Chanley
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Posts posted by Chanley
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IT has been a very long time since I delved into any of Ovid's work but if I recall, rape is a common theme. I think that includes both sex and violence.
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Yeah the Intro Class is the one where all 3 books are crammed into one year. The teacher is pretty amazing. Before her class, my kid would not even write a 5 sentence summary for me. Now the same kid is easily churning out long papers.
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Favorite Online Classes:
Lukeion- Latin: these classes are rigorous, the teachers are thorough and not only teach the student Latin but also good study skills and time management
WTMA- US History with Dr. Brian. She was able to get my reluctant writer to write very well from primary sources.
Science- We have been pleased with all classes taught by Amy Upperman. She is very well organized and her Biology and Anat & Physiology classes have been demanding, thorough and well taught.
Rhetoric: I cannot praise Mr. Hummel enough, the kids really love him and he gets them to write well in a very gentle, cordial way. If you have a kid who is scared of writing classes, I would definitely consider Mr. Hummel
AOPS: Ms. Quintero is great, I could NEVER teach AOPS but she does a fine job of it and my son is extremely happy in her classes.
PAHomeschoolers: My dd is taking AP Psychology with Mrs. Goodman this year. The class is thorough, well organized and my very type A kid is really enjoying it. This class is much better than the Pysch class I took as a freshman in college.
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My child took the AP prep class. The instructor is top notch! I highly recommend her. There was a considerable amount of reading from primary sources and my kid really learned to look at historical events in a more holistic way, that is, that the events did not happen in a vacuum.
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If you get to a point where you feel like you need review in book 3, remember Susan has links to printable flash cards. I have mine laminated and sometimes set them out at the beginning of the lesson.
Just wait till you see the jump in ability in level 4!!!
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She sees the benefits but sometimes the work feels overwhelming. She realized that her senior year of high school is going to feel much lighter because she won't be taking Latin. We are already trying to make sure next year when she takes AP Latin, her workload in other subjects is not as intense. It has definitely taught her some study discipline.
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Yeah our internet was out for the entire weekend and that was cramping her schedule for the PSQ. I need to detach and stay in my happy bubble.
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One hour. The teacher is excellent.
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Latin III here too! Maybe we need a support group for kids taking Latin III, the stressin' has already started here. I believe the PSQ opens on the 22nd. I had an email yesterday for instructions to sign up for class emails. I made my kid do it for me.
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My sister loved the kinesiology program at the University of Michigan.
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During the class the kids would usually workshop the weekly assignment for the class which consisted of writing assignments of about 500 words. There is quite a bit of discussion between the students which is artfully guided by Mr. Hummel. An example of one of the topics gun control, assisted suicide and big topics from the media. Mr. Hummel was able to guide the kids and keep the class discussions academic.
Mr. Hummel is an excellent teacher, kids absolutely adore him and he is careful not to bog them down with too much work. My daughter said that he was very careful not to put two big assignments back to back. Rhetoric 1 definitely made my daughter learn how to analyze her arguments better and discern the important bits in a piece. She is very careful not to generalize as a result of this class. Which is super nice when dealing with a teenager.
I recommend this class very highly.
Edited to add: if she can handle Lukeion, she can handle this for sure!
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I still agree that Bio is a very time consuming class, however, the instructor is top notch. My non-science kid absolutely loved how organized and involved Ms. Upperman has been throughout the year. The class was actually better in scope than the freshman bio class I took in college.
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Got them this morning. We were disappointed with the SAT scores from the test she took the day after AP exams. So ACT scores that were higher than what she anticipated was a nice relief.
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Airbnb also has plenty of longer term (by the month) rentals in ATL, I discovered that when I was looking for a place for the weekend. Many of the places I wanted to rent wanted a longer contract than just a week. Make sure you look at proximity to the Marta stations unless you want to keep a car in the city. Good luck!
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Dd took the APUSH yesterday and now we are about to leave for the SAT. She did not have time to answer part C. on one of the short response questions. She felt confident that Dr. Brian at WTMA prepared her really well for the essays. They have spent so much time on synthesis that part was comfortable for her. I just hope the person scoring her exam can read her writing.
Que sera sera...
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To add to this list, if the student is having a bad day and is reluctant, sometimes I start the session with a game. Normally we take the last 10 minutes to play a Spelling Success game, it is usually a reward for getting our work done for the day. But every so often, we inevitably hit a snag and are having a bad day from the start. On those days, it is important to me that the student leaves the hour feeling successful. So we start with a game. Sometimes that is enough to get on track, but sometimes it is not. If the game does not get the student ready to work, then I will just review previous lessons as suggested.
I also have a student who is very athletic and loves to move. I will have him get up and do some jumping jacks when sitting is too much. This is never used as punishment but more of a "hey lets jump the wiggles out" exercise.
I am going to post some ideas for how to help kids stay engaged with something as potentially challenging and exhausting as reading remediation:
1. Keep lessons short. If you need to do two lessons a day but keep them both shorter, then do so. This is exhausting work for a lot of kids. Their brain goes into overload. Go at the pace that your child can successfully make it through.
