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sixpence1978

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Everything posted by sixpence1978

  1. Anybody here make it through the Lial precalculus book? My DD finished Lial's Intermediate Algebra last year and did fine (B student). Math is not her passion. She is starting 11th grade and due to circumstances is not taking classes at the CC. That's fine since I comfortable teaching math anyway. My question is how do I schedule this book? It has so much more packed into it than previous Lial's books. Anybody actually complete it in a year or choose to cut certain topics out? Would I be better off (given her math reluctance) to spend 11th grade on the College Algebra book and do the Trig book for 12th grade? Our original plan was Precalc this year and then maybe Stats next. She isn't sure of future plans yet, but is thinking something along the lines of nursing or administrative work. Thanks for any input!
  2. Is the Teacher One-Stop Planner a valuable addition? Right now we are just going through the lesson and I am picking problems from the book to work on. What does the One-Stop Planner have that is better?
  3. My DD is doing and very excited about learning Japanese this year for her foreign language. We were all set up to go through the Irasshai series. It's been going.....okay. She loves the videos and Sensei Cook, but we're struggling a bit with the textbook and workbook. Their layout is difficult to follow and use. How did any of you other users use the textbook and workbook to make it flow better? Or did anybody add any other resources that worked out better? Thank you for your help. I really don't want to have DD start dreading the one subject she is showing an interest in.
  4. For year-long courses, do most people start over the grading cycle between semesters or do you keep the grades for the whole year. It seems like my DS's private school does the first option, but then I'm not sure how they give a total grade on his transcript (he's just starting 12th grade so I haven't seen the official transcript yet). But my DD is going to stay homeschooled for high school and I'm trying to figure out the best way to keep track.
  5. This is really interesting and I'm curious to see the outcome. My son took his first SAT in March and got a 1240 with a 660 on the math portion. Since then, he worked really hard studying and took the June test. He ended up with a 1360 and 750 on the math test. He said the math test was really easy and that he thinks he got all the no-calculator section problems correct.
  6. Thank you. I tried ? Thanks so much for the input everybody and for the video link. That's an awesome resource. We decided to go ahead and get Jacobs because both my DD and DH picked it out of the lineup. I'm still not entirely convinced, but I do have Holt on hand in case we need it. Thanks again!
  7. Anybody have any insight on a good selection for Geometry. I have been searching old threads for all Geometry reviews and am still unsure. My DD finished up Algebra using Lial's this year and it went well overall. She learns best with good clean visuals, sequential learning, and small things that keep it interesting. I would like a program that has Algebra review in some way. Some programs that I have been considering: Holt Geometry - I actually own this one because I tutored a student who used it this past year. I find it okay. I like the amount of review. But the presentation is very busy and I found the instruction to be okay. Doable, but not terribly exciting and some of the lessons seem very long. Jacobs Geometry - I'm curious how my creative daughter would do with its style. She generally likes words and creativity, but I'm not sure how she'll do with the "discovery" approach. While she likes things creative, she also likes them to be very clear in their expectations. Jurgensen Geometry - I wish I could see better samples, but the Table of Contents seems to have a good flow. I've heard great reviews, but my DD is very average in math. She does fine, but it definitely isn't a passion of hers. BJU Geometry - I like the layout a lot; colorful but without being too busy. I like their system of adding in a bit of mixed review each day. Again, not sure if it would be overkill or not for my DD. Programs we are not interested in - TT or MUS. I'm good at math and comfortable teaching it (I am a math tutor) and my DD doesn't like video programs. I'm simply having trouble landing on one that would fit my DD best.
  8. My DD will be starting 9th grade next year. This year we did Lial's Introductory Algebra. Overall, she picked things up very quickly and her computation abilities soared this past year. However, she still struggles conceptually and word problems have been her nemesis for many years now. Given her score at the end of the year (an 81%) and the results from her IOWA tests (below average in math but way above in computation), I'm thinking that doing another year of Algebra for 9th grade would be in her best interests. Is that the general consensus? Is there an appropriate Algebra course that will help solidify both algebra as well as general math concept skills? I've been looking at Jacob's, Foerster, and BJU. I'd even be willing to entertain Saxon with some trepidation. As far as science, we were originally planning on starting Apologia Biology next year, but her test scores show that she is very behind in Physical science concepts (which is funny since we did Apologia Physical this year). Overall she seems to like Apologia, but I haven't seen a ton of retention with the material. Now I'm wondering if I should look at doing something physics-first based like Hewitt or BJU/ABeka Physical. Any thoughts? She is a girl that loves stories, pictures, and light-heartedness - and doesn't mind repetition.
  9. Even though that is a different Novare book than we were looking at, may I ask what in particular your DD didn't like about the layout.
