He's going into a regular 4-year public university. It's the flagship campus of our university system, if that matters. Yolanda

As part of new student orientation, my son has to take an on-line math placement test. Although he's a transfer student, he hasn't had any math in over a year and would like to do some review before taking the test. Can anyone recommend material to do so? Is this anything like the Accuplacer tests given at the community colleges? Thanks! Yolanda

Language tutors can charge more than either math or music teachers. I was told this by a math tutor and a language tutor. That being said, she is young and inexperienced - I would pay her $12/hour. Once she gets more experience, then she can command lots more. Yolanda

Nope, don't worry at all about PS requirements. All I care about is what the colleges are looking for since that's our goal. Couldn't even tell you what the People's Republic of Mass government schools require for graduation, besides the useless high stakes test, that is. I think most experienced, knowledgeable homeschoolers can figure out for themselves, through research, what constitutes a good preparation for their kids' goals, be that college, or trade school, or the work force. Yolanda

Oh, how I wish Carson was more interesting, but, alas, he's not. I've tried 2 or 3 times to use his books with both my boys and he's just way too dry. The syllabus for the Hewitt history course is useful for any course and it's only $6, but it uses Carson, and that's the problem. Wish I could recommend them. Maybe someone has had better luck with them, but we have not. Wanna' buy mine? I have all of them and the teacher's guide (which doesn't provide any answers - grrr). Yolanda

Yes, yes, and yes! My older son was easily distracted and I didn't realize that I needed to monitor him much more closely than I did. He admitted a couple of years later how hard it was to study anywhere near the computer (so much for on-line classes and programs) as it was way too tempting to hop on and play games or chat with friends. My younger son is a bit better as he is not as easily distracted nor does he care for the computer as much, but....I keep having to remind myself that I have to hold him accountable on a daily, not weekly, basis. Leaving the house for several hours when they know you won't be back is especially tempting. Make sure they are kept very busy, are accountable and make it very hard to be tempted, especially with the computer. Yolanda

:iagree:

:iagree:Just borrowed this from a friend of mine last night and am loving what I'm reading. Yolanda

A bunch of us moms got together a few years ago to do a lit co-op and thought we could use Stobaugh's products. Not. There were few instructions for either the analysis or the writing, lots of typos, and a ridiculous amount of work expected by the student. All of the writing examples provided were his own or his kids' writings which none of us thought were very good. Then the next year we heard that he had taken care of the typos, done some reformatting, changing to the product, so we decided to try his Amer Lit or Brit Lit, don't remember which. We had originally tried the Lit Analysis. Same conclusion. It was of absolutely no use to us. I live near CBD so often attend their warehouse sales - Stobaugh's stuff is always on the clearance table. The product sounds wonderful, but not one of the 6-7 moms who tried using it (experienced homeschoolers) could get rid of it fast enough. There are many new products out there that I think are much more usable than Stobaugh's.

:iagree: Except for his bio on Mao, my son has loved every single book by Marrin. Yolanda

Hi, I just hopped on and saw that you were looking for Lial's Int Alg. I just posted mine on the WTM FS & Vegsource boards yesterday. Someone on this board recommended an earlier version (mine is the 8th) rather than the latest to save money since they're virtually the same content, so I went ahead and bought the student text and the solutions manual on Amazon back in Jan/Feb. Ended up not using it 'cause I didn't want to switch halfway through the year so I'm now selling it. You can do some searching on the boards for Lial's Intermediate, and on Amazon to get more specific edition information. Yolanda

My younger of two sons gets to finally enjoy uninterrupted attention from his parents, and I'm loving it! I can enjoy learning what he wants to learn, benefit from mistakes made with his older brother, go out to lunch with him, go places with him. All the things I never got to do with him, but I did with his older brother 'cause the older one ALWAYS seems to get more attention. Remember all those times the little one(s) gets dragged along? No more getting dragged along. It's a wonderful time. Enjoy! Yolanda

I'm just finishing it up! Hard enough to get through without a head cold; can't imagine reading it with one. Can't say it's one of my favorites. I much preferred The Scarlet Letter. Yolanda

Check this website out. It's the best I've seen comparing the two tests. http://www.appelrouthtutoring.com/blog/2008/08/26/sat-vs-act/#more-36 Yolanda

Never heard of any such thing here in the People's Republic of Massachusetts. I imagine it would be possible only in states which regard homeschools as private schools. We are not classified as private schools in this state. Yolanda

