Jump to content

Menu
Giving You and Your Child a Road Map to the Best Possible Education
The Well-Trained Mind Community

lunchlady

Members
 View Profile  See their activity

  • Posts

    20

  • Joined

  • Last visited

 Content Type 

Posts posted by lunchlady

    QuestBridge--anybody know anything about them?

    in High School and Self-Education Board

    Posted

    We've gotten an email and letter in the mail from Questbridge. www.questbridge.org Does anybody know about them? I think it's because DS got a high ACT score, but am not sure. But I don't know if our financials qualify us for this (but at the same time, we sure can't afford college). Can anybody tell us the results of using this service? And how they match you up with the colleges?

     

    Thanks,

    Lisa

    Is there some "controversy" over Teaching Textbooks?

    in High School and Self-Education Board

    Posted

    I read brief mention of "some controversy" with TT on another board, but it didn't go into detail. Anybody fill me in?

     

    Thanks.

     

    From what I've read, some don't think it's rigorous enough and doesn't covered the required material. The authors of the curriculum have written a response to this that you can find on this board and others.

     

    I think the proof is just starting to come in that TT **IS** a good curriculum. It's been so new on the market that there haven't been students who've gone through all the highschool levels and had test results from the ACT and SAT.

     

    My son used TT for geometry, Algebra II and Pre-Calc. My son just took the ACT and got a 27 on the Math portion (and he ran out of time to do the last 3 problems)--which is something like the 95 percentile and 6?? something on the SAT portion. Both tests placed him into Pre-Calculus II at the University.

     

    Since the ACT and SAT are suppose to test college preparedness for math, I would say that TT does prepare a student for college level math. Ask me in November and I'll be able to tell you how my son did at the college level.

     

    Lisa

    Questions

    in High School and Self-Education Board

    Posted

    We've read the following

     

    Dickens--Tale of Two Cities, A Christmas Carol

    Shakespeare- MacBeth and Hamlet and some sonnets

    Beowulf--we read also--but I'm thinking that was a different year, volume 1.

     

    We did not read Frankenstein.

     

    I've sold all my volumes, except volume 3. So, I can't look to see if Marsha said we could count Volume 2 as a British Literature or not. We did ALL the TOG literature assignments (never skipped or substituted). I know we read soo many of the classics, but I don't know if we hit enough British lit in a single year to constitute a credit for British lit.

    Teaching helps for Apologia Biology?

    in High School and Self-Education Board

    Posted

    If your son has used Apologia before without any teaching helps, I would think he could do the same with biology. The text is written directly to the student and the author writes in an explanatory way, assuming that there isn't a science teacher nearby. My ds did it without any problems. My dd did have a few areas in certain chapters that she didn't "get". It wasn't very often. So, she asked me to explain them. I just read through enough of the chapter to get an understanding and then explained it.

     

    ETA-- I have NOT learned the material along with my children. I basically give them their assignments and am available if there are questions (which there generally aren't). They've enjoyed the Apologia science and have done well on their tests (both average in high 90's on their tests) without instruction from me. And DS has taken a CLEP exam for science. So, I think Dr. Wile has done a good job of making the texts very user friendly for the student.

     

    Lisa

    Calvin College in Grand Rapids, MI: Opinions??

    in High School and Self-Education Board

    Posted

    It's a very pretty campus. There were a couple of neat things about their program that I liked. They had a special series in January that is 4 weeks (or 6 weeks??) long where you don't take regular class load. Instead you can take an intensive class, attend their free lecture series or take trips abroad. Something like more than 50% of their students take advantage of this and study abroad for those weeks.

     

    They also had a service-learning center that helps Calvin students engage with the community, volunteering their services and in turn learning from those they're helping.

     

    We enjoyed a tour. Our guide didn't talk about the religious aspects of campus life other than the 20 minute daily chapel time that is offered.

     

    Lisa

    ACT test prep recommendation

    in High School and Self-Education Board

    Posted

    What do you recommend for ACT test prep? We have the official book and ds looked over that breifly before the test. I think he did better on the ACT than the SAT, but I think he might be able to improve his score. We'd actually been concentrating on the SAT, so I don't know as much about the ACT--except that it's more of a brute knowledge test.

     

    DS got a 31 composite. 33 english, 32 reading, 30 science, 27 mathematics.

     

    Although he finished precalc with TT, he will be taking it at UTC this fall. And Precalc II in the spring session.

     

    When do you think he should take the ACT again for applying to colleges and financial aid stuff. And what do you think would be the best test prep for us? Should I expect his score to go up this next time?

     

    Lisa

    Notgrass World History

    in High School and Self-Education Board

    Posted

    I'm trying to decide what to do for this coming school year. We've done four years of TOG. It was a great match for ds, but he's going to do college stuff this year. DD, although a great reader, doesn't want to do TOG. I'm leaning towards Notgrass and just adding great books that we want to read.

     

    Anyone have advice, opinions, suggestions on Notgrass?

     

    How is the writing with the program? Will I need to do something else too?

     

    Lisa

×
×
  • Create New...