yesterday, and we are on track to complete almost all of the courses before Christmas Break. Yeah! That gives DS the liberty to truly take off for two weeks at Christmas- the credit hours do not have to be finished until Jan 15. We are in good shape!! I want to make some adjustments in our workflow next semester, and I am eager to start really thinking about those changes in detail.

Welcome! Hope to see you on the high school board!

All I know right now for sure is that 10th will be some form of Chemistry and Foerster's Algebra 2. I can reasonably predict Danish 3 and Latin 3. I am starting to look at our outsourcing options so I don't miss out, but anything homegrown can wait until March or so.