It was my year 8 history teacher who first told me that history is written from the victor's viewpoint. Quite revolutionary in Australia in 1983. And at the risk of sounding narky (and I don't really mean to be), as a scientist, it is my job not to deal in opinion, but to put my opinions and beliefs aside and deal with the facts. But for scientists, that's both a priviledge and a curtain to hide behind. I'm not sure historians are as lucky. D

DS13 is saving up to do this. He's done a lot of research. He's been plotting and scheming all year, and keeps changing his mind. Its been a really good exercise, mostly because earning the money to pay for it has given him lots of time to think about exactly what he wants, and the compromises that you have to make for affordability. He already has a Raspberry Pi and is VERY tech savvy. He wants a gaming PC (we are a Mac family and he is the only one interested in gaming). Meanwhile, he's teaching himself programming and LINUX, upgrading ancient iMacs and dual booting them, and playing around with 3D modelling. I have to admit I underestimated his flare, enthusiasm and determination. I've taken IT off the list of things to teach him.......

I have a very stubborn child. We butt heads. He's an only, so our interactions are intense. I wish I had been tougher earlier on the 'get the work done' front. At 13, he has some bad habits and unrealistic expectations. So with the benefit of hindsight, here is my advice: do with it what you will: Give him some options: "you can do reading now, or maths or watch this science video. All of these things need to be done today, but you can be in charge of the order." A little bit of control goes a long way, but not doing the allocated tasks isn't an option I would vary reading. Somedays, reading should just be you reading and him listening. It doesn't have to feel like work. If you think the program doesn't work for him, be big enough to admit it. Thats a really important behaviour to model for kids, particularly stubborn kids who value integrity and honesty. I would give him my infamous "I don't like cleaning the toilet but it has to be done" talk (DS hates it!). Learning to suck it up and do the work is an important life lesson. You may as well learn it as a child cos you are sure gonna get it as grown up! I would not shift school to his time line. School hours are between 9 and 3. I get to knock off at 3. I am available to help if you need it, but not if you stuffed around during school hours. I would make it clear that xbox use is contingent on school work. If you fronted up to school and the teacher told you that your son had refused to work all day, would you expect the teacher to stay back with your son, and then let him play xbox when you got home? Of course not! For tomorrow, forgive him (he's still a baby and he's testing you with the only tools he's got) and move on. If he works, don't mention the incident again. Good luck: its a long and rocky journey, but worth the effort. D

Chocolate. Always.

I left my job as a science writer and statistician 5 years ago to homeschool DS. Much of this piece is correct, although I'm not sure I can read it objectively yet! I was very lucky to work with an outstanding science writer. Her mantra was that our writing should be understandable for a 12 year old. Publishers and granting bodies are generalists. If you can't explain your work in understandable terms, you don't deserve their money. Unfortunately in science, the prevaling opinion seemed to be that the more complex you made your work sound, the cleverer you were. It took me years to realise that the real art was making difficult concepts appear easy, not the other way around. D

Yes, we still have Gaytimes. They're DH's favourites (this sentance is not weird in Australia!) A few others: To "nurse" means to hold, or provide nursing care. Breastfeeding is called just that. Thongs come in pairs, are made of rubber and you put them on your feet. No self-respecting Aussie would be without at least one pair. That not-quite-there underwear is a "g-string". A pussy is a cat and this term is quite acceptable yelled up the street. It is also the source of much silly tittering when watching the wonderful vintage British comedy "Are you being served" The bit of anatomy at the top of your legs (the other bit) is your bum or your ar$e. A butt is the bit you have left after you smoke a cigarette (which is a fag, smoke, cancer stick or dhurrie). When I was a kid we had lollies called 'Fags'. They were fake cigarettes. They've been renamed, but I can't remember what they are called. Fanny is a bit rude, and rarely used. The opening theme from "The Nanny" caused a bit of consternation. We would have said " out on her bum" but that didn't rhyme. Our terms for Indigenous Australians are every bit as revolting as yours. The n word isn't used. We have others. Aborigine isn't tolerated anymore.

We had a bit of a public stink in Australia last month when Aldi sold a number of children's picture books as their weekly special. Unfortunately, one of the books was Roald Dahl's version of Cinderella, which anyone with half a brain can see is a spoof and not for little kids. The book uses the word "slut" in the very British context of slatternly housekeeper - no mention is made of Cinder's sexual proclivities. Aldi copped a pasting, as did poor Roald Dahl, and the book was hastily withdrawn amid threats of boycott. I'm now going to spend all day tomorrow trying not to say 'ejaculating' D

Brilliant job, Hunter! Thanks for doing all this for anybody and everybody. D

Open library have Ivan Southall (beautifully written, 12 and up), and Morris Gleiztman and Paul Jennings (twaddle but fun for 8-10ish). BUT best of all, they have Michael Morpurgo, the fabulous UK children's author. Lots of them!!!!! I hope this works for your side of the pond D

Hunter, have you looked into openlibrary.org? I'm not sure how it works in the US, but we seem to be able to access ebooks via DAISY. You can request the ebook and wait your turn in a queue until the previous borrow checks it back in (I assume they have limited licensing and that this gets around copyright). It may help solve the 20th century problem. They have Ruth Park's wonderful novels Playing Beattie Bow (set in both 1970's Sydney and 1870's Sydney), good from ages 11 and up, and The Harp in the South Trilogy, set in one of Sydney's poorest suburbs in 1950's or so. We studied it in year 9 - its really superb. D

