I recently posted that I signed up with Coursera. I actually had to pull an all-nighter last night to get my first essay done for World History Since 1300, but I'm loving it. I'm also taking beginning knitting at the kids' homeschool co-op so I have something to do with my time there.

If the class is not at all flexible, I think you have to ask yourself: Is this a good use of your daughter's time or should we switch? Have you talked to the teacher or to fellow students about how much time this is taking? Doing work "whether she needs it or not" is silly--when you're a homeschooler you have options.

LOF Beginning Algebra has two supplements available: The Home Companion (we are using), and Zillions of Problems (we don't need). If you need something to supplement, I would start with those two because they are coordinated with your main text. --Janet

The right amount of time for math is the amount of time it takes your student to learn. If she needs the reading, the video, and the practice problems to be prepared for class, then do all that. You can experiment with other strategies if it is too much repetition. For example, maybe skimming the book and doing the problems does the trick. Or, watching the videos first, and pause and open the book where it gets tricky. Or... When my DD was in public school 4th grade, we just did the "new material" problems in the homework, and skipped the whole second page of review problems each night. DD aced all the tests, and the teacher went along with this. If the homework is too redundant or time-consuming, work with your teacher to figure out what's important to him/her. --Janet

I'm taking History of the World since 1300 on Coursera, from Princeton. For an active participant whose doing more than just listening in as regentrude says, I think the course is *better* than taking it at Princeton. There are people from all over the world on the forums, many of them know their local histories better than the professor does. Some of them are retired professors, economists, archaeologists, etc. I wish I had more time to read them, but as a busy mom I can barely keep up. I am also taking an intro to programming class. The professors are simply not as engaged in the learning experience as the Princeton professor is. They're on the forums some, but they're just not leading the kinds of discussions and explanations that the history class has. There are little bugs in the course that show that they didn't "beta test" the system with actual students before implementing automated grading of answers. I'm an experience programmer, I just don't know Python, so I'm going to get what I need out of this class. But, it's much, much less impressive to me. Which just goes to show: Coursera is an aggregator of classes from different sources. Asking whether the classes from Coursera are "good" or "bad" is a bit like asking if books from Amazon are good or bad. It's a matter of the author of the specific course and the needs and engagement level of the student that matter. --Janet

I'm saving a few samples of my DDs' best work, course description, required reading list, and my grade spreadsheet for the year, as applicable for each course. --Janet

AoPS does not "give the brainpower." The student needs to have that brainpower already. If your student has been "pleased" with A Beka, rather than "starving for more challenging math", then the plan you have listed is probably not appropriate.

I think there's some tension in your requirements between "humanities major in mind" and "solid in case she changes her mind." I think Friendly Chemistry is good for the former, but "solid" implies lots of math and more challenging labs and problem sets. FC has no lab kit, but there is a manipulative kit for learning things like electron configurations and there are kitchen-chemistry labs involving grocery store supplies in the text. It would be a good foundation for a more rigorous course if she did change her mind. You might want to see if that will meet your needs. --Janet

I'm just using letter grades for transcripts -- some subjects (such as math and science) are very black-and-white: You got 92% on a math test. Others are more subjective -- Even if two teachers agree than an essay is an "A" paper, one might call it 95% and one might call it 94 or 96. Numbers don't mean as much, because papers are graded qualitatively rather than quantitatively. I usually just give a letter grade rather than a specific number on qualitatively graded assignments. Rather than having numbers for some subjects and just letters for other subjects, when I make my summary transcript, I just include the letters (with plus/minus for high/low part of the grading scale for quantitative subjects e.g. B+ or A-). --Janet

+1 on the electric pencil sharpener Also, I got a ton of use out of a few "PotLux" plastic disposable dishes, for containing messy projects of various sorts (beads, glitter, manipulatives, catching drips on science projects, place to set blobs of paper and glue to dry, etc.) They were maybe 4 bucks a piece at the grocery store and lasted forever.

What is the goal of her annotations? To get a subject for an essay? To find key ideas that will be on a test? To answer a discussion question? Rather than looking at a sentence and saying, "What can we annotate about this sentence?", give her a goal: "Suppose we want to write an essay comparing Writer A to Writer B. Which passages would we mark as examples of how they are the same? Which passages would we mark as examples of how they are different?" You could start with direct, concrete goals to annotate (let's mark all the new vocabulary we need to look up), then work up to more abstract ones (let's mark places that are relevant to writing a personal essay).

Thanks for this link. Great stuff!

I've downloaded gutenberg titles, ran them into word and increased the font size for my visually impaired DD, and took them to Office Depot for printing/binding (using educator discount). I'm sure the same thing would work for creating your own edition with margins and room for annotating. As folks have mentioned, there are a number of ways to annotate a PDF on an ipad. For Kindle/e-reader annotation, you want to see what the keyboard options are. I have a nook touch, and it's pretty easy to type a few sentences with my bookmarks about what's there. DD has the low end non-touch kindle. The keyboard is really not for anything detailed. (The nook store does not work overseas, but there are other kindles with either touchscreens or keyboards.) So, check out the capabilities of any reader you choose.