There was a recent discussion of Dr. Callahan's DVD's for Jacobs' Geometry. Check the boards; it was within the last week. Yolanda

I wouldn't hesitate to go with your dd. I sat down with my son and together we put together his schedule, then he went to the appointment on his own. But, if that's not possible, by all means, go with her. Before classes started, my son and I did a dry run of where his classes were, caf, library, etc., so he would feel more comfortable. He's not great with directions. Also, I would encourage your daughter to take advantage of the math and writing labs. CC's are extremely good at helping students in these areas. Even though my son is a good writer, he discovered that the tutors at the writing lab helped him tremendously and it's FREE! Lastly, my son just finished 3 semesters at cc and is now moving onto a 4-yr college with possible admittance to the honors college. CC gave him the confidence and time to mature and to focus, not to mention he knocked off lots of gen ed requirements at a very low cost. CC is an excellent stepping stone, and it's not just for kids who are not academically ready. Good luck! Yolanda

And this has absolutely nothing to do with your question, but everything he said about math made absolute sense to my very non-math brain. If his program is as good as his presentations your kids will be well-served! Especially liked his explanation of the evolution of high school math over the last 50-60 years. I learned a lot. Yolanda

:iagree:Although we stuck it out a lot longer. Should have ditched it sooner. Also - unlike more professionally produced programs, it was never clear what to watch on the DVD for each section. Kinda' expensive, too, if I recall. Nice guy, very responsive. Yolanda

:iagree:There's a world of difference between a 10th grader and a college student so far as reasoning and synthesizing abilities. Someone who is not used to dealing with kids in the midst of puberty (and 10th graders still are in that zone), really can not fairly gauge what they are capable of. There's so much maturation that occurs during the late teens and early 20s. I'd worry more about proper citation in a research paper, at this point, than cross-curricular thinking skills. Yolanda

We dissect, we research, we worry and, at the end of the day, we will continue to disagree. Look, if you've got a gifted kid in math, it's all you can do to keep him challenged. The son of a friend of mine is such a kid and ended up using his cousin's college calc 3 text in 8th or 9th grade (not the cc calc, but university calc). It was all his parents could do to keep him challenged in math. In fact, the other gifted math kids I've known didn't use just math texts. They used much more interesting material than that to feed their voracious math appetites. So let's leave those kind of kids out of the equation (:D couldn't resist). If you've got a kid who's merely "very good" at math, then using MUS won't ruin him. He'll finish faster, and move on to meatier stuff at the local cc and be just fine. My son was. Is it perfect? Nope. But my homeschool energy is not going to be depleted trying to find a different math program when I have one that works. Instead, I'd rather use that energy to craft a homeschool program that is uniquely suited to my kids' gifts and talents. I'd rather use that energy also to research real-life opportunities for my kids to explore interests with the freedom homeschooling provides. I don't mean to offend all you "mathy" people out there, but not all of us have kids who need the quintessential, certified "rigorous" math program. I'm going to go hide now, 'cause I'm sure all the math people are going to tell me how much I don't understand about math. Yolanda :seeya:

Steve Demme once made the comment: Why do people equate "hard to understand" with "hard"? If someone does a poor job of explaining a concept, hence, "hard to understand", does this make it rigorous? Maybe sometimes, something is "easy" 'cause the person doing the explaining has done an outstanding job. Hmmm?:glare:

Can't remember where this site was suggested, but it's an excellent comparison of the ACT and SAT. http://www.appelrouthtutoring.com/blog/2008/08/26/sat-vs-act/#more-36

I just posted some information about SAT prep on the thread called SAT Math I. Yolanda

There was a very lively discussion of SAT Math prep on a couple yahoo groups I belong to, and I've done lots (and I mean LOTS) of research in this area as my 16yos needs some math prep. There are so many different products and methods out there to help with SAT prep that I can't even begin to mention them. I'll simply mention two that I came across that many people have used: Chalkdust SAT Math Review http://www.chalkdust.com/satrevrev.html College Prep Genius http://www.collegeprepgenius.com/ We've decided to use the following rather than either of these two. Unlike the first two, this product is not marketed at all to homeschoolers which is why you won't see any postings about it anywhere. Video Aided Instruction SAT Prep http://www.videoaidedinstruction.com/college.html They have 3 dvd's, one for each section of the SAT. You can buy them separately or as a bundle. We found them through our library. As, I said I spent lots of time researching SAT prep and I learned there are many, many ways to prepare for the test and that's the key: preparation. Yolanda