Don't watch Whitechapel with young kids!!!!!!!!! Its about serial killers. Heartbeat is nice. Its set in a small Yorkshire village in the 1960's. There are about 4,000 episodes. Its mostly pretty tame. Older kids may be bored ridged, but young ones should like it. I don't know if you can get Sea Change, a fabulous, quirky Australian series. Well worth watching. Similar style to Doc Martin. Silk is fabulous. Teens and above. Spooks is great, but again, only for much older kids. There are some graphic, violent scenes, one in particular in the first episode. Similarly, the Lakes and anything else by Jimmy McGovern: harrowing, fabulous, thought provoking. The Street is his best, IMO. Adults only : its pretty confronting. Skins is great for older teens: lots of real life issues like suicide, drug use and sex. If you have insomnia, or a lot of ironing to do, you could try Midsummer Murders. Its a seemingly endless series, set in beautiful country villages, where at least 50% of the population must have been killed off by now. Someone must enjoy watching it because its always on our national broadcaster. I suspect its my MIL....... Have you watched Cranford and North and South? D

I forgot "The Magic Pudding"!!! It was published in 1918. Its fabulous. Quite mad and and very funny. Good from about age 8 as a read aloud. Its on Gutenberg. You could team it with a study of Lindsay's poetry and art (he did the illustrations, too) but be careful of his adult art: its full of beautiful, voluptuous women and is a bit risque. He was part of Sydney's bohemian set. Very influential. D

BTW, the change to our copyright laws is fairly recent (used to be public domain 50 years after author's death). The 70 year cutoff happened because of our free trade agreement with the US D

Try We of the Never Never (its on Gutenberg) Also CJ Dennis and Dorothy Wall. Wall is for young kids, Dennis wrote great poems and The Sentimental Bloke, which I wouldn't use till high school.

For an Australian author's work to be out of copyright they must have died before 1955. From the Adelaide Uni site: Under Australian copyright law, and the Free Trade agreement wth the USA, copyright has expired in published works of authors who died before 1955. (Authors who died after 1954 will retain copyright for 70 years after their death.) These works are now within the "public domain" in Australia and this is why the University is able to reproduce such works on this site. However, works may still be copyright in other countries. If copyright in the work still exists in the country from which you are accessing this website, it may be illegal for you to download the work. It is your responsibility to check the applicable copyright laws in your country. I'm running through lists of authors in my head, but all of them died more recently (we are a relatively young nation). Some great Aussie authors who won't make your list are Ivan Southall, Colin Thiele and Ruth Park. These would be my pick for insights into Australian life up to 1990. You will be able to access a couple of our legendary yarn spinners, Banjo Paterson and Henry Lawson. Both are known for their short stories and poems, and their very different depictions of the bush. I'll try to think up some more long-dead authors.... D

Oh, yes please!

Some students learn extremely well through just reading. I was one of them until I started Uni, when the work became too complex. Biology is information heavy, and the temptation is to stay in the lowest of Bloom's levels of learning, knowledge, because that is the easiest way to get through all the info in a reasonable timeframe. But this isn't really learning. You need to move your daughter up to at least the analysis phase. Doing the labs with the corresponding unit, rather than in a block at the end, will help. Active learning is a must with biology. To give you an idea, during the first year of my science degree (I majored in molecular biology), I spent 4 hours a week in biology lectures and 4 hours in the lab. This mix is what I'll aim for with DS in high school. Give her some projects to do where she has to read, research, analyse and synthesise information. These could be mostly plant based. Plant experiments are cheap and easily controlled (I did loads at uni). A good biology course should include ecology, genetics, evolution, cellular bio, human and animal systems, and botany. There are loads of good videos for supplementing. Bozeman is great, and he gets to the point quickly. Great note taking practice! Also try Open Learning Australia: loads of free, short courses from university lecturers, and you don't have to be Australian. Also have a look at Alison, based in the UK. Again, completely free, but both require internet access. BTW, there is a nasty myth, often perpetuated by physicists ;), that biology is easy. Its not. D

My husband is plugging away at the moment, studying for his masters on our 2008 MacBook. We bought it second hand in 2009. The battery only holds about an hours charge, but otherwise, it has never skipped a beat (including a nasty incident with a cup of tea). We've just blown our years IT budget on a 2009 iMac. I'd love a MacBook Pro, but really I only want it cos its new and shiny. D

You forgot 3 environmentalists to ask if the lightbulb was a super-efficient LED D

And some kisses for Farrer, too! Thanks, ladies. Fabulous as ever D

I have nothing sensible to add, but THANK you! I could kiss both of you, Hunter and Maize, for this resource. I've been faffing about trying work out how to cover 1700-1900 in the 10 weeks left of this year. You just gave me back my sanity and the last week of my holidays!!!!!! D

Wow - that's pretty drastic! I agree a dead-end option would be really bad, especially at this stage. How doable is repeating just maths, or would he have to repeat the whole year? I have no idea how your system works. I can't see it being viable in NSW, although a flexible school could allow maths to be completely privately tutored if they were open to working with an external teacher. If you tutor over summer, you've basically got two terms up your sleeve before year 10 starts. Would that get you over the line with extra work over the next year? And how will his poor maths skills impact on his other subjects like science? D

I think reading online books without downloading might be a bit like smoking pot without inhaling ;) D

You can unblock your DVD player so that it will play anything. Google it "unblock DVD player" and your make and model number. It involves lots of weird holding down of buttons in complicated sequences. D

Hi Ruth, how close is your curriculum to Australia's? We have a series of books called "Understanding year X maths" by Marlin. Years 7 and 8 are separate books, years 9 and 10 are combined. They are divided into units, with 5-10 page summaries of each topic (detailed enough to teach from) and then 5 worksheets, ranging from easy to difficult. They're good for tackling topics that the student isn't solid on. Danielle