Not really. I have used Alexandria Tutorials (online lit/essay class) and Mr. Turnbull does incorporate some of IEW into his essay instruction but not all of it. My ds benefited from the IEW session for its tips, ideas and organizing information.

My ds participated in the workshop last year in Cincinnati just prior to the homeschool conference beginning. It was very good....very productive.

Workshops...We took Essay 1 and are currently in Essay2 Workshop (Literary Analysis & Quotation essays). The assigned reading is from the Lively Art of Writing and that reading is then used to "format" the essays

Online...Writeathome.com incorporates the Lively Art of Writing into the lessons. It is our first year with Write at Home and I am very pleased with it.

Alexandria Tutorials! Simply excellent. My oldest son has taken Mr. Turnbulls classes for three years and my youngest son begins with Alexandria Tutorials this coming fall. Great literature reading with essay writing hand-in-hand.

My dear son just started 9th, too. I chose poetry...he reads a new poem on Monday and I time it. We continue until Friday with the same poem and "oogle" over his improvement by Fridays timing. These poems are several stanzas...not limerick types. I believe the rhythm and rhyming will speed up the reading progression. I'm looking for fluency...it's absolutely grueling for me listening to him read. It must be worse for him to actually do it! It's the " um...um...um..." and the overlooking of suffixes, the flipping of vowels, etc. I don't know if laziness is an issue...so I'm looking for books/poetry that might interest him instead of interesting me!

I have used Apologia Online Live classes for four years....from General Science up to Advanced Chemistry with two boys. It has been a great experience and my boys have scored above average on the ACT Science part as a result of these online courses. It was worth every penny.

I found that the background "electronic" music was very distracting during his lectures.

I am planning on using Smarr this fall also for my 9th grader. I went directly to the Smarr site and paid online for the course i wanted, was given a password, and was then able to access the courses. I printed everything and put it in a 3-ring binder. I prefer a "hard-copy" because we live in a very rural area and frequently we have trouble with the Internet.

How funny! I grew up living in two-story "nice" houses and now I live in a double-wide. I don't care because "less is more!" Less cleaning, less clutter...if you stay diligent at throwing things away... And it is on beautiful land! We fixed it up by adding on a screen-in porch, wood floors, etc. we are here to stay.

This is the encouragement I need to hear! I have 2 boys...11 th and 8th grades. I want to believe that I am doing a better job of education than our local school! When I talk to our neighbor boy (who is the same age as my 11th grader) about his public school classes, I am blown away by the lack of academics he is assigned! Never does he have homework and he has read only one book this past school year...fictional account of the atrocities in WWII.

Thanks for the new group!

IEW vs Write At Home? Thoughts, please

My son is taking the online Physics class with Mr. Hugh's. it is wonderful. We have taken Apologia's Online Academy science classes every year for four years now. My son has learned sooo much!

I printed it all off using both sides of paper. It's best if you intend to make teaching marks/highlighting, etc. I did American Lit and various literature guides which I put in a student binder and the keys in another teacher binder. Since I paid for the curriculum, I wanted a tangible item to have on the shelf in case the courses I purchased are gone off the Internet for some reason a year or so down the road