  10. I've decided to go the Physics first route with my DD for 9th next year. We've narrowed our choices down to either Novare Introductory Physics or Hewitt's Conceptual Physics. Any users of these programs care to give any insight on how they worked for you? We will not be outsourcing this class since I feel comfortable teaching/helping with physics. Math skills are fine with DD. She is comfortable with algebra. Does one text read better than another? More clear? Hands-on/experiments?
  11. Those are all good ideas. I was wondering about doing something like a conceptual physics first. I think she can give it take it on physics in general. She loves all things animal though, which is why she would like to do marine bio. In general she's a B-ish student. She has dyslexia and has to work hard for most everything. She is doing Lials Algebra this year and averaging around an 81%. She seems to catch on quickly, but makes a lot of errors and still struggles with word problems. Her scores in Physical science this year have ranged between 75%-100%.
  12. We are using Physical for science this year (8th grade), but will only make it a little more than half-way through it due to life circumstances this year. I'm trying to decide if we should continue to use Physical next year and I add to it to make it a complete HS credit for 9th grade and then move onto Biology, Chemistry, and Physics for 10th, 11th, and 12th. However, my DD is also very interested in getting to the Marine Biology book. Where would that fall in the sequence, at 12th grade or right after covering Biology? Can we leave off Physics and cover Marine instead if we did do a beefed up continuation of Physical next year? My DD is an average and sometimes struggling student. She is doing Algebra 1 this year and doing okay. I'm still undecided if I'll have her do a second year of Algebra for 9th grade or move on to Geometry (but that's whole new thread to bring up someday).
  13. Those are all great points and I appreciate all the tips. I am going to work on a more set schedule to implement next semester to bring more balance to our days. I do want to point out that I have not listed all that we do, which includes writing, vocabulary, apologetics, etc... We do a full day of school each day (9:00-2:30) minus a lunch break, plus some homework for co-op in the afternoons. So, we do a lot, it's just that I have a hard time centering our focus on more of the fine arts. But I do need to be more aware of making certain subjects more full. I struggle a bit putting all the resources together and bringing out meaningful discussions. So, I guess looking at outsourcing that a bit more or at least finding something with more direction would be of benefit. Thanks again.
  14. Thanks everybody. It's given me a lot to think about. I do think a better balance of time is what we need. Right now, we'll easily spend an hour each on math and science, but grammar is only 15 minutes of our day, reading is discussed once a month, history has been 2x a week for 20 minutes, and Japanese is shoved to whenever we have time (so we've only done it 3x this past semester). Thanks again for the encouraging words and suggestions.
  15. Here I have been homeschooling for 9 years, and I still don't have it all figured out. My DD is now in 8th grade and I'm looking down the barrel of high school, which we are leaning toward homeschooling as well. I'm trying to plan ahead some to give us direction. However, while doing so, I realize that I struggle with providing the right education for her. You see, I'm a lover of math and science. But my DD loves reading, history, grammar, and language. I've realized that I push hard on what I like, while letting things that she likes fall to the side. How can I get out of my box in order to put more focus on what she needs? Anybody else been successful with such a paradigm shift?
  16. Thank you guys so so much. I have tons to look through now. Yes, her problem right now is from the ascites. Surgery will probably be in her future. Right now she's just trying to figure out how to dress with her uncomfortable belly plus her PICC line. She'll probably be getting a port in at the same time as her surgery. These suggestions are great and I can't thank you enough.
  17. I admit to being completely out of the loop regarding clothing. I tend to stick with jeans/khaki and t-shirts pretty much 100% of the time. My mom's 65th birthday is coming up. Unfortunately, just within the past few weeks we have learned that she has ovarian cancer and has started on chemo. She is asking for some new pants because of all the bloating issues she has been having. She has mostly been wearing PJ and sweat pants, but would love something that would be comfortable on her abdomen without feeling so frumpy. My first thought was for the LE Starfish pants, but a previous thread made it seem like those have gotten tighter. Any ideas of where to look? She isn't the type to really go for leggings and a tunic though might be converted as long as it isn't too wild and crazy. She is your typical pear shape, about a size 14. Thanks for any help and suggestions.
  18. We ran into that a few times when we were using Lial's PreAlgebra last year. It didn't happen for every chapter, but it did happen on a few of them. My DD was also coming from spiral programs (also CLE and Horizons), but I'm not sure if that was the problem or not. When we hit snags like that, I had no problem slowing things down and reviewing a ton more. Usually we spread a lesson out over 2 days and do the odd problems. We also do all the odds for any review sets as well. Any time I noticed that she was struggling at the end of a chapter, we would add an extra review day and work the evens on the review set. If she was still struggling I would pick and choose from all the evens that we hadn't done during the actual lessons, making yet another review set. Yes, this did take some time because I would write them all down for her like a worksheet, but it definitely helped. You could even do this more than once because Lial's has so many problems. I also kept Lial's BCM on hand. Occasionally I would add in extra problems from that or use it to add in extra lessons on particularly tough topics. At one point in time I thought about adding in some of the Key To books, but the above method ended up working out well for us and it was free.