As usual, I seem to be the "softie grader" on this board! I don't agree that it's easier to make an "A" on the labs because they are open book, but we have just started. I had wanted the labs to count as much as the tests because they require a different, but equally important skill set, than the paper/pencil tests, which is how they ended up at 25%. As far as homework grades go, if my kids do poorly on an assignment, there is another one with the same type of problems assigned (until they seem to get it). But, the new assignment and the old assignment both "count" in the grade book. I don't just write down the 100% that they got on the second or third try. I will help if they come to me with questions on daily work, but not on tests. So, it's potentially easier to get A's on homework if a) they monitor their own understanding b) admit they need help. Unfortunately, DD #1 has troubles with "a" and DD #2 has troubles with "b." But, I could weight this part less, and count the labs and tests more. --Janet

I had planned to weight my chemistry course as: Homework/daily work = 50% Tests = 25% Labs = 25% Then, I was googling chemistry syllabi to use to help write my course description, and it seems that the schools weigh tests MUCH higher (50 to 60%). I know I can do anything I want, but I thought I would ask here if I was unusual to weigh tests at 25%. So, if you do a science class with written work, tests, and labs, and if you do formal grades: How do you weigh the value of each component? If you've changed over the course of high school, put how you do it for each grade. Thanks!

iphones are a lower-risk buy--there aren't that many models and they all work, though the older ones have less features or processing power. The android platform is a hodge-podge of high and low end phones. Some have the latest operating system and some have older versions. Some have higher processing power and some less. Some are being updated and supported by the vendors, but some are just abandoned. Some are popular with hackers, and you can download updates and such for yourself without waiting for your cell phone company. So, it takes a lot more research to get a good android phone from among the dreck. But: Android phones are a better buy, if you do your research well. Read reviews. Spend a lot of time on sites like phonescoop.com comparing specifications. I have Android, DH has iPhone. His is a nicer phone -- faster, nicer display, etc. Mine was much, much cheaper both upfront and plan costs. Money was really tight when I bought my phone, DH's was subsidized by his employer. The only thing I think is definitely better on my phone is that google maps and navigation work better than the iphone version. We share a family calendar and shopping lists with an app called Cozi which is available for both phones as well as via the web. I used my Android stock (as it comes out of the box) for about a year. I finally got the courage to jailbreak/root/flash custom ROM last month. I feel like I have a brand new phone--it runs much faster now and I freed up a lot of memory for other uses. I'm thinking I may upgrade to something with more processor power and more memory this Black Friday, though. --Janet

Are his math/science test scores strong? Since you don't have an outside class, you're just going to have to have a letter from a parent. The test scores will help corroborate what you say in the letter. I would only have one LOR from a parent, though. If DH writes one, you should not write one, too.

I'm not familiar with UTexas German, but the UT French is an excellent, very rigorous college course. So, if German is similar, one year of college language is equivalent to two years of high school language. But, how are you going to grade his work and evaluate his pronunciation if you don't speak the language? Foreign language is one area where you really do get what you pay for, and it sounds like paying for an outside teacher would be a good idea in this case. For a 36 week school year, you are looking at a little over 10 bucks a week. It really isn't that bad considering the off-loading you're getting in return. I'm assuming OSU will take care of organizing the schedule, creating assignments, and grading everything for you. You just have to make sure he keeps up with turning in the assignments. (My kids do French and Spanish, so I'm going with the hive's consensus on course quality here, not personal experience.) Good luck with your decision! --Janet P.S: I noticed a little asterisk on their pricing page -- it says there is a special rate for home schools. Maybe call after the holiday weekend and see if there's a discount?

We used "Fix it Write" -- it assumes that you have already learned how to form all the letters, and it focuses on exercises to build rhythm and exercises to form letters that are most important to legibility. (For example, making sure there is a hole in the middle of every lowercase "e" and a dot on top of every lowercase "i" so those letters don't look like each other.) There are sub-chapters for both standard and italic cursive -- you do the exercises chapters first, then go to the section for the writing style you want to improve. My perfectionist DD did not like some of the suggestions (to "fudge" certain things to make them easier, or to have a couple of ways to do certain things rather than just one "perfect" way), but overall it was worth our time. It's really about everyday handwriting, and not following a certain model perfectly. --Janet

I have custom planners built around each child's curriculum for the year. I wrote general weekly plans for each course over the summer, and I write detailed daily plans each week as I go. Each planner is in a 3-ring binder, which also serves as a grade book until I can get grades entered on the computer. Each course (section of the binder) has the general weekly outline, plus the blank grade book. The weekly schedule for that week gets slipped in each week as I write it. The previous weeks' plan goes back to me, to check off what we did, remind myself to schedule less work if I overbooked (I never plan too little LOL), remember to grade assignments, etc. --Janet

Are you near an IKEA? -- Lots of low-priced models, and they have a 5 year warranty. They are made by Whirlpool. --Janet

Should have everything "going" by Labor Day: Math - LOF Algebra Social Studies - Homegrown Archaeology study Foreign Language - French in Action English - Bits of Lightning Lit, MCTLA, and a vocab program Science - Spectrum Chemistry PE - Dance Music - Flute lessons Art - Classes taken at weekly co-op for 0.5 credit National History Day project - for 0.5 credit of independent study

The Bridge Math program from Beginnings Publishing is good for those types of skills.

Hmm... Five ensembles? I'm sure there are sports-loving boys who would like to be on five basketball teams, but that doesn't mean it's a good idea to try. I would check that it would even be physically possible to participate in that many groups come recital season. Are you sure performances and other obligations will not overlap? Next, look at the value of each ensemble -- is it music education? socializing with other musicians? performance opportunities? Prioritize and pick-and-choose what makes sense. I think it would be better to join the number of ensembles where he could perform well, as a fully-committed participant, rather than go for five ensembles but only have time to do the minimum amount of practicing and preparation. --Janet

If your child is more "average", he may have a harder time getting merit aid from private colleges. This makes it important to look closely at how homeschool friendly your state universities are and to make sure your records meet their requirements. Different state campuses have different "vibes" and majors, so don't treat them all the same as you choose a good safety school. The website diycollegerankings.com has a 50-50 college list: These are colleges that admit at least 50% of their applicants and graduate at least 50% of their students (in four years for private, in five years for public). This would be another good place for an average student to concentrate their college search. --Janet