My ds is loving school. His Engineering Honors Dorm and the kids in it, are a perfect match for my geeky, techie son. He flew to PennApps and won the best Pebble app award and got a free Pebble watch, which he gave to my dh. Surprisingly, his favorite class is his Astronomy class but he's enjoying the give and take of ideas in all the classes. I was a little nervous about the size of CU Boulder but it's been interesting to see how well the Residential Academic Collge works at making a smaller, more intimate school within a school. Thus far, it seems like it was a perfect fit and that he was ready for this next stage. Whew!

Honestly, I had a pretty good idea in April but had no hard and fast numbers until Aug 11th or 12th and my ds started school Aug 24th. They gave extra scholarships in June, had a computer glitch that took a huge one away at the beginning of Aug and got it all fixed and in a billable form on Aug 11th. It was stressful.

I think most of our kids face this. A professor from Berkely who works with my son on Computer Science stuff told me, " Huh, you Christian Homeschoolers seem to be actually smart. I never thought that was possible." I didn't know whether to laugh or say thank you.

My ds is starting his first day of college classes today, moved in on Wednesday and he turned 17 in May. I think he will be just fine but I wouldn't want to do it with every child. I think my oldest will do great but I don't think my twins could handle it at that early age. I think you really have to think it through. We always told our oldest that we reserved the right to call a gap year if we didn't feel he was ready. He chose to go to school close and got into a really great engineering honors residential college at CU so we felt comfortable with his choices.

Sorry, I didn't think this through. I completely agree with OneStepAtaTime. No curriculum is going to work well without working on his diligence and perseverance. In my kids freshman year, I check that everything is done everyday. If it is not, then nothing else is done until school work is done. I also tell my kids that assignments that are turned in late get a letter grade lower per late day. We do work a lot on how to schedule, how to stay on task, and time management. Working on it early made my oldest son's very busy, crazy senior year do able.

You could look at My Father's World or Sonlight. MFW would be the closest to HOD and its high school is designed to be mostly independent. If you have a reader, Sonlight is also a good choice.

Dropped our oldest off at his dorm today. It is only 15 min away but feels like 500. I am not sure who is struggling more, me or my dd. On the plus side, his roommate is a Junior in his major and the roommate was homeschooled. It was funny to watch them discuss math curriculum.

I designated Honors for courses that were to prep for AP tests but didn't have College Board approval. My ds then took the AP tests which showed that they were that level. I found that my ds' test scores were far more important and that the transcript merely backed up the scores instead of the other way around.

I would seriously look at the local CC that might move into an University. Even if she did really well on ACT/SAT and you managed to hobble a transcript together, would she honestly be prepared for that degree program? Would it be better for her actual education to take basics at a CC to train and educate her properly without her diving into the deep end of the University?

I had to have surgery after 10 months of chiropractic care, physical therapy and natural care. The surgery was necessary and with unbearable pain and a 4 year old and twin 1 year olds it was expedient. Now I manage degenerative disc disease with Pilates and arnica.

Several times in my teens and young adult years and then with each child.

Thanks, Nan. I am struggling with the thought that I need to drop him off, help him get set up and get out without dissolving. I will keep your note in mind and give extra grace to the families around me.

At the orientation weekend, they told us to call our kids on Thursday or Friday. They have statics that kids who talk to their parents on Thursday or Friday make better decisions regarding drug and alcohol usage in the weekend. One also mentioned to have killed ds call you while they are doing laundry, they are stuck in the laundry room so they might as well talk to their Mom.

My ds had friends who were in more traditional schools ( both public and private) who were taking similar loads (IB and AP programs) to my ds. As he was homeschooled, he had more time to both pursue his passions and have down time and rest. His friends were sick almost all the time and were horribly stressed. They all landed at the same school in the Engineering dept but my ds had more scholarships because his passions made him interesting. I strongly recommend the book, "How to be a High School Superstar". It helped us give our ds time to follow his passion ( comp sci) while maintaining a high academic standard and without stressing him to the point of sickness.

Just a cautionary note, none of my ds' CLEPs and only one of his AP's was accepted into my ds' Engineering program. The schools he applied to basically said, "Good for you, but we want you to go through our program". Check the colleges AND programs your student is interested in before spending a ton of time or money on CLEPs or dual enrollments. Edited to add - his APs got him more scholarships but the CLEPs were not helpful for that.

As soon as I saw Streams, I was less than thrilled.

Thanks for letting me know, SWB, so sorry you were being strong armed. My kids and I are using it as a read aloud and enjoying it.

I forgot about Deerskin, yes, it definitely had more adult themes. Dragonhaven had some language and I remember not liking it and not allowing my kids to read it. In general though, the other books I have let my kids read and they enjoyed them. I have also found that the Sonlight Summer Readers have been a huge hit at our house. Both the boys and girls sets.

I am assuming that SWB just changed the title to, "The Story of Western Science" but wanted to make sure that there weren't other changes. I bought it early so I have, "The Story of Science". Anyone know?

Almost anything by Robin McKinley except Dragonhaven and Sunshine. My dad loves McKinley but those are the two that I won't allow her to read yet, they are far more Adult themed.

Possibly something about how boxed curriculums (Sonlight, MFW, HOD etc) can be made or tweaked to fit a WTM or Classical mold. How to balance a Classical High School education with a STEM oriented student. I know I personally struggle with getting my Engineering minded ds to write enough words for an essay. He writes well and has been published but it is really hard to get him to use enough words. He ruthlessly edits to his own detriment.

Earlier is definitely better. My ds had most of his done by November. We scheduled time every Wednesday to go over essays and applications. I had to schedule time for me to write letters, transcripts as well as fill out scholarship applications. Many schools have rolling admissions and rolling scholarships so earlier was definitely better. The fall was definitely stressful but it was completely worth it.

I have a graduated son and boy/girl 14 year old twins. I think having mine home as helped tremendously. However, in the younger years we worked long and hard on obedience and respect between the siblings and parents. As they got older they got a lot more freedom and we stepped back. Thus far, the teen years have been fairly painless. We talk a lot and if we have a problem we take purposeful steps to talk the conflicts through to a resolution. Our teen girl (who takes after me) is strong willed and always has been but is also pretty logical so I often ask her to take her thoughts and actions through to their logical conclusion and she then generally changes her behavior. Her brothers are also helpful in helping her not to be too emotional. I agree that the middle school years were tougher. Puberty is rough all around but based on what I see when middle schoolers get together, I would much rather they be home. I gave a lot of grace in those middle school years and as SWB recommends, we used the, "need a nap, need a sandwich, need some exercise or need a shower?" when things would get a little tense. Homeschooling allowed us that freedom.

After much research, we ended up with a Pottery Barn Teen locking trunk. It's really sturdy, nice looking and was in a similar price range to those at Container Store.

Looking at it pretty seriously. I really like that he says the new Chemistry course will have more experiments and experiments at a higher level. My twins really love Science so I think this could be just what they need.