  19. Our science selection for the year isn't going so well and I've narrowed down switching to either Holt science and technology physical or starting on Rainbow science. If you've used either of these, what things did you like or not like about it? Is there any way to do Rainbow science cheaper? Thanks for any insight.
  20. We had great success here as well. We were using AAS before switching to A&P and I thought I would refer to the spelling rules as needed. Other than the few rules that A&P teaches, I also never referred to other spelling rules. I actually found that they confused my DD more. Like you mentioned, rules worked really well for learning to read, but fell through for spelling. As far as the font, I didn't make a big deal of it. My DD liked to try tracing it how it was, but she would still write using the font I taught her. The tracing didn't seem to be that huge of a part of A&P for us.
  21. I agree with most of the advice given. It definitely sounds like it's time to look into some evaluations. Ask your charter school, ask the local public school, or ask any homeschool umbrella programs in your state. I'm going to have to agree with Saxon math. It doesn't sound like a good fit. My DD is good at math and could handle CLE, Horizons, etc... but Saxon was never a good fit. In my opinion, Saxon doesn't work well with kids that struggle with reading. It is heavy linguistically. I would either switch back to CLE if he was doing well with it, or choose a different math that he succeeded with. We have had good luck with Lial. Also, unless he likes it, I feel like AAS 2 is going to be too babyish for a 7th grader. I would look into Sequential Spelling or Megawords to help with his spelling. Finally, we did decide to repeat a school year with my DD. She did 6th grade twice so that she would be ready for the increased workload in 7th. It was the best decision we made. She didn't like it at the time, but she is much more confident and it is reflected in her test scores as well. Of course, we live in a state where we have to declare a grade level and submit testing at that grade level.
  22. I hope you all can stomach one more. I've been doing so much reading regarding how to do literature that my head is spinning. We honestly haven't had a ton of success with any of my past literature plans. After about a month, it usually just degrades into my DD reading an assigned book each month. Sometimes she'll tell me about it or I will ask a few questions, but nothing that would really classify as "discussion". I do still read aloud to her because 1) I can pick books beyond her reading level and 2) she still really likes it. My DD is dyslexic, but has turned into a hearty reader, though she does still struggle with complicated language (ie, most classics). Last year my grand plan was to go through TTC over the summer and discuss our books each month. Well, let's just say I still haven't watched those DVDs. Also, I only ever read 1 of her assigned books to discuss (yikes!) We've tried lit anthologies in the past (BJU and K12) and neither have lasted long either. For this year, I think I have narrowed it down to either doing: 1) Just making myself proceed with the TTC route that didn't happen last year. It seems very daunting. 2) Picking 4 literature guides to complete while trying to do TTC with some other books or our read-alouds. Although I really don't want all the vocabulary work that is in most of those guides because my DD loves Wordly Wise (for some reason). 3) Going with something pre-planned like LL. I like this idea as well, but I'm not sure which level to put her in, am not wild about a few of the books, and we've already read some as well. Would I just skip that portion??? My DD is also quite behind in her writing skills, so I worry that that part of the program might be very hard. I'm not sure why I struggle so much with this subject when I am a voracious reader. I'd love any insight or other suggestions.
  23. I'm somewhat in the same boat as you. This is my DD's 8th grade year and there is the possibility of sending her to the private high school that DS goes to next year. It's still undecided at this point. Honestly, I'm not sure I would modify what you are already doing for 8th grade. Around here, high school seems to be a pretty fresh start for history. Most schools start with Geography for 9th grade and move on to World or US History from there. Coming from a homeschool setting, you may still be able to do AP if wanted depending on your DS's interest and study skill level. For science, around here is it either Earth Science for average students or Biology for honors/AP students in 9th grade. I know there isn't usually a lot of prep for Biology in Middle school. I think I would focus a lot more on making sure his math, reading, and writing skills were strong. I would also really focus on learning good time management and study skills because those are a huge change in high school (at least they were for my DS).
  24. I've always been a pen and paper kind of planner. However, DD is entering 8th grade next year and I think I should give something more robust a try in anticipation of high school record keeping. I've looked mainly at Homeschool Tracker and Homeschool Planet, but I was wondering if there were any planners that were software based. I'd much prefer to pay for a program once over having to subscribe each year (though I'm willing to do that if necessary). So, hit me up with your current favorites and why. I'm looking for something that I can enter lessons in, print out daily or weekly checklists, track grades, attendance, and transcripts.
  25. You could stay at Great Wolf Lodge. It's almost resort like. Not exactly an iconic Colorado Springs activity, but something to do without a car.
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