2. Do something more physical before and after.
3. Do something afterwards that they look forward to so they know when you are done they can take a mental break.
4. Recognize that this truly is hard work. If your child is sick or had an exhausting day the day before then maybe just play a Barton game for the day instead of setting them up for a potentially failed and frustrating lesson.
5. Do your prep. If you aren't sure yourself what is happening in the lessons you may confuse your child terribly. Undoing that confusion can be really, really hard.
6. Maybe let them have a small, healthy snack and a glass of water during lessons. Sometimes just taking a sip of water and eating a grape or a whole grain cracker with cheese helped DD to stay focused.
7. Be willing to go off on small tangents with the words and to keep things lighter. DD made a lot of connections when we would sometimes talk about the words, make up funny sentences, create our own games with the tiles, etc. and it kept her attitude better.
8. Use the suggestions in the TMs and on the website for some really helpful ideas when you hit snags.
9. Accept that there are going to be good days and bad days because reading remediation is hard, but having a bad day doesn't mean that you are a bad teacher, the program is a failure or your child is impossible to teach.
10. Build in time to go back and review previous lessons. This has helped us so much here. I find a logical place to stop moving forward and we go back and do Extra Practice pages, play Barton games, Spelling Success games, etc. to solidify what came before, then move forward again.
11. If you have tried and tried but Barton (or any other reading remediation program) just is not working, don't be afraid to put it aside and take a break or even walk away for good.
Anyway, hope that helps some.
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Not sure if it is considered Honors Bio but it is rigorous and the teacher is excellent. She is very organized and consistently updates the page to include extra resources for what they are studying. I know that my kid is currently doing more math in this Bio class (ratios of heredity?) than I ever did in my liberal arts college Bio class. The tests are challenging and the written answers are making my kid learn how to write suitable answers for scientific questions. Personally, I think it should be an honors level class but that is just my opinion which may not be as accurate.
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Could you enroll her in some online classes? Or work through a solid english/writing program that has some grammar in it? Can you get her schedule changed or at least ask the teacher about her placement in that class?
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My daughter took Rhetoric Prep last year. It was very helpful to her and helped her get acquainted with what is expected when writing things like a topos. She took it with Ms. Brian and we both love her. She was very clear and concise about what needed to be done and was patient when my daughter needed anything. Response emails were quick and she brought my daughter out of her shell in regards to writing.
This year my daughter has Mr. Hummel who is an excellent teacher, I was disappointed to see that he is not going to be teaching any expository classes next year because I wanted him to be responsible for my son's writing education.
You cannot go wrong with either teacher, they are both top notch in my experience.
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How did he do with nonsense words in Barton?
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I am so glad you posted, I did look that up. and you are correct. After level for IEW can be used as an "add on" program . I was mistaking it with grammar which is not recommended at that level. I clearly need more coffee!
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In Barton there is outside reading restriction until Level 6, I would not have my kids write anything outside of the program until they are through with Level 6 of the Barton program. Until then, they do not know many of the rules for reading many common words and it may reinforce compensatory strategies that will make Barton tutoring harder down the line. You want to break the "bad habits" and reinforce the good ones.
That said, IEW is a great tool after child has completed enough Barton tutoring. I am using it with my kid who is in Level 9 of Barton and it is great.
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Barton is linear for a good reason. The program NEVER requires the student to do read or spell something that the program has not taught. This is to insure a high level of success for the student. That is why it is called "systematic" Barton starts with teaching the child phonemes and how to encode and decode. While this may seem "easy" at first, there are many dyslexics who really struggle with that skill. Plus the first 2 levels teach the methodology. The hand movements and cues are an integral part of why the program works.
I am a Barton tutor so I have experience with more than just my own child. The "easy" lessons are always a blessing because we can breeze through them and the child feels a great level of success which helps when we get a hard lesson. I have experienced lessons that I thought should have been easy but we struggled for 5 hours (not at once) to complete a lesson. And then there are some that just take 2 tutoring sessions. Those are great for high fives and lots of praise because what is easy for one is not for another.
Every single aspect of the Barton program is well thought out and has a reason. Even the words used during the lesson are scripted to prevent confusion. I am positive that Susan herself would be happy to explain why. If you skip steps or fail to watch the videos (and yes, I know how boring those can be) you will miss out on kernals of importance that help you and the student.
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I thought Saxon was considered a decently rigorous curriculum while TT has historically under performed in regards to rigor. My concern would be that TT would not be enough to have your child ready for calculus or University level work.
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WTM Biology with lab?
in High School and Self-Education Board
Posted
A couple of hours a day is perfectly normal for this class. It is well organized and goes into great depth. Ms. Upperman is a fantastic teacher. I do wish they would label this as an honors Bio class. I do not think this class is for the unmotivated student. My daughter said 2 hours a day (including the 2 hours per week in class) was about accurate except for lab work. The labs took considerably more time as the lab reports are detailed and time consuming. This class will definitely prepare your kid for college level science classes. I just wish we would have taken the SATII test after my kid was done with the class.