Momto2Ns, just sign up for Carolina's mailing list and you will have a $25 coupon, too :)

I am buying stuff to create a high school chemistry lab set-up, and I thought that it would be a good idea to have a triple beam balance. Perhaps this was a misguided thought {shrug}.

Aside: Wow, Galore Park has really changed their website since that last time I looked at it. The blurb of the Latin Prep book touts its alignment with the Common Entrance Exam, so I took a quick peak into the syllabus of that exam. It seems like the Big Latin Test people in the UK think that English-to-Latin is important enough to put on their Big Latin Tests :lol: . We did Getting Started with Latin last year. I could take some of those sentences and have him translate them English-to-Latin for more practice on that aspect. Maybe LNM does more in Levels 2 and 3 - idk.

Thanks, Laura. It never even occurred to me NOT to think it was important until I started making the Anki deck. But I only have experience with modern foreign languages.

The title says it all: How important is English-to-Latin translation? Our textbook (LNM Level 1) has "Translate into Latin" exercises, but these are a really small percentage of the course. From what I can tell about the Big Latin Tests (NLE, AP, SAT), one "only" needs to be able to translate Latin-to-English. Recognizing derivatives seems quite important to the Big Latin Test people. Does composing in Latin become important later? How about in university Latin classes? I am setting up an Anki deck for long term retention, and I am trying to decide if it is important to drill the vocab from English-to-Latin. Yes? No?

Some of the SAT Subject Tests are freaking me out. It seems like you would have to memorize the whole 1000 page textbook for the Biology test. Same for World History.

I am trying not to fear the 1000 page high school textbooks that I have been collecting. Maybe someone can talk me down from the proverbial ledge... Throughout middle school, I have taught to mastery. I plan to continue to teach to mastery. How does one master a 1000 page textbook? Apparently, it happens often enough that kids to do very well on AP exams and SAT Subject tests! For example, what I just did for him for science may not work out so well in high school. He was having trouble really getting the gas laws. We spent an inordinate amount of time "mastering" the gas laws. Which constitute all of seven pages in the Physical Science text book. Granted, I thought that this concept was exceptionally important because he wants to SCUBA dive. But it is a given that other important, tricky things will cross our path again. What do you do? What does mastery of a 1000 page textbook look like? I know people skip stuff. Looking at AP test questions and SAT subject test questions makes skipping feel scary, too.

Gosh, there is always something to fret over, isn't there?! We have done interest-led science for all of middle school. Well, his interests never led to life science. So now I am nervous about 9th grade biology. I think we are going to do Ellen McHenry's Carbon Chemistry soon. Ellen's stuff is so fun, and it will hit quite a bit of the chemistry that will matter for biology. We spent most of 7th grade on physics. By the time he gets to physics again, it will be at least 11th grade. I'm pretty sure he will have forgotten most (if not all) of it.

If my kid was part of the plot, I would not have tied the mystery dinner to the work. It derails the experience of others. But I am the type who always hated it when a parent would call me and tell me that their kiddo had been naughty this morning, and now the playdate must be canceled. And then I get to get off the phone and disappoint my kiddo. Who had just cleaned his room to prepare for the playdate. ETA: but if I had already made that "threat" maybe I would explain that I had rethought the situation. And work out together when, over the weekend, he could finish the work.

Do you have a triple beam balance? If so, do you like it? Why or why not? What features do you think are important? Here are some that I am looking at: http://www.hometrainingtools.com/triple-beam-balance/p/BS-2610/ I have a $25 off coupon for Carolina: http://www.carolina.com/lab-balances-scales/ohaus-triple-beam-balance-model-750-s0/702150.pr?catId=&mCat=&sCat=&ssCat=&question=triple+beam+balance http://www.carolina.com/lab-balances-scales/carolina-triple-beam-balance/702020.pr?catId=&mCat=&sCat=&ssCat=&question=triple+beam+balance http://www.carolina.com/lab-balances-scales/ohaus-triple-beam-balance-model-tj611/FAM_702153.pr?catId=&mCat=&sCat=&ssCat=&question=triple+beam+balance

If (and I know it is a big if) you are willing to splurge on the shipping cost, I highly recommend the Trin for Trin textbook series: Book One: På Vej Til Dansk Book Two: Videre Mod Dansk This series was used in my Danish courses. The entire book is in Danish, but you have your mom to help you through the directions. I recently bought Grammatik i Brug, and I can't say enough good things about it. I think it would great for an adult beginner with access to a native speaker. The publishers offer the answer keys as downloads. Look for rettenøgle. Here is the one for the grammar - the textbook key is somewhere on the publisher's site. If you would like an online course, I like SpeakDanish. Have fun!!!

We will finish Book 8 of R&S this year (8th grade). I think we will try Analytical Grammar's High School Reinforcement after that. My son jumped from R& S Book 6 to Book 8. Chapter 2 was a bit bumpy, but it was fine after that.

This looks like a lovely new edition of the Beagle available for preorder. (Thanks for the thread, BTW!)

There is also a Teacher's Edition of the textbook. I got mine for about the same price as the Duke TIP materials.

Cosmos, you just saved me some work. I was going to go through a similar exercise!! BTW, here is a word count anecdote from my college sophomore son. The assignment (upper level psych course) was to write a literature review. The students were given a maximum allowable word count. Apparently, there was grumbling that the requirements of the assignment would necessitate a higher word count. I will presume that the professor was aiming for concision.

Not that you even asked about the SAT Bio test, but I don't want to leave misinformation floating around... I did Round Two with the M-L text, the big SAT Subject Test book, and Baron's SAT Bio Prep book. Again, I chose random questions and looked to see if the answer was in M-L. This time, I was less successful. I had better luck with the M test than the E test. To be fair and honest, I couldn't easily find some of the answers in Campbell's Concepts and Connections (which I also have on hand). But I would be hard pressed to believe that there is much of anything on the SAT Bio test that isn't in that book.

Ah, OK now I understand. The bolded makes all the difference in the world.

Melissa B, Thank you - that was super helpful. Wow, that is a big difference between honors and regular - a bigger difference than I expected. We are with Kolbe this year, but I have not seen their high school course plans. When you say that Kolbe would expect a 1-2 page typed paper each week for honors, I presume that the student would have that assignment for both history and literature. Thus, two such papers per week. Do typical weekly papers require synthesizing multiple resources? That adds significantly to the effort, at least in my homeschool (sample size of one). :eek:

Part two of the question: If you have used outside providers for history and/or literature, how much guidance are the students given for word count? What would be a typical workload? Let's assume Honors, non-AP level. I want to write my own courses, and am trying to get a feel for appropriate workload for Honors 9th grade. I want to be reasonable but not soft :)

I didn't know that the Kolbe syllabus offered alternatives to the virtual labs - thanks for mentioning that :)

N.B. I already know that papers need to be as long as they need to be in order to say what needs to be said. How long is a short paper? A brief essay? My estimate is 500 words, give or take a bit. Here are some of the curricula I have been looking through. Oak Meadow (social studies samples) The student chooses a weekly assignment. Some wording: "In a short essay, discuss the meaning of..." "Present your findings in a brief report." WTM (3rd edition / Great Books section) Write a one-page summary. The finished composition should be at least two pages. Should I presume double spacing? Times New Roman 12 pt = about 250 words per page. post edited for clarity

Absolutely. You can go on the College Board site and poke around for recommended texts and sample syllabi. And you can use test prep books.

The Kolbe syllabus just uses virtual labs, right? I have invested heavily in a microscope - so by golly, we are going to maximize microscope labs. Some of our labs will come from The Home Scientist Illustrated Guide to Biology Experiments: All Lab No Lecture. Somewhere on the site you can dowload the book for free. The labs are correlated with the Dragonfly version of M-L here : FAQ03 I am looking at Frog Guts for virtual dissections. Pricing is $36/yr. If you google "Pre-AP Biology + Miller Levine" you might get some different search hits. (Not to derail the thread, but I can't understand Kolbe Academy's philosophy for the Online Academy's biology. Regular Bio uses M-L, but both Honors Bio and AP Bio use the AP version of the Campbell text. The sequence of Honors Bio then AP Bio would be two times through the same book. Alternatively, you only take Bio once - but in that case why not take the AP Bio if you are ready for the text? I am open to being enlightened. )

It has even jumped from $20 / month to $49.99. Even through the Co-op the price remains over $30 / month. I like it, but not at that price.

Kolbe Academy is planning to have the new syllabus available in the fall - I just called and asked.